4 PRESIDENT S ADDRESS. 



And it was felt by those capable of forming a judgment that, as well 

 expressed by Lord Playfair at Aberdeen in 1885, ' Human progress is 

 so identified with scientific thought, both in its conception and realisa- 

 tion, that it seems as if they were alternative terms in the history of 

 civilisation.' This is only an echo through the ages of an utterance of 

 the great Englishman, Eoger Bacon, who wrote in 1250 a.d. : ' Ex- 

 perimental science has three great prerogatives over all other sciences : 

 it verifies conclusions by direct experiment ; it discovers truths which 

 they could never reach; and it investigates the secrets of Nature and 

 opens to us a knowledge of the past and of the future.' 



The world has greatly changed since 1831; the spread of railways 

 and the equipment of numerous lines of steamships have contributed to 

 the peopling of countries at that time practically uninhabited. More- 

 over, not merely has travelling been made almost infinitely easier, but 

 communication by post has been enormously expedited and cheapened ; 

 and the telegraph, the telephone, and wireless telegraphy have simpli- 

 fied as well as complicated human existence. Furthermore, the art 

 of engineering has made such strides that the question ' Can it be 

 done? ' hardly arises, but rather ' Will it pay to do it? ' In a word, 

 the human race has been familiarised with the applications of science ; 

 and men are ready to believe almost anything, if brought forward in 

 its name. 



Education, too, in the rudiments of science has been introduced into 

 almost all schools ; young children are taught the elements of physics 

 and chemistry. The institution of a Section for Education in our 

 Association (L) has had for its object the organising of such instruction, 

 and much useful advice has been proffered. 'The problem is, indeed, 

 largely an educational one ; it is being solved abroad in various ways — 

 in Germany and in most European States by elaborate Governmental 

 schemes dealing with elementary and advanced instruction, literary, 

 scientific, and technical; and in the United States and in Canada by the 

 far-sightedness of the people: both employers and employees recognise 

 the value of training and of originality, and on both sides sacrifices are 

 made to ensure efficiency. 



In England we have made technical education a local, not an 

 Imperial question; instead of half a dozen first-rate institutions of 

 University rank we have a hundred, in which the institutions are 

 necessarily understaffed, in which the staffs are mostly overworked and 

 underpaid ; and the training given is that not for captains of industry 

 but for workmen and foremen. ' Efficient captains cannot be replaced 

 by a large number of fairly good corporals.' Moreover, to induce 

 scholars to enter these institutions, they are bribed by scholarships, a 

 form of pauperisation practically unknown in every country but our 

 own; and to crown the edifice, we test results by examinations of a 



