“In the morning,” says Paris, “he was the sage interpreter of Nature’s laws; in the evening, he sparkled in the galaxy of fashion; and not the least extraordinary point in the character of this great man, was the facility with which he could cast aside the cares of study, and enter into the trifling amusements of society.--‘_Ne otium quidem otiosum_,’ was the exclamation of Cicero; and it will generally apply to the leisure of men actively engaged in the pursuits of science; but Davy, in closing the door of his laboratory, opened the temple of pleasure.... In ordinary cases, the genius of evening dissipation is an arrant Penelope; but Davy, on returning to his morning labours, never found that the thread had been unspun during the interruption.” The following letter from Coleridge will serve to show how this change was foreseen and deplored by his truest friends:-- “Nether Stowey, _Feby. 17, 1803_. “MY DEAR PURKIS, ... I have been here nearly a fortnight; and in better health than usual. Tranquillity, warm rooms and a dear old friend, are specifics for my complaints. Poole is indeed a very, very good man. I like even his incorrigibility in small faults and deficiencies; it looks like a wise determination of Nature to let well alone; and is a consequence, a necessary one perhaps, of his immutability in his important good qualities.... “I rejoice in Davy’s progress. There are three suns recorded in Scripture:--Joshua’s, that stood still; Hezekiah’s, that went backward; and David’s that went forth, and hastened on his course, like a bridegroom from his chamber. May our friend’s prove the latter! It is a melancholy thing to see a man, like the Sun in the close of the Lapland summer, meridional in his horizon; or like wheat in a rainy season, that shoots up well in the stalk, but does not _kern_. As I have hoped, and do hope, more proudly of Davy than of any other man; and as he has been endeared to me more than any other man, by the being a Thing of Hope to me (more, far more than my self to my own self in my most genial moments,)--so of course my disappointment would be proportionally severe. It were falsehood, if I said that I think his present situation most calculated, of all others, to foster either his genius, or the clearness and incorruptness of his opinions and moral feelings. I see two Serpents at the cradle of his genius: Dissipation with a perpetual increase of acquaintances, and the constant presence of Inferiors and Devotees, with that too great facility of attaining admiration which degrades Ambition into Vanity--but the Hercules will strangle both the reptile monsters. I have thought it possible to exert talents with perseverance, and to attain true greatness wholly pure, even from the impulses; but on this subject Davy and I always differed....