The first step,
however, the ascertaining whether the contrivance has the merit
of novelty, is most important; for it is a maxim equally just in
all the arts, and in every science, that the man who aspires to
fortune or to fame by new discoveries, must be content to examine
with care the knowledge of his contemporaries, or to exhaust his
efforts in inventing again, what he will most probably find has
been better executed before.
328. This, nevertheless, is a subject upon which even
ingenious men are often singularly negligent. There is, perhaps,
no trade or profession existing in which there is so much
quackery, so much ignorance of the scientific principles, and of
the history of their own art, with respect to its resources and
extent, as are to be met with amongst mechanical projectors. The
self-constituted engineer, dazzled with the beauty of some,
perhaps, really original contrivance, assumes his new profession
with as little suspicion that previous instruction, that thought
and painful labour, are necessary to its successful exercise, as
does the statesman or the senator. Much of this false confidence
arises from the improper estimate which is entertained of the
difficulty of invention in mechanics.
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