FIGHTING THE INEVITABLE.

Greymouth Evening Star, Volume XXXI, 4 October 1901, Page 4

FIGHTING THE INEVITABLE.

• :o: (From “Invention.”)

One of the strangest things in the history of some of the greatest inventions, innovations, and movements is the bitter opposition to which they have been subjected at the outset. It has proved, however, a fight against the inevitable. The Duke of Wellington (the hero of Waterloo) was a vigorous opponent of Eowland Hill’s penny postage scheme. Sir Walter Scott, the celebrated novelist, and other learned men, ridiculed the idea of lighting by gas. The great discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton (the law of gravitation) wore ignored by his own university for more than thirty years after they were published. Galileo was condemned to imprisonment for asserting that the earth moves, and had to abjure his doctrine on his knees. ’ Eeporc has it that as he rose to his feet ho said, “It does move, notwithstanding.” Christopher Columbus, for the discovery of America, was assailed with the fiercest persecution and opposition. John Faust, the inventor of printing, was charged with employing the assistance of the devil in the manufacture of books.

Dr. Harvey, the discoverer of the circulation of the blood, was attacked on all sides with every weapon that ignorance, prejudice, spleen, and envy could frame against him. Smeatcn, the great engineer, did not believe in Watt’s steam engine. Watt was called a madman.

Baron Alderson and Baron Parke opposed the Manchest r and Liverpool Railway Bdl before a Parliamentary Committee, and stigmatised Georgs Stephenson a fool, an ignoramus, and a maniac, because he proposed to run the line over the Chat Mess. Telford, the foremost engineer of his time, doubted the use of the railway. Lord Brougham, the statesman, tried to make thirty miles an hour the statutory limit of speed on railways.

Fulton was met with incredulous smiles rude jokes, and contemptuous ridicule, and his plans for steam navigation and torpedo boats, were snubbed by both the French and English Governments. Lord Palmerston was blind to the advantages which would accrue by tho construction of tho Suez Canal.

Sir Charles Napier fiercely opposed the introduction of steam power into the Royal Navy. Yet, in a few years after his futile battle, ho found himself in command of the largest steam navy the world had ever seen.

Windham fiercely opposed the Volunteer movement in 1803, and warmly defended “the national sport of bull-bait-ing.” Dr. .Tenner (vaccination) was opposed very hotly under the announcement of his discoveries being made public. fir Robert Peel blocked a proposal in Parliament to make all the railways seeking access to London adopt a comprehensive plan for a central exchange station. Sir Thomas More, in 1520, questioned tho policy of putting men to death for petty thefts, etc., and was at onco fallen upon by lawyers and others, who declared that any milder mode of punishment would “endanger the whole nation.’’

Reger Bacon was charged with being possessed of a devil because ho understood prospective, and was imprisoned for ton years.

The inventors of the ribbon loom, the stocking loom, and tho spinning jenny were ail ridiculed. So was the man who carried the first umbrella. Even the pendulum was ridiculed by the name of the “Swing Swang.’’