LORD BROUGHAM ON SIR ISAAC NEWTON. The inauguration of the
statue of Sir Isaac Newton at Grant- ham, on Tuesday, was celebrated with marked success. The monu- ment is the work of Mr. Theed the sculptor. It stands fourteen feet kigh, and represents the great astronomer in the act of speaking. Its pedestal is of marble and nearly equals the height of the statue. The cost of producing this memorial has been defrayed by subscription. Grantham subscribed 600/., and other places 1030/. Newton was not born at Grantham, but at the Manor House, Woolsthorpe, eight miles distant. He was, however, educated at Grantham Grammar School, and lodged in the town. At length, Grantham has done honour to her fa- mous son.
The company assembled in Grantham met at the Grammar school, and walked thence to St. Peter's.11111, where the statue stands. The pro- Damien included the local militia, the corporation, the deny, the masters and boys of the school, the Bishop of Lincoln Lord Brougham, having Dr. Whewell and Professor Owen on either hand, Sir Edward Cust, Sir George Welby, Mr. 'fheed, Mr. lionckton Mikes, Sir Benjamin Brodie, and Dr. Latham. Lord Brougham took the chair—a chair that belonged to Sir Isaac ; and after the statue had been unveiled, he delivered the inaugural oration—an elaborate and splendid tribute to the genius of Newton. He reviewed the growth of Newton's facu- lties. He did not manifest genius, like Pascal and Clairaut, at au early age ; he did not begin to study mathematics until he was eighteen, but "at twenty-five years of age, he had discovered the law of gravitation, and laid the foundation of celestial dynamics, the science Created by him. Before ten years had elapsed, he added-to his disbo- veries that of the fundamental properties of light. So brilliant a course of discovery, in so short a time, changing and reconstructing analytical, astronomical, and optical science, almost defies belief. The statement could only be deemed possible by an appeal to the incontestable evidence thatproves it strictly true. By a rare felicity these doctrines gained the universal assent of mankind as soon as they were clearly understood ; and their originality has never been seriously, called in question." With 11Prodigality of illustration drawn from the history of science, Lord rirougham showed the growth of Newton's discoveries in relation to what had been done before as the results of that law of gradual progress which governs all human approaches towards perfection. Neither in ,8„iikence, nor moral philosophy, nor in art, is there any sudden discovery. ;there have been steps towards every great discovery ; all eminent men have had eminent forerunners-- " The grand difference, then, between one discovery or invention and an- other is in degree rather than in kind ; the degree in which a person while he outstrips those whom he comes after, also lives as it were before his age. Nor can any doubt exist that in this respect Newton stands at the head of all who have extended the bounds of knowledge. The sciences of dynamics and of optics are especially to be regarded in this point of view ; but the former in particular ; and the completeness of the system 'which he unfolded—its having been at the first elaborated and given in perfection, its having, how- ever new, stood the test of time, and survived, nay, gained by, the most rigorous scrutiny—can be predicated by this system alone, at least in the same degree But the most marvellous attribute of Newton's dis- coveries is that in which they stand out prominent among all the other feats of scientific research, stamped with the peculiarity of his intellectual cha- racter. Their great author lived before his age, anticipating in part what was long after wholly accomplished; and thus unfolding some things which at the time could be but imperfectly, others not at all com- prehended ; and not rarely pointing out the path and affording the means of treading it, to the ascertainment of truths then veiled in darkness. He not only enlarged the actual dominion of knowledge, penetrating to regions never before explored, and taking with a firm hand undisputed possession ; but he showed how the bounds of the visible horizon might be yet further extended, and enabled his successors to occupy what he could only descry ; as the illustrious discoverer of the New World made the inhabitants of the Old cast their eyes over lands and seas far distant from those he had tra- versed—lands and seas of which they could form to themselves no concep- tion, any more than they had been able to comprehend the course by which holed them on his grand enterprise. In this achievement, and in the qua- lities which alone made it possible—inexhaustible fertility of resources ; patience unsubdued ; close meditation that would suffer no distraction; steady determination to pursue paths that seemed all but hopeless ; and un- flinching courage to declare the truths they led to, how far soever removed from ordinary apprehension—in these characteristics of high and