PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS — HARRIS. xlv 



of Nature: to suggest anytliiug else is by some regarded as 

 a eugenetical immorality. Still it is something to have got 

 the length of admitting that there is a problem here at all. 

 Science is of the very warp and woof of the wcl) of hiiiiKin 

 existence; ought we not to reckon with it officially, as it is 

 called? Has not the time come to admit that Science is 

 as important as it reallj'^ has become; for the existence of 

 something and the official admission that it exists are two 

 different things? Why should not science be taken under 

 the care of a cabinet minister? It is no longer vulgar, it 

 is no longer beneath the attention of the aristocratic intellect; 

 it is of preponderating usefulness to the nation, and it is 

 malevolent only when divorced from common-sense and 

 common morality by the insane, megalomaniacal obsessions 

 of self-hypnotized Prussians. It is within a very little of 

 being even a profession! Wh}^ not recognize the pursuit 

 of something which is almost a respectable profession, why 

 not have the official interests and the economic aspects 

 of science presided over by some one who knows something 

 about them? There is much latent vulgarity in the public 

 mind, and a great deal of snobbishness is endemic there. 



Few people recognize worth at home or excellence in 

 homespun; the familiar cannot be great, the prophet hath 

 no honor in his own country. You must have things magni- 

 fied out of their natural proportions, removed a little from 

 the every day setting, to be appreciated by the public. To 

 be quite specific; the man of science must have titles, orders, 

 decorations before he is appreciated b}' the blind public. 

 This is due to a weakness inherent in human nature. Prof. 

 Soddy, F. R. S., writing in the "Glasgow Herald" about the 

 beginning of August, 1916, said, Science must no longer 

 be the "Cinderella". "There is a lamentable lack of intelli- 

 gent interest in the sphere of Science as an essential factor 

 in the education of the nation, as an indispensible instru- 

 ment of its civilized progress. The unfortunate attitude 



