The man who should know the true history of the bit of chalk
which every carpenter carries about in his breeches pocket, tho
ignorant of all other history, is likely, if he will think his
knowledge out to its ultimate results, to have a truer, and,
therefore, a better, conception of this wonderful universe, and
of man’s relation to it, than the most learned student who is
deep-read in the records of humanity and ignorant of those of
nature. (Text.)--THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY.
(1740)