Modern science, then, so far from being an enemy of romance, is seen on every hand to be its sympathetic and resourceful friend, its swift and irresistible helper in its serious need, and an indulgent minister to its lighter fancies.

Le Gallienne argues against the common late‑Victorian/early‑modern opposition between scientific progress and “romance” (imagination, wonder, the poetic). Rather than disenchanting the world, modern science can supply new materials for awe—new vistas of time and space, new powers of travel and communication, and new explanatory frameworks that enlarge the mind’s sense of possibility. In this view, science becomes a collaborator of art and feeling: it aids humanity in practical “serious need” (medicine, technology) while also feeding “lighter fancies” by furnishing fresh metaphors and marvels. The quote thus defends a synthesis of scientific modernity with literary and emotional life.