10. Chapter X: Why The Americans Are More Addicted To Practical Than
To Theoretical Science
If a democratic state of society and democratic institutions
do not stop the career of the human mind, they incontestably
guide it in one direction in preference to another. Their
effects, thus circumscribed, are still exceedingly great; and I
trust I may be pardoned if I pause for a moment to survey them.
We had occasion, in speaking of the philosophical method of the
American people, to make several remarks which must here be
turned to account.
Equality begets in man the desire of judging of everything
for himself: it gives him, in all things, a taste for the
tangible and the real, a contempt for tradition and for forms.
These general tendencies are principally discernible in the
peculiar subject of this chapter. Those who cultivate the
sciences amongst a democratic people are always afraid of losing
their way in visionary speculation. They mistrust systems; they
adhere closely to facts and the study of facts with their own
senses. As they do not easily defer to the mere name of any
fellow-man, they are never inclined to rest upon any man's
authority; but, on the contrary, they are unremitting in their
efforts to point out the weaker points of their neighbors'
opinions. Scientific precedents have very little weight with
them; they are never long detained by the subtility of the
schools, nor ready to accept big words for sterling coin; they
penetrate, as far as they can, into the principal parts of the
subject which engages them, and they expound them in the
vernacular tongue. Scientific pursuits then follow a freer and a
safer course, but a less lofty one.
The mind may, as it appears to me, divide science into three
parts. The first comprises the most theoretical principles, and
those more abstract notions whose application is either unknown
or very remote. The second is composed of those general truths
which still belong to pure theory, but lead, nevertheless, by a
straight and short road to practical results. Methods of
application and means of execution make up the third. Each of
these different portions of science may be separately cultivated,
although reason and experience show that none of them can prosper
long, if it be absolutely cut off from the two others.
In America the purely practical part of science is admirably
understood, and careful attention is paid to the theoretical
portion which is immediately requisite to application. On this
head the Americans always display a clear, free, original, and
inventive power of mind. But hardly anyone in the United States
devotes himself to the essentially theoretical and abstract
portion of human knowledge. In this respect the Americans carry
to excess a tendency which is, I think, discernible, though in a
less degree, amongst all democratic nations.
Nothing is more necessary to the culture of the higher
sciences, or of the more elevated departments of science, than
meditation; and nothing is less suited to meditation than the
structure of democratic society. We do not find there, as
amongst an aristocratic people, one class which clings to a state
of repose because it is well off; and another which does not
venture to stir because it despairs of improving its condition.
Everyone is actively in motion: some in quest of power, others of
gain. In the midst of this universal tumult -this incessant
conflict of jarring interests -this continual stride of men
after fortune -where is that calm to be found which is necessary
for the deeper combinations of the intellect? How can the mind
dwell upon any single point, when everything whirls around it,
and man himself is swept and beaten onwards by the heady current
which rolls all things in its course? But the permanent
agitation which subsists in the bosom of a peaceable and
established democracy, must be distinguished from the tumultuous
and revolutionary movements which almost always attend the birth
and growth of democratic society. When a violent revolution
occurs amongst a highly civilized people, it cannot fail to give
a sudden impulse to their feelings and their opinions. This is
more particularly true of democratic revolutions, which stir up
all the classes of which a people is composed, and beget, at the
same time, inordinate ambition in the breast of every member of
the community. The French made most surprising advances in the
exact sciences at the very time at which they were finishing the
destruction of the remains of their former feudal society; yet
this sudden fecundity is not to be attributed to democracy, but
to the unexampled revolution which attended its growth. What
happened at that period was a special incident, and it would be
unwise to regard it as the test of a general principle.
Great revolutions are not more common amongst democratic
nations than amongst others: I am even inclined to believe that
they are less so. But there prevails amongst those populations a
small distressing motion -a sort of incessant jostling of men -which annoys and disturbs the mind, without exciting or elevating
it. Men who live in democratic communities not only seldom
indulge in meditation, but they naturally entertain very little
esteem for it. A democratic state of society and democratic
institutions plunge the greater part of men in constant active
life; and the habits of mind which are suited to an active life,
are not always suited to a contemplative one. The man of action
is frequently obliged to content himself with the best he can
get, because he would never accomplish his purpose if he chose to
carry every detail to perfection. He has perpetually occasion to
rely on ideas which he has not had leisure to search to the
bottom; for he is much more frequently aided by the opportunity
of an idea than by its strict accuracy; and, in the long run, he
risks less in making use of some false principles, than in
spending his time in establishing all his principles on the basis
of truth. The world is not led by long or learned demonstrations;
a rapid glance at particular incidents, the daily study of the
fleeting passions of the multitude, the accidents of the time,
and the art of turning them to account, decide all its affairs.
