Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 76.djvu/116

112 nearly every new advance some disadvantage is connected, that with the development of industrialism there is connected great injustice, that the results of crowding in cities have led to great misery and sickness, problems not yet solved, and that the recent survey of Pittsburg has revealed conditions which could doubtless be paralleled elsewhere, but which cause us to blush for our boasted civilization. At the same time, these defects are not to be charged to science, but to the failure to utilize it. On the other hand the increase of insanity due to the greater strenuousness of life brought on by modern conditions is not so easily explained away.

It is not, however, for all these works of science that I wish to arouse your enthusiasm. As I have before stated, I consider James the more prosaic apostle, while it is Paul that stirs our feelings. What is the object of science, and is it worth our devotion? What are its purposes and methods, and what may we hope from it? Does it consist in building railroads and bridges, laying cables, digging tunnels and canals, and converting coal into ice? I believe it does not. Let us suppose that the advance of science, the adoption of socialism, or what not, has furnished every working man not only with three acres and a cow, but with hot and cold water, sanitary plumbing, steam heating, with cold brine for refrigeration, milk and beer laid on in pipes, with electric lighting, heating and power for the sewing machine, vacuum cleaner and the few remaining domestic necessities, with a telephone for communication and for the enjoyment of contemporary music, a phonograph and automatic piano for that of the past, an automobile and flying machine for transportation and sport, and that the hours of labor have been reduced to four, will universal happiness then reign? I fear not, if this is all. For life does not consist exclusively of eating and drinking, nor yet of pleasure. Unless what we call the soul is improved as well as the body, life is likely to be a poor thing. It is here that we come to the improvement of morals and of taste, and the need for art, literature and science. I mention these together, for their purposes are the same. They elevate the mind, kindle the imagination and give a more lofty outlook on the universe in general. It is the satisfaction of man's legitimate curiosity, his desire to know the how and the why of nature, that is, in my opinion, the true end of science. There are in the world, we are told by the late William Kingdon Clifford, three classes of persons: in the first place, scientific thinkers, secondly, persons who are engaged in work upon what are called scientific subjects, but who in general do not, and are not expected to, think about these subjects in a scientific manner, and lastly those whose work and thoughts are unscientific. Scientific thought is not determined by the subject thought of. The subject of science is the universe, its limitations those of the human mind. When the captain of