o in much of his thought resembled Carlyle: "What
hours of melancholy my mathematical works cost! It was long before I
learned that there is something wrong with a man's brain who loves
them."[18]

Mathematics are of course the basis of many studies, trades, and
professions and are sometimes of benefit as a recreation for men of
affairs. Devotion to Euclid undoubtedly added to Lincoln's strength, but
the necessary range of knowledge for the historian is so vast that he
cannot spend his evenings and restless nights in the solution of
mathematical problems. In short, mathematics are of no more use to him
than is Greek to the civil or mechanical engineer.

In the category with mathematics must be placed a detailed study of any
of the physical or natural sciences. I think that a student during his
college course should have a year's work in a chemical laboratory or
else, if his taste inclines him to botany, geology, or zoology, a year's
training of his observing powers in some one of these studies. For he
ought to get, while at an impressible age, a superficial knowledge of
the methods of scientific men, as a basis for his future reading. We all
know that science is moving the world and to keep abreast with the
movement is a necessity for every educated man. Happily, there are
scientific men who popularize their knowledge. John Fiske, Huxley, and
Tyndall presented to us the theories and demonstrations of science in a
literary style that makes learning attractive. Huxley and Tyndall were
workers in laboratories and gave us the results of their patient and
long-continued experiments. It is too much to expect that every
generation will produce men of the remarkable power of expression of
Huxley and John Fiske, but there will always be clear writers who will
delight in instructing the general public in language easily understood.
In an address which I delivered eight or nine years ago before the
American Historical Association, I cheerfully conceded that, in the
realm of intellectual endeavor, the natural and physical sciences should
have the precedence of history. The question with us now is not which is
the nobler pursuit, but how is the greatest economy of time to be
compassed for the historian. My advice is in the line of concentration.
Failure in life arises frequently from intellectual scattering; hence I
like to see the historical student getting his physical and natural
science at second-hand.

The religious and poli