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of facts confessedly incomplete in the eyes of the most enlightened, was made the great centre round which all chemical knowledge placidly rolled. We may be allowed to boast, that, when this society had existed only a few years, one of its members was found to devise a theory which not only was sufficient to throw light on the past, but at once to put into the infinite observations of his predecessors that reason and order of which before they seemed totally deprived. The hermetic mystic and alchemist had toiled over the difficulties, had tried to remove them by physics and by metaphysics, had explained them by supposing an independent will in the elements or by the immediate Divine interposition; by their wildest imaginings and their clearest reasonings little definite had been attained. The laws which Dalton shewed us to be dominant in matter, considered chemically, were at once clear enough to satisfy the most exact reasoner, great enough to satisfy the most poetical thinker, and simple enough to satisfy those who believe that, at least the great primary laws of nature are simple, whether because the highest wisdom can of course attain its ends with the greatest ease, or because the simplest germ is more easily fitted to branch out into an endless development of character and power.

It is scarcely possible to write the life of Dalton without referring to this Society, and as it is by request of this body that I have undertaken to write, I must explain to them what I have specially attempted to do. After Dr. Henry had written the life of Dalton, it might fairly be asked why I should undertake one. I was requested to write this memoir at a time when it was uncertain when Dr. Henry's would appear. I was unwilling to compete with Dr. Henry, and saw no propriety in doing so, although he offered me his materials on certain fair conditions. I had no intention to write a complete life, nor, I believe, had the society the desire to have a memoir so large as that which I present, and I

considered it better to confine myself to certain aspects of Dalton's life and discoveries, thus preventing any reason for asking why another memoir should have at all appeared. The portion which I have most carefully worked out is the History of the Atomic Theory. Much has been said of it; some have given the credit to Dalton, some have taken it from him;: most writers have confusedly mixed him up with others. Some have looked forward to the probable developments of truth in after times, and undervalued the laws of combination as they now stand, and with them the discoverers. It has been my desire to shew distinctly what of importance each celebrated thinker or worker has said or done in the matter before Dalton, and what he has himself accomplished. This is done by bringing the original words of the authors, and endeavouring to find what amount of meaning can be attached to them. As for all future developments of the present laws I can only say that, believing as I do in the infinite wisdom with which creation is ordered, I am ready to believe in infinite developments of any law; but strange as may be the new and possible combinations of elements, and interesting also the breaking up of these our present elements into other elements, or even into mere pieces, it is not to be imagined that even nature has any thing in store for us fitted to answer the same purpose within the same limits and still simpler and more extensive than the laws of combination as Dalton has expressed them.

Of the man it has been attempted to give only a short sketch, and the whole merely to serve as an enlarged epitaph, written here instead of on his tomb, a token of remembrance for ourselves especially, like the coffin of some departed friend to preside at our feasts, and as a contribution to his defence if he should be assailed.

It will also be more in accordance with his own life if little is said about his personal affairs, which took such a very inferior place in his occupations. Unlike many men of the

greatest attainments, Dalton was little occupied with those numerous incidents closely relating to family and friends, which, although productive of much true happiness, capable equally of enlarging the smallest minds and deepening the influence of the most gifted, involve the consumption of much time, a loss much deplored as often as we consider how little we have, and how much is needful in order to obtain from nature even the smallest addition to our knowledge. For Dalton, science was the occupation of life, of a life spent in the most laborious manner. The amenities of life came to him as memories of what had been in his childhood rather than as pleasures realized at the time, memories certainly which he willingly recalled, but as willingly, or perhaps resolutely, left, because his work was before him. He was a student of nature from his cradle.

Few as the materials for his early life are, and bare as are all the narratives, we have perhaps all that could really be found to be interesting. To all appearance he was like those around him, born to be a clodhopper, few things happening to fix the attention of others upon him, no incidents worth a record, because happening to millions daily; the first years must be passed with a simple record of the meagre living and the scantier education he received, until the glow of his life became warmer than that of his fellows. From that time his life is almost entirely in his works, like a devotee who has no heart for the world, but for Divine truth only, his very visits to his early friends were visits as much made for the investigation of truth, made to nature under that aspect which first taught him to observe and to think, which in fact first made him a philosopher and the love of which he never for a moment lost.

