Part 26 (2/2)

The St. Louis World's Fair promised, through the vast extent of its grounds, through the beautiful plans of the buildings, through the eagerness of the United States, through the partic.i.p.ation of all countries on earth, and through the gigantic outlines of the internal plans, to become the most monumental expression of the energies with which the twentieth century entered on its course. Commerce and industry, art and social work, politics and education, war and peace, country and city. Orient and Occident, were all to be focussed for a few summer months in the ivory city of the Mississippi Valley. It seemed most natural that science and productive scholars.h.i.+p should also find its characteristic place among the factors of our modern civilization.

Of course the scientist had his word to say on almost every square foot of the Exposition. Whether the building was devoted to electricity or to chemistry, to anthropology or to metallurgy, to civic administration or to medicine, to transportation or to industrial arts, it was everywhere the work of the scientist which was to win the triumph; and the Palace of Education, the first in any universal exposition, was to combine under its roof not only the school work of all countries, but the visible record of the world's universities and technical schools as well. And yet it seemed not enough to gather the products and records of science and to make science serve with its tools and inventions. Modern art, too, was to reign over every hall and to beautify every palace, and yet demanded its own unfolding in the gallery of paintings and sculptures. In the same way it was not enough for science to penetrate a hundred exhibitions and turn the wheels in every hall, but it must also seek to concentrate all its energies in one spot and show the cross-section of human knowledge in our time, and, above all, its own methods.

An exhibition of scholars.h.i.+p cannot be arranged for the eyes. The great work which grows day by day in quiet libraries and laboratories, and on a thousand university platforms, can express itself only through words.

Yet heaped up printed volumes would be dead to a World's Fair spectator; how to make such words living was the problem. Above all, scholars.h.i.+p does not really exhibit its methods, if it does not show itself in production. It is no longer scholars.h.i.+p which speaks of a truth-seeking that has been performed instead of going on with the search for further truth. If the world's science was to be exhibited, a form had to be sought in which the scholarly work on the spot would serve the ideals of knowledge, would add to the storehouse of truth, and would thus work in the service of human progress at the same moment in which it contributed to the completeness of the exhibition.

The effort was not without precedent. Scholarly production had been connected with earlier expositions, and the large gatherings of scholars at the Paris Exposition were still in vivid memory. A large number of scientific congresses of specialists had been held there, and many hundred scholarly papers had been read. Yet the results hardly suggested the repet.i.tion of such an experiment. Every one felt too strongly that the outcome of such disconnected congresses of specialists is hardly comparable with the glorious showing which the arts and industries have made and were to make again. In every other department of the World's Fair the most careful preparation secured an harmonious effect. The scholarly meetings alone failed even to aim at harmony and unity. Not only did the congresses themselves stand apart without any inner relation, grouped together by calendar dates or by their alphabetical order from Anthropology to Zoology; but in every congress, again, the papers read and the ma.n.u.scripts presented were disconnected pieces without any programme or correlation. Worse than that, they could not even be expected in their isolatedness to add anything which would not have been worked out and communicated to the world just as well without any congress. The speaker at such a meeting is asked to contribute anything he has at hand, and he accepts the invitation because he has by chance a completed paper or a research ready for publication. In the best case it would have appeared in the next number of the specialistic magazine, in not infrequent cases it has appeared already in the last number. Such a congress is then only an accident and does not itself serve the progress of knowledge.

Even that would be acceptable if at least the best scholars would come out with their latest investigations, or, still more delightful, if they would enter into an important discussion. But experience has too often shown that the conditions are most favorable for the opposite outcome.

The leading scholars stay away partly to give beginners the chance to be heard, partly not to be grouped with those who habitually have the floor at such gatherings. These are either the men whose day has gone by or those whose day has not yet come; and both groups tyrannize alike an unwilling audience. Yet it may be said that in scientific meetings of specialists the reading of papers is non-essential and no harm is done even if they do not contribute anything to the status of scholars.h.i.+p; their great value lies in the personal contact of fellow workers and in the discussions and informal exchange of opinions. All that is true, and completely justifies the yearly meetings of scholarly a.s.sociations. But these advantages are much diminished whenever such gatherings take on an international character, and thus introduce the confusion of tongues.

And hardly any one can doubt that the turmoil of a world's fair is about the worst possible background for such exchange of thought, which demands repose and quietude. Yet even with the certainty of all these disadvantages the city of Paris, with its large body of scholars, with its venerable scholarly traditions, and with its incomparable attractions, could overcome every resistance, and its convenient location made it natural that in vacation time, in an exposition summer, the scholars should gather there, not on account of, but in spite of, the hundred congresses. With this the city of St. Louis could make no claim to rivalry. Its recent growth, its minimum of scholarly tradition, its great distance from the old centres of knowledge even in the New World, the apathy of the East and the climatic fears of Europe, all together made it clear that a mere repet.i.tion of unrelated congresses would be not only useless, but a disastrous failure. These very fears, however, themselves suggested the remedy.

