FINAL DEDUCTIONS. 



97 



law by complete energy-transformation, we could to- 

 day build engines of over 400 horse-power to the ton 

 weight, and that obstacle would be out of our way. 

 Could we completely transform heat or mechanical 

 power into light, a resulting advantage would also be 

 the reduction of the whole system of hght-producing 

 machinery in weight and bulk in corresponding degree. 

 These gains would be observed in innumerable direc- 

 tions. 



32. Costs. — On the other hand, nature in all her 

 transformations makes use of chemical processes and 

 organic and complex compounds that may prove to be 

 too costly as substitutes for the fuels, though the latter 

 are subject to present wastes ; and thus the question 

 of dollars and cents, always controlling, comes in to 

 confuse the wisest of scientific men. However that 

 may be, these problems must always afford instructive 

 lessons to the student of the mysteries of nature ; and 

 the bare possibility that by following her methods he 

 may find ways of so enormously benefiting his fellow- 

 man and of adding so greatly to the comfort, the 

 pleasure, the safety, and the opportunities of the race, 

 must be quite sufficient to stimulate every young 

 aspirant for fame and every lover of research to strive 

 to achieve some one or all of these solutions of the 

 grandest scientific problems that remain unsolved. It 

 seems more than probable that it is to the mysteries 

 and lessons of life that the chemist, the physicist, the 

 engineer, must turn in seeking the key that shall un 

 lock the still unrevealed treasures of coming centuries. 

 These constitute nature's challenge to the engineer. 



