EDITORIAL AND GENERAL 



183 



ledge has been manifested by wealthy 

 men. As instances may be cited the 

 bequest of about thirty thousand dol- 

 lars for the upkeep of the Lloyd Li- 

 brary of Cincinnati maintained for the 

 advancement of botanical science, and 

 the founding' of a publishing house in 

 Chicago with a million dollar endow- 

 ment to aid in issuing useful books 

 which otherwise could not be issued 

 because the demand for such matter is 

 still too small to justify its being printed 

 for profit. The general public is not 

 yet alive to the delights and advantages 

 of scientific studies. On this point, 

 Dr. Richardson in an address deliv- 

 ered at the Minneapolis meeting" of the 

 American Chemical Society expressed 

 himself thus : 'Considered by itself, 

 science and the scientific method are 

 the most satisfactory and satisfying 

 things in the possession of the human 

 mind. The unfortunate thing — it can 

 not be classed as a criticism — about 

 science is that it has left the multitude 

 untouched. With the results of science 

 and the scientific method on every hand 

 forming so large a part of our splendid 

 materialistic civilization, nevertheless 

 the great, the overwhelming majority 

 of people are ignorant of the methods, 

 the aims and the results of scientific 

 inquiry in daily use and of daily ne- 

 cessity ; of even greater import, the 

 scientific method of thought is not a 

 part of their mental equipment.' One 

 of the reasons why the general public 

 has not a more abiding interest in real 

 science is doubtless due to the fact that 

 newspaper writers have so long dealt 

 in a fanciful brand of pseudo-science 

 that the facts seem sober and uninter- 

 esting by comparison. To overcome 

 this idea true science needs to be set 

 forth in its best garb, but this cannot 

 be done at present for lack of sufficient 

 support from the public." 



Undoubtedly the editor is right and 

 from that point of view the owner of 

 Arcadia is unquestionably wrong in ex- 

 pecting the entire general public to 

 support, on a paying basis, an Insti- 

 tution such as The Agassiz Association 

 which promulgates the tenets of ele- 

 mentary science. 



If you ask for an explanation of what 



seems a most astonishing act on the 

 part of the owner of Arcadia let me 

 give the best that I can suggest: he is 

 living one hundred years too soon. 



Carnegie realizes that science needs 

 aid; our benefactor thinks that there 

 should be so great a demand for 

 science on the part of the public that 

 the pursuit of science should be a pay- 

 ing business. Both are right, only one 

 is 1900 A.D., the other 2000 A.D. 

 When you are puzzled to know the 

 cause of Arcadia's troubles ponder this 

 explanation and decide in which cen- 

 tury you are living. 



"The Scientific Method of Thought." 

 The foregoing quotation from Dr. 

 Richardson leads me to suggest that 

 some have it and some have it not, 

 and that the two classes are as far 

 from each other as the zenith is from 

 the nadir. Here are two examples 

 that have come to me within two or 

 three days. A business man of New 

 York City took me in his automobile 

 to ride into the realms of wild nature 

 and then astonished me by this re- 

 mark : "Say, Bigelow, there is no use 

 of your Agassiz Association work. 

 There is no excuse for such an Insti- 

 tution nowadays. Why, don't you 

 know that there is no need of mission- 

 ary work in popularizing nature? 

 Everybody is interested in nature ; 

 there are plenty of magazines on the 

 subject, books are issued from the 

 press every week, all the schools teach 

 it and everybody is moving out of the 

 city to get near to nature. There un- 

 doubtedly was a time when such an 

 Institution was needed in the very be- 

 ginning of an interest in nature study, 

 but now there is no further use for the 

 AA, because its ideals have all been 

 achieved." 



The next day a prominent woman of 

 Sound Beach, calling at this office to 

 extend sympathy and aid in our pres- 

 ent trouble, made the remark, "You do 

 not realize just how much this institu- 

 tion is needed right here among the 

 intelligent people of Sound Beach. 



"Only a few days ago a woman said 

 she would not contribute to the AA 

 nor to the new Arcadia because she 



