414 THE SCIENTIFIC PAPERS OF 



In Hie, discussion of the Paper 



"ON THE SOCIETY OF ARTS' PATENT BILL," 

 By SIR FREDERICK BRAMWELL, F.R.S., 



Read before Section G. (Mechanical Science) of the British Association, at 

 the York Meeting, September, 1881, 



DR. SIEMENS, F.R.S.,* said if anything were needed to show 

 the difficulty surrounding the framing of a good and just patent 

 law, the observations that have fallen from the last two speakers 

 would furnish incidental proof. Mr. Head, who is so well known 

 for his mechanical talent, suggests that the obtaining of a patent 

 should be made very difficult that the patentee should not 

 only prove that it had novelty, but that it had usefulness. I am 

 afraid that, if that suggestion were adopted, many valuable patents 

 would fall to the ground or be stillborn. It is the very essence of 

 an invention that it cannot be worked in its first conception, 

 because an invention is not a mere idea. An idea may strike the 

 mind in an instant, but an invention is necessarily the result of 

 labour mental and physical and of expenditure, and there is 

 hardly an invention ever brought out that in its first stage would 

 have stood such a test. I cannot agree with Mr. Head in sup- 

 posing that all those inventions that have not taken immediate 

 effect, and enriched the patentees, are so much loss to the country. 

 On the contrary, although the inventor is to be felt for who has 

 not reaped any benefit from his invention and for his labour, yet 

 the public at large profits by it, because it may form the stepping- 

 stone for somebody else to carry the idea to its practical point. 

 The patent law must not be based upon the idea that all difficulties 

 will be done away with, that all men are to be made happy, and 

 that there is to be no legal contention of any sort. That would be 

 a chimera such as could not reasonably be expected. If it is 

 difficult to establish a title to landed property, surely it may be 

 reasonably supposed that it is as difficult to establish a title to 

 the product of the mind ; and all we can do is to render the ad- 



* Excerpt Journal of the Society of Arts, Vol. XXIX. 1880-81, pp. 813-814. 



