THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION "It is a very great thing to be able to think as you like ; but, after all, an important question remains what you think. It is a fine thing to secure a free stage and no favour ; but, after all, the part which you play on that stage will have to be criticised. Now, all the liberty and industry in the world will not ensure two things : a high reason and a fine culture. They may favour them, but they will not of them- selves produce them: they may exist without them. But it is by the appearance of these two things, in some shape or other, in the life of a nation, that it becomes something more than an independent, an energetic, a successful nation that it becomes a great nation." The Popular Education of France, with Notices of that of Holland and Switzerland, /. xliii. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION CHOSEN FROM THE WRITINGS OF MATTHEW ARNOLD EDITED BY LEONARD HUXLEY " A fugitive and gracious light he seeks, Shy to illumine ; and I seek it too. This does not come with houses or with gold, \Vithplace, "with honour, and a flattering crew ; ' Tis not in the world's market bought and sold" THYRSIS NEW YORK THE MACMILLAN COMPANY, 64-66, FIFTH AVENUE 1912 PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES. PREFACE To Mr. Theodore Reunert, whose name I gratefully place first among my few words of preface, this book owes its inception, and not its inception only, but a host of practical suggestions. His own activity on the Johannesburg Council of Education, his own enthusiasm for that which is the chiefest instrument of civilisation, owed much of their inspiration to Matthew Arnold, the labourer in the field of practical education as well as the apostle of enlightenment Xhe inspector of English schools, the investigator of educational systems in France and Germany, in Holland, Italy and Switzerland, was a critic of edu- cational .ideas and educational methods who could appreciate the best in them while exposing their defects, and who claimed that England should not fall short of the other centres of European civilisation in making true education a national concern, in making it an organised training for the many, and not either the privilege of the few or the prey of the charlatanism and cupidity of individual speculation. Matthew Arnold long regarded himself as one crying in the wilderness. Yet in the course of years his voice has made itself heard more widely than the voice of many another who wrote on education ; men perhaps so wholly identified with strictly educational work that they appealed for the most part to profes- sional circles only. In the public eye he was not the School Inspector, but the man of letters, the cham- pion of a high cause ; he was equipped not merely with educational formulas, but with wide-ranging 2C26S3O vi PREFACE ideas ; armed, too, with memorable phrases and stinging epigrams for the knotted cords with which to drive the profane and mere money-changers from the sanctuary of the human spirit. In him was some- what of the prophet as well as the critic, and it was this prophetic impulse, I think, that made itself felt among thoughtful persons outside the circle of educators proper, just as a similar prophetic impulse made itself felt from his contemporary seers of natural science. The crying need which he proclaimed for more wide-spread culture could be appreciated by every one who possessed culture or realised its power. He saw popular education develop in many ways during his lifetime, not always on the lines he desired ; but while various practical details which he advocated in the subjects and methods of teaching have been left aside, the larger ideals at which he would have education aim have constantly shaped the develop- ments of popular education during the years that have passed since his death. And this is not only due to the fact that the educational world has long known and studied the record of his technical work as inspector of schools, his foreign reports upon schools and universities and popular education of the Con- tinent, and his domestic reports upon the English schools that it was his duty to inspect year after year, admirable selections from which have been published from the Bluebooks wherein they are embalmed, first by Lord Sandford, and latterly by Mr. Marvin. It was due also to the fact that thoughtful people tfad been stirred by his general essays, wherein the ideals that form the educational goal were set forth not in PREFACE vii naked isolation, but as intimately linked with the social and political movements, the restless dreams of to-day, and the established realities of to-morrow which lie so near to the heart of that eminently "political creature," the Englishman. Nor indeed were these high considerations absent from his pro- fessional reports : witness " Democracy," the first in the volume of " Mixed Essays," which is the intro- duction to his report on "Popular Education in France," now inaccessible save in the libraries of the British Museum and the Board of Education, and the like. Far and wide, Matthew Arnold's prophesyings drove home the conviction that education is not a thing of the schoolroom, but of the whole body politic. His influence was the greater for being as it were indirect, for showing the value of education in terms of our more obviously insistent problems. The special references to education, however, have remained scattered up and down his works. That well-known book of selections, the " Prose Passages," contains but a handful of such. To collect into a single volume the most striking passages on matters educa- tional from his published writings and from Blue-books, was, as I have already said, the idea of Mr. Reunert who had marked many of them in the course of his reading. That the execution of his idea has fallen to my hand is, for personal as well as general reasons, a peculiar pleasure to me, and here, if I may not elsewhere, I gratefully associate his name with this book of Matthew Arnold's " Thoughts on Education." In these selections are included passages of a par- ticular and professional character dealing with the state of schools at certain periods of the nineteenth a 2 viii PREFACE century, as well as others of wider and less technical bearing. Matthew Arnold's repeated insistence on the value of literature and especially poetry as a humanising force in education has suggested the inclusion of several passages of literary criticism to show what kind of poetry he had in mind as possess- ing the highest formative power. The arrangement is chronological as far as may conveniently be, an arrangement which will enable the reader to follow Matthew Arnold's views as they developed with the developments of the time, while an index supplies cross-references to the subjects discussed. Subjoined is a list of the works from which selections have been taken, noting the edition used for the purpose, and the original date of publication. Nor are his formal publications alone drawn upon. The " Letters of Matthew Arnold " furnish a number of remarks to intimate correspondents on the main points of interest in his work from time to time. For permission to include some material that is still in copyright, my best thanks are due to Messrs. Macmillan. This volume does not profess to exhaust the educational stores in Matthew Arnold's writings. My hope is that it gathers within convenient compass the most interesting of his reflections, whether general or particular, and will help alike to show the general reader what was actuall}' thought and done for educa- tion by the " apostle of culture," and to push forward by direct stimulus or indirect suggestion the consum- mation of a true educational ideal for the whole people. L. H. December 1911 LIST OF BOOKS QUOTED FROM R. E. S. REPORTS ON ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS, 1852-1882 New edition by F. S. Marvin. (Wyman, for H.M. Stationery Office, 1908.) L. LETTERS OF MATTHEW ARNOLD. (Macmillan, 1895.) P. E. F. THE POPULAR EDUCATION OF FRANCE, WITH NOTICES OF THAT OF HOLLAND AND SWITZERLAND. (Longmans, 1861.) A reprint of the Report to the Education Commission, 1 86 1, entitled " Popular Educa- tion in France, Holland, and the French Cantons of Switzerland," after his continental mission of 1859. O. T. H. ON TRANSLATING HOMER. (Smith, Elder, 1896). Lectures delivered 1860-1862. F. E. A FRENCH ETON. (Macmillan, 1892). Containing "A French Eton," 1864, that portion of "Schools and Universities on the Continent" (1868) which deals with Secondary Education in France, and a Preface (1874) written when the German portion of the latter book was published separately, but afterwards omitted. E. C. ESSAYS IN CRITICISM. First Series (Macmillan, 1865). H. S. G. HIGHER SCHOOLS AND UNIVERSITIES IN GER- MANY. (Macmillan, 1892.) Published in 1868 as a Report to the Schools Enquiry Commissioners from 1865 onwards. C. L. THE STUDY OF CELTIC LITERATURE. (Smith, Elder, 1905: Corn hill Magazine, 1866; first in book form, 1867.) x LIST OF BOOKS QUOTED FROM F. G. FRIENDSHIP'S GARLAND. (Smith, Elder, 1903). Appeared from 1866 to 1870 ; first published in book form, 1871. B. R. S. A BIBLE READING FOR SCHOOLS. The Great Prophecy of Israel's Restoration : Isaiah, chapters 49- 66 (Macmillan, 1872). I. E. IRISH ESSAYS. (Smith, Elder, 1882.) U. A. DISCOURSES IN AMERICA (Macmillan, 1885) and Eversley Series, 1906. S. R. E. E. SPECIAL REPORT ON CERTAIN POINTS CON- NECTED WITH ELEMENTARY EDUCATION IN GER- MANY, SWITZERLAND, AND FRANCE. (Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1886.) L. D. LITERATURE AND DOGMA, 1873. CONTENTS PACK Proportion in Education . . . Preface, Johnson's Lives of the Poets I Discipline R. E. S. 52 . 3 The English Language in Welsh Schools R. E. S. 52 . 4 Co-education for Young People . R. E. S. 52 . 5 Lack of Culture in Pupil-teachers R. E. S. 52 . 5 Compulsory Education alone Universal R. E. S. 53 . 7 The Duty of the School Inspector R. E. S. 54 . . 7 The Schoolmaster . . . . R. E. S. 54 . 9 The Teacher's Training R. E. S. 55 10 Women Teachers in 1855 L. i, 46 12 Montalembert on English Public Schools and Universities . . . L. i, 50 12 Napoleon's Organisation of Church and State L. r, 114 13 The American Character in 1860 L. i, 115 13 Reading-books and Culture . R. E. S. 60 . 14 State Interference in Education . P. E. F. xii. 16 Character of the Masses in France P. E. F. xxi. 17 Causes of the Power of France . P. E. F. xxii. 17 Democracy's Lack of Ideals . P. E. F. xxxii. . 18 The Lack of Public Schools for the Middle Class P. E. F. xl. . 19 Culture and Character united in Athens P. E. F. xliii. . 20 French Administrative Divisions in 1 859 P. E. F. 5, 9 . 22 Over-Government and Under-Govern- ment . . . . . , ' . P. E. F. 1 1 . 22 The Christian Brothers' Schools . P. E. F. 14 and 1 6 23 Schools Founded by the Convention . P. E. F. 24 . 24 xii CONTENTS PAGE Educational Results of the French Revolution P. E. F. 29 . .24 Napoleon as Educator . . . . P. E. F. 31-3 . 25 Fusion ofthe Upper and Middle Classes^ Secondary Education in England and I P. E. F. 74-7 . 27 France .) Mixed Schools in France and Holland P. E. F. 81 . . 32 Comparative Expenditure in England and France in 1856 . . . P. E. F. 88 . .32 Schoolless Children in France and England in 1856 . . . . P. E. F. 101 . 33 The Sisters' Schools of Paris . . P. E. F. 103 . 33 Needlework Schools . . . . P. E. F. 104 . 34 Inspection of Private Schools . . P. E. F. 105-6 . 35 Pupil-teachers P. E. F. 108-9 3 6 Inspectors as Civil Servants . . . P. E. F. 147 . 38 Rational Form of the Code Napoldon . P. E. F. 159-60 , 38 Liberal Spirit of French Legislation . P. E. F. 160-1 . 40 The State as the Organ of the National Reason P. E. F. 164-5 . 41 Society dislocated by the Spread of Education P. E. F. 166-7 4 2 The Value of Ideals to a Nation . . P. E. F. 168-9 43 The Elimination of Superiorities} . . P. E. F. 192 . 44 Excellence of Primary Schools in Holland P. E. F. 195-6, 201 45 The Society for the Public Good. . P. E. F. 197-8 . 46 Organised School Inspection in Holland P. E. F. 199 . 46 Position and Character of Dutch Teachers P. E. F. 202-3 . 47 Teachers' Examination in Holland . P. E. F. 203 . 48 Pupil-teachers in Holland . . . P. E. F. 204 . 48 Religious Instruction in Holland . . P. E. F. 204-5 49 The Normal School of Haarlem . . P. E, F. 206 . 50 The Schools of Leyden and Utrecht . P. E. F. 207 .51 The Value of Recitation . . . R. E. S. 61 . .51 The most Important Poetical Monument O. T. H. i . . 53 The Translator's Task . . . . O. T. H. 2 . .54 The only Competent Tribunal . . O. T. H. 4-5 . 54 CONTENTS xiii PAGE Virtue of the Latin Element in English O. T. H. 7 . . 55 How to Approach Homer . . . 0. T. H. 8 . .55 The Four Qualities of Homer's Poetry O. T. H. 10. . 56 Unlikeness of Homer to Milton . . O. T.H.I 1-12 . 57 Fidelity in a Translator . . . O. T. H. 14 . .58 The Objection to a Rhymed Translation O. T. H. 15. . 58 How Pope fails to render Homer. . O. T. H. 16. . 59 Pope's Style lacks Plain Naturalness . O. T. H. 19-20 . 60 Pope's Style incapable of Good Descrip- tions . . . . * . , . O. T. H. 21-2 . 60 Pope's Fate a Warning to Translators . O. T. H. 22 . . 61 Pope's Version contrasted with Chap- man's O. T. H. 22-3 . 62 Chapman wrongly praised by the Critics O. T. H. 24 . . 63 Homer and the Elizabethans . . O. T. H. 25 . . 64 Chapman's Complexity of Thought . O. T. H. 26-7 . 64 Homer Works in the Grand Style . O. T. H. 30 . . 66 The One Thing demanded of a Transla- tion O. T. H. 32 . .67 Homeric Unity O. T. H. 47 . .67 What Constitutes the Grand Style . O. T. H. 59-61 . 68 Homer and Scott O. T. H. 61 . .69 English Eccentricity and the Need of Criticism O. T. H. 65 . .70 The Best Metres for Epic Poetry . O. T. H. 69-70 . 7 1 Milton's Blank Verse . . . . O. T. H. 71-2 . 73 Milton contrasted with Homer . . O. T. H. 73 . . 73 The Possibilities of the English Hexa- meter O. T. H. 77. .74 Homer and the Bible . . . . O. T. H. 89. .75 Genius of Homer O. T. H. 106 .76 The Evils of Literary Controversy . O. T. H. 108-9 7 6 English Literary Opinion . . . O. T. H. 112 -77 Danger and Charm of Dilettanteism . O. T. H. 114 . 78 The Saving Grace of Ignorance . . O. T. H. 116-17 . 79 Homer the Bible of the Athenians . O. T. H. 125 . 80 The Need to seek a Positive Result in Criticism O. T. H. 133-4 81 What is "The Grand Style" ? . . O. T. H. 137-8 . 82 xiv CONTENTS The Best Models of the Grand Style . O. T. H. 140-2 . 84 The Critic's First Duty O. T. H. 155-6 . 84 Verse Translation best for Homer O. T. H. 157-8 . 85 Distinctive Character of Poets . O. T. H. 170-2 . 86 Some Excuse for the Author's Vivacity O. T. H. 176 . 88 The Revised Code of 1862 . L. i, 148 . . 89 Reading and Recitation . . R. E. S. 63 . Q I Teachers and Self-culture . R. E. S. 63 . 93 A Learned and a Liberal Education . L- i, 233 . 93 The Reform of Eton .... F.E.3-4 . 94 French and English Literature . F. E. 17-18 . 94 Lacordaire F. E. 26, 28 . 95 Cost of Secondary Instruction . F.E.37-8 . . 96 The Need of Securities for Efficiency . F. E. 43 - 97 The Law of Supply and Demand In- applicable . . . . . F. E. 44-5 . . 98 Delusive Examinations F. E. 57-8 . . 99 The Real Needs in Secondary Instruc- F E. 60-3 . GO The Middle Class and Higher Education F. E. 66-7 . 102 Middle Class Education and the State F. E. 99-101 . 103 Public Establishment of Secondary F. E. 126-7. Middle Class Education and the Working Class F. E. 130-2 . . 1 06 National Influence of the Intellectual Life IO7 Educative Effect of the Aristocratic Ideal L. i, 305 . *v-v . 108 Oxford E. C. xviii. . . 109 Grammar and Science Teaching . L. r, 313 . no Class Division and State Authority L- i, 335 . in Public Schools and the Middle Class . F. G. 25 . 112 The Three Classes of Philistine . F. G. 35 . 113 Stein's Land Reform .... F. G. 36 . . 114 Teaching at Eton and at Lycurgus House F. G. 49 . 116 Compulsion for all Classes Alike . F. G. 52 . 119 The Welsh Problem .... C. L. ix. . . 119 The Bilingual Question C. L. 10 . 121 CONTENTS Payment by Results . . - . Would Compulsory Education Succeed? The Choice of School Books .' V The Old Private School . . . Origin of our Secondary Schools . The University of Paris Paris and Oxford . . . . . Studies in the Universities of Paris The College of France . . V. Schools of the Jesuits .... Condorcet's Plan of Secondary Educa- tion Napoleon's Work Revenue of the New University of France Guizot's Law of Primary Instruction . Ministry and Council of Public Instruction . . . . The Normal School . . Oxford and Cambridge French and English Schoolmasters Examinations in France and England . Private Schools in France and England Discipline in French and English Schools Growing Disbelief in Greek and Latin . Appointment by Examination Value of Public Establishments . Motto from Humboldt .... The Experience of the Continent . Compulsory Education .... Higher Education .... Technical Schools .... Council of Education . Obstacles to Profiting by Continental Experience . . . * XV PAGE R. E. S. 67 . 121 R. E. S. 67 . 122 R. E. S. 67 . 124 R. E. S. 67 . 124 F. E. 218 . 127 F. E. 2 10-12, 229- 31 128 F. E. 226-7 130 F. E. 232-3, 234, 237 . 131 F. E. 238 . 133 F. E. 239-40 134 F. E. 241 135 F. E. 245-6, 248, 252 . 135 F. E. 247, 253-4 . 136 F. E. 251-2. 137 F. E. 266-7 . 138 F. E. 279, 283-5 139 F. E. 281 . 141 F. E. 288, 290-2 . 142 F. R. 328-31 144 F. E. 337-8 I 4 6 F. E. 366-7 . H7 F. E. 394-5 I 4 8 F. E. 412 . ISO F. E. 4U-I5 IS* H. S. G. iv. . IS* H. S. G. ix. . 152 H. S. G. x.-xii. . 152 H. S. G. xv. 155 H. S. G. xviii. . I 5 6 H. S. G. xix. 157 H. S. G. xx.-i. 158 xvi CONTENTS The Initial Defect in English Schools . Reform of Classical Studies . . . Prussian School Law .... Prussian Leaving Examination . Pedagogic Teachers of Modern Languages . The Art of Teaching .... Need of an Education Minister . Prussian Belief in Culture Religious Instruction in Prussian Schools Salaries of Prussian Schoolmasters The Ancient Authors as Literature Wise Choice of Text-Books . Games at German Schools . Value of Classical Training . . " . The Pri-vatdocent Brodstudien and Examinations . The System of the German Universities The Conflict between Classical and Modern Studies .... The True Aim of Instruction Routine in our Public Schools Alter thumswissenschaft The Commercial Theory of Education The Conclusion of the Whole Matter . Our Middle Class Education Relative Efficiency of Public and Private Schools Functions of a Council of Education . Public Supervision of Endowed Schools English Universities merely Hants Lyctes Provincial Universities Foreshadowed . Limitation of Degree-Giving Powers . State Appointment of Professors . Training a better security of Fitness than Examinations .... FAGS H. S. G. 2 . 159 H. S. G. 13 . . 160 H. S. G. 20-2 . 161 H. S. G. 54-6 . 163 H. S. G. 67 . 164 H. S. G. 68-9 165 H. S. G.73- 165 H. S. G. 82-3 . 165 H. S. G. 85 . 167 H. S. G. 85-7 . 167 H. S. G. 96 . 169 II. S. G. 109-10 . 169 H. S. G. 112-13 170 H. S. G. 124-5 171 H. S. G. 131-2 . 172 H. S. G. 142-4 . 173 H. S. G. 148-9 . 175 H. S. G. 152 176 H. S. G. 153 . 177 H. S. G. 154-60 . 177 H. S. G. 161-2 . 182 H. S. G. 167-70 . 183 H. S. G. 172-5 . 185 H. S. G. 175-6 . 187 H. S. G. 187-91 (M. E. 147) 189 H. S. G. 200 . 192 H. S. G. 201-3 192 H. S. G. 206-8 . 194 H. S. G. 209-10 . 