capacity have done great things because it animated them; and men of
great natural gifts have failed, absolutely or relatively, because
they lacked this one thing needful.

[Sidenote: True aim and method of research.]

To anyone who knows the business of investigation practically, Bacon's
notion of establishing a company of investigators to work for
'fruits,' as if the pursuit of knowledge were a kind of mining
operation and only required well-directed picks and shovels, seems
very strange.[C] In science, as in art, and, as I believe, in every
other sphere of human activity, there may be wisdom in a multitude of
counsellors, but it is only in one or two of them. And, in scientific
inquiry, at any rate, it is to that one or two that we must look for
light and guidance. Newton said that he made his discoveries by
'intending' his mind on the subject; no doubt truly. But to equal his
success one must have the mind which he 'intended.' Forty lesser men
might have intended their minds till they cracked, without any like
result. It would be idle either to affirm or to deny that the last
half-century has produced men of science of the calibre of Newton. It
is sufficient that it can show a few capacities of the first rank,
competent not only to deal profitably with the inheritance bequeathed
by their scientific forefathers, but to pass on to their successors
physical truths of a higher order than any yet reached by the human
race. And if they have succeeded as Newton succeeded, it is because
they have sought truth as he sought it, with no other object than the
finding it.

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