Western Society of Naturalists. 993 
about him—a fine and intelligent spirit; for without these, the 
institutions, the enterprises, essential to his success can neither be 
established nor maintained. Each scientific society, if it is to live 
and thrive, must serve as a centre of upheaval for the community 
at large. If we unite and firmly bind ourselves in a society of 
restricted numbers, and with somewhat limited conditions of admis- 
sion, this is not done with any unworthy purpose of discriminating 
in our own favor, or of confining to our membership the benefits 
of our association, but to give unity and distinctive character to 
our influence, that it may reach farther and go deeper than if the 
energy of our organization were to be chiefly spent in keeping our- 
selves alive, 
And so we may inquire, what is to be our outside influence? I 
think that we may reasonably expect, acting within the limits of 
our organization, and along the line of our special purposes, to have 
a stimulating and directive influence upon the science work of the 
educational institutions and associations of this region, upon the 
local scientific societies with which we are connected, and, through 
our meetings and papers, upon the more intelligent part of the - 
general public. While ours is not primarily an association of 
teachers, but of original workers in science, it so happens that most 
of us teach, and there is certainly no way in which we can advance 
science more effectively than by sending out classes of bright and 
ambitious pupils prepared for research. Discussions of the methods 
of this work must consequently always be in order; and besides 
this internal work and influence, I believe that we should lay down, 
advocate, and defend a few general principles—bearing, for example, 
on the relations of instruction and investigation, on the main ends 
_ Of training in science, on the selection, arrangement, and co-ordina- 
tion of subjects in each division of the courses in which we are 
especially interested; on the amount, kind, and time of introduc- 
tion, of primary work in science preparatory to that of our higher 
institutions of learning, and the like. Preliminary, however, to 
any application of such principles to the actual situation in this 
region, we certainly and especially need to examine the situation 
itself, with respect to the institutions which we represent, to others 
not connected with us by membership of their instructors, and to 
the preparatory and high schools generally. I would greatly like 
