the fields of chemistry, geology, and biology; but this deepening and
broadening of natural knowledge produced next to no immediate
practical benefits. Even if, at this time, Francis Bacon could have
returned to the scene of his greatness and of his littleness, he must
have regarded the philosophic world which praised and disregarded his
precepts with great disfavor. If ghosts are consistent, he would have
said, 'These people are all wasting their time, just as Gilbert and
Kepler and Galileo and my worthy physician Harvey did in my day. Where
are the fruits of the restoration of science which I promised? This
accumulation of bare knowledge is all very well, but _cui bono_? Not
one of these people is doing what I told him specially to do, and
seeking that secret of the cause of forms which will enable men to
deal, at will, with matter, and superinduce new natures upon the old
foundations.'

[Sidenote: Its recent effect on life.]

But, a little later, that growth of knowledge beyond imaginable
utilitarian ends, which is the condition precedent of its practical
utility, began to produce some effect upon practical life; and the
operation of that part of nature we call human upon the rest began to
create, not 'new natures,' in Bacon's sense, but a new Nature, the
existence of which is dependent upon men's efforts, which is
subservient to their wants, and which would disappear if man's
shaping and guiding hand were withdrawn. Every mechanical artifice,
every chemically pure substance employed in manufacture, every
abnormally fertile race of plants, or rapidly growing and fattening
breed of animals, is a part of the new Nature created by science.
Without it, the most densely populated regions of modern Europe and
America must retain their primitive, sparsely inhabited, agricultural