128 SECTIONAL ADDRESSES. 



as illustrative of the man and of the times and not as an illustration of 

 what is required of a man called upon to nurse an invention in these more 

 peaceable days. 



The Inventor and the Promoter. 



Since I have touched on the chief characteristics required in the nurse 

 of an invention, it may not be inappropriate to refer also to the character- 

 istics of the two other members of the trio. 



In the Ordnance Department of the Admiralty there is a coloured 

 cartoon of a man with an emaciated body, an enormous head of the 

 encephalitic type, and wearing very concave spectacles, demonstrating 

 a precious invention to a Jack Tar, all muscle and little brain, carrying 

 an enormous spanner in his hand. Below it is the motto from ' Our 

 Fathers ' — 



' The optimist inventor should remember if he can, 



' Tho' the instrument is perfect, there are limits to the man.' 



That cartoon is perhaps typical of the attitude of many men towards 

 the class of men known as inventors. It is an attitude which is as old as 

 invention itself and will persist probably until the end of time. The 

 inventor's point of view, however, is that with the aid of invention there 

 are no ' limits to the man.' It is his whole object to eliminate the limita- 

 tions of the human element by giving to man the control through relay 

 mechanisms of power infinitely greater than his own and with little or no 

 expenditure of effort on his own part. The history of the past century 

 shows that he is succeeding beyond belief. His success will continue and 

 is bound to have a marked effect on the type of man of the future. 



The highest type of inventor is first of all an artist with a vivid imagina- 

 tion in certain and possibly limited directions. Like the painter he con- 

 ceives a mental picture and the picture grows as he proceeds to develop it. 

 Like most artists he is unconventional and as a rule diffident except, 

 naturally enough, in his own particular sphere. Unless he possesses also 

 the gift of clear exposition he cannot expound his invention and make 

 clear to others the mental picture he has created. Such a man has little 

 chance of working out his ideas and making his inventions commercial 

 propositions without the assistance of a promoter. 



The promoter is a man of means and imagination who generally knows 

 something about inventions or the branch of industry to which the inven- 

 tion relates, and is prepared to risk his capital in backing the invention. 

 It is only natural that he should back only the inventions for which he 

 can himself see a field of usefulness and be chary of those which he con- 

 siders comparatively useless or unlikely to provide him with an adequate 

 return for his risk. The great promoter is the man of vision who is not 

 content to finance minor inventions for improvements in a known industry, 

 but launches forth into the blue in support of an invention, unknown and 

 untried, like the first steam engine or the first iron ship, and cares nothing 

 for the sceptical criticism of the multitude who foretell disaster simply 

 because the invention is something beyond their ken. 



Much of the success of the great inventions of history has been due to 

 happy combination of inventor and promoter, as in the case of Watt 



