124 MICHIGAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 



A stirring poem stimulates emotions toward right living and great 

 deeds; and a strong novel, like "Uncle Tom's Cabin/' has great evolution- 

 ary force; yet discoveries due to progress in exact knowledge in nature's 

 realm, as, for instance, the working out, by the immortal Jenuer. of the 

 nature of the dairymaid's disease — cowpox, the scientific establishment 

 of vaccination, and the consequent gaining of power by man to absolutely 

 prevent the most loathsome disease ever known, are worthy to outrank 

 any such literarj^ work ever done or likely to be done. For such work 

 as advances the world's stock of useful knowledge, accurate observation 

 of nature, systematic arrangement of facts, and, above all, the habit of 

 scientific thinking — these are the essentials. To illustrate my idea of 

 the habit of scientific thinking: Two men were talking on several 

 topics. One who listened would soon notice that, whatever topic was 

 broached, one of them uniformly soon used a literaiy quotation, once 

 repeating something which a philosopher is alleged to have said some 

 sixteen hundred years ago. His mind was stored with literature, his 

 habit of thought was literary, he had in his mind no stock of facts or 

 principles relative to the great forces or materials of nature, from which 

 to draw and use in connection with whatever phenomenon was brought 

 to his attention, his mind was not stored even Avith the literature of any 

 of the physical or social sciences, conseipiently he was and is incapable 

 of adding anything new to man's control over his surroundings, his 

 knowledge stopped with grasping what men before him have done. Not 

 having [lis mind stored with the laws of nature, and not having the habit 

 of scientific thinking, his life could not add much to the welfare of the 

 world, through material, moral, or social p>-o</rc8s, however powerful 

 and useful he might be in infinencing emotions, toward self-mastery, 

 goodness and greatness. 



Of the two men, the other man was well known as one who has deeply 

 studied certain sciences, and is believed to have contributed something 

 of value to the world's stock of exact knowledge along one of the sciences. 

 It was apparent that his habits of thought were upon scientific subjects, 

 his references were not to the literature of the classics, rarely even to the 

 literature of the sciences, but he referred to the universal law of gravi- 

 tation, the doctrine of the indestructibility of matter, the law of the 

 persistence of force, the correlation of the physical forces, that action 

 and reaction are equal and opposite, and to the fact that heat, light, 

 electricity, and sound, are modes of motion. 



Is it not easy to see why it is impossible for the first of these two 

 men to advance the world's knowledge of the materials and forces of 

 nature, and why it is jierfectly possible for the other one to do so? 



You may notice that I am setting up a standard by which to judge of 

 the values of educations, and ranking as of most value that education 

 which enables man to add to the world's knowledge of the laws of nature 

 and how to control and utilize the conditions which surround us, for the 

 benefit of mankind. 



I submit that this is a higher standard than any which looks merely 

 to the selfish interests of the pupil. But is it not true that most of us 

 would, selfishly or unselfishly, choose to follow in the footsteps of Sir 

 Isaac Newton, of Faraday, Morse, Tyndall, Edison, Alexander Graham 

 Bell, and the others, who have advanced the cause of science, and brought 



