ABSTRACT
No sharp line can be drawn between scientific technique and traditional arts and crafts. The essential characteristic of scientific technique is the utilization of natural forces in ways not evident to the totally uninstructed. The earliest beginnings of scientific technique belong to prehistoric times; nothing is known, for example, as to the origin of the use of fire, though the difficulty of procuring fire in early times is shown by the care with which sacred fires were tended in Rome and other early civilized communities. Agriculture is prehistoric in origin, though perhaps it did not preced the dawn of history by any very long period. To one accustomed to the elaborate technique of modern life, all this may not seem to amount to very much, but it did in fact make the difference between primitive man and the highest grade of intellectual and artistic civilization.
