22 IOWA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 



creates new compounds, — calcium carbide, the source of 

 acetylene gas; carborundum, the abrasive of the future; 

 and calcium nitride, which promises a new source of nitro- 

 gen to fertilize and renew exhausted soils everywhere. It 

 assists in the synthesis by which the chemist builds out of 

 the inorganic the dye, the perfume, the essence, and soon 

 perhaps the food which nature builds only by the processes 

 of life. Such are some of the functions of the new muscular 

 system with which electrical science has equipped the 

 body social. 



It is not claimed that pure science is the only factor in 

 industrial progress. Invention, business sagacity, and 

 many other causes co-operate. But the work of science is 

 essential, fundamental, creative. How far unaided inven- 

 tion can go may be seen in China. Here is. a people once 

 pliant of intellect and inventive. As artificers they still 

 are given high praise. But Chinese invention, destitute of 

 all scientific foundation, stopped with the fire cracker, the 

 movable type and the directive loadstone. It could not 

 go on to the Lyddite shell, the Hoe press, and the compass 

 of Kelvin with its eight balanced magnets protected from 

 the influence of the metal of the ship. Invention is 

 applied science, and, as has been well said, science must 

 first exist before it can be applied. Between the scientific 

 investigator, the discoverer of principles, and the inventor 

 who applies them, there need be no jealousy. If the latter 

 has the popular fame and the financial reward of the 

 present, it is often to the former that the future belongs, 

 and in any event, in the words of the generous Schley at 

 Santiago, "there is glory enough for all." And, after all, 

 why should the name of science be refused to that vast 

 body of knowledge, classified and tested, which is in daily 

 use in the laboratories of the industries of the world. 



But to science, even in its most restricted sense, the 

 debt of society is incalculable. It has evoked those good 

 genii, steam and electricity. Watt was led to the inven- 

 tion of the steam engine, not by a boy's glance at his 

 mother's tea kettle, but through the discovery by Black of 

 latent heat, and after two years of profound study of such 



