July 13, 1906.] 



SCIENCE. 



39 



relating to the highest welfare of society 

 which can be solved only by science, and 

 how important it is that workers in kindred 

 subjects should be brought into contact 

 with each other! There are matters of 

 education, matters of public policy and 

 matters of research in all departments of 

 the government and of national life that 

 sustain very close relations to the opinions 

 of scientific men, and it is, therefore, of 

 first importance that there should be a body 

 which can express in an authoritative and 

 representative way the scientific opinion 

 of the country. 



This experiment of renewing the mid- 

 summer meeting indicates in a measure the 

 great growth in membership and in influ- 

 ence of this association. In so doing, of 

 course there is no intention of abandoning 

 the meetings in the winter. It was neces- 

 sary, in bringing about a proper adjust- 

 ment of the work and aims of the associa- 

 tion to the specialization of science as rep- 

 resented in the various affiliated societies, 

 to adopt the plan of a winter meeting, but 

 the association while gaining much un- 

 doubtedly lost something by it. Certain 

 members, desirable to have with us, were 

 unable to attend, and the more popular side 

 of the work may have suffered somewhat 

 because of the more special and technical 

 character of the papers presented at the 

 meetings in the winter. There are many, 

 such as school teachers, amateurs and 

 others intelligently interested in natural 

 and physical science, but not actively en- 

 gaged in research, whose support and in- 

 terest it is desirable that the association 

 should secure and who formerly attended 

 the summer meetings. It is to be hoped 

 that this effort to renew that kind of work 

 and influence of the association which was 

 expressed in the old days by the midsum- 

 mer meeting will be successful and this ex- 

 tension of influence can be secured without 

 any impairment of strictly scientific aims. 



As I have said, we certainly could not in- 

 augurate the movement under better con- 

 ditions than at this time and in this place. 



This is the first opportunity that I have 

 had to appear in my official capacity before 

 the association, and I wish to express my 

 appreciation of the distinguished honor 

 which was conferred on me at the meeting 

 in New Orleans. The honor is not merely 

 a personal one, but I interpret it as a recog- 

 nition of medical science as an integral, co- 

 ordinate part of the natural science of this 

 country; and medical science, in my judg- 

 ment, fully merits this recognition on ac- 

 count of the paths which it has opened up 

 and followed and the great advance which 

 it has made in recent years. 



President Schurman has indicated to us 

 the intimate relations which science sus- 

 tains to the highest interests of society 

 throughout the world, and this condition 

 has been brought about largely through 

 scientific discoveries and their application 

 to useful purposes. It is the glory of medi- 

 cine that in these later days it has been able 

 to contribute its share, a share not un- 

 worthy of its rank among the sciences of 

 man and of nature, toward the advance- 

 ment of useful knowledge. It has done so 

 partly by recognizing the fact that a large 

 part of medical science is essentially biolog- 

 ical science, and that this is not only true 

 of normal anatomy and physiology, but 

 that pathology, the science of disordered 

 structure and function, may be considered 

 and cultivated to a large extent as biolog- 

 ical science. This has been one of the rea- 

 sons for the great advance in medicine. 

 The scientific method, the method of ob- 

 servation, experiment and reasoning, in 

 contrast with the dogmatism, speculation 

 and reliance on authority which for cen- 

 turies dominated the history of medicine, 

 is recognized to-day by medicine as fully 

 as by any science as the only source of 

 fruitful progress. 



