Reflections on the Motive Power of Heat/Chapter 2
II.
LIFE OF SADI CARNOT.
As the life of Sadi Carnot was not marked by any notable event, his biography would have occupied only a few lines; but a scientific work by him, after remaining long in obscurity, brought again to light many years after his death, has caused his name to be placed among those of great inventors. In regard to his person, his mind, his character, nothing whatever has been known. Since there remains a witness of his private life—the sole witness, has he not a duty to fulfil? Ought he not to satisfy the natural and legitimate interest which attaches to any man whose work has deserved a portion of glory?
Nicolas-Léonard-Sadi Carnot was born June 1, 1796, in the smaller Luxembourg. This was that part of the palace where our father then dwelt as a member of the Directory. Our father had a predilection for the name of Sadi, which recalled to his mind ideas of wisdom and poetry. His first-born had borne this name, and despite the fate of this poor child, who lived but a few months, he called the second also Sadi, in memory of the celebrated Persian poet and moralist.
Scarcely a year had passed when the proscription, which included the Director, obliged him to give up his life, or at least his liberty, to the conspirators of fructidor. Our mother carried her son far from the palace in which violation of law had just triumphed. She fled to St. Omer, with her family, while her husband was exiled to Switzerland, then to Germany.
Our mother often said to me, “Thy brother was born in the midst of the cares and agitations of grandeur, thou in the calm of an obscure retreat. Your constitutions show this difference of origin.”
My brother in fact was of delicate constitution. He increased his strength later, by means of varied and judicious bodily exercises. He was of medium size, endowed with extreme sensibility and at the same time with extreme energy, more than reserved, almost rude, but singularly courageous on occasion. When he felt himself to be contending against injustice, nothing could restrain him. The following is an anecdote in illustration.
The Directory had given place to the Consulate. Carnot, after two years of exile, returned to his country and was appointed Minister of War. Bonaparte at the same time was still in favor with the republicans. He remembered that Carnot had assisted him in the beginning of his military career, and he resumed the intimate relation which had existed between them during the Directory. When the minister went to Malmaison to work with the First Consul, he often took with him his son, then about four years old, to stay with Madame Bonaparte, who was greatly attached to him.
She was one day with some other ladies in a small boat on a pond, the ladies rowing the boat themselves, when Bonaparte, unexpectedly appearing, amused himself by picking up stones and throwing them near the boat, spattering water on the fresh toilets of the rowers. The ladies dared not manifest their displeasure, but the little Sadi, after having looked on at the affair for some time, suddenly placed himself boldly before the conqueror of Marengo, and threatening him with his fist, he cried “Beast of a First Consul, will you stop tormenting those ladies!”
Bonaparte, at this unexpected attack, stopped and looked in astonishment at the child. Then he was seized with a fit of laughter in which all the spectators of the scene joined.
At another time, when the minister, wishing to return to Paris, sought his son, who had been left with Madame Bonaparte, it was discovered that he had run away. They found him a long way off, in a mill, the mechanism of which he was trying to understand. This desire had been in the child's mind for days, and the honest miller, not knowing who he was, was kindly answering all his questions. Curiosity, especially in regard to mechanics and physics, was one of the essential traits of Sadi's mind.
On account of this disposition so early manifested, Carnot did not hesitate to give a scientific direction to the studies of his son. He was able to undertake this task himself when the monarchical tendencies of the new government had determined him to retire. For a few months only Sadi followed the course of M. Bourdon at the Charlemagne Lycée to prepare himself for the Polytechnic School.
The pupil made rapid progress. He was just sixteen years old when he was admitted to the school, the twenty-fourth on the list. This was in 1812. The following year he left it, first in artillery. But he was considered too young for the school of Metz, and he continued his studies at Paris for a year. To this circumstance is due the fact that he took part in March, 1814, in the military exploits of Vincennes, and not of the butte Chaumont, as almost all the historians of the siege of Paris declared. M. Chasles, one of Sadi's school-fellows, took pains to rectify this error at a seance of the Institute in 1869.
