FIG. 330. JAMES P. JOULE. 

 CHAPTER XXIII. 



CONCLUDING REMARKS. 



A FEW brief observations on some of the more general character- 

 istics of the science of the present day, and a rapid retrospective 

 glance at certain features of antecedent epochs, will serve to now bring 

 this history to a close. 



A review of the whole progress of science presents as one of the 

 most striking circumstances of its history its unequal rate of growth 

 at different periods. That vast inheritance of intellectual wealth which 

 science now includes appears to have been almost entirely the creation 

 of the last four centuries, and as this store continues to increase at an 

 accelerated rate, the question arises whether we can assign any reason 

 for these variations in the rate of its development. 



We have seen that the ancient Greeks sought after those wide 

 general laws which it is the object of science to attain ; and yet it is 

 admitted that in spite of all their grand intellectual genius they alto- 

 gether failed in physical science. The cause of this failure has by 



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