He brought down Science from those heights which were before accessible only to a few, and placed her within the reach of all; he divested the goddess of all severity of aspect, and represented her as attired by the Graces. It is perhaps not possible to convey a better idea of the fascination of his style, than by the relation of the following anecdote. A person having observed the constancy with which Mr. Coleridge attended these lectures, was induced to ask the poet what attractions he could find in a study so unconnected with his known pursuits. "I attend Davy's lectures," he replied, "to increase my stock of metaphors." But, as Johnson says, in the most general applause some discordant voices will always be heard; and so was it upon the present occasion. It was urged by several modern _Zoili_, that the style was far too florid and imaginative for communicating the plain lessons of truth; that he described objects of Natural History by inappropriate imagery, and that violent conceits frequently usurped the place of philosophical definitions. This was Boeotian criticism; the Attic spirits selected other points of attack: they rallied him on the ground of affectation, and whimsically represented him as swayed by a mawkish sensibility, which constantly betrayed him into absurdity. There might be some show of justice in this accusation: The world was not large enough to satisfy the vulgar ambition of the conqueror, but the minutest production of nature afforded ample range for the scrutinizing intelligence of the philosopher; and he would consider a particle of crystal with so delicate a regard for its minute beauties, and expatiate with so tender a tone of interest on its fair proportions, as almost to convey an idea that he bewailed the condition of necessity which for ever allotted it so slender a place in the vast scheme of creation. After the observations which have been offered with regard to the injurious tendency of metaphors in all matters relating to science, I may probably be charged with inconsistency in defending Davy from the attacks thus levelled against his style. We need not the critic to remind us that the statue of a Lysippus may be spoiled by gilding; but I would observe that the style which cannot be tolerated in a philosophical essay, may under peculiar circumstances be not only admissible, but even expedient, in a popular lecture. "_Neque ideo minus efficaces sunt orationes nostræ quia ad aures judicantium cum voluptate perveniunt. Quid enim si infirmiora horum temporum templa credas, quia non rudi cæmento, et informibus tegulis exstruuntur; sed marmore nitent et auro radiantur?_"