37 



We are not as yet in this country producing our proper share of 

 scholars of the first ranl<;. Tlie reasons for this are many, including hasty 

 preparation, premature specialization, iii'^ullicient rewards, and unfavor- 

 able environment. 



As to iDreparatiou, those of us who contemplate academic careers are 

 usually unwilling to invest suflicieiit capital of time and money ; we ex- 

 jiect to complete our scholastic education if uninterrupted at about twenty- 

 five years cf age and then enter upon an active career in which there is 

 little time or opportunity for research or eveia A'ery serious or intensive 

 study, for the sake of the immediate pecuniary reward ; in Europe, 

 several more years are spent in subordinate positions as investigators, on 

 a semi-independent basis both scholastically and financially. The Euro- 

 pean makes a larger investment and reaps a larger ultimate reward, not 

 cnly in money but still more in the consideration accorded to intellectual 

 eminence. ■ i ij ' "i i ! 



Concerning too early specialization and its shallow results, I shall 

 speak later; let it suffice here to saj^ that, for example, he is a poor 

 chemist who is only a chemist. 



The rewards at present offered for pure scientific work in this country 

 .ire insufficient to attract the mosr vigorous, capable and ambitious men; 

 not only, nor chiefly, are the financial returns here less than in Europe, 

 in spite of our higher cost of living, but the pablic respect for intellectual 

 distinction is far inferior in this country, on account of our- commercialism 

 and our acceptance of wealth as our standard evidence of merit. 



The er.vironment, too, is less favorable to the highest scientific work 

 in that the numbers of those engaged therein are so few, and the national 

 characteristic of haste rather than thoroughness pervades our activity. 

 The value of real scientific attainment is still but dindy recognized by the 

 industrial world ; chemists are employed like clerks, without graduate 

 training, and work like day laborers, but for less pay. at routine analysis, 

 with neither the training nor the opportunity to attack the larger prob- 

 lems in a fundamental scientific way. Sucli chemists are not on the same 

 plane as the higher chemists in the German manufacturing industries, who 

 have supervision of the works as well as the laboratories. One result, 

 then, of this lack of demand for highly trained men is the small number 

 pursuing research in our universities, so that even our best qualified pro- 

 fessors have a mere handful of rescircli students, and many of these can 



