PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 113 
through the ages, as if in an Egyptian tomb. There are 
ideas also that, even after careful planting, may take long 
centuries to develop into maturity. If we had had a perfect 
definition of chemistry, or light, or electricity, for mstance, 
im concise and accurate language, who would have under- 
stood it? Or, if understood in a measure, would it have 
“helped us forward? Definitions and first principles may be 
too far away from us to be of use to us. _We may. view them 
across a gulf. Sound progress comes by adding to what is 
known the unknown which lies next to it. 
The first thing the modern scientist looks for ‘is proof: 
demonstrations; but these old philosophers offer us none. 
Someone argues that they are dealing with theories, and if 
those theories had been proved, they would have ceased to be 
theories, which is true. Then the scientist asks for argu- 
ments based upon experiment; but still none are forth- 
coming. And, lastly, the scientist wants to know at least how 
they arrived at their conclusions; but this, except to some 
extent in special cases, we shall probably never know. Their 
conclusions were apparently derived from observation and 
reasoning alone—too much reasoning and too little observa- 
tion, say some. They seem to have largely employed 
the powerful but treacherous method of reasoning from 
analogy. It seems most likely that these theories which 
have come down to us through the centuries have not been 
hastily formed, but, on the contrary, have been carefully 
thought out and-deliberately thrashed out in school and 
market-place, and have run the gauntlet of many exception- 
ally acute minds from generation to generation. They at- 
tempted too much, these ancients; they aimed too high, as 
we all know now. They tried to understand the whole 
system of the universe, instead of devoting themselves first 
to the study of a small and simple portion of it. But, above 
all, they did not experiment. Even Socrates taught that 
thought alone, without observation even, let alone experi- 
ment, was sufficient to lead us to the real nature of external 
things. It was-not considered impious to assume the place 
of deity, and attempt to construct the universe afresh in 
idea out of their own consciousness; but it was 
considered impious, forsooth, to examine into the nature 
ef the simplest matter close about them, by natural 
means, and endeavour to discover the principles regu- 
lating its constitution and behaviour! They framed a 
cosmogony, starting with the heavens and coming down to 
the earth ; we start with the earth and rise to the heavens— 
from the simplest mechanical powers to celestial mechanics. 
I 
