CHAPTER XV 



FOTHERGILL'S OTHER SCIENTIFIC INTERESTS 



Whoever seeketh knowledge and findeth it, will get two rewards : 

 one of them the reward for desiring it, and the other for attaining it ; 

 therefore even if he do not attain it, for him is one reward. MOHAMMED. 



La science impose la foi dans 1'unite de la raison. ROMAIN HOLLAND. 



IT was customary in the Royal Society in Fothergill's 

 time to commit books or reports that were newly pub- 

 lished to young and able men who had some leisure, for 

 the purpose of drawing up an abstract or criticism, to be 

 read at one of the meetings. These abstracts were short 

 and concise, as were all the papers then published by the 

 society. In this way Fothergill in his younger life con- 

 tributed several papers, very probably at the instance 

 of his friend Collinson. Some of these on medical topics 

 have already been noticed. 



An essay on the Origin of Amber was one of his first papers. 

 It was based on the researches of Wigand and others, and was 

 read in abstract before the Society in 1744. Amber or 

 electron, from which electricity takes its name, had always 

 been looked on as a mysterious substance, and science had 

 hardly yet shown a truer origin for it than the ancient fable 

 that it consisted of the tears of the sisters of Phaethon. Fother- 

 gill discusses three hypotheses : that it is a marine production ; 

 or a bituminous body as Sendelius thought ; or a vegetable 

 resin, derived from some kind of fir or pine, and changed in the 

 course of ages by the action of an acid. He argues cogently 

 for the last of these theories, and further knowledge since his 

 time has confirmed the justice of this view. He thinks it 

 may be possible to make an imitation by chemical means : 

 this also has been a true anticipation. He has no belief in 



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