Are we therefore to conclude that the best method of scientific education is to force a boy to work at uncongenial subjects? In the case of a genius it may not much matter what he is taught;

he will succeed, in spite of his education. But for us lesser mortals it does matter. I am not going to talk about the way in which science should be taught in schools, a matter about which I am not competent to speak. What I shall speak of is the learning rather than teaching of the subject.

I once heard Lord Rayleigh refer to the necessity of putting one’s subject-matter clearly before an audience, and he illustrated his point by the following story. Somebody, possibly a lady, came from listening to a lecture by Mr. So-and-So, and when asked what it was about, replied, “He didn’t say.” I shall follow Lord Rayleigh’s advice and tell you that my subject is “Why science should be learned.” Why it is worth while for a boy to give up some of his time to this particular form of knowledge, and what advantage he may expect to gain from so doing.

There are many possible reasons for a boy’s learning science.

I Because he is told to. This is an excellent reason, but not inspiriting.
II To get marks in an Entrance Scholarship examination. This is a virtuous reason but not intellectual.
III To gain knowledge which will be of use when he comes to follow a profession, and wants to know physics in view of becoming an engineer, or physiology as a part of medical training. This is a worthy reason, but not a common one.
IV Lastly, a boy may learn science because he wants to; because he finds it entertaining; because it satisfies an unreasoning desire to know how things in general work.

This is the best possible reason and the most efficient, and what I propose, is to inquire whether this wish to know something of science can be justified.

The word ‘science’ simply means knowledge, but it is usually applied to knowledge that can be verified. Thus we learn by heart that Queen Anne died in 1714. I believe this to be a fact, but I have no means of verifying it. But if I am told that putting chalk into acid will produce a heavy gas having the quality of extinguishing a lighted match, I can verify it. I can do the thing and see the results. I am now the equal of my teacher; I know it in the same way that he does. It has become my very own fact, and it seems to have the satisfactory quality that possession gives. This characteristic of scientific knowledge is not always recognised. I mean the profound difference between what we know and what we are told. When science began to flourish at Cambridge in the ’seventies, and the University was asked to supply money for buildings, an eminent person objected and said, “What do they want with their laboratories?—why can’t they believe their teachers, who are in most cases clergymen of the Church of England?” This person had no conception of what the word ‘knowledge’ means as understood in science.

Another characteristic of science is that it makes us able to predict. I have already referred to the fact that Queen Anne is dead, and we know, or are told, that she died, as I said before, in 1714; we also know that George I. died in 1727, and George II. in 1760, but that would not enable us to predict that George III. would die in 1820. They are isolated facts not connected by the causal bond that knits together a series of scientific truths. And this is after all a fortunate thing for the peace of mind of reigning sovereigns.

It is said that you should never prophesy unless you know. But science is made up of prophecies. Some are famous, like the prediction of Adams and Leverrier that a new planet would be found in a stated position. Some are on a humbler scale, such as my father’s prediction that a big moth would be found to carry the pollen of Hedychium by brushing it off with the tips of its hovering wings, a method of fertilisation unheard of at the time, which however proved to be the fact.

You may say that it does not matter whether the moth does this particular thing or not. This is no doubt true from a strictly commercial point of view. But in science all facts have some value. We should cultivate a point of view about facts the very reverse of that of the unknown person who said that all books are rather dull.