AND THE MODE OF TEACHING THEM. 447 



Now I shall asume it as an admitted truth, that the mode of 

 carrying on these gigantic operations must be taught. The public 

 will guard itself against incompetency, and stand forward to protect 

 interests of such magnitude ; and emulation will play its part, and 

 force the engineer to qualify himself, in some way or other, for his 

 task. The only question is whether his education is to be allowed 

 to take the direction which chance, or circumstances, have given to 

 it, or whether, on the contrary, the public bodies (which have 

 been endowed for the professional education of the youth of the 

 country) should step forward, and offer the assistance, which it is 

 their bounden duty to give if required. I think there can be little 

 hesitation in replying to this question. There can hardly be a doubt, 

 that where the practical applications of science are concerned, the 

 sciences themselves must be systematically taught at least so far 

 as to insure a knowledge of the principles which are thus applied. 

 I am sure, above all, that it is in the universities the established 

 schools of science that such applications may be best unfolded; 

 because in them provision has already been abundantly made for 

 communicationg the knowledge of those principles of which these 

 applications are the results. 



If it be said (as I know is sometimes said) that many of the 

 most important of the inventions to which I have referred some 

 of the successive improvements of the steam-engine, for example 

 are the results, not of science, but of a happy chance, I do not 

 hesitate to meet the objection by a direct denial. It is true, there 

 are happy moments in the history of every inventive mind, at 

 which new ideas seem to rise as it were by a kind of inspiration. 

 It is even true, that a fortuitous circumstance may have been the 

 means of awakening the train of thought which has ended in great 

 discovery. But it is nevertheless certain that all this is of no 

 avail, unless the mind be already prepared to combine the prolific 

 thought with its existing store, unless, in fact, the soil be pre- 

 pared for the seed which the capricious wind has borne to its bosom. 

 The apple might have fallen unheeded from the bough, had not 

 the master-mind of Newton been prepared to connect the fact with 

 the treasures of his existing knowledge. And (to return to the 

 example which I have already so often cited) the circumstances 

 which suggested some of the improvements of the steam-engine 

 might have occured in vain, had not the mind of "Watt been 

 prepared, by his acquirements in chemistry and mechanics, to 



