586 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXIV. No. 619. 



ited by the industrial prosperity of the na- 

 tion, it is to be deplored that those who 

 have acquired great wealth from industrial 

 undertakings have as a class failed to show 

 in a practical way their appreciation of 

 their obligations to these institutions. 



To whom should the public look for the 

 facts concerning industrial undertakings? 

 Certainly to those who are engaged in the 

 work, who understand the underlying prin- 

 ciples involved; who, knowing all the de- 

 tails and appreciating that part truth often 

 serves to deceive, are honest enough to tell 

 the truth, the whole truth and nothing but 

 the truth. 



During the last decade the management 

 of our industries has been falling more and 

 more into the hands of the men who have 

 received a preliminary training in our en- 

 gineering colleges. If this is to continue, 

 it must be the graduates of our technical 

 colleges to whom we must look more and 

 more for protection from the evils to which 

 I have referred. Questions are continually 

 arising which can be settled only through 

 expert advice. The people must come to 

 have confidence in those who give these ex- 

 pert opinions. Unfortunately, the title 

 'expert' has been too often degraded by 

 those who have assumed to speak as such. 

 Too often our experts accept retainers to 

 tell part only of the truth and possibly to 

 cloud over, distort or deliberately hide other 

 parts of the truth. Such expert advice 

 brings discredit upon our profession and 

 affords an opportunity which the enemy is 

 not slow to seize. 



Again, the so-called expert often errs 

 through ignorance. It must come to be 

 recognized within our own ranks that the 

 fields of science and practise have so 

 widened of late years that no man can 

 honestly claim to be able to cover author- 

 itatively more than a limited area of either 

 of these fields. 



There are a number of fairly well de- 



fined branches of engineering, such as civil, 

 mechanical, mining, naval, electrical and 

 chemical. But no one man can hope even 

 to cover authoritatively every portion of 

 any one of these branches. To be thor- 

 oughly efficient, the engineer must closely 

 specialize within his profession. And yet 

 we find public opinion on intricate and com- 

 plex industrial questions based upon the 

 dictum of men who have at the best but a 

 general knowledge of the matters involved. 

 Especially it is to be regretted that gradu- 

 ates of engineering colleges, possibly com- 

 petent in some one branch of the great 

 field of engineering, presume to instruct in 

 connection with some other branch on 

 which their knowledge is only of a general 

 character. 



But the technical adviser, be he scientist 

 or engineer, to serve the state as I have 

 indicated, must have more than a knowl- 

 edge of material things, he must be honest 

 to the core. 



Education is a boon. It is well for a 

 nation that its youth should be educated, 

 as was argued by your Benjamin Franklin 

 and his associates. But a little knowledge 

 is a dangerous thing and much knowledge 

 may be even more dangerous if not built 

 on the foundation of character. 



The engineer, to be an engineer in any- 

 thing more than title, must be practical. 

 His work must be based upon correct and 

 complete theory, but it must be first and 

 last practical. Can the engineer — that is, 

 the civil engineer as distinguished from the 

 military engineer— be practical, can he 

 economically apply the truths of nature 

 for the benefit and convenience of man- 

 kind ; in other words, can he really be an 

 engineer, unless he is competent to prac- 

 tise his profession within the necessary 

 commercial limitations and in accordance 

 with standard business methods'? Can he 

 disregard the question of return on in- 

 vestment? These questions, if fairly put, 



