THE CONQUEST OF NATURE 



IN the earlier volumes we have been concerned 

 with the growth of knowledge. For the most 

 part the scientific delvers whose efforts have held 

 our attention have been tacitly unmindful, or even ex- 

 plicitly contemptuous, of the influence upon practical 

 life of the phenomena to the investigation of which 

 they have devoted their lives. They were and are 

 obviously seekers of truth for the mere love of truth. 



But the phenomena of nature are not dissociated 

 in fact, however much we may attempt to localize and 

 classify them. And so it chances that even the most 

 visionary devotee of abstract science is forever being 

 carried into fields of investigation trenching closely 

 upon the practicalities of every-day life. A Black 

 investigating the laws of heat is preparing the way 

 explicitly, however unconsciously, for a Watt with his 

 perfected mechanism of the steam engine. 



Similarly a Davy working at the Royal Institution 

 with his newly invented batteries, and intent on the 

 discovery of new elements and the elucidation of new 

 principles, is the direct forerunner of Jablochkoff, 

 Brush, and Edison with their commercial revolution 

 in the production of artificial light. 



Again Oersted and Faraday, earnestly seeking out 



VOL. VI. I [ I ] 



