arrangement of their forms. In another department, the use of
the electrical conductor was a pure scientific combination, and the
sublimity of the discovery of the American philosopher was only equalled
by the happy application he immediately made of it. In our own times it
would be easy to point out numerous instances in which great improvements
and beneficial results connected with the comforts, the happiness, and
even life of our fellow creatures have been the results of scientific
combinations; but I cannot do this without constituting myself a judge of
the works of philosophers who are still alive, whose researches are
known, whose labours are respected, and who will receive from posterity
praises that their contemporaries hardly dare to bestow upon them.

_Eub_.--We will allow that you have shown in many cases the utility of
scientific investigation as connected with the progress of the useful
arts. But, in general, both the principles of chemistry are followed,
and series of experiments performed without any view to utility; and a
great noise is made if a new metal or a new substance is discovered, or
if some abstracted law is made known relating to the phenomena of nature;
yet, amongst the variety of new substances, few have been applied to any
trifling use even, and the greater number have had no application at all.
And with respect to the general views of the science, it would be
difficult to show that any real good had resulted from the discovery or
extension of them. It does not add much to the dignity of a pursuit that
those persons who have followed it for profit have really been most
useful, and that the mere artisan or chemical manufacturer has done more
for society than the chemical philosopher. Besides, it has always
appeared to me that it is in the nature of this science to encourage
mediocrity and to attach importance to insignificant things; very slight
chemical labours seem to give persons a claim to the title of
philosopher--to have dissolved a few grains of chalk in an acid, to have
shown that a very useless stone contains certain known ingredients, or
that the colouring matter of a flower is soluble in acid and not in
alkali, is thought by some a foundation for chemical celebrity. I once
began to attend a course of chemical lectures and to read the journals
containing the ephemeral productions of this science; I was dissatisfied
with the nature of the evidence which the professor adopted in