Passages from the Life of a Philosopher

I

My Ancestors

Traced his descent, through ages dark,
From cats that caterwauled in Noah’s ark.

Value of a celebrated Name—My Ancestors—Their Ante-Mosaic origin—Flint-workers—Toolmakers—Not descended from Cain—Ought a Philosopher to avow it if he were?—Probability of Descent from Tubal Cain—Argument in favour, he worked in Iron—On the other side, he invented Organs—Possible origin of my Name—Family History in very recent times.

What is there in a name? It is merely an empty basket, until you put something into it. My earliest visit to the Continent taught me the value of such a basket, filled with the name of my venerable friend the first Herschel, ere yet my younger friend his son, had adorned his distinguished patronymic with the additional laurels of his own well-earned fame.

The inheritance of a celebrated name is not, however, without its disadvantages. This truth I never found more fully appreciated, nor more admirably expressed, than in a conversation with the son of Filangieri, the author of the celebrated Treatise on Legislation, with whom I became acquainted at Naples, and in whose company I visited several of the most interesting institutions of that capital.