Soon after he made another great discovery, that of electric induction, or that one electric current will induce another current in an adjoining wire. Others had suspected this, but had sought in vain to prove it. The Bell telephone, which Sir William Thompson calls "the wonder of wonders," depends upon this principle. Here no battery is required; for the vibration of a thin iron plate is made to generate the currents. After this, Faraday proved that the various kinds of electricity are identical; and that the electricity of the Voltaic pile is produced by chemical action, and not by contact of metals, as Volta had supposed. The world meantime had showered honors upon the great scientist. Great Britain had made him her idol. The Cambridge Philosophical Society, the Institution of Civil Engineers, of British Architects, of Philosophy and of Medicine, and the leading associations of Scotland had made him an honorary member. Paris had elected him corresponding member of all her great societies. St. Petersburg, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Berlin, Palermo, Modena, Lisbon, Heidelberg, Frankfort, and our own Boston and Philadelphia had sent tokens of admiration. Eminent men from all the world came to see him. How proud his mother must have felt at this wonderful success! She was not able to enter into her son's pursuits from lack of early education; but she talked much about him, calling him ever, "my Michael"; and would do nothing whatever without his advice. He supported her in her declining years; and she seemed perfectly happy. His father had died in his boyhood; but Faraday ever honored his occupation. He used to say, "I love a smith-shop, and anything relating to smithing. My father was a blacksmith." He was now forty-nine. The overtaxed brain refused to work longer. Memory was losing her grasp, and but for the sweet and careful presence of Sarah Faraday, the life-work would doubtless have been finished at this time. She took him to Switzerland, where he walked beside the lakes and over the mountains with "my companion, dear wife, and partner in all things." For four years he made scarcely any experiments in original research, and then the tired brain seemed to regain its wonted power, and go on to other discoveries. An Italian philosopher, Morichini, was the first to announce the magnetizing power of the solar rays. Mrs. Somerville covered one-half of a sewing-needle with paper, and exposed the other half to the violet rays. In two hours the exposed end had acquired magnetism. Faraday, by long and difficult experiments, showed the converse of this: he magnetized a ray of light,--an experiment "high, beautiful, and alone," says Mr. Tyndall. He also showed the magnetic condition of all matter.