Invention: The Master-key to Progress

PREFACE

To show that inventors have accomplished more than most persons realize, not only in bringing forth new mechanisms, but in doing creative work in many walks of life, is, in part, the object of this book. To suggest what they may do, if properly encouraged, is its main intention. For, since it is to inventors mainly that we owe all that civilization is, it is to inventors mainly that we must look for all that civilization can be made to be.

The mind of man cannot even conceive what wonders of beneficence inventors may accomplish: for the resources of invention are infinite.

The author is indebted to Ginn & Company, Boston, for the use of illustrations from "General History for Colleges and High Schools," by Philip Van Ness Myers, and "Ancient Times, A History of the Early World," by James Henry Breasted, and to George H. Doran Company, New York, for the use of a map from "A History of Sea Power," by William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott.

CHAPTER I

INVENTION IN PRIMEVAL TIMES

Our original ancestors dwelt in caves and wildernesses; had no sewed or fabricated clothing of any kind; subsisted on roots and nuts and berries; possessed no arts of any sort; were ignorant to a degree that we cannot imagine, and were little above the brutes in their mode of living. Today, a considerable fraction of the people who dwell upon the earth enjoy a civilization so fine that it seems to have no connection with the brutish conditions of primeval life. Yet, as these pages show, a perfectly plain series of inventions can be seen, starting from the old conditions and building up the new.

The progress of man during the countless ages of prehistoric times is hidden from our knowledge, except in so far as it has been revealed to us by ruins of ancient cities, by prehistoric utensils of many kinds, and by inscriptions carved on monuments and tablets. The sharp dividing line between prehistoric times and historic times, seems to be that made by the art of writing; for this epochal invention rendered possible the recording of events, and the consequent beginning of history.

Of prehistoric times we have, of course, no written record; and we have but the most general means of estimating how many millenniums ago man first had his being. Geological considerations indicate a beginning so indefinitely and exceedingly remote that the imagination may lose itself in speculations as to his mode of living during those forever-hidden centuries that dragged along, before man had advanced so far in his progress toward civilization as to make and use the rude utensils which the researches of antiquarians have revealed.

Inasmuch as the most important employment of man from his first breath until his last has always been the struggle to preserve his life; inasmuch as the endeavor of primeval man to defend himself against wild beasts must have been extremely bitter (for many were larger and stronger than he), and inasmuch as man eventually achieved the mastery over them, one seems forced to conclude that man overcame wild beasts by employing some means to assist his bodily strength, and that probably his first invention was a weapon.

The first evidences of man's achievements that we have are rude implements of stone and flint, evidently shaped by some force guided by some intelligence; – doubtless the force of human hands, guided by the intelligence of human minds. Many such have been found in caves and gravel-beds over all the world. They were rough and crude, and indicate a rough and crude but nevertheless actual stage of civilization. Some call this the Old Stone Age and others call it the Early Stone Age. Besides stone and flint, bones, horns and tusks were used. Among the implements made were daggers, fish-hooks, needles, awls and heads of arrows and harpoons. One of the most interesting revelations of those rude and immeasurably ancient implements is the fact that man, even in those times, possessed the artistic sense; for on some of them can be seen rough but clear engravings of natural objects, and even of wild animals.

Men naturally supported themselves mainly by hunting and fishing, as savages do now; and it was because they had invented suitable implements and weapons for practicing those necessary arts, that their efforts were successful. The first weapon was probably the fist-hatchet, a piece of sharpened flint about nine inches long, that he grasped in his hand. At some time during the centuries of the Old Stone Age, someone invented a much finer weapon, that continued to be one of the most important that was known, until the invention of the gun, and is used even now in savage lands – the bow and arrow. What a tremendous advantage this weapon was in fighting wild beasts (and also men not possessing it) it is not hard for us to see; for the arrow tipped with flint or bone, could be shot over distances far greater than the spear or javelin could be thrown, and with sufficient force to kill. The club and spear had probably been devised before, for they were simpler and more easily imagined and constructed.

How the bow and arrow came to be invented we have no intimation. The invention of the club and spear did not probably involve much creative effort, so simple were those instruments, and so like the branches that could be broken from the trees. Yet, to the untrained mind of the primeval savage, the idea of sharpening a straight branch of wood into a fine point at the end, in order that penetration through the skin might be facilitated, must have come as an inspiration. No such thing as a spear exists as a spear in nature, and therefore the making of a spear was a creative act. To us, the use of the spear as a projectile may not seem to have required the inventive faculty – unless the hurling of stones may also be supposed to have required it. It may be, however, that with the dull mind of primeval men, even the idea of using stones or javelins as projectiles was the result of a distinct, and perhaps startling inspiration.

