Imagens das páginas
PDF
ePub

the eighty-third year of his age. He was better after it, and had his health clearer and memory stronger than I had known them for some years." A year later, the same diarist says: "April 15, 1726. I passed the whole day with Sir Isaac Newton, at his lodgings, Orbell's Buildings, Kensington, which was the last time I saw him." The house was lately in existence, situated in what is called Bullingham Place, retaining, when we visited it, a mansion-like aspect, with a large garden and tall trees. There he died, the 20th of March, 1727, having on the previous day been able to read the newspaper, and to hold a long conversation with Dr. Mead.

His body was laid in state in the Jerusalem Chamber, and then buried in Westminster Abbey.

At the funeral, his relative, Sir Michael Newton, Knight of the Bath, was chief mourner. He was followed by other relatives, and some of the most distinguished personal friends of the departed. The pallbearers, Fellows of the Royal Society, were the Lord High Chancellor, the Duke of Roxburgh, the Duke of Montrose, the Earl of Pembroke, the Earl of Sussex, and the Earl of Macclesfield. The Bishop of Rochester performed the service, assisted by a prebendary and the choir of the Abbey. In the most conspicuous part of that great temple stands his monument, erected in 1731, at the cost of £500, by his relatives. The following is a translation of the Latin inscription :

Here lies

Sir Isaac Newton, Knight,

who, by a vigour of mind almost supernatural,
first demonstrated

the motions and figures of the planets,
the paths of comets, and the tides of the ocean.

HIS PIETY.

He diligently investigated

the different refrangibilities of the rays of light, and the properties of colours to which they give rise. An assiduous, sagacious, and faithful interpreter

233

of nature, antiquity, and the Holy Scriptures, he asserted in his philosophy the majesty of God, and exhibited in his conduct the simplicity of the gospel. Let mortals congratulate themselves

that there has existed such, and so great

AN ORNAMENT OF THE HUMAN RACE.

Born, 25th Dec., 1642; died, 20th March, 1727.

This epitaph combines the two views which we have attempted to bring out in this brief sketch. He was a philosopher and a Christian. The fact may be so exhibited as to do more honour to philosophy than to Christianity; as if he had conferred some credit on the gospel by embracing and maintaining it. The disparity between the Divine and the human is so infinitely great that we should never forget it; and, shrinking from the semblance of any representation which should make Newton appear as a patron of the Gospel, we would describe him as he really was, and as we are sure he would have wished to be represented, a humble disciple of Jesus Christ, in whom he recognised all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, and at whose feet he wished to sit as a little child.

G

GEORGES CUVIER.

1769-1832.

EORGES CHRÉTIEN LEOPOLD DAGOBERT CUVIER WAS born at Montbéliard, a place of manufacturing industry about forty miles from Besançon, now within the French dominions, then a little principality pertaining to the Duke of Wurtemberg. Young Cuvier was remarkable for his intelligence and precocity; and an incident in his boyish days indicated the bent of his genius, and the sphere of knowledge and discovery in which as a man he was destined to excel. He found one day, amongst his father's books, Buffon's work on natural history, and it suggested the idea of copying and colouring the plates, after he had carefully studied the text. The contents formed his chief reading for many years.

The relatives of Cuvier were poor. His father was a pensioned officer in a Swiss regiment in the service of France. His mother was an affectionate, godly, wise woman. To her early lessons in Latin, geography, and drawing, and to her communications of religion, he always acknowledged himself much indebted. He went to the public gymnasium at the age of ten, and remained there for four years, bearing off prizes for

HIS EARLY LIFE.

235

learning and athletics. Through the patronage of a Wurtemberg princess, he was sent to the university of Stuttgart, where he pursued a course of scientific study, particularly in the division relating to natural history. There he acquitted himself with distinction, not only in that special department, but also in the most sacred branch of learning. "The young Cuvier," said his examiners, "has shown just notions of Christianity well adapted to his years," and "considerable skill" in reading the Greek Testament.1

:

Circumstances compelled him in early life to do something towards earning a livelihood, and in 1794 he became tutor in a French Protestant family living in the castle of Fiquainville, near Fécamp. In that little Norman fishing town he found much to gratify his curiosity and he might often be seen scouring the country after birds, butterflies, and other insects; or prying into nooks and corners on the shore, after shellfish and other marine productions; whilst the treasures of the boundless sea inspired wonder, with a longing to explore its depths, and to become acquainted with the forms of life hidden under its waters.

He appears to have continued in the family of Count d'Hericy for nearly seven years. He was introduced to the savans of Paris by his researches, and accepted an invitation to remove thither in 1795. He reached the French metropolis just after the horrors of the Revolution. Papers written by him already on his favourite subject had brought him into notice; and he found congenial employment in the Jardin des Plantes-the home of his after studies, and the sphere of his scien

1 Mrs. Lees' Memoirs of Cuvier, p. 271.

tific exploits. There he worked and lectured, and obtained the office of assistant to the aged professor of comparative anatomy. In the year of his appointment, he made a mark on the study which he rendered so famous, by a Memoir on the Meganolix, a fossil animal known by a few of its bones, and which, contrary to received opinion, he boldly proved to have been a gigantic sloth. This was the first of those able comparisons of the fossil with the present world which revolutionized geology, extended comparative anatomy, and absolutely created the science of paleontology. He was also appointed to a professorship of natural philosophy in the College of France; then he rose, step by step, under the favour and patronage of Napoleon, who made him an inspector-general of schools; secretary to the French Institute; councillor of the new Imperial University; and organizer of reformed colleges in Italy, Holland, and Germany, after the vast extension of the empire. Even at Rome he was thus employed in 1813; and though a Protestant, he there won the good opinion of the authorities. The conquest and banishment of the great ruler of France did not spoil the fortunes of Cuvier; for, after the restoration of Louis XVIII., he was confirmed by that monarch in the office of state councillor, to which he had been appointed by the emperor, and in 1819 he was made a baron of France.

Just before this he visited England, and was received with the highest honours. Another visit followed in 1830. An amusing circumstance occurred on one of these occasions, indicative of his wide-spread fame amidst the lower as well as the upper classes of society.

« AnteriorContinuar »