DISCOURSE OF W. B. TAYLOR. 323 



inductions of experience, would seem to conduct us directly to the 

 atomic hypothesis of Newton. A careful study of the dynamics 

 of the so-called "imponderables" certainly tended to their unifica- 

 tion. Admitting the difficulty of framing an entirely satisfactory 

 theory of the resultant transverse action of electricity, he suggested 

 that a tangential force was not accordant with any inductions from 

 actual experience; and was incapable of direct mechanical realiza- 

 tion. Extending the atomic conception of matter to the setherial 

 medium of space, he concluded by urging "the importance in the 

 adoption of mechanical hypotheses, of conditioning them in strict 

 accordance with the operations of matter under the known laws of 

 force and motion, as exhibited in time and space." * 



Among the various public Addresses delivered by Henry on 

 special occasions, reference may be here made to his excellent expo- 

 sition of the nature of power, and the functions of machinery 

 as its vehicle, — concluding with a sketch of the progress of arty 

 pronounced at the close of the Exhibition of the Metropolitan 

 Mechanics' Institute, in Washington, on the evening of March 19th, 

 1853. After representing to his hearers the close physical analogy 

 between the human body as a moving machine, and the steam loco- 

 motive under an intelligent engineer, he remarked : " In both, the 

 direction of power is under the influence of an immaterial, think- 

 ing, willing principle, called the soul. But this must not be con- 

 founded as it frequently is with the motive power. The soul of a 

 man no more moves his body, than the soul of the engineer moves 

 the locomotive and its attendant train of cars. In both cases the 

 soul is the directing, controlling principle ; not the impelling 

 poAver."t 



Vieics of Education. — Another address deserving of special notice 

 (delivered the following year,) is his introductory discourse before 

 the " Association for the Advancement of Education," as its retiring 

 President. In this, he maintained that inasmuch as "the several 

 faculties of the human mind are not simultaneously developed, in 

 educating an individual we ought to follow the order of nature, and 

 to adapt the instruction to the age and mental stature of the pupil. 



* Proceed. Am. Assoc. Albany, Aug. 1851, pp. 84-91. 



t Closing Address Metr. Mech. Inst. Washington, 1853, p. 19. 



