Michael Faraday

Michael Faraday was one of the most influential scientists who ever lived, and remarkably a self-made man of little formal schooling. Born near London in 1791, he rose to become the first Fullerian Professor of Chemistry at the Royal Institution and gave us the principles of electromagnetic induction, diamagnetism and the laws of electrolysis. He established the very idea of the electromagnetic field, invented the first electromagnetic rotary devices at the root of every electric motor, discovered benzene, coined words we still use such as anode, cathode, electrode and ion, and lent his name to the farad. Einstein kept his portrait on the study wall beside Newton.

His Sun in Virgo is written all over this life. This is the sign that shines not by seeking the limelight but through hard work, service and painstaking mastery, the jack of all arts who becomes master of all. Faraday embodied it: the tireless experimentalist, principled to the bone, who refused to build chemical weapons and loved science more than money. His Moon in Cancer, the Moon at home in its own tender house, gave him that deep well of feeling and devoted care, the man who quietly gave himself to public service, to lighthouses, to cleaner air, to the good of others.