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out of which he could have made much; but he had not time for it, and all was lost to the world. Will such governments as that of England ever become sufficiently enlightened to withdraw some portion of the immense amount now spent in prizes for bloodshed, and appropriate it to the support of those who, in a day of higher civilization, will be at once the glory and the shame of their country? a country which knows its true interest and honor no better than to lavish dukedoms and princely fortunes on Marlborough and Wellington, while these men, in every respect of mind and character immeasurably above mere soldiers, are thought highly blessed to receive from it enough to keep body and soul together in the dreary winter of their days.

Nothing can be more attractive than the account which Lord Brougham gives of Smith's disposition; his benevolence was often carried beyond his means, and always delicate in its regard to the feelings of others. His principles of integrity were firm and high. The thoughtfulness of study, the demands of ill health, had no tendency to make him selfish, and the approaches of age did not chill the warmth of his affections. His mother lived with him till her death, in 1784; and after her death, his cousin, Miss Douglas, took charge of his family for the four succeeding years. Her decease, in 1788, deprived him of most of the comforts of his hospitable home; but he lingered on with broken health and spirits, though with an equal mind, till 1790, when a painful disorder brought him down to the grave. A few days before he died, several distinguished friends who were accustomed to sup with him on Sunday were with him; when, finding himself unable to go with them to the table, he said, "I believe we must adjourn this meeting to some other place"; after which they never met again. His complaints were of the kind which are brought on by over-exertion of the brain and the inactivity of a literary life. At one time he believed he had found a panacea for his diseases in tar-water, which was recommended by so great an authority as Berkeley, and was hailed with as much enthusiasm as sundry other nostrums, each of which works miracles for the time, though unfortunately its wonders and glories are too good to last. The history of all such inventions and discoveries is written in two passages of his letters. In one he says, - "Tar-water is a remedy in vogue here for almost all diseases; it has perfectly cured me of an

inveterate scurvy and shaking in the head." But not long after this happy restoration, he says, that he has had those complaints as long as he remembers any thing, and "the tar-water has not removed them."

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The letter of Adam Smith in which he describes the closing life of Hume has been the subject of much remark, not very complimentary in its tone; for in former days, many, who manifested no other interest in Christianity, were furious against unbelievers, and nothing could be more unscrupulous than the manner in which they abused those sinners, by way of giving them a taste of the religion of love. Few men have ever received so much of this friendly attention as Hume; his crime seemed to be, that he was not so wicked as, in their opinion, an infidel ought to be. Of this offence he was certainly guilty; and so odious did it make him, that it required some courage in the good-natured Boswell, even under Johnson's broadside, to tell him that "he was better than his books," a eulogy which, proceeding from such a quarter, might, one would think, have turned his brain for ever. Now, though religionists at the time had no patience with his serenity and cheerfulness, still, if he possessed that equanimity in his closing hour, there was no good reason why his friend should not mention it even in words of praise. It is true, he had no right understanding of the religious relations in which he stood; but this should be dealt with as a misfortune, rather than as one of the seven deadly sins. Those who press their censures beyond the bounds of justice always throw the general sympathy on the opposite side. What Dr. Smith's religious opinions were, it is not easy to say; there are none of his writings in which he has disclosed them. Lord Brougham thinks that there are allusions enough to a Divine Providence and the hopes of a future state to remove all doubts on the subject; but if he was alienated from Christianity, and we have some fears that he was, it was probably owing in part to the abuse which Christians, so called, had heaped without measure on his friend.

The approach of Lavoisier, who comes next in order or disorder, whichever it may be, excites Lord Brougham to a strain of condemnation for which he took the pitch in his former volume; not that the French chemist was not great, and in many respects good; but on account of his propensity

to appropriate the discoveries of others, as if every thing which came to light in the domain of his favorite science must necessarily be his own. He was born in a condition of life which makes his devotion to science very creditable to him; being the son of a farmer-general, a kind of official who enjoyed great opportunities for gathering riches, and was usually not backward to improve them. The son had a certainty of succeeding to the fortune and post of his father, when that worthy should go to answer for the use of his wealth and the manner in which he had made it. Of course he enjoyed the best means of education which France afforded; studying astronomy with La Caille, botany with Jussieu, and chemistry with Rouelle. He gained several prizes for his success in classical pursuits; but his mind was bent in another direction. When he was twenty-one years of age, a prize was offered by M. de Sartine, the well known chief of police in Paris, for information as to the most efficient, readiest, and cheapest means of lighting a city. The prize was divided among three other claimants, but Lavoisier's paper was so highly appreciated that it was printed and honorably mentioned, and a gold medal was publicly presented to him by order of the king. At first he seemed inclined to devote himself to geology, and had collected materials for a work on the revolutions of the globe; but recent discoveries in chemistry arrested his attention, and he first presented himself as a candidate for its honors, in an analysis of Gypsum. In this, together with much that was original and valuable, he is said to have taken credit, in substance, for what had been ascertained by others before him, thus giving an early indication of that unscrupulousness for which his Lordship pours a vial of wrath upon his head. The times afforded strong temptation to such a taste, and easy means of indulging it. The scientific world were dazzled by the successes of Black, Cavendish, and Priestley. Lavoisier filled his house with the best instruments, and kept it open to all who were interested in those studies. Having men of science always about him, with whom he discussed all subjects to which his attention was directed, it was natural that he should take advantage of their suggestions, and that, when travelling over the same path of experiment in which others had gone before, he should not always remember the extent of his obligations. Besides, it should be remembered that the same discovery or invention VOL. LXIV. NO. 134.

