so forth. It is interesting in this connection to note that the ornithologist Coues became a historian during the last years of his life. The love of beauty is also undoubtedly a strong factor in the making of biologists, although there are some good workers who seem to be singularly deficient in this respect.[1] Many years ago the present writer went with Dr. and Mrs. Wallace to find the daffodils in an English meadow. When we arrived at the place, we found the flowers in profusion, and it was inspiring to see the child-like pleasure the veteran naturalist took in their beauty. Here was a man who could never grow old, to whom nature was a perpetual delight. As I heard Professor C. L. Herrick say in an address to some students, the love of nature is the secret of perpetual youth.
In the first issue of The Hibbert Journal, Sir Oliver Lodge writes as follows:
I think this antithesis is not altogether a natural one, but that, on the contrary, the scientific man must be something of 'a poet, or a philosopher, or a saint,' to be completely a scientific man. It will be a sad day for the world when we cease to have men who can live freely in the enjoyment of the universe, and each one is permitted to know only this or that. Let us be free to think and enjoy, even though our thoughts wander far afield, and our enjoyment is not always that of a connoisseur.
Sometimes science suffers greatly in the opinion of those who do not claim to be scientific, just because her proper character is not understood, and it is assumed that she must be cold, hard and unimaginative. I have heard the late William Morris speak contemptuously of science, and in his admirable lecture on 'The Aims of Art' (1887) he says that if socialism does not prevail 'science will grow more and more one-sided, more incomplete, more wordy and useless, till at last she will pile herself up into such a mass of superstition, that beside it the theologies of old time will seem mere reason and enlightenment.' Yet Morris was himself an admirable observer of nature, and possessed many of the best qualities of a naturalist. I suppose the name of psychology would have
- ↑ I heard the other day a perfectly authentic story of a teacher in one of our best universities, a man who has done wonderful work in classification, and is far ahead of all others in his particular specialty. One of his students, looking through the microscope, exclaimed at the beauty of some object. The professor immediately shut him up with the remark: 'I should think that by this time you would know that you don't come here to look at pretty things!'
