shall furnish the basis of an assured induction meeting all the requirements of the problem.
Prof. Tyndall, however, is impatient of any contradiction. He admits that he has not verified the effect of wind-currents "by means of a captive balloon rising high enough to catch the deflected wave," but none the less he ventures to propound his hypothesis as the last word of science in the premises. Indeed, he takes great credit to himself for having been able to rise above "the authority" of Prof. Henry in this investigation. He says that in one of his "phases of thought" on the question he passed through the solution "which Prof. Henry now offers for acceptation," "weighed it in the balance," and "found it wanting." And, as if this language were not supercilious enough, he proceeds to indulge in the following self-complacent reflections:
"But though it [Prof. Henry's solution of ocean-echoes] thus deflected me from the proper track, shall I say that authority in science is injurious? Not without some qualification. It is not only injurious, but deadly, when it cows the intellect into fear of questioning it. But the authority which so merits our respect as to compel us to test and overthrow all its supports, before accepting a conclusion opposed to it, is not wholly noxious. On the contrary, the disciplines it imposes may be in the highest degree salutary, though they may end, as in the present case, in the ruin of authority."
It is impossible to conceive of language more expressive of vanity, conceit, and arrogance, than this ascription of intellectual superiority to which Prof. Tyndall treats himself on the assumption that he has laid "the authority" of Prof. Henry in "ruins" upon the question of atmospheric sound. At no time and in no place has Prof. Henry assumed to speak "by authority" on the subject. The man of straw whom Tyndall sets up under cover of Henry's name, in order to exhibit upon it the strength and prowess of his intellectual muscle, is a cheap device of rhetoric which a much inferior man might have disdained to employ in a case like this. The cause of science does not profit by the self-laudation of its votaries, and Prof. Tyndall's praises are in the mouths of too many people to render it necessary for him to praise himself at the expense of Prof. Henry or of anybody else.
REPLY OF PROFESSOR TYNDALL.[1]
To the Editor of the Nation.
Sir: I have been favored with a copy of the Nation of October 8th, and would ask permission to make a few remarks on the critique of my work on "Sound" therein contained.
With regard to Prof. Henry, I hope I am not presumptuous in venturing the opinion, and expressing the belief, that his earlier scientific labors were marked by rare power and originality, and that his later years have been usefully and honorably employed in the service
- ↑ From the Nation of December 23, 1875.