The invention of the bow and arrow was one of the first order of brilliancy, and would be so even now. It is not easy to think of any simple accident as accounting for the invention; because the bow and arrow consists of three entirely independent parts – the straight bar of wood, the string, and the arrow; for the bow was not a bow until the string had been fastened to each end, and drawn so tight that the bar of wood was forced into a bent shape, and held there at great tension. When one realizes this, and realizes in addition the countless centuries during which the bow and arrow held its sway, the millions of men who have used it, and the important effect it has had in the overcoming of wild beasts, and the deciding of many of the critical battles of the world, he can hardly escape the conclusion that the invention of the bow and arrow was one of the most important occurrences in the history of mankind.

A still more important occurrence was the invention of making fire. Probably less inventive effort was needed for this than for the bow and arrow; for fire could be seen in the lightning and in trees struck by lightning, and in the sparks that came forth when two hard stones were struck together. The discovery of fire may have been made by accident; but this does not mean that no invention was needed for devising and producing the means whereby fire could be produced at will. To note the fact of a phenomenon, say the production of fire when stones are accidentally struck together, or the falling of an apple from a tree, requires no special effort, and of itself brings forth no benefit; but to reason from the appearance of the sparks to the production of an apparatus for making fire at will; or to reason from the falling of an apple to the enunciation of Newton's Law of Gravitation, is the kind of successful mental effort that has produced the effects which it is the endeavor of this humble book to indicate. These effects have combined as progress has advanced, to put civilized man in a position relatively to his natural surroundings very different from that held by primeval man, and very different from that held by the brutes, both in primeval days and now. Evidently, the effects have been made possible by some faculty possessed by man and not by brutes. This faculty is usually called reason, and is held to be a faculty by means of which man can infer cause from effect, and effect from cause, and can remember events and facts to a degree sufficient to enable him to hold them in his mind, while reasoning about them.

But it seems impossible to explain the advent of even the oldest and simplest inventions by the possession of reason only, using the word reason in its ordinary sense; for it is obvious that no matter how clearly a man could reason as between cause and effect, no matter how great a student of all phenomena he might be, no matter how good a memory he might have, he might nevertheless live for many years and never invent anything. In fact, we see men at the present day who possess great knowledge, splendid energy, keen powers of analysis, high courage, and even great administrative talent, and yet who are obviously deficient in originality, who seem to possess the constructive faculty in only a small degree, and who seem incapable of taking any step forward except on paths that have been plainly trod before.

Countless instances can be cited of the persistence of men, even in civilized lands, in following a certain practice for long periods, until someone possessing the inventive faculty has devised a better one. For the sake of brevity, only two cases, and those well known, will be mentioned as illustrative. One was the invention of movable type, and the other that of pointing the wood screw. Man had continued for centuries to make blocks of wood or other material on which words and phrases were engraved or cut, and then to print from them. Suddenly a man in Germany (usually said to be John Guttenberg) made the change, so slight in appearance and yet so tremendous in results, of cutting only one letter on a block, and arranging and securing the blocks in such a way as to enable him to print any word or words desired. This did not occur until about the year 1434 A. D. Why had not someone done this in all the long centuries? Surely it was not because men of great reasoning faculties had not lived; for in the long interval the civilization of Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Greece and Rome had flourished; and Plato, Aristotle, Cæsar and the great inventor Archimedes had lived! Similarly, men continued to use in wood the same flat pointed screw that they used in metals, boring the hole first in the wood with a gimlet, and then entering the flat point of the screw into the hole. Suddenly (but not until the nineteenth century A. D.) an inventor made and patented a screw which came to a sharp point like a gimlet, which could be forced into wood just as the gimlet was, and then screwed into the wood without further ado. How can we explain the curious fact that countless men of reason, intelligence and mechanical skill had continued century after century to bore into wood with gimlets, and then follow the gimlet with flat-pointed screws?

The explanation seems to be expressed in the phrase, "the idea had not occurred to them." Why had it not occurred to them? This question cannot, of course, be answered convincingly; but it may be pointed out that there is a small class of men to whom original ideas seem to come of their own accord. The inventor of mechanical appliances is in this class, and is perhaps its most conspicuous exemplar.

