Page:Lectures on Ten British Physicists of the Nineteenth Century.djvu/145

 to all he feels, we would hear the chemist, the astronomer, the physiologist, the electrician, the botanist, the geologist, all with one accord, and each in the language of his own science declaring not only the wonderful works of God disclosed by it, but the delight which their disclosure affords him, and the privilege he feels it to be to have aided in it. This is indeed a magnificent induction—a consilience there is no refusing. It leads us to look around, through the long vista of time, with chastened but confident assurance that science has still other and nobler work to do than any she has yet attempted; work which, before she is prepared to attempt, the minds of men must be prepared to receive the attempt; prepared, I mean, by an entire conviction of the wisdom of her views, the purity of her objects, and the faithfulness of her disciples."

In 1846 on resigning the chair at Southampton he announced that science was about to triumph in a remarkable way by predicting the position of a new planet. The following year, 1847, the Results of his observations at the Cape of Good Hope were published in one large quarto volume, the expense of publication being borne by the Duke of Northumberland; there may be found an extended catalogue of southern stars and nebulæ, with elaborate drawings and discussions of their relative and variable brightness. In 1850 the office of Master of the Mint, an office which had been held by Sir Isaac Newton, was changed from a political to a scientific appointment; and Herschel was appointed. He did not break up his home, but stayed himself in London as much as was necessary. He did not like the separation from his family, and after five years resigned. While holding this office, he also accepted a place on the Cambridge University Commission. After retiring from the Mint, he lived for sixteen years longer as the Sage of Collingwood. He was ever ready to help a younger or less fortunate man of science. He had an unbounded admiration for the genius and character of Sir W. R. Hamilton; he gave him practical counsel in the preparation of the "Elements of Quaternions," and in an indirect way assisted him financially in the education of his eldest son—a very unworthy recipient as events