SCIENCE NEGLECTED IN ENGLAND 97 



paid if a Royal Society medal were awarded to then. 

 Some, lik-- .hun. had even to save their own 



in ven rasp of unscrupulous claimants, 



who wished to rob them i uiU of their g< 



result of this policy of indifference was plain to 

 all who could see. "In England, whole branches of 



i uen tal discovery are unstudied , and , i ndeed, almost 

 unknown. ven by name. ! D vain to conceal th.- 

 melancholy truth. We are fast dropping behind. In 

 mathematics we have long since drawn the rein, and 



i over a hopeless race. In chemistry the case is 

 not much better." These were the words of Sir John 

 Bench .-1 in 1830, fifteen years after the great war 

 was ended, and could no longer be pleaded as a reason 

 for our isolation and ignorance. Sir Humphry Davy, 

 President of the Royal Society, spoke in the same 

 terms and about the same time. Babbage, the in- 

 ventor of the wonderful calculating machine, expressed 

 vie ws equally strong .iigland, particularly with 



respect to the more difficult and abstract sciences, we 

 are not merely much below other nations of equal rank, 

 hut below several even of inferior power, . . . and 

 nothing but the full expression of public opinion can 

 remove the evils that chill th.- enthusiasm, and cramp 

 the energies of the science of England." l Seventy 

 years have passed since then, and though it cannot be 

 the ground lost has been all regained, a vast 

 change for the better has taken place. Public opinion 

 has been awakened to the danger that threatens the 

 neglect 



vas long in vain that learned men, loving t 



1 Ovewtorfy ***, xliii. 805, " Reflexions on the Decline of "-JTITI 

 in England, and on tome of iu Causes." 



1 



