236 



THE GUIDE TO NATURE 



Greatness and the Missionary Spirit. 



In an experience of some twenty- 

 two years of editing scientific maga- 

 zines I have been more and more 

 impressed by the fact, that the 

 greater the man, the more will- 

 ing he is to help those who are not 

 so great. I have found that when I 

 want to know the answer to even the 

 simplest question, it is best to send 

 that question to the biggest expert in 

 that particular line of thought that 

 there is in the country or perhaps in 

 the world. Then I am sure to get not 

 only an authoritative, but a kindly and 

 prompt answer. Several times I have 

 thought when a question comes to my 

 desk, one, for example, pertaining to 

 dentistry, that I would send it to a local 

 dentist, or a legal query to a local 

 lawyer, or perhaps some point in 

 natural science to a local teacher 

 who should have access to main- 

 books. But such an action almost 

 invariably proves to be a mistake. 

 Several times a letter has been re- 

 turned unanswered, but using my 

 stamped and self-addressed envelope. 

 Several times has come the reply, 

 "I am too busy in my work to answer 

 your questions." And not infrequently 

 has come a reply, 'This question is 

 too simple for me to take time to an- 

 swer it. You ought to send it to some 

 one more interested in elementary 

 work than I am." 



But not once in this almost a quar- 

 ter of a century of experience have I 

 been refused, or repulsed or delayed 

 by any really great authority. I now 

 send such questions, simple as they 



may be, to the most learned men or 

 women in the land or to the most ac- 

 complished specialists. Take a man 

 like President David Starr Jordan, of 

 the Leland Stanford Junior University. 

 There is not a busier man in all this 

 country than he, nor one better versed 

 in the science of ichthyology, yet he 

 will send promptly a full, interesting, 

 kindly answer to a barefoot boy's in- 

 quiry about something that he has ob- 

 served while fishing, or about some 

 strange fish that he has caught. Make 

 the experiment just once if you doubt. 

 If, for example, some friend asks you 

 an astronomical question that seems 

 simple, and you send it to the teacher 

 of astronomy in a high school, the 

 chances are that you will be told that, 

 "This subject is fully explained in all 

 the elementary text-books on astron- 

 omy." Send it to the Yerkes Obser- 

 vatory or to the Naval Observatory 

 at Washington, and you get a reply 

 that treats the whole subject as if it 

 were a matter previously unknown ; 

 they will convey the impression that 

 they have investigated it at your re- 

 quest, and are happy to give you the 

 result in simple language. Surely the 

 missionary spirit goes with greatness, 

 and it accompanies profound learning. 

 Profound learning is always ready to 

 impart, and to do so in the simplest and 

 plainest language. The expert knows 

 that he knows what he knows, and that 

 is Confucius's definition of knowledge. 

 The man who befogs the subject in a 

 cloud of words, is virtually concealing 

 himself behind his own ignorance, as 

 the cuttlefish retreats under a cloud of 



