iq; 



NATURE 



[Dkcembhr ;. i^ir 



.iHudrd, who first discovered the properties of fire, or of 

 those who originated the smelting of metals, who launched 

 (heir frail, and at that time novel, coracles upon the 

 ocean, and first applied wheels to the primitive cart, 

 arc more living factors to^iay than the valour of all the 

 warriors, the wisdom of all the statesmen, or the wiles of 

 all the politicians that the world has seen? It is a truism, 

 irulff'd, that the world knows little of its greatest men. 



Can it be questioned that the discoveries of Archimedes 

 and his disciples have more effect to-day than the battles 

 of Alexander or of Hannibal? Or, if we turn to modern 

 times, can it be gainsaid that Watt and Stephenson, Davy 

 and Faraday, have done more to change both the course 

 of history and the material conditions of life than did 

 Napoleon or Wellington, Walpole or Pitt? 



The fact is, as I once remember hearing lamented by 

 no less a statesman than the late Lord Salisbury, that 

 while the work of the politician, the statesman, the soldier, 

 or the leader of men, however groat and however fortunate, 

 is of necessity but transitory, what is accomplished by one 

 man being undone by another — the work of the scientific 

 <liscoverer and inventor is everlastinfj. However insignifi- 

 cant this work may apparently bo, provided it is new it 

 adds something more to that great store of human know- 

 ledge and experience which is slowly accumulating, and 

 enables man more and more to triumph over nature. More- 

 over, results that appear of but slender importance at the 

 time of their discovery often turn out in the end to be of 

 the greatest moment. 



For the undue amount of influence on the progress of 

 the world that is attributed to leaders of men, in com- 

 parison with that exerted by investigators of nature, 

 historians are no doubt to blame. In stating this, how- 

 ever, one must in justice remember that, after all, most 

 histories are written to sell, or, if not that, to bring fame 

 to their authors. Further, we must allow that the story 

 of scientific investigation is frequently not very interesting, 

 at any rate to the general public, who may justly find such 

 a story dull as compared with accounts of the stirring 

 episodes that occur in the Senate or the feuds that are 

 settled on the battlefield. Thus the tale of, say, Marl- 

 borough's campaigns makes probably more picturesque 

 reading, and is more likely to interest the average student, 

 than would be a history of the patient scientific work that 

 led up, about the same period, to the enunciation, say, of 

 Bo3'Ie's law of the expansion of gases. We can admit this, 

 though there can be no doubt that the permanent influence 

 of Boyle's discovery on the history of the world has been 

 in the past, and will continue to be in still greater ratio 

 in the future, incomparably greater than was that of all 

 the battles of the day, inasmuch as Boyle's law was an 

 important link in the chain of discoveries that led up to 

 the steam engine and modern industrial development ; 

 while to-day the effects of the wars of the seventeenth 

 century have, for all practical purposes, passed away. 



The fact is that there is a glamour attached to the 

 position of those who are supposed to direct the history 

 of nations that prevents the real directing forces from 

 being seen in their true proportions. The great states- 

 ment, the great generals, leaders of mankind in general, 

 are, after all, nothing much more than glorified policemen, 

 whose utility to the world is only occasioned by the imper- 

 fections of human nature. As organisers they are no doubt 

 useful, but they generally benefit particular nations at the 

 expense of others ; and, as a rule, they leave little behind 

 them that will stand the test of centuries. 



Another product of human endeavour which also seems 

 to have an undue amount of importance attached to it in 

 regard to its influence on human progress is literature, 

 which I am here considering apart entirely from its 

 aesthetic claims upon us as a means of relaxation. That 

 literature has a directive influence, and that a powerful 

 one, no one can deny ; but I fancy that all scientific men 

 will agree that it is not to be compared with that exercised 

 by material discoveries and inventions. In saying this, I 

 know that it is the fashion to ascribe the beginning of all 

 modern science to what is contained in the " Novum 

 Organum " ; but I rather fancy that if we could truly 

 estimate the influence on the world's history of the two 

 men, we should find that Roger Bacon, the inventor of 

 gunpowder, would come before the better known Francis 



Bacon, who, kome centuries later, wrote his great wa 

 on the new learning. Indtt-d, probably the chief aiflrit 

 the " Novum Organum " was that it aMwted a return,! 

