The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1898-03-30

For many centuries past the prob
lem Of perpetual motion has been the
bugbear ofbusy brains: and the inven-
tors who have tried their hands at the
subject is legion. Like the search af-
ter the elixer vitae, the transmutation
Of the baser metals into the nobler,
and the quadrature Of the circle, per-
petual motion is subject eminently
suitable for constitutional wonderers
and half learned mechanics.
All the would-be inventors Of this
early demonstrated impossi5ility,
however, have not been half-learned
BY any means. Witness that famous
poet, sculptor and general genius,
Leonardo da Vinci. The British Mu-
scum contains a rough sketch from the
painter of the "Last Supper" Of a
perpetual mott IN machine, arranged
as the majority Of them are, on the
principle Of hinged weights round the
periphery Of a wheel.
Arkwright, again, was certainly not
fool nor half-learned machinist,
but he believed in the possibility Of
perpetual motion and made several
models Of his ideas-which, it is al
most needless to state, failed to work
while Sir Christopher Wren took out
patent for similar machine. But
perpetual motion was invented before
the time Of Christopher Wren, or
even Leonardo da Vinci; that is, the
subject, not the fact, was invented.
The earliest known example was in
the thirteenth century.
Wilars de Honecort, Flemish ar
tist and architect, who died at Paris
in the year 1880, was responsible for
it. There is, in the Imperial Library
in Paris, big quarto sketch book
which once belonged to this gentle
man, and which contains, among vari-
ons sketches Of landscapes, buildings
and decorations, a sketch Of a perpet-
ual melton machine, with the note:
MANY people have for long tine
past tried to produce machine which
viii go Of its own accord and continue
to go until it is stopped. Here is
such machine, which, with movable
mallets arranged round wheel, will
go forever.
The machine itself is Of the pattern
that has recommended itself to the
majority Of perpetual motion cranks.
It is merely wheel hung on an axle,
and has arranged around its periphery
several mallets at equal distances
from each other in such way that
the weight shall always be on one
side, and so keep pulling the wheel
over. It's only fault was that the
weights did not act as desired-the
machine looked very well on paper,
but was good illustration Of the def
milton once given of theory, that it
is Fan impracticable method Of doing
that which is impossible"
In 100 gentleman of the name Of
Orfyrus claimed to have invented a
perpetual motion machine. The Land
grave Of Hesse Cassel believed in the
invention, it appears, and granted him
the castle of Weissenstein as a resi-
dence while he built his contrivance.
This, when it was finished, resembled
in shape a gigantic cheese, twelve feet
ACROSS and two and a half feet thick.
It was hung upon an axle eight feet
long and eight inches in diameter, and
was set into solid oak frame. When
the whole was ready the Landgrave
came to see it, and it was set going.
Then the room was sealed up, and the
Landgrave returned in eight weeks,
the room was opened and the machine
found to be still going.
Thereupon the Landgrave declared
that Orfyrus had invented perpetual
motion, for had he not seen the proof
thereof with his own eyes! But this
evidence was not sufficient for pro-
fessor Of philosophy at Berlin. He
came to see the machine, and asked
its inventor so many awkward ques-
tions that Orfyrus refused to let him
examine it. The professor published
his report upon the machine, and said
that he could not say where the fraud
precisely lay, because he was not per-
mitted to examine his invention close
ly. This report SO angered poor orr
fyrus that he took his machine to
pieces and never sat it up again, and
when he died, in 1745, his secret of
perpetual motion-if he possessed it
died with him.
tits not, we believe, very far from
! !