Repository: UIHistories Project: Dedication - New Chemistry Building [PAGE 36]

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I would rather be a little Moses than a big Jeremiah. I would much rather point a way to a promised land, however remote, than talk about our lamentable conditions. But we Americans are not sufficiently imbued with the spirit of active and efficient service. We are a preliminary experiment on the possibility of operating a competitive nation in a democratic manner, but we don't care enough about it. We have about as little interest in the wonder and elasticity of nature, the laws of materials (except where they affect our stomachs and our health) as had Darwin's starving Patagonians. With us the spirit of the hive is confined to the bees. Germans and Japanese make better scholars than we do, and a Chinese laundryman sticks longer to his daily job and talks less about it. We are living in the Garden of the Gods, but we are still eating grass. Is there no significance in the fact that many Ameriican colleges are better known through their foot work than their head work? Is it not significant that the Y. M. C. A.'s dotting our land are as strong in bowling alleys as in education, and that most of our religious training goes to the heathen? Is it a sign of health that so large a portion of our newspapers are paid to feed us with results of useless experiments between prize fighters? I think the stadium should be the accessory of the laboratory, not the temple of the oracle; and that in reality a research laboratory is more compatible with the object of a university than is the more common training table. I do not mean to be too insistent as a critic or too pressing as an advocate, but I hate to see my own country such a trailer as it now is. I hope the conditions are changing, but I know they are not changing fast enough. Probably Moses and Jeremiah were both right. All service is based on knowledge, and knowledge is an ever augmenting thing which almost anyone may increase. If the stock is eternally useful, as it is, how great must be the value of the indestructible increments which anyone may produce. I do not think due reverence is given to new knowledge. I want to illustrate.

SERVICE OF RESEARCH

Sometime, somewhere, centuries ago, the slag of a fireside appeared transparent; someone tried to learn more about it, and so ultimately, glass was made. Research is still under way on that very material, and countless numbers of men have slowly added to the knowledge. Glass has kept the cold (33)