66 
Trade Bank already mentioned, acknowledged in 
his speech at the meeting on the neglect of science 
held last May at the Linnean Society that, as a 
banker, he had found it a serious drawback to be 
ignorant of even the most elementary knowledge 
of the natural sciences. “Perhaps,” he added, “if 
my education had not been neglected on those 
lines, I should in some cases have been able to 
avoid supporting some processes of manufacture 
which were in themselves wrong, or futile, while 
in other cases I might have been tempted to depart 
from the very rigid banker’s attitude of refusing 
to give support to any new idea.” It is to be 
hoped that the day is near when no educational 
course will be considered to be complete unless 
it includes instruction in the broad facts and prin- 
ciples of natural science, so that men in all walks 
of life may be able to appreciate possible directions 
of advance. Scientific thoroughness in detail, and 
sound factory management, are no doubt two of 
the conditions of industrial success, but banking 
facilities are another, and whether they are rightly 
or wrongly offered often depends, as Mr. Huth 
Jackson said, upon the possession of sufficient 
scientific knowledge either to discriminate between 
undertakings, or to know when to call for expert 
advice. 
_ It is neither desirable nor necessary that every 
pupil in school or student at college should be com- 
pelled to take up science courses of a specialised 
kind, but it is essential that they should under- 
stand something of the place of science in modern 
life. Business cannot be learnt in a university or in 
a technical college, but breadth of view can be 
gained there, and all can learn that the attitude of 
mind induced by scientific education is just what is 
required for the successful development of industry. 
The changes which have taken place in the con- 
dition and needs of business life in recent years 
render it absolutely necessary to employ men of 
scientifically trained minds, not only among the 
captains of industry, but also among what may be 
termed the non-commissioned officers, and even in 
the rank and file. Our manufacturers are com- 
bining in their own interests, and are prepared to 
co-operate with education and science in national 
reconstruction. The time has come for the pro- 
duction of schemes of scientific instruction and re- 
search, practical enough to appeal to manufac- 
turers and commercial men, and intended to pro- 
mote the advance of the organised community. 
We look to the various committees, boards, and 
advisory councils lately established to see that the 
opportunity is not wasted in the further statement 
of axioms and postulates which are now taken for 
granted by all intelligent people. 
NO. 2448, VOL. 98] 
NATURE 
[SEPTEMBER 28, 1916 
SCIENCE AND THE SAVANT. 
Les Allemands et la Science. By Prof. Gabriel 
Petit d’Alfort et Maurice Leudet du Figaro. 
Préface de M. Paul Deschagel. Pp. xx +374. 
(Paris: Librairie Félix Alean, 1916.) Price 
3.50 francs. ; 
HE articles collected in this volume were 
written by twenty-eight prominent represen- 
tatives of science and art in France to amplify and 
enforce for the general public the protest made by 
the 
against the German manifesto of October 30 of 
that year, wherein ninety-three ‘German intellec- 
tuals”” claimed for their Kultur the hegemony of 
the world of science. , 
The book reminds one of an “air with varia- 
tions.’’ The theme is an oft-quoted remark of 
Pasteur’s: ‘La science n’a point de patrie; mais 
l’homme de science en a une.” The aria is the 
admirable preface by M. Paul Deschanel, Presi- 
dent of the Chamber of Deputies. In the twenty- 
eight variations, along with a good deal of repeti- 
tion about scientific ideas as distinguished from 
scientific material, there are very marked differ- 
ences of treatment according as the writer en- 
visages la science or l’homme de science. The 
tone ranges from extreme bitterness in an article 
on “La Thérapeutique Commerciale des Alle- 
mands,” by Gaucher, and mordant irony in 
Delage’s ‘“‘ Histoire Naturelle du Doctus Bochen- 
sis,’ to an amiable letter by Grasset, who insists 
that science has no country and will not follow 
the German savants in their excursion outside the 
region of science into that in which political or 
national animus .is possible. In the cireum- 
stances it is difficult to regard so cosmopolitan an 
attitude as quite fitting the case. There is more 
ring of sympathetic resonance in Prof. A. Dastre’s 
views about German mysticism and materialism 
in relation to science and its progress. 
Emile Picard raises the practical questicn of 
international co-operation in science after the war, 
and thereby reminds us that science is not inde- 
pendent of the savant. 
but the progress of science can only find 
expression through organisations which have 
national characteristics. In the long run, truth is 
the only consideration; but the truths of science 
are not recognisable at all while they are still in 
embryo in the researcher’s brain, and are not 
always recognised when they have reached the 
stage of manuscript or print. The spectacles of 
prejudice may bring some aspects of truth into 
brilliant focus, but may distort others beyond 
recognition; and prejudice may be characteristic 
of nations as of men. It never helps the progress 
of science; but unfortunately it may affect the 
development of the truths of science in other 
ways. The life of true genius may be too short 
for the struggle against prejudice, for genius is 
not always sufficiently self-conscious and self- 
assertive to make headway in a_ prejudiced 
environment. 
Academy of Sciences in November, 1914, — 
Science has no country, 
