municated to others. Speaking for myself as one who in a special sense entered into his labors, I should find it difficult to express adequately my feeling of obligation. The impress of his thoughts may be recognized in much of the best work of the present time. As a teacher and examiner he was well acquainted with the almost universal tendency of uninstructed minds to elevate phrases above things: to refer, for example, to the principle of the conservation of energy for an explanation of the persistent rotation of a fly-wheel, almost in the style of the doctor in "Le Malade Imaginaire," who explains the fact that opium sends you to sleep by its soporific virtue. Maxwell's endeavor was always to keep the facts in the foreground, and to his influence, in conjunction with that of Thomson and Helmholtz, is largely due that elimination of unnecessary hypothesis which is one of the distinguishing characteristics of the science of the present day.
In speaking unfavorably of superfluous hypothesis, let me not be misunderstood. Science is nothing without generalizations. Detached and ill-assorted facts are only raw material, and, in the absence of a theoretical solvent, have but little nutritive value. At the present time and in some departments, the accumulation of material is so rapid that there is danger of indigestion. By a fiction as remarkable as any to be found in law, what has once been published, even though it be in the Russian language, is usually spoken of as "known," and it is often forgotten that the rediscovery in the library may be a more difficult and uncertain process than the first discovery in the laboratory. In this matter we are greatly dependent upon annual reports and abstracts, issued principally in Germany, without which the search for the discoveries of a little-known author would be well-nigh hopeless. Much useful work has been done in this direction in connection with our Association. Such critical reports as those upon hydro-dynamics, upon tides, and upon spectroscopy, guide the investigator to the points most requiring attention, and in discussing past achievements contribute in no small degree to future progress. But, though good work has been done, much yet remains to do.
If, as is sometimes supposed, science consisted in nothing but the laborious accumulation of facts, it would soon come to a stand-still, crushed, as it were, under its own weight. The suggestion of a new idea, or the detection of a law, supersedes much that had previously been a burden upon the memory, and by introducing order and coherence facilitates the retention of the remainder in an available form. Those who are acquainted with the writings of the older electricians will understand my meaning when I instance the discovery of Ohm's law as a step by which the science was rendered easier to understand and to remember. Two processes are thus at work side by side, the reception of new material and the digestion and assimilation of the old; and, as both are essential, we may spare ourselves the discussion of their relative importance. One remark, however, should be made.