If the scholarly work of our time was to be represented at St. Louis, something had to be attempted which should be not simply an imitation of the branch-congresses which every scientific specialty in every country is calling every year. Scholars.h.i.+p was to be asked to show itself really in process, and to produce for the World's Fair meeting something which without it would remain undone. To invite the scholars of the world for their leisurely enjoyment and reposeful discussion of work done elsewhere is one thing; to call them together for work which they would not do otherwise, and which ought to be done, is a very different thing.

The first had in St. Louis all odds against it; it seemed worth while to try the second. And it seemed not only worth while in the interest of scholars.h.i.+p, it seemed, above all, the only way to give to the scholars.h.i.+p of our time a chance for the complete demonstration of its productive energies.

The plan of unrelated congresses, with chance combinations of papers prepared at random, was therefore definitively replaced by the plan of only one representative gathering, bound together by one underlying thought, given thus the unity of one scholarly aim, whose fulfillment is demanded by the scientific needs of our time, and is hardly to be reached by other methods. Every arbitrary and individual choice was then to be eliminated and every effort was to be controlled by the one central purpose; the work thus to be organized and prepared with the same carefulness of adjustment and elaboration which was doubtless to be applied in the admirable exhibitions of the United States Government or in the art exhibition. The open question was, of course, what topic could fulfill these various demands most completely; wherein lay the greatest scholarly need of our time; what task could be least realized by the casual efforts of scholars.h.i.+p at random; where was the unity of a world organization most needed?

One thought was very naturally suggested by the external circ.u.mstances.

St. Louis had asked the nations of the world to a celebration of the Louisiana Purchase. Historical thoughts thus gave meaning and importance to the whole undertaking. The pride of one century's development had stimulated the gigantic work from its inception. An immense territory had been transformed from a half wilderness into a land with a rich civilization, and with a central city in which eight thousand factories are at work. No thought lay nearer than to ask how far this century was of similar importance for the changes in the world of thought. How have the sciences developed themselves since the days of the Louisiana Purchase? That is a topic which with complete uniformity might be asked from every special science, and which might thus offer a certain unity of aim to scholars of all scientific denominations. There was indeed no doubt that such an historical question would have to be raised if we were to live up to the commemorative idea of the whole Fair. And yet it seemed still more certain that the retrospective problem did not justify itself as a central topic for a World's Congress. There were sciences for which the story of the last hundred years was merely the last chapter of a history of three thousand years and other sciences whose life history did not begin until one or two decades ago. It would thus be a very external uniformity; the question would have a very different meaning for the various branches of knowledge, and the treatment would be of very unequal interest and importance. More than that, it would not abolish the unrelated character of the endeavors; while the same topic might be given everywhere, yet every science would remain isolated; there would be no internal unity, and thus no inner reason for bringing together the best workers of all spheres. And finally the mere retrospective att.i.tude brings with it the depressing mood of perfunctory activity. Certainly to look back on the advance of a century can be most suggestive for a better understanding of the way which lies before us; and we felt indeed that the occasion for such a backward glance ought not to be missed. Yet there would be something lifeless if the whole meeting were devoted to the consideration of work that had been completed; a kind of necrological sentiment would pervade the whole ceremony, while our chief aim was to serve the progress of knowledge and thus to stimulate living interests.

This language of life spoke indeed in the programme of another plan which seemed also to be suggested by the character of the Exposition.

The St. Louis Fair desired not merely to look backward and to revive the historical interest in the Louisiana purchase, but its first aim seemed to be to bring into sharp relief the factors which serve to-day the practical welfare and the achievements of human society. If all the scholars of all sciences were to convene under one flag, would it not thus seem most harmonious with the occasion, if, as the one controlling topic, the question were proposed, ”What does your science contribute to the practical progress of mankind?” No one can deny that such a formulation would fit in well with the lingering thoughts of every World's Fair visitor. Whoever wanders through the aisles of exhibition palaces and sees ama.s.sed the marvelous achievements of industry and commerce, and the thousand practical arts of modern society, may indeed turn most naturally to a gathering of scholars with the question, ”What have you to offer of similar import?” All your thinking and speaking and writing, are they merely words on words, or do you also turn the wheels of this gigantic civilization?

Such a question would give a n.o.ble opening indeed to almost every science. Who would say that the opportunity is confined to the man of technical science? Does not the biologist also prepare the achievements of modern medicine, does not the mathematician play his most important role in our mastery over stubborn nature, do we not need language for our social intercourse, and law and religion for our practical social improvement? Yes, is there any science which has not directly or indirectly something to contribute to the practical development of the modern man and his civilization? All this is true, and yet the perspective of this truth, too, appears at once utterly distorted if we take the standpoint of science itself. The one end of knowledge is to reach the truth. The belief in the absolute value of truth gives to it meaning and significance. This value remains the controlling influence even where the problem to be solved is itself a practical one, and the spirit of science remains thus essentially theoretical even in the so-called applied sciences. But incomparably more intense in that respect is the spirit of all theoretical disciplines. Philosophy and mathematics, history and philology, chemistry and biology, astronomy and geology, may be and ought to be helpful to practical civilization everywhere; and every step forward which they take will be an advance for man's practical life too. And yet their real meaning never lies in their technical by-product. It is not the scholar who peers in the direction of practical use who is most loyal to the deepest demand of scholars.h.i.+p, and every relation to practical achievement is more or less accidental or even artificial for the real life interests of productive scholars.h.i.+p.

