Invention: The Master-key to Progress

The Swiss departing from Switzerland by another route, Cæsar pursued them, and defeated a fourth of them in a battle on the banks of a river which the other three-fourths had crossed. He then built a bridge over the river and sent his army across. This feat alarmed the Swiss more than their defeat; because Cæsar had built the bridge and sent his army across in one day, whereas they had consumed twenty days in merely crossing. The Swiss pleaded to be allowed to proceed; but Cæsar was obdurate. A battle followed, in which the Swiss, though greatly superior in numbers and reinforced by 15,000 allies, were decisively beaten; not because of inferior courage or warlike skill, but by reason of inferior equipments, mechanical appliances and weapons.

Cæsar's next battle was with the Germans. It was won, if not precisely with inventiveness, at least with "brains." He learned that the German matrons had declared, after certain occult proceedings, that Heaven forbade them to fight before the new moon. Apprehending his opportunity, he advanced his forces right up to the German camp, thereby forcing them as valiant soldiers to come out and fight. Fight they did, but under an obvious psychological disadvantage, and with the natural result.

In this battle, as in others between the Romans and the barbarians, it was noticeable that although their first onslaught was fine, the barbarians seemed to be at a loss afterwards, – if anything unexpected occurred, or if any reverse was sustained; whereas the Romans – and especially Cæsar himself – never behaved so well as when threatened with disaster. This may be expressed by saying that the barbarians, as compared with the Romans, were wholly inferior in the inventiveness needed to devise a new plan quickly.

Not long afterward, Cæsar advanced against the town of Noviodunum. He soon saw that he could not take it by storm; and so he brought forward his mechanical siege appliances. The psychological effect of these on the barbarians was so tremendous that they at once pleaded for terms of surrender.

After a battle with the Nervii, in which Cæsar defeated them disastrously, largely because of his resourcefulness in emergency and their lack of it, he advanced against a great barbarian stronghold that looked down on steep rocks on three sides, and was protected by a thick, high double wall on the fourth side. Cæsar made a fortified rampart around the town, pushed his mantlets (large shields on wheels protected on the sides and top) close up to the wall, and built a tower. The barbarians laughed at this tower; seeing it so far away that, they thought, no darts thrown from it could reach them. But when they saw the tower actually moving toward them they were struck with terror and began at once to sue for peace.

During the following winter the Veneti, a large tribe on the northwestern coast, the most skilful seamen and navigators of Gaul, stirred up a revolt that quickly and widely spread. The situation at once became serious for Cæsar, for the reason that the Veneti could not be subdued, except on the sea; and neither the Roman sailors nor the Roman vessels were as good as were those of the Veneti. Nevertheless, Cæsar ordered war-vessels to be built on the Loire River, and seamen and rowers to be drafted from the Roman Province.

When the improvised fleet of the Romans and the thoroughly prepared fleet of the Veneti came together, the latter was superior even in numbers. Furthermore, the Romans were at a great disadvantage in the matter of throwing projectiles, from the fact that the Veneti's decks were higher than theirs.

But Cæsar had prepared a scheme that gave him victory. In accordance with it, the Roman galleys rowed smartly against the Veneti ships, and Roman sailors raised long poles on which were sharp hooks which they put over the halliards that held up the sails. Then each Roman galley rowed rapidly away, the halliards were cut, and down came the sails. The Veneti ships became helpless at once and were immediately boarded; with the result that, of all the number, only a few made their escape.

Somewhat later, Cæsar decided to cross the Rhine into the country of the Sueves, and to impress them with the power of Rome by building a bridge and marching his army across. This bridge and the quickness and thoroughness with which it was built are still models for engineers; for in ten days after he had decided to build it, at which time the material was still standing in the forest, a bridge 40 feet wide had been constructed. Across this Cæsar at once marched his legions. The effect on the barbarous Germans can be imagined. It made them realize that the Romans were a race superior to themselves in ways that they could not measure or even understand; and it impressed them with that fear which is the most depressing of all fears, the fear of the unknown.

