646 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



impress upon all the ages that have followed. The lessons taught by 

 the Greeks have not been forgotten. The examples of beauty and 

 the vestiges of truth they have bequeathed to us, still exist to ameli- 

 orate the condition and improve the moral character of a thousand 

 times greater number of individuals than was effected by them in the 

 palmy days of Hellenic development. But we should not unduly 

 exalt the past, or claim for it a superiority over the present. There 

 never was a time in which the realms of actual thought were so ex- 

 tended as at present, nor when so many individuals were occupied in 

 the contemplation of abstract truths. 



Such being the results proceeding from science as we have stated, 

 it appears strange that so little encouragement is given to its prosecu- 

 tion, and that it should not be more liberally fostered by governments 

 and wealthy individuals. In a new country like this, where a whole 

 continent is to be subdued, and there is so great a demand for the 

 practical application of science to art, it is not surprising that the great 

 principles which underlie these applications while they can be borrowed 

 from Europe should not at first receive much attention 5 but, since our 

 country has become so much advanced in wealth and in intelligence, 

 this state of things should no longer exist, and it is therefore proper 

 on an occasion like this to call public attention to the importance and 

 wants of abstract science. 



In this country, science is almost exclusively prosecuted by those 

 engaged in the laborious and exhaustive employment of imparting in- 

 struction. Science among us brings comparatively little emolument, 

 and is accompanied with but little honor. High talents are therefore 

 driven into other pursuits more remunerative and more favored with 

 popular applause. Those who from a love of truth would pursue it 

 for its own sake are so overworked with the drudgery of elementary 

 teaching, and so poorly supplied with the implements of investigation, 

 that it is not surprising that science has made comparatively little 

 advance among us, but that, under existing conditions, it should have 

 made so much. "What is especially wanted at present is an improve- 

 ment in our higher institutions of learning, and on this point permit me 

 to dwell a few moments. 



Three things are essential to a well-constituted college or univer- 

 sity: 1. An unencumbered, free endowment, which shall liberally 

 provide for the support of the faculty, and defray all the expenses of 

 the operations of the establishment ; 2. A faculty consisting of men 

 of profound learning and powers of original thought and fluent ex- 

 pression; and 3. A full supply of all the objects and implements 

 of instruction and research. I say a " free endowment," in contradis- 

 tinction to one invested in buildings intended for external display more 

 than for internal use, as is unhappily too often the case in this country. 



The faculty should be men of intrinsic worth, chosen, not on ac- 

 count of influential connections, social position, denominational j)re- 



