XI 



2Et. 24 (1816). 



On the 17th of January, 1816, Faraday began a course of seventeen 

 Lectures on Chemistry, at the City Philosophical Society, which extended 

 over two years and a half. He called them " an account of the inherent Pro- 

 perties of Matter, of the forms in which matter exists, and of simple ele- 

 mentary substances. " During the year he gave six or seven lectures on the 

 general properties of matter, on the attraction of cohesion, on chemical affinity, 

 on radiant matter, on oxygen, chlorine, iodine, and fluorine, on hydrogen, 

 and on nitrogen. He wrote his first lectures at full length, whilst of the 

 latter lectures he only made notes, putting the experiments very distinctly 

 apart, and he kept very much to this plan during the rest of his life. 



It was in this year also that Faraday published his first paper, an analysis 

 of native caustic lime, in the Quarterly Journal of Science. In the volume 

 of his * Experimental Researches on Chemistry and Ph} r sics,' he has added a 

 note : — " I reprint this paper at full length ; it was the beginning of my 

 communications to the public, and in its results very important to me. Sir 

 Humphry Davy gave me the analysis to make as a first attempt in chemistry, 

 at a time when my fear was greater than my confidence, and both far greater 

 than my knowledge ; at a time, also, when I had no thought of ever 

 writing an original paper on science. The addition of his own comments, 

 and the publication of the paper, encouraged me to go on making, from 

 time to time, other slight communications, some of which appear in this 

 volume. Their transference from the ' Quarterly ' into other journals in- 

 creased my boldness, and now that forty years have elapsed, and I can 

 look back on what successive communications have led to, I still hope, 

 much as their character has changed, that I have not either now or forty 

 years ago been too bold." 



Early in February he thus wrote to his friend Abbott: — "Be not of- 

 fended that I turn to write you a letter, because I feel a disinclination to 

 do anything else ; but rather accept it as a proof that conversation with 

 you has more power with me than any other relaxation from business, — 

 business I say ; and I believe it is the first time for many years that I have 

 applied it to my own occupations. But at present they actually deserve 

 the name ; and you must not think me in a laughing mood, but in earnest. 

 It is now 9 o'clock p.m., and I have just left the laboratory and the pre- 

 paration for to-morrow's two lectures. Our double course makes me work 

 enough ; and to them add the attendance required by Sir H. in his re- 

 searches, and then if you compare my time with what is to be done in it, 

 you will excuse the slow progress of our correspondence on my side. Un- 

 derstand me, I am not complaining ; the more I have to do the more I 

 learn, but I wish to avoid all impression on your side that I am lazy — 

 suspicions, by-the-by, which a moment's reflection convinces me can never 

 exist." 



In consideration of the additional labour caused to him by Mr. Brande's 



