[From the Proceedings of the American Association for the advancement 
of Science, Vol. XXXIV, Ann Arbor Meeting, August, 1885.] 
The science of statistical analysis. By Charles S. Hill, 
State Department, Washington, D. C. 
The Sciences are becoming, as they should be, the feature of 
education. Not that the classics must go, but that the sciences 
must come ; between these two classes in our colleges, and in our 
social and public relations, there is at present an evidence of 
feeling akin more to bitterness than to reason. 
The classic scholar has for so long a period ignored the greater 
importance and classification of scientific branches of knowledge 
that the modesty of the student, seeking skilfully the develop- 
ment of practical industry at home, and commercial relations with 
foreign countries, has unjustly and injuriously kept back much 
benefit to the masses of mankind and rational principles of reason. 
The beautiful accomplishment of a proficiency in interchanging 
thought and salutation in a common language gives grace, ease, 
and elegance to intercourse in society, in travelling, in diplomacy, 
and in many associations, as well as in study, but it is likewise a 
burden if allowed to obstruct the progress of industry. 
It is in the education of the masses that the power of a nation 
lies ; that the light of knowledge burns brightest and incessantly 
for the benefit of mankind. 
And even in the gradual advance of science to the foremost rank 
of study there has been too much disposition to disregard the 
many distinctive branches, and particularly the very rudiments 
of this standard of knowledge, even as the classic scholar has dis- 
509 510 
SECTION I. 
regarded the multiplicity, and often the most important base, of 
languages. 
Content with the acquirement of a science, the student often glo- 
ries in the knowledge of a principle without according his knowl- 
edge to the scientific system of research through the labyrinths of 
natural matter and analysis of statistical data by means of which 
knowledge is attained, and in many instances, it must be said with 
regret, without a willingness even to acknowledge that the system 
of analysis is a distinct and most important science-much less the 
rudiment of all sciences I 
The science of statistical analysis is paramount in the importance 
of correctness of result and satisfactory comprehension of how 
that result can be verified. The analysis of official statistical data 
is mining in mountains of precious metals - a miner's labor in 
separating the gold from the sulphurets. 
The labor of such work is purely and indisputably a science of 
the highest order. To separate and group together the figures and 
facts of greatest value, exhibiting and analyzing the wealth of hid- 
den knowledge, and interweaving chains of social problems with 
golden truths-otherwise left buried from view-which glisten the 
brighter when contrasted with the brassy alloys of sophistry or 
the counterfeit representations of fallacy, is a science without a peer. 
The definition of science, says Professor Fowler, of Oxford, 
" is the filiation of causes through the common observation to 
things beyond." 
Accepting the expression of Professor Fowler, we must accept, 
as the corner-stone of all sciences, arithmetic, the only basis upon 
which we may, with that second stone of science, logic, found an 
article on political economy, which, as a knowledge, is far more 
powerful in influence, effective in application, and brilliant as well 
as bountiful in results. 
To be thus effectual and bountiful in results, delicate distinction 
between like and unlike conditions is essential; similia similibus 
curantur is a faithful precept; but the application of like doctrine 
to cure evil or to guide our course merely upon general principles 
is the most fatal error into which a people may fall especially in 
economics. 
While the first object of the student is to find the origin of his 
subject, his great error, like that of some " professors " of theo- ECONOMIC SCIENCE AND STATISTICS. 
511 
retical economy, is in applying the derivations of terms to their rea- 
soning rather than in pursuing the pure science of defining the 
cause that must work the results. 
But neither science, arithmetic nor logic, can produce food or 
the other necessaries of life ; it requires good sense and reason 
which practical experience alone can give, to apply rules or prin- 
ciples to trading and economy. 
To draw these thoroughly into harmonious unity of action in our 
individual daily life is not only advisable, but essential to our 
prosperity, and, therefore, we must look particularly into the causes 
which create results rather than into the etymology of words or 
rules of syntax, and not forget to reason upon science with 
" Good sense, which is alone the gift of Heaven, 
And-though no science-fairly worth the seven." 
