January 1, 1904.] 



SCIENCE. 



have been actuated by different motives, 

 and often one and the same worker has 

 been under the influence of mixed motives. 

 Only in a few cases does it appear that the 

 highest motives alone operate. We must 

 take men as we find them, and we may be 

 thankful that on the whole there are so 

 many who are impelled by one motive or 

 another or by a mixture of motives to take 

 up the work of investigating the world in 

 which we live. Great progress is being 

 made in consequence and almost daily we 

 are called upon to wonder at some new and 

 marvelous result of scientific investiga- 

 tion. It is quite impossible to make pre- 

 dictions of value in regard to what is likely 

 to be revealed to us by continued work, but 

 it is safe to believe that in our efforts to 

 discover the secrets of the universe only a 

 beginning has been made. No matter in 

 what direction we may look we are aware 

 of great unexplored territories, and even 

 in those regions in which the greatest ad- 

 vances have been made it is evident that 

 the knowledge gained is almost insignifi- 

 cant as compared with that which remains 

 to be learned. But this line of thought 

 may lead to a condition bordering on hope- 

 lessness and despondency, and surely we 

 should avoid this condition, for there is 

 much greater cause for rejoicing than for 

 despair. Our successors will see more and 

 see more clearly than we do, just as we see 

 more and see more clearly than our prede- 

 cessors. It is our duty to keep the work 

 going without being too anxious to weigh 

 the results on an absolute scale. It must 

 be remembered that the absolute scale is 

 not a very sensitive instrument, and that 

 it requires the results of generations to 

 affect it markedly. 



On an occasion of this kind it seems fair 

 to ask the question : What does the world 

 gain by scientific investigation 1 This ques- 

 tion has often been asked and often an- 

 swered, but each answer differs in some re- 



spects from the others and each may be 

 suggestive and worth giving. The ques- 

 tion is a profound one, and no answer that 

 can be given would be satisfactory. In 

 general it may be said that the results of 

 scientific investigation fall under three 

 heads — the material, the intellectual and 

 the ethical. 



The material results are the most ob- 

 vious and they naturally receive the most 

 attention. The material wants of man are 

 the first to receive consideration. They 

 can not be neglected. He must have food 

 and clothing, the means of combating dis- 

 ease, the means of transportation, the 

 means of producing heat and a great va- 

 riety of things that contribute to his bodily 

 comfort and gratify his esthetic desires. 

 It is not my purpose to attempt to deal 

 with all of these and to show how science 

 is helping to work out the problems sug- 

 gested. I shall have to content myself by 

 pointing oiit a few of the more important 

 problems the solution of which depends 

 upon the prosecution of scientific research. 



First, the food problem. Wlaatever 

 views one may hold in regard to that which 

 has come to be called ' race suicide,' it is 

 certain that the population of the world is 

 increasing rapidly. The desirable places 

 have been occupied. In some parts of the 

 earth there is such a surplus of population 

 that famines occur from time to time, and 

 in other parts epidemics and floods relieve 

 the embarrassment. We may fairly look 

 forward to the time when the whole earth 

 will be overpopulated unless the produc- 

 tion of food becomes more scientific than 

 it now is. Here is the field for the work 

 of the agricultural chemist who is showing 

 us how to increase the yield from a given 

 area and, in case of poor and worn-out ' 

 soils, how to preserve and increase their 

 fertility. It appears that the methods of 

 cultivating the soil are still comparatively 

 crude, and more and more thorough inves- 



