54 A Plea for Freedom. 
To the Editor of the New Phytologist. 
A PLEA FOR FREEDOM. 
Sir, 
I would like to urge upon your notice one or two considerations 
which influence me in witholding agreement from your most note¬ 
worthy proposals about the reform of botanical teaching, in their 
present state. 
Firstly, and most broadly, 1 object to revolutions, for I cannot 
see any guarantee either in history or in logic for their efficacy. 
The normal always re-establishes itself. 
Secondly, 1 think the premises of the memorandum are wrong. 
Morphological botany has not failed, so far as I can see, to justify 
its primordial claim to be the elementary basis of the science ; since 
1 maintain that the sensuous impressions of morphology are more 
easily apprehended by the outsider, either layman or young student, 
and, on the other hand, its subtle and mysterious speculations have 
a semi-religious fascination over him, more than anything in cold 
and formal chemico-physical analyses, marvellous and truthful 
though these are. 
Again, within the limits of my own experience, students who 
are attracted to the science at all are more easily inclined towards 
a liking for morphology, even by an indifferent teacher, than towards 
physiology, even by a teacher with personality. I know of no 
enthusiasm among physiologists to compare with the brilliant and 
heart-felt devotion to morphological and systematic botany among 
the men I have known. Maybe these points are simply the 
expressions of a weakness of the human mind for the tangible 
rather than the abstract, but surely it is this very weakness that 
must be most carefully taken into account in deciding what is to form 
the introductory phases of the science in our classes. 
There is another aspect of these proposals, which may not have 
struck those responsible for them, and that is the intense distaste 
which now reigns almost everywhere for the prospect of fresh 
upheavals after the war. If there is one thing which every single 
man, apart from a few red-souled plotters, longs for, it is to be let 
alone in peace after the war to work out his destiny in his own way. 
No more shifting and turmoil, no more bullying and dictation ! 
It is peace we want, really peace, in every phase of life. Every 
attempt to enthrone this grey-faced efficiency, every attempt to key 
up the struggle to infinite lengths beyond the duration of the war, 
