¶ … obituary is addressed to a lay audience and, therefore, focuses on points that made Faraday particularly compelling to the 'person of the street' of his time. Two of these points are the magnetic appeal of Faraday's lectures, and the "rarest felicity of experimenting."
Both of these points are dwelt on since, as the author observes, it is unusual that so many are attracted to an topic that is usually obtuse, that these lectures attract particularly the youth who would, in any other instance, prefer to attend lighter more generally appealing affairs, and that the fact that they did so, no doubt, indicated a magical aspect to Faraday's lectures. There certainly must have been a magical attribute if, as Chapter 1 notes, there were oftentimes "more than one thousand people crammed into this space, many standing on the stairs and passageways." One thousand people attending a scientific lecture for no other reason than for its enjoyment is a rarity. Faraday must have been an exceptional lecturer indeed. And so...
And it is this aspect that the obituary, slanted to the very people who attended Faraday's lecture, points out.
Part of the reason attributable to Faraday's appeal was his use of experimentation, his enthusiasm for the subject, and his endeavor and ability in rendering the subject comprehensible to a lay audience.
Possibly, another aspect of the appeal could be traced to the fact, inferred by the author's description of the 'simplicity' of Faraday's character. Faraday was self-taught. He came from the working-class, and this enabled him to step back and see elements of physics with a working man's curiosity in a manner that people brought up in the classroom often fail to imbue it with. He saw these concepts as part of his everyday existence. He was attracted, precisely, because of the ways in which he recognized that concepts, such as motion and magnetism and electricity, could contribute to the betterment of his existence, and in expounding on these concepts to his listeners (many of…
