INTERPRETATION OF NATURE 121 



This is the age of fact, and we are proud of it. 

 But it may be also the age of the imagination. 

 Fact is not to be worshiped. The Hfe that is 

 devoid of imagination is dead ; it is tied to the 

 earth. There need be no divorce of fact and 

 fancy ; they are only the poles of experience. 

 What is called the scientific method is only 

 imagination trained and set within bounds. Com- 

 pared with the whole mass of scientific attainment, 

 mere fact is but a minor part, after all. Facts are 

 bridged by imagination. They are tied together 

 by the thread of speculation. The very essence of 

 science is to reason from the known to the 

 unknown. 



There can be no objection to the poetic inter- 

 pretation of nature. It is essential only that the 

 observation be correct and the inference reasonable, 

 and that we allow it only at proper times. In 

 teaching science we may confine ourselves to 

 scientific formulas, but in teaching nature we may 

 admit the spirit as well as the letter. If I were 

 making a teacher's curriculum for the study of 

 nature, I should include a course in English poetry. 

 With pupils, however, one must be careful to have 

 the poem exactly appropriate to the subject and 

 the occasion. One may not make a list of poems 

 that are always to be used by teachers of nature- 

 study for specified topics. The choice of the poem 

 should lie with the particular teacher or the pupils. 

 These poems should be used sparingly, and not at 

 all when the teacher himself does not have 

 poetic feeling by means of which to interpret 



