THE SCIENTIFIC MOOD 15 



and when they are combined, in adjusted pro- 

 portions, in a full human life. But that is so 

 difficult of attainment, especially when great 

 excellence in one direction has been inherited or 

 acquired, that the disproportionate developments 

 we have spoken of are apt to occur. They are 

 often the more dangerous because of the very 

 strength which the exaggeration gives to its pos- 

 sessor. This is part of the penalty of genius. 



For ordinary folk, however, it is safe to say 

 that when any mood becomes so dominant that 

 the validity of the others is denied or ignored, 

 the results are likely to be tainted with some vice 

 some inhumanity, some sentimentalism, some 

 pedantry, some violence to the unity of life. A 

 sane life implies a practical recognition of the 

 trinity of knowing, feeling, and doing. This 

 spells health, wholeness, holiness, as Edward 

 Carpenter has well said. 



CHARACTERISTICS OF THE SCIENTIFIC MOOD. 

 In his presidential address to the British Associa- 

 tion in 1899, Sir Michael Foster inquired into the 

 qualities that distinguish the scientific worker, 

 and came to the conclusion that they were, in the 

 main, three: 



"In the first place, above all other things, his 

 nature must be one which vibrates in unison 

 with that of which he is in search; the seeker 

 after truth must himself be truthful, truthful with 



