November 14, 1913] 



SCIENCE 



693 



intellectual life of the nation and the Royal 

 Institution, as well as Oxford and Cam- 

 bridge, fare little better at his hands. 



Now no one will attempt to deny that 

 the characteristic quality of British science 

 has always rested in the individual, and 

 that organized efforts there have played a 

 less conspicuous part than in Prance or in 

 Germany. During a large part of their 

 history, Oxford and Cambridge have done 

 little for research, though the past half 

 century has seen an extraordinary change 

 in this respect, particularly in the case of 

 the Cavendish laboratory, whose succession 

 of brilliant leaders can hardly be matched 

 in the history of any other university lab- 

 oratory. Men whose names are famous in 

 science have sprung up in the most unex- 

 pected places, without ancestry, training 

 or encouragement to account for the domi- 

 nant influence they have exerted on the 

 scientific thought of the world. A notable 

 illustration of this kind is afforded by 

 Faraday, whose obscure origin, extreme 

 poverty, and lack of the assistance of 

 schools, were most fortunately offset by his 

 transcendent genius and by the influence 

 of Davy, whose lectures at the Royal Insti- 

 tution soon transformed the bookbinder's 

 apprentice into Davy's brilliant successor. 

 Darwin, though of distinguished ancestry, 

 was another English "amateur" whose 

 work was done apart from the universities. 

 A host of others might be mentioned, whose 

 extraordinarily original contributions to 

 scientific thought have found few equals in 

 other lands. For the most part, they have 

 worked alone and sometimes unaided, and 

 their great results have been achieved in 

 spite of conditions which may appear un- 

 favorable and discouraging. But in my 

 opinion the Royal Society and the Royal 

 Institution, not to speak of other important 

 agencies, such as the societies devoted to 

 special branches of science, have exercised 



in England a profoundly favorable influ- 

 ence which can not be ignored. 



In failing to take note of this in his 

 classic work, Merz seems to exhibit some 

 traces of that pessimistic quality which is 

 not infrequently encountered in English 

 life. It is to short-sightedness of the gov- 

 ernment and to individual conservatism, 

 tinctured with pessimism, that I should be 

 inclined to charge that lack of support of 

 scientific men of which Merz so feelingly 

 complains, rather than to the Royal So- 

 ciety and other organized bodies for the 

 promotion of science. As a matter of fact, 

 it is easy to show that these institutions 

 have exerted a powerful stimulus, without 

 which the progress of science in England 

 undoubtedly would have been delayed. 



In the first place, the Royal Society has 

 extended the distinction and privileges of 

 its fellowship to a much larger number of 

 investigators than have been similarly hon- 

 ored by the continental academies.^'* Every 

 investigator in science will understand and 

 appreciate the benefit which such recogni- 

 tion entails. Most of all the obscure indi- 

 vidual worker, unnoticed and unsupported 

 by the universities, but wholly devoted to 

 the pursuit of science, must benefit by 

 such moral support. On the continent I 

 have known investigators of this type, not 

 connected with a university, and receiving 

 no aid or encouragement from neighboring 

 university men, who could not be recog- 

 nized by election to the academies because 

 of their limited membership or their fixed 

 traditions. In England such men would 

 have been received into the Royal Society, 

 which would have been glad to publish their 

 papers as Fellows and to aid them in other 

 ways. 



A notable illustration is afforded by the 

 case of Newton, elected a fellow of the 



so Fifteen new members are elected annually, 

 making a total membership of 477 (Jan. 1, 1913). 



