PART III. 

 INTRODUCTORY. 1 



SECTION XIX. INTRODUCTORY AND SUMMARY. 

 I. INTRODUCTORY. 



61. Bacon characterises the scientific thinker by attribut- 

 ing to him largeness of capacity, faithfulness of memory, swift- 

 ness of apprehension, and penetration of judgment.' 2 (Advance- 

 ment of Learning, Dedication, second paragraph.) 



Having perhaps this passage dimly in mind, Descartes ex- 

 presses himself in this form: "Pour moi, je n'ai jarnais presume 

 que mon esprit fut en rien plus parfait que ceux du commun: 

 meme j'ai souvent souhaite d'avoir la pensee aussi prompte, ou 



1 It would be a grave and unpardonable error to suppose that every 

 invention and discovery of note dates from the rise of modern science; for 

 before that era man had invented language, alphabets, the arithmetical nota- 

 tion now in use, and customs, manners, morals, religions, and laws; domesti- 

 cated diverse animals; developed the cereals, vegetables, and fruits, and 

 discovered the use and safe production of fire ; extracted, utilised, and mixed 

 various metals; introduced the axe, the knife, the saw, the plough, the 

 wheel, glass, mirror, sails, bricks, windmill and watermill, the calendar, the 

 compass, spectacles, clocks, and scores of other inventions and discoveries 

 of far-reaching significance: built magnificent roads, waterways, carriages. 

 ships, and temples; produced unsurpassed works of art, and developed man's 

 sense of the beautiful; and laid the foundations of mathematics, astronomy, 

 logic, and medicine, besides those of poetry, the drama, and literature gener- 

 ally. In these circumstances, whilst determined to mete out ample justice 

 to modern science, it behoves us to speak with profound appreciation of 

 what men accomplished in the far past. According to Alfred Russell Wallace 

 the nineteenth century is responsible for the subjoined first-class intentions-- 

 railways, steam-navigation, electric telegraphs, the telephone, friction matches, 

 gas lighting, photography, the phonograph, RQntgen rays, spectrum analysis, 

 the use of anaesthetics, and the employment of antiseptics a truly wonder- 

 ful output for one century. 



- Here is a more comprehensive Baconian summary: " For myself I found 

 that I was fitted for nothing so well as for the study of Truth; as having 

 a mind nimble and versatile enough to catch the resemblance of things 

 (which is the chief point), and at the same time steady enough to fix and 

 distinguish their subtler differences; as being gifted by nature with desire 

 to seek, patience to doubt, fondness to meditate, slowness to assert, readiness 

 to reconsider, carefulness to dispose and set in order; and as being a man 

 that neither affects what is new nor admires what is old, and that hates 

 every kind of imposture." (De Interpretations Naturae Procemium, Spedding's 

 translation ) 



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