1 6 NATURE STUDY AND AGRICULTURE 



ization. But, whatever the name or the definition, what 

 is entirely agreed upon in this connection is helpful contact 

 with nature, and what finds much less agreement is what 

 kind of nature contact is most helpful. 



Nature Study a Sentiment? — The love of nature is a 

 sentiment that seems to belong to all healthy minded 

 people who revel in forest and stream and mountain and 

 sea like children turned out for a holiday, and just as this 

 sentiment is nurtured by experience the mind will retain its 

 healthy, natural tone. But if this were all that is meant 

 by " helpful contact with nature " the mission of nature 

 study would be hardly more than a campaign for fresh-air 

 outings. Yet the delight that comes from being immersed 

 in nature as one is immersed in air is an essential condition 

 and stimulus for nature study itself. Such love of nature 

 must be awakened or nature study will have no vitality, 

 and perhaps this is as far as some will go or can go. This 

 is fine as far as it goes, but it is not nature study. It is 

 only nature sentiment. 



Nature Study a Science? — At the other extreme of 

 opinion is the claim that nature study is science. Now if 

 science is held to mean in this connection method rather 

 than matter there might be no dispute with this claim, for 

 science as a" method of problem solving " begins even 

 in nature study. But science as ordinarily used means 

 organized knowledge in reference to nature. Such claim 

 would mean then that nature study is composed of bits of 

 botany, and bits of zoology, physics, geology, etc., for these 

 are the so-called sciences. 



Any such organization of nature study would defeat 

 its purpose, for it is knowledge without definite organiza- 



