SCIENTISTS 



pottering in which nothing is followed up. Sir Henry Dale, 

 speaking at a Congress held in Cambridge in 1948 in honour 

 of Sir Joseph Barcroft, said that the great physiologist always 

 regarded research as an amusing adventure. Speaking at the 

 same Congress, Professor F. J. W. Roughton said that for 

 Barcroft and for Starling, physiology was the greatest sport in 

 the world. 



The great pioneers of science, although they have defended 

 their ideas feH^ently and often fought for them, were mostly at 

 heart humble men, for they realised only too clearly how puny 

 were their achievements compared to the vastness of the as yet 

 unknown. Near the end of his life Pasteur said : " I have wasted 

 my life" as he thought of the things he might have done to 

 greater profit. Shortly before his death Newton is reported to 

 have said : 



" I know not what I may appear to the world, but to myself I 

 appear to have been only like a boy playing on the sea-shore, and 

 diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a 

 prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay 

 all undiscovered before me." 



Diversion and holidays are very much a question of individual 

 requirements but freshness and originality may be lost if the 

 scientist works unremittingly for too long. In this connection a 

 good maxim has been coined by Jowett : "Don't spare; don't 

 drudge." Most of us require recreation and variety in interests 

 to avoid becoming dull, stodgy and mentally constipated. Simon 

 Flexner's attitude to holidays was the same as Pierpont Morgan's 

 — who once remarked that he could do a full year's work in nine 

 months but not in twelve months. Most scientists, however, do not 

 require as much as three months' annual vacation. 



Mention has already been made of the disappointments so 

 often met in research and the need for understanding and encour- 

 agement from colleagues and friends. It is recognised that these 

 continual frustrations sometimes produce a form of neurosis 

 which Professor H. A. Harris calls "lab. neurosis", or they may 

 kill a man's interest in research. Interest and enthusiasm must 

 be kept alive and this may be difficult if the worker is obliged 

 to plod along on a line of work which is not getting anywhere. 



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