History, Modern -- 19th century; Nineteenth century
Engineering works could have been designed and useful inventions
made, but they could not have been carried out without combination.
Corporate organization collects the small savings of many into great
sums through savings-banks, life insurance companies, etc., and uses
this concentrated capital to construct the vast works of our days.
This could not continue unless fair dividends were paid. Everything
now has to be designed so as to pay. Time, labor, and material must
be saved, and he ranks highest who can best do this. Invention has
been encouraged by liberal patent laws, which secure to the inventor
property in his ideas at a moderate cost.
Combination, organization, and scientific discovery, inventive ability,
and engineering skill are now united.
It may be said that we have gathered together all the inventions of
the nineteenth century and called them works of engineering. This
is not so. Engineering covers much more than invention. It includes
all works of sufficient size and intricacy to require men trained in
the knowledge of the physical conditions which govern the mechanical
application of the laws of nature. First comes scientific discovery,
then invention, and lastly engineering. Faraday and Henry discovered
the electrical laws which led to the invention of the dynamo, which
was perfected by many minds. Engineering built such works as those at
Niagara Falls to make it useful.
An ignorant man may invent a safety-pin, but he cannot build the
Brooklyn Bridge.
The engineer-in-chief commands an army of experts, as without
specialization little can be done. His is the comprehensive design, for
which he alone is responsible.
Such is the evolution of engineering, which began as a craft and has
ended as a profession.
In past times, civilization depended upon military engineering.
Warriors at first used only the weapons of the hand. Then came military
engineering, applied both to attack and defence, and culminating in the
invention of gunpowder. The civilization of to-day depends greatly upon
civil engineering, as we have tried to show. It has changed the face
of the world and brought all men nearer together. It has improved the
condition of man by sanitary appliances and lowering the cost of food.
It has shown that through machinery the workman is better educated,
and his wages are increased, while the profits of capital increase
also. It has made representative government possible over vast areas of
territory, and is democratizing the world.
Thoughtful persons have asked, will this new civilization last, or will
it go the way of its predecessors? Surely the answer is: all depends
on good government, on the stability of law, order, and justice,
protecting the rights of all classes. It will continue to grow with the
growth of good government, prosper with its prosperity, and perish with
its decay.
THOMAS C. CLARKE.
RELIGION
CATHOLICISM
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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