158 Mr Buchanan on the Strength of Materials. ^ 
ously to a real increase of wealth. Political economists speak' 
highly, and with justice, of the improvements occasioned by the 
use of a paper currency, which, in throwing a mass of specie 
out of circulation, adds it to the general stock of the country. 
In the same manner, the improvements which arise from an ex- 
tended application of the principles of strength, are continually 
throwing dead stock into active circulation, by opening the re- 
sources formerly locked up in the rude and unformed materials of 
our consumption ; and every discovery in this science, every new 
thought which can enable us to acquire strength, by a better 
disposition of materials, may be said, by its extensive application, 
and the prodigious mass of capital which it may relieve from em- 
ployment, to add millions to the national resources. 
Such being the important nature of this subject, it appears 
rather singular, that we should yet be ignorant as to various 
particulars regarding it ; and, that it should only have been of 
late, indeed, that any very accurate notions were entertained of 
it at all. The principles have no doubt been pretty clearly laid 
down, although even here, there is room for improvement.; 
but there is a want of accurate experiments to bring these prin- 
ciples to bear ; and without which they remain as a dead letter 
in the various works which contain them. Here, as well as in, 
various other instances, we observe, what is not a little remark- 
able in a country abounding both in science and in practical skill, 
a want of that proper combination which proves of such service 
to both. Philosophers have hitherto been in general rather refined 
in their notions, and often indeed push their theories to such an 
extreme, as to bring science itself into discredit ; while, practical 
men, without leisure to inform themselves, are left each to the 
uncertain light of his own narrow experience. Fortunately, how- 
ever, this evil is on the decline, and the advantages are becom- 
ing daily more apparent of conjoining practice with sound and 
accurate theory. 
The illustrious Galileo was the first philosopher who studied 
with attention the laws of the strength of materials. The vast 
works which he observed going on in the dock-yards and arsenal 
of Venice, appear to have roused his acute and inquisitive ge- 
nius, and, reflecting deeply on the subject, he succeeded in ex- 
plaining the effects arising from direct and cross strains, and by 
