MICHELL, JOHN (1724-1793)

This article appears in Volume V18, Page 371 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: MIC-MOL

MICHELL, JOHN (1724-1793) , English natural philosopher and geologist, was born in 1724, and educated at Queens' College,

Cambridge

. His name appears fourth in the Tripos

list

LIST (O.E.
lisle
- LISLE, ALICE (c. 1614-1685)
, a Teutonic word, cf. Dut. lust, Ger. Leiste, adapted in Ital. lista and Fr.
lisle
- LISLE, ALICE (c. 1614-1685)
)
LIST, FRIEDRICH (1789-1846)

for 1748-1749; and in 1755 he was

moderator

MODERATOR (from Lat. moderare, to impose a modus, limit)

in that examination. He became M.A. in 1752, and B.D. in 1761. He was a fellow of his college, and was appointed Woodwardian professor of geology in 1762, and in 1767

rector

RECTOR (Lat. for " ruler," " guide," &c., from regere, " rule ")

of Thornhill in Yorkshire, where he died on the 29th of April 1793. He was
elected a fellow of the Royal Society in the same year as Henry Cavendish (176o). In 1750 he published at

Cambridge

work

WORK

of some eighty pages entitled A Treatise of Artificial Magnets, in which is shown an easy and expeditious method of making them superior to the best natural ones. Besides the description of the method of magnetization which still bears his name, this

work

WORK

contains a variety of accurate magnetic observations, and is distinguished by a lucid exposition of the nature of magnetic induction. He was the

original

ORIGINAL

inventor of the torsion balance, which afterwards became so famous in the hands of its second inventor Coulomb. Michell described it in his proposal of a method for obtaining the mean density of the earth. He did not live to put his method into practice; but this was done by Henry Cavendish, who made, by means of Michell's apparatus, the celebrated determination that now goes by the name of Cavendish's experiment (Phil. Trans., 1708). His most important geological essay was that entitled Conjectures concerning the Cause and Observations upon the Phaenomena of Earthquakes (Phil. Trans., li. 176o), which showed a remarkable knowledge of the strata in various parts of England and abroad.
Michell's other contributions to science are: " Observations on the Comet of January 176o at Cambridge, Phil. Trans. (176o) ; " A Recommendation of Hadley's Quadrant for Surveying," ibid. (1765) ; " Proposal of a Method for measuring Degrees of Longitude upon Parallels of the

Equator

Late
- LATE
_Lat_aequator_from.html">EQUATOR (
Late
- LATE
Lat. aequator, from aequare, to make equal)

," ibid. (1766) ; " An Inquiry into the Probable

Parallax

PARALLAX (Gr. aapa?X6, alternately)

and Magnitude of the Fixed Stars," ibid. (1767); " On the Twinkling of the Fixed Stars," ibid. (1767), " On the Means of Discovering the Distance, Magnitude, &c., of the Fixed Stars," ibid. (1784).

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