182 
Toronto. The places and times have been 
arranged so that this can be done con- 
veniently. The scientific programs and 
social arrangements for both meetings 
promise ample reward for those who are 
able to be present. We must not fail to 
give British men of science a cordial wel- 
come, and we have much to learn from 
their meeting. Our own Association de- 
serves support. Every motive of public 
spirit and self-interest should lead us to 
make the meeting at Detroit worthy of the 
present position of science in America and 
a stepping-stone in its progress. 
We do not at all sympathize with the 
idea sometimes expressed that National 
Associations for the Advancement of Science 
There is 
nothing more typical of modern social con- 
have outlived their usefulness. 
ditions than combinations and trade-unions. 
Human development depends less than 
formerly on natural selection of the indi- 
vidual and more on competition between 
groups. It will fare ill with men of science 
if they cannot unite to maintain and for- 
With them 
not only selfish instincts of self-preservation 
ward their common interests. 
are concerned, but also moral sentiments, 
for they believe that the interests of science 
are in large measure conterminous with the 
interests of civilization. 
The objects of the American Association 
for the Advancement of Science ‘“ by peri- 
odical and migratory meetings, to promote 
intercourse between those who are culti- 
vating science in different parts of Amer- 
ica, to give a stronger and more general 
impulse and more systematic direction to 
scientific research, and to procure for the 
SCIENCE. 
[N.S. Vou. VI. No. 136, 
labors of scientific men increased facilities 
and a wider usefulness,” are as valid and as 
important now as they were when the con- 
In- 
deed, as the magnitude of the interests in- 
stitution was adopted fifty years ago. 
creases, the need of caring for them becomes 
With the growth of special- 
ization and the scattering of men of science ~ 
over the whole area of America, the need 
of cultivating intercourse between them be- 
more urgent. 
comes more pressing. The greater popular 
interest in science requires direction into 
proper channels. As science grows, it needs 
more workers and more money. The work- 
ers must be secured from students at school 
and college, the money from private gifts and 
from the State. The magnitude of scientific 
work is now such that in many cases it can 
only be accomplished by united effort con- 
tinuing for years. Witness what the Royal 
Society has accomplished in inaugurating 
international cooperation in the catalogu- 
ing of scientific literature; the Zoologische 
Gesellschaft in the publication of ‘Das 
Tierreich,’ the British Association in the 
work of its committees. The American 
Association should not only maintain its 
present position, but should make itself a 
still more important factor in the advance- 
ment of science. 
It must not be forgotten that as the en- 
vironment alters, the organization that will 
survive must accommodate itself to the new 
conditions. Science in America is very dif- 
ferent to-day from what it was fifty years 
ago. There is reason to doubt whether the 
Association has in like measure enlarged its 
range and increased the nicety of its ad- 
justments. Methods suitable to a small gath- 
