Excerpt from A Historical Account of Useful Inventions and Scientific Discoveries: Being a Manual of Instruction and EntertainmentIt has been demonstrated that the desire of obtaining knowledge is one of the most natural, and, at the same time, most ennobling attributes of' the human mind. There is at the present time a great number of' inquiring minds among the working classes of this kingdom, and a. Still greater number of the young of all classes thirsting for information, who in entering upon a course of general reading must be greatly at a loss for many things which are familiarly alluded to in ordinary conversation, with which every body is understood to be acquainted, or would have people to think so, but which, in reality.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully, any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.