AN AMERICAN MANUAL TRAINING-SCHOOL. 625 



mechanics, always make. Certain parts it had been practically im- 

 possible to construct, as they involved shapes that could not be molded 

 by ordinary means. A nut had been placed where it was next to im- 

 possible to turn it ; and certain parts which were to be of cast-iron 

 had been given such dimensions that the castings would have snapped 

 in pieces while cooling. These errors had been corrected by the 

 mechanic, and the perfected thought lay fully expressed before me. 



In this illustration we have three greatly different methods of ex- 

 pressing essentially the same thought. Each constitutes a distinct 

 language, and each is absolutely essential to modern civilization. 



You will note how a crude thought often takes practical shape in 

 the hands of the draughtsman and the mechanic. "Drawing," says 

 Professor Silvanus P. Thompson, " is the very soul of true technical 

 education, and of exact and intelligent workmanship." Those who 

 have tested this can tell how many marvels of ingenuity, as lovely as 

 chateaux en Espagne, have vanished in the presence of " plans and ele- 

 vations " ; and how many beautifully drawn designs have been merci- 

 lessly condemned as impracticable by judges versed in the laws of con- 

 struction and the strength of materials. 



Much more could be said upon the arts of expression, their relative 

 importance and proper cultivation. You will readily think, as did 

 Lessing in his Laocoon, of poetry, painting, and sculpture. You will 

 recall how lofty thoughts have in all ages found expression in archi- 

 tectural forms, and yet, throughout all the history of architecture, the 

 laws of mechanics as then understood and the properties of the ma- 

 terials used have determined the different styles. In our own age we 

 are trying to express ourselves in iron and steel, and to cast off the 

 fetters of an age of marble and granite. 



In a recent address Mr. Charles H. Ham, of Chicago, said that, by 

 putting thought into seventy-five cents' worth of ore, it is converted 

 into pallet-arbors worth 82,500,000. He continues : " Skilled labor is 

 embodied thought thought that houses, feeds, and clothes mankind. 

 The nation that applies to labor the most thought, the most intelli- 

 gence (i. e., that best expresses its thought in concrete form), will rise 

 highest in the scale of civilization, will gain most in wealth, will most 

 surely survive the shocks of time, will live the longest in history." 



But some one will say, as to methods of expression : " One art is 

 enough for me ; make me master of one, and I will care for no second." 

 I answer, you are thinking of an impossibility. If a mechanic is only 

 a mechanic, he is never a master, even of his own art. He is crippled 

 at every turn ; in expressing himself, he is limited to what he can make. 

 He is without that powerful ally, drawing, the short-hand of the im- 

 agination, and in the presence of thoughts that baffle concrete expres- 

 sion he is dumb. Valuable machines even are sometimes purely im- 

 aginary. Clerk Maxwell, in his " Theory of Heat," says : "For the 

 purposes of scientific illustration we shall describe the working of an 



TOL. XXI. 40 



