418 JOSEPH 



of the propagation of heat the subject of the great mathe- 

 matical prize which was to be awarded in the beginning 

 of the year 1812.* Fourier did, in effect, compete, and 

 his memoir was crowned. But, alas ! as Fontenelle said : 

 " In the country even of demonstrations, there are to be 

 found causes of dissension." Some restrictions mingled 

 with the favourable judgment. The illustrious commis- 

 sioners of the prize, Laplace, Lagrange, and Legendre, 

 while acknowledging the novelty and importance of the 

 subject, while declaring that the real differential equa- 

 tions of the propagation of heat were finally found, as- 

 serted that they perceived difficulties in the way in which 

 the author arrived at them. They added, that his pro- 

 cesses of integration left something to be desired, even 

 on the score of rigour. They did not, however, support 

 their opinion by any arguments. 



Fourier never admitted the validity of this decision. 

 Even at the close of his life he gave unmistakable evi- 

 dence that he thought it unjust, by causing his memoir 

 to be printed in our volumes without changing a single 

 word. Still, the doubts expressed by the Commissioners 

 of the Academy reverted incessantly to his recollection. 

 From the very beginning they had poisoned the pleasure 

 of his triumph. These first impressions, added to a high 

 susceptibility, explain how Fourier ended by regarding 

 with a certain degree of displeasure the efforts of those 

 geometers who endeavoured to improve his theory. 

 This, Gentlemen, was a very strange aberration of a 

 mind of so elevated an order! Our colleague had al- 

 most forgotten that it is not allotted to any person to 

 conduct a scientific question to a definitive termination, 

 and that the important labours of D'Alembert, Clairaut, 

 Euler, Lagrange, and Laplace, while immortalizing their 



