Excerpt from Geographical Essays
The Need of Comparing Opinions. One of the objects to which geographers may well direct their attention is the nature of the whole subject of geography, under whose broad shelter individual studies are carried on. If we work only in view of our chosen field within the whole area of geography, we lose something of breadth, although we may gain much in depth. Our work will become more serviceable to others if it is presented in such a manner that its relations to the whole subject are made clear. Not only so; we may often benefit ourselves by systematically setting forth the place of our individual studies in geography as a whole, for we may be thereby led to discover that the systematic sequence of parts is interrupted here and there by gaps, which can be filled by well-directed effort.
But it is manifest that, if we should attempt to make exposition of our ideas concerning the relation of our own studies to the whole subject, we must have previously gained a tolerably definite idea of the nature of the whole. Very likely we each have some such conception. If so, it would be profitable to institute a collection and a comparison of opinions, though it can hardly be doubted that they would show much diversity.
Examples of Geographical Statements. As a contribution towards such a collection of opinions, I propose to consider the nature or content of geography in this essay; but instead of presenting an abstract definition of the subject, the problem will be regarded from the other side.
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