195 H. S. G. 218-19 196 TT r r^ _ H. S. G. 220 H. S. G. 222-3 H. S. G. 225 197 198 199 CONTENTS The English Character . ... Obedience and Right Action . . Need of a Serious Conception of Righteousness .... Recitation as a Formative Influence . Latin in Elementary Schools . " *~'_ Educational Interest of " A Bible Reading for Schools" . . . ". Importance of Letters in Schools . Value of a Classical Education . . Relation of Classical to Modern Poetry The Bible the only Possible Classic for the People Hindrances to Bible Reading in Schools Disregard of the Civilising Power of Letters Culture needed for All .... German and English Law-Making University Education in Ireland . The Need of Religion .... State-appointed Professors . Clap-Trap and Catch-Words , Confectioner and Doctor Good Recitation as helping Intelligence The Regulation of Studies . Grammar as a Class Subject Science and Letters .... Natur-kunde The Formative Power of Poetry . Middle Class and Working Class Education The Influence of Poetry Influences affecting Voluntary Schools Cramming, and the Creative Spirit . The Governing Aim of Education The Aim of Education .... Formative Influence of Masterpieces . Eutrapelia XVll PAGE F. G. x. I 99 F. G. xii. . 200 L. 2, 47 201 R. E. S. 72 . 202 R. E. S. 72 . 203 L. 2, 86 205 B. R. S. vi-vii. . 205 B. R. S. vii-viii . 208 B. R. S. ix-x. 210 B. R. S. x-xi. 212 B. R. S. xi-xii. . 213 B. R. S. xii. . 215 L. D. 7 i-3 216 F. E. 137-40 217 F. E. 153-4, 155 220 F. E. 159, 161, 191, 201-2 . 221 F. E. 188-9. 223 F. E. 215 . 224 F. E. 215-16 224 R. E. S. 74 . 225 L. 2, 123 227 R. E. S. 76 . 228 R. E. S. 76 . 22 9 R. E. S. 78 . 230 R. E. S. 78 . 232 L. 2, 151 233 R. E. S. 80 . 234 R. E. S. 82 . 235 R. E. S. 82 . 239 R. E. S. 80 . 242 I. E. 184 . 243 I. E. 184 . t 244 I. E. 187 . 244 xviii CONTENTS PAGE Regular Reading L. 2, 196 . .249 Reading of Books Hindered by News- papers L. 2, 268 .250 Light also a Moral Cause . . . D. A. x-xi. . ., 250 The Things of the Mind as a Political Force D. A. 30-7 . .251 The Love of France . . . . D. A. 38-9 . . 254 The Rivalry of Literature and Science in Education D. A. 76-92 . 255 Science Teaching and Human Nature D. A. 99-102 . 262 Mediaeval Universities . . . D. A. 115-16 . 264 The Middle Ages, Science and Letters D. A. 117-18 . 264 The Final Need of Letters in Education D. A. 124-6 . 265 The Study of Greek .... D. A. 130-2 .266 The Necessity for Literature . . D. A. 136-7 . 267 Free Education in Saxony . . . S. R. E. E. 6 . 268 ' Quality of Education . . . . S. R. E. E. 13-14 268 Careful Grounding . . . . S. R. E. E. 14 . 270 The Humanising Touch . . . S. R. E. E. 14 . 270 Religious Teaching in Germany . . S. R. E. E. 14 . 272 Organisation the Secret of Superiority S. R. E. E. 15 . 273 Lack of Co-ordination . . . . S. R. E. E. 15 . 274 Co-ordination of Primary and Secon- dary Education S. R. E. E. 16 . 275 Status, Training, and Pensioning of Teachers S. R. E. E. 16-17 276 French Training Schools . . . S. R. E. E. 18 .280 General Reflections from Abroad . S. R. E. E. 24-5 . 281 INDEX 285 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Proportion in Education DA milii, Domine, scire quod sciendum est, " Grant that the knowledge I get may be the knowledge which is worth having ! " the spirit of that prayer ought to rule our education. How little it does rule it, every discerning man will acknowledge. Life is short, and our faculties of attention and of recollec- tion are limited ; in education we proceed as if our life were endless, and our powers of attention and recollection inexhaustible. We have no time or strength to deal with half of the matters which are thrown upon our minds ; they prove a useless load to us. When some one talked to Themistocles of an art of memory, he answered : " Teach me rather to forget ! " The sarcasm well criticizes the fatal want of proportion between what we put into our minds and their real needs and powers. From the time when first I was led to think about education, this want of proportion is what has most struck me. It is the great obstacle to progress, yet it is by no means remarked and contended against as it should be. It hardly begins to present itself until we pass beyond the strict elements of education, beyond the acquisition, I mean, of reading, of writing, and of calculating so far as the operations of common 2 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION life require. But the moment we pass beyond these, it begins to appear. Languages, grammar, literature, history, geography, mathematics, the knowledge of nature, what of these is to be taught, how much, and how ? There is no clear, well- grounded consent. The same with religion. Re- ligion is surely to be taught, but what of it is to be taught and how ? A clear well-grounded consent is again wanting. And taught in such fashion as things are now, how often must a candid and sensible man, if he were offered an art of memory to secure all that he has learned of them, be inclined, as to a very great deal of it, to say with Themistocles : " Teach me rather to forget ! " In England the common notion seems to be that education is advanced in two ways principally : by for ever adding fresh matters of instruction, and by preventing uniformity. I should be inclined to prescribe just the opposite course ; to prescribe a severe limitation of the number of matters taught, a severe uniformity in the line of study followed. Wide ranging and the multiplication of matters to be investigated, belong to private study, to the de- velopment of special aptitudes in the individual learner, and to the demands which they raise in him. But separate from all this should be kept the broad plain lines of study for almost universal use. I say almost universal, because they must of necessity vary a little with the varying conditions of men. Whatever the pupil finds set out for him upon these lines, he should learn ; therefore it ought not to be too much in quantity. The essential thing is THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 3 that it should be well chosen. If once we can get it well chosen, the more uniformly it can be kept to, the better. The teacher will be more at home ; and besides, when we have once got what is good and suitable, there is small hope of gain, and great cer- tainty of risk, in departing from it. Preface to Johnson's " Lives of the Poets." Discipline I AM convinced there is no class of children so indulged, so generally brought up (at home at least) without discipline, that is, without habits of respect, exact obedience, and self-control, as the children of the lower middle class in this country. The children of very poor parents receive a kind of rude discipline from circumstances, if not from their parents ; the children of the upper classes are generally brought up in habits of regular obedience, because these classes are sufficiently enlightened to know of what benefit such a training is to the children them- selves ; but children of the class I am alluding to receive no discipline from circumstances, for they are brought up amidst comparative abundance ; they receive none from their parents, who are only half educated themselves, and can understand no kind- ness except complete indulgence ; and, in conse- quence, nowhere have I seen such insubordination, such wilfulness, and such a total want of respect for their parents and teachers as among these children. The teacher's hands cannot be too much strengthened in the schools which this class frequents ; for, if 4 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION they are not disciplined at school, they will, while young, be disciplined nowhere ; and a scale of fees is peculiarly undesirable, which makes the teacher dependent on the favour of their parents, and unwilling to risk that favour by introducing strict habits of discipline. General Report, 1852. The English Language in Welsh Schools THE children in the Welsh Schools are generally docile and quick in apprehension, to a greater degree than English children ; their drawback, of course, is that they have to acquire the medium of informa- tion, as well as the information itself, while the English children possess the medium at the outset, There can, I think, be no question but that the acquirement of the English language should be more and more insisted upon by your Lordships in your relations with these schools as the one main object for which your aid is granted. Whatever encourage- ment individuals may think it desirable to give to the preservation of the Welsh language on grounds of philological or antiquarian interest, it must always be the desire of a Government to render its domi- nions, as far as possible, homogeneous, and to break down barriers to the freest intercourse between the different parts of them. Sooner or later, the difference of language between Wales and England will probably be effaced, as has happened with the difference of language between Cornwall and the rest of England ; as is now happening with the difference of language between Brittany and the rest of France ; THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 5 and they are not the true friends of the Welsh people, who, from a romantic interest in their manners and traditions, would impede an event which is socially and politically so desirable for them. General Report, 1852. Co-education for Young People I MUST say that I have never seen any inconvenience arising from bringing together boys and girls in the same school, if their playgrounds are kept distinct. Indeed, the education of girls, when they learn with boys and from a master, appears to me to gain that very correctness and stringency which female education generally wants; while a female teacher is no doubt the person best qualified to instruct infants of both sexes. General Report, 1852. Lack of Culture in Pupil-Teachers ON one other topic, in connection with the subject of pupil-teachers, I am anxious to touch in conclusion. In the general opinion of the advantages which have resulted from the employment of them, I most fully concur ; and of the acquirements and general be- haviour of the greater number of those of them whom I have examined I wish to speak favourably. But I have been much struck in examining them towards the close of their apprenticeship, when they are generally at least eighteen years old, with the utter disproportion between the great amount of positive information and the low degree of mental culture and intelligence which they exhibit. Young men, 6 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION whose knowledge of grammar, of the minutest details of geographical and historical facts, and above all of mathematics, is surprising, often cannot para- phrase a plain passage of prose or poetry without totally misapprehending it, or write half a page of composition on any subject without falling into gross blunders of taste and expression. I cannot but think that, with a body of young men so highly instructed, too little attention has hitherto been paid to this side of education ; the side through which it chiefly forms the character ; the side which has perhaps been too exclusively attended to in schools for the higher classes, and to the deve- lopment of which it is the boast of what is called classical education to be mainly directed. I attach little importance to the study of languages, ancient or modern, by pupil- teachers, for they can seldom have the time to study them to much purpose without neglecting other branches of instruction which it is necessary that they should follow ; but I am sure that the study of portions of the best English authors and composition, might with ad- vantage be made a part of their regular course of instruction to a much greater degree than it is at present. Such a training would tend to elevate and humanise a number of young men, who at present, notwithstanding the vast amount of raw informa- tion which they have amassed, are wholly un- cultivated ; and it would have the great social advantage of tending to bring them into intellectual sympathy with the educated of the upper classes. General Report, 1852. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 7 Compulsory Education alone Universal I AM far from imagining that a lower school fee, or even a free admission, would induce the poor universally to send their children to school. It is not the high payments alone which deter them ; all I say is, as to the general question of the education of the masses, that they deter them in many cases. But it is my firm conviction, that education will never, any more than vaccination, become universal in this country, until it is made compulsory. General Report, 1853. The Duty of the School Inspector His first duty is that of a simple and faithful re- porter to your Lordships ; the knowledge that imperfections in a school have been occasioned wholly or in part by peculiar local difficulties, may very properly restrain him from recommending the refusal of grants to that school ; but it ought not to restrain him from recording the imperfections. It is for your Lordships to decide how far such imperfec- tions shall subsequently be made public ; but that they should be plainly stated to you by the In- spector whom you employ there can be, I think, no doubt at all. It is said that the Inspector is sent into his district to encourage and promote education in it ; that often, if he blames a school, he discourages what maybe, from local difficulties, a struggling effort, and an effort whose inferiority is owing to no fault of its promoters. I answer, that it is true that the 8 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Inspector is sent into his district to encourage education in it ; but in what manner to encourage education ? By promoting the efficiency, through the offer of advice and of pecuniary and other helps, to the individual schools which he visits in it ; not by seeking to maintain by undeserved praise, or to shelter by the suppression of blame, the system, the state of things under which it is in the power of this or that local hindrance to render a school inefficient, and under which many schools are found inefficient accordingly. A certain system may exist, and your Lordships may offer assistance to schools established under it ; but you have not, surely, on that account committed yourselves to a faith in its perfect excellence ; you have not pledged yourselves to its ultimate success. The business of your Inspector is not to make out a case for that system, but to report on the condition of public education as it evolves itself under it, and to supply your Lordships and the nation at large with data for determining how far the system is successful. If, for fear of discouraging voluntary efforts, Inspectors are silent respecting the deficien- cies of schools respecting the feeble support given to this school, the imperfect accommodations in another, the faulty discipline or instruction in a third, and the failure of all alike to embrace the poorest class of children if everything is repre- sented as hopeful and prosperous, lest a manager should be disappointed or a subscriber estranged then a delusion is prolonged in the public mind as to the real character of the present state of things, a THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION g delusion which it is the very object of a system of public inspection, exercised by agents of the Govern- ment on behalf of the country at large, to dispel and remove. Inspection exists for the sake of finding out and reporting the truth, and for this above all. But it is most important that all Inspectors should proceed on the same principle in this respect that one should not conceal defects as an advocate for the schools, while another exposes them as an agent for the Government. If this happens, besides that the general picture of the state of education will be unfaithful, there is also a positive hardship inflicted on the schools which are frankly reported on ; they will appear at a disadvantage compared with other schools, not because they are really in a better state, but because the statement of their defects is softened down or altogether suppressed. General Report, 1854. The Schoolmaster ALTHOUGH I thus press for the most unvarnished and literal report on their schools, I can assure the teachers of them that it is from no harshness or want of sympathy towards them that I do so. No one feels more than I do how laborious is their work, how trying at times to the health and spirits, how full of difficulty even for the best : how much fuller for those whom I too often see attempting the work of a schoolmaster men of weak health and purely studious habits, who betake themselves to this profession, as affording the means to continue their io THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION favourite pursuits ; not knowing, alas, that for all but men of the most singular and exceptional vigour and energy, there are no pursuits more irrecon- cilable than those of the student and of the school- master. Still, the quantity of work actually done at present by teachers is immense : the sincerity and devotedness of much of it is even affecting. They themselves will be the greatest gainers by a system of reporting which clearly states what they do and what they fail to do ; not one which drowns alike success and failure, the able and the inefficient, in a common flood of vague approbation. General Report, 1854. The Teacher's Training MUCH of the exaggeration respecting the over-teach- ing in elementary schools arises, I think, in the following way. People read the examination papers, which are printed from year to year in your Lord- ships' Minutes, and exclaim at the rate of attainment demanded ; as if the rate of attainment demanded by those examination papers was the rate of attain- ment demanded in elementary schools. They forget that these examination papers are for teachers, not for scholars. Yes ; but, they say, why demand so much learn- ing from those who will have to impart so little ? Why impose on those who will have to teach the rudiments only of knowledge to the children of the poor, an examination so wide in its range, so search- ing in its details ? THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION n The answer to this involves the whole question as to the training of the teachers of elementary schools. It is sufficient to say, that the plan which these objectors recommend, the plan of employing teachers whose attainments do not rise far above the level of the attainments of their scholars, has already been tried. It has been tried, and it has failed. Its fruits were to be seen in the condition of elementary education throughout England, until a very recent / period. It is now sufficiently clear, that the teacher I to whom you give only a drudge's training, will do : only a drudge's work, and will do it in a drudge's] spirit : that in order to ensure good instruction even within narrow limits in a school, you must provide it with a master far superior to his scholars, with a master whose own attainments reach beyond the limits within which those of his scholars may be bounded. To form a good teacher for the simplest elementary school, a period of regular training is requisite : this period must be foiled with work : can the objectors themselves suggest a course of work for this period, which shall materially differ from that now pursued ; or can they affirm that the attainments demanded by the certificate-examina- tion exceed the limits of what may without over- work be acquired within the period of his training, by a man of twenty or twenty-one years of age, of fair intelligence, and of fair industry ? General Report, 1855. 