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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXVII. No. 960 



meeting an audience of American men of 

 science. 



One of the most delightful parts of my 

 sojourn in Washington has been my inter- 

 course with your men of science. There is 

 not any city in America — I doubt if there 

 be any city in Europe — where so many men 

 of eminence in science are assembled as 

 live in Washington, and the gatherings 

 which you have here, when the men of 

 science from the whole of your wide coun- 

 try come together, have been among the 

 most delightful experiences that I or any 

 Briton has had in this country. I have 

 had it also in Philadelphia and in New 

 York, and I have had the pleasure of 

 making the acciuaintanee of your men of 

 science in many journeys all over the coun- 

 try ; but this, after all, is the focus to which 

 is gathered most of the scientific lights and 

 leaders of the United States at stated inter- 

 vals when you come together here. 



And I can assure you, gentlemen, there 

 is nothing I shall look back to with more 

 pleasure, in so much of life as remains to 

 me, as to the friendships I had formed with 

 your scientific men and the inspiration I 

 have derived from the ardor and energy 

 with which they pursue the studies to 

 which we are all so much debtors. 



Dr. Woodward has suggested that I 

 should say something about foreign acad- 

 emies, but my knowledge about foreign 

 academies is, really, practically confined to 

 my own country, for, whenever I have 

 traveled abroad, it has rather been among 

 the historians than among the men of sci- 

 ence that my work has lain. 



However, I should in any case feel a 

 little doubtful about venturing to talk 

 about scientific academies, knowing that, 

 whatever else "science" means, Mr. Vice- 

 President, it is supposed to mean knowl- 

 edge; and if a man feels that he does not 



know a thing, scientific people are the last 

 to whom he should address his remarks. 



I received at Oxford my literary educa- 

 tion, and I remember "education" being 

 defined by a very eminent professor there, 

 who said: "What our Oxford education 

 does is to teach our men to write plausibly 

 about subjects they do not understand" — 

 an art which we were in the habit of ex- 

 emplifying by immediately beginning to 

 write for the journals and reviewing books 

 — whose authors knew infinitely more about 

 their subject than we did — in a very su- 

 perior manner, an experience which, how- 

 ever, is not confined to England. 



The vice-president said, gentlemen, that 

 he regarded men of science with fear and 

 veneration. I share those feelings. I have 

 veneration for the lofty and disinterested 

 spirit which you bring to your work. I 

 have fear for the enormous power you 

 exercise. 



You are really the rulers of the world. 

 It is in your hands that lies control of the 

 forces of activity; it is you who are going 

 to make the history of the future, because 

 all commerce and all industry is to-day, far 

 more than ever, the child and product of 

 science; and it is you who make these dis- 

 coveries upon which, when they are applied 

 by industry, the wealth and prosperity of 

 the world depend. It is in your hands that 

 the future lies, far more than in those of 

 military men or politicians. 



But I have another feeling besides fear 

 and veneration. It is that of envy. I 

 envy you your happy lives. Compare your 

 lives with the lives of any other class. If 

 the vice-president will permit me, I think 

 the life of a man of science is a great deal 

 happier than the life of a politician or the 

 life of a statesman, who, as we know, is 

 many pegs above the politician, because the 

 politician is occupied, as the vice-president 

 has said, in endeavoring to promote the 



