240 GOODYEAR ON GUM-ELASTIC. 



by those social barriers with which the sympathy and moral 

 feeUng of the community surround other rights of property. 



The history of inventions as well as authors, with few ex- 

 ceptions, proves that whoever attempts by inventions to im- 

 prove the condition of others, usually impairs his own, except 

 so far as he may add to his happiness, from the satisfaction 

 of having done good to others. A biographical collection of the 

 lives of distinguished inventors, would afford interesting, but sad 

 materials for the pen of an author. Among the unsuccessful, 

 no case is calculated more to excite our sympathies than that of 

 John Fitch, although his experiments should in no way detract 

 from the merit of Fulton, his successor. Yet in the recollection 

 of his sad fate, who can but wish that he might have lived to share 

 in Fulton's success. Among the records of successful inventors 

 who have made their improvements under the greatest embar- 

 rassments, and almost unparalleled discouragements, no one is 

 more exciting than the well authenticated, though brief history 

 of Paisley, the inventor of the methods of cementing porcelain. 

 The case of Whitney, although not one of pecuniary privation, 

 will afford a striking instance of inadequate compensation, com- 

 pared with the magnitude of the results of his discovery, and the 

 benefits conferred upon mankind. 