It may be pointed out, however, that the inventors of mechanical appliances are not the only men to whom original conceptions come; for original conceptions evidently come to the poets, the novelists, the musical composers, the artists, the strategists, the explorers, the statesmen, the philosophers, the founders of religions and the initiators of all enterprises great and small. It may be pointed out also that their mental processes are similar, and that they are best described by the greatest of all poets in the lines —

These lines suggest that the first step in invention is made almost without effort; that a picture, confused and dim but actual, is made by the imagination on the mental retina; and that, after that, the constructive faculties arrange the elements of the picture in such wise as to produce a clear and definite entity.

Regarded in this way, the inventor of mechanical appliances suddenly sees a confused and dim picture of an instrument or a mechanism (or a part of it) that he has never seen with his bodily eyes; the musical composer hears imperfectly and vaguely a new musical composition; the sculptor sees a statue, the painter sees a new combination of objects and colors producing a new effect, and the poet feels the stirring in him of vague, but beautiful, or powerful or inspiring thoughts. If now the picture is allowed to fade, or if the constructive faculty is not able to make it into an actuality, or if the picture has not in itself the elements which the state of civilization then prevailing make it possible to embody in an entity, no invention of a mechanical appliance is made, no plan of campaign, no musical composition, no statue, no painting, no poem is produced.

If, however, the constructive effort develops successfully the conception that the imagination made, and if the circumstances of time and place are all propitious, then the art of making fire at will is born, or Bonaparte's suggestion at Toulon is made, or the strains of Beethoven's music inspire the world, or the statue of Moses is carved, or the Immaculate Conception is pointed, or Hamlet is written, or the electric telegraph binds the peoples of the earth together.

The inventor in mechanics, the sculptor, the painter, the novelist and the poet embody their creations in material forms that are enduring and definite, and constitute evidences of their work, which sometimes endure throughout long periods. The architect and the constructing engineer are able similarly to produce lasting and useful monuments to their skill; but it can hardly be declared that their work is characterized by quite so much of originality and invention, because of the restrictions by which the practice of their arts is bound. It is, in fact, hard to conceive of a bridge very different in principle or design from bridges that had been built before; and while it is not difficult to conceive of an engine different in principle and design from previous ones, yet we realize that the points of novelty in such an engine would be attributable more to invention than to engineering. This is because the arts of engineering and architecture rest on principles that have long since been proved to be correct, and on practices that are the results of long experience; whereas one of the main characteristics of invention is novelty.

It is true that many of the most important inventions have been made by engineers; but this has been because some engineers, like Ericsson, have been inventors also. But it is also true that only a small proportion of the engineers have made original inventions; and it is equally true that many inventions have failed – or have been slow in achieving success – because of lack of engineering skill in construction or design. These facts show that the work of the inventor is very different from that of the engineer, and that the inventor and the engineer are very different people, though an engineer and an inventor sometimes live together inside of the same skin. In fact, it is by a combination of inventive genius and engineering talent in one man that the greatest results in invention have been achieved; though great results have often followed the intimate cooperation of an inventor and an engineer, the two being separate men.

It is in the latter way that important advances have usually been made; and it is somewhat analogous to the way in which authors and publishers, actors and managers, promoters and capitalists cooperate.

But while the individuals whose inventions have taken the form of new creations, such as novel machines and books and paintings, have received the clearest recognition as men of genius, may not the inventive faculty be needed in other fields and be required in other kinds of work? If an instrument is produced by the joint exercise of imagination and constructive talent, is not every puzzle worked out, and every problem solved, and every constructive work accomplished by the similar exercise of those same faculties?

It may seem obvious that this question should be answered in the negative, and so it unquestionably should be. But there always has been much cloudiness as to what constitutes invention in our own minds; and it must be admitted that the dividing line is not immediately obvious between invention and the art of meeting difficulties with resourcefulness, or between invention and the act of solving any of the perplexing riddles of our daily lives.

It may be declared with confidence, however, that the difference between invention and any one of these other acts is that, while invention ends in performing such acts, it begins with an exercise of the imagination. A man who designs an engine to fulfil a stated purpose, who solves any problem whatever that is presented to him from outside, simply accomplishes a task that is given to him to accomplish; whereas, while the inventor accomplishes a similar task, he does it as a second step in a task that was not given him to accomplish, but that he himself had pictured to himself. The act of inventing consists of three separate acts – the act of conceiving, the act of developing, and the act of producing. Of these three acts, that of conceiving is obviously not only the first, but also the most important, distinctive and unusual.

