THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE. 



443 



the U. S. Lake Survey, a volume of 

 about one thousand quarto pages de- 

 voted chiefly to a discussion of the geo- 

 detic work of the Survey done during 

 the forty years of its existence. He is 

 the author of several of the Bulletins of 

 the U. S. Geological Survey, and of a 

 memoir on the Iced Bar and Long Tape 

 Base Apparatus of the U. S. Coast and 

 Geodetic Survey. These forms of ap- 

 paratus, devised and perfected by him, 

 involve many novel features and secure 

 a much higher precision at a much 

 smaller cost than apparatus previously 

 used. He prepared for the Smithsonian 

 Institution a volume entitled 'Geo- 

 graphical Tables,' being a manual for as- 

 tronomers, geographers, engineers and 

 cartographers, published in 1894. Sev- 

 eral of his most important mathemati- 

 cal papers relate to geophysics, especial- 

 ly those bearing on the secular cooling 

 and cubical contraction of the earth, on 

 the form and position of the sea sur- 

 face, and on the profoundly difficult 

 problem presented by the recently dis- 

 covered phenomenon of the variation of 

 terrestrial latitudes. Although most of 

 his publications are necessarily of a 

 highly technical character, his semi- 

 popular addresses and reviews have been 

 widely read and appreciated. Profes- 

 sor Woodward was an associate editor of 

 the 'Annals of Mathematics' from 1889 

 to 1899 and has been an associate editor 

 of 'Science' since 1894. He has taken 

 an active part in the work of the scien- 

 tific societies with which he is con- 

 nected, and in addition to the official 

 positions he holds in the American As- 

 sociation for the Advancement of 

 Science, he has been honored by election 

 to the presidency of the American 

 Mathematical Society and to the presi- 

 dency of the New York Academy of 

 Sciences. Professor Woodward repre- 

 sents the highest type of the man of 

 science. Eminent for his original con- 

 tributions to science, a teacher of great 

 intellectual and moral influence, an ad- 

 ministrator with unfailing tact and 

 unerring judgment, he confers an honor 



on the Association which has elected 

 him to its highest office. 



President Low welcomed the 

 American Association to New York and 

 to Columbia University in an address 

 which recounted the increased recog- 

 nition given to science by the city since 

 the Association met there thirteen years 

 ago and the great progress of science 

 itself. He concluded with the follow- 

 ing words: "I am especially glad to 

 welcome you because you are an Asso- 

 ciation for the Advancement of Science. 

 That, after all, is what ought to make 

 you feel at home in the atmosphere of 

 this university: for a university that 

 does not assist the advancement of 

 science has hardly a right to call itself 

 by that great name. I heard Phillips 

 Brooks say, in a sermon that I heard 

 him preach in Boston when this Asso- 

 ciation met there twenty years ago, 

 that you can get no idea of eternity, by 

 adding century to century or by piling 

 aeon upon aeon; but that, if you will re- 

 member how little you knew when you 

 sat at your mother's knee to learn the 

 alphabet, and how with every acquisi- 

 tion of knowledge which has marked the 

 intervening years you have come to 

 feel, not how much more you know, but 

 how much more there is to be known, 

 all can get some idea of how long eter- 

 nity can be, because all can understand 

 that there never can be time enough to 

 enable any one to learn all that there 

 is to know. There is so much to be 

 known, that even the great advances 

 of the last generation do not make us 

 feel that everything is discovered, but 

 they appeal to new aspirations and 

 awaken renewed energy in order to 

 make fresh discoveries in a region that 

 teems with so much that is worthy of 

 knowledge. I congratulate you upon 

 your success, and I bid you welcome to 

 Columbia." 



In the course of his reply, the presi- 

 dent of the Association, Professor 

 Woodward, said: "But surprising and 

 gratifying as have been the achieve- 