Did Cæsar make an invention? This depends on the meaning of the word invention. Cæsar did not invent the bridge; but he did conceive and carry into execution a highly original, concrete and successful scheme. By it he accomplished as much as a victorious campaign would have accomplished, and without shedding any blood. He devised means which created a state of thought in the minds of his enemies that destroyed their will to fight. Therein lay his invention.

Cæsar then conceived the idea of going across the water to the island of Britain, about which little was known. After having a survey made of the coast, he took his legions across in about eighty vessels. He had to fight to make a landing, of course; but he succeeded, and then formed his camp. A Roman camp, we may now remind ourselves, was so distinctly a Roman conception, and so distinctly a part of the Roman system of conducting war, that it almost constituted an invention. Whenever a Roman army halted, even for one night, they intrenched themselves within a square enclosure, surrounded with a ditch and a palisade of stakes, and made a temporary little city, laid with streets. In such a camp they were reasonably safe against any attack that barbarians could make.

But a storm arose that drove some of Cæsar's ships ashore and some out to sea. In this emergency, Cæsar's resourcefulness and energy directed the work of recovery and repair, and enabled the Romans to collect and put into good condition nearly all their ships. Cæsar returned shortly afterward to Gaul; arrived there, he gave directions for building and equipping another and larger fleet.

In the following July (54 B. C.), he started again for Britain. This time he took five legions and some cavalry and had about 800 vessels. He landed and formed his camp, and then advanced inland; – but another storm arose that scattered his ships. He returned at once to the coast, and instituted such prompt and resourceful measures that in ten days he was able to resume his march. On this march, which took him far inland, he was able to overcome all opposition; largely because, after the first onset, the barbarians seemed to be without any plan of action, while Cæsar was at his best.

Cæsar had the ability to invent under circumstances of the utmost danger and excitement.

Cæsar's remaining campaigns in Gaul were marked with the same resourcefulness and originality on his part, and the same lack of resourcefulness and originality on the part of the barbarians. Cæsar would continually do something that the barbarians had not expected him to do. True, they gradually learned some of his schemes and methods from him; but only to find that he had then some newer schemes and methods.

Cæsar at one time remarked that wise men anticipate possible difficulties, and decide beforehand what they will do, if certain possible occasions arise. Does not this process involve invention, in cases where the possible occasions are not of the ordinary and expectable kind? In such cases, does it not require imagination to foresee the possible occasions, and form a correct picture on the mind of the resulting situations? This being done, does it not require the exercise of the constructive faculty afterwards, to make a concrete and effective plan to meet them?

If it be so, then we may reasonably declare that, of all the factors that contributed to the successes in Gaul of Cæsar, the most powerful single factor was his inventiveness.

The final crisis came when Cæsar besieged Alesia, and Vercingetorix, who had taken refuge in it, sent out a call for succor, that was eagerly and promptly responded to; for it was plain to the barbarians that Cæsar, being held in position fronting a fortress that he could not successfully storm, would be in a precarious condition if attacked vigorously in his rear. Attacked vigorously he was; for the barbarians came in his rear with about 250,000 men; Cæsar having only 50,000, and the enemy in front having 80,000.

But it required somewhat more than a month for the barbarians to unite and reach Alesia. With his wonted energy and resourcefulness, Cæsar had by this time cast up siege works all around the fortress, placed camps at strategic points, and constructed twenty-three block-houses. He dug a trench twenty feet deep around the place, and back of this began his other siege works. These included two parallel trenches fifteen feet broad and fifteen feet deep. Behind these he built a palisade twelve feet high, and to this he added a breastwork of pointed stakes; while at intervals of eighty feet he constructed turrets. In addition, he had branches cut from trees and sharpened on the ends; and these he fastened at the bottom of the trenches, so that the points projected just above the ground. In front of these he dug shallow pits, into which tapering stakes hardened in the fire were driven, projecting four inches above the ground. These pits were hidden with twigs and brushwood. Eight rows of these pits were dug, three feet apart; and in front of all stakes with iron hooks were buried in the ground at irregular intervals. When all this had been done on the side toward the fortress, Cæsar constructed parallel entrenchments of the same kind, to protect his rear; the two sets being so arranged with respect to each other that the same men could man both. Having constructed all these material appliances, he instituted a comprehensive system of drills, so that his men would know exactly how to utilize them under all probable contingencies.

