82 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLI. No. 1046 



our cloistered world within the college 

 walls. 



Let us come among our fellows not as 

 doctors gowned and coped, but as the simple 

 men and women that we are, seeking advice 

 and aid more often than we can impart 

 knowledge or develop wisdom. Eealizing 

 as we do that could we but exchange the 

 known for the unknown, the little that sci- 

 ence has achieved would appear contemp- 

 tible. From the frontiers of our culture we 

 gaze into the vast unknown, but it is but 

 little that we can see. 



Our science is not alone the concern of 

 specialists but of every man and woman of 

 our land and with the advent of modern 

 medicine, antiseptic surgery, and a knowl- 

 edge of the law of heredity, great human 

 problems have arisen. 



We now stand as trustees guarding 

 things of vast import for good or evil. The 

 very word eugenics conjures up problems 

 for the wisdom of humanity to solve. 

 These problems of science have shaped 

 themselves from out the mists of doubt 

 and lie as awful things upon our path, yet 

 the higher the precipices the safer the 

 harbor they enclose, and we await the wis- 

 dom of the wisest to guide us. 



These are things too deep for the mere 

 scientist, they are for each and every one 

 of us, and the investigator is but one with 

 the vast public in giving heed to their solu- 

 tion. 



Yet in a deeper, more far-reaching sense, 

 our association has a mission humanity- 

 wide in its embrace, and as the duel has 

 ceased to be respectable among individuals, 

 so let war come to be regarded among the 

 nations. It is with no boasting of virtue 

 that we men of science of America can take 

 this stand. We must speak as sinners 

 pleading with sinners. Let us not forget 

 that militarism has been in our own land as 

 well as elsewhere. Let us remember that 



every generation of Americans has drawn 

 the sword, and that the most prolonged and 

 devasting conflict of the nineteenth cen- 

 tury was waged on our own soil over a 

 question which Great Britain solved 

 through a simple act of Parliament. 



The light of civilization has glorified the 

 summit of our ideal but the vast mountain 

 below has forever remained dark in the 

 barbarism of the savage. Our new-born 

 love of all humanity is superimposed upon 

 ages of distrust, prejudice and hatred born 

 of ignorance, but let us recognize that the 

 spark of kindliness that seems so small 

 to-day is ours at least to foster until true 

 to its destiny it shines as a blessing to all 

 future generations of our earth. 



To effect these things what better body 

 can there be than the men of science of the 

 nations of the earth acting in cooperation 

 with that vast multitude of our fellows from 

 whom we have received the blessed oppor- 

 tunity to labor and to serve. 



The problems of our fathers' day were 

 trivial compared with these. Let us there- 

 fore be true to the old ideals of our Amer- 

 ican Association, and let it forever stand 

 for association in terms of mutual helpful- 

 ness between our public and our men of 

 science.^ 



Alfred G. IIayee 



AID TO ASTBONOMICAL BESEAECH 

 The experience of the Eumford, Elizabeth 

 Thompson and certain other research funds 

 shows that great returns may be obtained from 

 relatively small grants to suitable persons. 

 Owing to the excellent organizations resulting 

 from the large sums given to astrophysics in 

 this country, astronomers are well qualified to 

 secure such results. Accordingly, the foUow- 



1 Dr. Mayer devoted the remainder of the even- 

 ing to an account of the research work of the 

 Tortugas Laboratory of the Carnegie Institution 

 of Washington illustrated by colored lantern 

 slides. 



