their numerous economic problems. Hence Joseph Henry, the idealist in science, was practically unknown. This was the mental attitude which Europe called “American materialism” in science. De Tocqueville, the famous French traveller and keen observer, said this about us in a book which he published over seventy years ago: It must be confessed that, among the civilized peoples of our age, there are few in which the highest sciences have made so little progress as in the United States.... The future will prove whether the passion for profound knowledge, so rare and so fruitful, can be born and developed so readily in democratic societies as in aristocracies.... The man of the North ... does not care for science as a pleasure, and only embraces it with avidity when it leads to useful applications. To-day this criticism sounds like a national libel, but fifty years ago it was swallowed like a bitter pill which, in the opinion of many patriotic thinkers, we needed if we were to be cured of a malady which threatened to become a national calamity. The greatest leaders of scientific thought in this country pointed to our educational system, in order to prove that de Tocqueville was right and that science was neglected in our schools and colleges. Foremost amongst them were, as I have already pointed out in this narrative, Joseph Henry, President Barnard, of Columbia, President White, of Cornell, Draper, Youmans, and others. They were all idealists in science, and when they invited Tyndall to this country, fifty years ago, they invited the most eloquent apostle of scientific idealism. The great movement for higher scientific research, inaugurated in England by the immortal Maxwell and his supporters, and in this country by the great Joseph Henry and his followers, was a movement for idealism in science, or, as Andrew White called it, “hope for higher endeavor.” When the European speaks of materialism in American science, he is resurrecting notions which de Tocqueville had in his mind when he wrote the lines quoted above. These notions were correct, but wonderful changes have taken place in this country since de Tocqueville wrote his book. If he were living now and published another edition of his famous book, I am sure that he would insert a chapter which would speak of idealism and not of materialism in American science. What is the mental attitude which I call “idealism in science”? Before answering this question it is well to quote here from an earlier part of my narrative: