55° 



NA TURE 



[April 5, 190b 



energj is not the only solution of the problem, and 

 it remains for the future to decide which of the two 

 is tin more convenient and the more fundamental. 

 The "energetic" system of physical philosophy 

 suffers by being intangible and lacking in imaginative 

 stimulus, whilst the material it makes use of in order 

 to build up a picture of the phenomena of nature is 

 not characterised by the simplicity which is desirable 

 in n lations of so ultimate a character. 



Returning to the book under review, we find, natur- 

 ally, that a great deal of it refers to the important 

 investigations on the charge, mass, velocity, and 

 other properties of ions and electrons. These have 

 been described with that excellence which charac- 

 terises the whole production. The reader will find a 

 particularly satisfactory account of Townsend's very 

 exact investigations on ionisation by collision-. 



There i- a minor point which may be criticised, and 

 that i- the prominence given to Moreau's results on 

 the velocity of ions produced by metallic salts in 

 flames. That investigator found that the velocity of 

 the negative ions varied in an unexplained way with 

 the concentration of the salt and the atomic weight 

 ol iln metal, whereas II. A. Wilson found it to be 

 independent of both these factors. The editors appear 

 hi have overlooked the experiments on this subject of 

 the last-named author. 



With this slight exception, we have nothing but 

 praise for the whole work, and heartily congratu- 

 late the French Physical Society and all who have 

 been concerned in its production. We hope that they 

 will lie able to bring out more volumes of a like kind 

 a- the development ol the subject proceeds. It will 

 be remembered that a few years ago the French 

 Physical Society published a very important series of 

 memoirs, on all branches of physics, which had been 

 communicated to the International Congress at Paris 

 in 1900. The extraordinary activity of tin society in 

 this way must command the admiration and grati- 

 tude of physicists in every part of the world. 



O. W. Richardson. 



INOTHER PLEA FOR RATIONAL 



EDUCATION. 



(hi Professional Education, with Special Reference In 



Medicine. in [ddress delivered at King's ('"Urge. 



London, on October ;, [905. By Prof. T. Clifford 



Allbutt, F.R.S. Pp. vi + 80. (London: Macmillan 



and Co., Ltd., 190(1.) Price 2s. net. 

 " ' I ■" HI" RE is no state so perilous as that in which 



J- things seem good to us, and at present in 

 England the schoolmaster is complacent, the public 

 indifferent." So Prof. Allbutt generalises earl} in 

 hi- address, directing attention, however, in a foot- 

 note, to a single exception in the case of the head- 

 master of the Perse School, Cambridge. Though 

 many more earnest schoolmasters anxious to reform 

 scholastic methods could be named, thoughtful ob- 

 -1 rvers of English educational procedure must admit 



in spite of the current bickerings among politicians 

 as to religious instruction in elementary schools — that 

 tin ii hoolmaster's policy of laisser-aller ami the apathy 

 NO. 1 9OI, VOL. J2>~\ 



of the public are, and have been, the chief causes of 

 the chaotic and rudimentary state of our secondary 

 education. For half a century it has been dinned into 

 Mm ears ol statesmen, parents, and schoolmasters that 

 no system of higher education, whether academic or 

 technical, can prove successful in the absence of a 

 sane, modern, and broad supply of secondary educa- 

 tion given by rationally trained teachers. Prof. 

 Allbutt is to be congratulated upon ranging himself 

 on the side of tlie prophets, and though for the 

 present he may be a voice crying in the wilderness, 

 hi- able advocac} of the introduction of sweet reason- 

 ableness into our secondary schools will some day be 

 counted unto him for righteousness. 



A lew- of Prof. Allbutt \ le-soiis to the schoolmaster 

 ma} be quoted with advantage. " The scientific stud\ 

 ol facts is the lever by which liberal culture has been 

 re-awakened, and we .ire beginning to see that the 

 ideas and methods of natural science, instead of being 

 mm ok curious or commercial, are, if not the flower 

 of education, at any rate the stem and branches." 

 " On both ' sides 'Jul most schools], while the memory 

 is exercised, and file intellect somewhat called upon, 

 tin imagination, the centre of creative life, the source 

 of great action, is left out in the cold." The teacher 

 who fears the baneful effects of specialisation may 

 note this:—" 1 am satisfied that if the two main 

 'in M11 nuts of mind — tin' intellect and the imagination 

 — are fostered, it proves best in the end to promote 

 development in each person on the lines of his own 

 nature," Hut we have kept what in our judgment is 

 the most important quotation — trite though the advice 

 is — to the last : — " It is not so much what a man is 

 taught as how he is taught it." 



This advice leads naturally to the consideration of 

 1 he present secondary school curriculum. Not every 

 essential part of a wide subject can be included in a 

 single address, but it is to be regretted that Prof. 

 Allbutt has so little to -ay on the simplification and 

 lightening of the absurdly congested time-tables of 

 most schools. It is true that we are told that the 

 current teaching of Greek and Latin is a parody of 

 education, and that, like Sir William Ramsay, Dr. 

 Allbutt considers chemistry is not a good subject for 

 boys, but some guidance in the direction of a ruthless 

 cutting down of the number of subjects at presenl 

 studied by young boy- would have been welcome. It 

 is in this direction that the schoolmaster ha- a right 

 to look to the man ol science for guidance. Cannot 

 physiologists and psychologists agree together as to 

 what groups of faculties should be trained during the 

 years of school-life, and, with the help of peda- 

 gogical experts, decide which groups of subjects best 

 assist such training? Until this is done, or until 

 some masterful genius filled with the pedagogic 

 passion arises who will solve this most pressing of 

 educational problems, secondary education will con- 

 tinue to be a process ol filling the minds of boys 

 and girls with pellets of information in a multitude 

 ol subjects, and of loading the verbal memory with 

 a brecciated congeries of unrelated facts. 



On the tertiary, or university, stage of education 



