SCIENCE VERSUS ART-APPRECIATION. 453 



SCIENCE VERSUS ART-APPRECIATION. 



By JOHN QUINCY ADAMS, 



PHILADELPHIA, PA. 



A PERSON traveling for the first time in a foreign land is often 

 --*- puzzled by its customs and institutions. He can not understand 

 why people lay so much stress on forms which seem to him trivial, and, 

 with good intentions, habitually do so many things which he considers 

 immoral and vicious. These will remain incomprehensible to him as 

 long as he attempts to judge them by the laws and habits of his own 

 land the common mistake of travelers. 



In like manner, an inhabitant of the realm of science, entering the 

 domain of art, misconceives its character, because he does not under- 

 stand its language, methods nor traditions. The scientist carries with 

 him into the field of art the mental habits and standards peculiar to 

 his native soil, and whatever can not be measured by scientific methods 

 escapes his notice. 



We know that the botanist, the housewife and the farmer see a 

 different set of properties in the common dandelion, and would classify 

 it respectively as composite, food or weed. In the same way, one sees 

 in each object what one looks for, and this is determined by one's 

 mental habits. It is but logical that the scientists should seek in 

 environment the leading characteristics of science, and should expect 

 to arrive at truth by analysis and generalization. 



Scientific ideas rule not only the scientists they dominate also our 

 science-trained age. Evidence of this confronts us whichever way we 

 turn. 



We see nearly every field of human effort controlled by specialization. 

 It is no less clear that the aim of the manufacturer, as of the investi- 

 gator, is to set forth 'the latest thing out.' Every province of human 

 interest has been brought under scientific classification, so that nearly 

 all thought is now cast in 'general ideas.' This mode of thinking 

 ignores individuality and sees in men and things only units of a class. 

 For this reason, man is content with countless repetitions of the same 

 form because his class idea is realized if it find in each object the few 

 characteristics common to the group. Therefore, in general many of 

 man's needs are satisfied with mere form, and if he sees objects pos- 

 sessing these formal features sitting in art's accustomed seats, he does 

 not call in question their titles, but allows articles of furniture, forms 



