NATURE 
177 
THURSDAY, JULY 3, 1873 
AN ORDER OF INTELLECTUAL MERIT 
HE many obvious objections that may be urged 
fb against the well-meant proposal which Earl 
Stanhope brought forward in the House of Lords the 
other evening, for the creation of an Order of Merit to 
confer upon men who have deserved well of their 
country in Literature, Science, and Art, have already been 
pretty fully discussed both in the Upper House itself, and 
by the daily press. Happily “It is not now as it hath 
been of yore ;” the classes for whose behalf it is sought 
to create a special Order of Merit, are getting to be 
regarded as less and less a peculiar people, both by 
themselves and by the public generally. To many it ap- 
pears that the creation of any such order would be going 
in the face of the progressive tendencies of the age, and, 
we are confident, would not be in accordance with the 
desires of many of the men whom Lord Stanhope is sin- 
cerely anxious to honour. It is well-known, that over and 
over again have both academical and imperial honours 
been refused by men whom all acknowledge to have 
produced works that must be placed in the highest 
rank of intellectual products, and they spurn patronage. 
The matter is not, however, all one way. The medals 
conferred by the Royal Society are really the decorations 
of an Order of Merit, election to which, however, lies 
in the hands of competent men; and much of the ob- 
jection to the creation of an Order of Merit, such as that 
proposed by Lord Stanhope, would be done away with 
if Government were composed of men as competent to 
select the candidates for such an honour, as are the 
Fellows of the Royal Society. No doubt as civilisation 
based on Science advances, a Government competent to 
elect to such an order, as wellas of performing efficiently 
all the other functions of a model Government, will be 
found at the head of this great country. 
Speaking specially for men of Science, for men who 
devote to the advancement of scientific knowledge what 
leisure they have to spare from the necessary work of 
bread-winning, we must at once point out a tremendous 
difference between them and those who are generally 
classed with them. 
The work of the artist and the author is always a 
marketable commodity—sometimes a very marketable 
one—while the investigation of new scientific truth is 
absolutely unremunerative ; all the same, we may safely 
say that they seek no such recognition from the State as 
is indicated in Lord Stanhope’s proposal. 
From the tenor of all the speeches in the Upper 
House on Friday night, even those adverse to the 
creation of a special Order of Merit, we judge that 
the Government, as well as the House of Lords, be- 
lieves that men who attain eminence in Science ar2 
as deserving of recognition by the State as men who 
have distinguished themselves in the army or navy, 
in diplomacy or politics. If this is so, then we 
are sure we speak the wishes of the great majo- 
rity of scientific men when we say that they are 
willing to dispense with all hope of ever obtaining any 
honour from the State, if Government would do what is 
No, 192—VOL, VIII. 
without doubt its duty,—eaable those wna hive showa 
themselves competent to pursue original scientific re- 
search, to devote all their time to this object without 
care as to the means of living. 
Most of those who, not being rich men, have done 
most to advance scientific knowledge have done so in 
moments snatched from the duties imposed upon them 
by the necessity of procuring the wherewithal to support 
life. Many who do the most valuable work in Science, 
which is generally o¢ the work that ismost volubly brought 
before fashionable audiences, are compelled, for bare life, 
to adopt some profession, and almost the only profession 
open to men who have qualified themselves for thorough 
scientific research, is the profession of teaching. This 
profession, it is well known, is one demanding, for the 
thorough performance of its duties, a very large expendi- 
ture of the highest energy as well as of {time, so that men 
of Science of the class we are speaking of, who are com- 
pelled to adopt it, have but a small amount of energy and 
little time left to devote to that pursuit on which their 
heart is set, for which their whole training has qualified 
them, and in which they have shown themselves com- 
petent to attain the highest results ;—results of the 
greatest and most wide-spread value both to our 
own country and to humanity generally. Is it not 
shameful then, nay does it not argue the greatest blind- 
ness on the part of Government to the best interests 
of the country, that these men should be compelled to 
expend the very best of their valuable and well-skilled 
energies in the drudgery of a profession for which they 
may by no means be peculiarly fitted, merely to keep 
the life in their bodies, while but a very moderate 
expenditure on the part of the State, would enable 
them to devote, without dread of coming to want, 
the whole of their power to the pursuit of that 
research, from which the country already has 
reaped the highest benefit? Noman whose opinion is 
of any value, not even any member of Her Majesty’s 
Government, we believe, doubts the eminently practical 
utility of scientific research, and the dependence of our 
country for its foremost place among the nations of the 
world, that it should have at its disposal the highest and 
latest results of such research. Instead then of devising 
new and empty honours wherewith to reward men who, 
amid a life passed in the worry and struggle for existence, 
have been able to push forward scientific knowledge a 
short stage, would it not be honouring the pioneers of 
Science far more, and at the same time making an invest- 
ment which ere long would be repaid a hundredfold, if 
Government would only bestow upon these men the 
means wherewith to do thoroughly, and with all their 
might, the unspeakably valuable} work which at present 
they can only do by snatches, or be compelled to give up 
when probably it is about to bring forth noble results? If 
Lord Stanhope and those in both houses of Parliament 
who have the wisdom to see wherein the true glory and 
highest good of their country consist, would only set 
themselves earnestly to devise some plan whereby scien- 
tific research could be pursued under the most favourable 
circumstances, they would delight the hearts of scientific 
men infinitely more than if they heaped upon their beads 
all the honours of all the Courts of Europe. 
