failed altogether in practice, but why is this? it is not that the principles of nature operated in the one case and did not operate in the other, but that we have imperfectly understood them, that from some unforeseen circumstances we have been unable to apply them; or that we have indolently abandoned them without sufficient or proper trial. In many cases we are unable to obtain the same conditions of success upon the large scale that we have upon the small one. In other cases a process fails because of its too great expense; many attempts have been made to supersede steam as a motive power by means of electro-magnetism, and engines driven by that force have been constructed of five or ten horse-power, but the cost of driving them has been found to be at least ten times the amount of that of the steam-engine of equal strength. And in other cases we fail because we attempt at once to carry out upon a large scale that which has only been the subject of limited experiment, instead of enlarging the process by small degrees, and adapting the apparatus, the materials and the treatment, to the size of the operation.
That also which appears very simple in the hands of an experimentalist, almost invariably becomes much more complex when carried into practice in a manufactory, simply because there is then a greater number of conditions to be fulfilled. Electro-plating a piece of steel with silver is to a chemist a very simple matter, because it is of no importance to him
whether the silver adheres firmly, is of good colour, or is deposited at a certain cost; but with a manufacturer unless all these conditions are fulfilled, the process is a failure. These matters, however, belong to invention and not to original discovery.
We should not condemn theoretical science because we are not able, even with fair and persevering trial, to apply it to any useful purpose, but wait patiently until circumstances ripen for its application. Many inventions which are inapplicable in one state of knowledge become applicable by the progress of scientific research. The idea of an electric telegraph, attempted by Mr. Ronalds, in the year 1816, with the aid of frictional electricity, had to wait the development of the galvanic battery and the discovery of electro-magnetism before it could be successfully applied.
Many manufacturers seem to think that because some of their operations are completely routine, and have been handed down to them by their predecessors in nearly their present state, they are not at all indebted to science; but there is no manufacture, especially among metals, which has not in some degree been aided by scientific discovery.
In addition to the great benefits accruing from original research to all classes of society, our Governments have also derived immense advantages from the same source. The revenues have been greatly increased by the universal advantages conferred upon all kinds of industry and commerce by
scientific knowledge. The additional taxes upon increased incomes from agriculture, arts, manufactures, mines; increased value of land and rents; investments in railway, telegraph, steam-ship and other companies, have been extremely great. From the sale of patents alone, a surplus sum of nearly six hundred thousand pounds has already accumulated. Our Governments are also indebted to original research for the use of percussion-powder, gun-cotton, improvements in cannon, projectiles, rifles, armour-plated ships, the ocean telegraph, field telegraph, the telephone, rapid postal communication, the speedy transport of troops and war-material, and a multitude of other advantages. The value of science to Governments in the prevention of war by means of more ready correspondence through telegraph is incalculable. Mr. Sumner, of America, at the period when the Atlantic telegraph was first employed, stated that the use of that telegraph averted a probable rupture between Great Britain and America. There was a period when we did not possess such evidence of the great value of science; but that time has now passed away, and our governing men have had abundant proof of the national importance of scientific discovery, and of the essential dependence of the welfare of this country upon scientific research.
Whilst vast sums of money are spent upon the applications of science in military and naval affairs, research itself is neglected; the superstructure is
attended to, but the foundations are left to decay. A very small proportion of the money which is expended upon military affairs would, if devoted to research, save a great deal of expense in warfare:—
"Were half the power, that fills the world with terror,—