Bacon, the great pioneer of physical science, erected the sign-post: for the path along which generations of his disciples have followed—Knowledge," he said, "is not a couch for the curious spirit, nor a! terrace for the wondering, not a tower of state for the proud mind, nor s vantage ground for the haughty, nor " shop for profit and sale, but a storehouse for the glory of God and the endowment of mankind." ne which contained liam Gascoyne-Cecil's arti-ele had other, and more real, details of China's perils. Casually glancing over the headlines, the following selection is made: "The Siang Valley Flood," "White Wolf's Success" and "New Likin Charges." Flood—robbery—extortion; it is the old, old story of Europe until the nineteenth century. Chaos and confusion—Nature and man op rossing the weak; that was the peril of existence until the lamp of science showed that the forces of Nature may be utilized for the benefit of mankind. We are learning that men reap greater rewards by sub-cluing nature and assisting his fellows than by the old barbarous methods of murder and robbery.
Somewhere in his writings the engineer-novelist, Robert Louis Ste-Yenson, says that gas-lambe are the best nocturnal police. That fs a statement which our well-intentioned moralists might keep always in memory. Piracy on the high seas became impossible when steamships appeared. The publicity of the luting press transformed the morality of statesmen. "If it is true that the increase of knowledge, the winning of a greater dominion over Nature, which is its consequence, and the wealth which follows upon that dominion, are to make no difference in the extent and intensity of Want, with its concomitant physical and moral degradation, among the masses of the people, 1 should hail the advent of some kindly comet, which would sweep the whole affair away, desirable consum-ote the scientist fifty years ago; so would say any thoughtful man to-day. "If it is true""—but it is not true. Those who have eyes to see are aware of the transformation in many parts of the world even since those lines were penned. "If it is true""—the not true is better n anything else that "God's in his Heaven—all's well with the world."
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.