ancement--a disposition to adhere to the old,
which has been tried and approved, and a tendency toward the new, which,
however promising and alluring, may yet disappoint and mislead. In the
long run, however, the latter prevails, and the progressive movement,
more or less rapid, goes on continually. Improvements gradually force
themselves upon the attention of the most prejudiced minds, and
eventually conquer opposition in spite of professional immobility and
aversion to change. Observation has shown that the most important steps
of progress usually originate outside of the professions, and are only
adopted when they can no longer be resisted with safety to the
conservative body. To the volunteer officer and soldier, or to those
educated soldiers who have long been in civil life, will probably be due
the greater part of that accessibility to new ideas which will result in
important advances in the art of war. This assertion may seem to be
paradoxical; but all experience proves that ignorance of old processes
is most favorable to the introduction of new ones. And though in a
thousand instances such ignorance may be disastrous, occasionally it
finds the unprejudiced intellect illuminated by flashes of original
genius, and open to the entrance of valuable ideas which would have been
utterly excluded by all the old and established rules.

But the actual work of the unexampled mental activity of the present
day, will not be fully known and estimated until after the close of the
war. Until then there will be neither time nor opportunity to weigh and
test the creations of the national ingenuity. In the midst of campaigns
and battles, with the absorbing interest of the great struggle, the
instruments of warfare cannot be easily changed, however important may
be the improvement presented. The emergency which arouses genius and
brings forth valuable inventions, is by no means favorable to their
adoption and general use. On the contrary, by a sort of fatality which
seems to be a law of their existence, they are doomed to struggle with
adversity and fierce opposition, and they are left by the occasion which
gave them birth as its repudiated offspring--a legacy to the future
emergency which will cherish and perfect them, make them available, and
enjoy the full benefit to be derived from them.

The navy has always justly been the pride of our country; and it was to
be expected that it would first feel the impulse of inventive genius.