212 Canadian Record of Science. 



man of science. As illustrating the injustice of such an 

 opinion one may cite the case of the most brilliant philoso- 

 pher of his time. Michael Faraday, who in the matter of his 

 connection with the Trinity House alone, gave many of the 

 best years of his life to the service of his fellow-men. The 

 intensely " practical " nature of this service is shown by the 

 fact that it included the ventilation of light-houses, the 

 arrangement of their lightning conductors, reports upon 

 various propositions regarding lights, the examination of 

 their optical apparatus and testing samples of cotton, oils 

 and paints. A precisely similar illustration is to be found 

 in the life of our own great physicist, Joseph Henry, who 

 sacrificed a career as a scientific man, already of exceptional 

 brilliancy, yet promising a future of still greater splendor, 

 for a life of unselfish usefulness to science and to his country- 

 men as Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, as a mem- 

 ber of the Light House Board, and in other capacities for 

 which he was especially fitted by nature as well as by his 

 scientific training. 



There is an unfortunate, and perhaps a growing tendency 

 among scientific men to despise the useful and the practical 

 in science, and it finds expression in the by no means un- 

 common feeling of offended dignity when an innocent lay- 

 man asks what is the use of some new discovery ? 



Referring to the theoretically extremely interesting spar 

 prism of Bertrand, which under certain conditions may be 

 used to detect traces of polarization of light, a recent writer 

 remarks, "But for this application the prism would possess, 

 in the eyes of the true votary of science, the inestimable 

 value of being of no practical utility whatever." 



Much is said, everywhere and at all times, about the pur- 

 suit of science for the sake of science, and on every hand it 

 is sought to convey the impression that no one who has any 

 other object in view in interrogating Nature than the mere 

 pleasure of listening to her replies, is unworthy of a high 

 place among men of science. So old, so universally accepted, 

 so orthodox, is this proposition, that it is with much hesita- 

 tion that its truth is questioned in this presence. In so far as 



