Life — April 7, 1887 — page 8: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

192 ‘LIFE : A SKETCH OF ISAAC NEWTON. Written for a Forthcoming Encyclopedia, with a view to animate the Encyclopedic style. SAAC NEWTON, who, coming after Bacon, may be styled the stepfather of English Science, first saw the light in Lincolnshire, on December 25th, 1642; but his investigations of the luminiferous ether at this date were not as profound as subsequently, he being confined to the house by a severe attack of milk-crust. As Isaac's natal day was the 25th of December, his biography is invested with all the peculiar charm of a Christmas story. to trace Newton's lineage, but the family was of great antiquity; for Isaac's grandfather was a centenarian, and his grandmother came near being an old maid. At school, the boy soon displayed remarkable mechanical genius by constructing a pneumatic putty-blower of 48 calibre for private use; and every school-boy has heard of Ike Newton's wonderful water-clock, which struck the years, rang fire-alarms, had a shower-bath-alarm attachment, and propelled a grist-mill on the eight-hour plan. of Niagara Falls and the Lakes of Killarney; it is known to Science as Newton's Own Waterbury. How Sir Isaac would sneer, could he see a couple of peasants come out on the front porch of a modern Swiss clock and dance a hurried jig as the hours strike! And yet this is an age in which we know it all! Isaac's attentiveness to his studies was inversely as the head-master'’s distance; so he was taken from school to tend the farm. But so imbued was the lad with the great idea of the conservation of energy, that he would sit down in the shade, figuring out the binomial theorem on his cuff, when he ought to have been hay- making or treating the cattle for botts. One sultry but historic summer noon, between terms at Cambridge, Newton was seated under a gnarled apple-tree in his mother’s garden, perusing the fly-leaf of Descartes to keep up his reputation. | High over his head a june-bug burrowed deep into the plump cheek of a large horse-apple, swaying it gently on its stem. Suddenly the leafy canopy parted, | and, cleaving the air, fell with a mellow thud on the head of the absorbed student, who, starting from his brown-study, instinctively exclaimed, “Foul and Out!""— at the same time glancing nervously as if he expected to be mobbed. But remembering that it was not half-holiday at Cambridge, and perceiving | that cider and equilibrium had knocked out an apple by some freak of nature, he gradually took in the gravity of the situation. As he rubbed his head, he passionately asked himself why that apple had not bounded into space with the june-bug as a joyous satellite, and thus he was led to discover that majestic force which alike precipitates the frost-bitten persimmon to the vile dust from which it sprung, wheels the planets down the ruts of time, prevents the rain- drops from diluting the milky way, and enables the right-fielder to put in his work. The invention was not believed in for sixteen years; so the Keely motor may brace up. The time-serving and primitive papers of the day ridiculed Professor Newton until he gave a trial exhibition, and succeeded. Then they dusted up an abominable woodcut of some beef-eater at the last coronation, and pictured and lauded the philosopher. Our hero's sole weakness consisted in allowing himself to be knighted by Queen Anne for manipulating a magic- | lantern at one of her tea-parties; but we note witha feeling of vindictive pleasure that he got into the Royal Society without amassing a fortune in America, and giving a blow-out to the Prince of Wales. Newton was the most patient and gentle of men. A bench-legged terrier of his once upset a candle and destroyed reams of priceless manuscript. the luckless brute. There was merely a new dogskin rug on the library floor next day. We owe much to this celebrated man. His researches in optics gave us everything from the single eye-glass to the aurora borealis; and in We will not attempt | At twelve o'clock it also gave an exhibition | Yet there was no hot word, no angry kick for | AD SIMPLICITATEM. OLLY, you're the girl to love, Always smiling, and as trim As the hand within your glove— As the hand you'll give to him Who, one dear and dreamy day, Bending over you, shall say : “All my brain is strangely stirred, Thinking of your pretty face Peeping from the folds of lace— Musing on a whispered word— All my heart is in a whirl "— Folly, you're the girl! What you know is very slight, Measured by a scholar's books ; Logic—what is wrong or right,— Mathematics—in your looks, Full of double curvéd lines And of plus and minus signs ; Language—limited to one, Rich in fascinating flaws, Disobeying grammar laws, Half in earnest, half in fun, Yet with every word a pearl :-— Folly, you're the girl ! Books hold but a minor part Of the lore a girl should know : Better is the constant heart, Constant now, and ever so; Giving all its love to make Life a heaven for Loves sake. This is wisdom of the wise: This it is belongs to you, Shining brightly in those two Soft and sympathetic eyes— Giving man’s poor heart a twirl— Folly. you're the girl! Idle Idyller. IT 18 STATED THAT THE MASSAGE TREAT- literature the Differential Calculus immortalizes his name, but it is not detraction to say that a Key to Todhunter's Algebra would have more endeared him to the student world. Eureka Bendall. MENT, OR ‘LAYING ON OF HANDS,” WAS MUCH IN VOGUE DURING THE EARLY ELIZABETHAN PERIOD, comicbooks.com