Editing David Brewster (section)

===Other work===
[[File:Brewster, David – Treatise on new philosophical instruments for various purposes in the arts and sciences, 1813 – BEIC 756678.jpg|thumb|''Treatise on new philosophical instruments for various purposes in the arts and sciences'', 1813]]

Although Brewster's own discoveries were important, they were not his only service to science. He began writing in 1799 as a regular contributor to the ''[[Edinburgh Magazine and Literary Miscellany|Edinburgh Magazine]]'',<ref name="Maria)1870">{{cite book|author=afterwards GORDON BREWSTER (Margaret Maria)|title=The Home Life of Sir David Brewster. By his daughter. With a portrait|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZadcAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA46|year=1870|publisher=Edmonston & Douglas|page=46}}</ref> of which he acted as editor 1802–1803 at the age of twenty.<ref name="MorganHohlfeld1959">{{cite book|author1=Bayard Quincy Morgan|author2=Alexander Rudolf Hohlfeld|title=German Literature in British Magazines, 1750–1860|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WVUP8ozExswC|year=1959|publisher=University of Wisconsin Press|quote=Edinburgh Magazine and Literary Miscellany ... 1785.  ... Merged with Scots Magazine in 1804. Ed. by James Sibbald till 1792; by Robert Anderson till 1802; by Sir David Brewster till 1803.}}</ref> In 1807, he undertook the editorship of the newly projected ''[[Edinburgh Encyclopædia]]'', of which the first part appeared in 1808, and the last not until 1830. The work was strongest in the scientific department, and many of its most valuable articles were from the pen of the editor. At a later period he was one of the leading contributors to the ''[[Encyclopædia Britannica]]'' (seventh and eighth editions) writing, among others, the articles on electricity, [[hydrodynamics]], [[magnetism]], [[microscope]], [[optics]], [[stereoscope]], and [[voltaic electricity]].  He was elected a member of the [[American Antiquarian Society]] in 1816.<ref>{{cite web| url = http://www.americanantiquarian.org/memberlistb| title = American Antiquarian Society Members Directory}}</ref>

In 1819 Brewster undertook further editorial work by establishing, in conjunction with [[Robert Jameson]] (1774–1854), the ''[[Edinburgh Philosophical Journal]]'', which took the place of the ''Edinburgh Magazine''. The first ten volumes (1819–1824) were published under the joint editorship of Brewster and Jameson, the remaining four volumes (1825–1826) being edited by Jameson alone. After parting company with Jameson, Brewster started the ''[[Edinburgh Journal of Science]]'' in 1824, 16 volumes of which appeared under his editorship during the years 1824–1832, with very many articles from his own pen.

He contributed around three hundred papers<ref name=odnb/> to the transactions of various learned societies, and few of his contemporaries wrote as much for the various reviews. In the ''[[North British Review]]'' alone, seventy-five articles of his appeared. A list of his larger separate works will be found below. Special mention, however, must be made of the most important of them all: his biography of Sir [[Isaac Newton]]. In 1831 he published the ''Life of Sir Isaac Newton'',<ref>Sir David Brewster, ''Memoirs of the Life, Writings, and Discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton'', [https://books.google.com/books?id=B5IfAQAAMAAJ Vol. 1], Preface</ref> a short popular account of the philosopher's life, in ''[[Murray's Family Library]]'', followed by an 1832 American edition in Harper's Family Library;<ref>''[https://archive.org/details/lifesirisaacnew01brewgoog The Life of Sir Isaac Newton]'' (1832) Harper's Family Library, New York, No. 26.</ref> but it was not until 1855 that he was able to issue the much fuller ''Memoirs of the Life, Writings and Discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton'', a work which embodied the results of more than 20 years' investigation of original manuscripts and other available sources.<ref name="EB1911">{{EB1911|inline=1 |wstitle=Brewster, Sir David|volume=4 |pages=513–514}}</ref><ref>"Discovery of gravitation, A.D. 1666" by Sir David Brewster, in ''The Great Events by Famous Historians'', Rossiter Johnson, LL.D. Editor-in-Chief, Volume XII, pp. 51–65, ''The National Alumni'', 1905.</ref>

