Text 8. Lomonosov

The great Russian scientist, outstanding poet and enlightener, Lomonosov, was born in the village of Denisovka (now Lomonosovo), far off in the North, on November 19 1711. The boy was very young when he easily mastered reading and writing. He spent all his free time in reading books and studying but that did not satisfy him. The young boy longed for knowledge, he longed to master science. That longing was so great that at the age of 19, or so, he left his father’s home and started on foot for Moscow in spite of the long distance and the cold winter.

However, entering the Slavonic-Greek-Latin Academy in Moscow was not an easy thing to do, because his father was a peasant and a fisherman. Strange as it may seem at present, the Academy was closed to peasants at that time.

He experienced great want and countless hardships during his student years both in Moscow and later on in Germany where he had been sent to complete his education. Studying at the Academy, he got only 3 copecks a day, that scholarship being his only means of living.

Nevertheless, the simple peasant boy from the far North soon became famous as a scientist and a poet. At the age of 35 he was already an experienced professor and an academician.

Lomonosov was a complete master of natural sciences as well as of history, philosophy and engineering. In addition to the Russian language, he had a good knowledge of foreign languages, namely German, French, Greek and, last but not least, Latin which was the international language of science at that time.

It is quite impossible to name a scientific problem he did not turn his attention to. However, theory alone left him dissatisfied. He knew by experience that it was useless and unreliable if it did not find practical application and could not, therefore, serve the good of his people and his country. He always tried to find a practical application for the phenomena studied.

Lomonosov possessed an unusual capacity for work. His scientific activity lasted for 25 years but in these 25 years he carried out an extraordinary amount of useful, educational work in various fields of scientific and cultural life. He car­ried on scientific research in natural sciences and made nu­merous reports on the results of his achievements. He lectured to students and translated the works of various foreign scien­tists into Russian for he wanted to educate “our own Newtons.” For this very purpose he founded Moscow Uni­versity and wrote his odes as well as numerous books on the Russian language and literature, on physics and so on.

For many years the great scientist carried on systematic laboratory-experimental work both in physics and chemistry, for, according to him, without observation and experiment there could be no progress in science. In this connection, one might ask: “Do you know that Lomonosov organized the first chemical laboratory in our country?” One more question: “Who built the first glass-making factory in Russia?” It was Lomonosov, of course!

As a materialist, Lomonosov studied physical properties of bodies on the basis of the molecular and atomic theory. He developed the kinetic theory of gases, the molecular kinetic theory of heat and first discovered the law of the con­servation of matter and motion. He also found that light, heat and electricity are different forms of motion. As a result, many of his discoveries became invaluable contributions to world science.

From the very first and to the last days of his life he struggled alone for Russian science and the enlightenment of the Russian people.