There are whole worlds as yet unexplored
and waiting to be won. Do men whimperingly complain that there is no
longer a career for genius? Tush! It is enthusiasm that is wanted.
Give us that, and the career will follow. But the enthusiasm must be
of the real sort--not self-asserting, self-conscious, self-seeking;
but earnest, patient, resolute, and reticent: for science, too, needs
heroism no less than war.
In the domain of Physical Science there has been in our own time no
lack of intelligent co-operation, and volunteers have been many and
earnest, nor have they spared themselves or shrunk from sacrifices.
In the domain of Historical Science the labourers are few and far
between; there research proceeds with lagging steps. No one sneers at
a philosopher who travels to Iceland to investigate the habits of a
gnat, or who counts it the pride of his life to have discovered a new
fungus, but simpletons are pleased to make themselves merry with
caricaturing any student of his country's institutions who is "always
poring over musty old parchments." And yet these minute researches
will have to be made sooner of later, and till we can bring ourselves
to study the structure and the tissues and the comparative anatomy of
Institutions, and to go through all the drudgery which sluggards
loathe and fools deride, the light of truth will be dim for us all;
our Ethical, equally with our political Philosophy must remain in a
condition of hopeless sterility.
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