12 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Women Teachers in 1855 I AM rather interested in seeing the Training School for the first time. I am much struck with the utter unfitness of women for teachers or lecturers. No doubt it is no natural incapacity, but the fault of their bringing up. They are quick learners enough, and there is nothing to complain of in the students on the female side ; but when one goes from hearing one of the lecturers on the male side to hear a lecturer on the female side there is a vast difference. However, the men lecturers at the Boro' Road are certainly above the average, one from his great experience, the other from his great ability. You should have heard the rubbish the female Principal, a really clever young woman, talked to her class of girls of seventeen to eighteen about a lesson in Milton. " Letters of Matthew Arnold," i. 46. Montalembert on English Public Schools and Universities, 1856 WHAT he says about the Public Schools and Universities comes curiously from a foreigner, and just now ; but I think there is much truth in it, and that if the aristocratical institutions of England could be saved by anything, they would be saved by these. But as George Sand says in the end of her Memoirs : " L'humanite tend a se niveler : elle le veut, elle le doit, elle le fera ; " and though it does not particularly rejoice me to think so, I believe that this is true, and that the English aristocratic THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 13 system, splendid fruits as it has undoubtedly borne, must go. I say it does not rejoice me to think this, because what a middle class and people we have in England ! of whom Saint Simon says truly : " Sur tous les chantiers de 1'Angleterre il n'existe pas une seule grande idee." " Letters," i. 50. Napoleon's Organisation of Church and State, 1860 I HAVE had to look a good deal into the history of the present French organisation in Church and State, which dates from the first Consulate of the great Napoleon, and have come out of my researches with, if possible, a higher opinion of that great man than ever. The way in which he held the balance between old and new France in reorganising things I had till now had no idea of, nor of the difficulties which beset him, both from the Revolution party and the party of the ancient regime. "Letters," i. 114. The American Character in 1860 I SEE Bright goes on envying the Americans, but I cannot but think that the state of things with respect to their national character, which, after all, is the base of the only real grandeur or prosperity, becomes graver and graver. It seems as if few stocks could be trusted to grow up properly without having a priesthood and an aristocracy to act as 14 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION their schoolmasters at some time or other of their national existence. "Letters," i. 115. Reading-books and Culture THE candour with which school inspectors in France avowed to me their dissatisfaction with the school- books in use there, led me to reflect on the great imperfection exhibited by our school-books also. I found in the French schools good manuals for teach- ing special subjects a good manual for teaching arithmetic, a good manual for teaching grammar, a good manual for teaching geography ; what was wanting there, as it is wanting with us, was a good reading-book, or course of reading-books. It is not enough remembered in how many cases his reading- book forms the whole literature, except his Bible, of the child attending a primary school. If then, instead of literature, his reading-book, as is too often the case, presents him with a jejune encyclo- paedia of positive information, the result is that he has, except his Bible, no literature, no humanising instruction at all. If, again, his reading-book, as is also too often the case, presents him with bad literature instead of good with the writing of second or third-rate authors, feeble, incorrect, and colourless he has not, as the rich have, the correc- tive of an abundance of good literature to counter- act the bad effect of trivial and ill- written school- books ; the^second or third-rate literature of his school-book remains for him his sole, or, at least, THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 15 his principal literary standard. Dry scientific dis- quisitions, and literary compositions of an inferior order, are indeed the worst possible instruments for teaching children to read well. But besides the fault of not fulfilling this, their essential function the ill-compiled reading-books I speak of have, I say, for the poor scholar, the graver fault of actually doing what they can to spoil his taste, when they are nearly his only means for forming it. I have seen school-books belonging to the cheapest, and therefore most popular series in use in our primary schools, in which far more than half of the poetical extracts were the composition either of the anonymous compilers themselves, or of American writers of the second and third order ; and these books were to be some poor child's Anthology of a literature so varied and so powerful as the English ! To this defective- ness of our reading-books I attribute much of that grave and discouraging deficiency in anything like literary taste and feeling, which even well-in- structed pupil-teachers of four or five years' training, which even the ablest students in our. training schools, still continue almost invariably to exhibit ; a deficiency, to remedy which, the progressive development of our school system, and the very considerable increase of information among the people, appear to avail little or nothing. I believe that nothing would so much contribute to remedy it as the diffusion in our elementary schools of reading-books of which the contents were really well selected and interesting. Such lessons would be far better adapted than a treatise on the atmosphere, 16 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION the steam-engine, or the pump, to attain the proper end of a reading-book, that of teaching scholars to read well ; they would also afford the best chance of inspiring quick scholars with a real love for reading and literature in the only way in which such a love is ever really inspired, by animating and moving them ; and if they succeeded in doing this, they would have this further advantage, that the literature for which they inspired a taste would be a good, a sound, and a truly refining literature ; not a literature such as that of most of the few attractive pieces in our current reading-books, a literature over which no cultivated person would dream of wasting his time. General Report, 1860. State Interference in Education THE wish for a more deliberate and systematically reasoned action on the part of the State in dealing, with education in this country is more than once expressed or implied in the following pages. In this introduction I propose to submit to those who have been accustomed to regard all State-action with jealousy, some reasons for thinking that the circumstances which once made that jealousy prudent and natural have undergone an essential change. I desire to lead them to consider with me, whether, in the present altered conjuncture, that State- action, which was once dangerous, may not become, not only without danger in itself, but the means of helping us against dangers from another quarter. The Popular Education of France with Notices of that of Holland and Switzerland," p. xii, . ' THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 17 Character of the Masses in France THE common people, in France, seem to me the soundest part of the French nation. They seem to me more free from the two opposite degradations of multitudes, brutality and servility ; to have a more developed human life, more of what distinguishes elsewhere the cultured classes from the vulgar, than the common people in any other country with which I am acquainted. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. xxi. Causes of the Power of France THE power of France in Europe is at this day mainly owing to the completeness with which she has organised democratic institutions. The action of the French State is excessive ; but it is too little understood in England that the French people has adopted this action for its own purposes, has in great measure attained those purposes by it, and owes to having done so the chief part of its influence in Europe. The growing power in Europe is demo- cracy ; and France has organised democracy with a certain indisputable grandeur and success. The ideas of 1789 were working everywhere in the eighteenth century ; but it was because in France the State adopted them that the French Revolution became an historic epoch for the world, and France the lodestar of Continental democracy. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. xxii, C 18 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Democracy's Lack of Ideals ENGLISH democracy runs no risk of being over- mastered by the State ; it is almost certain that it will throw off the tutelage of aristocracy. Its real danger is, that it will have far too much its own way, and be left far too much to itself. " What harm will there be in that ? " say some : " are we not a self-governing people ? " I answer : " We have never yet been a self-governing democracy, or anything like it." The difficulty for democracy is, how to find and keep high ideals. The individuals who compose it are, the bulk of them, persons who need to follow an ideal, not to set one ; and one ideal of greatness, high feeling and fine culture, which an aristocracy once supplied to them, they lose by the very fact of ceasing to be a lower order and becoming a democracy. Nations are not truly great solely be- cause the individuals composing them are numerous, free, and active ; but they are great when these numbers, this freedom, and this activity are em- ployed in the service of an ideal somewhat higher than that of an ordinary man, taken by himself. Not only the greatness of nations, but their very unity, depends on this. In fact, unless a nation's action is inspired by an ideal commanding the respect of the many as higher than each ordinary man's own, there is nothing to keep that nation together, nothing to resist the dissolvent action of innumerable and conflicting wills and opinions. Quot homines, tot sententiae, and one man's opinion THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 19 is as good as another's there is no basis for a real unity here. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. xxxii. The Lack of Public Schools for the Middle Class THE aristocratic classes in England may, perhaps, be well content to rest satisfied with their Eton and Harrow ; the State is not likely to do better for them ; nay, the superior confidence, spirit, and style, engendered by a training in the great public schools, constitute for these classes a real privilege, a real engine of command, which they might, if they were selfish, be sorry to lose by the establishment of schools great enough to beget a like spirit in the classes below them. But the middle classes in England have every reason not to remain content with their private schools ; the State can do a great deal better for them ; by giving to schools for these classes a public character, it can bring the instruction in them under a criticism which the knowledge of these classes is not in itself at present able to supply ; by giving to them a national character, it can confer on them a greatness and a noble spirit, which the tone of these classes is not in itself at present adequate to impart. Such schools would soon prove notable competitors with the existing public schools : they would do these a great service by stimulating them, and making them look into their own weak points more closely : economical, because with charges 20 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION uniform and under severe revision, they would do a great service to that large body of persons, who, at present, seeing that on the whole the best secon dary instruction to be found is that of the existing' public schools, obtain it for their children from a sense of duty, although they can ill afford it, and although its cost is certainly exorbitant. Thus the middle classes might, by the aid of the State, better their instruction, while still keeping its cost moderate. This in itself would be a gain ; but this gain would be nothing in comparison with that of acquiring the sense of belonging to great and honourable seats of learning, and of breathing in their youth the air of the best culture of their nation. This sense would be an educational influence for them of the highest value ; it would really augment their self-respect and moral force ; it would truly fuse them with the class above, and tend to bring about for them the equality which they desire. "The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. xl. Culture and Character united in Athens IN modern epochs, the part of a high reason, of ideas, acquires constantly increasing importance in the conduct of the world's affairs. A fine culture is the complement of a high reason, and it is in the conjunction of both with character, with energy, that the ideal for men and nations is placed. It is common to hear remarks on the frequent divorce between culture and character, and to infer from THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 21 this that culture is a mere varnish, and that character only deserves any serious attention. No error can be more fatal : culture without character is, no doubt, something frivolous, vain, and weak, but character without culture is, on the other hand, something raw, blind, and dangerous : the most interesting, the most truly glorious peoples, are those in which the alliance of the two has been effected most successfully, and its result spread most widely. This is why the spectacle of ancient Athens has such profound interest for a rational man ; that it is the spectacle of the culture of a people. It is not an aristocracy leavening with its own high spirit the multitude which it wields, but leaving it the un- formed multitude still ; it is not a democracy, acute and energetic, but tasteless, narrow-minded, and ignoble ; it is the middle and lower classes in the highest development of their humanity that these classes have yet reached. It was the many who relished these arts, who were not satisfied with less than those monuments ; in the conversations re- corded by Plato, or by the matter-of-fact Xenophon, which for the free yet refined discussion of ideas have set the tone for the whole cultivated world, shopkeepers and tradesmen of Athens mingle as speakers. For any one but a pedant, this is why a handful of Athenians of two thousand years ago are more interesting than the millions of most nations our contemporaries. Surely, if they knew this, those friends of progress, who have confidently pronounced the remains of the ancient world so much lumber, and a classical education an aristocratic 22 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION impertinence, might be inclined to reconsider their sentence. "The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. xliii. French Administrative Divisions in 1859 (FRANCE contains, according to the last census, a population of 36,039,364 inhabitants.) Its 86 de- partments have, for administrative purposes, a division which it will often be necessary, in reading what follows, to bear in mind. Each department is divided into arrondissements ; each arrondissement is subdivided into cantons and communes. There are 363 arrondissements in France, 2850 cantons, 36,826 communes. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," pp. 5, 9. Over Government and Under Government I BELIEVE, as every Englishman believes, that over- government is pernicious and dangerous ; that the State cannot safely be trusted to undertake every- thing, to superintend everywhere. But, having once made this profession of faith, I shall proceed to point out as may be necessary, without perpetually repeat- ing it, some inconveniences of under-government ; to call attention to certain important particulars, in which, within the domain of a single great question, that of public education, the direct action of the State has produced salutary and enviable results. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. I r. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 23 The Christian Brothers' School IN 1789 the religious societies engaged in teaching the poor of France were twenty in number ; but the religious society which has prosecuted this work most effectually, which has most merited gratitude by its labours for the education of the poor, and which, at the present day, most claims attention from its numbers and from its influence, is undoubt- edly the society of the " Brethren of the Christian Schools." The brethren are enjoined by their statutes to devote themselves to the instruction of boys in all things that pertain to an honest and Christian life. They are not forbidden to receive the rich into their schools, but their principal business is to be with the poor, and to their poorer scholars they are to extend a special affection. They are to obey a Superior-General, who, with two assistants, is to be elected by the assembled directors of the principal houses. The Superior-General is chosen for life, the assistants for ten years. The separate houses are to be governed by directors, chosen for three years. No brother is to take holy orders. Their vows, which are for three years only, are the three regular vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience, with another of stability, and of teaching without fee or reward. Even these three-year vows they are not permitted to make until they have been members of the institute two years, one of which is passed in the noviciate, the other in a school. They are always to go in company with others of their order ; 24 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION at first they went in parties of two, now they must be at least three. Together with religious know- ledge they are to teach their scholars reading, writing, and arithmetic. They are to have in each of their houses a store of school-books and school- material, which they are to sell to their scholars at the cost price. They are not to talk or gossip with their scholars, or to hear any news from them. They are to be sparing of punishments. The director of each house is to have the inspection of the schools in connection with it. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," pp. 14, 16. Schools Founded by the Convention IT was the Convention which endowed France with two admirable institutions, of which the vitality has proved not less great than the usefulness the Normal School and the Polytechnic School. "The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. 24. Educational Results of the French Revolution " WHAT," I ventured to ask M. Guizot, " did the French Revolution contribute to the cause of popular education ? " " Un deluge de mots," replied M. Guizot, " rien de plus ! " As regards the material establishment of popular instruction, this is un- questionably true. Yet on its future character and regulation the Revolution, as unquestionably, exer- cised an influence which every Frenchman takes it THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 25 for granted that an inquirer understands, and which we in England must not overlook. It established certain conditions under which any future system of popular education must inevitably constitute itself. It made it impossible for any Government of France to found a system which was not lay, and which was not national. ft The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. 