If the pupils of the Polytechnic School did not earlier enter into the campaign, it was not because they had not asked to do so. I find in my brother's papers the copy of an address to the Emperor, signed by them December 29, 1813:
"Sire: The country needs all its defenders. The pupils of the Polytechnic School, faithful to their motto, ask to be permitted to hasten to the frontiers to share the glory of the brave men who are consecrating themselves to the safety of France. The battalion, proud of having contributed to the defeat of the enemy, will return to the school to cultivate the sciences and prepare for new services."
General Carnot was at Anvers, which he had just been defending against the confederate English, Prussians, and Swedes, where the French flag yet floated, when he wrote to his son, April 12, 1814:
"My dear Sadi: I have learned with extreme pleasure that the battalion of the Polytechnic School has distinguished itself, and that you have performed your first military exploits with honor. When I am recalled, I shall be very glad if the Minister of War will give you permission to come to me. You will become acquainted with a fine country and a beautiful city, where I have had the satisfaction of remaining in peace while disaster has overwhelmed so many other places."
Peace being restored, Sadi rejoined his father at Anvers and returned with him into France.
In the month of October he left the Polytechnic School, ranking sixth on the list of young men destined to service in the engineer corps, and went to Metz as a cadet sub-lieutenant at the school. Many scientific papers that he wrote there were a decided success. One is particularly referred to as very clever, a memoir on the instrument called the theodolite which is used in astronomy and geodesy.
I obtain these details from M. Ollivier, who was of the same rank as Sadi and who, later, was one of the founders of the Ecole Centrale. Among his other comrades besides M. Chasles, the learned geometrician just now referred to, was Gen. Duvivier, lamented victim of the insurrection of June 1848. I ought also to mention M. Robelin, Sadi's most intimate friend, who came to help me nurse him during his last illness, and who published a notice concerning him in the Revue encyclopédique, t. lv.
The events of 1815 brought General Carnot back into politics during the "Cent Jours" which ended in a fresh catastrophe.
This gave Sadi a glimpse of human nature of which he could not speak without disgust. His little sub-lieutenant's room was visited by certain superior officers who did not disdain to mount to the third floor to pay their respects to the son of the new minister.
Waterloo put an end to their attentions. The Bourbons re-established on the throne, Carnot was proscribed and Sadi sent successively into many trying places to pursue his vocation of engineer, to count bricks, to repair walls, and to draw plans destined to be hidden in portfolios. He performed these duties conscientiously and without hope of recompense, for his name, which not long before had brought him so many flatteries, was henceforth the cause of his advancement being long delayed.
In 1818 there came an unlooked-for royal ordinance, authorizing the officers of all branches of the service to present themselves at the examinations for the new corps of the staff. Sadi was well aware that favor had much more to do with this matter than ability, but he was weary of garrison life. The stay in small fortresses to which the nature of his work confined him did not offer sufficient resources to his love of study. Then he hoped, and his hope was realized, that a request for a furlough would be obtained without difficulty, and would insure him the leisure that he sought. In spite of the friendly opposition of some chiefs of the engineer corps, testifying to a sincere regret at the removal from their register of a name which had gained honor among them, Sadi came to Paris to take the examination, and was appointed lieutenant on the staff, January 20, 1819.
He hastened to obtain his furlough, and availed himself of it to lead, in Paris and in the country round about Paris, a studious life interrupted but once, in 1821, by a journey to Germany to visit our father in his exile at Magdeburg. We had then the pleasure of passing some weeks all three together.
When, two years later, death took from us this revered father and I returned alone to France, I found Sadi devoting himself to his scientific studies, which he alternated with the culture of the arts. In this way also, his tastes had marked out for him an original direction, for no one was more opposed than he to the traditional and the conventional. On his music-desk were seen only the compositions of Lully that he had studied, and the concerti of Viotti which he executed. On his table were seen only Pascal, Molière, or La Fontaine, and he knew his favorite books almost by heart. I call this direction original, because it was anterior to the artistic and literary movement which preceded the revolution of 1830. As to the sympathy of Sadi for the author of the Provinciales, it was due not only to the respect of the young mathematician for one of the masters of science, but his devoutly religious mind regarded with horror hypocrisy and hypocrites.
