550 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLVII. No. 1223 



Although the stigma of intolerance may 

 cling to mankind forever there is a second 

 factor which also limits intellectual free- 

 dom but -which is capable of very great 

 amelioration. This is the failure on the 

 part of the patrons to appreciate the 

 choicest fruits of scholarship and research. 



It is more rare that a failure of apprecia- 

 tion leads to dismissal of a professor, but it 

 is a matter of not unusual occurrence that 

 persons whose vision is not easily followed 

 are thwarted, nagged and otherwise actively 

 encouraged to go somewhere else where the 

 patrons are more enlightened. 



As an example of this nagging which is 

 none the less disagreeable for being unpre- 

 mediated, I can not refrain from quoting a 

 story, as realistic as it is imaginary. It is 

 told by President Maclaurin, of the Massa- 

 chusetts Institute of Technology, in his 

 article on "Efficiency and Education": 



The superintendent of buildings and grounds, 

 or other competent authority, calls upon Mr. New- 

 ton. Superintendent: Your theory of gravitation 

 is hanging fire unduly. The director insists upon 

 a finished report, filed in his office by 9 a.m. Mon- 

 day next; summarized on one page; typewritten 

 and the main points underlined. Also a careful 

 estimate of the cost of the research per student 

 hour. 



Newton : But there is one difficulty which has been 

 puzzling me for fourteen years and I am not 

 quite . . . 



Superintendent (with snap and vigor) : Guess you 

 had better overcome that difficulty by Monday 

 morning or quit.s 



If, however, an investigator insists on 

 continuing upon his way through fields of 

 investigation which make no obvious ap- 

 peal to the patrons unless it be to arouse 

 their spirit of economy, then two courses 



5 E. 0. Maclaurin, ' ' Education and Industrial 

 Efficiency," Science, XXXIII., p. 101, 1911. 

 This story I once had the mischievous pleasure 

 of sending to Mr. Allen, of the Wisconsin Uni- 

 versity Survey, and was complimented by having 

 him write me requesting the exact reference! 



are open to him. He must either accept a 

 situation which acknowledges that poverty 

 is the patrimony of the Muses or he must 

 find some method of winning the approval 

 of the patrons for his cherished line of re- 

 search. 



In connection with the first of these alter- 

 natives, I recall with the greatest pleasure a 

 certain penniless scholar whom I know and 

 greatly admire but whose example I will 

 not recommend for the reason that his mode 

 of life is too ascetic and his privations too 

 severe. Indeed I feel with Burton, that de- 

 lightful old chatterbox, when he asks in his 

 "Anatomy of Melancholy," 



What Christian will be so irreligious, as to bring 

 up his son in that course of life [that of the poor 

 scholar] which a beggar's brat taken from the 

 bridge where he sits a-begging, if he knew the in- 

 convenience, had cause to refuse it ! s 



If on the other hand the investigator re- 

 jects the undowered Muse as a proposition 

 not only personally inconvenient but also 

 incompatible with his own highest effi- 

 ciency, he must find some way of winning 

 the approval of the patrons. It is here that 

 the privately endowed universities may 

 have some advantage over those which rely 

 on popular support. For in the former 

 pure science maj^ be cherished not only be- 

 cause its more cultured patrons are more 

 appreciative of esthetic and spiritual values 

 but also because of the affection which their 

 class (the wealthy and leisure class) has 

 for activities, which, because of their ap- 

 parent uselessness, contribute the more to 

 their social prestige. Such non-material 

 returns are not likely to appeal at once to 

 the patrons of a state university, that is, to 

 the common man, still less to the "hard- 

 headed" (that is, unimaginative) business 

 men who sometimes dominate a board of 



sEobert Burton, "The Anatomy of Melan- 

 choly," Pt. I., Sec. 2, Mem. 3, Subs. 15, 1652. 



