HIS PLACE IN THE WORLD 



the character of the training, often, to his 

 mind, in the department to which he has 

 given his life, fatally deficient, tending toward 

 artificiality and veneer, as well as toward a 

 certain specialized one-sidedness. He has 

 taken his place in the world on this point 

 alongside " many other men of prominence 

 who are now secretly or openly opposed to 

 certain superficial tendencies in modern edu- 

 cational life, and stands for such a revision 

 of curricula as shall leave the average college 

 and university graduate master of certain 

 essential fundamentals of which too often 

 he is lamentably ignorant. In discussing the 

 moral and religious influence of science, 

 Herbert Spencer takes occasion to quote 

 Tyndall on inductive inquiry, and the latter 's 

 words are so illustrative of the life of Mr. 

 Burbank that they are here quoted: 



" Inductive inquiry requires patient in- 

 dustry and an humble and conscientious 

 acceptance of what Nature reveals. The 

 first condition of success is an honest recep- 

 tivity and a willingness to abandon all 

 preconceived notions, however cherished, if 

 they be found to contradict the truth, Believe 



359 



