NA TURR 



121 



THURSDAY, JUNE 8, 1893. 



THE ROYAL SOCIETY ELECTION. 



HAD it not been for the unnecessary and indiscreet 

 communication to the newspapers of a letter not 

 intended for the public eye, the difference of opinion 

 which made itself manifest at Burlington House last 

 Thursday might have been settled in a purely domestic 

 manner. As it was, it gave rise to comments which, in 

 most cases, were as absurd as they were painful to the 

 persons concerned. But the mischief is done and it 

 would be affectation to deny that a question of consider- 

 able moment has been raised and one which will very 

 probably provoke in the future a good deal of discussion 

 and consideration. Clearly, therefore, it has to be faced, 

 and I willingly accede to the wish of the Editor of Nature 

 to state why I think the policy of the dissentients should 

 not be accepted by the general body of the Fellows of 

 the Royal Society. 



I say policy, because I think it must be obvious to 

 every one that the matters involved go a good deal deeper 

 than the personal interests which were at stake. And 

 here I would say at once that looking at the names of the 

 dissentients, it is impossible to suppose that those who 

 proposed to reject the recommendations of the Council 

 were animated by anything but perfect good faith, and a 

 real desire to act in the best interests of the Royal Society. 

 Though I entirely disagree with them, I say this with the 

 more conviction as they were nearly all my own personal 

 friends. The harshest thing I should be disposed to say 

 of their action is that while it had the uncompromising 

 honesty, it also had the unreasonable narrowness of a 

 somewhat provincial point of view. 



Every one will I suppose admit that in most adminis- 

 trative matters the English people are above all things 

 practical and are little influenced by considerations of 

 either logical order or of mere symmetry. The Royal 

 Society appears to be a notable case in point. It is un- 

 like any analogous institution, as far as I know, in the 

 world. It is by no means a mere Academy of Science. 

 Looked at historically and from the point of view of 

 actual facts, it is seen to be an association of persons of 

 "light and leading" who wish to promote the interests 

 of science especially in so far as they are a matter of 

 national concern. I use deliberately the rather hackneyed 

 words "light and leading" as descriptive of the qualifica- 

 tions of its members. They fall in fact into the two 

 categories ; on the one hand they consist of the most 

 competent experts in different branches of science and 

 on the other of prominent men in the political and social 

 world who are sympathetic to science and desirous of 

 promoting its progress as an indispensable phase of our 

 life and intellectual development as a nation. 



Now it seems to me that the real importance of the 

 proceedings of last Thursday was the attack which was 

 virtually made and with some vigour on this position. 

 The dissentients in their printed statement completely 

 ignored its existence. I can only make the excuse for 

 them which Dr. Johnson made when a lady asked him 

 to account for a very palpable blunder in his dictionary. 

 " Ignorance, ma'am, sheer ignorance." It seems there- 

 NO. 1232, VOL. 48] 



fore worth while to show that in including in the fifteen 

 selected candidates a man of public distinction who was 

 not a professional man of science the Council acted in 

 accordance with well-established tradition and precedent 

 which has not hitherto been seriously challenged. 



In other countries where Government is constituted on 

 more bureaucratic lines than it is in this, men of science 

 associate themselves in bodies to which non-scientific 

 members of the community have no access. Such 

 bodies can address the state, and are doubtless listened 

 to with the respect due to expert authority. But the 

 reason is mainly because science under such conditions 

 falls into line with general bureaucratic arrangements. 

 In England the expert as such is more usually listened 

 to with hesitation. It is my belief that if the Royal 

 Society were simply constituted of professional scientific 

 men, its influence in the country would be vastly dimin- 

 ished. Englishmen are distrustful of experts whom they 

 think, and I must admit too often with justice, to be 

 cramped in their general outlook and wanting in know- 

 ledge of the world. Furthermore Englishmen are 

 curiously shy of what they don't comprehend. A purely 

 professional Royal Society would be apt to be treated 

 with a kind of ironical respect but otherwise severely left 

 alone as a thing " no fellow can understand." 



Now it may be asked reasonably, would this be a 

 desirable state of things t I think it may be shown with 

 little difficulty that in the interests of scientific progress 

 in this country it would not. Consider for a moment the 

 kind of work which the Royal Society does. In the first 

 place, and I sujipose the dissentients would say that this 

 is its only proper function, it signalises and marks out 

 those workers in science as to whose integrity and com- 

 petence it has satisfied itself. But this might be done 

 by a small and exclusive club, and though such a 

 body would be distinguished, it would never enjoy the 

 distinction which attaches to the Royal Society. That 

 distinction rests on the fact that it possesses a quasi- 

 official position in the State. It is therefore on the one 

 hand able to approach the Government of the day with 

 a recognised status and authority to speak ; on the other 

 hand it is the supreme scientific tribunal from which the 

 Government can count on obtaining a perfectly impartial 

 judgment on questions of importance to the community. 

 Here it may be replied that a strictly-restricted scientific 

 Academy could equally fulfil those functions. In any 

 other country, I have already admitted that it may be so. 

 But here again national peculiarities must be reckoned 

 with. In this country most important Government 

 business is in all essential features settled in a semi- 

 official way. Preliminary pour-parlers ascertain what 

 applications would be acceptable and what will be con- 

 ceded to them. The official letters which are ultimately 

 exchanged only put on record what has been previously 

 negotiated. It is here that the presence of what I may 

 call a sympathetic lay element in the Society is so in- 

 valuable. A statesman or public man by becoming a 

 fellow has solemnly pledged himself to co-operate with 

 his colleagues. A minister therefore who is an F.R.S. 

 cannot refuse, in common courtesy, to lend his ear to 

 representations to which as a politician he might be very 

 willing to be deaf. 

 No doubt there was a time when this lay element tended 



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