Se ee ee ee ie 5 ee ne a a re eee 
1838. | BOTANICAL GAZETTE, 63 
an amateur,” and is modestly keeping silent, apply this writing to him- 
self, and know that what he can say finds as large an audience as does the 
technical paper of his professional brother. 
OPEN LETTERS. 
On some mistaken estimates made by amateurs. 
. Ido not wish to be understood as criticising adversely the literature 
of the laboratory when I say that its influence has led to mistaken esti- 
j ve to 
sional holiday. The student, with commendable zeal, puts devotion to 
Science first and the good of the individual second. We admire the 
scorn with which he rejects the thought of “an indolent self-culture.” 
st and b second—very important, no doubt, but still second. It 
should be valued directly in proportion as it ministers to his intellectual 
' Does it help to a better style of life? Does it help in the achieve- 
to say, i nl’ 
tory-worker the last person qualified to pronounce an unbiased opinion 
on the question, what work had best be undertaken by amateurs in 
America, : : 
_ The first, and least harmful, mistake made under the influence to 
Which I have alluded is an extravagant overestimate of the educational 
igh se 
pace is taken. The student does not “digest what he learns into learn- 
ing. An elaborate thesis results, for instance, in comparing the cell- 
structure of the leaves of this order of plants with the cell-structure of the 
iso f 
elaborately prepared series of slides—and there it ends! No generaliza- 
fon of agreements or differences, no correlation of certain peculiarities 
of cell-structure with recognized natural affinities, not so much even 
the recognition of an a priori robability that a general similarity or dis- 
similarity might obtain, whieh an vee isenae of the facts showed was 
hot the case—nothing! Observation without judgment! Only this and 
ng more. Were a student, using a common pair of eyes, fo do the 
Same thing, comparing in this thoughtless way, for instance. the Eros 
Anatomy of the leaves in question, his teacher would tell him—and 
bent in telling him—that his work was simply silly. I fail to perceive 
how the intervention of a compound microscope is going to stay the ver 
= Purtherm ore, it may be seriously questioned if the power of enon 
Hi akoat ber se, is in any considerable degree capable of cultivation. 
ers are born, not made. . 
he second and by far the most pernicious mistake has been sv 
Part of many to ignore the one high use which the study of botany,a 
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