In the ages in which active life is the condition of almost
everyone, men are therefore generally led to attach an excessive
value to the rapid bursts and superficial conceptions of the
intellect; and, on the other hand, to depreciate below their true
standard its slower and deeper labors. This opinion of the
public influences the judgment of the men who cultivate the
sciences; they are persuaded that they may succeed in those
pursuits without meditation, or deterred from such pursuits as
demand it.
There are several methods of studying the sciences. Amongst
a multitude of men you will find a selfish, mercantile, and
trading taste for the discoveries of the mind, which must not be
confounded with that disinterested passion which is kindled in
the heart of the few. A desire to utilize knowledge is one
thing; the pure desire to know is another. I do not doubt that
in a few minds and far between, an ardent, inexhaustible love of
truth springs up, self-supported, and living in ceaseless
fruition without ever attaining the satisfaction which it seeks.
This ardent love it is -this proud, disinterested love of what
is true -which raises men to the abstract sources of truth, to
draw their mother-knowledge thence. If Pascal had had nothing in
view but some large gain, or even if he had been stimulated by
the love of fame alone, I cannot conceive that he would ever have
been able to rally all the powers of his mind, as he did, for the
better discovery of the most hidden things of the Creator. When
I see him, as it were, tear his soul from the midst of all the
cares of life to devote it wholly to these researches, and,
prematurely snapping the links which bind the frame to life, die
of old age before forty, I stand amazed, and I perceive that no
ordinary cause is at work to produce efforts so extra-ordinary.
The future will prove whether these passions, at once so
rare and so productive, come into being and into growth as easily
in the midst of democratic as in aristocratic communities. For
myself, I confess that I am slow to believe it. In aristocratic
society, the class which gives the tone to opinion, and has the
supreme guidance of affairs, being permanently and hereditarily
placed above the multitude, naturally conceives a lofty idea of
itself and of man. It loves to invent for him noble pleasures,
to carve out splendid objects for his ambition. Aristocracies
often commit very tyrannical and very inhuman actions; but they
rarely entertain grovelling thoughts; and they show a kind of
haughty contempt of little pleasures, even whilst they indulge in
them. The effect is greatly to raise the general pitch of
society. In aristocratic ages vast ideas are commonly entertained
of the dignity, the power, and the greatness of man. These
opinions exert their influence on those who cultivate the
sciences, as well as on the rest of the community. They
facilitate the natural impulse of the mind to the highest regions
of thought, and they naturally prepare it to conceive a sublime -nay, almost a divine -love of truth. Men of science at such
periods are consequently carried away by theory; and it even
happens that they frequently conceive an inconsiderate contempt
for the practical part of learning. "Archimedes," says Plutarch,
"was of so lofty a spirit, that he never condescended to write
any treatise on the manner of constructing all these engines of
offence and defence. And as he held this science of inventing
and putting together engines, and all arts generally speaking
which tended to any usetul end in practice, to be vile, low, and
mercenary, he spent his talents and his studious hours in writing
of those things only whose beauty and subtilty had in them no
admixture of necessity." Such is the aristocratic aim of science;
in democratic nations it cannot be the same.
The greater part of the men who constitute these nations are
extremely eager in the pursuit of actual and physical
gratification. As they are always dissatisfied with the position
which they occupy, and are always free to leave it, they think of
nothing but the means of changing their fortune, or of increasing
it. To minds thus predisposed, every new method which leads by a
shorter road to wealth, every machine which spares labor, every
instrument which diminishes the cost of production, every
discovery which facilitates pleasures or augments them, seems to
be the grandest effort of the human intellect. It is chiefly
from these motives that a democratic people addicts itself to
scientific pursuits -that it understands, and that it respects
them. In aristocratic ages, science is more particularly called
upon to furnish gratification to the mind; in democracies, to the
body. You may be sure that the more a nation is democratic,
enlightened, and free, the greater will be the number of these
interested promoters of scientific genius, and the more will
discoveries immediately applicable to productive industry confer
gain, fame, and even power on their authors. For in democracies
the working class takes a part in public affairs; and public
honors, as well as pecuniary remuneration, may be awarded to
those who deserve them. In a community thus organized it may
easily be conceived that the human mind may be led insensibly to
the neglect of theory; and that it is urged, on the contrary,
with unparalleled vehemence to the applications of science, or at
least to that portion of theoretical science which is necessary
to those who make such applications. In vain will some innate
propensity raise the mind towards the loftier spheres of the
intellect; interest draws it down to the middle zone. There it
may develop all its energy and restless activity, there it may
engender all its wonders. These very Americans, who have not
discovered one of the general laws of mechanics, have introduced
into navigation an engine which changes the aspect of the world.
