August 3, 1906.] 



SCIENCE. 



they might make if left entirely free from teach- 

 ing — Agassiz is a case in point. Anton de Bary 

 was one of the ablest investigators of his genera- 

 tion (he died in 1887) . But all his brilliant work 

 would sooner or later have been accomplished by, 

 not one person, but a considerable number of other 

 people, and as it lay in the then advanced field 

 involving microscopical appliances and technique, 

 the great improvement in modern methods has 

 enabled inferior men to do some of his work 

 better than he did it, and clear up difficulties he 

 left unsolved. His influence, however, as a 

 teacher can not be overestimated. The men who 

 received inspiration and training in his laboratory 

 are among the leaders, and what is better perhaps, 

 are among the sanest influences in botanical work 

 in their generation. Again the pupils of de 

 Bary's pupils are among the best influences of the 

 younger generation. 



In his students the work of a great 

 investigator is multiplied a hundred or a 

 thousand fold. To be thus remembered, 

 to live thus in the spirit and methods of 

 the generations in science that follow after 

 us, this is for us, as university teachers, as 

 university investigators, as men who teach 

 through the method of research, the noblest 

 type of fame, the worthiest conception of 

 personal immortality. 



In the preparation of this address I sent 

 a circular note to about a hundred leading 

 university men, and I have received a sin- 

 gularly valuable and suggestive series of 

 answers. Most of them agree in a general 

 way with my own views already stated, or 

 more exactly, their agreement has helped 

 me to form my own final opinions with 

 more precision and more confidence. Some 

 of them state recognized principles with 

 novel force, while a few others hold views 

 unlike my own on one or two phases of the 

 question. A few are partially satisfied 

 with present conditions, believing that 

 these matters are self-regulating and that 

 the universities are doing all that can be 

 done under present conditions. A few 

 again place a higher value on the young 

 enthusiast who thinks that he can investi- 



gate what he can not teach, and others still 

 are more tolerant towards the man who can 

 teach what he can not investigate. One 

 correspondent places especial emphasis on 

 the value of leisure, even though for a time 

 our university men may not know how to 

 use it. He says : 



I think, in general, that the great lack in the 

 American college and university is lack of leisure. 

 The ideal seems to be that of ' keeping busy ' both 

 the faculty and the students. More show of 

 activity is thus made, and trustees are better 

 satisfied. I believe, on the contrary, that a cer- 

 tain amount of guaranteed unoccupied time every 

 day should be a distinctive feature of the academic 

 life, both for student and for professor. Of 

 course, if leisure were suddenly granted, we should 

 neither of us know what to do with it and how 

 to use it rightly. But we can't learn how to use' 

 leisure aright without having some little leisure- 

 to use. Reform might come gradually. America, 

 it would seem, has combined the English way of 

 keeping its instructors occupied all day with the- 

 German idea of extending the working year over 

 three quarters or more of the solar year. But the 

 English tutor gets more than six months of the 

 year to himself; and the German professor lives 

 a much more leisurely life than the American 

 professor can do. The consequence is, I think, 

 that both the Englishman and the German are, at 

 their best, better academic men than we American 

 professors can be. 



This leisure I should give to everybody, and I 

 believe that the granting of it would in essentials 

 answer your question. But I add this: I do not 

 think that the number of men capable of doing 

 research work is anything like so great as one 

 would gather from the scientific journals (Sci- 

 ence, for instance), or from the general atmos- 

 phere of faculties. The tacking-on of a graduate 

 school to the college and the implicit idea that 

 every holder of a chair can direct if he can not 

 himself accomplish research work, I take to be 

 wrong and mischievous in the extreme. In Eng- 

 land, as there are among the students pass-men 

 and class-men, with no jealousy or rivalry or 

 thought of superiority or inferiority, so there are 

 among the teachers men who are appointed mainly 

 to teach and men who are appointed to research 

 offices. I think that this division should be drawn 

 in American faculties. It should be frankly 

 recognized that the majority of professors, how- 

 ever excellent their method of instruction and 



