EDITOR'S TABLE, 



743 



founders, and presided over its third, 

 fourth, and fifth meetings. He said: 

 " When the effort was first made to 

 estabhsh a general American Associa- 

 tion for the Promotion of Science, it is 

 certain that it met with considerable 

 opposition. There were various rea- 

 sons for this. From close communica- 

 tion with many who are now active 

 members of the Association, I know 

 why this fear prevailed over their 

 hopes of the usefulness of such an in- 

 stitution. The opposition came not 

 more from those who were habitually 

 conservative, than from those who, be- 

 ing earnest in regard to the progress 

 of science, are usually in favor of all 

 progressive measures. It proceeded 

 from no under-estimate of the strength 

 which there was among the cultivators 

 of science. Some of us had studied 

 the workings of the British Associa- 

 tion, and had been convinced of the 

 absolute necessity for the attendance 

 there from year to year of the men of 

 the universities, to give tone to the 

 proceedings, and were alarmed, per- 

 haps, at the forays into the domains of 

 science, which had there been witnessed 

 in some of the less powerful sections, 

 and even into the park of Section A 

 itself. So far from having been trained 

 in the same schools, we scarcely knew 

 each other personally. How could we 

 irregulars venture into conflict, when 

 the files to our right and to our left 

 were strangers to us, and when the 

 cause might thus have suffered from 

 the want of discipline of its volunteer 

 support ? " 



The difficulties thus anticipated 

 made their appearance. It may be not 

 quite just to say that they were pro- 

 vided for, but a course was pursued 

 which could hardly fail to bring them 

 on. The American Association for the 

 Advancem.ent of Science was organized 

 on the general plan of the British As- 

 sociation ; its meetings were to be held 

 in different places, as if to create a 

 public interest in science ; the member- 



ship was made easily accessible, and 

 the form of proceedings was the same. 

 But while the British Association has 

 had in it a strong popular element, 

 which has been regarded as perfectly 

 legitimate, while it has aimed to awak- 

 en sympathy for science, and arouse an 

 interest in it on the part of the people, 

 by providing addresses to be delivered 

 during its meetings to popular audi- 

 ences, by including a wide range of 

 subjects of public moment in its sec- 

 tional discussions, and by giving earnest 

 attention to the general subject of sci- 

 entific education, all these things have 

 been studiously avoided by the Ameri- 

 can Association, which has constantly 

 maintained that its function is the cre- 

 ation of science and not its diffusion or 

 popularization. Its title has misled the 

 public from the beginning. It is not 

 an Association for the Advancement of 

 Science, in the full or comprehensive 

 sense of the expression, or as interpreted 

 by the institution which first adopted it. 

 Had it chosen a title which accurately 

 described its character, such as "An 

 Association for the Promotion of Sci- 

 ence by Original Research," misunder- 

 standings would have been avoided, 

 and the difiiculties feared at the outset 

 might have been escaped. There would 

 then have been a distinctive basis of 

 membership ; nobody would have been 

 admitted that had not done something 

 in the way of actual research, and the 

 work of these would not have been 

 embarrassed and impeded by the inter- 

 ference of outsiders. But in the actual 

 working of the institution these diffi- 

 culties have arisen. A portion of the 

 membership, who claim to be the in- 

 vestigators for which the Association 

 was established, complained that their 

 proceedings have been hampered and 

 overborne by the influx of scientific 

 nobodies; and the said nobodies have 

 complained that the concern was man- 

 aged by a self-constituted and exclusive 

 ring, who have spent as much time in 

 admiring each other as in their proper 



