CONCLUSION. 729 



admits of no doubt in the minds of those who, while looking 

 at the present and towards the future by the help of the light 

 of past history, cannot but see clearly that a great advance 

 has been and is being made in our powers over the external 

 world. 



** Not for a moment need we hesitate to admit that those who 

 will live after us will know very much more than we now can 

 even dream of; and just in the same proportion as human know- 

 ledge extends its boundaries, so also will human power widen its 

 sphere of action. The age in which we are living has been most 

 abundantly fertile in discoveries, and as yet even those men who 

 are most intimately familiar with these discoveries are unable 

 to appreciate the full value and significance of them, nor can 

 they realise the great rewards open to future and perhaps still 

 more patient and persevering workers, for whom these modern 

 and new inventions will serve as keys and clues. 



'* Of all the adages current among us there is none more true 

 than the trite one which assures us that ' Nothing succeeds like 

 success ' ; there is none which is so true of human progress 

 in so many different ways. The young and earnest investi- 

 gator of these days stands upon a vantage ground of immeasur- 

 able value. He is so incalculably ahead of his predecessors 

 that he may be said in great measure to start where they left off. 

 Of course, it is only partially true that any beginner can com- 

 mence where those who went before him have finished ; for in 

 some measure at least all human beings must submit them- 

 selves to the same severe training in order to reach any degree of 

 excellence. Yet the path of progress has been cleared of many 

 most formidable obstacles, and it has been marked out, so to say, 

 in advance, so that pioneers need not lose themselves in impene- 

 trable jungles of sophistry which lead far away from the truth, 

 fog the intellectual powers, and obscure the shrewdness and 

 clear perspicacity of even the deepest thinkers and searchers. A 

 great deal of what may be termed the initial rough work has 

 been done; the results of this are fairly easily attainable, may, 

 in fact, be gathered up by stretching out the hands, can be 

 grasped and utilised with but very small efforts, as compared with 

 those originally put forth to obtain them by those toilers who 

 first secured them for the benefit of struggling humanity. 



" This more or less direct means of benefit is, however, by no 



