224 



NA TURE 



[July 7, 1887 



costly character. Bence Jones came to me, and after 

 some hesitation — for he knew that money was likely to 

 raise a difficulty between us — he said, with earnestness : 

 " Dear Tyndall, behave as my friend ; do me the favour 

 and the honour of devoting this to your investigation. 

 There is more, if you need it, where that came from." He 

 handed me a cheque for ^100. Had I asked for 

 ^1000, he would have given it to me, and the world, 

 as far as he was concerned, would have been none the 

 wiser. Bence Jones was a strong man, and liked to have 

 his own way. At first, as was natural, we sometimes 

 surged against each other ; but these little oppositions 

 were rapidly adjusted, and for many years before his 

 death the tie of brother to brother was not truer or 

 tenderer than that which united myself and Bence Jones. 

 On my return from the United States I found him dying. 

 In fact, the knowledge of his condition caused me to 

 take leave, earlier than I otherwise should have done, of a 

 people that I had learnt to trust and love. Soon after 

 my return I saw him lowered into the grave. 



The death of Bence Jones, whose steadfast loyalty to the 

 Institution he loved so well, showed itself to the last, was a 

 sore calamity to be met. At that time one man only 

 seemed fitted to supply his place. That man was the beloved 

 and lamented William Spottiswoode. To him I appealed 

 to stand by the Institution at a critical hour of its for- 

 tunes. He had his own mathematical work on hand, and 

 he was too well acquainted with the duties of our 

 honorary secretaryship to accept them lightly. After 

 much reflection, he wrote me a letter regretfully but 

 distinctly declining the office. But he reflected a second 

 time. He knew that his refusal would cause me pain, 

 and his affection for me prevailed. When, therefore, the 

 letter of refusal — for he sent it to me — came, it was 

 accompanied by a second letter, cancelling the refusal and 

 accepting the post. With William Spottiswoode I had 

 the happiness of working in close companionship for six 

 years. The diligence, wisdom, and success with which 

 he discharged his onerous duties — the princely hospitality 

 which shed a glow upon the office while he held it — are 

 well remembered. Of the dignity with which he after- 

 wards filled the high position now occupied by the 

 illustrious man who presides here this evening it is need- 

 less to speak. Him also we have seen lowered to his 

 rest, amid the grief of friends assembled to do honour 

 to his memory. Such were the men who served the Royal 

 Institution in the past ; and their example has been 

 worthily followed by other men of eminence, still happily 

 amongst us. Never was an institution better served than 

 the Royal Institution, and not by its honorary secretaries 

 alone. With singleness of purpose and purity of aim, its suc- 

 cessive Presidents, Boards of Managers, and honorary 

 treasurers have unswervingly promoted the noble work 

 of investigation and discovery. May they never lower 

 the flag which, for well-nigh a century, they have kept 

 victoriously unfurled. 



The year after my appointment I was called upon to 

 deliver, in conjunction with Dr. Whewell, Faraday, Sir 

 James Paget, and some other eminent men, one of a series 

 of lectures on scientific education. I then referred with 

 serious emphasis to the workers in our coal-mines, and to 

 the terrible perils of their occupation. I pointed to the in- 

 tellectual Samsons toiling with closed eyes in the mills and 

 forges of Manchester and Birmingham, and I said : "Give 

 these toilers sight by the teachings of science, and you 

 diminish the causes of calamity, multiply the chances of 

 discovery, and widen the prospect of national advance- 

 ment." Thus early, you will see, I was alive to the import- 

 ance of technical education ; and I am no less alive to it 

 now. You will not, therefore, misunderstand me when I say 

 that to keep technical education from withering, and to 

 preserve the applications of science from decay, the roots 

 of both of them must be well embedded in the soil of 

 original investigation. And here let it be emphatically 



added, that in such investigation practical results may 

 enter as incidents, but must never usurp the place ol 

 aims. The true son of science will pursue his inquiries 

 irrespective of practical considerations. He will evei 

 regard the acquisition and expansion of natural know- 

 ledge — the unravelling of the complex web of nature by 

 the disciplined intellect of man — as his noblest end, and 

 not as a means to any other end. And what has beer 

 the upshot of science thus pursued ? Why, that the 

 investigator has over and over again tapped springs ol 

 practical power which otherwise he would never have 

 reached. Illustrations are here manifold. I might point 

 to the industries which affiliate themselves with Faraday'; 

 discovery of benzol, and with his discovery of the law; 

 of electrolysis. But I need not go further than th( 

 fact that in this our day a noble and powerful professior 

 has been called into existence by his discovery of magneto 

 electricity. The electric lamps which milclly illuminat< 

 our rooms, the foci which flood with light of solai 

 brilliancy our railway-stations and public halls, can all b( 

 traced back to an ancestral spark so small as to b( 

 barely visible. With impatient ardour Faraday refusec 

 to pause in his quest of principles to intensify his spark 

 That work he deliberately left to others, confidently pre' 

 dieting that it would be accomplished. And, prompted 

 by motives both natural and laudable, but which had 

 never the slightest influence on Faraday, others have 

 developed his spark into the splendours which now shim 

 in our midst. 



It would be a handsome Jubilee present, if it were < 

 possible one, to roll up the career of Faraday into portabh 

 form, and to offer it to the Queen as the achievement o 

 one of Her Majesty's most devoted subjects during hei 

 own reign. Faraday's series of great discoveries, however 

 began in 1831, which throws his work five or six years to( 

 far back. During the rest of his fruitful life he was : 

 loyal son of the Victorian epoch. But, passing beyonc 

 the limitations of the individual, what is science, as ; 

 whole, able to offer, on the golden wedding of the Queei 

 with her people ? A present of the principle of gravita 

 tion — a handing over to Her Majesty of the bit an< 

 bridle whereby the compelling intellect of Newtoi 

 brought the solar system under the yoke of physical law 

 — would surely be a handsome offering. I mention thi 

 case of known and conspicuous grandeur, in order to fi: 

 the value of another generahzation which the science 

 her reign can proudly offer to the Queen. Quite fit t 

 take rank with the principle of Gravitation — mor 

 momentous if that be possible — is that law of Conserva 

 tion which combines the energies of the material univers 

 into an organic whole ; that law which enables the eyi 

 of science to follow the flying shuttles of the universa 

 power, as it weaves what the Earth Spirit in " Faust 

 calls "the living garment of God." This, then, is th' 

 largest flower of the garland which the science of the las 

 fifty years is able to offer to the Queen. 



The second generalization is like unto the first i 

 point of importance, though very unlike as regards it 

 reception by the world. For whereas the principle c 

 Conservation, with all its far-reaching, and, from som 

 points of view, tremendous implications, slid quietly int 

 acceptance, its successor evoked the thunder-peals whic 

 it is said always accompany the marriage of thought an 

 fact. For a long time the scent of danger was in the ai 

 But the evil odour has passed away ; the air is fresh( 

 than before ; it fills our lungs and purifies our blood, an 

 science, in its Jubilee offering to the Queen, is able tj 

 add to the law of Conservation the principle of Evolutio 1 

 In connexion with these victories of the scientil 

 intellect, I have mentioned neither persons nor natio 

 alities, holding, as Davy expressed it, when the Copl 

 Medal was awarded to Arago, that " science, like Natu 

 to which it belongs, is neither limited by time nor spa( 

 It belongs to the world, and is of no country and no ag f 



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