46 On the Campus 



where the intellect really has play, lies in the world in- 

 visible, where molecules and atoms have been wont to 



"The rushing metamorphosis, 

 Dissolving all that fixture is, 

 Melts things that be to things that seem 

 And solid nature to a dream." 



Nay ; the atoms themselves are gone. Ions and electrons, 

 mere disembodied units of energy, are before us now, 

 bringing analysis and even system to the assumedly in- 

 divisible ; and we venture to speak of the nucleus of the 

 hydrogen atom, hitherto the most minute of things con- 

 ceived, and even to assert that that now reckoned the 

 most minutest thing, visible only to the eye of the in- 

 tellect, as in its quest it wanders beyond the dominion of 

 the seen, and studies in the ' ' light that never was on sea 

 or land/' that that minutest nucleus has, as things 

 electric go, a definite algebraic sign! If anything may 

 quicken the spirit that is in us, surely here is stimulus 

 refined. On what gossamer threads in heedless safety 

 imagination runs to bridge its dizzy way far through 

 worlds unlimited, unvisited, unviewed, yet real as the 

 universe itself ! 



According to quoted dictum of Matthew Arnold, cul- 

 ture in the active sense is the quest of sweetness and 

 light; in other words, it is the quest of beauty, that 

 which pleases, and wisdom, that which guides. How 

 does the scientific speculation of the day meet both re- 

 quirements, at once charming us, and leading to more 

 and more certain knowledge of the truth; pragmatic 

 truth, growing, changing in the indefinite grandeur of 

 its simple splendor! 



