264 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION. 1919. 
upon by the people of the time as diversions of the learned, not 
likely to have much effect upon human life and progress. How 
erroneous such a view was it is unnecessary to point out to a gen- 
eration accustomed to daily use of the trolley car, telegraph, tele- 
phone, and electric light. Not only is the utility of science not 
always predictable, but it is of very different kinds. That astronomy 
has certain practical applications in navigation and geodesy is well 
known; but important as these applications are they seem insig- 
nificant in comparison with the debt that we owe to this science for 
enlarging our intellectual horizon. This, too, is usefulness which I 
venture to think is of a truer and higher sort than much that passes 
current for utility. The classic researches of Pasteur on the tartaric 
acids, on fermentation, on the anthrax bacillus, on the silkworm dis- 
ease, and on rabies were so-called applied science of the very highest 
type, indistinguishable in the spirit and method of their pursuit from 
investigations in pure science. They were not merely the application 
of knowledge to industry, but were extraordinarily fruitful scientific 
investigations undertaken to solve particular industrial and humani- 
tarian problems. They are especially interesting in the present con- 
nection as probably the most conspicuous example in the history of 
research of the merging of pure and applied science. Pasteur was 
doubly fortunate in that he not only enormously enlarged human 
knowledge but was able to see, at least in part, the practical applica- 
tion of his discoveries to the benefit of humanity. The value of his 
results measurable in dollars is enormous, yet this is not their only 
value. Prof. Arthur Schuster, in a recent address, remarks : 
The researches of Pasteur, Lister, and their followers, are triumphs of science 
applied directly to the benefit of mankind ; but I fancy that their hold on our 
imagination is mainly due to the new vista opened out on the nature of disease, 
the marvelous workings of the lower forms of life, and the almost human at- 
tributes of blood corpuscles, which have been disclosed. 
The effect on a community is only the summation of the effect on individuals, 
and if we judge by individuals there can be little doubt that, except under the 
stress of abnormal circumstances, pure knowledge has as great a hold upon the 
public mind as the story of its applications. 
Quite independently of any recognized usefulness, investigations 
that yield results that are of interest to the public are willingly sup- 
ported by the people, and this fact is significant in connection with 
what I shall have to say later on the function of education. As 
illustrations of this truth may be cited our Government Bureau of 
Ethnology and our large public museums. Probably few who read 
the admirable Government reports on the aboriginal antiquities of 
our country and on the arts and customs of the Indian tribes could 
point out any particular usefulness in these studies; but they have 
to do with human life, and their popular appeal is undeniable. The 