For every real invention, there have been countless constructive acts. In the invention of the bow and arrow, the conception was probably instantaneous and unbidden. The subsequent work of developing the conception into material and practical shape was probably one of long duration, consisting of many acts, accompanied with many difficulties and disappointments, and accomplished finally in the face of much active and passive opposition.

The Old Stone Age gradually developed into the New Stone Age at different times in different localities, as successive improvements in implements were made. The New Stone Age was distinguished from its predecessor mainly by the fact that the principal weapons and utensils were formed into regular shapes, polished into smoothness, and in many cases ground to sharp points and keen cutting edges. These improvements made the implements more effective both as weapons and as utensils, by facilitating not only cutting but penetration.

How much invention was needed to make these improvements, it is not easy to decide; but probably only a little was required, and that of an order not very original or high; for the improvements were rather in detail than principle. Perhaps their character can be best indicated by saying that they were improvements, rather than inventions of a basic kind.

It may here be pointed out that the act of improving upon an invention already existing may be almost wholly a constructive act, performed on a visible and tangible material object, and not on a picture made by the imagination on the mind. In such a case, the act of improving belongs rather in the category of engineering than of invention, for the reason that it involves only a slight use of the imagination. It may also be pointed out, however, that a mere improvement may be, and sometimes has been an invention of the highest order. As a rule, of course, basic inventions have been the most brilliant and also the most important.

But it was not only by polished instruments of stone and bone that the New Stone Age was characterized; for we find in the records which our ancestors unintentionally left us, many evidences that they had invented the arts of making pottery, of spinning and weaving, and of constructing houses of a simple kind. This Age was characterized by many improvements besides those relating to articles of stone, and was a period far in advance of its predecessor on the march to civilization. It was marked by the domestication of animals and plants, the tilling of the soil, and a gradual change from a purely savage and nomadic mode of life. This change was first to a pastoral life, in which men lived in fixed habitations and tended their flocks; thence to an agricultural life, in which men cultivated the ground over large areas and grew crops of cereals and vegetables; and then to a still more settled existence, in which men congregated in villages and towns. Certainly, the race had taken the first steps, and had started on the path which it has since pursued.

In order to make the start and to proceed afterwards in the line begun, many physical, mental and spiritual attributes were needed and employed, that mere brutes did not possess, and because of which the civilization of the Old Stone Age had been begun and gradually developed. Of these faculties, those principally characteristic seem to have been mental; and among those faculties, invention, reason, construction and memory seem to have been the most important. It would be unreasonable to declare any one of those faculties to have been more important than the others; but it can hardly be denied that the first steps in the march of progress should be credited to invention. Clearly, it was the weapons and utensils of the Old Stone Age that made possible the subduing and subsequent domestication of certain animals, such as the horse, the cow, the dog, the sheep and the goat.

It may be pointed out, in passing, that many animals have not been domesticated even at this late day – such as the tiger, the eagle and the bear. But, equally, certain tribes of men have not been domesticated. It may be that in both the undomesticated men and the undomesticated brutes, the mind is of such a character that it cannot assimilate even the first grains of knowledge, or make any effort whatever of an inventive character.

There was one invention that was probably made in the Old Stone Age, which must have needed considerable inventiveness to be developed as highly as it was developed during the Old and New Stone Ages, and that was language. The origin of language is, of course, hidden in the impenetrable mystery of the childhood of the race; and it may be that language was an original attribute of man. If we reason, however, that the development of language must have been a continuing act from the first, inferring it from the fact that it has been a continuing act from the dawn of recorded history until now, and if we suppose that it had a rise and a growth like those of other arts, we may reasonably conclude that some man invented the plan of making his wants known by the use of vocal sounds, uttered in accordance with a preconcerted code; that the invention was only partially successful at first, and that it was afterwards improved. That language was not a natural gift, but rather the result of an invention and subsequent development, is suggested by the fact that a child has to be taught to speak, but does not have to be taught to exercise his natural functions, such as breathing, eating, drinking, walking, etc.

Which was the first invention ever made by man, there is, of course, no means of ascertaining; but it seems obvious that that of language must have been among the first. The invention of weapons we may easily imagine to have been actually the first, called for by the necessity of defense against wild beasts and other men. Following the defense by individual men of their individual lives, it seems logical to suppose that a man and his wife, a man and his brother, and then groups of men, banded together in their common defense against common foes. To further their joint action, what would be more valuable than a language consisting of vocal sounds, arranged in accordance with a simple code, as a means of conveying information, issuing warnings, and giving signals in emergencies, to insure concerted action?