CHAPTER XVI.

THE INVENTORS, CIVIL ENGINEERS, AND MECHANICS OF ENGLAND, AND ENGLISH PROGRESS.

A Trade is better than a Profession. -- The Railway, Telegraph, and Steamship are more Potent than the Lawyer, Doctor, and Priest. -- Book-makers writing the Lives of the Inventors of last Century. -- The Workshop to be the Scene of the Greatest Triumphs of Man. -- The Civil Engineers of England the Heroes of English Progress. -- The Life of James Brindley, the Canal-maker; his Struggles and Poverty. -- The Roll of Honor. -- Mr. Gladstone’s Significant Admission that English Triumphs in Science and Art were won without Government Aid. -- Disregarding the Common-sense of the Savage, Legislators have chosen to learn of Plato, who declared that “The Useful Arts are Degrading.” -- How Improvements in the Arts have been met by Ignorant Opposition. -- The Power wielded by the Mechanic. 170