1832.] State of Science in En gland. 201 



men envious of the brilliancy of Poet Laureate rhymes ? Or worse, 

 would they have science, too, oppressed with the administration of a 

 plethoric hierarchy ? Would they fatten it into indolence by inalienable 

 endowments ? Or would they disturb its serene atmosphere by the 

 storms of rivalry and ambition after secular preferments and distinc- 

 tions ? It is most marvellous, that of the two noblest and purest things in 

 the earth, religion and science, we should be told, on such high authority 

 as Lord Plunkett in the one case, and Mr. Babbage in the other, that 

 they will not exist unless nourished with money — they will have no 

 brightness, unless tinselled with the gewgaws of a vain life. Such a sen- 

 timent ought to be scorned. 



No civilized government can carry on its operations without patro- 

 nizing science, for the single reason that it needs both its men and its 

 materials. They are indispensable in innumerable ways for the effi- 

 ciency of its army and its navy, for its surveys at home and abroad, for 

 its mint, and for many other purposes : and in these things all kinds of 

 science are brought into requisition. This sort of patronage is whole- 

 some ; and we have only to wish that it were more wisely distributed. 

 But there appear to be some who would attach rather curious functions 

 to Government, as the great patrons of Science and Art ; functions 

 which would require a peculiar Board for the purpose of pensioning all 

 savans, painters, and poets, whose wits cannot keep them ; and investing 

 with baronetcies, or lordships, or earldoms, or dukedoms, men who ought 

 to ihirst for such things as the glory of discovering the alcaline metals, 

 or shewing a list of 700 double or treble stars, or producing the calculat- 

 ing machine. As I have said, a civilized Government must of necessity 

 patronise science, and Governments must likewise be the greatest 

 patrons of science ; but I cannot see that they are under any obligation 

 to dispense a gratuitous patronage, or that they would do any thing but 

 harm by such a thing. Because of their responsibility to those whose 

 money they spend, they are bound to require a quid pro quo in every 

 part of their expenditure. Government is the greatest individual pa- 

 tron of science, but if the community do their duty, their combined 

 patronage will throw that of the most liberal Government almost into 

 insignificance ; and it will flow through a thousand channels which no 

 state patronage could have reached, and where alone the coming Davys, 

 and Watts, and Murrays, and Tennants, are to be found and nourished. 

 Let scientific knowledge continue to be industriously diffused ; and 

 it will awaken the energies of such men as Sir James Hall and Sir 

 J. South, and many others who might be mentioned, whose place it is 

 to patronize, not to ask patronage : or if it fails to do this generally, 



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