The Hawaiian gazette., 1873-02-05

Thousands of intelligent Americans fancy that
things here are at the very top of the notch, be-
cause they either have never seen the countries
of the old world, and marked the enormous dis
parity between their culture and ours, or have
paid but little attention to the higher walks OF
science, art, music, architecture and literature, in
which the culture of Europe so far surpasses our
own. While we do not justify self-depreciation,
and have uniformly opposed and denounced croak-
ing, we yet cannot see what is to be gained by
being so entirely satisfied that the condition of
things here is so much in advance Of what can
be seen abroad 1t cannot be denied that we are
everywhere predOminantly practical people, aud
while this has its great advantages it has also its
disadvantages. On the one hand it has made our
material civilization an amazing fabric of rapid
construction; but, on the other hand, no one who
compares Europe with America can fail to see
that in the highest forms of cultivation we are
deplorably in arrears. 1t may be truly said that
this is not for want Of striving for no people ever
stove harder than ours to do everything within
the range of human effort. But there is defect
somewhere IN the machinery, since we see clearly
that we are constantly indebted to European in
telect and genius on such a scale that our own
contributions to the sum of human knowledge
will bear no comparison Herewith. The Patent
Office is our grand resource and pride, and when
we have pointed to that marvellous demonstra-
ton of the fertility of American invention, We
fancy that we have upset all that has been so
forciby said by such men as De Tocqueville.
But how many of these inventors who have
reflected so much honor upon their country, have
ever attained even fame during their lifetime as
reward for their achievements Morse is one of
the few exceptions. But Whitney, the inventor
of the cotton gin, obtained neither fame nor
money. And so it has been with the general
mass of American inventors. Their productions
have enriched others, while the men who invent
ed them obtained no adequate reward As to
the cultivation of pure science, it is really true
that it is neglected because We appreciate only
the practical. We have in our own city re-
markabIe instance of this 10 the Academy of the
Natural Sciences the finest institution of its kind
in America. 1t requires The constant supervision
and management of the abest scientists, and the
regular preparation or overhauling Of specimens,
and yet the institution is left without an endow-
ment adequate to the payment of any one for
such labors, aud the men who do the most of the
work are obliged to do it without pay and for the
love Of science in the intervals of other pursuits
1t is only within the last few years that our Uni
versty>could obtain the aid essential to its main
tenance and development upon proper scale.
There is much more to do in this world beside
building railroads and houses and bridges, and
manufacturing goods, and buying AID selling, and
piling up material wealth. However men may be
disposed to question it. knowledge really is power,
and it is because the knowledge is cultivated in
Europe, its highest forms, more assiduously than
here that the practical men of those countries are
constantly presented with more materials to work
upon in the discoveries and developments of
these men of intellect, art and science. 1t is a
great mistake to suppose that everything can be
taught in schools or colleges, or bought by money,
or brought forth voluntarily by men laboring in
private. There are many things for the develop
ment Of which great facilities are essential, and
the men who have the ability to do the work are
seldom in possession Of these facilities, or Of the
means to procure them. We must not merely
have free public libraries museums of science and
galleries Of art-we must encourage and sustain
the men whom we see industriously at work using
these for the purposes designed, even when we
cannot see that their aims are practical.