Michael Faraday: Third Edition, with PortraitGladstone, J. H. (John Hall)
Science
Michael Faraday: Third Edition, with Portrait
Gladstone, J. H. (John Hall)
Faraday, Michael, 1791-1867
"You know me as well or better than I do myself. You know my former
prejudices and my present thoughts--you know my weaknesses, my vanity,
my whole mind; you have converted me from one erroneous way, let me
hope you will attempt to correct what others are wrong.... Again and
again I attempt to say what I feel, but I cannot. Let me, however,
claim not to be the selfish being that wishes to bend your affections
for his own sake only. In whatever way I can best minister to your
happiness, either by assiduity or by absence, it shall be done. Do not
injure me by withdrawing your friendship, or punish me for aiming to be
more than a friend by making me less; and if you cannot grant me more,
leave me what I possess,--but hear me."
The lady hesitated, and went to Margate. There he followed her, and
they proceeded together to Dover and Shakspeare's Cliff, and he
returned to London full of happiness and hope. He loved her with all
the ardour of his nature, and in due course, on June 12, 1821, they
were married. The bridegroom desired that there should be no bustle
or noise at the wedding, and that the day should not be specially
distinguished; but he calls it himself "an event which more than any
other contributed to his happiness and healthful state of mind." As
years rolled on the affection between husband and wife became only
deeper and deeper; his bearing towards her proved it, and his letters
frequently testify to it. Doubtless at any time between their marriage
and his final illness he might have written to her as he did from
Birmingham, at the time of the British Association:--"After all, there
is no pleasure like the tranquil pleasures of home, and here--even
here--the moment I leave the table, I wish I were with you IN QUIET.
Oh! what happiness is ours! My runs into the world in this way only
serve to make me esteem that happiness the more."
He took his bride home to Albemarle Street, and there they spent
their wedded life; but until Mr. Barnard's death it was their custom
to go every Saturday to the house of the worthy silversmith, and
spend Sunday with him, returning home usually in the evening of that
day. His own father died while he was at Riebau's, but his mother,
a grand-looking woman, lived long afterwards, supported by her son,
whom she occasionally visited at the Institution, and of whose growing
reputation she was not a little proud.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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