Grand River times. [volume] (Grand Haven, Mich.) 1851-18??, 1851-09-24
LITTLE THINGS.

N0thing 6e7ledtb me dttenta0n or great man.
This short sentence is inscribed over the door
Of small building in Holland, which was once
the workshop of Peter the Great; and furnish
es more than volumes of common description
and history could do, into the character of the
man who raised the Muscovites from the deepest
barbarism to the rank of civilization, and laid
the foundation of an empire, the extent Of which
the world as yet seems little able to comprehend.
One of the most fatal errors to which men
are subject is the disposition to treat small
things with contemptuous indifference; forget
ting that great things are but an aggregate of
small ones, and that discoveries and events of
the greatest Importance to the world can be
traced to things most insignificant in them
selves Nothing more truly marks an original
mind, and stamps its possessor as truly great
man, than the seizure of circumstances which
would pass unnoticed by the great multitude,
and by subjectng them to the powerful ANAL
ysis of his reasoning powers, deducing inferen-
ces of the greatest political results.
The power Of the loadstone to attract iron,
has been known from time immemorial; acct
dent discovered the fact that the magnetized
needle would indicate the NORTH but for long
time this truth was productive of no results
In the hands of Flavia Gioja, of Amalfi, it pro-
duced the mariners compass, an instrument
which has changed the whole course of CON-
merce and opened America and Australia to the
rest of the world. To mention only one of
the things that the use of the compass in mari
time discovery has led tot has given the pota-
to to Europe, and thus trebed the means of sub
sistence as well as doubled the population.
We owe the galvanic or Voltaic battery, one
of the most powerful instruments in advancing
science the world has yet seen, to Madame
Galvanis noticing the contraction of the mus
cles Of skinned frog, accidentally touched by
a person on whom her husband was at the mo-
ment making some experiments in electricity.
The experiments of Galvani and Volta were
followed up by Davy, Hare, and Siliman and
effects which have astonished and instructed the
world, have been the result. The dry galvanic
pile in the hands of the discoverer, De Luc, was
nothing more than scientific plaything.-
Singer, of London mechanic of genius, saw
the pile, and applied the power thus generated
to moving the machinery Of watch; and one
constructed by him has run more than sixteen
years without winding or loss of motion.
A chemist was at work in his laboratory pre-
pairing powder for certain purpose A spark
fell into this composition and it exploded; and
from that day gunpowder was discovered
Some may question the utility of this discovery,
but we do not. Gunpowder has materially aid
ed the miner, the founder, and the chemist it
has made war, where now carried on between
nations, much less evil than formerly but
more than all, it has given internal order and
tranquility to the kingdoms of Europe, by knock
ing down those strong holds Of feudal barbar-
ism and cruelty, the castles of naughty domi-
neering nobility, and placing the weak, so far
as regards protection by law, and security to
person and property, on level with the high
est.
A German peasant carved letters on the bark
Of beach tree, and with them stamped charac-
tiers on paper for the amusement of his children.
Nothing more was thought of them; but from
them Faust conceived and executed movable
types, and printing, an art that perhaps has ex-
ercised greater influence on the destiny of
mankind than any other, thus had a beginning.
Calico was in a church at Florence where q
drowsy Dominican was holding forth, on the
merits of the virgin, and the miracles of the
Holy Church, things about which the phioso-
pher cared but little. The principal lamp of
the church had been left suspended in such a
manner that it swung to and fro in the slightest
breath and caught the eye of the philosopher.
The regularity of its oscillations struck him,
and the idea Of employing such vibrations to
measure time occurred Calico left the church
and returned to his study, and in short time
the first pendulum ever made was swinging.
Some children, playing with the glasses of
Dutch spectacle maker, accidentally placed two
so that the steeple of church appeared much
nearer and turned bottom upwards. From this
small beginning was produced the telescope
an instrument which more than any other, has
enlarged the boundaries of the universe, and
given to man more exalted ideas of that Being
who spake all these worlds into existence.
About one hundred and fifty years ago an old
man might have been seen in his study appa-
rently amusing himself by Witnessing the es-
cape of steam from an old wine bottle, and then
checking it by instantaneously plunging it into
the cold water. There are multitudes would
sneer at an observer of nature who could stoop
to notice such trife; yet this expansion and
condensation of steam in the wine bottle, and
the train of thoughts which it suggested in the
hands of the Marquis of Worcester, gave birth
to the steam engine, the most valuable present
science has ever made to the arts. These very
men, now filled with delight and astonish-
ment when they behold the beautiful steamboat
mnJestically poughing the waves, or the steam
car whrling its train of carriages over the rail-
road with almost the rapidity of thought, would
be first to look and speak with contempt of the
train OF small causes that led to such important
results.
u.