The late Professor Faraday had very serious doubts whether it was quite wise and reasonable to give out to the public at large certain discoveries of modern science.  Chemistry had led to the invention of too terrible means of destruction in our century to allow it to fall into the hands of the profane.  What man of sense—­in the face of such fiendish applications of dynamite and other explosive substances as are made by those incarnations of the Destroying Power, who glory in calling themselves Anarchists and Socialists—­would not agree with us in saying:—­Far better for mankind that it should never have blasted a rock by modern perfected means, than that it should have shattered the limbs of one per cent even of those who have been thus destroyed by the pitiless hand of Russian Nihilists, Irish Fenians, and Anarchists.  That such discoveries, and chiefly their murderous application, ought to have been withheld from public knowledge may be shown on the authority of statistics and commissions appointed to investigate and record the result of the evil done.  The following information gathered from public papers will give an insight into what may be in store for wretched mankind.

England alone—­the center of civilization—­has 21,268 firms fabricating and selling explosive substances.[E] But the centers of the dynamite trade, of infernal machines, and other such results of modern civilization, are chiefly at Philadelphia and New York.  It is in the former city of “Brotherly Love” that the now most famous manufacturer of explosives flourishes.  It is one of the well-known respectable citizens—­the inventor and manufacturer of the most murderous “dynamite toys”—­who, called before the Senate of the United States anxious to adopt means for the repression of a too free trade in such implements, found an argument that ought to become immortalized for its cynical sophistry—­“My machines,” that expert is reported to have said—­“are quite harmless to look at; as they may be manufactured in the shape of oranges, hats, boats, and anything one likes....  Criminal is he who murders people by means of such machines, not he who manufactures them.  The firm refuses to admit that were there no supply there would be no incentive for demand on the market; but insists that every demand should be satisfied by a supply ready at hand.”

That “supply” is the fruit of civilization and of the publicity given to the discovery of every murderous property in matter.  What is it?  As found in the Report of the Commission appointed to investigate the variety and character of the so-called “infernal machines,” so far the following implements of instantaneous human destruction are already on hand.  The most fashionable of all among the many varieties fabricated by Mr. Holgate are the “Ticker,” the “Eight Day Machine,” the “Little Exterminator,” and the “Bottle Machines.”  The “Ticker” is in appearance like a piece of lead, a foot long and four inches thick.  It