28 Canadian Record of Science. 



Among other questions closely connected with science is 

 the problem of universal education ; and while only a few 

 in each community can acquire wealth of knowledge, these 

 few must get it for themselves, and must work hard for it. 

 It is not desirable to make the acquisition of knowledge too 

 easy. "The harder the dinner is to chew, the stronger 

 grows the eater. Canned science, as a steady diet, is as 

 unwholesome for the growing mind as canned fruits and 

 vegetables for the growing body. The wise teacher imitates 

 the method of nature, who has but one answer for all ques- 

 tions : Find it out for yourself, and you will then know it better 

 than if I were to tell you beforehand. " The lecturer recognized 

 an evil tendency " in the present popular rage for over- 

 classification, unification, and simplification of science ; for 

 ultra-symmetrical formulae, and excessive uniformity in 

 nomenclature." There is no logical consistency in Nature: 

 nor can the work of the student be over-simplified with- 

 out danger of its failing to produce genuine men of science. 



It is characteristic of science that great discoveries can 

 come only at long intervals, and the claim to special atten- 

 tion made by inexperienced stumblers on forgotten facts 

 should be deprecated. The progress of science the Presi- 

 dent compared to a procession, in which " two facts arrest 

 attention : first, the eager gaze of expectation which the 

 crowd of lookers-on direct towards the quarter from which 

 the procession comes, and their unaccountable indifference 

 to what has already passed ; and secondly, the wonderful 

 disappearance, the more or less sudden vanishing out of the 

 very hands of the carriers, of a lai*ge majority of the facts 

 and theories of which they make so pompous an exposure ; 

 few of them however seeming to be aware that thereby 

 they have lost their right to participate in the pageant, and 

 should retire from it into the throng of spectators, at least 

 until good fortune should take pity on them and drop some 

 new trifle at their feet to soothe their wounded vanity." 



The audacity with which young students take up difficult 

 problems should be discouraged. " Shall such themes as 

 the nebular hypothesis, the probable solidity or fluidity of 

 our planet, the metamorphosis of rocks, the origin of ser- 



