accuracy. Again, your training here has shown you how needful it is in
scientific research to adopt thorough and exhaustive methods of
procedure. The conditions to be taken into account are so numerous and
complex, the possible combinations so manifold, before a satisfactory
conclusion can be reached. A laborious collection of facts must be
made. Each supposed fact must be sifted out and weighed. The evidence
must be gone over again and yet again, each link in its chain being
scrupulously tested. The deduction to which the evidence may seem to
point must be closely and impartially scrutinized, every other
conceivable explanation of the facts being frankly and fully
considered. Obviously the man whose education has inured him to the
cultivation of a mental habit of this kind is admirably equipped for
success in any walk in life which he may be called upon to enter. The
accuracy and thoroughness which you have learned to appreciate and
practice at college must never be dropped in later years. Carry them
with you as watchwords, and make them characteristic of all your
undertakings.
In the third place, we may take breadth. At the outset of your
scientific education you were doubtless profoundly impressed by the
multiplicity of detail which met your eye in every department of
natural knowledge. When you entered upon the study of one of these
departments, you felt, perhaps, almost overpowered and bewildered by
the vast mass of facts with which you had to make acquaintance. And
yet as your training advanced, you gradually came to see that the
infinite variety of phenomena could all be marshaled, according to
definite laws, into groups and series. You were led to look beyond the
details to the great principles that underlie them and bind them into
a harmonious and organic whole. With the help of a guiding system of
classification, you were able to see the connection between the
separate facts, to arrange them according to their mutual relations,
and thus to ascend to the great general laws under which the material
world has been constructed. With all attainable thoroughness in the
mastery of detail, you have been taught to combine a breadth of
treatment which enables you to find and keep a leading clew even
through the midst of what might seem a tangled web of confusion. There
are some men who can not see the wood for the trees, and who
consequently can never attain great success in scientific
investigation. Let it be your aim to master fully the details of the
tree, and yet to maintain such a breadth of vision as will enable you
to embrace the whole forest within your ken. I need not enlarge on the
practical value of this mental habit in everyday life, nor point out
the excellent manner in which a scientific education tends to develop
it.
In the fourth place, I would inculcate the habit of wide reading in
scientific literature. Although the progress of science is now too
rapid for any man to keep pace with the advance of all its
departments, you should try to hold yourselves in touch with at least
the main results arrived at in other branches than your own; while, in
that branch itself, it should be your constant aim to watch every
onward step that is taken by others, and not to fall behind the van.
This task you will find to be no light one. Even were it confined to a
survey of the march of science in your own country, it would be
arduous enough to engage much of your time. But science belongs to no
country, and continues its onward advance all over the globe. If you
would keep yourselves informed regarding this progress in other
countries, as you are bound to do if you would not willingly be left
behind, you will need to follow the scientific literature of those
countries. You must be able to read at least French and German. You
will find in these languages a vast amount of scientific work relating
to your own department, and to this accumulated pile of published
material the journals of every month continue to add. In many ways it
is a misfortune that the literature of science increases so fast; but
we must take the evil with the good. Practice will eventually enable
you to form a shrewd judgment as to which authors or papers you may
skip without serious danger of losing any valuable fact or useful
suggestion.
In the fifth place, let me plead for the virtue of patience. In a
scientific career we encounter two dangers, for the avoidance of which
patience is our best support and guide. When life is young and
enthusiasm is boundless; when from the details which we may have
laboriously gathered together we seem to catch sight of some new fact
or principle, some addition of more or less importance to the sum of
human knowledge, there may come upon us the eager desire to make our
discovery known. We may long to be allowed to add our own little stone
to the growing temple of science. We may think of the pride with which
we should see our names enrolled among those of the illustrious
builders by whom this temple has been slowly reared since the infancy
of mankind. So we commit our observations to writing, and send them
for publication. Eventually we obtain the deep gratification of
appearing in print among well-known authors in science. Far be it from
me to condemn this natural desire for publicity. But, as your
experience grows, you will probably come to agree with me that if the
desire were more frequently and energetically curbed, scientific
literature would gain much thereby. There is among us far too much
hurry in publication. We are so afraid lest our observations or
deductions should be forestalled--so anxious not to lose our claim to
priority, that we rush before the world, often with a half-finished
performance, which must be corrected, supplemented, or canceled by
some later communication. It is this feverish haste which is largely
answerable for the mass of jejune, ill-digested, and erroneous matter
that cumbers the pages of modern scientific journals. Here it is that
you specially need patience. Before you venture to publish anything,
take the utmost pains to satisfy yourselves that it is true, that it
is new, and that it is worth putting into print. And be assured that
this reticence, while it is a kindness to the literature of science,
will most certainly bring with it its own reward to yourselves. It
will increase your confidence, and make your ultimate contributions
more exact in their facts as well as more accurate and convincing in
their argument.
