358 Journal of Applied Microscopy. 



provided, and where no apparatus is available. Those who have charge of these 

 things either do not know, or frequently forget, that work in science without a 

 laboratory and apparatus is as impossible as work in manual training without a 

 shop or tools ; and that text-book science is only on a par with text-book manual 

 training, or text-book blacksmithing. 



The ordinary text-book course in science is about as fruitless a waste of time 

 as can well be imagined. It may have some value in a literary way, but it cer- 

 tainly IS 7wt and should not he paraded as science. I have no fault to find with a 

 go©d text-book ; it is the way it is misused, or over-used, of which I complain. 



The basis of all science work should be knowledge at first hand — individual 

 investigation — -"something acquired" — not "something learned." I believe it 

 is the best, and practically the only way during school life, of training the senses, 

 the avenues through which all knowledge must enter. It should also constantly 

 exercise the judgment on original problems. " Text-book science is a make- 

 believe, a misnomer, and is better out of a course of study than in it. It gives 

 no special mental training, and adds no knowledge worth having." 



I believe that the foundation of every course in general botany or zoology 

 should be some good, plain, natural system of classification, around which all 

 laboratory and reference work should be gathered. It will form a foundation for 

 future reading and reference. It is the classification of knowledge, without 

 which all knowledge loses half its value. 



Then if a natural classification is to be the basis of our course, it is highly 

 necessary that the various orders and classes be taken up in a somewhat logical 

 order, and that types enough be introduced and studied, not only to fix the 

 classification, but to make apparent the more common likenesses and differences. 



To teach botany or zoology intelligently, or to study the animal or plant 

 kingdoms from the standpoint given, without the use of the microscope, is not 

 only impracticable but impossible. By far the greatest number of animal and 

 plant forms cannot be studied without the aid of the microscope, to say nothing 

 of its necessity in the study of the anatomy and histology of the higher and more 

 complicated forms. 



It is sometimes urged that we do not need a microscope for the study of the 

 common forms around us. This statement comes from an ignorance of what is 

 around us, and what is common. I would not convey the idea that an object, 

 to be of any interest or value, must be viewed through a microscope, but I do 

 mean to say, and to insist, that there are many important forms which have their 

 place in the animal or plant kingdoms, and which are of the greatest importance 

 in the economy of nature, that must be so studied, if studied at all. 



The microscope is no longer a plaything — an instrument for pastime and 

 amusement. It is a piece of apparatus for actual scientific work. It is no 

 longer viewed as the thing to be studied — it is simply a means to an end, as is a 

 pen or a hammer. It is as indispensable to good work in science as are tools to 

 good work in carpentry. 



Since a course in botany or zoology should give an idea of the range and 

 extent of the various life forms, with a fair acquaintance with at least a few of 

 the type specimens, and their most evident relations, it is clear to anyone who 



