FOREWORD 



There is in the making a movement of thought toward a new focus 

 in the history of science. Though interrupted by two world wars 

 and a great depression, it has been steadily taking shape and gath- 

 ering strength. It has drawn to itself a considerable number of our 

 more thoughtful scientists, historians, and educators. So far, it has 

 spoken the language of scholars. In 7be Life of Science Library, it 

 is beginning to speak the language of lay men and women, girls 

 and boys. 



Among the scholars, George Sarton, who holds the chair of the 

 History of Science at Harvard University, is respected and loved 

 as the leader of the movement. It was he who conceived and fash- 

 ioned its two basic tools: the Introduction to the History of Sci- 

 ence, which he has now brought through the fourteenth century, 

 and the journal Isis, with its systematic and critical bibliographies 

 of current publications in the field. 



Dr. Sarton has not only led in developing a sound scholarly 

 basis for the movement, but he has been the most eloquent voice 

 of its ideals as a new form of humanism which is needed to do for 

 our time what an older humanism did for the Renaissance. 



Many of the essays in which he has expressed these ideals can 

 be read with understanding and enjoyment by the wider circle of 

 readers for whom Ibe Life of Science Library is intended. It has 

 seemed to the publisher and sponsors of 7be Life of Science Li- 

 brary that its purposes could not be better conveyed than by gath- 

 ering together in the present volume a selection from these essays. 



The essays chosen, though far apart in time of composition, are 

 united by spirit and intent. They were not planned with a view 

 to being collected here. Yet, when read together, they have vir- 

 tues a more formal treatment would lack. By their very diversity 

 of subject and method, they give the beginner and the layman 



v 