The other danger to which I referred as demanding patience is of an
opposite kind. As we advance in our career, and the facts of our
investigations accumulate around us, there will come times of
depression when we seem lost in a labyrinth of detail out of which no
path appears to be discoverable. We have, perhaps, groped our way
through this maze, following now one clew, now another, that seemed to
promise some outlet to the light. But the darkness has only closed
around us the deeper, and we feel inclined to abandon the research as
one in which success is, for us at least, unattainable. When this
blankness of despair shall come upon you, take courage under it, by
remembering that a patient study of any department of Nature is never
labor thrown away. Every accurate observation you have made, every new
fact you have established, is a gain to science. You may not for a
time see the meaning of these observations, nor the connection of
these facts. But their meaning and connection are sure in the end to
be made out. You have gone through the labor necessary for the
ascertainment of truth, and if you patiently and watchfully bide your
time, the discovery of the truth itself may reward your endurance and
your toil.
It is by failures as well as by successes that the true ideal of the
man of science is reached. The task allotted to him in life is one of
the noblest that can be undertaken. It is his to penetrate into the
secrets of Nature, to push back the circumference of darkness that
surrounds us, to disclose ever more and more of the limitless beauty,
harmonious order, and imperious law that extend throughout the
universe. And while he thus enlarges our knowledge, he shows us also
how Nature may be made to minister in an ever-augmenting multiplicity
of ways to the service of humanity. It is to him and his conquests
that the material progress of our race is mainly due. If he were
content merely to look back over the realms which he has subdued, he
might well indulge in jubilant feelings, for his peaceful victories
have done more for the enlightenment and progress of mankind than were
ever achieved by the triumphs of war. But his eye is turned rather to
the future than to the past. In front of him rises the wall of
darkness that shrouds from him the still unknown. What he has
painfully accomplished seems to him but little in comparison with the
infinite possibilities that lie beyond. And so he presses onward, not
self-satisfied and exultant, but rather humbled and reverential, yet
full of hope and courage for the work of further conquest that lies
before him.--_Nature._
FOOTNOTE:
[40] An address to the students of Mason University College,
Birmingham, at the opening of the session, October 4, 1898.
SHALL WE TEACH OUR DAUGHTERS THE VALUE OF MONEY?
BY ALEXANDRA L. B. IDE.
I am induced to write a few lines on this subject by a remark recently
made to me by a widow of large property. In speaking about the
management of her money she said: "As to myself, I leave everything to
my business man or agent. I would not know if my tax bills were
correct. He gives me plenty of money to spend on my charities; why
should I trouble myself about the details?" Evidently it had never
occurred to her that she might be spending her principal; that some
day she might wake up to the fact that her fortune had been
dissipated. Another rich woman, to whom I made the remark that certain
bonds were bought at par, inquired, "Is that the same thing as buying
them on a margin?" Now here were representative women of New York
society, both belonging to excellent families, and to all appearances
well educated. It is amazing that such profound ignorance on ordinary
business matters exists. In conversation with many other wealthy women
I discovered that it was very much the exception to find a woman who
possessed the slightest knowledge of money matters.
Now, why should these things be? The time has passed for a young girl
to be brought up a "perfect fool." Let her not waste the beautiful
morning of her life in profitless and frivolous occupations. The
reason often given as excuse for the ignorance of many women is, so
few comparatively have any money to keep, therefore it is useless to
teach them.
True, it is unusual to find a young girl with an independent fortune;
but she may marry rich, and what a help she would be to a sensible man
if she were capable of aiding him in his business affairs! Again, she
might be left a widow, and have the entire direction of her husband's
property. No knowledge is ever lost. The more one knows, the more one
realizes how little one does know. I maintain that a woman's intellect
is perfectly capable of coping with and understanding business
affairs. In some matters she is far shrewder than the average man, and
in many cases her quick insight sees at a glance that which man
requires time to penetrate. Only give her half a chance. I do not wish
for a moment to be understood as advocating women becoming
stockbrokers or lawyers; nothing could be more unnatural or
unsuitable. It seems to me only in accordance with the wishes of a
reasonable woman to participate with her brothers in such rudimentary
knowledge as will enable her to oversee or take the entire charge of
her own property. Take, for example, a well-to-do New York business
man. He has acquired through his own industry and shrewdness a large
fortune. He maps out the education for his children. His sons are sent
to the best schools, and afterward to college. He determines that no
expense shall be spared to fit them for their future career.
For his daughters expensive foreign governesses are engaged, who teach
them the languages, music, and other accomplishments. Or the daughters
are sent to some high-priced fashionable school, where they are put
through a course of training to enable them to "shine in society."
Having reached the age of eighteen, the daughter returns to the
parental roof.
