The Days of a Man 1885 



Bionomics my thirty-three years' service at Indiana and 

 Stanford, I gave each year (unless absent) a course 

 of lectures on what was later called by Professor 

 Patrick Geddes of Edinburgh the Science of Bio- 

 nomics. This deals with the philosophy of Biology, 

 beginning with the laws of organic life and leading 

 up to Eugenics and Ethics. Meanwhile I was con- 

 tinuously engaged in some line of research in Ichthy- 

 ology, or in fields related to the origin of species. 



It has always seemed to me that if a university 

 president is to exert a stimulating influence on 

 students, he should never relinquish the oppor- 

 tunities of the classroom. Again, as I have already 

 implied, to judge the work of scholars accurately he 

 himself should be a scholar, which condition he can 

 maintain only through some form of actual re- 

 search. Without personal effort toward the ex- 

 tension of knowledge, he is likely to fall out of 

 harmony with scholarship and thus fail in his most 

 important duty the selection of progressive men. 

 Foibles Moreover, a university head is subject to the foible 

 ofunwer- o f omniscience, being expected by the public to 



sity heads i i i -11 



speak with authority on almost every conceivable 

 subject. Lacking the discipline of research, he is in 

 danger of being satisfied with second-hand knowl- 

 edge and of drifting with the current along lines of 

 least resistance. 



i The obligations of my position now led me to 

 enter on a new kind of activity alien to my taste 

 and preparation. Up to 1885 I had given a few 

 scientific lectures to general audiences, but no public 

 addresses of other character beyond the occasional 

 reading of an essay on some special occasion. It 

 became at once evident, however, that I must make 

 n 298 ] 



