An Introduction to a Biology 



logical research ; but the truth is, surely, that this 

 fact should be an argument for such a selection. 

 For in studying again a development which had 

 recently been studied, the investigator would be 

 throwing light upon two problems instead of only 

 one : upon the meaning of the changes of form 

 undergone by the animal in its development ; and 

 upon the trustworthiness of the human intelligence 

 as an investigating mechanism ; and probably more 

 light upon the second than upon the first. For if 

 the investigator made a point of looking neither at 

 the description made by the previous investigator 

 of the development, nor at his interpretation of the 

 facts of which this description was a record until 

 after he had completed his own description and 

 interpretation, he would obtain results which would 

 be interesting both to the embryologist and to the 

 philosopher. The solitary confinement in their own 

 studies and laboratories, and the complete isola- 

 tion of biological workers all over the world, 

 would doubtless be a hindrance to progress in bio- 

 logical inquiry, at any rate on its applied side ; 

 but it is very doubtful whether the opposite 

 extreme, the perfect means of inter-communication 

 now available, is not an equally serious obstacle 

 to such progress. 1 For it ensures the spreading 

 thin rather than the digging deep. 



It is not, of course, true that the biologist has 

 entirely excluded man from his attention. He has 

 studied him ; but he has done so in the same de- 

 tached, objective way in which he has studied the 



* The probable cessation of communication between the countries now 

 at war may effect a partial removal of this obstacle. 



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