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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXIX. No. 1017 



6. Our strength has not all been used in 

 the promotion of constructive work. "We 

 spend too much time in criticizing the work 

 of others or defending our own species. 

 Naturally our own children are much bet- 

 ter than others, but I doubt if we gain much 

 by rushing to their defense whenever they 

 are attacked. This sipeeies-making is 

 merely for a day; species characterization 

 is for all time. It is true that they may be 

 thrown down to-day and erected to-morrow, 

 but in the course of time the worthy will 

 be established and the worthless will go to 

 synonymy. To love our own is well, but 

 to love them so well as to be willing to 

 juggle the testimony is vicious. Pages and 

 pages are wasted in criticism, recrimina- 

 tion and the imputing of wrong motives. 

 The inexperienced alone are convinced by 

 such speciousness. Those who have learned 

 wisdom know that the attacked party, were 

 he so minded, could put up an equally 

 effective defense. Is it not better, how- 

 ever, to use all available time in productive 

 work, knowing that nothing gets its final 

 rating until established or disestablished 

 by critical monographic work. The one 

 thing we can not afford to be guilty of is 

 insincerity. We simply must deal honestly 

 with nature and justly with the work of 

 our fellows. Personally I would rather 

 my whole brood should perish than to save 

 even the most promising by dissimulation 

 or misrepresentation. 



But I must not carry the inquiry as to 

 causes further. There are many questions 

 I had intended to raise, but time will not 

 permit. I must condense into a few para- 

 graphs just a thought as to the influence 

 of the chaotic condition of taxonomy upon 

 the progress of our science as a whole. 

 Morphology, physiology, ecology and econ- 

 omic botany in its scores of applications 

 have all gone forward by leaps and bounds, 

 but it is (dare I say it?) in spite of, not 



by the aid of taxonomy. Our unstable 

 nomenclature, involved synonymy, multitu- 

 dinous, often "half-baked" species have 

 produced the conditions described in this 

 paper. The effect must of necessity be to 

 retard, to discourage, to divert effort. 



Now lest I be misunderstood let me say 

 that taxonomic work has not all been mis- 

 directed — far from it. Keenness of obser- 

 vation and great powers of discrimination 

 are noteworthy in the work done. It is 

 not so much that what has been done 

 should not have been done, but rather that 

 much greater effort ought to have been 

 made to relate recent work to that which 

 had gone before. Synthesis should have 

 followed so closely upon the analysis of 

 the elements of our flora that duplications 

 would promptly have been discovered and 

 the relation of each element to the other 

 detected and stated. 



If we will keep in mind that technical 

 systematic work does not exist primarily 

 for its own sake ; that when it ceases to be 

 a means of culture and pleasure to others; 

 that when it becomes burdensome to and 

 unworkable by our fellow botanists in other 

 lines — the chief reasons for its existence 

 have passed, then we shall see more clearly 

 what yet remains to be done. We need to 

 popularize our subject, but not by writing 

 down to those who know little and care 

 less, but by classifying our work so that 

 those who wish to know shall be able to 

 understand. We need more local descrip- 

 tive floras with well-made keys and illus- 

 trations. Our manuals have become too 

 bulky; we cover so much territory that 

 the species are necessarily very numerous. 

 The more species there are in a given genus 

 the more complicated the key and the 

 slighter the differences that separate the 

 species. We ought to have many hand- 

 books and pocket manuals such as the one 



