THE BEGINNINGS OE AMERICAN SCIENCE. 



THE THIRD CENTURY. 



By George Brown Goode, 

 President of the Biolop^ical Society of Washington. 



VIII. 



In the address which it was my privilege one year ago to read in the 

 presence of this society I attempted to trace the progress of scientific 

 activity in America from the time of the first settlement by the English 

 in 1585 to the end of the Revolution, a period of nearly two hundred 

 years. 



Resuming the subject, I shall now take up the consideration of the 

 third century, from 1782 to the present time. For convenience of dis- 

 cussion the time is divided, approximately, into decades, while the dec- 

 ades naturally fall into groups of three. From 1780 to 18 10, from 18 10 

 to 1840, from 1840 to 1870, and from 1870 to the close of the century 

 are periods in the history of American thought, each of which seems to 

 be marked by characteristics of its own. These must have names, and 

 it may not be inappropriate to call the first the period of Jefferson, the 

 second that of Silliman, and the third that of Agassiz. 



The first was, of course, an extension of the period of L,inn£eus, the 

 second and third were during the mental supremacy of Cuvier and Von 

 Baer and their schools, and the fourth or present, beginning in 1870, 

 belongs to that of Darwin, the extension of whose influence to America 

 was delayed by the tumults of the civil convulsion which began in 1861 

 and ended in 1865. 



The beginnings of American science do not belong entirely to the 

 past. Our science is still in its youth, and in the discussion of its history 

 I shall not hesitate to refer to instit'ttions and to tendencies wdiich are of 

 very recent origin. 



' Annual presidential address delivered at the seventh anniversary meeting of the 



Biological Society of Washington, January 22, 1S87, in the lecture room of the 



United States National Museum. 



409 



