DISCOURSE BY REV. S. B. DOD. 141 



whom he honored and loved ; to her students he delighted to impart 

 the fruits of his study, and kindle in them some of the earnest 

 enthusiasm which marked his pursuit of knowledge. And, when 

 a call which he regarded as imperative, carried him away from here, 

 he retained his place still among her professors, and often revisited 

 Princeton; and those who knew him well, remember his constant 

 expression of regret and of longing for this peaceful academic life, 

 with its opportunity for research. 



As we look at the appliances of a physical laboratory in these 

 days, and remember the meagre apparatus of forty years ago, we 

 wonder at the genius and patience of this great discoverer, who 

 with limited means, devised and in great measure constructed the 

 apparatus with which many of his wonderful discoveries were 

 made. 



I presume that you are familiar with the few incidents of his life. 

 With no advantages in the way of early education, with limited 

 means, with no patronage of friends to aid him, by his own labor 

 he earned his livelihood, by his own efforts he obtained recognition 

 and position. First called at his graduation, to the chair of Mathe- 

 matics in the Albany Academy, from there he was called, in 1832, 

 to the professorship in Princeton, and from there, in 1846, to the 

 Smithsonian Institution at Washington. 



This is not the time nor the place to enter into a detailed account 

 of those discoveries, begun in Albany and carried on here, which 

 have given him not only a national, but a world-wide fame. I 

 shall only attempt to point out some of those characteristics which 

 distinguished Professor HENRY as a philosopher and as a man. 



As a student of science he was ardent and enthusiastic in his 

 love for the chosen pursuit of his life. He did not dally with it as 

 a pastime, nor prosecute it with the greed of gain, nor pursue it 

 with the ambition of making himself famous among men. He 

 desired knowledge, and searched out wisdom in the love of it. One 

 of his students says, speaking of his construction of his second and 

 largest magnet: " We shall always remember the intense eagerness 

 with which he superintended and watched his preparations, and how 

 he fairly leaped from the floor in excitement when he saw his 

 instrument suspending and holding a weight of more than a ton 



