PHYSICS IN GENERAL EDUCATION 25 



physics, by one of the greatest mathematical physicists of modern 

 times, is confessedly but little more than his interpretation. 



Dazzled by the success of the leaders and representatives of an- 

 other school, we proclaim that true success will depend on mathemati- 

 cal attainment, and that mathematical physics is the only physics 

 worthy of the name. Here, again, the exceptionally brilliant few, 

 who have succeeded under this training, stand as its exponents, and we 

 fail to consider that, if adopted to the exclusion of the first, its results 

 may be disastrous in the extreme. No better evidence of this need be 

 furnished than is found in the remarks recently made by Mr. G. H. 

 Darwin, concerning a contest for honors, in what is generally admitted 

 to be the greatest school of mathematics and mathematical physics in 

 existence. Mr. Darwin, who was one of the examiners, says : " The 

 subject which exhibited the average weakness of grasp most flagrantly 

 was thermo-dynamics. A great many men had read something of it, 

 but very few really understood what they attempted to explain. Ex- 

 traordinary muddle and confusion was sent up in answer to a question 

 on the absolute scale of temperature. On another question, while the 

 very elements of the subject were unknown to those who answered, 

 the same men reproduced faultlessly the algebraic calculation of the 

 thermo-dynamic function for a perfect gas." 



Mr. Darwin also strongly recommends such a change in the style 

 of questions as that half intelligence may be more stringently treated, 

 and men induced to read less and master more, and to gain a compre- 

 hension of physical principles. 



There can be little doubt but that the experimental and mathemat- 

 ical study of the subject should go on together, assuming, of course, 

 a sufficient preliminary training in pure mathematics. 



What seems desirable, therefore, at least in some instances, is less 

 experimental work on the part of the student, and more thorough and 

 exhaustive discussion and examination of what is done. 



This leads at once to the consideration of what oueht to be the 

 nature of the work done in the laboratory. The limits to which I am 

 confined will not allow me to enter into any lengthy discussion of this 

 important question. 



I will remark, however, that in my opinion there is much done 

 which is neither desirable nor necessary. As a rule, quantitative work 

 alone, and that the best possible under the circumstances, should occu- 

 py the time of the student. I would relegate to the lecture-table of 

 the instructor all illustrative experiments and qualitative work neces- 

 sary to a good understanding of the underlying principles of the sub- 

 ject, which every student should possess when he enters the laboratory. 

 That which he gets which is of most worth in his course in a physical 

 laboratory is not a familiarity with the principles of the science, but a 

 training in the methods of investigation in use among physicists, in- 

 cluding a knowledge of the use and abuse of experiment and the ne- 



