into the hands of the infidel."'


Chapter 4.

Points of Character.

A point highly illustrative of the character of Faraday now comes into
view. He gave an account of his discovery of Magneto-electricity
in a letter to his friend M. Hachette, of Paris, who communicated
the letter to the Academy of Sciences. The letter was translated
and published; and immediately afterwards two distinguished Italian
philosophers took up the subject, made numerous experiments, and
published their results before the complete memoirs of Faraday had
met the public eye. This evidently irritated him. He reprinted the
paper of the learned Italians in the 'Philosophical Magazine,'
accompanied by sharp critical notes from himself. He also wrote a
letter dated Dec. 1, 1832, to Gay Lussac, who was then one of the
editors of the 'Annales de Chimie,' in which he analysed the results
of the Italian philosophers, pointing out their errors, and defending
himself from what he regarded as imputations on his character.
The style of this letter is unexceptionable, for Faraday could not
write otherwise than as a gentleman; but the letter shows that had he
willed it he could have hit hard. We have heard much of Faraday's
gentleness and sweetness and tenderness. It is all true, but it is
very incomplete. You cannot resolve a powerful nature into these
elements, and Faraday's character would have been less admirable
than it was had it not embraced forces and tendencies to which the
silky adjectives 'gentle' and 'tender' would by no means apply.
Underneath his sweetness and gentleness was the heat of a volcano.