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is sometimes made at the same time, by those who could have had no possible communication with each other. But after every explanation that can be made, we fear there is no denying the charge, that he was quite willing to "gather where he had not strewed"; a strange and suicidal propensity, unaccountable in one whose own merits were so distinguished, and which, after a moment's poor gratification of vanity, must - evidently lead to a most unenviable fame.

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Such was his activity of mind, that he was constantly turning aside from his chosen path of science, to engage in what is now the province of the civil engineer. After writing on the best means of supplying Paris with water, he entered into an examination of Stahl's theory, which was, that the union of phlogiston with the bases of the metals was the cause of their ductility and lustre, and that the evolution of that substance was the cause of their becoming earths or calces. From various experiments, he came to the conclusion, that the union of air with the metal was the cause of calcination, valuable discovery, and fatal, of course, to Stahl's theory, though it did not proceed so far as to ascertain what gas was thus absorbed, which ought to have led him to a knowledge of the composition of atmospheric air. This and the discovery of oxygen, two years after, laid the foundation of Priestley's fame. But Lavoisier did claim to have been acquainted with oxygen; if so, he kept it to himself in a manner not common in the scientific world; for Priestley's discovery must have been known to him in 1774, and in the many papers which he published between 1772 and 1780, no allusion is made to any similar claim of his own. But in 1782, somewhat late in the day, it suddenly dawned upon his memory that he had made the same discovery about the same time with Priestley; not stating that the way in which he discovered it was by communication from Priestley himself, who was very indifferent as to this kind of credit, and, contenting himself with his successes, did not care who appropriated the fame.

The discovery of the composition of water afforded another temptation to Lavoisier to claim a share of the renown which belonged to others. Mr. Watt had arrived at the suggestion that water was not a simple element; Mr. Cavendish had performed those experiments by which the fact was clearly established. In 1783, Sir Charles Blagden visited Paris,

and, as he himself declares, gave an account of Cavendish's experiments to a company where Lavoisier was present, and evidently very much to the surprise of the French chemist, who could not be convinced, except by a trial, that two gases could be converted into water. But afterwards it seems that he had forgotten his surprise on that occasion, and believed himself to have been all the while familiar with the great fact which was so new to all the rest of the world. So, too, in his papers on the subject of the gases and the nature of heat, Lavoisier contrives to avoid all mention of Black, the unquestionable discoverer of latent heat, who had lectured on the subject for years; and he leaves on the minds of readers who did not know better the impression that all these triumphs of science were his own. At the same time that he was carefully suppressing all mention of Dr. Black's name, he wrote some flattering letters to the great Scotch chemist, in which he professed great admiration for his talents, and a desire to be an humble disciple of such a master. Dr. Black was surprised at this course of conduct, and treated the verbal homage that was thus paid him with very little regard; but in his lectures, as Lord Brougham, who was one of his audience, testifies, he spoke with the greatest respect of the scientific character of Lavoisier, and of his powers of generalization with particular admiration, cheerfully admitting him to a share in the great discovery of the composition of water, and never intimating a complaint of the injurious course of conduct toward him which there was no denying that Lavoisier had pursued.

It is a relief to turn from these defacing stains on so great a name to other passages of his history, which can be remembered with entire satisfaction. Besides his geological attempts already mentioned, which have lost all their interest in the wonderful disclosures afterwards made in that branch of science, he took some part, as has been usual in France, in public affairs; not, however, as a politician, but simply to aid the government in any department where his service was required. At the instance of Turgot, he made great improvements in the manufacture of gunpowder, which, to be sure, is but a doubtful blessing to the human race; in order to amend the system of taxation, he made a most valuable report on the wealth and productions of the country; being appointed a commissioner of the treasury, he introduced

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