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<h2 id="id00014" style="margin-top: 4em">MARVELS OF MODERN SCIENCE</h2>
<p id="id00015">By PAUL SEVERING</p>
<p id="id00034" style="margin-top: 4em">Introduction</p>
<p id="id00035">The purpose of this little book is to give a general idea of a few of
the great achievements of our time. Within such a limited space it was
impossible to even mention thousands more of the great inventions and
triumphs which mark the rushing progress of the world in the present
century; therefore, only those subjects have been treated which appeal
with more than passing interest to all. For instance, the flying machine
is engaging the attention of the old, the young and the middle-aged,
and soon the whole world will be on the wing. Radium, "the revealer,"
is opening the door to possibilities almost beyond human conception.
Wireless Telegraphy is crossing thousands of miles of space with
invisible feet and making the nations of the earth as one. 'Tis the
same with the other subjects,—one and all are of vital, human interest,
and are extremely attractive on account of their importance in the
civilization of today. Mighty, sublime, wonderful, as have been the
achievements of past science, as yet we are but on the verge of the
continents of discovery. Where is the wizard who can tell what lies
in the womb of time? Just as our conceptions of many things have been
revolutionized in the past, those which we hold to-day of the cosmic
processes may have to be remodeled in the future. The men of fifty
years hence may laugh at the circumscribed knowledge of the present
and shake their wise heads in contemplation of what they will term our
crudities, and which we now call <i>progress</i>. Science is ever on the
march and what is new to-day will be old to-morrow. We cannot go
back, we must go forward, and although we can never reach finality in
aught, we can improve on the <i>past</i> to enrich the <i>future</i>. If this
volume creates an interest and arouses an enthusiasm in the ordinary men
and women into whose hands it may come, and stimulates them to a study
of the great events making for the enlightenment, progress and elevation
of the race, it shall have fulfilled its mission and serve the purpose
for which it was written.</p>
<h2 id="id00036" style="margin-top: 4em">CHAPTER I</h2>
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