ADDRESS. 35 



overlooked. If students do not easily find emploj'ment, it is chiefly at- 

 tributable to a want of appreciation for science in the nation at large. 



This want of appreciation appears to arise from the fact that those wlio 

 nearly half a century ago directed the movement of national education 

 wei'e trained in early life in the universities, in which the value of scientific 

 methods was not at that time fully recognised. Hence our elementary, 

 and even our secondary and great public schools, neglected for a long time 

 to encourage the spirit of investigation which develops originality. This 

 defect is diminishing daily. 



There is, however, a more intangible cause which may have had influence 

 on the want of appreciation of science by the nation. The Government, 

 which largely profits by science, aids it with money, but it has done very 

 little to develop the national appreciation for science by recognising that 

 its leaders are worthy of honours conferred by the State. Science is not 

 fashionable, and science students — upon whose efibrts our progress as a 

 nation so largely depends — have not received the same measure of recog- 

 nition which the State awards to services rendered by its own officials, by 

 politicians, and by the Army and by the Navy, whose success in future 

 wars will largely depend on the efi'ective applications of science. 



The Reports of the British Association aftord a complete chronicle of 

 the gradual growth of scientific knowledge since 18.31. They show that 

 the Association has fulfilled the objects of its founders in promoting and 

 disseminating a knowledge of science throughout the nation. 



The growing connection between the sciences places our annual 

 meeting in the position of an arena where representatives of the difierent 

 sciences have the opportunity of criticising new discoveries and testing 

 the value of fresh proposals, and the Presidential and Sectional Addresses 

 operate as an annual stock-taking of progi*ess in the several branches of 

 science represented in the Sections. Eveiy year the field of usefiilness of 

 the Association is widening. For, whether with the geologist we seek 

 to write the history of the crust of the earth, or with the biologist to trace 

 out the evolution of its inhabitants, or whether with the astronomer, the 

 chemist, and the physicist we endeavour to unravel the constitution of the 

 sun and the planets or the genesis of the nebulffi and stars which make 

 up the universe, on every side we find ourselves surrounded by mysteries 

 which await solution. We are only at the beginning of work. 



I have, therefore, full confidence that the future records of the Britisli 

 Association will chronicle a still greater progress than that already 

 achieved, and that the British nation will maintain its leading position 

 amongst the nations of the world, if it will energetically continue its 

 voluntary eflforts to promote research, supplemented l)y that additional 

 help from the Government which ought never to be withheld when a 

 clear case of scientific utility has been established. 



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