SCIENCE FOR ALL.

MR. PRESIDENT !

THE idea of the diffusion of knowledge beyond the circle of the learned class, may be said to be almost peculiar to the age in which we live. For although it is now some centuries since what is called publication was effected by the printing press, yet this was a publication to those who were already in private possession of the materials of knowledge, and was not much more than the exchange of manuscripts for books. This was undoubtedly an important alteration, fraught with many consequences; but it was never contemplated, at that time, that publication could embrace the whole public. Even Lord Bacon appears to have had but little idea that knowledge could be fostered by other than princes, or communicated more widely than from one learned body to another.

This, however, is probably not the opinion, and certainly it is not the temper, of the present generation. What with our "Rights of Man," and other self-evident thoughts and axiomatic phrases, we think that we are as fairly entitled to participate in the advancement of learning, as if we were all clergymen, or initiates, or even monks. It is in vain that we are warned that such and such intellectual dishes "are not good for us:" we insist upon tasting and judging for ourselves; and we sit down with all imaginable familiarity at the same table with the savans. We, who have stood so long behind their chairs, neither venturing to understand nor to smile, still less to mingle in the entertainment, are suddenly taught our rights and dignities, and moved to claim a dogmatical equality with our former masters, and, pursuantly, to share the feast, and enjoy the circumstance and freedom of the social board. Never

theless, as we are not completely acquainted with the manners or phrases of the learned, we require helps in both cases; and these helps, in general terms, consist in the diffusion of knowledge."

Those who have taught us this lesson so hard to be unlearnt, - those who have taught us to think in this novel fashion,have, to say the least of it, shown a laudable anxiety to fit us for our new position. Societies of charitable and energetic men, presiding over Useful and over Christian knowledge, have circulated manuals, at a small cost, on the one hand to enable us to sustain our rightful dignity with learned laymen; on the other, to cherish our endangered humility after the most approved manner of the clergy. The result is, upon the whole, that we feel ourselves nearly on a level with our teachers in both these particulars; and class knowledge, and class clericity even, are declared to be abolished; for every man is not only a professor, but also a clergyman in posse, as indeed Luther taught long ago.

But without dwelling too much upon our rights, which are apt to be barren where we cannot enforce them, it is obvious that the end for which knowledge was sought and recorded by the learned, and the end for which it is required by the multitude, are not the same, but different ends. I am now speaking especially of knowledge or science, and not so much of applied knowledge, or of the useful arts. The ends being different, the knowledge gathered by, and for, the one end, is not so serviceable as might be thought for the purposes of the other. Hence the choicest viands of the savans prove rather insipid and indigestible to the common world; and thus, like all servants, we are less content than our masters with ordinary fare. We stand upon our infinite rights and wants, while they are glad to put up with the best food that can be had.

The truth is, that the passion of learning, which has presided over the accumulation, and, to a great extent, over the formation of the sciences, aims rather at increasing intellectual property in a few hands, and transmitting it unimpaired from generation to generation, than in farming it out with a simple regard to the public service. It is the love of private possession in its com

pound form. All the tenements, plantations, fences, and other arrangements of such intellectual estates, are especially adapted for the system of individual proprietorship, and would be useless under a different mode of tenure. On the other hand, the awakened desire for knowledge in the unlearned world at least all that is peculiar in that desire, is the evidence of a state which condemns the largest fruits of the system hitherto, as poor and unsatisfactory; which twits the learned with unsolved problems, with public and private calamities; and, in a word, which measures human wants and attractions, against that small measure of satisfaction and fulfilment which the present condition can afford them. It is in vain that the learned demand to be judged by their own peers, and by their own intentions; it is in vain that they point to the deep ruts of learning, or plead that its possessions are not impaired in their keeping; that simple enlargement and accumulation have been their object from the beginning. These pleas are but a new aggravation of the difference already so great between them and their new judges and familiars. In a word, the very intentions of the two classes are toto cœlo contrarious.

This might undoubtedly be an excellent occurrence; for the variety of ends, compatibly with their harmony and true subordination, is the very enrichment of the human race. It may, however, be doubted whether the benignant diffusers of knowledge have taken sufficient account of it in their praiseworthy endeavors. They seem to imagine that the difference between the passion of the learned for knowledge, and the passion of the unlearned, is simply the difference between great and small; that the one is a large passion, and the other a lesser one for the same object; that the broken meat of the rich man's table is food made easy for the poor man's; that hard and dry sciences will be soft and succulent when presented in small pieces; that if a learned memory can hold a thousand disconnected facts, an unlearned memory must be tenacious enough to retain a tenth or a hundredth part of them.

Never, however, were they more mistaken. The general reader or inquirer cannot retain with ease and comfort more than a bare exception of the facts which constitute the peculium

of learning; unless indeed he find occasion to employ them in the business of life, in which case they pass from the sciences into the sphere of the arts. Otherwise they are foreign bodies in his mind, somewhat irritating for a time, but soon ejected or forgotten.

The contrary opinion arises from a very common ignorance of the multiplicity of human parts; in other words, from a great want of observation, with which, as respects whatever is largest and most obvious, the learned are much more chargeable than the vulgar. For the genera of memory are as various as the genera of man, and have distinct objects, and are subject to different excitements.

It is evident that scholars in all ages have had the greatest delight in the accumulation of learning; and this delight, so little attended to, yet so keenly pursued, is the secret spring and power of their memory. What we love, that we can remember. On the other hand, it is equally clear from the facts of the case, that the new class whom this age calls to participate in the sciences, has no mere love of learning, and consequently no memory for its details. But as memory lies at the basis of education, the question becomes important, whether ninety-nine hundredths of the human family are therefore to be excluded from the benefits and blessings of the knowledge of natural truths; whether they are condemned to take a few generalities on trust from others, to the exclusion of those multifarious particulars which give weight and consistency to the understanding of the sciences.

This is a question which the diffusers of knowledge have not proposed to themselves, much less attempted to answer. The scientific world has a pleasure in its science, and therefore retains it in mind; the general public is attracted to other objects, and scientific facts are faintly apprehended with whatever effort, and are no sooner heard than they fade from the recollection. The promoters of education appear to have a serious obstacle here, which requires their primary regard.

It must not, however, be thought that even the scientific memory is remarkable for strength and retentiveness. Putting out of sight the mathematical and mechanical sciences, and