Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume VII.djvu/363

 FOURIER monic beings, will give happiness to all the world. Then comes the plenitude and apogee of harmony, the pivotal or amphiharmonic age of the race, which nature will recognize by the conversion of the aurora borealis into a boreal crown, encircling the earth as the rings of Saturn encircle that planet, the stationary po- sition of the ecliptic, and the disinfection and perfuming of all the waters of the seas, by means of the boreal fluid. This supreme con- dition of nature and man will continue for about 8,000 years, when the beam of happi- ness will again descend, and society pass through a series of declines, similar to the series of its advances. The earth itself will be smitten with a palsy of weakness, and after many convulsions sink into death. The hu- man race, however, will not perish, but by a series of bicomposite transmigrations attain to immortality in other spheres. Fourier was rigidly true to his method in all departments of inquiry, and applied it with the most in- trepid and unhesitating fidelity, whatever the conclusions to which it might lead. His cosmo- gonical and ultramundane speculations there- fore assumed often the most grotesque forms ; and yet his disciples found so much beauty in his social scheme, that they endured his aber- rations for the sake of the comprehensive ideas which he suggested. His collected works (3d ed., 6 vols., Paris, 1841-'5) do not include all his writings. Some transcendental specula- tions have since been published separately ; others still remain in manuscript. FOURIER, Jean Baptiste Joseph, baron, a French savant, born in Auxerre, March 21, 1768, died in Paris, May 16, 1830. He was professor of mathematics at Auxerre, afterward a teach- er in the polytechnic school at Paris, and in 1798 a member of the scientific commission in Egypt. In 1802 he was appointed prefect of the department of Isere, and in 1808 made a baron. By the draining of the marshes of Bourgoin he freed more than 40 communes from the pestilential malaria to which they had always been subject. On the return of Napo- leon from Elba, he issued a proclamation in favor of Louis XVIII., and was removed by the emperor, who however appointed him pre- fect of the department of the Rhone. In 1817 he became a member of the academy of sciences, and soon afterward perpetual secre- tary jointly with Cuvier, and in 1827 member of the French academy. Upon the death of Laplace in 1827 he became president of the conseil de perfectionnement in the polytechnic school. His principal works are Theorie ana- lytique de la chaleur (1822), and Analyse des equations determinees (1831), a posthumous publication, but written in his youth. FOURNEYRON, Benoit, a French inventor, born in St. Etienne, Oct. 31, 1802, died in Paris, July 8, 1867. He was educated at the school of mines in his native city, and upon leaving it in 1819 was employed in the mines of Creuzot, and invented the turbine. His FOWLER 355 first turbine was exhibited with complete suc- cess at Inval, near Gisors, in 1834, and the prize of 6,000 francs, which had for nine years remained unawarded, was bestowed upon him by the academy of sciences. His proposal to establish several of these machines in the Seine at Paris, for the purpose of supplying every part of the city with water, as well as of filling the ditches which surround the fortifications, was commended by Arago. He published Memoires sur les turbines hydrauliques, et leur application en grand dans les usines et manu- factures (Liege, 1841), and a Table pour fa- ciliter les calculs des formules relatives au mouvement des eaux dans les tuyaux de con- duite (Liege, 1844). FOURN1ER, Edouard, a French author, born in Orleans, June 15, 1819. He early devoted himself to literary labors, and produced many S'ays alone or in collaboration with others, ne of his best efforts is Corneille a la butte Saint- Roch (1862) ; his drama Gutenberg was favorably received in 1868 at the Odeon, after having been rejected by the Theatre Francais. His writings relate to a great variety of sub- jects, and he has edited many voluminous publications and reviews. His best known works are : L 1 Esprit des autres (1855 ; 4th enlarged ed., 1861); L' Esprit dans Vhistoire (1857; 2d ed., 1860); and Levieux-neuf, his- toire ancienne des inventions et decouvertes mo- dernes (2 vols., 1859). FOWLER. I. Orson Squire, an American phre- nologist, born in Oohocton, Steuben co., N. Y., Oct. 11, 1809. He graduated at Amherst col- lege in 1834, and immediately began to lecture on phrenology. In 1835 he and his brother Lorenzo opened an office in New York. In 1836 the two wrote and published " Phrenology Proved, Illustrated, and Applied." " The Self- Instructor in Phrenology and Physiology " (1849) is also their joint production. In Octo- ber, 1838, he issued in Philadelphia the first number of the "American Phrenological Jour- nal," which was published in that city till 1842, when it was removed to New York, and con- tinued by the firm of O. S. and L. N. Fowler, which became Fowlers and Wells in 1844, and, by the retirement of the Fowlers, S. R. Wells in 1863. Meantime Mr. Fowler has pursued, as editor, lecturer, and author, a career of unusual activity, lecturing in almost every part of the United States and Canada. The entire years 1872 and 1873 were devoted to lecturing in California and on the Pacific coast. In 1863 he removed to Boston, where he now resides (1874). Among the many volumes on phrenology and kindred subjects which he has published, may be mentioned "Memory and Intellectual Improvement ap- plied to Self-Education" (1841); "Physi- ology, Animal and Mental, applied to Health of Body and Power of Mind" (1842); "Matri- mony, or Phrenology applied to the Selection of Companions" (1842); "Self-Culture and Perfection of Character " (1843) ; " Hereditary