Lives of the electricians

by William T. Jeans

Next year (1874) he was President of the British Association, and the address which he delivered at the annual meeting, held that year in Belfast, caused some sensation among “the orthodox.” For this he was not unprepared. He admitted that he had touched on debateable questions, and gone over dangerous ground—and this partly with the view of telling the world that as regards religious theories, schemes, and systems which embrace notions of cosmogony, science claims unrestricted right of search. The address was condemned by the unscientific as veiled materialism, and a flood of sermons and pamphlets were published to expose its “heresies.” One writer went so far as to publish “an inquiry of the Home Secretary as to whether Professor Tyndall had not subjected himself to the penalty of persons expressing blasphemous opinions.”

It seemed to be generally forgotten that Professor Tyndall had stated before the British Association in 1868 that the utmost the materialist “can affirm is the association of two classes of phenomena, of whose real bond of union he is in absolute ignorance. The problem of the connection of body and soul is as insoluble in its modern form as it was in the pre-scientific ages. If you ask him whence is this ‘matter,’ who or what divided it into molecules, he has no answer. Science also is mute in reply to these questions. But if the materialist is confounded and science rendered dumb, who else is entitled to answer? To whom has the secret been revealed? Let us lower our heads and acknowledge our ignorance one and all.” In 1874 he desired to set forth equally “the inexorable advance of man’s understanding in the path of knowledge, and the unquenchable claims of his emotional nature, which the understanding can never satisfy. And if, still unsatisfied, the human mind, with the yearning of a pilgrim for his distant home, will turn to the mystery from which it has emerged, seeking so to fashion it as to give unity to thought and faith—so long as this is done, not only without intolerance or bigotry of any kind, but with the enlightened recognition that ultimate fixity of conception is here unattainable, and that each succeeding age must be held free to fashion the mystery in accordance with its own needs—then, in opposition to all the restrictions of Materialism, I would affirm this to be a field for the noblest exercise of what, in contrast with the knowing faculties, may be called the creative faculties of man.”

Next year, in introducing Sir John Hawkshaw as President of the British Association, Professor Tyndall said his successor would steer the Association through calm water, which would be refreshing after the tempestuous weather which “rasher navigators had thought it their duty to encounter rather than to avoid.” Carlyle says we pardon genial weather for its changes, but the steadiest climate of all is that of Greenland.

FOOTNOTES:

[4] For the descriptions of the Falls of Niagara and of the adventure on the Piz Morteratch we are indebted to the kindness of Professor Tyndall, who readily granted permission to quote them from his copyright works.

CHAPTER V.

“There is something in the contemplation of general laws which powerfully persuades us to merge individual feeling, and to commit ourselves unreservedly to their disposal; while the observation of the calm, energetic regularity of nature, the immense scale of her operations, and the certainty with which her ends are attained, tends irresistibly to tranquillise and reassure the mind, and render it less accessible to repining, selfish, and turbulent emotions.”—J. F. W. Herschel.

The Royal Institution, the scene of Professor Tyndall’s labours, is situated in Albemarle Street, London, and was founded in 1800 by Count Rumford. George III., appreciating the importance of “forming a public institution for diffusing knowledge and facilitating the general introduction of useful mechanical inventions and improvements, and for teaching by courses of philosophical lectures and experiments the application of science to the common purposes of life,” granted it a charter of incorporation in the fortieth year of his reign; and in 1810 the objects of the Institution were extended to the prosecution of chemical science and the discovery of new facts in physical science, as well as the diffusion of useful knowledge. Curiously enough, while the Royal Institution of Great Britain was founded by an American, the great Smithsonian Institute in Washington was founded by an Englishman. As in most institutions founded by private enterprise, the first arrangements made in the Royal Institution were on a humble scale. The building selected for a chemical laboratory was originally a blacksmith’s shop with a forge and bellows; and the physical laboratory remained in its original state for nearly seventy years, during which period it was the scene of the great discoveries of Davy, Faraday, and Tyndall, including the laws of electro-chemical decomposition, the decomposition of the fixed alkalies, the investigation of the nature of chlorine, the philosophy of flame, the condensability of many gases, the science of magneto-electricity, the twofold magnetism of matter, comprehending all known substances, the magnetism of gases, the relation of magnetism and light, the physical effects of pressure on diamagnetic action, the absorption and radiation of heat by gases and vapours, the transparency of our atmosphere, and the opacity of its aqueous vapour to radiant heat. A place hallowed by so many scientific achievements Professor Tyndall desired to preserve, notwithstanding that, owing to the progress made in other scientific institutions, its reputation had changed from that of the best to that of the worst in London; but when he saw that a transformation of the scene was inevitable he did what he could to promote it. Accordingly new laboratories were built in 1872. In reference to this event, Mr. Spottiswoode said in 1873, when he was treasurer to the Institution, that “the one act of wisdom, among the many aberrations of an eccentric member of Parliament, saved Faraday to us, and thereby, as seems probable, our Institution to the country. The liberality of a Hebrew toy-dealer[5] in the east of London, has made the rebuilding of our laboratories possible. It is said that Mr. Fuller, the feebleness of whose constitution denied him at all times and places the rest necessary for health, could always find repose and even quiet slumber amid the murmuring lectures of the Royal Institution; and that in gratitude for the peaceful hours thus snatched from an otherwise restless life, he bequeathed to us his magnificent legacy of £10,000.”

On his return from America in 1873, Professor Tyndall presented to the Royal Institution the new philosophical apparatus that he had used in his lectures in the United States, and it was thereupon resolved to present the warmest congratulations of the members of the Royal Institution “to their Professor of Natural Philosophy upon his safe arrival in England from the United States, in which, upon the invitation of the most eminent scientific men of America, he has been recently delivering a series of lectures unexampled for the interest they have created in that country, and the large and distinguished audiences who have been attracted to them. The members rejoice and welcome him on his return to what they are proud to be able to designate as his own scientific home, with satisfaction and delight, and wish him all continued health and prosperity. They also thank him for his liberal gift to the Institution of the splendid and extensive apparatus employed by him in his lectures in America, and congratulate him on the generous spirit and the love of science which has led him to appropriate the profits of his lectures in the United States to the establishment of a fund to assist the scientific studies of young Americans.”

Another evidence of the respect entertained for him was given on the occasion of his marriage, in 1876, to Lady Louisa Charlotte, eldest daughter of Lord and Lady Claude Hamilton. The ceremony was performed by Dean Stanley in Henry the Seventh’s Chapel, Westminster Abbey; and in commemoration of the event a silver salver with 300 guineas was presented to Professor Tyndall by the members of the Royal Institution, the subscriptions being limited to one guinea each.