original genius we may be permitted to compere the career of those great men. But Columbus did not invent the mariners' compass as Newton did the instru- ment which guided his course and enabled him to make his discoveries, and his successors to extend them by closely following his directions in using it. Nor did the compass suffice to the great navigator without making any ob- servations, though he dared to steer without a chart ; while it is certain that by the philosopher's instrument his discoveries were extended over the whole system of the universe, determining the masses, the forms, and the motions of all its parts, through the mere inspection of abstract calculations and formulas analytically deduced." "Nor let it be imagined that the feelings of wonder excited by contem- plating the achievements of this great man are in any degree whatever there- suit of national partiality, and confined to the country which glories ip having given him birth. The language which expresses her veneration is equalled, perhaps exceeded, by that in which other nations give utterance to theirs; not merely by the general voice, but by the well considered and well in- formed judgment of the masters of science. Leibnitz, when asked at the royal table in Berlin his opinion of Newton, said that, taking mathema- ticians from the beginning of the world to the time when Newton lived, what he had done was much the better half.' The Priucipia ' will ever remain a monument of the profound genius which revealed to us the greatest law of the universe,' are the words of Laplace. That work stands pre- eminent above all the other productions of the human mind. The discovery of that simple and general law, by the greatness and the variety of the ob- jects which it embraces, confers honour upon the intellect of man.' La- grange we are told by Delarnbre, was wont to describe Newton as the- greatest genius that ever existed, but to add, how fortunate he was also, 'because there can only once be found a system of the universe to establish.' 'Never,' says the father of the Institute of France—one filling a high place among the moat eminent of its members= Never,' says M. Mot, was the supremacy of intellect so justly established and so fully confessed. In ma- thematical and in experimental science without an equal and without an example, combining the genius for both in its highest degree." The Prin- cipia ` he terms the greatest work ever produced by the mind of man, adding, in the words of Halley, that a nearer approach to the Divine nature has not beeu permitted to mortals. 'In first giving to the world Newton's method of flexions, says Fontenelle, • Leibnitz did like Prometheus-' he stole fire from heaven to bestow it on men.' 'Does Newton,' l'Hopital asked, sleep and wake like other men ? I figure him to myself as of a celestial kind, wholly severed from mortality.' To so renowned a benefactor of the world, thus exalted to the loftiest place by the common consent of all men, one whose life, without the intermission of an hour, was passed in the search after truths the most important, and at whose hands the human race had only received good, no memorial has been raised by those nations which erected statues to the tyrants and conquerors, the scourges of mankind, whose lives were passed not in the pursuit of truth but the practice of false- hood, or across whose lips, if truth ever chanced to stray, towards some selfish end, it surely failed to obtain belief; who to slake their insane thirst of power, or of preeminence, trampled on all the rights, and squan- dered the blood of their fellow-creatures, whose course, like the lightning, blasted while it dazzled ; and who, reversing the noble regret of the Roman Emperor, deemed the day lost that saw the sun go down upon their for- bearance, no victim deceived, or betrayed, or oppressed. 'That the wor- shippers of such pestilent genius should consecrate no outward symbol of the admiration they freely confessed to the memory of the most illustrious of men is not matter of wonder. But that his own countrymen' justly proud of having lived in his time, should have left this duty to their suc- cessors, after a century and a half of professed veneration and lip homage, may well be deemed strange. The inscription upon the cathedral, the masterpiece of his celebrated friend's architecture, may possibly be applied in defence of this neglect= If you seek for a monument look around," If you seek for a monument lift up your eyes to the heavens which show forth His fame.' Nor when we recollect the Greek orator's exclamation—' The whole earth is the monument of illustrious men '—can we stop short of de- claring that the whole universe is Newton's."
After this display of intellectual energy by a veteran who has just completed his eightieth year, the proceedings were brought to a :dose by the presentation of a handsome copy of.the Principle" to Lord Broug- ham. Then there was a luncheon and complimentary speeches.
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