eld, and make it
useful, without knowing and obeying the laws and rules of that soil; and
then you can subdue and conquer that field, and change and train it, as I
may say, to grow what you like. You cannot conquer diseases without
knowing and obeying the laws by which God has made man's body, and the
laws by which fever and cholera and other plagues come.

Let me give you another instance. You all have seen lightning
conductors, which prevent tall chimneys and steeples from being struck by
storms, so that the lightning runs harmless downward. Now we can all see
how this is conquering the force of lightning in a wonderful and
beautiful way. But before you can conquer the lightning by a conductor,
you must obey the lightning and its laws most carefully. If you make the
conductor out of your own head and fancy, it will be of no use. You must
observe and follow humbly the laws which God has given to the lightning.
You must make the conductor of metal wire, or it will be useless. You
must make it run through glazed rings, or it will be only more dangerous
than no conductor at all; for God who made the lightning chose that it
should be so, and you must _obey_ if you wish to _conquer_.

Man could not conquer steam, and make it drive his engines and carry his
ships across the seas, till he found out and obeyed the laws which God
had given to steam; and so without breaking the laws, man turned them to
his own use, and set the force of steam to turn his machines, instead of
rushing idly out into the empty air.

So it is with all things, whether in heaven or earth. If you want to
rule, you must obey. If you want to rise to be a master, you must stoop
to be a servant. If you want to be master of anything in earth or
heaven, you must, as that great Lord Verulam used to say, obey God's will
revealed in that thing; and the man who will go his own way, and follow
his own fancy, will understand nothing, and master nothing, and get
comfort out of nothing in earth or heaven.

Well--when Lord Verulam told men his new wisdom, they laughed and
scoffed, as fools always will at anything new. But one by one, wise men
tried his plan, and found him right, and went on; and from that time
those who followed Lord Verulam began discovering wonders of which they
had never dreamed, and those who did not, but kept to the old way of
witchcraft and magic, found out nothing, and made themselves a laughing
stock. And after a while witchcraft