29. Napoleon as Educator FOR the feeble and decaying central schools of the Convention * mere courses of lectures, without hold on their pupils, without discipline, and without study the new law substituted the communal colleges and the lyceums, with boarders, with a rigid discipline, and with a sustained course of study; institutions which do not, indeed, give an education equal to that of our best public schools, but which extend to all the middle classes of France an education which our public schools give to the upper classes only. For the exclusively mathe- matical and scientific course of the revolutionary theorists, it substituted, but with proper enlarge- ment, that bracing classical course which the ex- perience of generations has consecrated, and which Napoleon, though he had not himself undergone it, had the power of mind to appreciate. Finally, by the establishment of 6400 scholarships, fairly * The law of the third Brumaire, year four, had decreed one for each department. In 1802 only thirty-two were found to have had any success. These thirty-two were the first Lycles under the new law. 26 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION distributed, it opened an access as wide as was possible, or even desirable, to the schools which it created. Only the first chapter of the law of 1802 related to primary schools. This merely repeated the humble provisions of the last law of the Convention. The Commune was to furnish a schoolhouse to the teacher, who still, after this was supplied to him, had to depend for his support upon the payments of his scholars. The number of these to be exempted, on the ground of poverty, from the school-fee, was reduced from a fourth to a fifth. The superin- tendence of the teacher by the municipal authorities was confirmed. Finally, the schools were placed under the supreme charge of the newly created departmental executive, the sub-prefects and the prefects. Small as was the attention then bestowed on schools for the poor, in comparison with that which at a later time they received, it is curious to remark how strongly the inconvenience of their total dis- organisation was felt in the French provinces, as long ago as the beginning of this century. It seems as if, rude and illiterate as was the village-school of France before the Revolution, its disappearance could leave a blank as serious as the blank which the disappearance of the village-school would leave now. In its endeavour to bring order out of the chaos which the Revolution had left, the Consular Government invited in iSoithe practical suggestions of the council-general of each department upon the wants of the locality. The councils-general, in their THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 27 replies, expressed, among other things, the greatest dissatisfaction at the state of the primary schools, and the greatest desire to see it improved. Many of them called for the re-establishment of the religious orders devoted to teaching. " The Brethren of the Christian Doctrine, the Ursulines, and the rest, are much regretted here," says the council- general of the Cote d'Or. That of the Pas de Calais begs the Government " Again to employ in the instruction of boys and girls the Freres ignorantins, and the Daughters of Charity, and of Providence." That of the Pyrenees Orientales says, " People here regret the religious associations which busied them- selves in teaching the children of the poor." That of the Aisne asks, like that of the Pas de Calais, for the " reorganisation of the religious communities devoted to the elementary instruction of children of each sex." To commit the primary instruction of France to religious corporations was at no time the intention of Napoleon. To avail himself of the services of these corporations, under the control of a lay body, modern in its spirit, and national in its composition, he was abundantly willing. Such a body he designed to establish in his new University. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," pp. 31-33. Secondary Education in England and France MY limits forbid me to do more than touch on this great subject of secondary instruction ; yet to touch on it for one moment in passing I cannot forbear. 28 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION I saw something of it ; I inquired much about it ; had I not done so, I should have comprehended the subject of French primary instruction very imper- fectly. Let me, then, be permitted to call the English reader's attention to the advantage France possesses in its vast system of public secondary instruction ; in its 63 lyceums and 244 communal colleges, inspected by the State, aided by the State,* drawing from this connection with the State both efficiency and dignity ; and to which, in concert with the State, the departments, the communes, private benevolence, all co-operate to provide free admission for poor and deserving scholars. M. de Talleyrand truly said that the education of the great English public schools was the best in the world. He added, to be sure, that even this was detestable. But allowing it all its merits, how small a portion of the population does it embrace ! It embraces the aristocratic class ; it embraces the higher pro- fessional class ; it embraces a few of the richest and most successful of the commercial class ; of the great body of the commercial class and of the immense middle classes of this country, it embraces not one. They are left to an education which, though among its professors are many excellent and honourable men, is deplorable. Our middle classes are nearly the worst educated in the world. But it is not this only ; although, when I consider this, all the French commonplaces about the duty of the * In 1855 the grant from the State to the lyceums was 1,300,000 fr. ; to the communal colleges, 98,000 fr. 86 c. " Budget de 1'Instruction Publique," pp. 164, 167. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 29 State to protect its children from the charlatanism and cupidity of individual speculation seems to me to be justified. It is far more that a great oppor- tunity is missed of fusing all the upper and middle classes into one powerful whole, elevating and refining the middle classes by the contact, and stimulating the upper. /In France this is what the : system of public education effects ; it effaces / between the upper and middle classes the sense of social alienation ; it raises the middle without dragging down the upper ; Jit gives to the boy of the middle class the studies, the superior teaching, the proud sense of belonging to a great school, which the Eton or Harrow boy has with us ; it tends to give to the middle classes precisely what they most want, and their want of which is the great gulf between them and the upper ; it tends to give them personal dignity. The power of such an education is seen in what it has done for the professional classes in England. The clergy and barristers, who are generally educated in the great public schools, are nearly identified in thought, feeling, and manners with the aristocratic class. They have not been unmixed gainers by this identification ; it has too much isolated them from a class to which by income and social position they, after all, naturally belong, while towards the highest class it has made them, not vulgarly servile certainly, but intellectually too deferential too little apt to maintain perfect mental independence on questions where the prepossessions of that class are concerned. Nevertheless, they have, as a class, acquired the unspeakable benefit 30 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION of that elevation of the mind and feelings which it is the best office of superior education to confer. But they have bought this elevation at an immense money-price at a price which they can no better than the commercial classes afford to pay; which they who have paid it long, and who know what it has bought for them, will continue to pay while they must, but which the middle classes will never even begin to pay. When I told the French Uni- versity authorities of the amount paid for a boy's education at the great English schools, and paid often out of very moderate incomes, they exclaimed with one voice that to demand such sacrifices from French parents would be vain. It would be equally vain to demand them of the English middle classes. Either their education must remain what it is, vulgar and unsound ; or the State must create by its authorisation, its aid above all, by its inspection institutions honourable because of their public character, and cheap because nationally frequented, in which they may receive a better. If the former happens, then this great English middle class, grow- ing wealthier, more powerful, more stirring every year, will every year grow more and more isolated in sentiment from the professional and aristocratic classes. If the latter, then not only will the whole richer part of our rich community be united by the strong bond of a common culture, but the establish- ment of a national system of instruction for the poorer part of the community will have been rendered infinitely easier. In fact, the French middle classes may well submit to be taxed for the education of THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 31 the poor, for the State has already provided for their own. But already there are loud complaints among the lower middling classes of this country that the Committee of Council is providing the poor with better schools than those to which they themselves have access ; and we may be very sure that any new measure which proposes to do much for the instruction of the poor, and nothing for that of the middling classes, will meet with discontent and opposition from the latter. It is impossible to over- rate the magnitude of this question. English superior instruction is perhaps intelligent enough to be left to take care of itself. Oxford and Cambridge are popularising themselves : with little noise and in the shade, the London University is performing a work of great national benefit. At any rate, superior instruction is the efflorescence and luxury of education ; it is comparatively of limited im- portance. Secondary education, on the other hand, is of the widest importance, and it is neither or- ganised enough nor intelligent enough to take care of itself. The Education Commissioners would excite, I am convinced, in thousands of hearts a gratitude of which they little dream, if, in presenting the results of their labours on primary instruction, they were at the same time to say to the Govern- ment : " Regard the necessities of a not distant future, and organise your secondary instruction." " The Popular Education of France, etc.," pp. 74-77. 32 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Mixed Schools in France and Holland AMONG the 39,600 public boys' schools, 17,000 are mixed, that is, they admit girls as well as boys. The number of mixed schools tends continually to diminish, by the creation of separate schools for girls. Although M. Cousin, in his report of 1833, calls the objection to mixed schools a " wide-spread error which makes female education on a great scale an almost insoluble problem," and directs against it the whole weight of his authority, the objection has not ceased to gain strength, and is at the present day, in France, almost universal. Upon no point, I am bound to say, have I found all those connected with education in that country more unanimous. In Holland, on the other hand, there prevails an equal unanimity in favour of mixed schools. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. 81. Comparative Expenditure in England and France in 1856 IN Great Britain, according to the latest returns, the annual expenditure on primary instruction, properly so called, was about 800,000. Putting out of sight, as we have put out of sight in the case of France, the value received for this expenditure in the shape of administration, inspection, etc., let us ask what it achieved for schools and scholars. It maintained no schools, but it aided, we will assume, in one way or another, all the schools liable to in- spection ; and on this estimate, which is exaggerated, THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 33 it aided 8461 primary schools, giving instruction to 934,000 scholars ; that is to say, it helped, at the outside, 8461 schools to exist, and it helped 934,000 children to receive instruction. In France, the same grant would have entirely maintained nearly 25,000 schools, and to more than a million and a half of children it would have entirely given instruction. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. 88. School-less Children in France and England in 1856 I COULD not discover that even in the great towns, where population is thickest, masses of poor children anywhere remained without instruction. There are cases of hardship, such as those which I have men- tioned ; but I should mislead the English reader if I allowed him to think that I found in any French city educational destitution such as that of the 21,025 school-less children of Glasgow, such as that of the 17,177 school-less children of Manchester. I should mislead him if I let him think that I found in France, or that I believe to exist in France, a school- less multitude like the 2,250,000 of England. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. 101. The Sisters' Schools of Paris APART from the mere instruction, however, there is, even in Paris, something in the Sisters' schools which pleases both the eye and the mind, and which is more rarely found elsewhere. There is the fresh, D 34 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION neat schoolroom, almost always cheerfuller, cleaner, more decorated than a lay schoolroom. There is the orderliness and attachment of the children. Finally, there is the aspect of the Sisters themselves, in general of a refinement beyond that of their rank in life ; of a gentleness which even beauty in France mostly lacks ; of a tranquillity which is evidence that their blameless lives are not less happy than useful. If ever I have beheld serious yet cheerful benevolence, and the serenity of the mind pictured on the face, it is here. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. 103. Needlework Schools ATTACHED to the same establishment is an asile- ouvroir, or needlework school, which I visited. The schools are open after or between the ordinary school-hours ; they are attended by girls from mixed schools under masters, to which they are often annexed ; by girls from ordinary girls' schools, of which the teacher is not particularly skilled in needlework ; finally, by girls who attend no other school at all. For the benefit of the latter a little instruction in reading, arithmetic and religious knowledge is added to the lessons in sewing, knitting, and marking. Embroidery and ornamental work are proscribed by law, except in those districts of France where they form an important branch of female industry. As the schools are open only for a few hours in each day, the services of skilful THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 35 teachers can be secured for a very moderate re- muneration. These establishments, which are of great use, and which have had no small share in giving to French needlewomen their superiority, are unknown as a school institution in England. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. 104. Inspection of Private Schools HARDLY anywhere in France (in this the reports of all the inspectors concur) can the private boys' schools, whether they be lay or congreganist, hold their own in the competition with the public schools. The private girls' schools kept by the Sisters are more fortunate. But for their boys although even in the private school the teacher has the indispensable guarantee of the certificate of capacity, without which, in France, no man may teach parents un- doubtedly prefer the public school with its additional guarantees of a public character and a more detailed inspection. To State inspection all private schools are subject ; but only in what concerns their pro- vision for the bodily health and comfort of the pupils, and their maintenance of due morality. So strongly do these establishments feel the advantage conferred by the publicity and stimulant of thorough inspection, that they constantly request the inspector to extend his examination from their school premises to their school instruction. Generally he refuses, and for reasons which his English brethren would do well to remember. " If T find the instruction 36 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION ever so bad and injudicious," he says, " I have no power to get it changed ; and I am bound to give public service where I know it can have results." Many an English squire, in like manner, wishes for the stimulant of inspection, while he is determined to keep his school entirely independent. In other words, he wishes to have an inspector down from London occasionally, as he would have a landscape- gardener or an architect, to talk to him about his school, to hear his advice, and to be free to dismiss him, as he might dismiss the landscape-gardener or the architect, the moment his advice becomes un- palatable. He wishes to have a public functionary to act as showman to his school once a year. But it is not for this that the State pays its servants. State supervision is useless if it can be rejected the moment it becomes a reality the moment it tends to enforce general reason against individual caprice. The counsels of inspection, to be of any real worth, must be in some way or other authoritative. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," pp. 105-106. Pupil-Teachers PUPIL-TEACHERS the sinews of English primary instruction, whose institution is the grand merit of our English State system, and its chief title to public respect ; this, and I will boldly say, the honesty with which that system has been administered. Pupil-teachers the conception, for England, of the founder of English popular education, of the THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 37 administrator whose conceptions have been as fruitful as his services were unworthily maligned, of Sir James Shuttleworth. In naming them, I pause to implore all friends of education to use their best efforts to preserve this institution to us unimpaired. Let them entreat ministerial economy to respect a pensioner who has repaid the outlay upon him a thousand times ; let them entreat Chancellors of the Exchequer to lay their retrenching hands any- where but here ; let them entreat the Privy Council Office to propose for sacrifice some less precious victim. Forms less multiplied, examinations less elaborate, inspectors of a lower grade let all these reductions be endured rather than that the number of pupil-teachers should be lessened. If these are insufficient, a far graver retrenchment, the retrench- ment of the grants paid to holders of our certificates of merit, would be yet far less grave than a con- siderable loss of pupil-teachers. A certificate, in- deed, is properly a guarantee of capacity, and not an order for money. There is no more reason that it should entitle its possessor to 20 than that it should entitle him to a box at the opera. Private liberality can repair the salaries of the schoolmasters, but no private liberality can create a body like the pupil-teachers. Neither can a few of them do the work of many. " Classes of twenty-five or thirty, and an efficient teacher to each class ; " that school- system is the best which inscribes these words on its banners. