The Internet is amazing. Much is in the public domain and may be freely reproduced for even commercial use, but such was not the case for "The Chemical History of a Candle" (1860), a famed Christmas series of six lectures directed to young people by Michael Faraday (1791-1867), the English chemist and physicist who laid the foundations of the classical theory of the electromagnetic field, which J. Clerk Maxwell (1831-1879) eminently expanded and enlarged upon, and which provided Albert Einstein (1879-1955) his principal inspiration for the theory of relativity. And, this brings us to another lecture on candles, appropriately called "Lecture on Candles," this time by a prominent English minister, Charles H. Spurgeon (1834-1892), whose anecdotal discourse contained many interesting, first person references to the use of candles in nineteenth century England.
The following are brief excerpts of Spurgeon's "Lecture on Candles," which may prove of interest to those who wish to see how candles affected daily life:
"CANDLES were far more familiar objects in my boyhood than in these days of gas and electricity. Now, fathers show their boys and girls how to make gas at the end of a tobacco pipe; but in my time the greatest of wonders was a lucifer-match. Our lights were so few that they justified the wit who declared that the word 'luxury' was derived from lux, the Latin for light. Assuredly, a good light is a high form of luxury. I can never forget the rushlight, which dimly illuminated the sitting-room of the old house; nor the dips, which were pretty fair when there were not too many of them to the pound; nor the mould candles, which came out only when there was a party, or some special personage was expected. Short sixes were very respectable specimens of household lights. Composites have never seemed to me to be so good as the old sort, made of pure tallow; but I dare say I may be wrong...
"Once I thoughtlessly hung a pound of tallow candles on a clothes-horse. This construction was moved near the fire, and the result was a mass of fat on the floor, and the cottons of the candles almost divested of tallow: a lesson to us all not to expose certain things to a great heat, lest we dissolve them. I fear that many a man's good resolutions only need the ordinary fire of daily life to make them melt away...
"I have here a case for candles, a casket for those jewels of light. Look well at this curiosity, ye dwellers in cities; for I do not suppose that any of you have such a piece of furniture in your houses. It is a candle-box, well-fashioned and neatly japanned. Here at the back are two plates with holes in them by which to hang up the box against the wall. It closes very neatly, opens very readily, and keeps its contents out of harm's way. I can assure you that I have within it a number of the very best candles, from the most notable makers. Wax, stearine, palmatine, and so forth: there could not be a handsomer assortment than I now exhibit to you. Let no one despise this display: here we have capacity, elegance, preparation, and plenty of each.
"But suppose that we were in this room without the gas, and I were simply to exhibit the candle-box and its contents, and say, 'Here is brilliance! You need no electric lighting: this box abundantly suffices for the enlightenment of this large assembly!' You would reply, 'But we see none the better for your boasted illumination. The candles are shut up in their box, and yield no single beam of light.' Herein detect a resemblance to many a church...
"In other lands, as, for instance, on the northwest coast of America, candles have a singular originality about them: for there they burn a fish, a species of smelt, which grows nearly a foot long and is full of fat. We should rather think the smelt smelleth, when they put a rush or a piece of bark down the centre of him, and make a natural candle of him...
"It was a shocking habit of bad boys to snuff the candle, and then open the snuffers and let the smoke and the smell escape. The snuffers are made on purpose to remove the snuff, or consumed wick, and then to quench it by pressure, and prevent any offensive smoke; but young, urchins of a mischievous sort would set the snuffers wide, and let the filthy smoke fill the room with its detestable odor. So do some who hear of a brother's faults, make them known, and seem to take pleasure in filling society with unsavory reports. I pray you, do not so... Keep an ill report secret; and do not be like the young lady who called in a dozen friends to help her keep a secret, and yet, strange to say, it got out... To rebuke in gentle love is difficult, but we must aim at it till we grow proficient. GOLDEN snuffers, remember; only golden snuffers. Put away those old rusty things-- those unkind sarcastic remarks..."
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