October 2, 1003.] 



SCIENCE. 



421 



the nation would now be much richer than 

 it is, and would have much less to fear from 

 competition. 



Suppase we were to set about putting 

 our educational house in order, .so as to se- 

 cure a higher qiiality and greater quantity 

 of brain-power, it would not be the first 

 time in history that this has been done. 

 Both Prussia after Jena and France after 

 Sedan acted on the view : 



" Wlien land i.s gone and money spent, 

 Then learning is most excellent." 



After Jena, which left Prussia a 'bleeding 

 and lacerated mass,' the King and his wise 

 counsellors, among them men who had 

 gained knowledge from Kant, determined, 

 as they put it, 'to supply the loss of ter- 

 ritory by intellectual effort.' 



"What did they do? In spite of uni- 

 versal poverty, three universities, to say 

 nothing of observatories and other institu- 

 tions, were at once founded, secondary edu- 

 cation was developed, and in a few years 

 the mental resources were so well looked 

 after that Lord Palmerston defined the 

 kingdom in question as 'a country of 

 damned professors.' 



After Sedan, a battle, as Moltke told us, 

 'won by the school-master,' Prance made 

 even more strenuous efforts. The old 

 University of France, with its 'academies' 

 in various places, was replaced by fifteen 

 independent universities, in all of which 

 are faculties of letters, sciences, law and 

 medicine. 



The development of the University of 

 Paris has been truly marvellous. In 

 1897-8, there were 12,000 students, and the 

 cost was 200,000L a year. 



But even more wonderful than these ex- 

 amples is the 'intellectual effort' made by 

 Japan, not after a war, but to prepare for 

 one. 



The question is, shall we wait for a 

 disaster and then imitate Prussia and 



France? or shall we follow Japan, and 

 thoroughly prepare by 'intellectual effort' 

 for the industrial struggle which lies before 

 us? 



Such an effort seems to me to be the first 

 thing any national or imperial scientific 

 organization should endeavor to bring 

 about. 



RESEARCH. 



"When dealing with our universities, I 

 referred to the importance of research, 

 as it is now generally acknowledged to be 

 the most powerful engine of education that 

 we possess. But education after all is but 

 a means to the end which, from the na- 

 tional point of view, is the application of 

 old and the production of new knowledge. 



Its national importance apart from edu- 

 cation is now so generally recognized that 

 in all civilized nations except our own 

 means of reseai-ch are being daity more 

 amply provided for all students after they 

 have passed through their university 

 career, and more than this, for all who 

 can increase the country's renown or pros- 

 perity by the making of new knowledge 

 upon which not only commercial progress, 

 but all inteUeetual advance must depend. 



I am so anxious that my statement of 

 our pressing, and indeed imperative, needs 

 in this direction should not be considered 

 as resting upon the possibly interested 

 opinion of a student of science merely, 

 that I must troiible you with still more 

 quotations. 



Listen to Mr. Balfour: — 



"I do not believe that any man who 

 looks round the equipment of our univer- 

 sities or medical schools, or other places of 

 education, can honestly say in his heart 

 that we have done enough to equip research 

 with all the costly armory which research 

 must have in these modern daj's. "We, the 

 richest country in the world, lag behind 

 Germany, France, Switzerland and Italy. 



