Nobel lecture december 12, 1933 On passing through an optical instrument, such as a telescope or a camera lens, a ray of light is subjec reflecting surface. The path of the rays can be constructed if we know the two simple laws which govern the changes in direction: the law of refrac- tion which was discovered by Snellius a few hundred years ago, and the law of reflection with which Archimedes was familiar more than 2,000 years ago
When in 1920 I resumed my studies of theoretical physics which had long been interrupted by circumstances beyond my control, I was far from the idea that my studies would bring me several years later to receive such a higl and envied prize as that awarded by the Swedish Academy of Sciences each year to a scientist: the Nobel Prize for Physics. What at that time drew me towards theoretical physics was not the hope that such a high distinction