THE BIUTISH ASSOC/. \T/o\ MEETING. 



491 



somewhal akin to, thai of the modern military practice, under which 

 frontal attacks are abandoned in favor of a less direct method of as- 

 sault. One sees in English scientific papers a greater tendency to 

 attack by the flank than in America or Germany; a somewhat readier 

 disposition to be satisfied with a general statement of facts already 

 known rather than the concentration of effort on particular problems 

 which need to be cleared up. All of which simply means that the 

 methods of education and of national life in England have not brought 

 into existence a large army of disciplined students of research such as 

 one finds, for example, in Germany. 



The fact that physics and mathematics are still retained in one 

 section in the British Association is not without significance. The 

 necessary connection between the two was many times referred to in 

 the addresses and papers of the section. Notwithstanding this there 

 was more than one reference to the fact that mathematics, as taught 

 in the universities and colleges, is seldom grasped by the student so 

 that it becomes a facile tool in his hands. This is a disappointing 

 fact in our present day teaching on this side the Atlantic no less than 

 in England. Why is it that mathematics, the oldest of the sciences, 

 should lend itself less readily as an instrument of research or of prac- 

 tice than chemistry or physics? Is it because we fail to use the lab- 

 oratory method in mathematics? or because we are still tied to the 

 methods of the past ? or is it due in part to the fact that too little time 



First Court of Sidney Sussex College. 



