332 LHE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 
I have referred to the course of the last administration and of the 
present one in making withdrawals of government lands from entry 
under homestead and other laws and of congress in removing all doubt 
as to the validity of these withdrawals as a great step in the direction 
of practical conservation. But it is only one of two necessary steps to 
effect what should be our purpose. It has produced a status quo and 
prevented waste and irrevocable disposition of the lands until the 
method for their proper disposition can be formulated. But it is of 
the utmost importance that such withdrawals should not be regarded 
as the final step in the course of conservation, and that the idea should 
not be allowed to spread that conservation is the tying up of the natural 
resources of the government for indefinite withholding from use and 
the remission to remote generations to decide what ought to be done 
with these means of promoting present general human comfort and 
progress. or, if so, it is certain to arouse the greatest opposition to 
conservation as a cause, and if it were a correct expression of the pur- 
pose of conservationists it ought to arouse this opposition. Real con- 
servation involves wise, non-wasteful use in the present generation with 
every possible means of preservation for succeeding generations; and 
though the problem to secure this end may be difficult, the burden is on 
the present generation promptly to solve it and not to run away from it 
as cowards, lest in the attempt to meet it we may make some mistake. 
As I have said elsewhere, the problem is how to save and how to utilize, 
how to conserve and still develop; for no sane person can contend that 
it is for the common good that nature’s blessings should be stored only 
for unborn generations. 
I beg of you, therefore, in your deliberations and in your informal 
discussions, when men come forward to suggest evils that the promotion 
of conservation is to remedy, that you invite them to point out the 
specific evils and the specific remedies; that you invite them to come 
down to details in order that their discussions may flow into channels 
that shall be useful rather than into periods that shall be eloquent and 
entertaining, without shedding real light on the subject. The people 
should be shown exactly what is needed in order that they make their 
representatives in congress and the state legislature do their intelligent 
bidding. 
