THE INTERPRETATION OF NATURE 127 



taneous interest and emotional attitude have been practically ignored. 

 We have been trying to educate pieces of children. 



"We choose for discussion here one phase of the educational situation, 

 education touching the living world. We choose this not because it is 

 of transcendent value as compared with other aspects, but because the 

 writer happens to be a biologist and a teacher. 



Why is it that so few persons even among the educated are gen- 

 uinely and broadly interested in and informed about plants and ani- 

 mals? Of course everybody cares for plants to the extent of wanting 

 good table vegetables and fruits, and nearly everybody cares for flowers. 

 Everybody, too, is interested in the domestic products of the animal 

 world; and most of us have more or less fondness for a few pet ani- 

 mals. After this much has been said it will be allowed, I think, that 

 nine tenths of all grown persons in Christian lands are quite indiffer- 

 ent to the myriads of plants and animals by which they are surrounded. 

 Why is this? Perhaps some one asks what sense there is in such a 

 question. To justify the contention that the great rank and file of 

 mortals ought not to be thus indifferent, we must reflect a bit on the 

 state of being alive, on its nature and scope. 



Are you fond of living ? Are you one of that great number of hu- 

 man beings who assent to the saying that life is the most interesting 

 thing in the world, the thing to be most sought after, most watchfully 

 tended? What life is it which you thus appraise? Human life, you 

 say promptly ; and that is well, so far. But what is human life ? Is it 

 something wholly apart from the living things round about you? 

 Surely you have noted some elements in common between the human 

 life you love so dearly and the lowly life you care so little for. And you 

 have heard something of what the learned have made out about " Man's 

 place in Nature." 



I ask you to summon the best thought of which you are capable, 

 and tell me if you have no feeling of selfishness, of smallness, of mean- 

 ness, when you assert your love of life and mean by " life " nothing 

 more than your own life and that of your family and friends, or even 

 of humanity generally. On the other hand, tell me with equal candor, 

 do you not have a sense of largeness, of generosity, of outgoing to all 

 about you, when your love of life encompasses everything that lives ? 



By asking the question, Why are most persons so indifferent toward 

 most living things, we approach the answer to the question : It is be- 

 cause our theory of life does not include all life, and because it is not 

 made by our whole selves. It is made by the intellectual side of our 

 natures ; the affective, the emotional side having almost no part in the 

 process. 



I am sure that if the development of our race and our civilization 

 goes on normally, man will reach after a time a synthesis of himself 



