mind for the successful practice of the Law, or to obtain a high place
in the Mathematical Tripos.

I have known men, who when they were at school, never could see the
good of mathematics, but who, when in after life they made this
discovery, not only became eminent as scientific engineers, but made
considerable progress in the study of abstract mathematics. If our
experimental course should help any of you to see the good of
mathematics, it will relieve us of much anxiety, for it will not only
ensure the success of your future studies, but it will make it much
less likely that they will prove injurious to your health.


But why should we labour to prove the advantage of practical science
to the University? Let us rather speak of the help which the
University may give to science, when men well trained in mathematics
and enjoying the advantages of a well-appointed Laboratory, shall
unite their efforts to carry out some experimental research which no
solitary worker could attempt.

At first it is probable that our principal experimental work must be
the illustration of particular branches of science, but as we go on we
must add to this the study of scientific methods, the same method
being sometimes illustrated by its application to researches belonging
to different branches of science.

We might even imagine a course of experimental study the arrangement
of which should be founded on a classification of methods, and not on
that of the objects of investigation. A combination of the two plans
seems to me better than either, and while we take every opportunity of