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no motive for pursuing that from which we expect to evolve no good effect, nor to receive recompense or pleasure. The little reward and encouragement accorded to the higher kinds of scientific research in this country, and the consequent great self-denial required in order to pursue it, often compel even the most devoted of scientific men to abandon such labour. The chief reward of original scientific research is the pleasure of contemplating the intrinsic worth, and consequent benefit to mankind, of the new knowledge obtained; and such a reward could only be valued by a lover of truth and benevolence. Fame is a less reward of research; it affords no means of subsistence, and comparatively little of it is accorded to a discoverer during his lifetime, because the value of his labours is then understood only by a few persons; even popularity can be obtained by much easier means, viz., by delivering popular lectures on science, and writing popular scientific books.

Fame is the birthright of genius. The fame of a scientific discoverer is largely dependent upon a combina tion of suitable circumstances; that of Franklin was mainly due to his being a public man, as well as to the striking character of his experiments, as the drawing electricity from the clouds, &c. The publicity enjoyed by a popular lecturer enables him to obtain a larger degree of repute from his discoveries than a private investigator. Some of the most important discoveries often do not attract much notice at the time (for instance, Dufay's discovery that there are two kinds of electricity; Young's discovery of the cause of polarization of light); whilst the finding of a popular trifle makes a man famous at once.

The most fundamental personal motive and condition of success in original scientific research is an intense and

U

unquenchable love of truth. A scientific investigator should love truth with unceasing fervour, and avoid error with all his might, and unless he does so he will not be able to make many important discoveries. This statement does not, however, mean that the love alone of truth is sufficient to enable a man to make discoveries, but only that it is one of the necessary motives and conditions.

6

We cannot intelligently love that which we cannot form an idea of, nor discover that which we cannot discriminate when it is present; and if we cannot discriminate truth, we cannot intelligently love it, nor can we discover it. This raises the question, what is truth? and how can we detect it? questions which have occupied the minds of men during many ages, and even now are only partially solved. These questions have been already discussed in Chapter XIII. on the Criteria of Scientific Truth'; and I have there shown, and also in Chapter XXXVI. on the Use of the Intellect in Scientific Research,' that scientific truth is that which is universally consistent with nature, and that the intellect in general, and the reasoning power in particular, is the sole means by which we apprehend, distinguish, and select truthful ideas. What, therefore, is worthy of love and pursuit, the intellect (acting upon the evidence supplied by the external world and our own faculties) decides for us.

The love of truth and its beneficent effects, and the fear of error and its evil consequences, are the purest motives of human action, because they do not excite selfish expectations or unreasonable desires; and to employ unregulated lower motives in the pursuit of pure science, would be to use inferior means to effect a good object.

Scientific investigators are also stimulated by the same general cause which excites most men to devote themselves to other occupations, viz., the health and pleasure deriv

LOVE OF FAME STIMULATES RESEARCH.

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able from physical and mental activity. A desire for fame is also a powerful inducement in many cases. Pecuniary motives can act but feebly in original scientific research, because but little money can be obtained directly or indirectly by such means. A man who works at science for money only, will gain but poor repute in it. In consequence of these circumstances, those who follow research through the whole of their lives are those only who pursue it from the worthiest of motives.

The love of power is also a stimulus to research. That the study of the order of nature does add to man's power, the history of the sciences has abundantly shown. But though this hope of derivative advantages may stimulate our exertions, it cannot govern our methods of seeking knowledge without leading us away from the most general and genuine form of knowledge. The nature of knowledge must be studied in itself and for its own sake, before we attempt to learn what external rewards it will bring us.'1

Properly viewed, i.e., in its widest aspect, original research is to a certain extent a duty and a necessity attached to the profession of science, because it is a most important part, and the highest in kind, of scientific labour, and the most praiseworthy means of attaining scientific repute; and it may be fairly compared with the time gratuitously given by medical men in attendance at hospitals. Scientific men of the present time also have been benefited by the researches of men of the past, and it is only fair that they should yield a similar return to men of the future.

The circumstances most likely to damp the ardour, and destroy the motives for research in an investigator, are to find that after having made and published a long and laborious investigation, the conclusions were all a mis

'Whewell, Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, vol. i. p. xiv.

take; or to discover that after having nearly completed such a research, some one has published a similar one on the same subject. In this latter instance, however, it is very rarely the case that the methods of working of the two investigators are exactly the same, or the results they have obtained are exactly identical. It is almost impossible, in a new subject of research to which a number of workers have been suddenly attracted, that each worker whilst ignorant of his neighbour's exact employment, should be able to keep to a perfectly separate part of the subject; an example of this occurred with Jannsen and Lockyer, when separately discovering the mode of observing the solar flames by means of spectrum analysis. Another circumstance likely to diminish the incentive to research, is to prematurely disclose the chief idea or result: What thou intendest to do, speak not of before thou doest it.'2

There are several instances on record in which able discoverers have for special reasons kept secret their discoveries for a time. By dint of industry and perseverance, Galileo had succeeded in perfecting his telescopes, so that for some time he obstinately refused to impart to anyone the manner in which he made them, and it was not until his eyesight began to fail him, that he consented to create a manufacturer in the person of Ippolito Mariani, commonly called Il Torado." Wollaston, also, for a long time kept secret his process of welding platinum.

1 See p. 107.

2 Pittachus.

Address of Professor De Eccher. Conferences Special Loan Collection. London, 1876.

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CHAPTER XXX.

ADVANTAGES OF PREVIOUS SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE.

It is a pleasure to stand upon the shore, and to see ships tost upon the sea; a pleasure to stand in the window of a castle and to see a battle and the adventures thereof below; but no pleasure is comparable to the standing on the vantage ground of truth (a hill not to be commanded, and where the air is always calm and serene), and to see the errors and wanderings, and mists and tempests, in the vale below: so always that this prospect be with pity and not with swelling or pride.—BACON.

ALL great discoverers have possessed extensive knowledge. A discoverer cannot work without materials for thought, any more than without substances to experiment with. From nothing nothing can come; even original research does not create ideas, although it is sometimes said to do so. Existing knowledge is the basis of future discovery; all our knowledge of the future is implicitly wrapped up in nature; we require to stand upon the terra-firma of the known, in order to stretch outwards into the darkness and uncertainty of the unknown. New knowledge, when to any purpose, must come by contemplation of old knowledge, in every matter which concerns thought.' 'All the men who are now called discoverers, in every matter ruled by thought, have been men versed in the minds of their predecessors, and learned in what had been before them. There is not one exception.' It is remarkable how many of the greatest names in all departments of knowledge have been real antiquaries in their several subjects."

1 A. de Morgan, A Budget of Paradoxes, p. 4.