J0NE 25, 1915] 



SCIENCE 



933 



responsibility and power of initiative of the 

 teacher are further diminished by the inter- 

 position of a principal, who may be a man 

 of all affairs except that in hand — ^the work 

 of teaching. 



If the conclusion at which I have arrived 

 be correct — that science is not for the multi- 

 tude and can never be generally appre- 

 ciated or even fashionable — in view of the 

 part which it is clearly destined to play in 

 education and in daily life, on account of 

 its infinite and far-reaching influence upon 

 our well-being — the responsibility cast upon 

 the few representatives of science is very 

 great ; in support of our civilization and in 

 order that wisdom may prevail more gen- 

 erally, they must organize its forces effec- 

 tively. 



Whilst individuality is the mainspring 

 of scientific progress, collective action is 

 required to provide full and proper oppor- 

 tunity for the workers and to promote the 

 success of their inquiries. At present, scien- 

 tific workers are organized merely for the 

 purpose of providing means of publishing 

 the results of their studies, in no way either 

 for defence or offence ; our societies are not 

 effective even for the purposes of debate 

 and criticism. Thus, our chief English 

 scientific society, consisting of some 500 

 members representative of all the various 

 branches of physical and biological sci- 

 ence, is little more than a rabble — ^its fel- 

 lows are such individualists that scarce half 

 a dozen of us can ever agree to work seri- 

 ously together for a common purpose, and 

 the irresistible influence we might exercise 

 if we could be unanimous as to our objec- 

 tive is lost to the community. Most unfor- 

 tunately, the society has no influence what- 

 ever either on political or on public opin- 

 ion ; it makes no attempt either to guide the 

 public or to give dignity and importance 

 to the cause of science in the eyes of the 

 commiinity. Its meetings are dull, and its 



belated publications by no means represent 

 the scientific activity of its fellows. The 

 presidents of the society have too often been 

 appointed at an age when the propagandist 

 spirit is no longer paramount, when they 

 have no particular scientific message left 

 in them to deliver. And they occupy the 

 chair too long; this arises chiefly from the 

 fact that however clear each one of us may 

 be that individually he is fully competent 

 to hold the office, we all agree in finding 

 some objection to every name that is sug- 

 gested; to overcome this difficulty a short 

 tenure is desirable, so that the compliment 

 can be paid and encouragement given to 

 the various sciences in turn ; no one should 

 be appointed to such an office who is more 

 than sixty to sixty-five years old, as most of 

 us have used up our ideas and have lost our 

 virility by that age. The other officers also 

 hold their positions too long, but members 

 of the council have far too short a life — 

 consequently aU the power is centered in 

 the official body; attempts that have been 

 made to organize the whole society in sec- 

 tions representative of the various sciences 

 have always 'been defeated by the official 

 party. 



Unless our scientific societies can be made 

 more generally effective, if scientific work- 

 ers are incapable of learning lessons from 

 administrative life, it stands to reason that 

 the collective interests of science and of 

 the body scientific must remain unrepre- 

 sented and unvoiced — to the great detri- 

 ment of progress and of the public. 



Science must be organized, in fact, as 

 other professions are organized, if it is to 

 be an effective agent in our civilization; 

 the problems pressing upon us are of such 

 magnitude and of such infinite importance 

 that we can no longer afford to be without 

 wisdom. 



Henry E. Armstrong 



