188 THE IDEALS OF A SCIENCE SCHOOL 



ments have arisen which have permanently enlarged 

 the common heritage of the race, and which have 

 been followed by an aftermath of Pharisaism, when 

 the high priests of learning holding the keys of 

 knowledge can neither enter in themselves nor allow 

 others to do so. Youth has so far preserved science 

 from that fate, but there is another powerfully con- 

 tributive factor in the usefulness of much of scientific 

 knowledge. Great and striking discoveries to-day 

 are to-morrow the starting-points of whole industries 

 and professions, and the pioneer is compelled to keep 

 marching on. If a contemporary of James Watt 

 were to return and attempt to lecture to us on the 

 design and construction of the steam-engine, tens of 

 thousands of quite humble people would in turn 

 instruct him. No doubt he would feel much the 

 same as a classical scholar being corrected by some 

 cad who had got his classics from a crib, but he 

 would have to recognise that his first-hand acquaint- 

 ance with James Watt made of him no high-priest of 

 the steam-engine. So a pioneer in what but yester- 

 day was an abstruse field of inquiry, purchasing 

 instruments for its pursuit, may receive a lucid 

 exposition of the principle of his subject from the 

 instrument maker, and any wireless operator on 

 board ship would probably be equal to expounding 

 to one Hertz, were he alive to profit by the informa- 

 tion, the ether waves by which messages were sent. 

 To be a scientific pioneer to-day, in any of the useful 

 branches of science, at any rate, it is necessary to 

 keep moving on. 



It is just because we, to-day, are not such great 

 sculptors or poets as the Greeks, so great law- 

 givers as the Romans, or so great architects as 

 the cathedral builders of the Middle Ages, and 

 because the desire to study these past ages of 

 pre-eminence has not resulted in any overmastering 



