MACHINE DESIGNING.[1]

[Footnote 1: A lecture delivered before the Franklin Institute,
Philadelphia, Monday, Jan. 30, 1888. From the journal of the
Institute.]

By JOHN E. SWEET.


"Carrying coals to Newcastle," the oft quoted comparison, fittingly
indicates the position I place myself in when attempting to address
members of this Institute on the subject of machine designing.

Philadelphia, the birthplace of the great and nearly all the good work
in this, the noblest of all industrial arts, needs no help or praise
at my hands, but I hope her sons may be prevailed upon to do in their
right way what I shall try to do roughly--that is, formulate some
rules or establish principles by which we, who are not endowed with
genius, may so gauge our work as to avoid doing that which is truly
bad. No great author was ever made by studying grammar, rhetoric,
language, history, or by imitating some other author, however great.

Neither has there ever been any great poet or artist produced by
training. But there are many writers who are not great authors, many
rhymsters who are not poets, and many painters who are not artists;
and while training will not make great men of them, it will help them