

U^V**J^^ 



BENJAMIN THOMPSON, COUNT 

 RUMFORD 



PHYSICIST : ;::-,;=; 



1753-1814 ;Q ; ; ;;' ; '. , 



BY EDWIN E. SLOSSON 



THE life of a scholar is apt to be a quiet one, externally devoid 

 of dramatic incidents and sudden changes of fortune, but there is 

 material enough to satisfy a writer of historical romances in the 

 life of the poor New England boy who became, in England, cav- 

 alry colonel, Under Secretary of State and Sir Benjamin Thomp- 

 son; in Bavaria, Count Rumford of the Holy Roman Empire, 

 Privy Councilor, Minister of War, Chief of Police and Chamber- 

 lain to the Elector Palatine; in Paris, husband of &femme savante 

 of a French Salon; and who died alone and friendless in the city 

 where he had been honored by Napoleon while living, and was 

 eulogized by Cuvier when dead. The name of the New England 

 town which persecuted him as a traitor he made known and hon- 

 ored throughout the world; he left his fortune to the country he 

 fought. England owes to him the Royal Institution, as we owe 

 our similar Smithsonian Institution to an ij!nglishman. In Mu- 

 nich he had a monument erected in his honor while yet alive 

 for his philanthropic work, and was lampooned by the press of 

 London for doing the same work there. As an intellectual free 

 lance he did service in as many different realms of science as he 

 did military service in different countries. He laid the first foun- 

 dation of the greatest generalization the human mind has yet con- 

 ceived, thej^w "f thp rn ngArva ti r m ftf (MPT and ne explained 

 the construction of coffee-pots. He was in action and thought a 

 paradoxical philosopher. 



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