unlikely. Such revolutions in public opinion are
rare events. Democracy moreover inevitably worships and is swayed by
the spoken word. As inevitably, the range and purposes of science
daily more and more transcend the comprehension--even the educated
comprehension--of the vulgar, who will of course elevate the nimble
and versatile, speaking a familiar language, above dull and
inarticulate natural philosophers.

In these discussions there is a disposition to forget how very largely
natural science is already included in the educational curriculum both
at schools and universities. Schools subsidised by the Board of
Education are obliged to provide science-teaching. The public schools
have equipment, in some cases a superb equipment, for teaching at
least physics and chemistry. At the newer universities there are great
and vigorous schools of science. Of the old universities Cambridge
stands out as a chief centre of scientific activity. In several
branches of science Cambridge is without question pre-eminent. The
endowments both of the university and the colleges are freely used for
the advancement of the sciences. Not only in these material ways are
scientific studies in no sense neglected, but the position of the
sciences is recognised and even envied by those who follow other kinds
of learning. The scientific schools of Cambridge form perhaps the
dominant force among the resident body of the university, and except
by virtue of some great increase in the endowments, it would be
impossible to extend further the scientific side of Cambridge and
still maintain other forms of intellectual activity in such proportion
as to preserve that healthy co-ordination which is the life of a great
university.

At Oxford the case is no doubt very different. The measure in which
the sciences are esteemed appears only too plainly in the small
proportion of Fellowships filled by men of science. Progress has
nevertheless begun. At the remarkable Conference called in May, 1916,
to protest against the neglect of science it was noticeable that the
speakers were, in overwhelming majority, Oxford men[3].

Among the educational institutions of England there is no general
neglect to provide teaching of natural science and much of the
language used in reference to the problem of reform is not really in
accord with fact. Probably no boy able to afford a good secondary
school, certainly none able to proceed to a university, is debarred
from scient