JUNE 17, 1915] 
NATURE 
429 

‘our command of the sea. Extensive coke-oven 
plants, while tending to commercial efficiency in 
times of peace, have given her a supply of raw 
material for high explosives in times of war. Her 
extensive liquid chlorine plant has also been 
turned to notorious use. 
The lesson of all this is that a nation lags 
behind in scientific development at a cost of a 
possible loss of supremacy in times of war. A 
state of unreadiness in this direction is co-exten- 
sive with its influence and life. Industry 
developed on- empirical lines has a_ certain 
advantage in times of peace, for it has at its 
command markets of great strength and deals 
with large outputs, but it is one-sided. It actually 
leads into a backwater where adventure is 
suppressed in favour of mere attention to detail ; 
the walls of the factory or works being the 
natural bounds of the manufacturer’s interests; 
his energies confined within a few yards of 
buildings. In other words he is working in the 
proverbial rut.  Industrially he is entirely 
‘domesticated. 
It would be impossible to deny that in certain 
directions this system has its advantages; 
or that many industries are undoubtedly sound 
under such conditions. Also that certain 
phases of Empire have partly directed industry 
into the lines we have followed, where a 
large output of universal application is essential. 
The distressing limitations of such a system have 
only come to be universally recognised under the 
stress of war. 
Now the British manufacturer is called upon 
suddenly to turn industrialist, and to co-operate 
with the scientific investigator to consider our 
industry as a whole. The danger of such a rapid 
.change will be seen in the persistence of command 
which is essential to empiricism, as seen in the 
attempt to control rather than co-operate. This 
will only represent a transition stage, serving a 
purpose in the course of a radical alteration in 
procedure. 
It is for the scientific worker to see that this 
intermediate stage is made as short as possible; 
that recognition of the work of the investigator 
shall be complete in all directions. This can best 
be achieved by taking an active interest in 
industrial affairs. To be merely academic will 
not suffice, for this offers no encouragement to 
the manufacturer to hold out the hand of friend- 
ship. When obliged by the circumstance of 
the moment to seek scientific advice he has turned 
to those who have technical experience rather 
than a studied condition of brain energy directed 
in the display of pure science. That a severely 
academic attitude has reacted against the applica- 
tion of science to industry is certain. The 
effective antidote against such a condition is a 
greater interest in application, as apart from 
theory. This can be most easily achieved by a 
linking up with some specific industry, which 
method has led many a German chemist to widen 
his horizon and plan of research. The effect 
of such a change in this country would be magical. 
NO. 2381, VOL. 95] 

It would react progressively both on science and 
industry. 
The scientific worker must never forget that 
the business man has achieved great things for 
this country in the past. This is our hope for the 
future when he will work in partnership with the 
experimentalist. Such a change in attitude is an 
essential. preliminary to a working arrangement 
between the interests involved. The business 
man will then realise that a new factor has come 
into his affairs. While scientific endeavour is 
almost entirely confined within the college walls, 
and recorded in the journals of learned 
societies, this will remain unrecognised. What 
is required is an active partnership between 
the trained investigator and those who specialise 
in the means of actual manufacture. The manu- 
facturer must be convinced that certain modern 
industries are so bound up with experimental 
science that they are inseparable; that they 
cannot be run on the lines which were so success- 
ful in the case of the older industries. 
It may even be that a thorough awakening of 
science is more necessary than that the business 
man should afford recognition. So far as chem- 
istry is concerned, the division of those actively 
engaged in this science (as roughly represented by 
the different societies) has not altogether made 
for progress as a whole. Science must speak 
with a collective authority and with no uncertain 
voice. It must demonstrate by the conduct of 
its own affairs that it is capable of leading; that 
its advent into the industrial (and political) world 
will bring order and not chaos. At this late stage 
of development, the English business man_ will 
only respond to a party which exhibits by action 
the essential qualifications of its watchword. 
Thus the passing of a certain sense of exclu- 
siveness on the part of those who follow research 
is a preliminary step towards recognition by the 
commercial world. An advance on parallel lines 
is not business. Against this system we have the 
close association of the German method which has 
resulted in a solid network of endeavour. 
Just so long as our advance is confined to 
empiricism, so long will the work of the chemist 
be chiefly directed towards the mere testing of 
material, instead of the legitimate work of 
developing new processes and manufacturing new 
materials. The war has cleared the air, and 
clearly points to a new path which we shall do 
well to follow, the common one of partnership 
between science and industry. 
The treatment in this volume of such matters 
as the influence of tariffs and political economy 
on the industries of a country will enable the 
general reader to grasp certain essential factors 
as they are recognised to-day by the contending 
schools. Chapters on finance and industry, and 
science and industry, are equally valuable as 
an introduction to these complicated and involved 
relationships, which are so little understood in 
certain quarters where they should really be 
mastered in detail. Not the least satisfactory 
feature of this volume is the reprinting, with notes 
