The Soul in Nature

THE LIFE OF H. C. OERSTED.

discovery soon engaged the attention of the physicists of all countries; it was extended by zealous inquiry and repeated experiments, and proved itself to be fruitful by a rapid succession of new discoveries, so that it now forms the basis of one of the principal divisions in textbooks. Renown and honorable testimonials streamed in upon him from every side; many learned societies selected him as a member. The Royal Society in London sent him the Copley medal, and the French Institute, as an extraordinary acknowledgment, presented him with one of the mathematical class-prizes, worth 3,000 francs.

We must bear in mind, when speaking of this great event of Oersted’s life, that his services in experimental physics were by no means confined to this single phenomenon, although it may have cast the others into the shade. In the following years, his labors on a new edition of his work on Physics led to very important experiments on the compression of water. When engaged in these researches, he invented an instrument by which a more certain method was attained for compressing liquids. Through repeated experiments, he succeeded at a later period in pointing out the validity of the so-called Law of Mariotte Now commonly known as Boyle's Law; the author uses the historical term "Mariotti" (Mariotte). (regarding the compression of air)—which had previously been doubted—even for a greater amount of pressure, up to the point where gases become liquid. He proved the existence of a metal in alumina and invented a method of separating it, as well as a new method to create chlorides from oxides.

Assisted by the Government, Oersted undertook a third journey to Germany, France, and England in 1822–23; he was chiefly occupied with the latest discoveries regarding light, and he brought back a number of important instruments. On his return home, he founded the Society for the Distribution of Natural Science, which, among other things, was the occasion of public lectures being delivered by its pupils