20 Dv Whewell's Inaugural Lecture. 



the most modern which exist. In the former class, as I have 

 said, Art existed before Science ; men could shape, and melt, 

 and purify, and combine the metals for their practical pur- 

 poses, before they knew anything of the chemistry of metals ; 

 before they knew that to purify them was to expel oxygen or 

 sulphur; that combination may be definite or indefinite. 

 Tubal-Cain, in the first ages of the world, was " the instruc- 

 tor of every artificer in brass and iron ; '* but it was very 

 long before there came an instructor to teach what was the 

 philosophical import of the artificer's practice. In this case, 

 as I have already said. Art preceded Science ; if even now 

 Science has overtaken Art ; if even now Science can tell us 

 why the Swedish steel is still unmatched, or to what pecu- 

 liar composition the Toledo blade owes its fine temper, which 

 allows it to coil itself up in its sheath when its rigid thrust 

 is not needed. Here Art has preceded Science, and Science 

 has barely overtaken Art. But in the second class, Science 

 has not only overtaken Art, but is the whole foundation, the 

 entire creator of the art. Here Art is the daughter of 

 Science. The great chemical manufactories which have 

 sprung up at Liverpool, at Newcastle, at Glasgow, owe their 

 existence entirely to a profound and scientific knowledge of 

 chemistry. These arts never could have existed if there had 

 not been a science of chemistry ; and that, an exact and 

 philosophical science. These manufactories now are on a 

 scale at least equal to the largest establishments which exist 

 among the successors of Tubal-Cain. They occupy spaces 

 not smaller than that great building in which the produc- 

 tions of all the arts of all the world were gathered, and 

 where we so often wandered till our feet were weary. They 

 employ, some of them, five or six large steam-engines ; they 

 shoot up the obelisks which convey away their smoke and 

 fumes to the height of the highest steeples in the world ; 

 they occupy a population equal to that of a town, whose 

 streets gather round the walls of the mighty workshop.* Yet 

 these processes are all derived from the chemical theories of 

 the last and the present century ; from the investigations 

 earned on in the laboratories of Scheele and Kirwan, Berth- 



* " Illustrated Catalogue," p. 184. 



