654 MINING ENGINEERING 



To the man thus fundamentally trained nothing is impossible. He 

 may still need to be made familiar with the general scope of each of 

 the main branches of engineering, their relations to each other, the 

 nature of the problems that each is called upon to solve, and the 

 leading methods which, in each branch, have stood the test of time; 

 and he should be made sufficiently familiar with the literature of the 

 subject to know where to go for needed particulars; but any attempt 

 to cram his memory with the details of methods that may become 

 obsolete, before he is called upon to use them, is a distinct and fatal 

 mistake. 



The Organizing Faculty 



The successful engineer is a creative artist in the use of materials 

 and energy. In this class, he stands first who with the smallest 

 means produces the greatest results. Success will come most surely 

 to him who clearly sees the nature of each concrete problem, and, 

 from the widest outlook, chooses just the right methods, materials, 

 and forces of men and nature, to bring his undertaking to a successful 

 issue. 



Among engineers the creative or organizing faculty is a natural gift 

 as rare as any other kind of genius. But fortunately it is a faculty 

 most Americans have, at least in embryo, and it can be cultivated. 

 All the work of a mining school, whether in the basal sciences or in 

 the technical branches, may be utilized to develop it. Instead of 

 possessors of encyclopedic erudition, there is needed a type of man 

 that may mechanically remember less but can do more. Such a man 

 learns to analyze each problem that comes before him; when neces- 

 sary, he runs down the literature bearing upon it; selects the good; 

 rejects the bad; supplies by ready invention the missing link; de- 

 cides what must be done, and does it, cleanly, rapidly, and with 

 certainty, while the "encyclopedia maniac" is still digesting his 

 erudition. 



This kind of training, repeated again and again with every subject 

 studied in the college course (at first in small and simple problems, 

 later in larger and more complicated ones), does more to create the 

 engineering faculty than anything else that can be devised. It is 

 only by actually doing things that we learn how to do them. Action 

 must follow reflection, and reflection must precede action for success- 

 ful and useful life. Unless action follows reflection, life is "sicklied 

 o'er with the pale cast of thought." Unless reflection precedes action 

 we have all the ills that follow impetuosity, of which anarchy is the 

 final and the bitter fruit. From this point of view the training of 

 engineers has a moral effect on the whole body politic, since it tends 

 to create a solid, well-balanced element in the community. Nothing 

 develops a good man sooner than responsibility, which forces not only 



