174 Second Essay, on the Progress (if' the Useful Arts. 



none have contributed so much to the increase of civilization : 

 Iron seems to attach itself most pertinaciously to our species, 

 and not a seaman is cast away but a saw, a knife, or an axe must 

 providentially follow him. The truth being that it is almost 

 beyond the power of the novelist to supply, by any other scheme, 

 their place. For the production, then, of one of the most or- 

 dinary articles of commerce, the exertions of almost, I may say, 

 the whole human race have been combined ; and the midnight 

 toil of the man of science mingles itself with the roar of the 

 blast furnace and the clatter of the forge ; th& sage of antiquity 

 and the ancient craftsman have both lent an assistance which 

 could not have been awanting without a postponement of the 

 period at which the human race has reached to its present state. 

 It is, as I have already said, not an individual, but the whole 

 race that progresses to maturity ; and not merely every state- 

 ment, but every useful piece of labour, goes to swell the capital 

 of mankind. 



In spite of the fanaticism which has sent the Turk to exter- 

 minate the Brahmin, the Christian to eradicate the Turk, — in 

 spite of the craft that sets nation to war against nation, and de- 

 clares France to be the natural enemy of Britain, — the arts and 

 the sciences have made of us one family, not a single branch of 

 which can enjoy an advantage that will not speedily diffuse it- 

 self through the whole. 



Such being, then, the anastomosing natui-e of the arts, it be- 

 comes almost impossible to treat of them systematically, and 

 there is left little else to guide us in arrangement than the pe- 

 culiarity of taste. Some of the arts are, indeed, more elemen- 

 tary than others, yet this consideration affords us but little as- 

 sistance. I have therefore determined to follow, in the arrange- 

 ment of the series of reports, whatever circumstances may ap- 

 pear to combine interest with utility, and I propose for my first 

 subject, the recent improvements that have been made in 

 damask, shawl, and carpet weaving ; improvements in which, I 

 am happy to say, our own country, nay even our own Society, 

 has had no trifling share. 



Edw. Sang. 



