PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS. 27 
pointed out by Sir W. Roberts, M.D., science has one 
advantage over literature and art, viz., that whatever 
advance is made by a master mind can be used as a stepping- 
stone for the next advance by those who come after him, 
even if they be somewhat inferior; in art much depends 
upon individual taste and skill, which cannot be placed on 
record in black and white. By the study of the old master- 
pieces an artist cannot set to work and make an advance 
upon them; but in science a well-trained scientific man, if 
he has the time and opportunity, can usually improve, even 
if only to a sheht degree, upon the work of his predecessors. 
Mere training and teaching for a degree is not sufficient ; 
post-graduate work is essential if we wish to turn out 
scientific men who will be able to “ advance Australia” by 
developing its resources and improving the conditions of 
life. It is not sufficient to merely instruct in the facts and 
principles of scientific knowledge—it is most important 
also to impart scientific habits of thought and methods, 
especially with the object of making new investigations or 
researches, so that the student may in turn be able to 
acquire something more than he himself was taught, or 
had learnt from books. 
Our students cannot, as a rule, spare the time and money, 
but have to put what knowledge they acquire to a money- 
making use as soon as possible. The University greatly 
needs funds for studentships, to be held by graduates, so 
as to help a few of the most promising to spend an addi- 
tional year or two in doing some real solid work, after they 
have been duly trained in the lecture-room and laboratory, 
for the first degree. 
The arguments as to the necessity for students to do 
some original work, wherever possible, apply still more 
strongly to the teaching staff. 
Professor Michael Foster, Secretary of the Royal Society, 
in his address to the British Association at Toronto, says :— 
‘“ Never so clearly has it been recognised that each post 
