Part 20 (1/2)
”Lo! on this sensitive, link-- It is one link, not a chain-- Man with his brother can think Spanning the breadth of the main,-- Man to his brother can speak Swift as the bolt from a cloud, And where its thunders eak There his least whisper is loud!
”Yea; for as Providence wills, Now doth intelligentthem down as he can,-- And lay one weak little coil Under the width of the waves, Distance and Time are his spoil, Fetter'd as Caliban slaves!
”Ariel?--right through the sea We can fly swift as in air; Puck?--forty minutes shall be Sloth to the bow that we bear: Here is Earth's girdle indeed, Just a thought-circlet of fire,-- Delicate Ariel freed Sings, as she flies, on a wire!
”Courage, O servants of light, For you are safe to succeed; Lo! you are helping the Right, And shall be blest in your deed
Lo! you shall bind in one band, Joining the nations as one, Brethren of every land, Blessing theh health Thrilling with vigour and heat, Brotherhood, wisdoood sooth Lest to false fever it swerve,-- Touch it with tenderest truth As the world's exquisite nerve!
”Let the first ive heed-- Not be of profit or loss, But one electric indeed: Praise to the Giver be given, For that He giveth man skill, Glory to God in the Heaven!
'Peace upon earth, and goodwill!'”
Another Electric poee,” also in Gall's edition, was sent over by telegraph to America What a miserable muddle, by the way, those e;--preferring a dubious sigy by oodwill towardsrammatical, _in_ whoed by their 36,000 needless alterations in the New Testa been really necessary), and I know not how many more myriads in the Old, but happily their Version falls dead, and will soon be as forgotten as Dr Conquest's ”Bible with 20,000 emendations,” whereof I now possess a somewhat scarce copy in the library at Albury I have less than no patience with those principally clerical revisers; albeit for their chairman, Dr Ellicott, I retain a pleasant memory froression, wrung froainst those who have done their worst to spoil for us The Angel's Message, the first word uttered by the telegraphic wire under the sea
Returning to the subject of Electrics I have so of interest to say which will be news tointo Addison's _Spectator_ at Albury, Idiscovery which I recorded in the newspapers at the tiive the extract now fully as thus:--
In the 241st No of Addison's _Spectator_, bearing date Thursday, Decened ”C” (one of the letters of the reat Joseph Addison hi remarkable anticipation of our presumably most modern discovery Those who have access to the London edition of the _Spectator_ of 1841, published by JJ Chidley, 123 Aldersgate Street, can verify the verbatie 274:--
”Strada, in one of his Prolusions (Lib II prol 6), gives an account of a chimerical correspondence between two friends by the help of a certain loadstone, which had such virtue in it, that if it touched two several needles, when one of the needles so touched began to reat a distance, moved at the same time, and in the sa each of them possessed of one of those needles,it with four-and-twenty letters, in the same manner as the hours of the day are marked upon the ordinary dial-plate They then fixed one of the needles on each of these plates in such a manner that it could move round without impediment, so as to touch any of the four-and-twenty letters
”Upon their separating froreed to withdraw themselves punctually into their closets at a certain hour of the day, and to converse with one another by ly, when they were some hundred miles asunder, each of them shut himself up in his closet at the time appointed, and immediately cast his eye upon his dial-plate If he had ato his friend, he directed his needle to every letter that for a little pause at the end of every word or sentence, to avoid confusion
”The friend in theof itself to every letter which that of his correspondent pointed at By this ether across a whole continent, and conveyed their thoughts to one another in an instant over cities or mountains, seas or deserts
”If Monsieur Scudery, or any other writer of roenerally in the train of a knight-errant,a present to two lovers of a couple of these above-mentioned needles, the reader would not have been a little pleased to have seen theuarded by spies and watchers, or separated by castles and adventures
”In the meanwhile, if ever this invention should be revived or put in practice, I would propose that upon the lover's dial-plate there should be written not only the four-and-twenty letters, but several entire words which have always a place in passionate epistles, as fla, drown, and the like This would verya letter, as it would enable hile touch of the needle--C”
Thus far Addison, a hundred and seventy years ago, and Strada (whoever he nore him), perhaps fifty before him, and the two unknown experi in all two hundred and forty or fifty years ago as the date of electrical invention: whereof we see no furtherthe ”Century of the Marquis of Worcester's Inventions”?--as is possible; the scarce volume is not near me for reference Let the curious reader who can, turn to it and see
Meanwhile, how strangely Addison and Strada have anticipated the dial-plate, and the needles, and the letters, and the short forraphists Verily there is nothing new under the sun
Extract from ain an electric guest, this time at the Great Albion dinner (Liverpool) to Mr Morse, whom I had met at Erith and in America A day or two afterwards I sent hi the sonnet below; and not knowing his London address I posted it to my brother Charles in London for hih that I did so, for Mr Morse had just sailed for Araphed to hie any money for it! This is perhaps the only tiraph, and certainly the only tiratis”
Here it is, for which I had a very corateful note from ”Samuel FB Morse, as an ardent admirer,” &c As never in print till now, I trust it will be acceptable to h-minded and true-hearted, as indicated in the sonnet
_To Professor Morse, in pleasant ood and generous spirit ruled the hour; Old jealousies were drowned in brotherhood, Philanthropy rejoiced that skill and power, Servants to science, coion's banner stood, Upheld by _thee_, true Patriarch of the plan Which in two hemispheres was schemed to shower Mercies from God on universal man
Yes, this electric chain from East to West More than ether kinsmen, in the best As most affectionate and frankest bond, Brethren at one, and looking far beyond The world in an electric union blest”
CHAPTER xxxVI