CHARLES SEDGWICK MINOT. 83 
Minot fixed his attfiiti(tn on the l:il)t)r;it()r\ as tlic ^rtat rdiicatiniial 
device in science teadiing. In his address on " Knowledp- and I'rae- 
tice " (1S99) he says, " Practical work is the instructive work; it is tlie 
source of real knowledge The very best that can he said of a 
lecture or a book is that it describes well the knowledge which someone 
possesses. There is no kuoidrdgv In hooka, and that motto ought to be 
inscribed over the library door. A book or a lecture can serve only to 
assist a man to acquire knowledge with les.sened loss of time. Knowl- 
edge lives in the laboratory; when it is dead we bury it, decently, in 
a book." 
With this view of the great value of the laboratory, with the in- 
vestigator's keen appreciation of the high price of time, we see clearly 
why he lal)ored so to make the laboratory efficient in general plan, as 
indicated by his unit system of construction, and in all its various 
appliances and arrangements, as represented by the several micro- 
tomes which he devised and the methods of preparing and making 
useful, microscopic specimens. The needless repetition of work filled 
him w'ith sorrow; the sight of slovenliness with enthusiastic scorn. 
It was by his recognition of what could be accomplished through 
histological preparations that Minot made one of his most valuable 
and far reaching contributions to our educational resources. I have 
in mind the great series of sections, comprising now over two thousand 
embryos, which form so "splendid a possession of the Embryological 
Laboratory of the Harvard Medical School. It represents a well de- 
vised plan to meet the needs of advancing science within the limits of 
his special field — and it is worthy of unlimited imitation. 
The geographical explorer must be able to build his own boat, the 
earlier chemists were wont to pause and make their more uncom- 
mon reagents, the histologist or the embryologist has the custom of 
preparing the sections he must study. But there are limits to this 
method. 
^Yith the increasing demands for wider comparisons, the young 
investigator now too often finds years of mechanical toil lying between 
him and the threshold of his problem. This is a natural consequence of 
the advance of science, and the devising of extensive series of standard 
preparations for general use gives the solution for the difficulties which 
thus arise. The need for such preparations, with the accompanying 
models, has growTi with the years, and in Minot's laboratory has been 
steadily met by the enthusiasm and cooperative industry of the staff 
and students of the Embryological Department. In a way this collec- 
