DISCOVERY 



A MONTHLY POPULAR 

 JOURNAL OF KNOWLEDGE 



Vol. IV, No. 39. MARCH 1923. 



PRICE Is. NET. 



DISCOVERY. A Monthly Popular Journal of Know- 

 ledge. 



Edited by Edward Liveing, B.A., Rothersthorpe, 

 Northampton, to whom all Editorial Communications 

 should be addressed. (Dr. A. S. Russell continues to 

 act as Scientific Adviser.) 



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Editorial Notes 



There is a tale of three eminent botanists — a French- 

 man, a German, and an Englishman — who were 

 stranded on an ocean island where there were only 

 fourteen varieties, all told, of green plants. Fortitn- 

 ately, one of these was new to science ; unfortunately 

 none of these scientists knew a word of any language 

 save his own. Such a momentous discovery (made, 

 as it happened, simultaneously by all three botanists, 

 since the whole island was carpeted with the flower, 

 a species of daisy) called for deep discussion. It is 

 said that science found out a way, and in an intricate 

 language evolved by stringing together the Latin 

 names of well-known flowers, the international con- 

 ference unanimously decided that the .*lower was a 

 daisy, but rather less so than most daisies. The tale 

 may be exaggerated ; it must be admitted that the 

 problem of verbs must have been acute. But it serves 

 to point a moral — that in a world where the influences 

 which separate nations are all too many, in science 

 and in the pursuit of what we mean by that disgraced 

 word "culture," there are influences which work power- 

 fully in the direction of friendship and mutual esteem. 

 ***** 

 In this world of unattained ideals and fruitless 

 labours, one individual has an easy road to eminence, 

 and that individual is the pessimist — in spite of the 

 fact that a German author, Max Nordau, whose death 

 occurred this year, called Pessimism the most mar- 



vellous production of the human intellect in any age. 

 We are almost always right in prophesying, for 

 example, that bread will fall the buttered side under- 

 neath. When we point with pride to our new London 

 omnibus, or our latest Latin dictionary, we are sure 

 to be reminded by Dean Inge at home or Mr. Shafer 

 in .\merica that we still remain human, and that 

 therefore our buses and dictionaries are not true 

 " progress." And when the question of international- 

 ism arises in a general conversation, we may be certain 

 that the speaker whose voice will be most full of con- 

 viction will be the one who foretells imminent failure 

 and oblivion to the League of Nations and all its works. 

 To be sure. Life is an incurable disease— it always ends 

 in death ; the cave men were our superiors, let us 

 admit, in teeth and possibly in stone-axe manufacture ; 

 we will grant readily that Plato was a greater philo- 

 sopher and a more outspoken essayist than any to-day ; 

 and finally that there have been many wars and many 

 treaties, and that a hundred dreams of world peace 

 have ended in disappointment. Yet we believe that 

 the world is not chasing a bubble in its search for know- 

 ledge and its development of the world's resources ; 

 we believe that in these very pursuits lies the hope of 

 the great ideal of international friendship. 

 ***** 



Let us face again the question which Adam, doubt- 

 less, pondered as he fell asleep on his first night in 

 Eden— what is the real aim and object of human en- 

 deavour ? Dr. Johnson said that it was happiness at 

 home ; later he apparently changed his mind and said 

 that happiness was greatest when travelling in a stage 

 coach from one place to another. We must reluctantly 

 assume that Dr. Johnson did not know the answer to 

 that age-old question. Dean Inge, judging from the 

 prominence which Eugenics assume in his Outspoken 

 Essays, believes that the object of the world of to-day 

 is to'breed with discretion the world of to-morrow, and 

 his wholesale condemnation of a great proportion of 

 the world of to-day would leave that section without 

 any object in living. There are a large number of 

 people who believe that the great object of existence 

 should be the improvement of the lot of others, and 

 a devotion to their interests. Carried to- its logical 



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