SECTION 20. STUDIES PREPARATORY TO ALL INVESTIGATIONS. 197 



miss the stimulus of intimate acquaintance with the trials and 

 labours of others in an analogous position to ourselves. 



(e) The finished product is of comparatively trifling signifi- 

 cance in furnishing an insight into the origin or origination of 

 the sciences, an aspect of decisive importance for the man of 

 science who aspires to be a discoverer. Accordingly, the study 

 of older works and the study of the history of the sciences and 

 arts should be assiduously cultivated. Knowledge of antiquity 

 and antiquity of knowledge are indispensable. 



(/) Comte made out a plausible case for an inter-specialist 

 science, a science which would act as a bond and intermediary 

 between all the sciences. In a certain sense as illustrated even 

 by the scope of this work his was a reasonable demand. 

 Nevertheless, when we remember that narrow specialisation 

 grows more and more anti-scientific as sound knowledge ac- 

 cumulates ; that there are now various groups of closely related 

 sciences ; that it is difficult to harmonise or generalise without 

 experience and verification ; and that the true scholar is encyclo- 

 paedic in his understanding of phenomena, it will be seen that 

 an inter-specialist science has limited possibilities. Indeed, if the 

 proposal of such a science should tend towards an intensification 

 of specialisation, its effect on progress would be prejudicial in 

 the extreme. We conclude therefore that the scholarly specialist 

 will probably overlook little that is relevant in the learning of 

 his day, and that what is additionally needed is a wide interest 

 in science as such, in order to ensure that a sufficient number 

 of scientific works of a comprehensive character is produced. 

 These would aim both at pointing out certain blanks in our 

 knowledge, and intimate how the sciences of the day might be 

 conveniently blended into a comparatively connected whole. 

 If there has to be a choice, it is far more important that the 

 investigator shall have breadth of knowledge than that he shall, 

 relatively or absolutely, exhaust the specialist literature. 



Inasmuch as our more prominent thinkers are almost invariably in- 

 structors in higher educational establishments, and seeing that the scope 

 of their duties is decided for them by their governors whose interest 

 cannot be solely that of research, it may be contended that little can be 

 attained in practice to satisfy methodological demands. Consequently, it 

 may be argued that most of our academic teachers are compelled to take 

 for their province a whole series of sciences, whilst others are required to 

 specialise to a high degree, and all are expected to read prodigiously. Even 

 under such unfavourable conditions, however, much might be achieved. 

 The teacher of philosophy, for instance, who lectures on metaphysics, 

 logics, ethics, and aesthetics, may still devote a certain time to exploring 

 thoroughly one of these sciences, and his specialist colleague who lectures 

 on thermodynamics may engage on the converse task of grappling with 

 some large problem, say the properties of matter. Needless to remark, this 

 labour of love, pursued throughout a life-time, will exert an extremely 

 vitalising and beneficent influence on the official outpourings of the two 

 types of teachers. 



The above objection appears at first sight almost completely fatal in 

 the economic life where every moment of a long day is supposed to be 