But if the contrast between his real intention and his social technical successes may not appear striking to the physicist or chemist, it would appear at least embarra.s.sing to the scholars in many other departments and directly bewildering to not a few. Perhaps two thirds of the sciences to which the best thinkers of our time are faithfully devoted would then be grouped together and relegated to a distant corner, their only practical technical function would be to contribute material to the education of the cultured man. For what else do we study Sanscrit or medieval history or epistemology? And finally even the uniform topic of practical use would not have brought the different sciences nearer to each other; the Congress would still have remained a budget of disconnected records of scholars.h.i.+p. If the practical side of the Exposition was to suggest anything, it should then not be more than an appeal not to overlook the importance of the applied sciences which too often play the role of a mere appendix to the system of knowledge. The logical one-sidedness which considers practical needs as below the dignity of pure science was indeed to be excluded, but to choose practical service as the one controlling topic would be far more anti-scientific.

2. _The Unity of Knowledge_

There was another side of the Exposition plan which suggested a stronger topic. The World's Fair was not only an historical memorial work, and was not only a show of the practical tools of technical civilization; its deepest aim was after all the effort to bring the energies of our time into inner relation. The peoples of the whole globe, separated by oceans and mountains, by language and custom, by politics and prejudice, were here to come in contact and to be brought into correlation by better mutual understanding of the best features of their respective cultures. The various industries and arts, the most antagonistic efforts of commerce and production, separated by the rivalry of the market and by the diversity of economic interests were here to be brought together in harmony, were to be correlated for the eye of the spectator. It was a near-lying thought to choose correlation as the controlling thought of a scientific World's Congress too. That was the topic which was finally agreed upon: the inner relation of the sciences of our day.

The fitness and the external advantages of such a scheme are evident.

First of all, the danger of disconnectedness now disappears completely.

If the sciences are to examine what binds them together, their usual isolation must be given up for the time being and a concerted effort must control the day. The bringing together of scholars of all scientific specialties is then no longer a doubtful accidental feature, but becomes a condition of the whole undertaking. More than that, such a topic, with all that it involves, makes it a matter of course that the call goes out to the really leading scholars of the time. To aim at a correlation of sciences means to seek for the fundamental principles in each territory of knowledge and to look with far-seeing eye beyond the limits of its field; but just this excludes from the outset those who like to be the self-appointed speakers in routine gatherings. It excludes from the first the narrow specialist who does not care for anything but for his latest research, and ought to exclude not less the vague spirits who generalize about facts of which they have no concrete substantial knowledge, as their suggestions towards correlation would lack inner productiveness and outer authority. Such a plan has room only for those men who stand high enough to see the whole field and who have yet the full authority of the specialistic investigator; they must combine the concentration on specialized productive work with the inspiration that comes from looking over vast regions. With such a topic the usual question does not come up whether one or another strong man would feel attracted to take part in the gathering, but it would be justified and necessary to confine the active partic.i.p.ation from the outset to those who are leaders, and thus to guarantee from the beginning a representation of science equal in dignity to the best efforts of the exhibiting countries in all other departments. In this way such a plan had the advantage of justifying through its topic the administrative desire to bring all sciences to the same spot, and at the same time of excluding all partic.i.p.ants but the best scholars: with isolated gatherings or with second-rate men, this subject would have been simply impossible.

Yet all these halfway external advantages count little compared with the significance and importance of the topic for the inner life of scientific thought of our time. We all felt it was the one topic which the beginning of the twentieth century demanded and which could not be dealt with otherwise than by the combined labors of all nations and of all sciences. The World's Fair was the one great opportunity to make a first effort in this direction; we had no right to miss this opportunity. Thus it was decided to have a congress with the definite purpose of working towards the unity of human knowledge, and with the one mission, in this time of scattered specializing work, of bringing to the consciousness of the world the too much neglected idea of the unity of truth. To quote from our first tentative programme: ”Let the rush of the world's work stop for one moment for us to consider what are the underlying principles, what are their relations to one another and to the whole, what are their values and purposes; in short, let us for once give to the world's sciences a holiday. The workaday functions are much better fulfilled in separation, when each scholar works in his own laboratory or in his library; but this holiday task of bringing out the underlying unity, this synthetic work, this demands really the cooperation of all, this demands that once at least all sciences come together in one place at one time.”

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