MECHANICS AND USEFUL ARTS. 101 



to science, to learn for ourselves and for others ; so making a fruitful 

 return to man in the future for that which we have obtained from the men 

 of the past. Bacon, in his instruction, tells us that the scientific student 

 ought not to be as the ant, who gathers, merely ; nor as the spider, who spins 

 from her own bowels; but rather as the bee, who both gathers and produces. 

 All this is true of the teaching afforded by any part of the physical science. 

 Electricity is often called wonderful beautiful; but it is so only in com- 

 mon with the other forces of nature. The beauty of electricity, or of any 

 other force, is not that the power is mysterious and unexpected, touching 

 every sense at unawares in turn, but that it is under law, and that the taught 

 intellect can even now govern it largely. The human mind is placed above, 

 not beneath it ; and it is in such a point of view that the mental education 

 afforded by science is rendered supereminent in dignity, in practical appli- 

 cation, and utility : for, by enabling the mind to apply the natural power 

 through law, it conveys the gifts of God to man. 



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