In the battle that followed the barbarians showed their wonted courage and dash; but an unexpected situation arose when Cæsar attacked a separated part in their rear. Then they were seized with panic, and the natural rout and disaster followed.

This battle decided the fate of Gaul; though its actual subduing, especially in the southwestern part was not accomplished immediately. The last major act was taking a strong fortress. This was accomplished by cutting a tunnel, by which the spring was tapped that supplied the garrison with water. As Vercingetorix said, the Romans won their victories, not by superior courage, but by superior science.

Cæsar's later passage across the Rubicon, the flight of the Senate, and his later operations by land and sea against Marseilles (Massilia) and hostile forces in northern Spain, are well known, and were characterized by the same high order of inventiveness. His later operations against Pompey, and later still against Pharnaces and Scipio, were conducted under conditions that gave him less opportunity to utilize the quality of inventiveness in such clear ways; but they were marked with the kindred qualities of foresight, skilful adaptation of means to ends, and presence of mind in emergencies.

In the minds of some, Cæsar's greatest influence on history has been due to his improvement of the Calendar, and especially his reforms of the public morals and the laws of Rome, after his campaign against Pharnaces. This subject has been the theme of jurists and scholars to such a degree that it might seem presumptuous in a navy officer to do more than mention it. At the same time it may be pointed out that Cæsar's work was not in any matters of detail, or in contributing any legal or juridical skill or knowledge, but in conceiving the idea of creating the Leges Juliæ, and then creating them.

Julius Cæsar was murdered in the year 44 B. C. He was followed in power by his grandnephew Octavius, one of the most fortunate occurrences in history; for Octavius possessed the ability and the character to carry on the constructive work that Julius Cæsar had begun. Under Octavius and his successors, the Roman Empire became increasingly large and strong, until the reign of Trajan in the second century, A. D., when it acquired its greatest territorial extent.

During the time when Rome was increasing in extent and power, the wealth of cities and of individuals increased also, and enormous public works of all kinds were constructed, many of which are still the admiration of the world. Material prosperity reached its highest point.

But the creative period had passed. Youth, with its dreams and vigor of doing had gone, and maturity, with the luxury of prosperity and the consequent dulling of the imagination, had assumed its place. Senescence followed in due course. Then the empire was divided into two parts, the Empire of the West and the Empire of the East. Finally, in 476 A. D., Rome died and with it the Empire of the West.

But the Eastern Empire stood, and Constantinople was its capital. And it stood, alone and unassisted, as the sole bulwark of Christianity and civilization for nearly 1000 years, until it finally fell before the Ottoman Turks in 1543. It could not have done this, if in the latter part of the seventh century when it was beleaguered by a Turkish fleet, much greater than its own, it had not suddenly received unexpected aid in the shape of a new invention. This was "Greek fire," which seems to have been a pasty mixture of sulphur, nitre, pitch, and other substances, which when squirted against wood set it on fire with a flame that water could not quench. In the very first attack, the Turks were so demoralized by the Greek fire that they fled in panic. They never learned the secret and were never able to stand up against it. On one occasion, fifteen Christian ships, using Greek fire, actually put to rout a Turkish fleet numbering several hundred.

