6 9 o SCIENCE PROGRESS 



day become in relation to British Learning and Science what 

 the College de France has been and is in the intellectual life of 

 France, and fulfil the purpose for which the purchase of the 

 South Kensington Estate was recommended fifty-eight years 

 ago by the late Prince Consort. 



The building stands ready amid a group of active Colleges, 

 occupied partly by the offices of the University, partly by the 

 offices of the Imperial Institute itself. But in both parts, the 

 natural and fitting service that it ought to fulfil is shown by 

 the existence of active laboratories which have arisen in it 

 as the natural and fitting organs of an Imperial Institute of 

 Science. What nobler service could be assigned to the Imperial 

 Institute than that of an Imperial Institute of Science and 

 Learning, a central meeting-place of an intellectual corps d'e'lite, 

 composed of the most active learners and teachers of the 

 Metropolis and of the United Kingdom and of His Majesty's 

 Dominions beyond the Seas ? 



The building was intended as an Imperial Institute of Com- 

 merce ; that intention has not been fulfilled, and cannot be 

 fulfilled at South Kensington. Yet, if we believe that Commerce 

 rests upon applied Science, as applied Science rests upon pure 

 Science, is it not an even wider fulfilment of the original purpose, 

 and a fuller satisfaction of the generous support of that purpose 

 from all quarters of the British Empire, to form an Imperial 

 Institute of Science as a provision in the Metropolis for Uni- 

 versity teaching and research, and as " a facility afforded by the 

 Metropolis for specialist and advanced students in connection 

 with the provision existing in other parts of the United Kingdom 

 and of His Majesty's Dominions beyond the Seas" — an Imperial 

 clearing-house of knowledge ? 



To recapitulate the whole argument : 



The quickening factor of initiative — i.e. of research — must 

 permeate the substance of the receptive and imitative element in 

 teaching. Research and teaching form an indissoluble com- 

 pound, each a necessary complement of each. Research apart 

 from teaching, teaching apart from research, are equally un- 

 natural and comparatively ineffective factors. It is essential 

 to the welfare and efficiency of a University, and especially 

 so in the case of the University of London, that in the organisa- 

 tion of its teaching staff at all grades effect should be given to 



