Getting Patents

If yon look back on the history of hnmau progresa, you will find that noueof the great epoch making inventioua has ever been patented. The inau who lit the lirst fire - whether Prouietlieus or the party from whom he Btole the idea - did not get a patent for it. Noither did the man who made the flrst wheel, in every sen se one of the most revolutionary inventions in the history of man. The same thing may be said of the invention of soip, candlcs, gun powder, umbrellus und the mariner's compass, or, to eome down to our own day, of the steam engine and the electric telegraph. Patenta ere mtslly conoerned with small mechüiiical itails and iinprovements - it inay be in the applicatiou of steani and electrioifv - and by means of these patents euon i.i.s proflts have been secured to seoond i r inventora, but the great ideas and discoveries whieh underlie these details have been given to the world gratis. There is a general notion that if yoa did not protect inventions by means of patenta inventora vrould cease to iuvent aud material progresa wonld come to a standstill. But history does not Luar this out in the least. Men with great mechanical gifts do not exorcice thein solely with a view to commercial profit any more than astrot'OJncrs gpfl?Th the houvens for nevv worlds witu au eje tu r(;gistering patenta and floating coinpauiea