46 CHEMISTRY AND NATIONAL PROSPERITY 



own sake did not directly contribute to the immediate 

 material prosperity of the community. In these days 

 of experimental science it is this type which governs 

 it. Starving, in the time-honoured manner, a great 

 pioneer of religion, reason or art was cheap. But 

 starve the same type of mind in science now and 

 the community starves with him. It cannot possibly 

 compete, either in war or peace, with any modern 

 nation that treasures as its most fertile asset the 

 original mind of the discoverer and inventor and the 

 bold exploring spirit of the scientific investigator. 



It is true that society may, like an old-established 

 firm, carry on in dignified rottenness in the ways of 

 a bygone generation and live for a while upon its 

 established reputation, if its rivals and competitors 

 are obliging enough to do the same. It is true that 

 ruin may apparently be staved off by the growing 

 power of money and the law to enslave the creators 

 of wealth in the community. Huge individual for- 

 tunes may so be built up, but at an ultimate cost to 

 the country altogether disproportionate to the private 

 gain. No quicker road to general impoverishment 

 could well be chosen than the treatment habitually 

 accorded in this country to the poor discoverer and 

 inventor, preyed upon by rascals of every description 

 who flourish under the protective majesty of the law, 

 and in the grip of a commercialism that deems it the 

 highest wisdom not to pay for anything it can get by 

 other means. A country that so mistakes the making 

 of money for the creation of wealth is going to pay in 

 its pocket as well as in its prestige. So is the whirli- 

 gig of time fast bringing its revenges ! 



In conclusion, I would like to say a few words 

 about chemists and the training of chemists. The 

 chemist, if he is a genuine pioneer, is not usually a 

 very worldly-wise person, and he suffers grievously 

 in any sort of beggar-my-neighbour competition. 



