Apologies are tendered for going into what may seem a technicality at such great length; but the author wishes to utilize this example to emphasize the importance of the original conception, the image pictured on the mind by the imagination. This original conception is of paramount importance in making inventions, not only of material mechanisms, but of all other things that can be invented, such as religions, laws, systems of government, campaigns, books, paintings, etc., etc. The final product cannot be better than the original conception, except by chance; for even if the development be absolutely perfect, the invention finally brought forth can be only equal to the original conception. It is obvious that the simpler the invention is the more easily it can be made equal to the original conception, and vice versâ. For this reason the stethoscope is a more efficient embodiment of the original conception than is that very inefficient product--the steam engine. The fact that the final product cannot be better than the original conception (except by chance) is the bottom reason for placing men of fine minds at the head of important organizations. It is the ideas conceived by the man at the head in any walk of life, that are developed by his assistants: at least, this is the intention, in all organizations, and the only efficient procedure. We see an analogue in the actual life of every individual. Now the conception is the work of the imagination, and not of the reasoning faculties: the reasoning faculties develop and construct what the imagination conceives. It is because of this that men of fine mentality sometimes devote their talents to evil ends: their imaginations have conceived evil pictures. Sometimes this is the result of a bad environment in childhood. The environment of Talleyrand's childhood, for instance, caused the conception in his imagination of evil aims. In 1860 Carré made the important invention of the manufacture of ice with the use of ammonia. In 1861 Craske improved stereotyping by making it possible to reproduce curved printing plates from flat forms of type. Green invented the driven-well in the same year, and McKay invented the shoe-sewing machine.