Chapter LXXVII: Section I: Lack of General Ideas

When at Oxford, some years ago, during the meeting of the British Association, I met, amongst the few students still in residence, a young Englishman, a man of intelligence, with whom I became intimate.[396] He took me in the evening to the New Museum, well filled with specimens. Here short lectures were delivered, new models of machinery were set to work; ladies were present and took an interest in the experiments; on the last day, full of enthusiasm, "God Save the Queen" was sung. I admired this zeal, this solidity of mind, this organization of science, these voluntary subscriptions, this aptitude for association and for labor, this great machine pushed on by so many arms, and so well fitted to accumulate, criticise, and classify facts. But yet in this abundance, there was a void; when I read the Transactions, I thought I was present at a congress of heads of manufactories. All these learned men verified details and exchanged recipes. It was as though I listened to foremen, busy in communicating their processes for tanning leather, or dyeing cotton: general ideas were wanting. I used to regret this to my friend; and in the evening, by his lamp, amidst that great silence in which the university town lay wrapped, we both tried to discover its reasons.