Private | Admiralty | April 4
My dear Sir Robert
You will perhaps, in consideration of the intercourse I have had with Scientific Men, excuse the liberty I am taking with you when I venture to suggest a fit object of your countenance & Patronage.
Mr Faraday the great chemist is, like most persons of high Scientific attainments, very wise but not very wealthy - indeed his whole income obtained by wearying & ceaseless labour does not exceed four hundred pounds a year - he has but little time for reflection, & none, I believe, to direct any undertakings to improve his circumstances.
Since there is not in Europe a more renowned name for practical excellence in this grand & useful science - he is, in point of Genius, at least equal to Airy1; & if you will be so kind as just to cast your eye over the Memoir of his life2 (prepared at my request by a friend of mine) you will see what toils, what privations, what sorrows this philosopher has seduced in prosecution of high & beautiful learning.
May I not ask you for the next pension of £300 a year? I ask it most disinterestedly; for I never saw Mr. Faraday in my life, nor has he made any communication to me - he indeed is entirely ignorant that I am writing to you on his behalf; nor is this fact known to any but two besides myself.
Believe me | very truly yours | Ashley
Rt Honble | Sir R. Peel
Endorsed: April 4th 1835. Lord Ashley recommends a Pension to Mr Faraday
AIRY, Wilfrid (1896): Autobiography of Sir George Biddell Airy, Cambridge.
MacLEOD, Roy (1970): “Science and the Civil List 1824-1914”, Tech. Soc., 6: 47-55.
Please cite as “Faraday0777,” in Ɛpsilon: The Michael Faraday Collection accessed on 28 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/faraday/letters/Faraday0777