that the fourth of twenty is five under any and all circumstances and is in no way affected by erroneous suppositions about the third of six. The first part of the question assumed organic insanity, the second part assumed a return to partial sanity in the subsequent proceeding, but not to complete sanity. To preserve a consistent basis of procedure, such a question should read something like this: If a mind were so insanely constituted that it supposes the third of six is three and if it were proportionately insane respecting other mathematical relations, what would be its insane conception of the fourth of twenty? In my own field there is an embarrassment of illustrative cases of the like import, but you cannot fairly be supposed to have made the personal acquaintance of such a multitude of unfortunates, and besides the edges and angles of the few in the mathematical field are cleaner cut and keener, and that is doubtless why the philosopher of the ideal and he of earth alike have recourse to them. To me it seems that if the logical system of thought on which mathematics is founded be in organic error in one vital particular, the rest of the system carries no presumption of trustworthiness. And so generally, if the mind permits itself to go outside the existing order of things in its adoption of an imaginary postulate not strictly in harmony with known entities and relations, there is little more ground for confidence in its processes than in its assumptions. The sanction of sanity rests as much with postulates as processes. The canons of scientific procedure require that both shall be tested to the utmost before adoption, all the more so in proportion as they may be lacking. in the support of a body of determinate facts. If an intellectual structure is to be built on a slender basis, it is the more important that the basis be solid and strong. No strength is acquired in mid-air, unless new attachments to substantial truth are added. (4) Not only does the scientific procedure require special circumspection relative to the foundation, but further scrutiny at every step with constant loyalty to embodied facts and principles. If any term is allowed to slip outside the limits of actual or symbolic reality into strict unreality, there is, I think, no dependence on the results. If at any stage, a ghostly factor is permitted to replace a concrete. factor, or its generalized substitute or symbol, a ghostly result is likely to follow. In the physical sciences, the chief preventive of and remedy for insidious errors of all kinds is an unceasing testing of every step by related phenomena or by crucial experimentation. The logical process by itself commands but little confidence beyond the simpler steps, because experience has disclosed a multitude of pitfalls set all along its path and has revealed its oft-occurring incompetency. Why should we rest much on unassisted logic in the solution of the complex problems of the world, when it must be conceded that all the powers. of ratiocination that came into function between the days of the Para doxides and the present, working alone, unaided by experimental means, would scarcely have discovered the elements or the internal logical relations of a pinch of salt? Workers in the physical field long ago learned that they must keep in close touch with concrete realities. They have found this especially necessary in such exploratory work as involves hypotheses and logical deductions when facts are yet few and poorly determined. Safety here, so far as there is any safety, depends on a constant recurrence to such facts as are available, conjoined with an ever-present realization of the uncertain basis of the whole procedure. To the worker in the field of substantial science the following is a sufficient working guide: Whatever has been embodied in the system of things of which we are a part, may be assumed to be a worthy subject of research; whatever has not been so embodied may be safely neglected, even if we could suppose ourselves competent to deal with it. A preacher may be allowed to put it thus: Whatever the Divine Artificer has seen fit to use in the making of the system, we may safely study; whatever He found no use for, we may safely conclude has no value for us. Accepting as a primary tenet of faith that the system is genuine and honest, that our powers are adapted to give us true results when properly used, that it is our mission to use them, and that the highest productiveness comes from the closest contact with actualities of the system, we bid all workers join us in loyalty to these articles of faith and in fidelity to these working maxims. Let each enjoy the independence of a free worker, but let each accept loyally the realities he cannot escape. Let everyone stand on his own feet, and let everyone keep his feet on the ground. ASSEMBLY OF THE COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE SERVICES OF NORMAN J. COLMAN TO AMERICAN COLONEL CHARLES F. MILLS Editor of the Farm Home, Springfield The very pleasant duty has been assigned me of briefly referring on this very appropriate occasion and place to the services of Norman Jay Colman to American agriculture. The honor of my selection for this very agreeable duty is highly appreciated, and I enter upon its discharge with the conviction that the man and his eminent services to American agriculture are deserving of a far more gifted compiler. To the student of our literature pertaining to the farm, Mr. Colman is well and widely known as second to none of the active and successful promoters of American agriculture. The very full reports of the highly creditable and far reaching work for good of Mr. Colman, in advancing the best conditions of our agriculture, are well known to this assembly. It is fortunate for the interested student that the results of his labors have been so fully and widely published in the official records of the National and State Departments of Agriculture, the farm press and in the books relating to advanced methods in rural husbandry. My effort will therefore be that of a compiler of the historical data necessary to complete the record for this occasion. All present, I believe, will rejoice in this fitting opportunity to refer to the familiar and worthy achievements of a patriotic, painstaking man who has merited the distinguished honors so freely bestowed upon him by a conservative, discriminating and appreciative constituency. Mr. Colman was born on a farm near Richfield Springs, Otsego county, New York, and his abiding interest in farming pursuits has never