NATURE 



265 



THURSDAY, JANUARY 20, 18S7 



THE IMPERIAL INSTITUTE 



FOR some time before the scheme of the Prince of 

 Wales's Committee was before the pubhc, there 

 was a feeling that it seemed only too probable that the 

 Imperial Institute would be merely a show-place for the 

 amusement of sight-seers and for the benefit of the show- 

 men. Happily this danger has been averted. Prof. 

 Huxley and others have sounded a note which has now 

 brought the real basis of trade and commerce to the 

 front. It is possible that the mere trade-product view 

 will now give way, so that we may hope the scheme 

 in its final form will be hardly less scientific than that 

 sketched by us in the first of our articles on " Science 

 and the Jubilee " (p. 217). If this anticipation is realised, 

 the Institute will be in every sense a worthy memorial of 

 the fiftieth anniversary of the Queen's reign, and will 

 prove to be of enduring benefit to the whole Empire. 

 There cannot be the slightest doubt as to the necessity 

 for a vital change in our national way of regarding scien- 

 tific as if they were opposed to industrial methods. 

 There was a time when England, with her monopoly of 

 coal and iron, had practically no competitors in the 

 gre.it markets of the world. By the splendid achieve- 

 ments of her inventors, and by the energy and prompti- 

 tude of her manufacturers and traders, she had got 

 so far — having such a monopoly of raw material — ahead 

 of her rivals that the foremost place in commerce seemed 

 to belong to her by a sort of natural right. Within 

 the lifetime of the present generation all this has been 

 changed. France, Germany, and other nations gradually 

 became aware that they also, if they pleased, might play 

 a prominent part in the industrial movement, and they set 

 to work in the right way to fit themselves for the new con- 

 ditions of modern fife. Recognising that permanent suc- 

 cess could be accomplished only by knowledge and or- 

 ganised effort, they provided for the education both of 

 employer and employed by the establishment of schools, 

 and by every means at their disposal encouraged the deve- 

 lopment of science. The consequence is that England has 

 been driven from some markets in which she was formerly 

 supreme, and that in others she finds it hard to maintain 

 her ancient predominance. There is not the faintest 

 chance that she will recover the ground she has lost un- 

 less she chooses to adapt herself to the altered circum- 

 stances by which she is surrounded In commerce, as in 

 all other relations, it is the fittest that survives ; and if raw 

 material fails, then greater knowledge alone can triumph ; 

 and the fittest commercial nation is the nation which equips 

 its workers with the most e.xact knowledge, the most alert 

 intelligence, and the most thorough technical skill. If the 

 Imperial Institute is founded and carried on in accord- 

 ance with the best and most characteristic ideas of our 

 time, it may make Greater Britain greater yet, if it helps 

 to bring British industry under the dominion of the scien- 

 tific spirit ; and to secure for it this magnificent posi- 

 tion ought unquestionably to be the aim of all who 

 undertake to press its claims on the attention of the 

 public. 



This aspect of the subject was kept prominently in view 

 Vol. XXXV. — No. Soo 



by all the principal speakers at the meetings in St. James's 

 Palace and the Mansion House last week. The Prince 

 of Wales laid the strongest emphasis on the fact that, in 

 all parts of the civilised world, commerce and manu- 

 factures have been profoundly affected by the progress of 

 science. " I have, on more than one occasion,'' he said, 

 "expressed my own views, founded upon those so often 

 enunciated by my lamented father, that it is of the greatest 

 importance to do everything within our power to advance 

 the knowledge, as well as the practical skill, of the pro- 

 ductive classes of the Empire. I therefore commend to 

 you, as the leading idea I entertain, that the Institute 

 should be regarded as a centre for extending knowledge 

 in relation to the industrial resources and commerce of 

 the Queen's dominions. With this view it should be in 

 constant touch, not only with the chief manufacturing 

 districts of this country, but also with all the colonies and 

 India. Such objects are large in their scope, and must 

 necessarily be so, if this Institute is worthily to represent 

 the unity of the Empire.'' 



Prof Huxley spoke at the Mansion House and, of all 

 the speeches delivered there, his was the most striking. 

 As the present needs of the nation, and how an Imperial 

 Institute might be made to help >is, are never likely to be 

 more lucidly or more impressively stated, it seems to us 

 that we shall do our readers good service by printing the 

 speech in full. Seconding the resolution proposed by 

 Lord Rothschild, " That this meeting pledges itself to take 

 all practicable steps to assist in the formation of the Im- 

 perial Institute, and to support it when brought into ex- 

 istence," Prof Huxley said: — 



" He wished to state, very briefly, his opinion of 

 the value of the proposed Institute from the iioint 

 of view of a man of science. The epoch coincident 

 with Her Majesty's reign was remarkable above all 

 corresponding periods of human history that he knew 

 anything about for two peculiarities. One was the 

 enormous development of industry, and the other was the 

 no less remarkable and prodigious development of physi- 

 cal science, which two developments, indeed, had gone 

 hand in hand. The opinion which he was now expressing 

 was not one formed ad hocior the purpose of this meeting. 

 It was one which he expressed two or three years ago when 

 taking leave of the Royal Society. It was a matter which 

 was perfectly obvious to any person who had paid atten- 

 tion either to the history of science or to the history of 

 industry, that there had been nothing, not only in any 

 period of fifty years, but in any century, in the slightest 

 degree comparable with the magnitude and the im- 

 portance of the growth of those two branches of 

 human activity which had taken place since 1037. 

 His memory went back far enough to call to mind 

 with great vividness a period when industry, or, at 

 least, the chiefs and the leaders of industry, looked 

 very much askance at science. The practical man then 

 prided himself on caring nothing for it, and made it a 

 point to disbelieve that any advantage to industry could 

 be gained by the growth of what he was pleased to call 

 abstract and theoretic knowledge. But within the last 

 thirty years more particularly that state of things had en- 

 tirely changed. There began in the first place a slight 

 flirtation between science and industry, and that flirtation 

 had grown into an intimacy, he might almost say court- 

 ship, until those who watched the signs of the times 

 saw that it was high time that the young people married 

 and set up an establishment for themselves. This 

 great scheme, from his point of view, was the public 

 and ceremonial marriage of science and industry. It 



