PRESENT-DAY BIOLOGICAL THOUGHT 57 



Every one of these letters was written on the same 

 kind of paper (not on parchment), and all were written 

 in French. One can appreciate a nonscientific writer's 

 comment upon this case : 



"Remember that these manuscripts were eagerly pur- 

 chased and their authenticity warmly defended by one 

 of the leading geometricians of his time, and then be- 

 lieve, if you can, that development of the mathematical 

 faculty has anything to do with reasoning power, or even 

 common sense." 



When we speak of men still living, or but recently 

 passed away, in whose disciples the fires of emotional 

 desire for credit loom large, matters of importance to the 

 real advancement of science are too often confused with 

 a mere matter of priority, so that, as Metcalf has pointed 

 out, the more valuable work is usually overlooked or for- 

 gotten. To this same idea, J. M. Aldrich contributes the 

 following : 



''Criticism is usually a generation behind publication, 

 so that the poorest work may stand, as we often see, for 

 twenty or forty years before it is completely revised, 

 ^loreover, in North America at least, the ablest men are 

 quite likely to be the very ones to succumb to the higher 

 rewards of administrative and economic work, and so 

 fail to make the contribution of which they are capable."* 



And finally, in the matter of psychological reaction of 

 scientists, Poincare has called attention to the compari- 

 son of Gallic and Anglo-Saxon genius. 



"Characteristic of the one is a feeling for form, for sym- 



