Memoir of the life of Thomas Young : $b with a catalogue of his works and essays

Transcriber’s notes:

The text of this e-book has been preserved in its original form apart from correction of three typographic flaws: asistance → assistance, äorta → aorta, Booksellers → booksellers. The spelling of superintendence/superintendance varies in this manner.

Italic text is denoted by underscores. Superscript text is indicated by a caret mark preceding the relevant text, e.g. 2^{c}

New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the public domain.

MEMOIR

OF THE

LIFE

OF

THOMAS YOUNG, M.D. F.R.S.

FOREIGN ASSOCIATE OF THE ROYAL INSTITUTE OF FRANCE, ETC. ETC.

WITH

A CATALOGUE

OF HIS

WORKS AND ESSAYS.

LONDON:

JOHN & ARTHUR ARCH, CORNHILL.

MDCCCXXXI.

LONDON:

PRINTED BY J. L. COX, GREAT QUEEN STREET,

Lincoln’s-Inn Fields.

MEMOIR,

&c. &c.

The following slight Memoir of the Life of the late Dr. Young was drawn up, from some short memoranda of his own writing in the possession of a near connexion, by one who had the advantage of long and intimate acquaintance with that distinguished scholar and philosopher; but who, never having been engaged in the pursuits of accurate science, feels himself incompetent to give more than an imperfect sketch, which he trusts to see filled up hereafter by an abler hand.

Dr. Thomas Young, a man eminently distinguished in more departments of literature and science than any other individual of his age and country, was born at Milverton in Somersetshire, the 13th of June, 1773. He was the eldest of ten children of Mr. Thomas Young of that place, and his mother was a niece of Doctor Richard Brocklesby, a physician of eminence in the metropolis, who was well known both from his connexion with the first literary societies, and with the highest political circles of the times in which he lived.

His parents were both of them of the society of Quakers, and of the strictest of a sect, whose fundamental principle it is, that the perception of what is right or wrong, to its minutest ramifications, is to be looked for in the immediate influence of a Supreme intelligence, and that therefore the individual is to act upon this, lead where it may, and compromise nothing. To the best of these early impressions he was accustomed in after-life to attribute, in some degree, the power he so eminently possessed of an imperturbable resolution to effect any object on which he was engaged, which he brought to bear on every thing he undertook, and by which he was enabled to work out his own education almost from infancy, with little comparative assistance or direction from others.

From a very early period Dr. Young was chiefly an inmate in the family of his maternal grandfather, Mr. Robert Davies, of Minehead; a gentleman who amidst mercantile avocations, though no very deep or accurate scholar, had cultivated a taste for classical literature, which it was his earnest endeavour to impress upon the mind of his grandson. It is stated that whilst domesticated with him, he had learnt to read with fluency when he was two years old, and that soon after this, in the intervals of his attendance on a village schoolmistress, he was made to commit to memory a number of English poems, and even some Latin ones, the words of which he retained without difficulty, although at the time unacquainted with their meaning.

Before he was six years old, he attended the seminary of a dissenting minister, and went afterwards to a school at Bristol, where he remained about a year and a half, and where the deficiency of the instructor appears to have advanced the studies of the pupil, as he here first became his own teacher, and had by himself studied the last pages of the books used, before he had reached the middle under the eye of the master.

His father had a neighbour, a man of great ingenuity, by profession a land surveyor and land steward; and in his office, during his holidays, he was indulged with the use of mathematical and philosophical instruments, together with the perusal of three volumes of a Dictionary of Arts and Sciences, which he also found there. These were to him sources of instruction and delight of which he seemed never to weary, and which, thus accidentally thrown in his way, had probably no small influence on the issues of his future life.

In 1782, he was sent to the school of a Mr. Thompson, at Compton, in Dorsetshire, of whom he was always accustomed to speak with great respect, as a person of an enlarged and liberal mind; and who, possessed of a moderate and miscellaneous library, permitted and encouraged his scholars to turn it to their profit; the principle which he adopted in the course of his instructions, being to allow them a certain degree of discretion in the employment of their time.

Here Young went through the ordinary course of Greek and Latin Classics, together with the elementary parts of the Mathematics; and by rising earlier and sitting up later than his companions, with the assistance of a schoolfellow who had some French and Italian books, he rendered himself tolerably familiar with those languages. He had acquired, in his visits to his father’s neighbour, the art of land surveying, and the amusement of his walks was to measure heights with a quadrant.

The next study he undertook was Botany, and for the sake of examining the plants which he gathered, he attempted the construction of a microscope from the descriptions of Benjamin Martin. This led him to Optics; but in order to make his microscope, he found it necessary to procure a lathe. Every thing then gave way to a passion for turning, and science was forgotten for the acquirement of manual dexterity; until falling upon a demonstration in Martin which exhibited some fluxional symbols, he was never satisfied till he had read and mastered a short introduction to the doctrine of Fluxions.

Mr. Thompson had left in his way a Hebrew Bible. He began by enabling himself to read a few chapters, and was soon absorbed in the study of the principal Oriental languages. At the age of fourteen, when he quitted Mr. Thompson’s school, he was thus more or less versed in Greek, Latin, French, Italian, Hebrew, Persic, and Arabic; and in forming the characters of those languages, he had already acquired much of the beauty and accuracy of penmanship which was afterwards so remarkable in his copies of Greek compositions, as well as of those subjects connected with the literature of ancient Egypt.

In 1787, the friends of Dr. Young were beginning to think seriously of the line in life which might be most advantageously taken by a youth of such extraordinary promise. When at the house of one of his relations he accidentally met a connexion of Mr. David Barclay, of Youngsbury, in Hertfordshire, who was then wishing to form an arrangement for the education of his grandson, and through the intervention of Sir William Watson, it was agreed that Dr. Young and the grandson of Mr. Barclay should pursue their studies together, under a private tutor, in Mr. Barclay’s house. The tutor who was engaged, found a situation of greater permanence, and never came; so that two boys being left together, whose ages differed only about a year and a half, Young, then little more than fourteen, took upon himself, provisionally, the office of preceptor. They were afterwards joined by a gentleman who was then in progress of perfecting himself in the higher branches of classical attainment, of somewhat maturer years, and who has since been known to the world as the author of the “Calligraphia Græca.” But Dr. Young did not relinquish the task which he had previously undertaken, and already far advanced beyond the limits of ordinary scholastic attainment, was the principal director of the studies of the whole party.

When about the age of fourteen, he was attacked by symptoms of what was feared to be incipient consumption. But under the attendance of his uncle Dr. Brocklesby, and Baron Dimsdale, he recovered his health, without suffering any ultimate inconvenience, and was enabled for the most part, to pursue his labours through the whole duration of his indisposition, merely relieving his attention by what, to him, stood in the place of repose—a course of Greek reading in such authors as amused the weariness of his confinement.

In the five years between 1787 and 1792, residing during the summers in Hertfordshire, and for some months of the winter in London, with no other assistance than that of a few occasional masters in the latter place, he had rendered himself singularly familiar with the great poets and philosophers of antiquity, keeping ample notes of his daily studies. Of the various and conflicting opinions of the ancient philosophers he had drawn up a most admirable analysis; and as his reading was not merely the gaining words and phrases, and the minuter distinctions of dialects, but was invariably also directed to what was the end and object of the works he laboured through, it is probable that the train of thought into which he was led in this analysis, was not without its effect, in somewhat mitigating his attachment to the peculiar views of the sect amongst whom he had been born.