Editorial ComrAent. 43. 
and where these sciences were from the beginning granted a 
relative position worthy of their claims. There are institutions 
w^here the executive and advisory influences are in sympathy 
with the natural sciences and with the spirit of the age. We 
have no doubt that the number of such institutions will steadily 
increase. 
Our object in offering these statements for record is twofold. 
We desire to call the attention of geologists and other scientific 
gentlemen to the actual state of the facts. The geological in- 
structor and investigator is apt be so deeply absorbed in his ef- 
forts to advance and diffuse the knowledge of natural truth that 
he is scarcely conscious of the enormous inequalities of position 
in which he is placed. A general consensus of demands for 
rights will be more likely to improve the situation than a sweet- 
tempered and silent acquiescence in wrongs. Our second object 
is to arrest the attention of all those whose common influence 
or authority has imposed upon geology the disabilities under 
which it suffers in some of our collegiate institutions. In doing 
this, we desire to protest not only against the unjust estimate 
which traditional opinion places on the natural sciences, and in 
particular on biology and geology, but also and emphatically 
against the principle that those departments are to be most fos= 
tered which bring m^ost revenue to the college or university, and 
are held in hightest pofular esteem. For the very reason that 
some studies and disciplines look toward professional and money 
getting ends, they are the better able to take care of themselves. 
If any study or department has the right to expect special favor 
and special sustenance, it is a study or department which is 
purely cultural, occupying a place quite above the level of com- 
mon appreciation. 
We have written thus far as if acquiescing in the arrogant 
estimate which consigns geology to an inferior and unessential 
place in a liberal education, and fails to recognize it as potent 
factor in modern civilization. That it is such a factor, however, 
is known to the intelligent public, and it is not our purpose to 
demonstrate it. Geology, in truth, if placed on the basis of use- 
fulness to man, would hold a position in educational processes 
not inferior to that of literature and languages. In the esteem 
of the intelligent public it is making rapid and constant advance. 