Brewster's position as editor brought him into frequent contact with the most eminent scientific men, and he was naturally among the first to recognise the benefit that would accrue from regular communication among those in the field of science. In a review of [[Charles Babbage]]'s book ''Decline of Science in England'' in ''[[Quarterly Review|John Murray's Quarterly Review]]'', he suggested the creation of "an association of our nobility, clergy, gentry and philosophers".<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=nlUAAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA341 Reflexions on the Decline of Science in England, and on some of its Causes], ''Quarterly Review'', Vol. 43, Nr. 86 (October 1830)</ref> This was taken up by various ''Declinarians'' and found speedy realisation in the [[British Association for the Advancement of Science]]. Its first meeting was held at [[York]] in 1831; and Brewster, along with Babbage and Sir [[John Herschel]], had the chief part in shaping its constitution.<ref name="EB1911"/>

In the same year in which the British Association held its first meeting, Brewster received the honour of knighthood and the decoration of the [[Royal Guelphic Order]]. In 1838, he was appointed Principal of the united colleges of St Salvator and St Leonard, [[University of St Andrews]]. In 1849, he acted as president of the British Association and was elected one of the eight foreign associates of the [[Institute of France]] in succession to [[Jöns Jakob Berzelius|J. J. Berzelius]]; and ten years later, he accepted the office of principal of the University of Edinburgh, the duties of which he discharged until within a few months of his death.<ref name="EB1911"/> In 1855, the government of France made him an [[Officier de la Légion d'honneur]].

He was a close friend of [[William Henry Fox Talbot]], inventor of the [[calotype]] process, who sent Brewster early examples of his work. It was Brewster who suggested Talbot only patent his process in England, initiating the development of early photography in Scotland and eventually allowing for the formation of the first photographic society in the world, the [[Edinburgh Calotype Club]], in 1843.<ref name=odnb /> Brewster was a prominent member of the club until its dissolution sometime in the mid-1850s; however, his interest in photography continued, and he was elected the first President of the [[Photographic Society of Scotland]] when it was founded in 1856.<ref>{{cite book|title=The British Journal of Photography|volume=XXI|publisher=Henry Greenwood|location=London|page=385|url=https://archive.org/stream/britishjournalp01socigoog#page/n395/mode/2up|editor=J. T. Taylor|display-editors=etal|access-date=2 November 2013}}</ref>

Of a high-strung and nervous temperament, Brewster was somewhat irritable in matters of controversy; but he was repeatedly subjected to serious provocation. He was a man of highly honourable and fervently religious character. In estimating his place among scientific discoverers, the chief thing to be borne in mind is that his genius was not characteristically mathematical. His method was empirical, and the laws that he established were generally the result of repeated experiment. To the ultimate explanation of the phenomena with which he dealt he contributed nothing, and it is noteworthy although he did not maintain to the end of his life the corpuscular theory he never explicitly adopted the wave theory of light. Few would dispute the verdict of [[James David Forbes]], an editor of the eighth edition of the ''[[Encyclopædia Britannica]]'': "His scientific glory is different in kind from that of [[Thomas Young (scientist)|Young]] and Fresnel; but the discoverer of the law of polarization of biaxial crystals, of optical mineralogy, and of double refraction by compression, will always occupy a foremost rank in the intellectual history of the age." In addition to the various works of Brewster already mentioned, the following may be added: ''Notes and Introduction to Carlyle's translation of Legendre's Elements of Geometry'' (1824); ''Treatise on Optics'' (1831); [http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.rbc/general.29167.1 '' Letters on Natural Magic'', addressed to Sir Walter Scott (1832)] ''The Martyrs of Science, or the Lives of Galileo, Tycho Brahe, and Kepler'' (1841); ''More Worlds than One'' (1854).<ref name="EB1911"/>

In his ''Treatise'' he demonstrated that vegetal colors were related with the [[absorption spectra]]<ref>{{cite book |author1=[[Charles R. Cross (physicist)|Charles Robert Cross]] (1848–1921, ed) |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=07cWAQAAIAAJ |title=Year-book of Facts in Science and Art |author2=William Ripley Nichols |author3=John Trowbridge (1843–1923, ed) |author4=Samuel Kneeland |author5=George Bliss |author6=David Ames Wells |year=1854 |quote=Sir David Brewster had several years before discovered a remarkable phenomenon in an alcoholic solution of the green coloring matter of leaves, or, as it is called by chemists, chlorophyll}}</ref> and he described for the first time the red fluorescence of [[chlorophyll]].