TEE EVANESCENCE OF FACTS 183 



erring and unfailing senses, aided of course usually by the microscope 

 and the stethoscope, but solid fact nevertheless. No deduction need 

 apply; no fiery imagination can play around a fact. The supreme 

 tragedy of nature, Huxley reminded Spencer, was one of his theories 

 killed by a fact. Eeason indeed must play a minor role in the new 

 theocracy. Man indeed has been accustomed to lean upon it but: 



Ein wenig besser wiird er leben 



Hilttest du ihm nicht den Schein 

 Des Himmels Licht gegeben 

 Er nennt 's Vernunf t und braucht 's allein 



Nur thierischer als jedes Thier zu sein. 



When the fact comes to be builded into a structure of any use to 

 mankind, of course the " light of Heaven " must be employed, but not 

 for a fact alone. That shines by its own effulgence. It would appear, 

 I confess, that the fact should shine for the babe as well as for the sage, 

 but after all sight and hearing and smell (that Judas of the senses — 

 why is it always necessary to reckon with this atavistic weakling?), 

 need interpretations; certain conclusions, not of course deductively but 

 inductively — mark the difference — must be drawn from those peripheral 

 stimuli which ring a bell in the caves of thought. This is entirely differ- 

 ent from the circuitous ratiocinations which formerly disfigured the 

 face of science. Pure science is direct induction, as distinguished from 

 the impure science in which the heavenly beacon plays too conspicuous 

 a part. Truth is apt to be lost if we get too far from the peripheral 

 stimuli; just how far, it is at present inconvenient to determine. At 

 any rate, it is now universally recognized that the sources of knowledge 

 are entirely different from former sources of knowledge, so elongated in 

 degree that the difference is fundamental. "Without this appreciation 

 of the difference between an interpretation of external peripheral 

 stimuli, revealed to us by the senses, and the conclusions arrived at by 

 the philosopher who sat in his tub or by the deductive sage who con- 

 stantly contemplated his umbilicus, one is apt to lose sight of the glory 

 of modern science. One method we readily believe was fallacious, the 

 other we know to be unfailing. 



This change in the methods of science began when the old method 

 had advanced about as far along its old paths as we have along the new 

 ones. The change (it is uncertain whether we are to reckon its inception 

 from Eoger Bacon or Lord Bacon) gradually became so emphasized that 

 under Cuvier at the French Academy even discussion was frowned upon. 

 It is true that France is no longer the exclusive home of science or 

 even the chief home of science. Science finds a favorite residence 

 amidst the fogs of Germany, where, owing to the idiosyncrasies of 

 etymology, discussion is a tiresome, but alas, not a neglected occupa- 

 tion. Indeed, there is well-founded suspicion that science has advanced 



