THE TECHNOLOGIST. [August 1, 1864. 



6 ON THE PHYSICAL SCIENCES WHICH FORM 



fighting men. The drams and trumpets of the band are at the disposal 

 of any combatant officer who has lawful occasion to give a signal to the 

 troops ; but the bandmaster himself never meddles with those exceed- 

 ingly analytical instruments, the guns and swords of the active com- 

 batants. 



Thus, then, in all its departments, and at all times, Technology 

 stretches forth both hands : with the one, receiving from the Observa- 

 tional Registrative Naturalist an organic or inorganic substance, a phy- 

 sical phenomenon, or a physical force ; and with the other, receiving 

 from the Directive, Transforming Experimentalist the means of changing 

 that rude material into many a precious product ; that terrestrial, or 

 sidereal, or cosmical phenomenon, into a faithful watcher and measurer, 

 that wild force into a patient, docile servant. 



After this explanation, I shall fall back upon the familiar division of 

 all the physical sciences, whether dealing with dead or living matter, 

 into two groups, viz. : — 



I. The Observational and Registrative, Natural History Sciences. 



II. The Directive and Tranformational, Experimental Sciences. 



Let us look more particularly at these contrasted groups. The 

 sciences which illustrate the contrast best are astronomy on the one 

 hand, and chemistry on the other. I shall commence with them. 



Astronomy, the oldest, the grandest, and the ripest of the sciences, is, 

 in relation to the physical objects which it considers, almost purely 

 observational. When we study it, we are like men reading a book under 

 a glass case, the leaves of which are slowly turned over by a self-acting 

 mechanism, so that two pages only can be studied at a time. If we 

 quickly exhaust the meaning of these pages, or tire of their perusal, we 

 cannot hasten the period when the leaf will turn over ; and if we miss 

 their meaning, or wish to dwell upon it, we cannot arrest or delay the 

 turning of the leaf, but must wait, it may be for a lifetime, till the cycle 

 is complete, and these pages are opened again. 



The magnificent clockwork of the heavens, with all its fiery glories, 

 its stately movements, and faultless machinery, is far beyond and above 

 our slightest interference. We cannot reach it, nor, if we could, dare 

 we approach to touch it. The humiliating contrast which any compa- 

 rison of the two brings to light, between the immensity and majesty of 

 the heavens and the littleness and impotence of man, presses too heavily 

 on the heart to allow us easiby to contemplate with merely intellectual 

 eyes the unapproachableness of the objects of astronomy. The greatest 

 of modern astronomers have often with their lips, and always, I believe, 

 with their hearts, uttered their amen to the star-loving king of Israel's 

 confession, " When I consider Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the 

 moon and the stars which Thou hast ordained ; what is man, that Thou 

 art mindful of him ? and the son of man, that Thou visitest Mm ?" 



But upon this moral aspect of the peculiarity of astronomy under 

 consideration I have no desire at present to dwell. I would rather on 



