738 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



progress of the research. A natural i^rudence recommends great rigor 

 in this connection. For it is pretty much the same to the greater 

 number even of the instructed hearers whether a man of science says 

 " I know," or " I suppose ; " they only ask after the result and the au- 

 thority by which it is supported, not the grounds or the doubts. It is 

 thus not to be wondered at if earnest investigators do not willingly 

 shock the confidence of their readers in what the former may think 

 true and demonstrable, by the enumeration of ideas of the correctness 

 of which they do not feel themselves quite secure. These may be very 

 probable, and may be expressed with ever so much prudence and care- 

 ful guardedness ; they still expose him who utters them to the danger 

 of vexatious misrepresentation. 



It is, further, not to be overlooked, that the peculiar discipline of 

 scientific thought which is necessary for the most abstract and rigor- 

 ous grasp possible of newly-found ideas and laws, and for the purifica- 

 tion from all accidents of the sensuous order of phenomena, along 

 with the habitual residence of the mind among a circle of ideas far 

 removed from general interest, is not a quite favorable preparative 

 for a popular intelligible exposition of the insights obtained, to hear- 

 ers who have not had the like discipline. For this task there is rather 

 required an artistic talent of exposition, a certain kind of eloquence. 

 The lecturer or writer must find generally accessible stand-points from 

 which he may call forth new representations with the most vivid dis- 

 tinctness, and then allow the abstract principle, which he seeks to 

 make intelligible, to derive from these concrete life. This is almost 

 an opposite mode of treatment to that which obtains in scientific trea- 

 tises, and it can readily be understood that the men are rare who are 

 equally fitted for both these kinds of intellectual labor. 



Owing to all these circumstances, a sort of dividing wall is raised 

 between the men of science and the laity who might obtain instruction 

 and guidance from them. That many, and indeed some of the most 

 able, investigators have the qualities and peculiarities belonging to 

 abstract work is natural, and will, in each individual case, be at once 

 willingly excused. I have here merely to guard against the reversal 

 of this relation, as if the defects named were necessary, or at all con- 

 stituted a prerogative. 



The compilers can give no help in those directions where the origi- 

 nal thinkers have neglected or avoided expressing themselves. So 

 much the more gratifying is it, 1 consider, in such a state of things, 

 when, among those who have shown the highest ability for original 

 scientific work, there is found, at times, a man like Tyndall, full of 

 enthusiasm for the problem of making the newly-acquired insights and 

 outlooks of his science available for the wider circle of the people, 

 and, at the same time, endowed with other qualities which are the 

 necessary conditions of success toward this end, eloquence and the 

 gift of lucid exposition. 