DALTON'S EARLY LIFE AND FIRST BOOK.

John Dalton was born at Eaglesfield, in Cumberland, on the 5th of September, 1766, in a small cottage on the estate of

the family, which had come into their possession through his maternal grandmother. His father at this time was a woollen weaver, and did not live in the house belonging to the property, but in a cot of his own, having two small rooms below, one some ten feet square only, and the other still less. The larger house was afterwards, on the death of his uncle, occupied by the father. It is described as one of the better class of farm houses of the district, and is still in possession of the family in a somewhat modernized state. The village of Eaglesfield is 2 miles south-west of Cockermouth. The whole township contains only 371 inhabitants. His father, Joseph Dalton, was very poor, in fact he earned only a scanty subsistence by weaving common country goods, and his wife eked it out by selling paper, ink, and quills,* but he seems to have been a man of some vigor of mind, as we find that he taught his sons mathematics, giving them such an education at least as is included in mensuration and navigation.† He afterwards inherited the estate, his brother having died childless. He then gave up weaving. It was by a similar occurrence that the property long afterwards came into the possession of Dr. Dalton, and afterwards into the hands of his cousins on the mother's side. Of the Daltons, or the relatives by the father's side, yeomen or small proprietors in Cumberland, we can find little information; his mother, Deborah Greenup, through whom the property came, connected him with many families in the neighbourhood. She was the third daughter of a family of one son and seven

daughters, living at Greenrigg, Caldbeck. The son was a barrister, and practised in London, but having inherited Greenrigg, retired to it, living there to an advanced age, having no children, and leaving the property to his unmarried sister, Ruth. This aunt of Dr. Dalton left the estate of

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This estate was of about sixty acres, but Dalton's elder brother Jonathan increased it considerably by purchase.

Greenrigg to be divided equally between Jonathan and John Dalton and their cousin, George Bewley. The estate was small and in a mountainous district, so that when sold in 1817 or 18, it brought only £750.*

I shall give in a note the names of his aunts the Greenups and their families, as their children the cousins of Dr. Dalton were most affectionately looked on by him during his whole life, as well as kindly and liberally remembered in his will.†

Jonathan Dalton, the grandfather, joined the Society of Friends, and the family continued with that body, a circumstance that no doubt in a considerable degree influenced the habits and character of Dr. Dalton.

Joseph Dalton and Deborah Greenup had three children, Jonathan, John, and Mary. The sons were taught mathematics, partly we are told, by the father, but they were also sent to Mr. Fletcher, the teacher of the school belonging to the Society of Friends. Eaglesfield was early connected with this society, and is said to have first built a meeting house for that body. In Mr. Fletcher's school John remained until twelve years of age, and during that time he must have made great progress, as we find him immediately beginning to teach. He always spoke with great admiration of Mr. Fletcher, who lived until Dalton himself was advanced in life. Indeed we have no reason to think that even in that small

Mr. Bewley's Letter.

† Eldest daughter of Greenup family married to Samuel Bristo; many descendents, particularly Rachel and Margaret Lickbarrow, of Kendal, to whom Dalton left legacies. (There was a third, Isabella, living at Dalton's death.) Second daughter married to Thomas Bewley, whose only son was George Bewley, of Woodhall, who formerly had the school in Kendal. The grandson, Thomas Bewley, of Bassenthwaite, to whose letter I am indebted for a history of the whole family, has daughters married to Mr. Abbatt, of Liverpool, and Mr. Benson, of Preston, who went in the funeral procession as nearest of kin to Dalton, and who by his will received legacies. The fifth married to Mr. The sixth married in the

Dickinson, whose descendent's letter I have quoted.
north of Scotland; whilst the seventh is mentioned in the text.

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