 experimental methods as oppu^-d to what had become 

 benumbing system of .Aristotle, who, by the way, 

 interesting to this soiicty for the reason that he was 

 author of the immortui, if not very il! : - — ng, pi 

 that " nature abhors :i vacuum." .^ since 



earliest times there has never been a b-:: . .^..niwd nr 

 more successful mutual admiration society than t) 

 by the writers of the world, who have always b" 

 concerned to discuss one another and one another 

 This, and the fact that the written word endures, 

 to the wielders of the pen a prominence in i 

 which they are scarcely entitled by their infl 

 progress. 



At the present time, when it is the fashion to ascril" 

 production of all wealth to the manual labourer ani 

 progress to the politician, it is more than ever nec«~ 

 that correct views should be insisted on. Let us, v 

 fore, emphasise the fact that from the beginning c; 

 world all advance has been due, not to the many, b 

 a few exceptional individuals ; and had it not been fo; 

 genius of these we should still be naked savages, not 

 painted with the proverbial woad. 



As an instance, take the electric telegraph, which 

 had more effect on civilisation than almost an\ ■• 

 else during the past century, and gives employmer.i 

 thousands. The names of those to whom it is <I • , 

 beginning with Franklin, Volta, and Galvani, going c 

 with Morse and Cook, and ending with, say, WheatstOl 

 and Kelvin, can literally be counted upon one's fingaf 

 Nor is it very different with the steam engine or with d 

 railway itself, which, to read some of the newspapers < 

 to-day, one would almost think had been invented by tfc 

 rank and file of the railway workers. 



Most really scientific workers feel that knowledge f( 

 knowledge's sake is a sufficiently worthy object for pa 

 suit, and are content with the extension of knowledge SB 

 the satisfaction that it brings without immediately desirUS 

 precise information as to the practical results that M 

 likely to follow from any particular line of investigatioc 

 It is well that this is so, as otherwise many of the lines < 

 scientific research that have been most fruitful in bringts 

 lasting benefits to mankind would never have been begv 

 or followed up. 



As an instance of this, could there be a better examp 

 than the history of that most remarkable and importai 

 discovery in physics which was the primary cause of th 

 foundation of this society? 



Consider for a moment the position of affairs man 

 years ago, when Sir William Crookes first commenced h 

 laborious experiments on the electric discharge throu| 

 rarefied gases. Could anything be imagined of nMi( 

 purely academic interest, and, at the time, seemingly lii 

 likely to lead to results of a practical nature? The sma 

 scale, the extreme delicacy of the apparatus, the XA 

 certainty of the results, the minuteness of the forces il 

 volved, all tended to give to the investigations an air i 

 entirely aloof from the practical concerns of everyday B 

 that one can scarcelv wonder that for years it was oOi 

 a few of the very foremost scientific intellects who \A 

 sufficient insight to take much interest in the matter. i 



Yet we all know how things have turned out ; how, i 

 a direct result from these very recondite investigations, 

 have had the discoven,- of the Rontgen rays, with 

 practical applications to the investigation of the hut 

 frame, to the relief of suffering, and to the cure 

 disease ; and also, as another result, perhaps the 

 momentous and far-reaching upheaval in scientific tt 

 on the constitution of matter and the nature of elect 

 that has taken place for centuries, heralding the bit 

 a new idea, that of radio-activity, which may in 

 be destined to prove the salvation of the whole human 

 from annihilation. Here, of course. T refer to the vast 

 previously unsuspected source of energy that mode 

 vestigations have shown to lie hidden away in the 

 of matter, a store which is revealed by the energy 

 out by radium and other radio-active substances, ar 

 which we may hope to see made available for hums 

 in centuries to come, when others, such as those conl| 



NO. 2197, VOL. 88] 