Statistical science, applied to social phenomena, enables us to 
comprehend facts which to the unthinking are incredible. One 
fact is worth one hundred theories. No greater misnomer can 
be applied to him who " has no time " for such data than the word 
" practical. " 
Nor should it be considered that the logic of statistics belongs 
alone to scientists. It is an essential in the education of every man 
who desires to arrange his study or regulate his own business cor- 
rectly. It is as important to possess this safeguard or guide through 
the numerous channels of occupation in life as the chart is to guide 
the mariner through the entrance to his harbor. 
How necessary, then, is the systematic preparation of official 
statistical data from all parts of the world, and how much more 
necessary that the analysis of such data should be made and is- 
sued authoritatively, that our manufacturers, merchants, and, in- 
deed, our whole people, may be assured that the information they 
receive is not deceiving. 
For more than a hundred years the Government of the United 
States failed to appreciate fully the Consul as a factor in the great 
work of protecting and enlarging the foreign commerce of the 
country. 
And yet the principal idea held by the founders of our Republic, 
when creating the consular service, was the development of inter- 
national trade through the medium of agents of the United States 512 
SECTION I, 
throughout the world to protect and enlarge our commercial re- 
lations. Such intent is evinced in all our state papers, although 
at times this idea seems to have been disregarded or lost sight of. 
The first effort to give system by organization to the promul- 
gation of the valuable information acquired by these representa- 
tives for the benefit of our industries, as well as for the extension of 
our commerce, under the preparation and direction of the United 
States Department of State, was by the Act of Congress, August 
16, 1842, followed by Act of August 18, 1856, and of July 4, 
1864. 
A further act of Congress, June 20, 1874, created the office of 
Chief of the Bureau of Statistics in the Department of State for 
the development of such work. 
This act was never annulled, although rendered inoperative by 
failure from indifference to provide means for the proper working 
of the same. 
That bureau, however, increased by provision of an Act of Con- 
gress, June 16, 1880, granting a very small force, and ordering 
more frequent publication of its results. 
A further Act of Congress, March 3, 1881, renewed the last ap- 
propriation with a small but inadequate increase for the monthly 
issue of such information as had proved so acceptable to the 
public. 
These publications by the Department of State, during the 
last four years, have been analyses of " The State of Labor in 
Europe ; " " The Commerce of the World," and "The Share of the 
United States Therein" The Cotton Goods Trade of the 
World " Glass," " Cereals," Ostrich," " Petroleum," and " Fruit 
Industries," and " The Credit System of the World," "The Con- 
dition of Labor Abroad,"-compared with conditions at home,- 
in connection with the regular monthly series, which have clearly 
demonstrated the possibility of the usefulness of the consul, if 
properly encouraged and conserved in his true sphere. 
The Consul's reports, which convey so much useful data, were 
formerly, necessarily, doomed to oblivion in the archives of unpub- 
lished and unread history, if we except those very few which ap- 
peared in the annual volume after lapse of time and without ex- 
amination, analysis, or deduction, and which consequently served 
no higher usefulness than very unreliable works of reference, par- ECONOMIC SCIENCE AND STATISTICS. 
513 
ticularly from their old date, and from the natural absence of 
incentive to the consul, especially in the practical utility of his 
work or appreciation by the public, which always stimulates pride 
and correctness. 
In the spring of 1880 the Department of State made strenuous 
efforts to remedy this evil and utilize this vast field of information 
by more frequent and immediate publication of special and se- 
lected reports, as referred to above, relating to every industry and 
every condition of other nations, whereby our own social and in- 
dustrial conditions might be advanced. 
To accomplish this work was at first a great difficulty, but 
finally, through earnest efforts and determination, the exhumation 
of the consul from obscurity to conspicuousness-his revival from 
inaction to usefulness-was effected through this channel of com- 
munication that enables him to show himself publicly according to 
his real merit, and serve his country practically. 
Thus for about four years this system has been tried in a very 
small way. In this short time that department has daily received 
letters from scientists of all branches, from senators and members of 
Congress, from industrial, educational, and other corporate bodies, 
from private individuals, home and foreign, attesting the value of 
these publications, and requesting that more copies, if possible, be 
supplied ; which request, however, has been only partially complied 
with out of the limited issue of 10,000 copies, 4,000 of which 
are supplied to Congress, and about 2,000 to consuls, an average 
of 10 each to the former and 3 each to the latter ; the remainder 
being demanded by the press, merchants, and laboring masses. 
