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NATURE 



[December 22, 1921 



It is true that the old idols of wood and stone 

 are gone, but far nobler conceptions have taken 

 their place. The universe no longer consists of a 

 few thousand lamps lit nightly by angel torches, 

 but millions of suns moving in the infinite azure, 

 into which the mind of man is continually pene- 

 trating further. Astronomy shows that realms of 

 celestial light exist where darkness was supposed 

 to prevail, while scientific imagination enables 

 obscure stars to be found which can never be 

 brought within the sense of human vision, the 

 invisible lattice work of crystals to be discerned, 

 and the movements of constituent particles of 

 atoms to be determined as accurately as those of 

 planets around the sun. The greatest advances of 

 science are made by the disciplined use of 

 imagination ; but in this field the picture conceived 

 is always presented to Nature for approval or 

 rejection, and her decision upon it is final. In 

 contemporary art, literature, and drama imagina- 

 tion may be dead, but not in science, which can 

 provide hundreds of arresting ideas awaiting 

 beautiful expression by pen and pencil. It has 

 been said that the purpose of poetry is not truth, 

 but pleasure ; yet, even if this definition be 

 accepted, we submit that insight into the mys- 

 teries of Nature should exalt, rather than repress, 

 the poetic spirit, and be used to enrich verse, as 

 it was by some of the world's greatest poets — 

 Lucretius, Dante, Milton, Goethe, Tennyson, and 

 Browning. With one or two brilliant exceptions, 

 popular writers of the present day are completely 

 oblivious to the knowledge gained by scientific 

 study, and unmoved by the message which science 

 is alone able to give. Unbounded riches have 

 been placed before them, yet they continue to 

 rake the muck-heap of animal passions and stir 

 the froth of sloppy sentiment for themes of com- 

 position. Not by their works shall we become 

 " children of light," but by the indomitable spirit 

 of man ever straining upwards to reach the 

 stars. 



Where there is ignorance of natural laws all 

 physical phenomena are referred to supernatural 

 causes. Disease is accepted as Divine punish- 

 ment to be met by prayer and fasting, or the act 

 of a secret enemy in communion with evil spirits. 

 Because of these beliefs thousands of innocent 

 people were formerly burnt and tortured as witches 

 and sorcerers, while many thousands more paid in 

 devastating pestilences the penalty which Nature 

 inevitably exacts for crimes against her. In one 

 sense it may be said that the human race gets the 

 diseases it deserves ; but the sins are those of 

 ignorance and neglect of physical laws rather than 

 against spiritual ordinances. Plague is not now 

 explained by supposed iniquities of the Jews or 

 conjunctions of particular planets, but by the 

 presence of an organism conveyed by fleas from 

 rats ; malaria and yellow fever are conquered by 

 destroying the breeding places of mosquitoes ; 

 typhus fever by getting rid of lice ; typhoid by 

 cleanliness; tuberculosis by improved housing; 

 and most other diseases by following the teachings 



NO. 2721, VOL. 108] 



of science concerning them. Though the mind 

 does undoubtedly influence the resistance of the 

 body to invasion by microbes, it cannot create the 

 specific organism of any disease, and the responsi- 

 bility of showing how to keep such germs under 

 control, and prevent, therefore, the poverty and 

 distress due to them, is a scientific rather than a 

 spiritual duty. 



The methods of science are pursued whenever 

 observations are made critically, recorded faith- 

 fully, and tested rigidly, with the object of using 

 conclusions based upon them as stepping-stones 

 to further progress. They demand an impartial 

 attitude towards evidence and fearless judgment 

 upon it. These are the principles by which the 

 foundations of science have been laid, and a noble 

 structure of natural knowledge erected upon 

 them. A scientific inquiry is understood to be 

 one undertaken solely with the view of arriving 

 at the truth, and this disinterested motive will 

 always command public confidence. It is poles 

 apart from the spirit in which social and political 

 subjects are discussed : it is the rock against 

 which waves of emotion and storms of rhetoric 

 lash themselves in vain. If political science were 

 guided by the same methods it would present an 

 open mind to all sides of a question, weighing 

 objections to proposals as justly as reasons in 

 support of them, whereas usually it sees only the 

 views of a particular class or party, and cannot 

 be trusted, therefore, to strike a judicial balance. 

 The methods of science should be the methods 

 appHed to social problems if sound principles of 

 progress are to be determined. When they are 

 so used a statesman will be judged, as a scientific 

 man is judged, by correct observation, just infer- 

 ence, and verified prediction; in their absence 

 politics win remain stranded on the shifting sands 

 of barter, concession, and expediency. 



Local scientific societies should provide a 

 common forum where workers with hand or brain 

 can meet to consider new ideas and discuss judi- 

 cially the significance of scientific discovery or 

 applied device in relation to human progress. At 

 present such societies are mostly out of touch with 

 these practical aspects of knowledge, and are more 

 interested in prehistoric pottery than in the living 

 world around them. Most of those connected with 

 the British Association are concerned with natural 

 history, but all scientific societies in a district 

 should form a federation to proclaim the message 

 of knowledge from the house-tops. Men are 

 ready to listen to the gospel of science and to 

 believe in its power and its guidance, but its 

 disciples disregard the appeal and are content to 

 let others minister to the throbbing human heart. 

 Civilisation awaits the lead which science can give 

 in the name of wisdom and truth and unprejudiced 

 inquiry into all things visible and invisible, but 

 the missionary spirit which would make men eager 

 to declare this noble message to the world has yet 

 to be created. 



This is as true of the British Association itself 

 as it is of local scientific societies. It seems to 



