I
The division of the sciences reflects the diversity of human interests; it represents the economical adaptation of organized thought to the conditions of reality; and it likewise recognizes the intrinsically and objectively distinct realms and aspects, in which and under which phenomena occur. It is obvious that the sciences were shaped by human needs; that physics and chemistry and geology and biology and psychology do not constitute independent departments of nature's régime, but only so many aspects of complex natural activities; that a cross-section of the composite happenings of a cosmic moment would reveal an endlessly heterogeneous concomitance of diverse forms of energy acting upon diverse types of material; that, as we confine our attention somewhat arbitrarily to one or another component of the aggregate, we become physicists, or chemists, or geologists, or biologists, or psychologists; that, indeed, Nature is all things to all men. There is, furthermore, a community of spirit between the several sciences, as there is a logical unity of method and purpose within the realm of each. However ignorant they may be of one another's facts, the chemist and the psychologist readily appreciate one another's purposes, and find a bond of sympathy in the pursuit of a commonly inspired though differently applied method. The search for objective truth, the extension of the realm of law and regularity, the expansion and organization of the army of facts constantly marshaled and reviewed and made ready for service, the ever widening development of principles and the furthering of a deeper insight into their significance,—these are ideals for the advancement of science, far easier of expression than of execution, but the clear and accepted formulation of which itself attests a highly developed stage of accurate thought. A clear-cut conception of the purposes and methods of scientific investigation and of the scope of the several sciences is a dearly bought product of generations of well-directed, as also of misdirected, effort. The path of progress leading to this achievement has been tortuous and indirect; there has been much expenditure of energy that resulted merely in marking time, in going through the movements of locomotion but with no advance, in following a false trail, or, through a loss of the sense of direction, in coming back after a circuitous march to an earlier starting-point. It is easy, when a certain height is reached, to look down and back, and see how much more readily the ascent might have been accomplished; but it is a very different matter to form a successful plan for attaining the next higher commanding point. It is inevitable that there shall be differences of opinion as to course and manœuvre, and errors of judgment of commission and omission; but such diversity is quite consistent with an underlying coöperation and singleness of purpose. It is in the inspiration and in the execution of that purpose that science becomes differentiated from the unscientific and non-scientific.
Between the organized effort and well-recognized plan of action of science and the chaotic movements of the untutored mind, there is a marked contrast. The savage, like the child, constantly meets with the unexpected; every experience lying outside his narrow beaten track stirs him with a shock and often fills him with fear—the handmaid of ignorance. He is apt to picture nature as a fearful monster, and to people the world with tyrannical beings. Step by step the region of the known expands, and suggests the nature of the unknown; men expect, they foresee, they predict. The apparent chaos of mutually inimical forces gives way to the profound harmony of unifying law. And yet the unknown and the borderland that separates it from the known are always near by, to tempt curiosity and the spirit of adventure.
The problem here to be considered relates to the attitude which may most properly and profitably be taken with regard to the outlying phenomena of the mind. Are they outcasts, to be treated in a spirit of charity and forbearance? Are they the true owners of the land, driven off, like the Indian before the white man, by the relentless march of civilization to a prescribed reservation? Are they the unjustly deposed and rightful heirs, soon to be restored to their kingdom by a fairer and more searching examination of their title? Or are they, gypsy-like, of obscure origin, surviving in a civilization which they are in but not of, attempting to eke out an uncertain existence by peddling relics of antiquated lore to the curious and the credulous?