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In the field of the discovery and demonstration of natural phenomena Lord Rayleigh has, above all others enriched physical science by the application of mathematical analysis; and when I speak of mathematics you must not suppose mathematics to be harsh and crabbed. I will not, however, be hard on those who insist that it is harsh and crabbed.
'During my father's former residence in France, at the time when he was engaged in directing the works of the Rhone and Saone at Lyons, as he mentions in his Memoirs, he wrote a treatise on the construction of mills. He wished that D'Alembert should read it, to verify the mathematical calculations, and for this purpose he had put it into the hands of Morellet.
Taking down his coast-chart, he consulted it very studiously for nearly half an hour, laying off an angle with a pair of dividers and scale, with mathematical minuteness; after which he pricked his course along the surface to a given point. This was intended as his course. "Where do you make her, Captain?" said the mate, as he lay in his berth.
It was an important school she was to teach, where her Latin and German and mathematical achievements had won her the place above several other applicants, and where her well-known tact was expected to work wonders. But what were Latin and German and mathematics now? Could they show her how to climb a water-tank? Would tact avail with a hungry wolf? The howl in the distance seemed to come nearer.
The wondrous perfection of mathematical research is shown by the fact that we can now add up, as it were, all these momentary effects through years and centuries, with a view of determining the combined result at any one moment.
"Ah, Austin! do you not humble me if you are too proud to accept what is due to you from my brother?" "Velit, nolit, quod amica," answered my father, taking off and rubbing his spectacles, "which means, Kitty, that when a man's married he has no will of his own. To think," added Mr. Caxton, musingly, "that in this world one cannot be sure of the simplest mathematical definition.
Because there was no competition, scholars who were deficient in education at Eton were promoted to Cambridge, where they had no incentive to work, being exempt from the ordinary university examination. At Eton "no instruction was given in any branch of mathematical, physical, metaphysical or moral science, nor in the evidences of Christianity.
Its officers consist of a President, a Vice-President, two Secretaries, three Conservators, a Treasurer, and a Keeper of the records. It has associated correspondents throughout Europe. It is wholly devoted to natural, physical, and mathematical sciences. It assembles on Fridays, in the Rue d'Anjou, Faubourg St. Germain.
My main care was always to educate myself for the actual calling which at the moment I was following; thus, amongst the first things I took in hand was an attempt at finding the inner necessity and connection of the various parts of the drill and the military services, in which, without any previous acquaintance with military affairs, I managed, in consequence of my mathematical and physical knowledge, to succeed very fairly and without any great difficulty.
By a legitimate student, then, of the Platonic philosophy, I mean one who, both from nature and education, is properly qualified for such an arduous undertaking; that is one who possesses a naturally good disposition; is sagacious and acute, and is inflamed with an ardent desire for the acquisition of wisdom and truth; who from his childhood has been well instructed in the mathematical disciplines; who, besides this, has spent whole days, and frequently the greater part of the night, in profound meditation; and, like one triumphantly sailing over a raging sea, or skillfully piercing through an army of foes, has successfully encountered an hostile multitude of doubts; in short, who has never considered wisdom as a thing of trifling estimation and easy access, but as that which cannot be obtained without the most generous and severe endurance, and the intrinsic worth of which surpasses all corporeal good, far more than the ocean the fleeting bubble which floats on its surface.
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