In the fourth place, I would inculcate the habit of wide Reading
in scientific literature. Although the progress of science is now
too rapid for any man to keep pace with the advance of all its
departments, you should try to hold yourselves in touch with at least
the main results arrived at in other branches than your own; while,
in that branch itself, it should be your constant aim to watch every
onward step that is taken by others, and not to fall behind the van.
This task you will find to be no light one. Even were it confined to a
survey of the march of science in your own country, it would be arduous
enough to engage much of your time. But science belongs to no country,
and continues its onward advance all over the globe. If you would
keep yourselves informed regarding this progress in other countries,
as you are bound to do if you would not willingly be left behind, you
will need to follow the scientific literature of those countries.
You must be able to read at least French and German. You will find
in these languages a vast amount of scientific work relating to your
own department, and to this accumulated pile of published material
the journals of every month continue to add. In many ways it is a
misfortune that the literature of science increases so fast; but we
must take the evil with the good. Practice will eventually enable you
to form a shrewd judgment as to which authors or papers you may skip
without serious danger of losing any valuable fact or useful suggestion.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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