AMERICA'S INFERIOR POSITION 



experimental genius since Faraday; the list of his 

 discoveries, the range of his work, the fertility of 

 his resources have been amazing; and it is the 

 boast of his countrymen that he never took out a 

 patent. One of his eulogists said that his work 

 had been done for mankind. He has long been a 

 senator of France; he was for a time Minister of 

 Foreign Affairs ; yet it is told of him that visitors in 

 winter are invited to his bedroom when they call, 

 the single fire meaning a slight economy of coals! 

 It is a little difficult to assimilate such a character 

 to American ideas of success, yet even our Midases 

 may feel dimly the greatness of such simplicity as 

 that. 



The life of M. Berthelot recalls that of Pasteur, 

 or again that of the great physiologist, Claude Ber- 

 nard. They, like Faraday, might each have had 

 millions; they declined prizes that it needed but a 

 lifted hand to grasp. They labored for the race, 

 and perhaps some day we shall come to honor them 

 as much as we now honor a slayer of men or a mill- 

 ionaire. The work of Berthelot, like that of Ber- 

 nard, has been done chiefly at the College de France ; 

 that of Faraday was done at the Royal Institution 

 oC London. Every one knows of the Pasteur Insti- 

 tute, though not many know how widely its activi- 

 ty has been extended and the multitude of novel 

 things done there in recent years. 



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