6i2 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



the alumni of Hamilton College in 1888 he maintained that we 

 were living in a revolutionary period, which is marked by a great 

 advance in knowledge and a vastly larger control of the forces of 

 Nature; by a large increase in freedom of thought and action; by 

 a sudden and remarkable addition to the mobility of man, accom- 

 panied by an unexampled growth of great cities; and by an incalcu- 

 lable addition to the wealth of the world. Accompanying these 

 great changes in the material and intellectual world were certain 

 moral transformations appearing to grow out of them. All these 

 advances were ascribed to a movement — a new method of investi- 

 gating Xature — that began, so far as its particular and continuous 

 development is concerned, about three hundred years ago, but to 

 which no date or founder's name could be attached. This new 

 philosophy thoroughly respected Nature, was humble, patient in 

 the accumulation of facts and the trial of its theories, comprehen- 

 sive, progressive, and hopeful. It has given us the maiwelous 

 increase of knowledge which especially marks the nineteenth cen- 

 tury; it has impressed its influence upon all branches of study, and 

 has wrought great improvements in methods and results; and has 

 rendered an immense and inestimable service to Christian theology, 

 and done much to broaden and rationalize it and thus to perpetuate 

 and strengthen its hold on the world. Finally, the method of sci- 

 ence was pronounced " the best gift that God has given to the 

 mind of man." A similar train of thought as to the material as- 

 pects is apparent, though in a somewhat different form, in an address 

 on The Stored (or Fossil) Power of the World, delivered in 1894. 

 A considerable part of Professor Orton's presidential address 

 at the last meeting of the American Association was devoted to a 

 summary of the conclusions derived from Alfred Russell Wallace's 

 book, The Wonderful Century, that the progress accomplished in 

 the present century far outweighs the entire progress of the human 

 race from the beginning up to 1800. In this address, also, the 

 author felicitously spoke of the scope of the American Association 

 as possibly including the wltole continent, and its object as the ad- 

 vancement of science, the discovery of new truth. " It is possible 

 that we could make ourselves more interesting to the general pub- 

 lic if we occasionally forswore our loyalty to our name and spent 

 a portion of our time in restating established truths." But the dis- 

 coveries recorded, though often fragmentary and devoid of special 

 interest to the outside world, all had a place in the great temple of 

 knowledge; and the speaker hoped that although no great discov- 

 eries should be reported this time, the meeting might still be a 

 memorable one through the inspiration it would give to the multi- 

 tude of workers in the several fields of science. 



