WISSENSCHAFT

The whole of human knowledge is indicated by the phrase "the arts and sciences." Between these two branches of learning a distinct cleavage has grown. Science dominates the modern world--science in the narrow sense. The business-man, unquestionably master of our civilization, is a scientist. Persons, things, actions, even philosophies must justify themselves by the standards of the market-place. "Theorist" and "idealist" have become terms of contempt.

Dovotees of the arts have been forced by their comparative weakness into a belligerently defensive attitude. They cultivate a contempt for precision and a horror of practicality. Thus the scientists, seeing artistry in this artificial light, become more firmly satisfied of their own essential correctness. Between the arts and the sciences the gulf widens. Literary men and philosophers recede further into their pleasant vacuum of impracticality; while scientists, penetrating ever deeper into the structure of matter, also lose connection with the deeper problems of life.

This separation need not be. Science and the humanities are mutually essential. Without one the progress of civilization would halt; without the other that progress would be deprived of meaning. In the colleges, where both branches of knowledge are harbored, the cleavage should be minimized. Departmental boundaries should represent merely administrative divisions, not irreconcilable units. Yet professors of chemistry still confuse culture with laziness; humanists still regard slide-rules and test-tubes with contempt.

The roots of this problem are as deep as our civilization. One often feels that the only remedy would be a series of drownings in sulphuric acid or of suffocations in library dust. Nevertheless, much progress has been made here at Harvard. The rules of distribution, even when most burdensome, do force the student to give grudging attention to fields other than his own. The tutors, if men of sufficient breadth, serve as an antidote to intolerance. Most valuable, however, is the work of the few professors who, being scientists, have a background of wide culture or who, as humanists, realize the value of precision. Such men, by their lectures and writings, not only bridge the abyss but narrow it. The University would be fulfilling its duties well by encouraging them at every opportunity.