Assuredly I do not content that the democratic nations of
our time are destined to witness the extinction of the
transcendent luminaries of man's intelligence, nor even that no
new lights will ever start into existence. At the age at which
the world has now arrived, and amongst so many cultivated
nations, perpetually excited by the fever of productive industry,
the bonds which connect the different parts of science together
cannot fail to strike the observation; and the taste for
practical science itself, if it be enlightened, ought to lead men
not to neglect theory. In the midst of such numberless attempted
applications of so many experiments, repeated every day, it is
almost impossible that general laws should not frequently be
brought to light; so that great discoveries would be frequent,
though great inventors be rare. I believe, moreover, in the high
calling of scientific minds. If the democratic principle does
not, on the one hand, induce men to cultivate science for its own
sake, on the other it enormously increases the number of those
who do cultivate it. Nor is it credible that, from amongst so
great a multitude no speculative genius should from time to time
arise, inflamed by the love of truth alone. Such a one, we may
be sure, would dive into the deepest mysteries of nature,
whatever be the spirit of his country or his age. He requires no
assistance in his course -enough that he be not checked in it.
All that I mean to say is this: -permanent inequality of
conditions leads men to confine themselves to the arrogant and
sterile research of abstract truths; whilst the social condition
and the institutions of democracy prepare them to seek the
immediate and useful practical results of the sciences. This
tendency is natural and inevitable: it is curious to be
acquainted with it, and it may be necessary to point it out. If
those who are called upon to guide the nations of our time
clearly discerned from afar off these new tendencies, which will
soon be irresistible, they would understand that, possessing
education and freedom, men living in democratic ages cannot fail
to improve the industrial part of science; and that henceforward
all the efforts of the constituted authorities ought to be
directed to support the highest branches of learning, and to
foster the nobler passion for science itself. In the present age
the human mind must be coerced into theoretical studies; it runs
of its own accord to practical applications; and, instead of
perpetually referring it to the minute examination of secondary
effects, it is well to divert it from them sometimes, in order to
raise it up to the contemplation of primary causes. Because the
civilization of ancient Rome perished in consequence of the
invasion of the barbarians, we are perhaps too apt to think that
civilization cannot perish in any other manner. If the light by
which we are guided is ever extinguished, it will dwindle by
degrees, and expire of itself. By dint of close adherence to
mere applications, principles would be lost sight of; and when
the principles were wholly forgotten, the methods derived from
them would be ill-pursued. New methods could no longer be
invented, and men would continue to apply, without intelligence,
and without art, scientific processes no longer understood.
When Europeans first arrived in China, three hundred years
ago, they found that almost all the arts had reached a certain
degree of perfection there; and they were surprised that a people
which had attained this point should not have gone beyond it. At
a later period they discovered some traces of the higher branches
of science which were lost. The nation was absorbed in
productive industry: the greater part of its scientific processes
had been preserved, but science itself no longer existed there.
This served to explain the strangely motionless state in which
they found the minds of this people. The Chinese, in following
the track of their forefathers, had forgotten the reasons by
which the latter had been guided. They still used the formula,
without asking for its meaning: they retained the instrument, but
they no longer possessed the art of altering or renewing it. The
Chinese, then, had lost the power of change; for them to improve
was impossible. They were compelled, at all times and in all
points, to imitate their predecessors, lest they should stray
into utter darkness, by deviating for an instant from the path
already laid down for them. The source of human knowledge was
all but dry; and though the stream still ran on, it could neither
swell its waters nor alter its channel. Notwithstanding this,
China had subsisted peaceably for centuries. The invaders who
had conquered the country assumed the manners of the inhabitants,
and order prevailed there. A sort of physical prosperity was
everywhere discernible: revolutions were rare, and war was, so to
speak, unknown.
It is then a fallacy to flatter ourselves with the
reflection that the barbarians are still far from us; for if
there be some nations which allow civilization to be torn from
their grasp, there are others who trample it themselves under
their feet.