German Science’ 
O one can have lived in modern England without hearing 
continually of the eminence of Germany in science. It. 
is generally supposed that the Germans are much more 
scientific than we are; that they believe in science more, 
study it more, pay for it more; that they bring it more into 
_ the affairs of life; that they have profited greatly by its 
application to.industry. These beliefs are well founded and 
just. | 
Other opinions that are hardly less current on the subject 
are not true. For example, I have met frequently with the 
opinions that the leading men of science in Germany far 
outdistance our own in ability and achievement, that the 
working men of Germany are specially equipped with 
scientific knowledge, that the German school curriculum 
is highly scientific. None of these things is true. | 
It will be my purpose this afternoon to try and give you 
an idea of the position which science really does occupy 
_in Germany and of the services which its cultivation has 
rendered to the nation, and I shall briefly describe the state 
of things in this country, venturing at the same time a little 
into the region of criticism. 
_ Any competence that I have to speak to you about German 
science must be in relation to chemistry, but happily that 
science is the one in which, perhaps, they are most eminent, 
the one to which they owe in a special degree material 
1! Anaddress to the Workers’ Educational Association, deliveredin Leeds 
July 1913. 