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," pp. 108-109, 3 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Inspectors as Civil Servants WHEN the Concordat was under discussion, neither supplication nor adroitness could prevail with Napoleon to give to the State itself an exclusively denominational character ; he steadily refused to call the Roman Catholic religion the religion of the State ; he would only consent to call it, what it undoubtedly was, the religion of the majority of the French nation. State inspection represents the unity of the civil power, not the divisions of rival sects. It takes care that children learn, in the public schools, each the doctrines of his own religion ; but it protects each, in learning these, from the intolerance of the other, and itself remains neutral, that it may check intolerance the better. The State, therefore, owes no account to any man of the religious persuasion of its inspectors ; for it is not as religious sectaries that they have to discharge their duties, but as civil servants ; and the moment they begin to discharge them as religious sectaries, they discharge them ill. *' The Popular Education of France, etc.," p. 147. Rational Form of the Code Napoleon IT is not a light thing that the law, which speaks to all men, should speak an intelligible human language, and speak it well. Reason delights in rigorous order, lucid clearness, and simple statement. Reason abhors devious intricacy, confused obscurity, and prolix repetition. It is not unimportant to the THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 39 reason of a nation, whether the form and text of its laws present the characters which reason delights in, or the characters which reason abhors. Certainly the text of an English Act of Parliament never carried to an uneducated English mind anything but bewilder- ment. I have myself heard a French peasant quote the Code Napoleon ; it is in every one's hands ; it is its rational form, hardly less than its rational spirit, that the code has to thank for a popularity which makes half the nations of Europe desirous to adopt it. If English law breathed in its spirit the wisdom of angels, its form would make it to foreign nations inaccessible. The style and diction of all the modern legislation of France are the same as those of the Code. Let the English reader com- pare, in their style and diction alone, M. Guizot's education-law, printed at the end of this volume, with the well-known bill of a most sincere and intel- ligent friend of English education, Sir John Paking- ton. Certainly neither was the French law drawn by M. Guizot himself, nor the English bill by Sir John Pakington ; each speaks the current language of its national legislation. But the French law (with a little necessary formality, it is true) speaks the language of modern Europe ; the English bill speaks the language of the Middle Ages and speaks it ill. I assert that the rational intelligible speech of this great public voice of her laws has a directly favourable effect upon the general reason and in- telligence of France. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," pp. 159-160. 40 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Liberal Spirit of French Legislation FROM the form I pass to the spirit. With still more confidence I say: It is not a light thing for the reason and equity of a nation that her laws should boldly utter prescriptions which are reasonable and equitable. It is not a light thing for the spread, among the French masses, of a wise and moderate spirit on the vital and vexed questions of religion and education, that the law of 1833 should say firmly : Le voeu des peres de famille sera toujours consulte et suivi en ce qui concerne la participation de leurs en/ants a I' instruction religieuse. It is not a light thing that the whole body of modern French legis- lation on these critical questions should hold a language equally firm, equally liberal. To this it is owing that in a sphere where the popular cry in other countries, either cannot be relied on or is sure to be wrong, there exists in France a genial current of sound public opinion, blowing steadily in the right quarter. To this it is owing that from dangers which perpetually thwart and threaten intellectual growth in other countries, intellectual growth in France is comparatively secure. To this, finally, it is owing that even in questions beyond this sphere, if they assume a sufficient generality, and do not demand a large knowledge of particular facts, of which the mass of Frenchmen is deplorably ignorant, the habit of intelligence continues in the French people to be active and to enlighten. It is with truth that M. Guizot says in his latest work : " C'est la grandeur de notre pays que les esprits THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 41 ont besoin d'etre satisfaits en mcme temps que Ics intfrets." * " The Popular Education of France, etc.," pp. 160-161. The State as the Organ of the National Reason IN dealing with education, a Government must often meet with questions on which there are two opposite opinions, and both rational. If it is wise, it will invariably treat such opinions with due respect, and will be guided, in deciding between them, by the character of the times, the state of the circum- stances, the disposition of its people. Shall public education be in the hands of the clergy or in the hands of the laity ? Shall the instruction given in primary schools be exclusively secular, or shall it be also religious ? Here are two questions, upon each of which opposite opinions, both having a ground of reason, may fairly be maintained. In inclining to either, in abandoning its own inclinations on the side of either, a Government may be taking a course which reason sanctions ; at any rate it is giving victory or defeat to arguments of which reason can take cognisance. The national intelligence can at least follow it in its operations. But a Government in dealing with education, will also sometimes meet with opinions which have no ground in reason, which are mere crotchets, or mere prejudices, or mere passions. Will it have the clearness of vision to discern whether they are such, or the courage, if * MAnoires, vol. ii. p 235. 42 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION they are, to treat them as such ? that is the ques- tion. Will it encourage and illuminate the national intelligence by firmly treating what is unintelligent as unintelligent, what is fanatical as fanatical, in spite of the loudness with which it maybe clamoured ; or will it wound and baffle and confuse the national intelligence by treating what is unintelligent as if it were intelligent, as if it were a real power, as re- spectfully to be parleyed with as possible to be inclined to, as reason herself ? The reader will be conscious that the State has sometimes followed, in England, the latter course. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," pp. 164-165. Society Dislocated by the Spread of Education EMINENT personages complained to me that already popular education in France was carried so far that society began to be dislocated by it ; that the labourer would no longer stay in his field, nor the artisan in his workshop ; that every labourer would be an artisan, every artisan a clerk. This is the language which we have all heard so often, from those who think that the development of society can be arrested because a farmer's wife finds it hard to get a cookmaid. It is sufficient to say to those who hold it, that it is vain for them to expect that the lower classes will be kind enough to remain ignorant and unbettered merely for the sake of saving them inconvenience. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," pp. 166-167. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 43 The Value of Ideals to a Nation THE two grand banes of humanity, says Spinoza, are indolence and self-conceit ; self-conceit is so noxious because it arrests man in the career of self- improvement ; because it vulgarises his character and stops the growth of his intellect. The Greek oracle pronounced wisest of men, him who was most convinced of his own ignorance : what, then, can be the wisdom of a nation profoundly convinced of its own attainment ? After all that has been said, it remains immutably true that " a little knowledge is a dangerous thing," unless he who possesses it knows that it is a little ; and that he may know this, it is almost indispensable for him to have before his eyes objects which suggest heights of grandeur, or intellect, or feeling, or refinement, which he has never reached. . . . The proud day of priesthoods and aristocracies is over, but in their day they have undoubtedly been, as the law was to the Jews, schoolmasters to the nations of Europe, schoolmasters to bring them to modern society ; and so dull a learner is man, so rugged and hard to teach, that perhaps those nations which keep their schoolmasters longest are the most enviable. The great ecclesiastical institutions of Europe, with their stately cathedrals, their imposing ceremonial, their affecting services ; the great aristocracies of Europe, with their lustre of descent, their splendour of wealth, their reputation for grace and refinement, have undoubtedly for centuries served as ideals to ennoble and elevate the sentiment L THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION pi the European masses.l Assuredly, churches and /aristocracies often lacked the sanctity or the refine- ment ascribed to them ; but their effect as distant ideals was still the same ; they remained above the individual, a beacon to the imagination of thousands ; they stood, vast and grand objects, ever present before the eyes of masses of men in whose daily avocations there was little which was vast, little which was grand ; and they preserved these masses from any danger of overrating with vulgar self- satisfaction an inferior culture, however broadly sown, by the exhibition of a standard of dignity and refinement still far above them. I " The Popular Education of France, etc." pp. 168-169. The Elimination of Superiorities IT is the spirit in which highly-instructed peoples live and work that makes them interesting, not the high instruction itself. Placed between France and Germany, Switzerland is inevitably exposed to influences which tend to prevent her democracy from exercising, unchecked, the pulverising action which democracy exercises in America. But the dominant tendency in modern Swiss democracy is yet not to be regarded without disquietude. It is socialistic, in the sense in which that word expresses a principle hostile to the interests of true society the elimina- tion of superiorities. The most distinguished, the most capable, the most high-minded persons in French Switzerland, are precisely those most ex- cluded from the present direction of affairs ; they THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 45 are living in retirement. Instruction may spread wide among a people which thus ostracises all its best citizens ; but it will with difficulty elevate it. " The Popular Education of France, etc," p. 192. Excellence of Primary Schools in Holland CUVIER has described the emotion of astonishment and delight with which on his first entrance into one of them he was struck ; so unlike was it to any school for the poor which he had ever seen, or which at that time was anywhere to be seen out of Holland. For it was in 1811. The popular instruction of other countries has grown up since that time ; but I have seen no primary schools worthy to be matched, even now, with those of Holland. The provincial governments fixed the teacher's salary for each province at a rate which made the position of the Dutch schoolmaster superior to that of his class in every other country. Free schools for the poor were provided in all the large towns ; in the villages, schools which taught the poor gratuitously, but imposed a small admission-fee on those who could afford to pay it. Ministers of religion and lay authorities combined their efforts to draw the children into the schools. The boards which distributed public relief, imposed on its recipients the condition that they should send their children to school. The result was a popular 46 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION education, which, for extent and solidity combined, has probably never been equalled. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," (Holland) pp. 195-196, 201. The Society for the Public Good IN 1784, John Nieuvenhuysen, a Memnonite minister in North Holland, founded, with the assistance of several friends, the Society for the Public Good. The society purposed, first, to prepare and circulate among the common people useful elementary works, not only on religious and moral subjects, but also on matters of everyday life. This first object it accomplished with such success, that in two or three years an improved calendar published by the society beat the popular calendar, a tissue of absurdities and superstitions, the Moore's Almanack of Holland, out of the field. The society's second object was to establish model and temporary schools, with libraries, for the use of workpeople who had left school. It purposed, thirdly, to conduct inquiries into the true principles of the physical and moral education of children, and into school method. The society prospered. In 1809 it numbered 7000 members, and had spread its operations as far as to the Cape of Good Hope. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," (Holland) pp. 197-198. Organised School Inspection in Holland To organise inspection : this is, in fact, the grand object of the law of 1806 ; with this it begins, and THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 47 with this it ends. To keep the system of inspection efficient was the central thought, the paramount aim of its author, up to the very last days of his life, when, a venerable old man, he received M. Cousin at Haarlem in 1836, and said to him : " Take care how you choose your inspectors ; they are men whom you ought to look for with a lantern in your hand." And inspection in Holland was organised with a force and completeness which it has attained nowhere else. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," (Holland) p. 199. Position and Character of Dutch Teachers FINALLY, and this M. Cuvier justly thought one of the grand causes of the success of the Dutch schools, the position of the schoolmasters was most advan- tageous. Municipalities and parents were alike favourable to them, and held them and their pro- fession in an honour which then, probably, fell to their lot nowhere else. Hardly a village schoolmaster was to be found with a salary of less than 40 a year ; in the towns many had from 120 to 160, and even more than that sum ; all had, besides, a house and garden. The fruits of this comfort and considera- tion were to be seen, as they are remarkably to be seen even at the present day, in the good manners, the good address, the self-respect without presump- tion, of the Dutch teachers. They are never servile, and never offensive. " The Popular Education of France, etc.," (Holland) pp. 202-203. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Teachers' Examination in Holland THE examination for the higher grades was con- siderably higher than the certificate examination of France, considerably lower than ours, for which, indeed, with its twelve hours of written exercises of mathematics alone,* it would be difficult to find a parallel. But the Dutch regulation, instructing the examiners to admit to the highest grade those candidates only who gave signs of a distinguished culture, assigned to the schoolmaster's training a humanising and educating direction, which is precisely what we, with our exaggerated demand for masses of hard information, have completely missed. School methods also and pedagogic aptitude occupied more space in the Dutch examination than in the French or in ours. " The Popular Education of France, etc," p. 203. Pupil-Teachers in Holland THE legislation of 1806 did not institute normal schools. How, then, was an efficient body of school- masters formed ? It was formed by permitting, in the schools of the Society for the Public Good, the best scholars to stay on at school for two or three years longer than usual, without paying, on con- dition that they acted as teachers : these became, * Lately reduced, I am happy to say, to nine. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 49 first, assistants ; then, under-masters ; finally, head- masters. Great eagerness was manifested to be nominated one of these retained scholars. M. Cuvier found this system in operation when he visited Holland, and he speaks warmly of its success. It was the first serious attempt to form a body of regularly trained masters for primary schools. In our eyes it should have a special interest : we owe to it the institution of pupil-teachers. " The Popular Education of France, etc." (Holland), p. 204. Religious Instruction in Holland FINALLY, under the legislation of 1806 it was not permitted to public schools to be denominational. The law required that the instruction in them should be such as to " train its recipients for the exercise of all social and Christian virtues," but no dogmatic religious instruction was to be given by the teacher, or was to be given in the school. Measures were to be taken, however, that the scholar should not go without the dogmatic teaching of the communion to which he belonged. Accordingly, the Minister for the Home Department exhorted by circular the ministers of the different communions to co-operate with the Government in carrying the new law into execution, by taking upon themselves the religious instruction of the school children belonging to their persuasion. The religious authorities replied favour- ably to this appeal. They willingly took upon them- selves the task required of them ; and nowhere, E 50 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION perhaps, has the religious instruction of the people been more eminently religious than in Holland, while the public schools have remained, by law, unsectarian. M. Cuvier found that the school children, in 1811, were taught the dogmatic part of their religion on Sundays, in church, by their own minister ; that on Saturdays, when Jews were absent, they were instructed in school by the schoolmaster in the New Testament and the life of Christ ; on other days, in the truths common to all religions. M. Cousin found, in 1836, the same avoidance of dogmatic teaching in the Dutch schools, the same prevalence of sound religious instruction among the Dutch people. M. Cuvier concludes his report by pointing out the foundation on which the excellent school-system of Holland appeared to him to repose. It reposed, he said, upon three things ; the comfort of the schoolmaster, the effectiveness of the inspection, the superiority of the school-methods. To these three advantages the Dutch schools still owe their prosperity. " The Popular Education of France, etc." (Holland), pp. 204-205. The Normal School of Haarlem THE normal school at Haarlem became justly cele- brated for its success, due to the capacity and character of its director, M. Prinsen. M. Prinsen was still at its head when M. Cousin visited Holland. He received M. Cousin at Haarlem ; and the vigour THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 51 of the man, and the personal nature of his influence over his pupils, is sufficiently revealed in reply to M. Cousin's request for a copy of the regulations of his school : " I am the regulations," was M. Prinsen's answer. " The Popular Education of France, etc." (Holland), p. 206. The Schools of Leyden and Utrecht IT was impossible for me to enter without emotion the halls and lecture-rooms of Leyden and Utrecht, illustrious by the memory of a host of great names, and recalling by their academic costume, their academic language, or their classical predilections, the venerable Universities of our own country. Perhaps the feeling that these, too, long maintained a course which the modern spirit, not altogether without justice, decried as antiquated, but which nevertheless formed generations able to fill, not ignobly, their part in Church and State, inspired me with indulgent tenderness towards their Dutch sisters. *' The Popular Education of France, etc." p. 207. The Value of Recitation RHETORIC and grammar are allied, and what may be called the rhetorical exercise of paraphrasing a passage of prose or poetry often finds a place in our grammar examinations. In general a pupil- teacher paraphrases a passage even worse than he 52 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION analyses it, and in the examination for Queen's scholarships this year no exercise in