506 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XIV. No. 348. 



details, which, though scientifically essen- 

 tial, tend only to obscure semi-popular pres- 

 entation. Courtesy, also, to those who 

 are at once our hosts and our guests re- 

 quires that, so far as possible, one should 

 substitute the vernacular for the 'jargon of 

 science,' and draw his figures of speech 

 chiefly from the broad domain of every-day 

 life rather than from the special, though rap- 

 idly widening,'fields of scientific activity. 



Between this nominally unlimited free- 

 dom on the one hand, and these actually 

 narrow restrictions on the other, I have 

 chosen to invite your attention for the hour 

 to a summary view of the salient features 

 of scientific progress, with special reference 

 to its effects on the masses, rather than on 

 the individuals, of mankind. We all know, 

 at least in a general way, what such prog- 

 ress is. We are assured almost daily by 

 the public press and by popular consent 

 that the present is not only an age of scien- 

 tific progress, but that it is preeminently the 

 age of scientific progress. And with re- 

 spect to the future of scientific achievement, 

 the consensus of expert opinion is cheerfully 

 hopeful, and the consensus of public opin- 

 ion is extremely optimistic. Indeed, to 

 borrow the language sometimes used by the 

 rulers of nations, it may be said that the 

 realm of science is now at peace with all 

 foreign parts of the world, and in a state of 

 the happiest domestic prosperity. 



But times have not been always thus 

 pleasant and promising for science. As we 

 look backward over the history of scientific 

 progress it is seen that our realm has been 

 taxed often to the utmost in defense of its 

 autonomy, and that the present state of 

 domestic felicity, bordering on tranquility, 

 has been preceded often by states of domes- 

 tic discord bordering on dissolution. And, 

 as we look forward into the new century 

 before us, we may well enquire whether sci- 

 ence has vanquished its foreign enemies and 

 settled its domestic disputes for good and 



all, or whether future conquests can be made 

 only by a similarly wasteful outlay of energy 

 to that which has accompanied the advances 

 of the past. Especially may we fitly enquire 

 on an occasion like the present what are the 

 types of mind and the methods of procedure 

 which make for the progress, and what are 

 the typesof mind and the methodsof proced- 

 ure which make for the regress, of science. 

 And I venture to think that we may en- 

 quire, also with profit, in some prominent 

 instances, under what circumstances in the 

 past science has waxed or waned, as the 

 case may be, in its slow rise from the myths 

 and mysticism of earlier eras to the law 

 and order of the present day. For it is a 

 maxim of common parlance, too well justi- 

 fied, alas ! by experience, that history re- 

 peats itself; or, to state the fact less gently, 

 that the blunders and errors of one age are 

 repeated with little variation in the succeed- 

 ing age. This maxim is strikingly illus- 

 trated by the history of science, and it has 

 been especially deeply impressed upon us — 

 burnt in, one might say — by the scientific 

 events of our own times. Have we not 

 learned, however, some lasting lessons in 

 the hard school of experience, and may we 

 not transmit to our successors along with 

 the established facts and principles of sci- 

 ence the almost equally well established 

 ways and means for the advancement of 

 science ? Will it be possible for society to 

 repeat in the twentieth century the appalling 

 intellectual blunders of the nineteenth cen- 

 tury, or have we entered on a new era in 

 which, whatever other obstacles are pending, 

 we may expect man to stand notably less in 

 his own light as regards science than ever 

 before? To a consideration of these and 

 allied questions I beg your indulgence, 

 even though I may pass over ground well 

 known to most of you, and encroach, per- 

 haps, here and there, on prominences in 

 fields controversial ; for it is only by dis- 

 cussion and rediscussion of such questions 



