To look is Not to See

Every reader of this passage must spend the whole of his waking life looking at things, like breathing,is natural; we do it without noticing it. Looking is passiven – but seeing is active, and that is theexplanation for the title of the passage. Once you start seeing thing you really begin to wake up. Peoplewho see thing which other have only looked at. And seeing, draw conclusion from what they see, can add to man’s knowledge and help progress.

Someone recently discovered a place where metal had been worked continuously longer than anywhere else in England. He saw a wall in the Forest of dean. Thousands of people must have looked at itwithout really seeing it, but this man noticed that among the usual stones of that place were bits and pieces of a different color; they also felt different hand. A closer sight showed that these pieces had been left behind in the fires of ancient people who had smelted rocks to get metals. Looking around, hefound more and more information, until the history of what man had one at that place over tenscenturies was known.