268 



SCIENCE 



[Vol. LVI, No. 1445 



Scholarship in a passive or conservative 

 position diminishes its value. Culture not 

 merely sets standards of form hut may also 

 indicate the rate of progress. It may not only 

 require that we know the best from the past, 

 but should demand the best that can be secured 

 in the present and future. The study of human 

 actions and interests is not to be limited 

 by assumption that creation, even in the human 

 sense, is ever complete, or that existing states 

 of law or culture are final. Science and re- 

 search should be tied to the humanistic gi'oup 

 of agencies for a combined investigation of 

 problems of every kind relative to man. Cul- 

 ture should be a constructive force with the 

 authority of history, and an active source of 

 ideas and ideals. 



Research and cultural activities not merely 

 overlap and have common aims, but their high- 

 est expression develops through influence of 

 similar types of constructive ideals. The 

 idealism which gives life and hope to culture 

 and science may be academic, unprofessional, 

 or even unfashionable, but it has contributed 

 much toward securing the present privileges of 

 humanity. The practical man insists that he is 

 limited by what is and not by what might be. 

 The idealist dwells upon what should be, with 

 the hope that what is, by reason of its insta- 

 bility and by virtue of the laws of change, may 

 ultimately come to be the thing desired. The 

 practical man with his hands tied by what he 

 must do sets precedents and limits which some- 

 times bind the wheels of progress. The ideal- 

 ist, with the widest view of unitj' and movement 

 reaching through the universe of being and of 

 thought, visualizes the larger possibilities and 

 helps to sweep away obstacles in the path of 

 advance along lines of 'natural development. 



And so, without further expansion of this 

 view, it is clear that I do not hope to see less 

 diversification in university activity but only 

 more unity. We should represent here every 

 type of thought. We must assemble, organize, 

 interpret and construct in every region over 

 which knowledge may extend. We must have 

 differing types of mind and multifarious 

 points of view. With meticulous refinement 

 of technique some will seek out the minutest 

 details of obtainable information and set them 

 in order with relation to the ocean of available 



facts. Some will work upon the nature of 

 matter and others on the theory of the state. 

 But with all this differentiation, the prin- 

 ciples of unity, or law, and the interrelation 

 and interdependence of all knowledge should 

 everywhere be recognized and made the basis 

 of advance in thought. The delight in con- 

 struction and the joy in expectation of progress 

 should be lessons of experience which no one 

 could fail to understand. Culture and scholar- 

 ship should help science and research to better 

 orientation. The explorer and builder should 

 be imbued with that culture which gives the 

 clearest vision of the road for human progress. 



We must not forget that for each individual 

 the end and aim of university effort is the 

 securing of that knowledge which fits him 

 into the niche in which he may perform the 

 largest service; and that the university is not 

 an apprentice shop, but is a source of ideals 

 and a type of environment peculiarly fitted 

 for growth of constructive minds. Let us be 

 clear that whatever the university gives repre- 

 sents wasted time, effort and material, unless it 

 is received in a spirit of reverence and with the 

 idea that the greatest satisfaction lies in 

 service as a builder who does not work for per- 

 sonal ends. It is said that geniuses are born, 

 not made; but those who come into the world 

 to live non-eontributive, purely individual 

 lives, leaving the world no better than they 

 find it, we may truthfully say are only made, 

 not born. Contribution to meet real human 

 needs gives perhaps the only way by which we 

 obtain full right of recognition as individuals 

 in the strictly human sense. We may not 

 know why living things must grow if they 

 would live, or why history has given a choice 

 between progress and oblivion, but the think- 

 ing world has always recognized the validity 

 of this view. 



We remember that the Great Teacher ex- 

 plained to Nicodemus the Pharisee : "Marvel 

 not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born 

 again." With all the spiritual meaning that 

 this saying carries may it not suggest to us 

 also that constructive service gives, with a sense 

 of reality, a new and true life, a verifiable per- 

 .sonality in the kingdom of creative beings. 

 What greater work can a university perform 

 than through its vision, its constructive power 