paraphrasing was given. We all complain of the want of taste and general culture which the pupil-teachers, after so much care spent upon them, continue to exhibit ; and in their almost universal failure to paraphrase ten lines of prose or poetry, without doing some grievous violence to good sense or good taste, they exhibit this want most conspicuously. Here, too, perhaps, the remedy will be found to lie, not in attempting to teach the rules of taste directly a lesson which we shall never get learnt but in introducing a lesson which we can get learnt, which has a value in itself whether it leads to something more or not, and which, in happy natures, will probably lead to this something more. The learn- ing by heart extracts from good authors is such a lesson. I have often thought of it as a lesson offering an excellent discipline for our pupil-teachers and I rejoiced to see it instituted by one of the regula- tions of the much attacked Revised Code. This regulation at any rate, I think, no one will be found to attack. Nay, it is strange that a lesson of such old standing and such high credit in our schools for the rich, should not sooner have been introduced in our schools for the poor. In this lesson you have, first of all, the excellent discipline of a lesson which must be learnt right, or it has no value ; a lesson of which the subject matter is not talked about, as in too many of the lessons of our elementary schools, but learnt. Here, as in the case of the grammar lesson, this positive character of the result THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 53 is a first great advantage. Then, in all but the rudest natures, out of the mass of treasures thus gained (and the mere process of gaining which will have afforded a useful discipline for all natures), a second and a more precious fruit will in time grow; they will be insensibly nourished by that which is stored in them, and their taste will be formed by it, as the learning of thousands of lines of Homer and Virgil has insensibly created a good literary taste in so many persons, who would never have got this by studying the rules of taste. Pupil- teachers will then be found to paraphrase well, whom no rules supplied by their teachers will ever teach to paraphrase well at present. General Report, 1861. The most important Poetical Monument IT has more than once been suggested to me that I should translate Homer. That is a task for which I have neither the time nor the courage, but the suggestion led me to regard yet more closely a poet whom I had already long studied, and for one or two years the works of Homer were seldom out of my hands. The study of classical literature is probably on the decline ; but, whatever may be the fate of this study in general, it is certain that, as instruction spreads and the number of readers increases, attention will be more and more directed to the poetry of Homer, not indeed as part of a classical course, but as the most important poetical monument existing. " On Translating Homer," p. i. 54 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION The Translator's Task IT is disputed what aim a translator should propose to himself in dealing with his original. Even this preliminary is not yet settled. It is said that the translation ought to be such " that the reader should, if possible, forget that it is a translation at all, and be lulled into the illusion that he is reading an original work something original " (if the trans- lation be in English) " from an English hand." The real original is in this case, it is said, " taken as a basis on which to rear a poem that shall affect our countrymen as the original may be conceived to have affected its natural hearers." " On Translating Homer," p. 2. The only Competent Tribunal No one can tell him how Homer affected the Greeks ; but there are those who can tell him how Homer affects them. These are scholars, who possess, at the same time with knowledge of Greek, adequate poetical taste and feeling. No translation will seem to them of much worth compared with the original ; but they alone can say whether the translation produces more or less the same effect upon them as the original. They are the only competent tribunal in this matter : the Greeks are dead ; the unlearned Englishman has not the data for judging ; and no man can safely confide in his own single judgment of his own work. Let not the translator, then, trust to his notions of what the ancient Greeks would THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 55 have thought of him he will lose himself in the vague. Let him not trust to what the ordinary English reader thinks of him ; he will be taking the blind for his guide. Let him not trust to his own judgment of his own work ; he may be misled by individual caprices. Let him ask how his work affects those who both know Greek and can appre- ciate poetry ; whether to read it gives the Provost of Eton, or Professor Thompson at Cambridge, or Professor Jowett here in Oxford, at all the same feeling which to read the original gives them. I consider that when Bentley said of Pope's trans- lation, " It was a pretty poem, but must not be called Homer," the work, in spite of all its power and attractiveness, was judged. " On Translating Homer," pp. 4-5. Virtue of the Latin Element in English WE owe to the Latin element in our language most of that very rapidity and clear decisiveness by which it is contradistinguished from the German, and in sympathy with the languages of Greece and Rome : so that to limit an English translator of Homer to words of Saxon origin is to deprive him of one of his special advantages for translating Homer. " On Translating Homer," p. 7. How to Approach Homer THE frame of mind in which we approach an author influences our correctness of appreciation of him ; 56 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION and Homer should be approached by a translator in the simplest frame of mind possible. Modern sentiment tries to make the ancient not less than the modern world its own ; but against modern sentiment in its applications to Homer the trans- lator, if he would feel Homer truly and unless he feels him truly, how can he render him truly ? cannot be too much on his guard. " On Translating Homer," p. 8. The Four Qualities of Homer's Poetry WHEN I say, the translator of Homer should above all be penetrated by a sense of four qualities of his author that he is eminently rapid ; that he is eminently plain and direct, both in the evolution of his thought and in the expression of it, that is, both in his syntax and in his words ; that he is eminently plain and direct in the substance of his thought, that is, in his matter and ideas ; and, finally that he is eminently noble ; I probably seem to be saying what is too general to be of much service to anybody. Yet it is strictly true that, for want of duly penetrating themselves with the first-named quality of Homer, his rapidity, Cowper and Mr. Wright have failed in rendering him ; that, for want of duly appreciating the second-named quality, his plainness and directness of style and diction, Pope and Mr. Sotheby have failed in rendering him ; that for want of appreciating the third, his plainness and directness of ideas, Chapman has failed in rendering him ; while for want of appreciating the THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 57 fourth, his nobleness, Mr. Newman, who has clearly seen some of the faults of his predecessors, has yet failed more conspicuously than any of them. " On Translating Homer," p. 10. Unlikeness of Homer to Milton I DO not despair of making all these propositions clear to a student who approaches Homer with a free mind. First, Homer is eminently rapid, and to this rapidity the elaborate movement of Miltonic blank verse is alien. The reputation of Cowper, that most interesting man and excellent poet, does not depend on his translation of Homer, and in his preface to the second edition, he himself tells us that he felt he had too much poetical taste not to feel on returning to his own version after six or seven years, " more dissatisfied with it himself than the most difficult to be pleased of all his judges." And he was dissatisfied with it for the right reason that " it seemed to him deficient in the grace of ease." Yet he seems to have originally miscon- ceived the manner of Homer so much, that it is no wonder he rendered him amiss. " The similitude of Milton's manner to that of Homer is such," he says, " that no person familiar with both can read either without being reminded of the other ; and it is in those breaks and pauses to which the numbers of the English poet are so much indebted both for their dignity and variety, that he chiefly copies the Grecian." It would be more true to say : The 58 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION unlikeness of Milton's manner to that of Homer is such, that no person familiar with both can read either without being struck with his difference from the other ; and it is in his breaks and pauses that the English poet is most unlike the Grecian." " On Translating Homer," pp. 11-12. Fidelity in a Translator IT is in vain that Cowper insists on his fidelity ; " my chief boast is that I have adhered closely to my original " " the matter found in me, whether the reader like it or not, is found also in Homer ; and the matter not found in me, how much soever the reader may admire it, is found only in Mr. Pope." To suppose that it is fidelity to an original to give its matter, unless you at the same time give its manner ; or, rather, to suppose that you can really give its matter at all, unless you can give its manner, is just the mistake of our pre-Raphaelite school of painters, who do not understand that the peculiar effect of nature resides in the whole and not in the parts. So the peculiar effect of a poet resides in his manner and movement, not in his words taken separately. " On Translating Homer," p. 14. The Objection to a Rhymed Translation ON the whole, Pope's translation of the Iliad is more Homeric than Cowper's, for it is more rapid. Pope's movement, however, though rapid, is not THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 59 of the same kind as Homer's ; and here I come to the real objection to rhyme in a translation of Homer. It is commonly said that rhyme is to be abandoned in a translation of Homer, because " the exigences of rhyme," to quote Mr. Newman, " posi- tively forbid faithfulness ; " because " a just trans- lation of any ancient poet in rhyme," to quote Cowper, " is impossible." This, however, is merely an accidental objection to rhyme. If this were all, it might be supposed, that if rhymes were more abundant Homer could be adequately translated in rhyme. But this is not so ; there is a deeper, a substantial objection to rhyme in a translation of Homer. It is, that rhyme inevitably tends to pair lines which in the original are independent, and thus the movement of the poem is changed. " On Translating Homer," p. 15. How Pope fails to render Homer RHYME certainly, by intensifying antithesis, can intensify separation, and this is precisely what Pope does ; but this balanced rhetorical antithesis, though very effective, is entirely un-Homeric. And this is what I mean by saying that Pope fails to render Homer, because he does not render his plainness and directness of style and diction. Where Homer marks separation by moving away, Pope marks it by antithesis. " On Translating Homer," p. 16 60 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Pope's Style lacks Plain Naturalness A LITERARY and intellectualised language is, how- ever, in its own way well suited to grand matters ; and Pope, with a language of this kind and his own admirable talent, comes off well enough as long as he has passion, or oratory, or a great crisis to deal with. Even here, as I have been pointing out, he does not render Homer ; but he and his style are in themselves strong. It is when he comes to level passages, passages of narrative or description, that he and his style are sorely tried, and prove them- selves weak. A perfectly plain direct style can of course convey the simplest matter as naturally as the grandest ; indeed, it must be harder for it, one would say, to convey a grand matter worthily and nobly, than to convey a common matter, as alone such a matter should be conveyed, plainly and simply. But the style of Rasselas is incomparably better fitted to describe a sage philosophising than a soldier lighting his camp-fire. The style of Pope is not the style of Rasselas ; but it is equally a literary style, equally unfitted to describe a simple matter with the plain naturalness of Homer. " On Translating Homer," pp. 19-20. Pope's Style Incapable of Good Descriptions IN elevated passages he is powerful, as Homer is powerful, though not in the same way ; but in plain narrative, where Homer is still powerful and de- lightful, Pope, by the inherent fault of his style, is THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 61 ineffective and out of taste. Wordsworth says somewhere, that wherever Virgil seems to have composed " with his eye on the object," Dryden fails to render him. Homer invariably composes " with his eye on the object," whether the object be a moral or a material one ; Pope composes with his eye on his style, into which he translates his object, whatever it is. That, therefore, which Homer conveys to us immediately, Pope conveys to us through a medium. He aims at turning Homer's sentiments pointedly and rhetorically ; at investing Homer's description with ornament and dignity. A sentiment may be changed by being put into a pointed and oratorical form, yet may still be very effective in that form ; but a description, the moment it takes its eyes off that which it is to describe, and begins to think of ornamenting itself, is worthless. " On Translating Homer," pp. 21-22. Pope's Fate a Warning to Translators THEREFORE, I say, the translator of Homer should penetrate himself with a sense of the plainness and directness of Homer's style ; of the simplicity with which Homer's thought is evolved and expressed. He has Pope's fate before his eyes, to show him what a divorce may be created even between the most gifted translator and Homer by an artificial evolution of thought and a literary cast of style. " On Translating Homer," p. 22. 62 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Pope's Version Contrasted with Chapman's CHAPMAN'S style is not artificial and literary like Pope's nor his movement elaborate and self-retarding like the Miltonic movement of Cowper. He is plain- spoken, fresh, vigorous, and, to a certain degree rapid ; and all these are Homeric qualities. I cannot say that I think the movement of his four- teen-syllable line, which has been so much com- mended, Homeric ; but on this point I shall have more to say by and by, when I come to speak of Mr. Newman's metrical exploits. But it is not distinctly anti-Homeric, like the movement of Milton's blank verse ; and it has a rapidity of its own. Chapman's diction, too, is good, that is, appropriate. With these merits, what prevents his translation from being a satisfactory version of Homer ? It is merely the want of literal faithful- ness to his original, imposed upon him, it is said, by the exigences of rhyme ? Has this celebrated version, which has so many advantages, no other and deeper defect than this ? Its author is a poet, and a poet, too, of the Elizabethan age ; the golden age of English literature as it is called, and on the whole truly called ; for, whatever be the defects of Elizabethan literature (and they are great), we have no development of our literature to compare with it for vigour and richness. This age, too, showed what it could do in translating, by producing a master-piece, its version of the Bible. " On Translating Homer," pp. 22-23. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 63 Chapman wrongly Praised by the Critics CHAPMAN'S translation has often been praised as eminently Homeric. Keats's fine sonnet in its honour every one knows ; but Keats could not read the original, and therefore could not really judge the translation. Coleridge, in praising Chap- man's version, says at the same time, " It will give you small idea of Homer." But the grave authority of Mr. Hallam pronounces this translation to be " often exceedingly Homeric " ; and its latest editor boldly declares that by what, with a de- plorable style, he calls " his own innative Homeric genius," Chapman " has thoroughly identified him- self with Homer ; " and that " we pardon him even for his digressions, for they are such as we feel Homer himself would have written." I confess that I can never read twenty lines of Chapman's version without recurring to Bentley's cry, " This is not Homer ! " and that from a deeper cause than any unfaithfulness occasioned by the fetters of rhyme. I said that there were four things which eminently distinguished Homer, and with a sense of which Homer's translator should penetrate himself as fully as possible. One of these four things was, the plainness and directness of Homer's ideas. I have just been speaking of the plainness and directness of his style ; but the plainness and directness of the contents of his style, of his ideas themselves, is not less remarkable. " On Translating Homer," p. 24. 