THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY. 47 



results, or a labored repetition of hearsay statements. As an intellec- 

 tual discipline, for facility of demonstration, for the simplicity of the 

 objects, their beauty and interest, their associations with the green 

 lanes and broad moors of England, with the poetry of " Cymbeline " 

 and " Lycidas," Avith fairy tales and local folk-lore — botany is to my 

 mind the branch of natural science which is above all others to be 

 chosen where one only can be taught. Next in importance I would 

 place elementary physics, the knowledge of the simplest laAvs of masses 

 at rest and in motion, of heat and light. Its great recommendations 

 are its precision, its constant and useful illustrations in daily life, the 

 interest it gives to the handicrafts and manufactures in which so large 

 a number of English boys and girls are busied, and the necessity of 

 such knowledge as the first step in acquiring all other natural sciences. 

 First, then, I would that every Sheffield girl should love flowers 

 with the deep and abiding affection of familiar knowledge, and that 

 every Sheffield lad should know every common plant in your beautiful 

 woods, and find his purest pleasure on the heights of Bell Hagg and 

 the broad expanse of Stanage Moor. And next I would that your 

 workmen and work-boys should know so much of mechanics that they 

 may take an intelligent pride in your vast factories, and that in some 

 of them may be awakened the genius to which we trust to repeat in 

 future generations the national services of Ai'kwright, and Watt, and 

 Stevenson. 



With regard to the endowment of research in biology, I must con- 

 fess that I should be sorry to see it undertaken by government funds. 

 That such investigations are of public interest, that they are difficult 

 and expensive, and that at present they languish for want of adequate 

 support, is all true. But this country is not so poor, nor our country- 

 men so wanting in public spirit, that Ave need appeal to the national 

 purse to supply every ascertained want. Great as is the national im- 

 portance of science, the nation is more important still ; and even if 

 that were the alternative, I would rather that we should indefinitely 

 continue dependent on Germany for our knowledge than give up the 

 local energy, the unofficial zeal which has made England what she is. 

 Far better for the strength and the civilization of the nation that a 

 thousand pounds were raised every year for the endowment of unre- 

 munerative researches in this wealthy toAvni of Sheffield than that ten 

 thousand were paid you by a paternal monarch or an enlightened de- 

 partment. 



But surely there is no need for us to go to Parliament for such 

 sums as we require. In the first place, scientific men themselves show 

 a good example of not asking before they give. There is the modest 

 sum M'hich we raise in this Association, there are the funds for help- 

 ing research of the Royal Society, the Chemical Society, the British 

 Medical Association, the Iron and Steel Institute, the Whitworth 



