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llustrated them with drawings of the apparatus used. After completing his apprenticeship, Faraday began life as a journeyman bookbinder. He had, however, as he says, "no taste for trade." His love of science became a consuming desire that he sought in every way to gratify. Inspired by his longing for scientific pursuits, he sent his lecture notes to Sir Humphry Davy, with the request that if opportunity offered he would give him employment at the Royal Institution. Davy was favorably impressed with the lecture report, and sent a kindly reply to the young philosopher. Shortly after this a vacancy did happen to occur at the Institution, and upon the recommendation of Davy, Faraday was elected to the place. Thus, in 1813, in the humble capacity of an assistant charged with the simple duty of dusting and caring for the apparatus, Michael Faraday began the life that was destined to make him the first scientist of the world and to bring honor to the Institution which had given him his opportunity. There is inspiration and encouragement to be found in reading the story of Faraday's success. He has been called a genius; but his genius seems to have largely consisted in persistent industry and the habit acquired in those early days of thinking over his experiments and reading until he had a clear perception of all there was in them. He lived in his work, and loved it. In the fifty busy years that followed his installment at the Royal Institution he digged deep into nature's secrets, and gave the world many brilliant gems as evidence of his industry. But of all his discoveries, _electro-magnetic induction_ is the crowning masterpiece and that for which the world stands most his debtor. The principle of conservation of energy, now so well known and universally accepted, was then but a vague guess in the minds of the more advanced in science. Faraday was among the first to accept the new doctrine, and many of his brilliant discoveries were made in his effort to prove the truth of these important generalizations. He was acquainted with Sturgeon's method of making magnets by sending a current of electricity through a wire wound around a bar of iron; and he reasoned, if electricity will make a magnet, a magnet ought to make electricity. As early as 1821 his note book contains this suggestion: "Convert magnetism into electricity." Again and again he attacked the problem; but it was not until the autumn of 1831 that his efforts t
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