The Imperial Institute

Abstract

FOR some time before the scheme of the Prince of Wales's Committee was before the public, there was a feeling that it seemed only too probable that the Imperial Institute would be merely a show-place for the amusement of sight-seers and for the benefit of the showmen. Happily this danger has been averted. Prof. Huxley and others have sounded a note which has now brought the real basis of trade and commerce to the front. It is possible that the mere trade-product view will now give way, so that, we may hope the scheme in its final form will be hardly less scientific than that sketched by us in the first of our articles on “Science and the Jubilee”(p. 217). If this anticipation is realised, the Institute will be in every sense a worthy memorial of the fiftieth anniversary of the Queen's reign, and will prove to be of enduring benefit to the whole Empire. There cannot be the slightest doubt as to the necessity for a vital change in our national way of regarding scientific as if they were opposed to industrial methods. There was a time when England, with her monopoly of coal and iron, had practically no competitors in the great markets of the world. By the splendid achievements of her inventors, and by the energy and promptitude of her manufacturers and traders, she had got so far —having such a monopoly of raw material—ahead of her rivals that the foremost place in commerce seemed to belong to her by a sort of natural right. Within the lifetime of the present generation all this has been changed. France, Germany, and other nations gradually became aware that they also, if they pleased, might play a prominent part in the industrial movement, and they set to work in the right way to fit themselves for the new conditions of modern life. Recognising that permanent success could be accomplished only by knowledge and organised effort, they provided for the education both of employer and employed by the establishment of schools, and by every means at their disposal encouraged the development of science. The consequence is that England has been driven from some markets in which she was formerly supreme, and that in others she finds it hard to maintain her ancient predominance. There is not the faintest chance that she will recover the ground she has lost unless she chooses to adapt herself to the altered circumstances by which she is surrounded. In commerce, as in all other relations, it is the fittest that survives; and if raw material fails, then greater knowledge alone can triumph; and the fittest commercial nation is the nation which equips its workers with the most exact knowledge, the most alert intelligence, and the most thorough technical skill. If the Imperial Institute is founded and carried on in accordance with the best and most characteristic ideas of our time, it may make Greater Britain greater yet, if it helps to bring British industry under the dominion of the scientific spirit; and to secure for it this magnificent position ought unquestionably to be the aim of all who undertake to press its claims on the attention of the public.