512 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol.. 11., No. 36. 



author or publl-lier makes by tlieni, knows tliat the 

 suggestion which I have quoted is ludicrous. The 

 writing of a good book is not a thing to be done in 

 leisure moments; and sucli as have been the result of 

 original research have cost their authors often years 

 of labor, apart fi-om the mere writing. Mr. Darwin's 

 books, no doubt, have had a large sale; but that is 

 due to the fact, apart from the exceptional genius of 

 the man who wrote them, that they represent some 

 thirty or more years of hard work, during which he 

 was silent. There is not a sufficiently large public 

 interested in the progress of science to enable a 

 researcher to gain an income by writing books, 

 however great his literary facility. A schoolbook or 

 classbook may now and then add more or less to the 

 income of a scientific investigator; but he who be- 

 comes the popular exponent of scientific ideas, except 

 in a very moderate and limited degree, must abandon 

 the work of creating new knowledge. The profes- 

 sional litterateur of science is as much removed by his 

 occupation from all opportunity of serious investiga- 

 tion as is the professional teacher who has to con- 

 sume all his time in teaching. Any other profession 

 — such as the bar, medicine, or the church — is 

 more likely to leave one of its followers time and 

 means for scientific i-esearch than is that of either 

 the popular writer or the successful teacher. 



We have, then, seen that there is no escape from 

 the necessity of providing stipends and laboratories 

 for the purpose of creating new knowledge, as is done 

 in continental states, if we are agreed that more of 

 this new knowledge is needed, and is among the prod- 

 ucts which a civilized community is bound to turn 

 out, both for its own benefit and for that of the com- 

 munity of states, which give to and take from one 

 another in such matters. 



There are some who would finally attack our con- 

 tention by denying that new knowledge is a good 

 thing, and by refusing to recognize any obligation, on 

 the part of England, to contribute her share to that 

 common stock of increasing knowledge by which she 

 necessarily profits. Among such persons are those 

 who would prohibit altogether the pursuit of experi- 

 mental physiology in England, and yet would not and 

 do not hesitate to avail themselves of the services of 

 medical meu whose power of rendering those services 

 depends on the fact that they have learned the results 

 obtained by the experiments of physiologists in other 

 countries or in former times. In reference to this 

 strange contempt and even hatred of science, which 

 undoubtedly has an existence among some persons 

 of consideration even at the present day, I shall have 

 a few words to say before concluding this address. I 

 have now to ask you to listen to what seems to me to 

 be the demand which we should make, as members of 

 a British association for the advancement of science, 

 in respect of adequate provision for the creation of 

 new knowledge in the field of biology iu England. 



Taking England alone, as distinct from Scotland 

 and Ireland, we require, in order to be approximately 

 on a level with Germany, forty new biological insti- 

 tutes, distributed among the five branches of physi- 

 ology, zoology, anatomy, pathology, and botany, — 



forty, in addition to the fifteen which we may reckon 

 (taking one place with another) as already existing. 

 The average cost of the buildings required would be 

 about £4,000 for each, giving a total initial expendi- 

 ture of £160,000; the average cost of stipends for the 

 director, assistants, and maintenance, we may calcu- 

 late at £1,500 annually for each, or £60,000 for the 

 forty,— equal to a capital sum of £2,000,000. These 

 institutes should be distributed in groups of five — 

 eight groups in all — throughout the country. One 

 such group would be placed in London (which is at 

 present almost totally destitute of such arrange- 

 ments), one in Bristol, one in Birmingham, one in 

 Nottingham, one in Leeds, one in Newcastle, one in 

 Ipswich, one in Cardiff, one in Plymouth, — in fact, 

 one in each of the great towns of the kingdom where 

 there is at present, or where there might be with ad- 

 vantage, a centre of professional education and high- 

 er study. The first and the most liberally arranged 

 of these biological institutes — embracing its five 

 branches, each with its special laboratory and staff 

 — should be in London. If we can have nothing 

 else, surely we may demand, with some hope that our 

 request will eventually obtain compliance, the for- 

 mation in London of a College of scientific research 

 similar to that of Paris (the College de France). It 

 is one of the misfortunes and disgraces of London, 

 that, alone amongst the capitals of Europe, with the 

 exception of Constantinople, it is destitute of any in- 

 stitution corresponding to the universities and colleges 

 of research which exist elsewhere. 



Either in connection with a properly organized 

 teaching university, or as an independent institution, 

 it seems to me a primary need of the day that the 

 government should establish in London laboratories 

 for scientific research. Two hundred and fifty years 

 ago Sir Thomas Gresham founded an institution for 

 scientific research in the city of London. The prop- 

 erty which he left for this purpose is now estimated 

 to be worth three millions sterling. This property 

 was deliberately appropriated to other uses, by the 

 Corporation of the city of London and the Mercers' 

 company, about a hundred years since, with the eon- 

 sent of both Houses of Parliament. By this outra- 

 geous act of spoliation these corporations, who were 

 the trustees of Gresham, have incurred the curse 

 which he quaintly inserted in his will in the hope of 

 restraining them from attempts to divert Iris property 

 from the uses to which he destined it. ' Gresham's 

 curse' runs as follows: "And that I do require 

 and charge the said Corporations and chief governors 

 thereof, with circumspect Diligence and without long 

 Delay, to procure and see to be done and obtained, 

 as they will answer the same before Almighty God; 

 (for if they or any of them should neglect the obtain- 

 ing of such Licenses or Warrants, which I trust cannot 

 be difficult, nor so chargeable, but that the overplus 

 of my Bents and Profits of the Premisses hereinbefore 

 to them disposed, will soon recompense the same; 

 because to soe good Purpose in the Commonwealth, 

 no Prince nor Council in any Age, will deny or defeat 

 the same. And if conveniently by my Will or other 

 Convenience, I might assure it, I would not leave it 



