ON BIOLOGY. 73 



cist will do the same for his branch of science. The great 

 changes and improvements in physical and chemical 

 scientific education which have taken place of late have 

 all resulted from the combination of practical teaching 

 with the reading of books and with the hearing of lec- 

 tures. The same thing is true in biology. Nobody will 

 ever know anything about biology except in a dilettante 

 'paper-philosopher' way, who contents himself with read- 

 ing books on botany, zoology and the like; and the reason 

 of'this is simple and easy to understand. It is that all 

 language is merely symbolical of the things of which it 

 treats; the more complicated the things, the more bare is 

 the symbol and the more its verbal definition requires to 

 be supplemented by the information derived directly 

 from the handling, and the seeing and the touching of 

 the thing symbolized; that is really what is at the bot- 

 tom of the whole matter. It is plain common sense, as 

 all truth, in the long run, is only common sense clarified. 

 If you want a man to be a tea merchant, you don't tell 

 him to read books about China or about tea, but you put 

 him into a tea merchant's office where 

 he has the handling, the smelling and the 

 tasting of teas. Without the sort of knowledge 

 which can be gained only in this practical way his ex- 

 ploits as a tea merchant will soon come to a bankrupt 

 termination. The 'paper-philosophers' are under the 

 delusion that physical science can be mastered as literary 

 accomplishments are acquired, but unfortunately it is 

 not so. You may read any quantity of books, and you may 

 be almost as ignorant as. you were at starting if you don't 

 have, at the back of your minds, the change for words in 

 definite images which can only be acquired through the 

 operation of your observing faculties on the phenomena 

 of Nature." 



The preliminary methods of procedure in biological 

 study here pointed out by Professor Huxley were given 

 to a New York audience by him as long ago as 1876, but 

 those methods have been true for all time and are es- 

 pecially applicable in these days. Indeed researches con- 

 ducted in precisely the manner pointed out by the most 

 distinguished expounder of biological science we have 

 living, the author whom I have just quoted, have come 

 to be spoken of by everyone who has the progress of 

 human learning at heart as the "scientific method." Now 

 to me, the modern "scientific method" in any kind of 

 investigation or research means nothing more than, first, 

 having one thoroughly acquaint himself with all of 



