Page:The Life and Work of Sir Jagadis C. Bose.djvu/7

 PREFACE asked whether the title of this book means especially a pioneer in science, who happens to be an Indian, or a pioneer of science in and for India. The answer is—Both. For on one hand Bose is the first Indian of modern times who has done distinguished work in science, and his life-story is thus at once of interest to his scientific contemporaries in other countries and of encouragement and impulse to his countrymen. But it will also be seen, in the general world of science, independent of race, nationality and language, which looks only to positive results, that here is much of pioneering work, and this upon levels rarely attained, with intercrossing tracks still commonly held and treated as distinct—in physics, in physiology, both vegetable and animal, and even in psychology. Pioneering too in all these fields, not in virtue of mere variety of interests, of mental versatility, and of inventive faculty of the rarest kind, though all these are present, but also as guided, inspired, even impassioned, by an endowment more than usually deep and strong of that faith in cosmic order and unity which is the fundamental concept of each and all the sciences. So it has come to pass that we have in this single and long solitary worker 'a mind working in long sweeps—and attracted alike by gulfs which separate, and by borderlands which unite,' and successful to a high and rare degree in such high intellectual adventures. Hence his contributions are from their very outset towards the unification of whole groups of phenomena hitherto explored separately. But here is not