Faraday to the Managers of the Royal Institution   1 March 1865

Hampton Court | 1 March 1865

To the Managers of the | Royal Institution

Gentlemen

Unless it be that as I get older I become more infirm in mind and consequently more timid and unsteady, and so less confident in your warm expressions, I might I think trust more surely in your resolution of the 2nd Decr. 1861¹. and in the reiterated and verbal assurances of your kind secretary Dr. Bence Jones, than I do;- but I become from year to year more shaken in mind, and feel less able to take any responsibility on me: I wish therefore to retire from the position of superintendant [sic] of the house and laboratories. That which has been in times past my chiefest pleasure, has now become a very great anxiety, and I feel a growing inability to advise on the Policy of the Institution, or to be the one referred to on questions both great & small concerning the management of the house.

In a former letter when laying down the Juvenile lectures², I mentioned that other duties such as research, superintendance, of the house, and other services, still remained, but I then feared that I might be found unfit for them. I am now persuaded that this is the case, and if under these circumstances you may think it desirable that, with the resignations of the positions I have thus far filled, the rooms I occupy should be at liberty, I trust that you will feel no difficulty in letting me leave them; for the good of the Institution is my chief desire in the whole of this action.

Permit me to sign myself personally | Your dear indebted and grateful friend | M. Faraday³