24 IOWA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 



raised to these discoverers, to Hoffman, Graebe and Lieb- 

 ermann. In a more telling way industry acknowledges 

 her debt to pure science when a great aniline factory such 

 as that at Elberfield employs sixty professional chemists 

 and turns the attention of twenty-six of them to pure 

 research in discovery of new compounds. 



Science has thus given society command of energies of 

 the highest efficiency. It has made the comforts of life 

 common and cheap; it has lifted from the shoulders of 

 labor its heaviest burdens and set free for higher social 

 services all who are capable of their performance. It is 

 the undiminishing fountain whence flows the world's 

 material wealth. 



The evolution of the circulatory system in the body 

 physiologic suggests a similar development in the body 

 social. The process which during the geologic ages slowly 

 changed the primitive gasto-vascular cavity to the per- 

 fected circulation of the higher animals to-day, which 

 evolved from a simple pulsating tube the powerful four- 

 chambered heart, maj^ at least serve as a simile to the evo- 

 lution of the distributory or transportative system of 

 modern society. So obvious is the analogy that the 

 arteries of commerce is a phrase of common parlance. 

 But for our purpose it will not be necessary to carry the 

 likeness into details, to discriminate, as some ingenious 

 sociologists have done, the various organs, such as the 

 capillaries, or to liken the red corpuscles of the blood to 

 the golden discs of the circulating medium. Let it suffice 

 to show that by the application of the discoveries of 

 science society has obtained a system incomparably rapid 

 and effective for the distribution of power, of food, and of 

 all the products of labor. 



The world is enmeshed by lines of railway and steam- 

 ship. They carry the products of our Iowa farms to west 

 Europe, to South Africa and to China. To our dinner 

 tables they bring in return linen from Ireland, porcelain 

 from France, cutlery from Old England and silverware from 

 New England, meats and fruits from states as distant as 

 Texas, California and Florida, spices from the East Indias, 



