'SO THE president's ADDRESS. 



its employment for these purposes. Again, guncotton used in 

 musketry has noi, the disadvantage of fouling the gun ; it has much 

 less recoil, though the effect is the same ; one third of the charge 

 is the equivalent proportion as compared with gunpowder ; and 

 guncotton does not heat the gun. The ultimate substitution of 

 guncotton for gunpowder, for military and most other purposes, 

 thus appears to be quite possible. 



In view of all these improvements in destructive warfare, it ia 

 satisfactory to remember that, as instruments of war become more 

 destructive, experience hitherto has shown that wars become less 

 frequent, are of briefer duration when they do take place, and lead 

 to less loss of life in a generation, than when less effective means of 

 warfare are employed. 



An appreciation of the practical part of science may well be ex- 

 pected amongst a cultivated people. Its value in time of war, or 

 in promoting the useful arts in time of peace, is not at all likely to 

 be overlooked. So far as it is perceived to effect improvements iu 

 what ministers to the wants of men, science is pretty sure of 

 attention. Indeed every day and almost every hour of our lives, 

 we are reminded of the services which practical science has rendered 

 in making life easy, and in promoting in every way our physical 

 well-being. The additions made, directly and indirectly, to the wealth 

 and comforts, the convenience and pleasures, of civilised countries, 

 by the steam engine, the railway, and the electric telegraph, and by 

 the numberless machines and contrivances of which scientific know- 

 ledge has led to the construction, are too obvious to escape the 

 observation of any. "Who could fail to recognise the value of the 

 knowledge which serves to convert some raw material in nature to 

 human use ? or which serves to contrive a new machine that saves 

 labor ? or a new instrument that diminishes the cost of production ? 

 or a new method of any kind which leads by a shorter road to 

 wealth ? 



On the other hand, that part of human knowledge, the application 

 of which is either unknown or very remote, is less apt to receive 

 attention, and less apt to be duly appreciated, than the other. This 

 doubtless ought not to be so. Eeason and experience alike shew 

 that what seems more practical cannot long prosper if it be severed 

 from what is more theoretical and abstract ; what is speculative 

 to-day becomes practical to-morrow; what is merely curious when 



