176 
Proceedings of the Royal Society 
entrenching itself in the aspirations of the teacher and the taught, 
and though not yet comprehended by our statesmen, it must sooner 
or later receive the sanction of Parliament. 
The British Association, who have done more for science in a 
quarter of a century than all the Governments of England have 
done since the revival of learning, have taken up the subject of 
scientific education, and have issued an elaborate report which can- 
not fail to command the approbation of the public. The rejection 
of the School Bill, when twice submitted to the House of Commons, 
warns us that a tribunal so constituted is ill fitted to decide the 
great questions in which art and science, morality and religion, are 
so deeply concerned ; but in the great “ Leap into the Dark,” 
mysterious though it be, and deep as may be the abyss into which 
it has plunged us, we may yet have fallen upon a solid platform, 
from which orators, of a new class and loftier aspirations, may plead 
the cause of neglected science, of taxed and persecuted inventors, 
and of those higher and holier interests which statesmen have 
failed to advance or comprehend. 
In calling your attention to this subject, it may be useful to 
mention that the Report of the British Association was drawn up 
principally by Fellows of the Royal Society of London, and that 
they count upon the assistance of other institutions in carrying out 
the work which they have begun. That science itself will be ad- 
vanced by teaching it in our schools, and more fully in our univer- 
sities, is a proposition too obvious to be questioned. A startling 
fact, a striking experiment, and even a popular toy, has often 
given an impulse to geuius ; and some of the greatest of our dis- 
coverers, even Newton and Leibnitz, spent their early life in flying 
kites, making sun-dials, and constructing simple machines. The 
smattering of science in the school will acquire solidity in the 
university, and will re-appear in the workshop with valuable appli- 
cations. It was the chemical teaching of Dr Black that made 
James Watt the greatest inventor of his age; and it was the rush 
of electricity through a mile of wire that gave the electric tele- 
graph to the world. 
Extensive as is the scheme of scientific instruction and scientific 
training proposed by the British Association, we would venture to 
suggest that some knowledge, however small, of the fine and useful 
