GERMAN SCIENCE 117 
days, has been the supreme influence in the great seats of 
learning, that have dominated our education and have trained 
the leaders of our national affairs. 
I say that the man of letters has not found science edifying. 
I have often heard him say with extraordinary composure that 
he knew nothing at all about it, much in the same way that the 
best-dressed aristocrat in the House of Commons once ex- 
plained in the course of a debate, that he had never been an 
agricultural labourer. Science has not gained the regard of 
the man of letters—not only because of the suspicion that it 
would tend to divert people from literary studies, to which, 
rightly enough, he attaches vast importance; but because the 
thing in itself has-not seemed to confer much benefit on the 
human mind or the human spirit, however far its applications 
might minister to material well-being. 
Now I do not quarrel altogether with this point of view. 
It is perfectly true, in the first place, that science has had to 
adopt an aggressive attitude. It has had to struggle and to 
fight against tremendous obstacles for recognition not merely 
asa worthy but as a legitimate subject of study. It has had 
constantly to assail deep-rooted prejudices and trench on 
vested interests, and so what is naturally a peaceful pursuit 
| became associated with the idea of idol-smashing and aggres- 
sion. Besides this, it is only fair to admit that science has 
been taught and practised by multitudes of people in this 
country in a truly unedifying way, and bad science is, I think, — 
the most unprofitable mental food that can be administered in 
the name of knowledge or culture to any human being. A 
man may outlive a diet of tough irregular verbs, hard-boiled 
literature, unleavened history, and philosophical dish-water, 
and yet become a speaker of languages, a lover of books, 
a student of the vital past and a reflective inquirer into the 
operations of the mind. Later experience of the realities of 
life may in these things beget a clearer vision and give a new 