64 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Homer and the Elizabethans BUT as eminently as Homer is plain, so eminently is the Elizabethan literature in general, and Chapman in particular, fanciful. Steeped in humours and fantasticality up to its very lips, the Elizabethan age, newly arrived at the free use of the human faculties after their long term of bondage, and de- lighting to exercise them freely, suffers from its own extravagance in this first exercise of them, can hardly bring itself to see an object quietly or to describe it temperately. Happily, in the translation of the Bible, the sacred character of their original inspired the translators with such respect that they did not dare to give the rein to their own fancies in dealing with it. But, in dealing with works of profane literature, in dealing with poetical works above all, which highly stimulated them, one may say that the minds of the Elizabethan translators were too active ; that they could not forbear importing so much of their own, and this of a most peculiar and Eliza- bethan character, into their original, that they effaced the character of the original itself. " On Translating Homer," p. 25. Chapman's Complexity of Thought ALL the Middle Ages, with its grotesqueness, its conceits, its irrationality, is still in these opening pages ; they by themselves are sufficient to indicate to us what a gulf divides Chapman from the " clearest souled " of poets, from Homer ; almost as great a THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 65 gulf as that which divides him from Voltaire. Pope has been sneered at for saying that Chapman writes " somewhat as one might imagine Homer himself to have written before he arrived at years of discretion." But the remark is excellent : Homer expresses him- self like a man of adult reason, Chapman like a man whose reason has not yet cleared itself. For instance, if Homer had had to say of a poet, that he hoped his merit was now about to be fully estab- lished in the opinion of good judges, he was as incapable of saying this as Chapman says it " Though truth in her very nakedness sits in so deep a pit, that from Gades to Aurora, and Ganges, few eyes can sound her, I hope yet those few here will so discover and confirm that the date being out of her darkness in this morning of our poet, he shall now gird his temples with the sun " I say Homer was as incapable of saying this in that manner, as Voltaire himself would have been. Homer, indeed, has actually an affinity with Voltaire in the unrivalled clearness and straightforwardness of his thinking ; in the way in which he keeps to one thought at a time, and puts that thought forth in its complete natural plainness, instead of being led away from it by some fancy striking him in connexion with it, and being beguiled to wander off with this fancy till his original thought, in its natural reality, knows him no more. What could better show us how gifted a race was this Greek race ? The same member of it has not only the power of profoundly touching that natural heart of humanity which it is Voltaire's weakness that he cannot reach, but can F 66 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION also address the understanding with all Voltaire's admirable simplicity and rationality. My limits will not allow me to do more than shortly illustrate from Chapman's version of the Iliad, what I mean when I speak of this vital differ- ence between Homer and an Elizabethan poet in the quality of their thought ; between the plain simplicity of the thought of the one, and the curious complexity of the thought of the other. " On Translating Homer," pp. 26-27. Homer Works in the Grand Style THE Elizabethan poet fails to render Homer because he cannot forbear to interpose a play of thought between his object and its expression. Chapman translates his object into Elizabethan, as Pope translates it into the Augustan of Queen Anne ; both convey it to us through a medium. Homer, on the other hand, sees his object and conveys it to us immediately. And yet, in spite of this perfect plainness and directness of Homer's style, in spite of this perfect plainness and directness of his ideas, he is eminently noble ; he works as entirely in the grand style, he is as grandiose, as Phidias, or Dante, or Michael Angelo. This is what makes his translators despair. " To give relief," says Cowper, " to prosaic subjects " (such as dressing, eating, drinking, harnessing, travelling, going to bed), that is to treat such sub- jects nobly, in the grand style, " without seeming unreasonably tumid, is extremely difficult." It is THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 67 difficult, but Homer has done it. Homer is precisely the incomparable poet he is, because he has done it. His translator must not be tumid, must not be artificial, must not be literary ; true : but then also he must not be commonplace, must not be ignoble. " On Translating Homer," p. 30. The One Thing demanded of a Translation IF the scholar in judging a translation looks to detail rather than to general effect, he judges it pedantically and ill. The appeal, however, lies not from the pedantic scholar to the general public, which can only like or dislike Chapman's version, or Pope's, or Mr. Newman's, but cannot judge them ; it lies from the pedantic scholar to the scholar who is not pedantic, who knows that Homer is Homer by his general effect, and not by his single words, and who demands but one thing in a trans- lation that it shall, as nearly as possible, reproduce for him the general effect of Homer. " On Translating Homer," p. 32. Homeric Unity THE insurmountable obstacle to believing the Iliad a consolidated work of several poets is this : that the work of great masters is unique ; and the Iliad has a great master's genuine stamp, and that stamp is the grand style. Poets who cannot work in the grand style in- stinctively seek a style in which their comparative 68 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION inferiority may feel itself at ease, a manner which may be, so to speak, indulgent to their inequalities. The ballad-style offers to an epic poet, quite unable to fill the canvas of Homer, or Dante, or Milton, a canvas which he is capable of filling. " On Translating Homer," p. 47. What Constitutes the Grand Style I MAY discuss what, in the abstract, constitutes the grand style, but that sort of general discussion never much helps our judgment of particular instances. I may say that the presence or absence of the grand style can only be spiritually discerned ; and this is true, but to plead this looks like evading the diffi- culty. My best way is to take eminent specimens of the grand style, and put them side by side with this of Scott. For example, when Homer says : a\\6., <(>(\os, Give Kul av. T/TJ o\vct>vpeai olirus ; KtirOave Kal fl6.TpoK\os, STTC/J fffo iroXXbj/ o.p.eCvuv,* that is in the grand style. When Virgil says : Disce, puer, virtutem ex me verumque laborem, Fortunam ex aliis, t that is in the grand style. When Dante says : Lascio lo fele, et vo pei dolci pomi Promessi a me per lo verace Duca ; Ma fino al centro pria convein ch' io tomi, J * " Be content, good friend, die also thou ! why lamentest thou thyself on this wise ? Patroclus, too died, who was a far better than thou." Iliad, xxi. 106. f " From me, young man, learn nobleness of soul and true effort : learn success from others." Aeneid, xii. 435. J " I leave the gall of bitterness, and I go for the apples of sweetness promised unto me by my faithful Guide ; but far as the centre it behoves me first to fall." Hell, xvi. 61. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 69 that is in the grand style. When Milton says : His form had not yet lost All her original brightness, nor appeared Less than archangel ruined, and the excess Of glory obscured,* that, finally, is in the grand style. Now let any one after repeating to himself these four passages, repeat again the passage of Scott, and he will per- ceive that there is something in style which the first four have in common, and which the last is without ; and this something is precisely the grand manner. " On Translating Homer," pp. 59-61. Homer and Scott THE poetic style of Scott is (it becomes necessary to say so when it is proposed to translate Homer into the melodies of Marmion) it is, tried by the highest standard, a bastard epic style ; and that is why, out of his own powerful hands, it has had so little success. It is a less natural, and therefore a less good style than the original ballad style ; while it shares with the ballad style the inherent incapacity of rising into the grand style, of adequately rendering Homer. Scott is certainly at his best in his battles. Of Homer you could not say this ; he is not better in his battles than elsewhere ; but even between the battle-pieces of the two there exists all the difference which there is between an able work and a master- piece. Tunstall lies dead upon the field, His life-blood stains the spotless shield : * Paradise Lost, i. 591. 70 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Edmund is down, my life is reft, The Admiral alone is left. " For not in the hands of Diomede the son of Tydeus rages the spear, to ward off destruction from the Danaans ; neither as yet have I heard the voice of the son of Atreus, shouting out of his hated mouth ; but the voice of Hector the slayer of men bursts round me, as he cheers on the Trojans ; and they with their yellings fill all the plain, over- coming the Achaians in the battle." I protest that, to my feeling, Homer's performance, even through that pale and far-off shadow of a prose translation, still has a hundred times more of the grand manner about it, than the original poetry of Scott. " On Translating Homer," p. 61. English Eccentricity and the need of Criticism OUR present literature, which is very far, certainly, from having the spirit and power of Elizabethan genius, yet has in its own way these faults, eccen- tricity and arbitrariness, quite as much as the Elizabethan literature ever had. They are the cause that, while upon none, perhaps, of the modern literatures has so great a sum of force been expended as upon the English literature, at the present hour this literature, regarded not as an object of mere literary interest but as a living intellectual instru- ment ranks only third in European effect and im- portance among the literatures of Europe ; it ranks after the literatures of France and Germany. Of these two literatures, as of the intellect of Europe THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 71 in general, the main effort, for now many years, has been a critical effort ; the endeavour, in all branches of knowledge, theology, philosophy, history, art, science to see the object as in itself it really is. But, owing to the presence in English literature of this eccentric and arbitrary spirit, owing to the strong tendency of English writers to bring to the consideration of their object some individual fancy, almost the last thing for which one would come to English literature is just that very thing which now Europe most desires criticism. " On Translating Homer," p. 65. The Best Metres for Epic Poetry I HAVE sufficiently shown why I think all forms of our ballad-metre unsuited to Homer. It seems to me to be beyond question that, for epic poetry, only three metres can seriously claim to be accounted capable of the grand style. Two of these will at once occur to every one the ten-syllable, or so- called heroic, couplet, and blank verse. I do not add to these the Spenserian stanza, although Dr. Maginn, whose metrical eccentricities I have already criticised, pronounces this stanza the one right measure for a translation of Homer. It is enough to observe that if Pope's couplet, with the simple system of correspondences that its rhymes introduce, changes the movement of Homer, in which no such correspondences are found, and is therefore a bad measure for a translator of Homer to employ, Spenser's stanza, with its far more intricate system 72 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION of correspondences, must change Homer's move- ment far more profoundly, and must therefore be for the translator a far worse measure than the couplet of Pope. Yet I will say, at the same time, that the verse of Spenser is more fluid, slips more easily and quickly along, than the verse of almost any other English poet. By this the northern waggoner had set His seven-fold team behind the stedfast star That was in ocean waves yet never wet, But firm is fixed, and sendeth light from far, To all that in the wide deep wandering are.* One cannot but feel that English verse has not often moved with the fluidity and sweet ease of these lines. It is possible that it may have been this quality of Spenser's poetry which made Dr. Maginn think that the stanza of The Faery Queen must be a good measure for rendering Homer. This it is not : Spenser's verse is fluid and rapid, no doubt, but there are more ways than one of being fluid and rapid, and Homer is fluid and rapid in quite another way than Spenser. Spenser's manner is no more Homeric than is the manner of the one modern inheritor of Spenser's beautiful gift, the poet, who evidently caught from Spenser his sweet and easy-slipping movement, and who has ex- quisitely employed it ; a Spenserian genius, nay, a genius by natural endowment richer probably than even Spenser ; that light which shines so unex- pectedly and without fellow in our century, an * The Faery Queen, Canto ii. stanza i. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 73 Elizabethan born too late, the early lost and ad- mirably gifted Keats. " On Translating Homer," pp. 69-70. Milton's Blank Verse THE rhymed ten-syllable couplet being thus ex- cluded, blank verse offers itself for the translator's use. The first kind of blank verse which naturally occurs to us is the blank verse of Milton, which has been employed, with more or less modification, by Mr. Gary in translating Dante, by Cowper, and by Mr. Wright in translating Homer. How noble this metre is in Milton's hands, how completely it shows itself capable of the grand, nay, of the grandest, style, I need not say. To this metre, as used in the Paradise Lost, our country owes the glory of having produced one of the only two poetical works in the grand style which are to be found in the modern languages ; the Divine Comedy of Dante is the other. England and Italy here stand alone ; Spain, France, and Germany, have produced great poets, but neither Calderon, nor Corneille, nor Schiller, nor even Goethe, has produced a body of poetry in the true grand style, in the sense in which the style of the body of Homer's poetry, or Pindar's, or Sophocles's is grand. " On Translating Homer," pp. 71-72. Milton Contrasted with Homer BUT the grandeur of Milton is one thing, and the grandeur of Homer is another. Homer's movement, 74 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION I have said again and again, is a flowing, a rapid movement ; Milton's, on the other hand, is a laboured, a self -retarding movement. In each case, the movement, the metrical cast, corresponds with the mode of the evolution of the thought, with the syntactical cast, and is indeed determined by it. Milton charges himself so full with thought, imagina- tion, knowledge, that his style will hardly contain them. He is too full-stored to show us in much detail one conception, one piece of knowledge ; he just shows it to us in a pregnant allusive way, and then he presses on to another ; and all this fulness, this pressure, this condensation, this self -constraint, enters into his movement, and makes it what it is noble, but difficult and austere. Homer is quite different ; he says a thing, and says it to the end, and then begins another, while Milton is trying to press a thousand things into one. So that whereas, in reading Milton, you never lose the sense of laborious and condensed fulness, in reading Homer you never lose the sense of flowing and abounding ease. With Milton line runs into line, and all is straitly bound together ; with Homer line runs off from line and all hurries away onward. " On Translating Homer," p. 73. The Possibilities of the English Hexameter WHEN I say this, I point to the metre which seems to me to give the translator the best chance of pre- serving the general effect of Homer that third metre which I have not yet expressly named, the THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 75 hexameter. I know all that is said against the use of hexameters in English poetry ; but it comes only to this, that, among us, they have not yet been used on any considerable scale with success. Solvitur ambulando : this is the objection which can best be met by producing good English hexa- meters. And there is no reason in the nature of the English language why it should not adapt itself to hexameters as well as the German language does ; nay, the English language, from its greater rapidity, is in itself better suited than the German for them. " On Translating Homer," p. 77. Homer and the Bible WE shall find one English book and one only, where, as hi the Iliad itself, perfect plainness of speech is allied with perfect nobleness ; and that book is the Bible. No one could see this more clearly than Pope saw it : " This pure and noble simplicity," he says, " is nowhere in such perfection as in the Scripture and Homer," yet even with Pope a woman is a " fair," a father is a " sire," and an old man a " reverend sage," and so on through all the phrases of that pseudo-Augustan, and most unbiblical, vocabulary. The Bible, however, is undoubtedly the grand mine of diction for the translator of Homer ; and, if he knows how to discriminate truly between what will suit him and what will not, the Bible may afford him also invaluable lessons of style. " On Translating Homer," p. 89. 76 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Genius of Homer HOMER has not only the English vigour, he has the Greek grace ; and when one observes the bolstering, rollicking way in which his English admirers even men of genius, like the late Professor Wilson love to talk of Homer and his poetry, one cannot help feeling that there is no very deep community of nature between them and the object of their en- thusiasm. " It is very well, my good friends," I always imagine Homer saying to them : if he could hear them : " you do me a great deal of honour, but somehow or other you praise me too like barbarians." For Homer's grandeur is not the mixed and turbid grandeur of the great poets of the north, of the authors of Othello and Faust ; it is a perfect, a lovely grandeur. Certainly his poetry has all the energy and power of the poetry of our ruder climates ; but it has, besides, the pure lines of an Ionian horizon, the liquid clearness of an Ionian sky. " On Translating Homer," p. 106. The Evils of Literary Controversy " NOTWITHSTANDING this example," says Buffon, who, as well as Montesquieu, had been attacked by the Jansenist Gazetteer, " notwithstanding this example, I think I may promise my course will be different. I shall not answer a single word." And to any one who has noticed the baneful effects of controversy with all its train of personal rivalries and hatreds, on men of letters or men of science ; to any one who has observed how it tends THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 77 to impair, not only their dignity and repose, but their productive force, their genuine activity ; how it always checks the free play of the spirit, and often ends by stopping it altogether ; it can hardly seem doubtful, that the rule thus imposed on himself by Buffon was a wise one. His own career, indeed, admirably shows the wisdom of it. That career was as glorious as it was serene ; but it owed to its serenity no small part of its glory. Buffon's example seems to me worthy of all imitation, and in my humble way I mean always to follow it. I have never replied, I never will reply, to any literary assault ; in such encounters tempers are lost, the world laughs, and truth is not served. " On Translating Homer," pp. 108-109. English Literary Opinion I THINK that in England, partly from the want of an Academy, partly from a national habit of intellect to which that want of an Academy is itself due, there exists too little of what I may call a public force of correct literary opinion, possessing within certain limits a clear sense of what is right and wrong, sound and unsound, and sharply recalling men of ability and learning from any flagrant misdirection of these their advantages. I think, even, that in our country a powerful misdirection of this kind is often more likely to subjugate and pervert opinion than to be checked and corrected by it. Hence a chaos of false tendencies, wasted efforts, impotent conclusions, works which ought never to have been 78 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION undertaken. Any one who can introduce a little order into this chaos by establishing in any quarter a single sound rule of criticism, a single rule which clearly marks what is right as right, and what is wrong as wrong, does a good deed ; and his deed is so much the better the greater force he counteracts of learning and ability applied to thicken the chaos. " On Translating Homer," p. 112. Danger and Charm of Dilettanteism " THE first beginnings of my Wilhelm Meister," says Goethe, " arose out of an obscure sense of the great truth that man will often attempt something for which nature has denied him the proper powers, will undertake and practise something in which he cannot become skilled. An inward feeling warns him to desist " (yes, but there are, unhappily, cases of absolute judicial blindness !) " nevertheless he cannot get clear in himself about it, and is driven along a false road to a false goal, without knowing how it is with him. To this we may refer everything which goes by the name of false tendency, dilet- tanteism, and so on. A great many men waste in this way the fairest portion of their lives, and fall at last into wonderful delusion." Yet after all Goethe adds it sometimes happens that even on this false road a man finds, not indeed that which he sought, but something which is good and useful for him ; " like Saul, the son of Kish, who went forth to look for his father's asses, and found a kingdom." And thus false tendency