1 XXIV
2 sufficient to offer judicious advice, I shall give my
3 cordial thanks, knowing how to appreciate an impartial
4 critique. Palmam qui meruit feral. — “ Be his the palm
5 who merits it.”
6 If my work meets with a favorable reception, and is
7 considered useful, I shall feel happy in having attained
8 my most ardent wishes ; I shall forget the toils, dangers,
9 and sacrifices I have undergone, and, moreover, escape
10 the lot of many, who, after having spent the greater
11 portion of their lives and fortune, and, not unfrequently,
12 ruined their health, in rendering themselves useful to
13 mankind, have too often met with ingratitude, and,
14 sometimes, with persecution. Many benefactors of the
15 human species have experienced such treatment, and
16 analogy almost prepares us to expect it. If we turn
17 to the histories of important discoveries and inventions,
18 we shall find, that, on their first announcement, they
19 were contemned and ridiculed, while the inventors and
20 discoverers were laughed at, misrepresented, and vilified.
21 Sydenham, whose memory we must revere, was, by
22 several of his cotemporaries, stigmatized with the name
23 of quack, and murderer. Many now celebrated men,
24 who, in the fourteenth century distinguished themselves
25 by their knowledge of physical science, were burned as
26 sorcerers. Galileo was imprisoned in his seventieth year,
27 for maintaining the rotation of the earth ; and posterity
28 may, perhaps, admire some of our cotemporaries, who
29 having done much for the advancement of arts and
30 sciences, have not enjoyed the esteem they merit.
31 We daily observe wffiat extraordinary things can be
32 achieved by persevering practice, and what strange facts
33 are brought to light by scientific investigation ; never-