June 24, 1904.] 



SCIENCE. 



949 



the work of the bureau. Every new line 

 of work taken up means a new research, 

 and often the designing and building of a 

 new series of instruments. As the limits 

 of errors are narrowed the labor is rapidly 

 augmented. What one man might do well 

 in a day may require two men a week or a 

 month if the accuracy is to be considerably 

 . increased. This will explain why the bu- 

 reau has not already announced a greater 

 range of testing, and why even when both 

 the new buildings are occupied many lines 

 of work will remain to be inaugurated. 



It is the constant purpose of the bureau 

 to cooperate with instrument makers and 

 manufacturers to the end that their output 

 of instx'uments and apparatus may be im- 

 proved. Not simply .to certify errors or 

 ■criticize results, but to assist in perfecting 

 the product, is the aim. In this work the 

 iDureau has so far enjoyed the confidence 

 .and cooperation of manufacturers to a 

 gratifying degree. It was largely to meet 

 "their needs that the bureau was organized, 

 .and if by serving them the standard of ex- 

 cellence of American-made instruments and 

 machinery is raised, the bureau will have 

 served the public also. In several specific 

 instances a marked improvement of this 

 Isind is already seen, due directly to the in- 

 fluence of the bureau of standards. 



The advantage to scientific men and engi- 

 neers of having a place in this country 

 where instruments and standards may be 

 verified with the highest possible precision, 

 and at nominal charges, and where re- 

 searches may be undertaken when neces- 

 sary to answer questions arising in such 

 •comparisons, is evident. It greatly facili- 

 tates precision work both in engineering 

 and in research. 



The bureau has also fulfilled another of 

 the functions mentioned in the act author- 

 izing its establishment, in furnishing infor- 

 mation on a variety of subjects included 

 more or less closely in its field of activities. 



A considerable correspondence of this kind 

 has grown up. 



The functions of the Bureau of Stand- 

 ards are very broad and its possibilities 

 for usefulness correspondingly great. It 

 should do in its field, indeed, what the 

 Coast Survey and the Geological Survey 

 and the Department of Agriculture are 

 doing in theirs, and what the Physikalisch- 

 Technisehe Reiehsanstalt and the Normal- 

 Aichungs Kommission are doing in Ger- 

 many. FuUy to realize these possibilities 

 will of course require a much further in- 

 crease in equipment and in personnel, and 

 this we expect to see. 



Edward B. Rosa. 



National Bureau of Standards. 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS. 

 Christian Faith in an Age of Science. By 

 William North Eice, Ph.D., LL.D., Pro- 

 fessor of Geology in Wesleyan University. 

 New York : A. G. Armstrong- & Son. 1903. 

 Pp. xi + 425. 



As the author himself hints in his preface, 

 it would not be difficult to cull some delightful 

 antinomies from this work, and on a scale 

 more extended than Dr. Rice suspects. At the 

 same time, it was ever thus with books of the 

 class. For example, I can picture the mean- 

 ingful smile that would cross the faces of cer- 

 tain experts I could name, when they read 

 those pronouncements : ' It is evident, in gen- 

 eral, that we have in the book of Genesis noth- 

 ing that approaches the character of reliable 

 history till about the time of Abraham (p. 122) ; 

 the Fourth Gospel is probably the only record 

 by an eye-witness of the events connected with 

 the resurrection' (p. 363). Similarly, in an- 

 other field, when Dr. Rice suggests that the 

 virgin birth and the resurrection — in the most 

 usual acceptation of these terms — are essential 

 to Christianity (p. 317), one is bound to refer 

 him to the relative articles in ' The Encyclo- 

 psedia Biblica.' In the same way, his naive 

 account of will would scarcely satisfy psy- 

 chologists, while his fearfully and wonder- 

 fully made presentation of causality would 

 amaze the thoroughly modern metaphysician. 



