440 D'ALEMBERT. 



the degrading practice of authors dedicating their works, 

 both of fancy and of science, to the great, in addresses 

 which savoured rather of prostrate submission before a 

 superior being, than of gratitude for human patronage. 

 He had long before accommodated his own practice to 

 the course which his principles, as expounded in this 

 Essay, would sanction ; his first work (the ' Dynamique') 

 having been inscribed to M. de Maurepas, Minister of 

 Marine, in a respectful but dignified address, only stating 

 that a scientific work was naturally enough dedicated to 

 a statesman who protected the sciences.'"" 



The annoyance and frequent irritation which the 

 deviations from his proper pursuits occasioned him, 

 made him always most willing to resume his more calm 

 and congenial occupation. His researches on various 

 important questions of physical astronomy, and his com- 

 pletion of the solution which he had a few years before 

 given, as we have seen, of the great problem of disturbing 

 forces, were published during the stormy years of his 

 life. But it is truly painful to think that the soreness 

 which he experienced from unjust attacks was supposed 

 on more than one occasion to extend its influence into 

 the serene regions of abstract science, and that the geo- 

 metrician and the controversialist were sometimes per- 

 ceived to be the same individual. The absurd attempt 



* His dedication to M. D'Argenson of his ' Essai sur la Resistance 

 des Fluides,' did not by any means conform to his principles. After 

 praising many other qualities, he ascribes, perhaps with some show of 

 justice, to that virtuous Minister, " Modestie, candeur, amour du bien 

 public, et toutes les vertus que notre siecle se contente d'estimer." 

 Did he mean to conceal under the latter branch of this sentence 

 only the meaning that M. D'Argenson gives an example of loving 

 the virtues which others only admired? 



