470 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXX. No. 771 



inductive standpoint. The old genius is 

 too strong, and stands menacingly by while 

 he writes. Several text-books have made a 

 bold start with this object in view; but 

 after a brief beginning of little promise, 

 the argument rapidly assumes the old dog- 

 matic form. Substances are said to be 

 aldehydes "because they contain the alde- 

 hyde group"; or unsaturated, "because 

 they possess double bonds." At every 

 turn, the chemical and physical properties 

 of compounds are attributed to them as a 

 result of certain "constitutions" or 

 "groupings of the atoms within the mole- 

 cules." Earely, if ever, is the veil lifted, 

 and the student permitted to see that, as a 

 matter of fact, precisely the reverse order 

 is the one which should hold, and that it is 

 the physical and chemical properties which 

 determine the constitution. It is a matter 

 of some surprise that we do not hear of 

 compounds with good constitutions, and of 

 others, in pathological conditions perhaps, 

 with bad constitutions. After an explosion 

 of nitroglycerin, it would seem to be quite 

 in keeping to hear that the compound un- 

 fortunately had ruined its constitution. 



Since this diiferenee of method has 

 grown up within these two divisions of 

 chemistry, it has come to pass that stu- 

 dents, thrust suddenly into the field of or- 

 ganic chemistry, find themselves lost in a 

 maze of symbols, formula and nomencla- 

 ture. Since the elementary inorganic 

 course at present has abandoned the use of 

 graphic formulse almost altogether, the 

 student does not receive any discipline of 

 that part of his mind which, for want of a 

 better name, may be called his formulse- 

 comprehending faculty, and, in conse- 

 quence, is at a loss to find himself in this 

 unexpected confusion. No assistance is 

 furnished him by the elementary texts of 

 organic chemistry, because these volumes 

 still take it for granted that the student has 



practised atomic gymnastics of the kind in 

 favor some thirty years ago. 



It seems to me that the teaching of ele- 

 mentary organic chemistry must soon 

 undergo a radical change, perhaps a revo- 

 lution. I believe this advance is develop- 

 ing at the present time. Let us return to 

 the basis of experimental facts and observa- 

 tions, and let us state our theoretical con- 

 clusions with these fully in the foreground 

 of our thoughts. There is no difficulty in 

 presenting to the student a set of facts de- 

 termined by experiment; and there is no 

 impossibility in bringing him to see how 

 these facts may be expressed, in part at 

 least, by properly chosen symbols in terms 

 of certain hypotheses and theories. The 

 modern text-book of organic chemistry re- 

 mains to be written; it will view the sub- 

 ject from this point of vantage. 



In his memorable address before the 

 German Chemical Society on the occasion 

 of the celebration in his honor, held in 

 1890, Kekule gave the well-known ac- 

 count of the origin of the theory of the 

 benzene ring, and at the close of this ac- 

 count said, "Let us learn to dream, and 

 then perhaps we shall find the truth . . . 

 but let us beware of publishing our dreams 

 before they have been put to the proof of 

 the waking understanding." 



Laudee William Jones 

 Univeksity of Cincinnati 



BOW CAN THE BUREAU OF EDUCATION 



HELP THE CITY SUPERINTENDENT 



OF SCHOOLS? 



Among the questions which the Country 

 Life Commission asked in its hearings in the 

 several parts of the United States which it 

 visited was : " In what way can government 

 help in the work of public education ? " The 

 question generally evoked two types of answer. 

 The one. 



