844 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXI. No. 805 



engineer and the scientist perform their 

 work steadily but quietly; they are not 

 appreciated by the unthinking multitude 

 because of the fact that their modesty is 

 usually as great as their achievements. 



True, I know some of them who do not 

 exactly "hide their light under a bushel"; 

 but show me the most vain engineer or the 

 most conceited scientist and he will appear 

 like the very picture of meekness and 

 modesty if you will put him alongside 

 some artists, some writers of fiction, some 

 opera singers, or opera composers. 



Let me insist on the fact that every one 

 of our betterments in material conditions, 

 every increase in our opportunities in life 

 has been the entering wedge of vastly im- 

 proved social, political and ethical changes. 



The steamships of to-day, to which the 

 armadas of yore and the fleets of antiq- 

 uity look like mere children's toys, bring 

 distant nations, distant men, nearer to- 

 gether; so do the railroad, the press, the 

 telegraph, the telephone. 



Not only have time and distance been 

 shortened by the industrial applications of 

 science, but life has been lengthened in 

 years, and still much more in accomplish- 

 ments and in opportunities. 



Improved means of communication do 

 not only facilitate the exchange of products 

 between far-away nations, and allow them 

 to compete in quality and price in the 

 most remote corners of the world's market, 

 but they enable more lasting exchanges 

 than merely those of material commodities ; 

 we intermingle, develop and distribute 

 thoughts and knowledge which slowly but 

 surely modify and perfect the political and 

 ethical conditions of nations as well as of 

 individuals. 



Not so long ago, opportunities for travel, 

 for education, wealth or comfort of exist- 

 ence, were given only to a very few; now 

 in our modern community all these advan- 



tages have come within the reach of the 

 multitude, and all this, thanks to our in- 

 dustrial developments. 



Much has been said and written about 

 the civilizing influence of the discovery of 

 the printing press. Has it ever occurred 

 to you that the printing press could accom- 

 plish very little if we had not invented the 

 means for manufacturing cheap and good 

 paper? In the same way, every facility 

 which science and engineering has endowed 

 the world with finds itself reflected in the 

 ever-increasing development of printed 

 publications. For one book that was 

 written a few centuries ago, thousands, 

 and better prepared ones, are published 

 nowadays. Ancient authors had few com- 

 petitors and few readers, and the latter 

 could afi'ord to remember the names of 

 their authors, and greatly exaggerate their 

 merits, and overawe following generations 

 with the extent of their importance and 

 hypnotize some of us into the belief that 

 there are no good authors but dead au- 

 thors, or ancient authors, an opinion un- 

 fortunately shared by some respectable 

 pedagogues. 



To-day, when illiteracy is no longer the 

 rule but the exception, new ideas, new 

 conceptions are carried to all points of the 

 globe: measured, discussed, hacked to 

 pieces, or developed, all this with a rapidity 

 never attained heretofore; and I believe 

 that one of the most important causes of 

 our rapid mental and industrial progress is 

 due to the very swiftness with which in- 

 formation and knowledge penetrate the 

 masses. 



The man who nowadays would try to 

 stem the tide of ideas, or intellectual ad- 

 vance, would only succeed in making him- 

 self ridiculous. 



In the middle ages, some devout people, 

 not knowing better, could try to bum 

 scientists and their books, and opposed for 



