V THE INTERNATIONAL FISHERIES EXHIBITION 197 



but also in relation to manufacturing industries, agri- 

 culture, mining, and even in relation to medicine. 

 To a large extent this arises from a misconception as 

 to the real nature and character of what is called 

 " science." Science is the knowledge of causes ; its 

 method and purpose when strictly pursued lead to 

 the accumulation and arrangement of thorough and 

 accurate knowledge of any given subject to which it 

 may be applied, with a certainty and an abundance 

 which no other method and no other purpose can give. 

 Undoubtedly the latest scientific knowledge of a sub- 

 ject is very usually not immediately useful to those 

 who are engaged in applying commercial enterprise 

 to the same subject. It is however to be noted, over 

 and over again, that the scientific discovery of one 

 generation becomes the necessary foundation of some 

 valuable commercial enterprise in the next : what was 

 at one time a curiosity and of little interest, save to 

 men of science, becomes after fifty years the pivot of 

 some great industrial manufacture. 



Accordingly commercial men, and those who place 

 the material well-being of this country beyond all 

 things as an object to be continually striven for, 

 should have patience in the presence of what seem 

 to be the useless accumulations of knowledge ; they 

 should have faith in the ultimate utility of science, 

 for already throughout the length and breadth of the 

 land this cause-reaching knowledge, which we call 

 " science," has proved its enormous power of aiding 

 commerce, and has amply established its claim not 

 to mere toleration but to eager and generous support 