During all the countless centuries before the dawn of recorded history, and during the approximately forty centuries that elapsed from the beginning of recorded history until the fall of Rome, we have observed the coming of many inventions of both material and immaterial kinds, and noted the influence of those inventions in causing civilization, and therefore in directing the line that history has followed.

It may be objected that a perfectly natural inference from what has been written would be that the only thing which had influenced the direction of movement of history was invention. To this, the answer may very reasonably be made that this book does not pretend to be a history, or to point out what have been the greatest factors that have influenced its line of movement; it attempts merely to emphasize the influence of one factor, invention, and to suggest that maybe its influence has not hitherto been estimated at its proper value.

Another objection like that just indicated might be made to the effect that all the progress of the world up to the fall of Rome is attributed in this book to inventors only; that all the work of statesmen, scientists, generals, admirals, explorers, jurists, men of business, etc., etc., is ignored.

Such an objection would be natural and reasonable; but to it an answer like the previous one may be made, to the effect that the purpose of this book is not to compare the benefits conferred by any one class of men with those conferred by any other, but merely to point out, in a very general way, what inventors have done.

Nevertheless, it does seem clear that inventors did more to map out the direction of the progress just traced than any other single class of men. If we will fix our attention on any one invention about which we know enough – say, the water-clock – we can see that the original inventor of the water-clock (no matter who he was) had more influence on the history of the clock than any other man has had; and that the inventors of clocks who followed him had more influence on the clock than any other equal number of men had. This does not mean that the men who risked their money in making novel clocks did not influence the history of the clock materially; and it does not mean that the men who made good materials for them did not influence the history of the clock greatly; and it does not mean that the engineers and mechanics who operated them successfully did not influence its history. It would be absurd to pretend that each one of these men did not influence the history of the clock; for without them there would have been no successful clock. Nevertheless, in the nature of things, the original inventors must be credited with influencing the history of the clock more than any other equal number of men did, just as a father must be credited with influencing the history of his children more than any other man can, from the mere fact of his having caused them to be born. The inventors of clocks were the fathers of the clocks that they invented, and also the forefathers of all the inventions that proceed directly or indirectly from them.

What has been said about the clock applies with equal force to every other invented thing. Therefore, it can hardly be gainsaid that, so far as invented things are concerned, their inventors have had more influence on the history that has resulted from them than any other men have had.

If anyone will glance through any book of ancient history, he will realize that it is mainly a record of wars; the political changes caused by wars, or rendered possible by their means; the growth of nations and other organizations; the invention of certain mechanisms, arts and sciences; and the construction of certain structures such as temples, palaces and ships. All these agencies influenced ancient history, of course; but it is clear that the agency that influenced it the most obviously and immediately was the wars.

Yet let us remind ourselves that the real effect on history of any war was not exerted by the war itself, so much as by the result of the war. Let us also remind ourselves that the result of any war was because of the material forces engaged and the skill with which they were handled.

Now the material forces put onto the field of battle on each side in any of the wars were the product of the material resources of the country, of its wealth, its ability to manufacture weapons and transport troops; that is, of its utilization of invented mechanisms, processes and methods. The skill with which they were handled – (especially when supreme skill was exerted, as in the cases of Alexander and Cæsar) – was the outcome not of mere laborious training, not of mere knowledge, or courage, or carefully detailed arrangement, but of plans so conceived, developed and produced (invented) as to confront the enemy with unexpected situations that they were not prepared to meet. So the influence of even the wars seems to have been due fundamentally to invention.

As to the other agencies that influenced the course of ancient history, they seem to owe their influence even more obviously to invention than war does. Every department of ancient civilization seems traceable back to some invention or inventions. The whole of ancient civilization seems to rest primarily on inventions.

As inventions were made by inventors, we seem forced to the conclusion that inventors influenced ancient history more than any other one class did. This does not mean that the inventor of a child's toy influenced history more than did any one of the millions of wise and good men in each generation who helped to keep the machine of civilization working smoothly; for it refers to inventors as a class, and not to inventors as individuals.