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AUTHOR OF "POOR BOYS WHO BECAME FAMOUS," "GIRLS WHO BECAME FAMOUS," "FAMOUS AMERICAN AUTHORS," "FAMOUS AMERICAN STATESMEN," "SOCIAL STUDIES IN ENGLAND," "STORIES FROM LIFE," "FROM HEART AND NATURE," ETC.
"The heights by great men reached and kept Were not attained by sudden flight; But they, while their companions slept, Were toiling upward in the night." LONGFELLOW.
"A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life."--DARWIN.
NEW YORK THOMAS Y. CROWELL & COMPANY PUBLISHERS
COPYRIGHT, 1889, BY THOMAS Y. CROWELL & CO.
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Garfield said, "No page of human history is so instructive and significant as the record of those early influences which develop the character and direct the lives of eminent men."
These sketches show how young men have overcome difficulties, sometimes poverty, sometimes illness; how they have made failures before finding their true vocation. They show the results of energy, perseverance, and untiring devotion; how a cheerful face and a hopeful spirit like Agassiz's, or a gentle and kindly nature like Darwin's, can win its way against opposition.
A sketch of Benjamin Franklin, which otherwise would have a place in this volume, will be found in "Famous American Statesmen"; also one of Michael Faraday, in "Poor Boys Who Became Famous."
GALILEO GALILEI 1 SIR ISAAC NEWTON 28 CARL LINNÆUS 49 BARON CUVIER 65 SIR WILLIAM AND CAROLINE HERSCHEL 81 ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT 107 SIR HUMPHREY DAVY 139 JOHN JAMES AUDUBON 167 SAMUEL FINLEY BREESE MORSE 202 SIR CHARLES LYELL 246 JOSEPH HENRY, LL.D. 275 LOUIS AGASSIZ 302 CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN 347 FRANCIS TREVELYAN BUCKLAND 396
"The same memorable day is marked by the setting of one of the most brilliant stars in the firmament of art and the rising of another in the sphere of science, which was to enlighten the world with beams of equal splendor. On the 18th of February, 1564, Michael Angelo Buonarotti closed his eyes at Rome, and Galileo Galilei first saw the light at Pisa."
Thus writes young Karl von Gebler, in the best life of Galileo ever written, his dying contribution to literature. Some other authorities place Galileo's birth on February 15.