FIRST EXPERIMENTAL RESEARCHES. 185 



The first experimental researches of Fresnel do not 

 date earlier than the beginning of 1815 ; but setting out 

 from this epoch, memoirs succeeded to memoirs, discov- 

 eries to discoveries, with a rapidity of which the history 

 of science offers few examples. On the 28th of December, 

 1814, Fresnel wrote from Nyons, " I do not know what 

 is meant by the polarization of light ; beg my uncle, M. 

 A. Merimee, to send me the best works from which I 

 may obtain information on this subject." Eight months 

 had scarcely elapsed, when highly skilful researches 

 placed him among the most celebrated physicists of our 

 era. In 1819 he carried off the prize proposed by the 

 Academy on the difficult question of diffraction. In 

 1823 he became a member of that body by an una- 

 nimity of suffrages, a kind of success extremely rare, 

 since it implies not only merit of the highest order, but 

 also, on the part of all the competitors, a frank and ex- 

 plicit avowal of inferiority. In 1825 the Royal Society 

 of London admitted him a foreign associate ; and, lastly, 

 two years later, the same body adjudged to him the 

 Rumford Medal. This homage from one of the most 

 illustrious scientific bodies in Europe, this judgment, 

 pronounced among a rival people, by the countrymen of 

 Newton, in favour of an experimenter who attached little 

 value to his discoveries, except as subverting a system of 

 which that great genius was the defender, appears to 

 me to possess all the characters of a decree which pos- 

 terity will confirm. I hope, then, it will be permitted 

 me to appeal to this decree, if in spite of all my desire 



Professor Stokes. (See Philos. Mag. 1845-6.) We merely allude 

 to these points in order to show how interesting it would have been 

 to have become acquainted with the view taken of such a subject by 

 a mind so eminently anticipative as that of Fresnel. Translator. 



