296 FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



pittance of men like John Dalton, or the voluntary 

 starvation of the late Graff; but compare what is con- 

 sidered as competency or affluence by your Faradays, 

 Liebigs, and Ilerschels, with the expected results of a 

 life of successful commercial enterprise: then compare 

 the amount of mind put forth, the work done for soci- 

 ety in either case, and you will be constrained to allow 

 that the former belong to a class of workers who, prop- 

 erly speaking, are not paid, and cannot be paid for 

 their work, as indeed it is of a sort to which no pay- 

 ment could stimulate.' 



But while the scientific investigator, standing upon 

 the frontiers of human knowledge, and aiming at the 

 conquest of fresh soil from the surrounding region 

 of the unknown, makes the discovery of truth his ex- 

 clusive object for the time, he cannot but feel the 

 deepest interest in the practical application of the 

 truth discovered. There is something ennobling in 

 the triumph of Mind over Matter. Apart even from its 

 uses to society, there is something elevating in the idea 

 of Man having tamed that wild force which flashes 

 through the telegraphic wire, and made it the minis- 

 ter of his will. Our attainments in these directions 

 appear to be commensurate with our needs. We had 

 already subdued horse and mule, and obtained from 

 them all the service which it was in their power to ren- 

 der: we must either stand still, or find more potent 

 agents to execute our purposes. At this point the 

 steam-engine appears. These are still new things; it 

 is not long since we struck into the scientific methods 

 which have produced these results. We cannot for an 

 instant regard them as the final achievements of Sci- 

 ence, but rather as an earnest of what she is yet to do. 

 They mark our first great advances upon the dominion 

 of Nature. Animal strength fails, but here are the 