Appreciating the useful and the beautiful, Sadi frequented the museum of the Louvre and the Italian Theatre, as well as the Jardin des Plantes and the Conservatoire des Arts et Metiers. Music was almost a passion with him. He probably inherited this from our mother, who was an excellent pianist, to whom Dalayrac and especially Monsigny, her compatriot, had given instruction. Not content with being able to play well on the violin, Sadi carried to great length his theoretical studies.
His insatiable intellect, moreover, would not allow him to remain a stranger to any branch of knowledge. He diligently followed the course of the College of France and of the Sorbonne, of the École des Mines, of the Museum, and of the Bibliothèque. He visited the workshops with eager interest, and made himself familiar with the processes of manufacture; mathematical sciences, natural history, industrial art, political economy,—all these he cultivated with equal ardor. I have seen him not only practise as an amusement, but search theoretically into, gymnastics, fencing, swimming, dancing, and even skating. In even these things Sadi acquired a superiority which astonished specialists when by chance he forgot himself enough to speak of them, for the satisfaction of his own mind was the only aim that he sought.
He had such a repugnance to bringing himself forward that, in his intimate conversations with a few friends, he kept them ignorant of the treasures of science which he had accumulated. They never knew of more than a small part of them. How was it that he determined to formulate his ideas about the motive power of heat, and especially to publish them? I still ask myself this question,—I, who lived with him in the little apartment where our father was confined in the Rue du Parc-Royal while the police of the first Restoration were threatening him. Anxious to be perfectly clear, Sadi made me read some passages of his manuscript in order to convince himself that it would be understood by persons occupied with other studies.
Perhaps a solitary life in small garrisons, in the work-room and in the chemical laboratory, had increased his natural reserve. In small companies, however, he was not at all taciturn. He took part voluntarily in the gayest plays, abandoning himself to lively chat. "The time passed in laughing is well spent," he once wrote. His language was at such times full of wit, keen without malice, original without eccentricity, sometimes paradoxical, but without other pretension than that of an innocent activity of intelligence. He had a very warm heart under a cold manner. He was obliging and devoted, sincere and true in his dealings.
Towards the end of 1826, a new royal ordinance having obliged the staff lieutenants to return to the ranks, Sadi asked and obtained a return to the engineer corps, in which he received the following year, as his rank of seniority, the grade of captain.
Military service, however, weighed upon him. Jealous of his liberty, in 1828, he laid aside his uniform that he might be free to come and go at will. He took advantage of his leisure to make journeys and to visit our principal centres of industry.
He frequently visited M. Clement Desormes, professor at the Conservatoire des Arts et Metiers, who had made great advances in applied chemistry. M. Desormes willingly took counsel with him. He was a native of Bourgogne, our family country, which circumstance, I believe, brought them together.
It was before this period (in 1824) that Sadi had published his Réflexions sur la puissance motrice, du feu. He had seen how little progress had been made in the theory of machines in which this power was employed. He had ascertained that the improvements made in their arrangement were effected tentatively, and almost by chance. He comprehended that in order to raise this important art above empiricism, and to give it the rank of a science, it was necessary to study the phenomena of the production of motion by heat, from the most general point of view, independently of any mechanism, of any special agent; and such had been the thought of his life.
Did he foresee that this small brochure would become the foundation of a new science? He must have attached much importance to it to publish it, and bring himself out of his voluntary obscurity.
In fact (as his working notes prove), he perceived the existing relation between heat and mechanical work; and after having established the principle to which savants have given his name, he devoted himself to the researches which should enable him to establish with certainty the second principle, that of equivalence, which he already clearly divined. Thermodynamics was established from that time.
But these researches were rudely interrupted by a great event—the Revolution of July, 1830.
Sadi welcomed it enthusiastically—not, however, it is evident, as a personal advantage.
Several old members of the Convention were still living, even of those who had become celebrated; no favor of the new government was accorded them. To the son of Philippe-Egalité was ascribed a saying which, if it was untrue, at least agreed well with the sentiment of his position: "I can do nothing for the members of the Convention themselves," he said, "but for their families whatever they will."
