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Excerpt from Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, Vol. 18 Suppose, however, that their errors were real ones, the record of their work is just as important to future navigators as it is to have the rocks and shoals of a channel mapped out and buoyed. It is work which must be done. The great ship passing straight to its destination is enabled to attain this directness and speed by the combined labours of a multitude of workers, some obscure and forgotten, some distinguished and remembered, but none of whom were able to realise the stately passage of the great ship through the channels marked out for it, and by aid of mechanism which they had taken a part in designing or constructing. So it is with every great erection: and the Forth Bridge stands upon piers sunk below the water-mark by the painful and long continued labours of Italian workmen in caissons full of com pressed and heated air. The study of specifically Natural knowledge was fostered and promoted by the recognition in the reign of Charles II. Of a body of enthusiasts who, during the disturbed but hopeful era of the Commonwealth, had met together to discuss problems of scientific interest; and today the Royal Society is among the dignified institutions of our land, taking all branches of Natural Philosophy and Natural History - the Physical Sciences and the Biological Sciences - under its wing. Us it does not recognise, but then neither does it recognise Mental and Moral Philosophy, or Ethics, or Psychology, or History, or any part of a great region of knowledge which has hitherto been regarded as outside the pale of the Natural Sciences. It is for us to introduce our subjects within that pale, if it turns out that there they properly belong; and if not, it is for us to do pioneer work and begin the establishment of another Society or group of Societies for recognition and promotion of work in the mental, the psychological, the psychical direction, until the day for unification shall arrive. Half knowledge sees divisions and emphasises barriers, delights in classification into genera and species, affixes labels, and studies things in groups. And all this work is of the utmost practical value and is essentially necessary. That the day will come when barriers shall be broken down, when species shall be found to shade off into one another, when continuity and not classification shall be the dominant feature, may be anticipated by all, but we have no power of hastening the day except by taking our place in the workshop and doing our assigned quota; still less have we any advantage in pretending that the day of unification has arrived while as yet its dawn is still in the future. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

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