been questioned. From an early age he was a diligent student, reading every volume in the common school library in his school district before the age of sixteen, and carrying on his other studies in his thoroughly characteristic manner. He worked his way through school by teaching in winter and attending the seminaries in the vicinity in summer, until twenty years of age, when his ambition to identify himself with the growing West influenced him to remove to Kentucky. Here he taught school in Louisville and thus provided himself with means to attend the Louisville Law University, where he took the degree of bachelor of law and later was licensed as an attorney. He practiced law at New Albany, Indiana, and was elected district attorney. In 1852, young Colman removed to St. Louis, con tinuing in the successful practice of his profession. His love for rural pursuits soon induced him to purchase a country home, and establish an agricultural journal known as Colman's Rural World, now of national reputation as an influential exponent of the best methods in all that pertains to advanced agriculture. He soon became a prominent leader and advocate of agricultural progress in the Mississippi Valley. He was called upon to take an active part in every movement in behalf of the interests of the farmer, and became generally known as a forceful and eloquent advocate of better methods in farming and of state and national legislation needed to give the producer the full return for his labors. His loyalty to his constituency and his unswerving devotion to the farmers' interest prompted the agricultural classes to secure him the following well-merited honors, viz: a member of the Missouri Legislature, Lieutenant-Governor of his state, president of the Missouri State Horticultural Society, president of the Missouri State Board of Agriculture, trustee for fifteen years of the Missouri State University, president of the Missouri State Press Association for two terms, United States Commissioner of Agriculture, and when the United States Department of Agriculture was created he was made the first secretary. But few persons appreciate the magnitude of the work accomplished by Mr. Colman in behalf of our agricultural interests. It was more than a score of years ago, that he took his seat as United States Commissioner of Agriculture, under the appointment of President Grover Cleveland. At that time the standing of the department was low. It was the butt of ridicule of the Washington correspondents of the public press. The great interests it represented had no voice in the President's cabinet. Not a single government experiment station existed in connection with an agricultural college or university in the United States. Many of the most important and useful divisions now existing in the department had never been thought of, or at least established. At that time also that terrible and incurable disease of contagious pleuro-pneumonia existed among our dairy herds and in cattle yards in various parts of the United States. It was a critical period in the history of the department, and it needed a man of great administrative and executive ability to place it in that position which the great interests it represented entitled it to оссиру. Fortunately, the right man was found to take charge of it and place it on the high plane it should occupy. Its elevation could be made only by slow degrees. Congress must furnish every dollar required to raise the quality of the work and expand it. Great diplomacy was necessary to secure the proper appropriations. It was only by showing Congress the value of the work being accomplished that new and increased appropriations could be secured. Mr. Colman was well equipped for the important work to which he was assigned. For more than thirty years prior to his appointment he had been editor of the leading agricultural paper of the Mississippi Valley. He had discussed not only with pen, but with tongue, the great problems that confronted the farmers, and that were identified with their interests. He was a forcible and eloquent speaker, and always held the rapt attention of his listeners. But few public meetings in his section were held where agricultural interests were considered at which he was not one of the invited speakers. Having been born and brought up on a farm, and having been a practical, as well as theoretical farmer all his life, he was in close touch and sympathy with his brother farmers. He knew their needs and also what was necessary to be done to secure them. He was well aware of the great prejudice existing against theoretical farming, or "book larnin' "' is sometimes called, then existing to a far greater extent than at the present day. He had had legislative experience, which was of much value in enabling him to deal with Congress, in order to secure proper appropriations to elevate the standard of the department. He had served as a member of the legislature of his state, and also as Lieutenant-Governor, presiding over the senate. We have presented these facts in order to show how well equipped he was to fill the important position to which he had been elevated, and it was to this admirable equipment that his great success was attributable. He repeatedly told us that in accepting the office his highest ambition would be achieved, if he could secure government experiment stations, or experimental farms in connection with our agricultural colleges, so that practical and scientific agriculture could walk hand in hand, and thus obviate the prejudice which existed against scientific farming. The other object of his ambition was to make the department worthy of becoming one of the great executive departments of the government, with a voice in the President's cabinet, during his administration, By his wise administration of the office, both houses of Congress passed a bill almost unanimously, creating it one of the great executive departments of the government, and Mr. Colman had the distinguished honor of being appointed the first Secretary of Agriculture. The bill establishing experiment stations in connection with our agricultural colleges was also passed, and the stations put into practical working order during his administration, so that both of the highest objects of his ambition were accomplished. But it is much easier to tell of the achievements of these great objects than of the steps that had to be taken to secure them. And first, as to the establishing of experiment stations. Feeling that it was essential to achieve the coöperation and influence of the agricul |