However it may be, some of those about him vaguely questioned my brother as to his desires in case one of us should be called to the Chamber of Peers, of which Carnot had been a member in 1815. We had on this occasion a brief conference. Unknown to us both, this distinction could be offered only to a title in some sort hereditary. We could not accept it without forsaking the principles of Carnot, who had combated the heredity of the peerage. The paternal opinion therefore came to second our distaste for the proposition, and dictated our reply.
Sadi frequented the popular reunions at this period without forsaking his rôle of a simple observer.
Nevertheless he was, when occasion demanded it, a man of prompt and energetic action. One incident will suffice to prove this, and to show the sang-froid which characterized him.
On the day of the funeral of Gen. Lamarque, Sadi was walking thoughtfully in the vicinity of the insurrection. A horseman preceding a company, and who was evidently intoxicated, passed along the street on the gallop, brandishing his sabre and striking down the passers-by. Sadi darted forward, cleverly avoided the weapon of the soldier, seized him by the leg, threw him to the earth and laid him in the gutter, then continued on his way to escape from the cheers of the crowd, amazed at this daring deed. Before 1830, Sadi had formed part of a Réunion polytechnique industrielle, made up of old pupils of the school, with a plan of study in common. After 1830, he was a member of the Association polytechnique, consisting also of graduates, the object being the popular propagation of useful knowledge. The president of this association was M. de Choiseul-Praslin; the vice-presidents, MM. de Tracy, Auguste Comte, etc.
The hopes of the democracy meanwhile seeming to be in abeyance, Sadi devoted himself anew to study, and pursued his scientific labors with all the greater energy, as he brought to bear upon them the political ardor now so completely repressed. He undertook profound researches on the physical properties of gases and vapors, and especially on their elastic tensions. Unfortunately, the tables which he prepared from his comparative experiments were not completed; but happily the excellent works of Victor Regnault, so remarkable for their accuracy, have supplied to science, in this respect, the blanks of which Sadi Carnot was conscious.
His excessive application affected his health towards the end of June, 1832. Feeling temporarily better, he wrote gayly to one of his friends who had written several letters to him: "My delay this time is not without excuse. I have been sick for a long time, and in a very wearisome way. I have had an inflammation of the lungs, followed by scarlet-fever. (Perhaps you know what this horrible disease is.) I had to remain twelve days in bed, without sleep or food, without any occupation, amusing myself with leeches, with drinks, with baths, and other toys out of the same shop. This little diversion is not yet ended, for I am still very feeble."
This letter was written at the end of July.
There was a relapse, then brain fever; then finally, hardly recovered from so many violent illnesses which had weakened him morally and physically, Sadi was carried off in a few hours, August 24, 1832, by an attack of cholera. Towards the last, and as if from a dark presentiment, he had given much attention to the prevailing epidemic, following its course with the attention and penetration that he gave to everything.
Sadi Carnot died in the vigor of life, in the brightness of a career that he bade fair to run with glory, leaving memory of profound esteem and affection in the hearts of many friends.
His copy-books, filled with memoranda, attest the activity of his mind, the variety of his knowledge, his love of humanity, his clear sentiments of justice and of liberty. We can follow therein the traces of all his various studies. But the only work that he actually completed is this which is here published. It will suffice to preserve his name from oblivion.
His moral character has other claims on our recognition. Our only ambition here is to present a sketch of it. But, much better than through the perusal of these few pages, Sadi Carnot can be appreciated by reading the thoughts scattered through his memoranda, which are to be carefully collected. There are many practical rules of conduct which he records for himself; many observations that he desires to fix in his memory; sometimes an impression that has just come to him, grave or gay; sometimes too, though rarely, a trace of ill-humor directed against men or society. He never thought that these notes, the outpouring of his mind, would be read by other eyes than his own, or that they would some day be used to judge him. I find in them, for my part, touching analogies with the thoughts of my father, although the father and son had, unfortunately, lived almost always apart, by force of circumstances.[1]