question of the propagation of heat the subject of the great
mathematical prize which was to be awarded in the beginning of the year
1812. Fourier did, in effect, compete, and his memoir was crowned. But,
alas! as Fontenelle said: "In the country even of demonstrations, there
are to be found causes of dissension." Some restrictions mingled with
the favourable judgment. The illustrious commissioners of the prize,
Laplace, Lagrange, and Legendre, while acknowledging the novelty and
importance of the subject, while declaring that the real differential
equations of the propagation of heat were finally found, asserted that
they perceived difficulties in the way in which the author arrived at
them. They added, that his processes of integration left something to be
desired, even on the score of rigour. They did not, however, support
their opinion by any arguments.

Fourier never admitted the validity of this decision. Even at the close
of his life he gave unmistakable evidence that he thought it unjust, by
causing his memoir to be printed in our volumes without changing a
single word. Still, the doubts expressed by the Commissioners of the
Academy reverted incessantly to his recollection. From the very
beginning they had poisoned the pleasure of his triumph. These first
impressions, added to a high susceptibility, explain how Fourier ended
by regarding with a certain degree of displeasure the efforts of those
geometers who endeavoured to improve his theory. This, Gentlemen, was a
very strange aberration of a mind of so elevated an order! Our colleague
had almost forgotten that it is not allotted to any person to conduct a
scientific question to a definitive termination, and that the important
labours of D'Alembert, Clairaut, Euler, Lagrange, and Laplace, while
immortalizing their authors, have continually added new lustre to the
imperishable glory of Newton. Let us act so that this example may not be
lost. While the civil law imposes upon the tribunes the obligation to
assign the motives of _their judgments_, the academies, which are the
tribunes of science, cannot have even a pretext to escape from this
obligation. Corporate bodies, as well as individuals, act wisely when
they reckon in every instance only upon the authority of reason.

CENTRAL HEAT OF THE TERRESTRIAL GLOBE.

At any time the _Theorie Mathematique de la Chaleur_ would have excited
a lively interest among men of reflection, since, upon the supposition