58 



DISCOVERY 



conclusion, this attitude towards life, admirable in 

 itself, would lead to a state of affairs where we took in 

 each other's washing and sacrificed ourselves to others 

 who with equal obstinacj' sacrificed themselves to 

 us — a situation which presents some difficulties and 

 discloses little definite advantage. 



***** 



The goal of scientific and social endeavour would 

 appear to be a state in which the control of natural 

 sources of energy was such that we were all fed and 

 clothed and housed with an absolute minimum of 

 effort and a maximum of efficiency, and were thereby 

 set free to spend all the years of our life in the sole 

 pursuit of our individual ideals and hobby-horses — 

 each of us a hundredfold millionaire with all that the 

 universe could grant at our finger-tips. No one 

 supposes that even such an extravagant to-morrow 

 would involve "progress " in the human mind. But 

 the answer to all who argue that material progress is 

 of no value is that which Mrs. Boswell gave to Dr. 

 Johnson when he said that wealth lets nothing in. 

 She asked, " But what does it keep out ? " It is 

 believed that Dr. Johnson was at a loss to reply. 

 Perhaps even Dean Inge would be. 



We have wandered a little from our botanists on 

 the daisy-carpeted island. But if we address ourselves 

 to considering for a moment what the scientific ideal 

 tends to "keep out," we find ourselves quicklj^ in 

 their company again. There is one sphere in which 

 internationalism is already attained. Whether or not 

 the economic conditions of nations are mutually related 

 (and this is fairly certain), there is no doubt whatever 

 that we share our diseases, and that what is a scientific 

 truth in Berlin remains true in London and even to 

 some extent in Paris. The world of science and 

 learning is blessed with a serenity which does not 

 sufficiently amaze us. In the very furnace of post- 

 war prejudice Professor Einstein came from Germany 

 to teach such few of us as could attain to his high 

 summit of intellect the new mysticism of Relativity. 

 While the politicians of yesterday and to-morrow argue 

 about the political virtues and vices of France, the 

 whole world unites iu remembering Pasteur — a name 

 whose mention makes international squabbles seem 

 pitifully smaU-minded in the light of international 

 indebtedness. The great German pathologists, 

 Ehrlich and Koch, have saved as many Allied lives 

 as German bullets have wantonly sacrificed, and we, 

 with Lister and Pasteur, have returned a like service 

 to balance the slaughter imposed on us. There has 

 recently been published some important work in 

 Physics, which was based on work done in Ruhleben 

 during war imprisonment, with the help of German 

 scientists, by an interned civilian. In short, the 



domain of science is at present the one assured home 

 of a true international spirit. 



***** 



.\mong the less well-known activities of the League 

 of Nations has been its work for international science 

 and health. We are sufficiently close to the influenza 

 epidemic of i9i<S to remember that it destroyed more 

 lives throughout the world than did the war itself. 

 There exists at present an international committee to 

 investigate the problem of world epidemics. The ques- 

 tion of the influence of the pilgrimage of Mohammedans 

 to Mecca in spreading plague, typhus, dysentery and 

 cholera has been fully investigated. It is no little 

 danger that threatens Europe, when we consider that 

 in 1913 no less than 98,000 pilgrims went to Mecca ; 

 that these diseases were rife among them and that 

 many pilgrims returned to Constantinople, there to 

 meet and mix with all the nations of the world in that 

 border-town of the East. Typhus, it is true, is a louse- 

 borne disease, and unlikely to invade cleanly countries ; 

 but its spread westward from Russia, where it is still 

 common, was checked by frontier precautions which 

 almost failed when a fresh " war " broke out not long 

 ago along that line. Finally, in these days of vaccine 

 treatment, a huge mass of unco-ordinated work has 

 been done in many countries on the various sera used 

 in dysenterj', tetanus, diphtheria, and other diseases. 

 Here, too, international work is in progress to stan- 

 dardise methods and doses, and to share the world's 

 knowledge. 



***** 



In this connection allusion must be made to certain 

 correspondence in the Nation of Decem.ber 2 and 9, 

 1922, Professor Harnack, a well-known German 

 theologian, who was last heard of by the layman when 

 he signed the notorious letter of German professors 

 condemning the Allied cause early in the war, wrote 

 deploring the great injury to German culture and 

 science done by the post-war conditions in Germany. 

 Books are unprintable ; foreign journals (in this a 

 correspondent to The Times bears him out) are not 

 to be found in reference libraries ; German science is 

 losing touch with the world. He advanced the possi- 

 bility of an English subsidy. Viscount Haldane, one 

 of few prominent Englishmen who retained an un- 

 prejudiced mind towards Germany throughout difficult 

 years, criticised this letter ; he said that science 

 advances most through difficulties, and quoted figures 

 which tend to show that German science is not suffering 

 at any rate in recruits. The Times points out that one 

 technical school in Germany has more than doubled 

 its pupils since the war. It would seem that England 

 could scarcely be called upon to help German research, 

 even on the most liberal ideals, until it had fully 

 subsidised its own x\nd that day is not yet. But 