What does she know in exchange for the large sum of money her
education has cost? Usually her penmanship is bad and illegible. Her
knowledge of arithmetic very slight. These two essentials of education
are not her forte.
But she is a good dancer, and perhaps at the assembly or some such
function the father's heart has swelled with pride as he noticed how
eagerly she was sought as a partner. She can sing French songs,
probably those which are rather _risqué_. She can converse, perhaps,
in two or three different modern languages. As a general rule her
French can scarcely be understood by the foreign _attachés_ at
Newport. The girl is absolutely unequipped for _real_ life, and the
man of sense, who has passed the boyish age and is looking for a
partner for life, knows _this_. Possibly this is one cause why there
are comparatively few marriages in our best society. What man is less
likely to seek as wife a woman who knows something about the care and
value of money? It is strange that a father should be so blinded to
the best interests of his daughter. Is it because he considers her
intellect so far below that of his son that he makes no effort to
instruct her in regard to the care of money? The only thing she knows
about money is how to spend it--generally on herself, for clothes and
jewels. Perhaps on the first of the month, when the bills for his
daughter's extravagance pour in on him, he is vexed; but if his
fortune is large, and it is no inconvenience for him to pay them, he
generally does so without a murmur. "Let her have a good time while
she is young," he soliloquizes.
But stop a moment and consider. What you sow you reap is as true in
this material concern as in the world of agriculture. The fond parent
by his indulgence and neglect is sowing the seeds of extravagance,
perhaps those of want. Years hence she may reap the fruit of his
ill-judged kindness in fostering habits of reckless expenditure.
In a few years the father dies; his property is divided; the daughter
receives her share. If she is married to a good business man who has
time to take charge of her fortune, possibly, during her husband's
lifetime, the difficulty is bridged over. But the chances are she may
not be married, or again the man she has selected as husband may be
worthless as a business man. It is not to be expected that a brother
(even if she is fortunate enough to possess one), however kind, will
overburden himself with the manifold details of looking after the
property of a sister. He has his own interests, which demand his
attention. He thinks his duty accomplished when he has chosen a man to
look after his sister's affairs whom he _believes_ to be reliable. The
person whom he has appointed as guardian over his sister's interests
may have an honest and high character, but that is no guarantee that
in a moment of weakness he may not yield to the temptation of abusing
the trust. He knows the woman is absolutely ignorant of how her
affairs are being conducted, and in all probability would not be the
wiser if he appropriated some of her fortune to his own uses. Her very
ignorance is his security. Who can not recall several such cases? If
each day for half an hour the father had instructed his child in the
essentials of business--how to calculate interest quickly, the manner
of filling out a lease in renting property, explaining about
mortgages, and giving her a lesson as to what were the best
investments--she would know enough to steer clear of the many sharks
and vultures which usually find her a ready prey. The woman who does
not know the difference between a registered and coupon bond should be
ashamed to acknowledge such ignorance. A parent's neglect in teaching
his child about monetary affairs is culpable, almost amounting to a
crime. There is nothing so costly as ignorance. This very fortune
which you have taken infinite pains to accumulate will be perhaps
dissipated, owing to your want of forethought in imparting the
requisite knowledge to your child. This information she will in after
years buy for herself at a heavy premium. If knowledge is power in
other matters, it is more than ever true in monetary affairs. Power to
keep your fortune is a power worth having, and more difficult to
acquire than to make a fortune. Let a girl but try to earn five
dollars, and she will see the task is not an easy one. Then, unless
she be a fool, she will realize that what is so difficult to obtain
should not be wasted.
I recall the case of a fashionable woman in New York society which
came under my own observation. Her husband told me he had deposited in
a bank a large sum of money for his wife to draw on, given her a bank
and check book, explained and showed her how to draw checks. He very
sensibly thought that it would be a far better plan for her to pay her
bills herself, instead of coming to him every time she needed money.
His relief from being her almoner was of short duration, for in less
than a month she came to him, and, throwing the check and bank books
on his library table, told him it was too much trouble--she could not
make head or tail of it; she wished to return to the old system! He
could pay her bills in future. This woman had been married twenty
years. Too much trouble, is it? Yes, I believe this is the keynote why
women are so ignorant. They are lazy, pure and simple. The details of
business are too dry and uninteresting. It is so much easier to have
some one else do the work for you. So much less exertion to read a
novel, or ride the wheel with some attractive man. "How prosaic," you
say, "to add up account books, balance check books, and calculate
whether your tax bill is correct when your property is assessed at the
rate of 2.01!"
