Many things which cannot be effected by strength, or by the vulgar way
of enterprising, may yet be brought about by some new and untried means.
A man of sagacity and penetration, upon encountering a difficulty or
two, does not immediately despair; but, if he cannot succeed one way,
employs his wit and ingenuity another; and, to avoid or get over an
impediment, makes no scruple of stepping out of the path of his
forefathers. Since our happiness, next to the regulation of our minds,
depends altogether upon our having and enjoying the conveniences of
life, why should we stand upon ceremony about the methods of obtaining
them, or pay any deference to antiquity upon that score? If almost every
age had not exerted itself in some new improvements of its own, we
should want a thousand arts, or, at least, many degrees of perfection in
every art, which at present we are in possession of. The invention of
any thing which is more commodious for the mind or body than what they
had before, ought to be embraced readily, and the projector of it
distinguished with a suitable encouragement. Such as the use of the
compass, for example, from which mankind reaps so much benefit and
advantage, and which was not known to former ages. When we follow the
steps of those who have gone before us in the old beaten track of life,
how do we differ from horses in a team, which are linked to each other
by a chain or harness, and move on in a dull heavy pace, to the tune of
their leader's bells? But the man who enriches the present fund of
knowledge with some new and useful improvement, like a happy adventurer
at sea, discovers, as it were, an unknown land, and imports an
additional trade into his own country.