FERRIS: THE CONTRIBUTION OF NATURAL HISTORY TO HUMAN PROGRESS 79 



slavery to detail. And if that be true, the naturalist can arise again and con- 

 tribute as a naturalist to the progress of biology and Ihi'ongh the progress of 

 biological understanding to the progress of man. 



There is here, however, one disturbing thought. The progress of biology has 

 been coincident with the rise and recognition of the professional biologist. The 

 Old Time Naturalist was in many instances a man who did not earn his living 

 through his knowledge of natural history. The present-day biologist is generally 

 employed in a professional capacity. Now a professional position demands pro- 

 fessional competence and professional competence demands something more than 

 acquaintance merely with principles. So the professional biologist who wishes 

 to compete within his profession is forced to consider and become proficient in 

 details as well as principles. And there is many a professional position which 

 demands nothing more — and frequently does not encourage anything more — 

 than competence in details. How that difficulty is to be resolved is not immedi- 

 ately apparent. But we may hope that the genuinely competent man -who has it 

 in him to extend the bounds of knowledge wdll also have it within him to triumph 

 over difficulties and eventually to emerge from the forest of details into the high 

 places where his view is unobstructed and far-ranging. 



So as one approaches the story of the contributions of natural history to 

 human progress it is desirable to remember something of the history which we 

 have been discussing. Natural history has given us some great things; in the 

 hands of real naturalists it can still give us great things. Let us consider how 

 natural history has expanded our range of thought and how it has contributed 

 to human progress, by this and by other means. 



There are tAvo aspects of these contributions which need to be considered. 

 One has to do with philosophical matters, the other has to do with material or 

 practical considerations. 



Tfieoretical Aspects 



First as to philosophical matters. Out of the work of the Old Time Naturalists 

 came the beginnings of most of the great ideas that not only dominate biology 

 today but reach far beyond. 



Consider the concept of evolution, the men from whom it came and the men 

 who first of all rose to its support and establishment. This was purely a contri- 

 bution from natural history; physiology had nothing at all to do with it. Experi- 

 mental biologj' had only an infinitesimal connection. Biochemistry had nothing 

 to do with it. Cytology had nothing to do with it. Comparative anatomy had only 

 a small part. Genetics had nothing to do with it, for genetics was not yet con- 

 ceived, even less born. Natural history, in its purest form, was almost all that 

 existed of w^hat w^e call biology at the time when the idea of evolution was accu- 

 mulated in the minds of Darwin and "Wallace and their predecessors. The idea 

 of evolution arose in the minds of men whose knowledge of any aspect of what 

 we now call biology except' what was included in natural history was almost nil. 

 Their i»redecessors. Buff on, Lamarck, and Erasmus Darwin, were purely natural- 

 ists. Wallace, who shares with Charles Darwin the honor of first formulating a 

 definite and intelligible concept of how evolution could have been brought about, 

 was a field collector of insects. Charles Darwan himself was the purest of pure 

 naturalists, whose ideas concerning evolution were first developed in the course 