I believe, if the truth were told, half the divorces in which the
reason given is incompatibility of temper arise from the fact that
women know nothing of the value of money. I am not speaking entirely
of women who have their own property, but also of those who are
dependent on a husband's income. The wife has a vague idea that there
is an inexhaustible supply of cash somewhere! What man can not tell
you how worried and harassed he felt when his wife came to him for
money to spend on nonessentials, and which he could ill afford? If he
attempted to remonstrate with her he probably received a rude or angry
reply! The wife, perhaps, had been used to an indulgent father, who
gratified her every whim. She overlooks the fact that a father and
husband are two vastly different beings, and require different
treatment. To some women a husband's value decreases when he can no
longer supply them with finery. Their alleged love soon wanes, and a
divorce is sought on any pretext.
It is easy to see that by a knowledge of business affairs a woman can
dispense with the services of an agent or trust company, whose salary
thus being saved is added to her income. In case a woman is fitted by
a proper education for so doing, who could attend to her own interests
better than herself, as she is the party interested? The phrase, "If
you wish anything well done, do it yourself," is never better
exemplified than in this case. Lastly, but not least, in saving our
money it need not be from a miserly spirit; but the more we have, the
more we can profitably give away. What pleasure equals that of
relieving real distress, and of helping others? Did not our Saviour
himself set the example of saving when, after performing the miracle
where he fed the multitude with the loaves and fishes, he said:
"Gather up the fragments that remain. Let nothing be lost."
SKETCH OF CLÉMENCE ROYER.
BY M. JACQUES BOYER.
Madame Clémence Augustine Royer was born at Nantes, France, April 21,
1830, of an old Catholic family. When she reached a suitable age she
was sent to school at the Sacré Coeur, where she received the most of
her education. Very shortly after coming out of the convent she
abandoned the religious doctrines they had tried to inculcate in her
there, and, like so many young persons, was attracted to poetry. But
her literary efforts as a whole received very little attention, and
she would never have been successful if she had only teased the Muse.
Happily, she applied herself, about 1850, to more serious studies, and
went to England, where she spent several years and acquired a thorough
knowledge of the language of Shakespeare. She removed thence to
Switzerland, and there found her definite vocation. The natural
sciences, philosophy, and political economy from that time engaged her
attention.
The opening of Madame Royer's course of lectures to women on logic at
Lausanne in the winter of 1859 and 1860 attracted much notice. The
first lecture was published under the title of an Introduction to
Philosophy, and brought most flattering praise to the author from
contemporary students. In an animated style the disciple of Jean
Jacques Rousseau, the apostle of bold and ingenious ideas, was already
beginning to declare herself. In the meantime she collaborated on the
journal The New Economist, which the historian and sociologist Pascal
Duprat had just founded.[41]
At the close of 1860, the Canton of Vaud having opened a competition
on the Principles of Taxation, "the little lady with a straw hat," as
her neighbors familiarly called her, handled the subject so thoroughly
that her memoir, entitled _Théorie de l'Impôt et Dime sociale_ (Theory
of the Impost and Social Tithe, 1862), won her the honor of dividing
the prize with Proudhon. While not all the ideas set forth in this
work were new, she took care at least to co-ordinate the systems of
her predecessors, to select from the one and the other of them what
was good in them, and to condense into a homogeneous whole works which
were scattered hither and thither. But we will pass over these books
of her youth to dwell more at large on that part of her work which
will assure Madame Royer an honorable place among the most zealous
promoters and ablest defenders of the Darwinian theories.
Her first effort in this line was to translate into French, in 1862,
the Origin of Species of the great English naturalist, preceding the
work with a preface which in itself alone constituted an excellent
summary of the doctrine of evolution. She pointed out the results
which logically follow from the transformist theory. She did not
conceal from herself that in doing thus she would be the object of
attacks from the immobilist and ecclesiastical parties still so
numerous thirty years ago in all civilized countries; but she
flattered herself, too, and with just reason, that she would furnish
the liberals and progressives of France with a powerful weapon. In
this introductory chapter she characterized the original and strong
personality of Darwin in appropriate terms, saying: "While he has not
the brilliant qualities of a Cuvier as a writer or a professor, he is
at least a worthy heir of the profoundly philosophical science of the
two Geoffroys Saint-Hilaire ... one of those workmen who cut their
stone with an indefatigable courage. But there are also thicker and
heavier stones, without beauty or apparent grace, which are designed
to be hidden at the base of an immense edifice, like the massive
columns with which the architects of the middle ages decorated the
crypts of their Gothic cathedrals. It is truth in the rough. He does
not impose his condition, but communicates it and proves it. If it is
certain, he affirms it; when he supposes, he says so; when he doubts,
he acknowledges it." She then passes to the exposition of Darwinism as
responding to one of the noblest aspirations of the mind, the
preliminary step to the accounting for the world of organized beings,
as astronomy, physics, and geology have explained the origin of
inanimate substances. In effect, the illustrious Englishman,
connecting the domain of botany and zoölogy with the action of second
causes, sought first to comprehend the genesis, and then the
evolution, in the same way that astronomers and geologists teach us
concerning the origin of our globe and the successive phases through
which its surface has passed.