Popular Scientific Lectures

Popular lectures, owing to the knowledge they presuppose, and the time they occupy, can afford only a modicum of instruction. They must select for this purpose easy subjects, and restrict themselves to the exposition of the simplest and the most essential points. Nevertheless, by an appropriate choice of the matter, the charm and the poetry of research can be conveyed by them. It is only necessary to set forth the attractive and the alluring features of a problem, and to show what broad domains of fact can be illuminated by the light radiating from the solution of a single and ofttimes unobtrusive point.

Furthermore, such lectures can exercise a favorable influence by showing the substantial sameness of scientific and every-day thought. The public, in this way, loses its shyness towards scientific questions, and acquires an interest in scientific work which is a great help to the inquirer. The latter, in his turn, is brought to understand that his work is a small part only of the universal process of life, and that the results of his labors must redound to the benefit not only of himself and a few of his associates, but to that of the collective whole.