When it is taken into consideration that every report, previous 
to publication, has to be copied, revised, condensed, often corrected, 
and sometimes rewritten, the labor incident thereto can be appre- 
ciated, and not even then to its full extent, save by men who have 
experience in the work of statistical analyses. 
The scope of the field of information, as set forth in the require- 
ments of consular regulations, 1881, article 27, paragraph 556, em- 
braces the following industries, viz.: 
1. Agriculture. 
2. Manufactures. 
3. Mining. 514 
SECTION I 
4. Fisheries. 
5. Forestry. 
6. Commerce and Navigation. 
7. Revenues. 
8. Miscellaneous, covering the conditions and peculiarities in 
business and habits of the several peoples of the world, viz., pop- 
ulation, emigration, labor, wages, prices of food and living. 
The last three Secretaries of State, Messrs. Evarts, Blaine and 
Frelinghuysen, under whose supervision and direction this labor 
has been performed, have fully appreciated these difficulties and 
have repeatedly called Congressional attention to the same and 
asked for sufficient provisions to enable that department to carry 
out this new system to its most profitable extent and in order 
to meet the petitions of the commercial community, made to the 
department, in this endeavor. 
It is hardly possible to day to meet and converse with a bus- 
iness or literary man from or in any city of our country who will 
not in some way speak of the benefit or pleasure he has derived 
from this systematic preparation and publication of official mat- 
ter and data. Contrast the benefit of the system of education and 
scientific analysis with the circumscribed condition and narrow- 
mindedness of the classic Turkish Cadi, Imaum Ali Zade, in reply 
to, and as given to the public by Mr. Layard, regarding the indus- 
try and commerce of Constantinople : 
" The thing you ask of me is both difficult and useless. Although I 
have passed all my days in this place, I have neither counted the houses, 
nor have I inquired into the number of inhabitants; and as to what one 
person loads on his mules, and another stows away in the bottom of his 
ship, that is no business of mine. But, above alb as to the previous 
of this city, God only knows the amount of dirt and confusion that the in- 
fidels may have eaten before the corning of the sword of Islam. It were 
unprofitable for us to inquire into it. O my soul! O my lamb! seek 
not after the things which concern thee not. Thou earnest unto us and 
we welcomed thee : go in peace." 
Such contractedness of mind and illiberality are too apt to pre- 
vail even with a few nearer our own home, but as " the sciences 
must come," so will analysis of the several sciences from rudiment 
to maturity, and their results be properly and justly classified. ECONOMIC SCIENCE AND STATISTICS. 
515 
The science of statistics may be credited to Sir Wm. Petty, of 
England, as its founder about the year 1650, but was first system- 
ized by Gottfried Achenwall, of Germany, a century later, who 
gave the name of Staat to his labor of love, and his noble pur- 
poses have been matured and wonderfully advanced by Quetelet, 
of Belgium ; Engel, of Dresden ; Rouher, of France; Bodio, of 
Italy; Neumann Spellart, of Austria ; Giffin, Bourne, and Levi; 
Farr, of England ; and their names will soon be " legion," and the 
world will be all the wiser for the work of those 
Statists, indeed! 
" And lovers of their country," 
Germany and England were the primogenitors of this science, 
the great value of which is now being appreciated by the civilized 
world. Nothing could be more forcible, more beautiful, or more 
appropriate here than the words of the Prince Consort Albert in 
opening the statistical Congress in London in 1860 : 
"Happy and proud indeed should I feel if this noble gathering should be 
enabled to lay the solid foundations of an edifice, necessarily slow of con- 
struction, and requiring for generations to come laborious and persevering 
exertions, intended as it is for the promotion of human happiness by lead- 
ing to the discovery of those eternal laws upon which universal happiness 
is dependent." 
These noble words are republican in sentiment, although born 
of a royal mind. 
Is not, then, statistical analysis the foundation of every science, 
the development of all good, the exposition of all bad ? and may 
we not hope for the sake of truth and practical usefulness and com- 
mon sense, rather than theoretical sophistry, that this science may 
in our colleges and universities be particularly 
" Tutored in the rudiments 
Of many desperate studies"? 
Salem Press, June, 1886.