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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



magnificent harvests of profit that had 

 grown up from the toilsome and un- 

 selfish labors of men of science. He 

 owed his fortune to the enterprising 

 use of steamships and railways, which 

 were made possible by the steam-en- 

 gine, a machine produced by the scien- 

 tific labors of many discoverers and in- 

 ventors, accumulated through genera- 

 tions. Mr. Vanderbilt's millions were 

 the ultimate but none the less direct 

 consequence of the self-sacrificing ex- 

 ertions of men of creative genius, work- 

 ing in poverty, obscurity, and difficulty, 

 with heroic devotion, to construct a 

 mechanism which they saw was to be- 

 come potent in the future, and which 

 has fulfilled their anticipations by revo- 

 lutionizing modern society and giving to 

 civilization the greatest impulse it has 

 ever received from any single agency. 

 It is therefore by no means a piece of 

 far-fetched sentimentality to claim that, 

 when the results of their work had 

 ripened to almost fabulous acquisitions 

 of wealth, some portion of it, at least, 

 should be devoted to the advancement 

 of the interests of science. Of course, 

 Mr. Vanderbilt had the right the legal 

 right to do what he pleased with his 

 money ; but if we recognize any higher 

 consideration, any sentiment of justice, 

 if we assume that there are such things 

 as moral indebtedness and obligations 

 of honor in the distribution of surplus 

 wealth for public objects, then was the 

 great harvester of millions by steam- 

 travel bound to do something liberal 

 and fair for the encouragement and 

 promotion of the great, beneficent work 

 of scientific investigation, which issues 

 in such large advantages to the world. 

 And this was the more incumbent 

 upon the rich custodian of tbe fruits of 

 inventive genius, because so little of the 

 scattered wealth of the rich finds its 

 way into these channels. It is here 

 that we see science and religion in prac- 

 tical rivalry, with the almost universal 

 defeat of science. When rich old men 

 and old women are about to distribute 



their wealth and die, science has but a 

 sorry chance, and the Church generally 

 has its own way. Where a dollar is got 

 in such cases for the promotion of the 

 study of Nature, and the elucidation of 

 those laws upon which the amelioration 

 of the condition of humanity most vi- 

 tally depends, thousands are obtained 

 by the representatives of ecclesiasticism 

 for the propagation of faith. Eeligious 

 societies abound in wealth, and scien- 

 tific societies starve. If there is a sci- 

 entific society in New York that owns 

 a roof for shelter we do not know of 

 it; yet, if we rightly remember the 

 figures of the census, $53,000,000 are 

 invested in its churches. We refer to 

 these facts simply to illustrate the pre- 

 ponderance of theological influence and 

 agencies over those that are available 

 for the service of science, and to show 

 the disadvantage at which science is 

 placed in the struggle for means to carry 

 on its work. 



But although some portion, at least, 

 of the immense wealth of Mr. Vander- 

 bilt was morally mortgaged to the use 

 of that class of men by whom it was 

 in reality created, we are not aware 

 that he ever in the slightest degree rec- 

 ognized such a claim. Some hundreds 

 of thousands of dollars, however, were 

 got out of him to found a sectarian uni- 

 versity. But, though Mr. Vanderbilt 

 had no care for science, one would have 

 thought that the trustees and faculty 

 of the institution which he endowed 

 might have gracefully acknowledged 

 that something was specially and hon- 

 orably due from them to the interests 

 of science, and have shaped the policy 

 of the university accordingly. They 

 might, at least, have been decently up 

 to the times in the spirit of its manage- 

 ment. An old educational establish- 

 ment hampered by traditions, and run- 

 ning in the deep ruts of long-settled 

 habit, has some excuse, perhaps, for 

 guiding its course by the illiberal pre- 

 cedents of the past ; but Vanderbilt 

 University was a new organization, 



