he now witness the successful results of Voltaic research?--and what would he say of that mighty genius who has demonstrated the relations of electrical energy to the general laws of chemical action?[68] It was his good fortune to have witnessed the discovery which identified electricity with the lightning of the thunder cloud: what would he have said of that which identified it with the magnetism of the earth! Of this at least we may be certain, that he would have expunged from his history the passage in which he observes--"Electrical discoveries have been made so much by accident, that it is more the powers of nature, than of human genius, that excite our wonders with respect to them." [67] The History and Present State of Electricity; by Jos. Priestley, LL.D. F.R.S., &c. London, 1795. [68] Dr. Priestley augured much from the talents of Davy. After the publication of his first paper on Galvanism, he wrote to him from America, and expressed the pleasure he felt on finding his favourite subject in such able hands. Priestley died in 1804, and therefore did not witness Davy's success. CHAPTER VII. The unfair rivalry of Philosophers.--Bonaparte the Patron of Science.--He liberates Dolomieu.--He founds a Prize for the encouragement of Electric researches.--His letter to the Minister of the Interior.--Proceedings of the Institute.--The Prize is conferred on Davy.--The Bakerian Lecture of 1807.--The Decomposition of the Fixed Alkalies--Potassium--Sodium.--The Questions to which the discovery gave rise.--Interesting Extracts from the Manuscript Notes of the Laboratory.--Potash decomposed by a chemical process.--Letters to Children, and Pepys.--The true nature of Potash discovered.--Whether Ammonia contains Oxygen.--Davy's severe Illness.--He recovers and resumes his labours.--His Fishing Costume.--He decomposes the Earths.--Important views to which the discovery has led. It must be confessed that there has too frequently existed amongst philosophers a strange and ungenerous disposition to undervalue the labours of their contemporaries. If a discovery be made, its truth and importance are first questioned; and should these be established, then its originality becomes a subject of dispute. Truth, although she may have been rarely held fast, has been frequently touched[69] in the dark: it is not extraordinary, therefore, that evidence may be often strained from the writings of philosophers in support of prior claims to late discoveries; but upon a candid review, these loose statements, or obscure hints, will generally be found wholly destitute of the pretensions which an unfair spirit of rivalry has too often laboured to support. Many of such hints, indeed, so far from advancing the progress of truth, had never even attracted notice, until after the discoveries to which they have been supposed to relate.