Biography of Berzelius. 191 



of his science in such a degree as to remain in after ages a 

 brilliant type of his class. 



Such was Berzelius. It is seldom that all these qualities 

 are found united in one man in so high a degree of perfection 

 as they were in him. In this respect, and in chemical science 

 at least, he has been exceeded by none. 



Since the death of Berzelius several biographies of him 

 have appeared, especially in Sweden. All tell how, in his 

 childhood and youth, he had to struggle with care and 

 poverty, — how he gradually overcame all obstacles, — 'how, 

 in spite of his unpropitious external circumstances, he opened 

 a way for himself, and entered upon the career for which he 

 was destined. 



In an academic eulogium, however, it is before all things 

 appropriate to point out the scientific merits of the de- 

 ceased member, to shew how much science has been ex- 

 tended by him, and how great is the loss it has suffered in 

 his death. 



It was exactly at the commencement of this century that 

 Berzelius first appeared as an independent investigator. 

 Volta had just constructed the electrical pile which bears his 

 name, and its astonishing effects occupied in a high degree 

 the attention of the men of science of the time. The unex- 

 pected chemical phenomena produced by the pile excited the 

 interest of chemists fully as much as that of physicists, 

 and induced them to multiply experiments with this re- 

 markable apparatus. The first investigation made public by 

 Berzelius was upon the effects of the electrical pile upon 

 saline solutions. In the year 1803, there appeared in Gehlen's 

 Neuem. Allg. Journal der Chemie an important paper on this 

 subject, the joint production of Berzelius and Hisinger. How- 

 ever manifold and remarkable were the results which had 

 hitherto been obtained with the Voltaic pile with regard to 

 chemical decomposition, still no one had succeeded in dis- 

 covering the laws of these phenomena. Berzelius was the first 

 to find the thread which could lead with certainty through this 

 labyrinth of complicated phenomena. He shewed that sub- 

 stances which are liberated at the one pole, have in other 

 respects a certain analogy, that all combustible bodies, alka- 



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