

LITTLE MASTERPIECES OF 

 SCIENCE 



GENERAL INTRODUCTION 



THIS is the golden age of science, a time of 

 creative energy, broadening horizons, new revo- 

 lutionary truth an age which the race for cen- 

 turies to come will esteem great and memorable 

 as the epochs of Pericles, Augustus or Elizabeth. 

 Like travel-worn wayfarers, whose delight in a 

 new and commanding prospect suffers subtrac- 

 tion in the fatigues and perplexities of their jour- 

 ney, the strife through which the great con- 

 quests of our time have been reached prevents 

 our prizing them as they deserve. In eras of 

 the past triumphs have been won in the fields of 

 empire, art, imagination; those of this age are in 

 the universal realms of science. Not a few men 

 of prophetic vision had glimpses of these tri- 

 umphs long ago. Nearly two centuries have 

 passed since Alexander Pope could say: 



All are parts of one stupendous whole, 

 Whose body Nature is, and God the soul; 

 That, chang'd thro' all, and yet in all the same; 

 Great in the earth, as in th* ethereal frame: 

 Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze, 

 Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees, 

 Lives thro* all life, extends thro* all extent. 

 Spreads undivided, operates unspent. 



And how much richer is Nature, as we know it 

 to-day, than the Nature of the times of Queen 

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