356 Decline of Science in England. 



" spectcd either at home or abroad, if, like the Russian, they 

 " had half a dozen of different coloured ribbons pending on his 

 «' breast ? In almost every country where such distinctions exist, 

 " one-half of the ribbons are given to jobbing and patronage ; 

 " and upon the whole, we believe that the institution itself has 

 " an injurious tendency. Such crosses and badges are but too 

 " often the price for which honour and conscience are bought 

 " These gaudy baubles are the hooks and baits by which a prey 

 " may be allured, which could not be taken in any other way. 

 " The distribution of these distinctions must of needs belong 

 " to government. How are its members to judge of the diffe- 

 " rent degrees of scientific merit ? How can a minister know 

 " whether an astronomer is a deserving honest man, or whether 

 " he belongs to that numerous class of forgers, cooks, trimmers, 

 " &c. whom Mr Babbage so justly brands and vows to execra- 

 " tion ? Mr Babbage does scarcely allow to government the ca~ 

 " pacity of choosing its own scientific advisers, — How will it be 

 " able to discern those who deserve the order of merit ? A well 

 " meaning government, not wishing to indispose any body, and 

 " attaching deservedly no great value to these things, gives 

 " a decoration for the asking, or for the slightest reason or re- 

 " commendation. In this way such orders get at every body's 

 " button hole ; and it is not extraordinary on the Continent, 

 " to see a sleight-of-hand performer, a fiddler, or a mountebank, 

 " decorated with some foreign order. Farinelli, a celebrated 

 " castrato, was decorated by the king of Spain with the mili- 

 " tary order of Calatrava ; Napoleon gave the order of the Iron 

 " Crown, la couronne de fer, to Velluti, another castrato. 

 " The consequence of all this must be naturally, that in such 

 " countries where such distinctions exist, fools are very eager 

 " to have them, and really meritorious men do not attach the 

 " slightest value to them, and very often refuse them when they 

 " are tendered. Thus the late Professor Van Swinden refused 

 " an order offered to him by the king of Holland. 



" But in England there can scarcely exist any pretext for 

 '' instituting such an order ; there is no necessity that govcrn- 

 " ment should expressly allow certain persons the permission 

 " to wear a toy attached to their button-hole. The king of 

 kk England, if he be inclined to science, and wishes to vest its 

 4< professors with distinction, may confer upon them the ho- 



1 



