252 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. II. No. 35. 



Now anthropologjr steps in, the new Sci- 

 ence of Man, offering the knowledge of 

 what he has been and is, the young but wise 

 teacher, revealing the future by the unwav- 

 ering light of the past, offering itself as 

 man's trusty mentor and friend, ready to 

 conduct him by sure steps upward and on- 

 ward to the highest summit which his nature 

 is capable of attaining ; and who dares set 

 a limit to that ? 



This is the final aim of anthropology, the 

 lofty ambition which the student of this 

 science deliberately sets before himself. 

 Who will point to a worthier or a nob- 

 ler one? Daniel G. Beinton. 

 University of Pennsylvania. 



THE PROVIDENTIAL FUNCTIONS OF GOVERN- 

 MENT WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE 

 TO NATURAL RESOURCES* 



It is with considerable hesitation that I 

 undertake the duty which you have seen fit 

 to impose upon me, namely, of addressing 

 you in a representative manner on a subject 

 of Economic Science. For I may not claim 

 to be an expounder of its laws, although en- 

 gaged in its practical application; much 

 less do I pretend to be a representative of 

 the science, if science it be. 



This doubt alone, whether there is as j^et 

 such a thing as economic science, should 

 unfit me for my present position before you, 

 who have chosen this field of human in- 

 quiry as your specialty and hold it, I pre- 

 sume, as correlated with equal value to all 

 the other sciences established as such. 



But even conceding the right to such a 

 correlation which I know is maintained 

 practically by the most eminent men, I am 

 still inclined to doubt the propriety of the 

 title which is applied to ttis section of the 

 Association for the Advancement of Sci- 

 ence, for I conceive that the rutention could 



* Address of the Vice-President, Section I, American 

 Association for the Advancement of Science, at the 

 Springfield Meeting, August 29, 1895. 



not have been to single out for representa- 

 tion in the great concourse of sciences one 

 portion and one method of the greater sepa- 

 rate field of inquiry, but that the title of 

 Economic Science .was in realitj' supposed 

 or intended to be inclusive of all those 

 branches of knowledge which deal with the 

 phenomena of political, commerical, eco- 

 nomic and social life of mankind, and which 

 might be comprised in the all-inclusive 

 name of Social Science, Anthropology in 

 Section II, forming its historical or descrip- 

 tive part. 



At least since this section I was foi-med, 

 if not before, it has been recognized that 

 political economy, or economics, was onlj' a 

 branch of a larger science, the science of the 

 social biology of man, and that this bi-anch 

 could not be satisfactorily developed for any 

 length of time without reference to and 

 without an equal development of all other 

 branches of the system. Hence to be 

 abreast with the times, at least in classifi- 

 cation and nomenclature, we should re- 

 christen this Section to be the Section of 

 Social Science, which to my mind would as- 

 sign it its proper place in the concourse of 

 sciences represented in the Association. 

 Social Science would then have to deter- 

 mine the forces and laws and to explain the 

 phenomena of social life, and finally, as ap- 

 plied social science, to direct the develop- 

 ment of the political, economic, commercial 

 and social intercourse of man; these four 

 aspects of social life being all inclusive and 

 at the same time so differentiated as to ad- 

 mit of their more or less separate studj^ and 

 largely, never entirely, independent devel- 

 opment. 



Perhaps I owe you an explanation, if not 

 an apologjN for mj^ doubt as to whether we 

 are as j/e/ justified in classing this branch of 

 knowledge as a science. This doubt, which 

 I notice is shared by others, has arisen fi-om 

 the observation that the discussions in this 

 field are still progressing to a very large ex- 



