November 28, 1902.] 



SCIENCE. 



847 



enee in the training of the pharmacist and 

 the physician. Take out of the pharma- 

 eopceia and the materia medica the contri- 

 butions which chemistry has made, and 

 you have little left but empiricism. 



The remedial principles of plants are 

 separated, purified and studied by chem- 

 ical means. Synthetic chemistry has 

 added to materia medica hundreds of valu- 

 able remedies. Standards of purity for 

 drugs are fixed by chemical processes. 



Thus we see the importance of chemistry 

 in the role of training, not only as a means 

 of a liberal education, but also as an ad- 

 junct to other scientific professions. 



Let us now consider for a short time 

 chemistry in the role of the higher uni- 

 versity instruction or in the graduate 

 schools. We now emerge from the region 

 where chemistry is studied for education 

 and for help, to a region where it is studied 

 as a profession. There is no other science 

 to my mind, and I think I will be able 

 to prove it to you statistically and other- 

 wise, which holds the place in the higher 

 universities and graduate schools which 

 chemistry occupies. Fortunately, I have 

 been spared the labor of collation in this 

 matter, by an interesting article which ap- 

 peared in Science for September 5, 1902, 

 entitled 'Doctorates Conferred by Ameri- 

 can Universities.' The doctorate referred 

 to is doctor of philosophy, and in most 

 instances it was conferred in the graduate 

 school of the university mentioned; if not 

 it was conferred only as the result of a 

 special training in the university itself. 

 Twenty-seven universities, representing the 

 principal institutions in the United States 

 of the university class, enter into the sta- 

 tistical data referred to. The period of 

 observation extended over five years, from 

 1898 to 1902 inclusive. During this period, 

 1,158 degrees of doctor of philosophy were 

 conferred by the universities mentioned. 

 Of this number 568 were conferred for 



purely scientific studies, as distinguished 

 from those other studies in universities 

 which, I think, are known as the human- 

 ities. It was always a mystery to me why 

 such studies as chemistry, physics, geol- 

 ogy and botany, which lie so near all the 

 necessities of life, should be excluded from 

 that class which has received such a high- 

 sounding name. I think there is more 

 humanity in a science which produces 

 edible roots than in one which studies 

 those of Greek and Latin origin, and more 

 philanthropy in the arts which produce 

 fuel and clothing than in those which 

 bring forth syntax and prosody. But we 

 will not stop to quarrel with appellations, 

 and if the sciences are not humanities in 

 name they are certainly so in fact. 



Thus, of the total number of degrees of 

 doctor of philosophy conferred in five 

 years, 49.5 per cent, were given in the 

 sciences; in round numbers, half of the 

 whole number. 



An interesting table is also given of the 

 percentage of the degrees conferred in the 

 various sciences. We find that of the 568 

 degrees of doctor of philosophy conferred 

 in the sciences, 137 were granted for the 

 study of pure chemistry, 18 for physio- 

 logical chemistry and physiology, and 3 

 for mineralogical chemistry and mineral- 

 ogy. The total number of chemical de- 

 grees, therefore, was 158, which is 27.8 per 

 cent, of the total number of degrees given 

 in the sciences. Compare this number of 

 158 with the degrees given in the other 

 leading sciences, viz., 68 in physics, 65 in 

 zoology, 63 in psychology, 61 in mathe- 

 matics, 53 in botany and 32 in geology. 

 No other science had as many as 20 de- 

 grees, and three had only one each. 



Thus we see the enormous preponderance 

 of chemistry in the higher scientific educa- 

 tion. It has more than double the number 

 of degrees of any other science. It must 

 be remembered also that chemistry is a 