as well as THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 79 true, vain effort as well as fruitful, go together to produce that great movement of life, to present that immense and magic spectacle of human affairs, which from boyhood to old age fascinates the gaze of every man of imagination, and which would be his terror, if it were not at the same time his delight. " On Translating Homer," p. 114. The Saving Grace of Ignorance AND he ends by saying that my ignorance is great. Alas ! that is very true. Much as Mr. Newman was mistaken when he talked of my rancour, he is entirely right when he talks of my ignorance. And yet, perverse as it seems to say so, I sometimes find myself wishing, when dealing with these matters of poetical criticism, that my ignorance were even greater than it is. To handle these matters properly there is needed a poise so perfect that the least overweight in any direction tends to destroy the balance. Temper destroys it, a crotchet destroys it, even erudition may destroy it. To press to the sense of the thing itself with which one is dealing, not to go off on some collateral issue about the thing, is the hardest matter in the world. The " thing itself " with which one is here dealing the critical perception of poetic truth is of all things the most volatile, elusive, and evanescent ; by even pressing too impetuously after it, one runs the risk of losing it. The critic of poetry should have the finest tact, the nicest moderation, the most free, flexible, and elastic spirit imaginable ; he should be 8o THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION indeed the " ondoyant et divers," the undulating and diverse being of Montaigne. The less he can deal with his object simply and freely, the more things he has to take into account in dealing with it the more, in short, he has to encumber himself so much the greater force of spirit he needs to retain his elasticity. But one cannot exactly have this greater force by wishing for it ; so, for the force of spirit one has, the load put upon it is often heavier than it will bear. The late Duke of Wellington said of a certain peer that " it was a great pity his educa- tion had been so far too much for his abilities." In like manner, one often sees erudition out of all proportion to its owner's critical faculty. Little as I know, therefore, I am always apprehensive, in dealing with poetry, lest even that little should prove " too much for my abilities." *' On Translating Homer," pp. 116-117. Homer the Bible of the Athenians HOMER'S verses were some of the first words which a young Athenian heard. He heard them from his mother or his nurse before he went to school, and at school, when he went there, he was constantly occupied with them. So much did he hear of them that Socrates proposes, in the interests of morality, to have selections from Homer made, and placed in the hands of mothers and nurses, in his model republic ; in order that, of an author with whom they were sure to be so perpetually conversant, the young might learn only those parts which might do THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Si them good. His language was as familiar to Sophocles, we may be quite sure, as the language of the Bible is to us. Nay, more. Homer's language was not, of course, in the time of Sophocles, the spoken or written language of ordinary life, any more than the language of the Bible, any more than the language of poetry, is with us ; but for one great species of composition epic poetry it was still the current language ; it was the language in which every one who made that sort of poetry composed. " On Translating Homer," p. 125. The Need to seek a Positive Result in Criticism THIS is all I seek in criticisms ; and perhaps (as I have already said) it is only as one seeks a positive result of this kind, that one can get any fruit from them. Seeking a negative result from them personal altercation and wrangling one gets no fruit ; seeking a positive result, the elucidation and estab- lishment of one's ideas one may get much. Even bad criticisms may thus be made suggestive and fruitful. I declared, in a former lecture on this subject, my conviction that criticism is not the strong point of our national literature. Well, even the bad criticisms on our present topic which I meet with, serve to illustrate this conviction for me. And thus one is enabled, even in reading remarks which for Homeric criticism, for their immediate subject, have no value which are far too personal in spirit, far too immoderate in temper, and far too heavy- G 82 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION handed in style, for the delicate matter they have to treat still to gain light and confirmation for a serious idea, and to follow the Baconian injunc- tion, semper aliquid addiscere, always to be adding to one's stock of observation and knowledge. Yes, even when we have to do with writers who to quote the words of an exquisite critic, the master of us all in criticism, M. Sainte-Beuve remind us, when they handle such subjects as our present, of " Romans of the fourth or fifth century, coming to hold forth, all at random, in African style, on papers found in the desk of Augustus, Maecenas, or Pollio," even then we may instruct ourselves if we may regard ideas and not persons ; even then we may enable ourselves to say, with the same critic describing the effect made upon him by D'Argenson's Memoirs : " My taste is revolted, but I learn something Je suis choque mais je suis instruit." " On Translating Homer," pp. 133-134. What is "The Grand Style"? HOMER can in no sense be said to sink with his subject, because his soundness has something more than literal naturalness about it ; because his sound- ness is the soundness of Homer, of a great epic poet ; because, in fact, he is in the grand style. So he sheds over the simplest matter he touches the charm of his grand manner ; he makes everything noble. Nothing has raised more questioning among my critics than these words noble, the grand style. People complain that I do not define these words THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 83 sufficiently, that I do not tell them enough about them. " The grand style but what is the grand style ? " they cry ; some with an inclination to believe in it, but puzzled ; others mockingly and with incredulity. Alas ! the grand style is the last matter in the world for verbal definition to deal with adequately. One may say of it as is said of faith : " One must feel it in order to know what it is." But, as of faith, so too one may say of noble- ness, of the grand style : " Woe to those who know it not ! " Yet this expression, though indefinable, has a charm ; one is the better for considering it ; bonum est, nos hie esse ; nay, one loves to try to explain it, though one knows that one must speak imperfectly. For those, then, who ask the question, What is the grand style ? with sincerity, I will try to make some answer, inadequate as it must be. For those who ask it mockingly I have no answer, except to repeat to them, with compassionate sorrow, the Gospel words : Moriemini in peccatis vestris, Ye shall die in your sins. But let me, at any rate, have the pleasure of again giving, before I begin to try and define the grand style, a specimen of what it is. Standing on earth, not rapt above the pole, More safe I sing with mortal voice, unchanged To hoarse or mute, though fall'n on evil days, On evil days though fall'n, and evil tongues. . . . There is the grand style in perfection ; and any one who has a sense for it, will feel it a thousand times better from repeating those lines than from hearing anything I can say about it. 84 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Let us try, however, what can be said, controlling what we say by examples. I think it will be found that the grand style arises in poetry, when a noble nature, poetically gifted, treats with simplicity or with severity a serious subject. " On Translating Homer," pp. 137-138. The Best Models of the Grand Style THE best model of the grand style simple is Homer ; perhaps the best model of the grand style severe is Milton. But Dante is remarkable for affording admirable examples of both styles ; he has the grand style which arises from simplicity, and he has the grand style which arises from severity. Both these styles, the simple and the severe, are truly grand ; the severe seems, perhaps, the grandest, so long as we attend most to the great personality, to the noble nature, in the poet its author ; the simple seems the grandest when we attend most to the exquisite faculty, to the poetical gift. But the simple is no doubt to be preferred. It is the more magical : in the other there is something intellectual, something which gives scope for a play of thought which may exist where the poetical gift is either wanting or present in only inferior degree ; the severe is much more imitable, and this a little spoils its charm. " On Translating Homer," pp. 140-142. The Critic's First Duty IT is the critic's first duty prior even to his duty of stigmatising what is bad to welcome everything THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 85 that is good. In welcoming this, he must at all times be ready, like the Christian convert, even to burn what he used to worship, and to worship what he used to burn. Nay, but he need not be thus inconsistent in welcoming it ; he may retain all his principles : principles endure, circumstances change ; absolute success is one thing, relative success another. Relative success may take place under the most diverse conditions ; and it is in appreciating the good in even relative success, it is in taking into account the change of circumstances, that the critic's judgment is tested, that his versatility must display itself. He is to keep his idea of the best, of per- fection, and at the same time to be willingly accessible to every second best which offers itself. " On Translating Homer," pp. 155-156. Verse Translation to be Preferred to Prose I CONCEDE that a good verse-translation of Homer, or, indeed, of any poet, is very difficult, and that a good prose-translation is much easier ; but then I urge that a verse-translation, while giving the pleasure which Pope's has given, might at the same time render Homer more faithfully than Pope's ; and that this being possible, we ought not to cease wishing for a source of pleasure which no prose- translation can ever hope to rival. Wishing for such a verse-translation of Homer, believing that rhythms have natural tendencies which, within certain limits, inevitably govern them ; having little faith, therefore, that rhythms which 86 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION have manifested tendencies utterly un-Homeric can so change themselves as to become well adapted for rendering Homer I have looked about for the rhythm which seems to depart least from the ten- dencies of Homer's rhythm. Such a rhythm I think may be found in the English hexameter, somewhat modified. "On Translating Homer," pp. 157-158. Distinctive Character of Poets BUT, after all, Homer is not a better poet than the balladists, because he has taken in the hexameter a better instrument ; he took this instrument because he was a different poet from them ; so different not only so much better, but so essentially different that he is not to be classed with them at all. Poets receive their distinctive character, not from their subjects, but from their application to that subject of the ideas (to quote the Excursion) , On God, on Nature, and on human life, which they have acquired for themselves. In the ballad-poets in general, as in men of a rude and early stage of the world, in whom their humanity is not yet variously and fully developed, the stock of these ideas is scanty, and the ideas themselves not very effective or profound. From them the narrative itself is the great matter, not the spirit and significance which underlies the narrative. Even in later times of richly developed life and thought, poets appear to have what may be called a balladist's mind; in whom a fresh and lively curiosity for THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 87 the outward spectacle of the world is much more strong than their sense of the inward significance of that spectacle. When they apply ideas to their narrative of human events, you feel that they are, so to speak, travelling out of their own province : in the best of them you feel this perceptibly, but in those of a lower order you feel it very strongly. Even Sir Walter Scott's efforts of this kind even, for instance, the Breathes there a man with soul so dead, or the O woman ! in our hours of ease, even these leave, I think, as high poetry, much to be desired ; far more than the same poet's descrip- tions of a hunt or a battle. But Lord Macaulay's Then out spake brave Horatius, The captain of the gate : ' To all the men upon this earth Death cometh soon or late,' (and here, since I have been reproached with under- valuing Lord Macaulay's Lays of Ancient Rome, let me frankly say that, to my mind, a man's power to detect the ring of false metal in those Lays is a good measure of his fitness to give an opinion about poetical matters at all), I say, Lord Macaulay's To all the men upon this earth Death cometh soon or late, it is hard to read without a cry of pain. But with Homer it is very different. This " noble barbarian," this " savage with the lively eye," whose verse, Mr. Newman thinks, would affect us, if we could 88 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION hear the living Homer, " like an elegant and simple melody from an African of the Gold Coast," is never more at home, never more nobly himself, than in applying profound ideas to his narrative. As a poet he belongs narrative as is his poetry and early as is his date to an incomparably more developed spiritual and intellectual order than the balladists, or than Scott and Macaulay ; he is here as much to be distinguished from them, and in the same way, as Milton is to be distinguished from them. He is, indeed, rather to be classed with Milton than with the balladists and Scott ; for what he has in common with Milton the noble and pro- found application of ideas to life is the most essential part of poetic greatness. " On Translating Homer," pp. 170-172. Some Excuse for the Author's Vivacity How vain to rise up early, and to take rest late, from any zeal for proving to Mr. Newman that he must not, in translating Homer, say houndis and dancen ; or to the first of the two critics above quoted, that one poet may be a greater poetical force than another, and yet have a more unequal style ; or to the second, that the best art, having to represent the death of a hero, does not set about imitating his dying noises ! Such critics, however, provide for an opponent's vivacity the charming excuse offered by Rivarol for his, when he was reproached for giving offence by it : " Ah ! " he exclaimed, " no one considers how much pain every THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 89 man of taste has had to suffer before he ever inflicts any." " On Translating Homer," p. 176. The Revised Code of 1862 THE impossibility of preparing the bulk of the children to pass the examination proposed was, no doubt, exaggerated. We have seen what can be accomplished in this line by preparers. On the other hand, I have always thought that the Com- missioners, finding in the state of the junior classes and of the elementary matters of instruction a point easy to be made and strikingly effective, naturally made it with some excess of energy, and pressed it too hard. I knew the English schools well in this period, between 1850 and 1860, and at the end of it I was enabled to compare them with schools abroad. Some preventible neglect of the junior classes, some preventible shortcoming in the ele- mentary instruction there was, but not nearly so much as was imagined. What there was would have been sufficiently met by a capitation grant on individual examination, not for the whole school, but for the children between seven and eight years old, and nine and ten, a grant which would then have been subsidiary, not principal. General " payment by results " has been a remedy worse than the disease which it was meant to cure. The opposition to Mr. Lowe's Revised Code of 1862 so far prevailed that it was agreed to pay one-third of the Government grant on attendance, 90 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION and but two-thirds on examination. Moreover, the grouping by age was abandoned, and the arrangement of the children in six classes, or standards, as they have come to be called, was substituted for it. The teacher presented the child in the standard for which he thought him fit ; he must present him the next time, however, in a standard above that. The capitation grant on attendance was four shillings ; that on examination was twice that amount, one-third of which was forfeited for a failure in reading, or writing, or arithmetic. This latter grant has governed the instruction and in- spection of our elementary schools ever since. I have never wavered in the opinion most unaccept- able to my official chiefs that such a consequence of the Revised Code was inevitable, and also harmful. To a clever Minister and an austere Secretary, to the House of Commons and the newspapers, the scheme of " payment by results," and those results, reading, writing, and arithmetic, " the most necessary part of what children come to school to learn," a scheme which should make public education " if not efficient, cheap ; and if not cheap, efficient, "-r-was, of course, attractive. It was intelligible, plausible, likely to be carried, likely to be maintainable, after it had been carried. That, by concentrating the teacher's attention upon enabling his scholars to pass in the three elementary matters, it must injure the teaching, narrow it, and make it mechanical, was an educator's objection easily brushed aside by our public men. It was urged by Sir James Shuttleworth, but this THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 91 was attributed to a parent's partiality for the Minutes of 1846 and the Old Code founded on them, a Code which the Revised Code had superseded. But the objection did really occur to him and weigh with him, because he was a born educator, and had seen and studied the work of the great Swiss educators, Pestalozzi, Fellenberg, Vehrli. It occurred to me because I had seen the foreign schools. No serious and well-informed student of education, judging freely and without bias, will approve the Revised Code. 1887. " Letters," i. p. 148. Reading and Recitation THE attention which has been drawn by the Revised Code to the elementary subjects of reading, writing, and arithmetic has already had the happiest effect in improving the quality of school reading books. At last the compilers of these works seem beginning to understand that the right way of teaching a little boy to read is not by setting him to read such sen- tences as these (I quote from school works till lately much in vogue) ; " the crocodile is vivi- parous," " quicksilver, antimony, calamine, zinc, etc., are metals," " the slope of a desk is oblique, the corners of the door are angles ; " or the right way of teaching a big boy to read better, to set him to read : " some time after one meal is digested we feel again the sensation of hunger, which is gratified by again taking food ; " " most towns are supplied with water and lighted by gas, their streets are paved and kept clean, and guarded by policemen ; " 92 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION " summer ornaments for grates are made of wood shavings and of different coloured papers." Reading books are now published which reject all such trash as the above, and contain nothing but what has really some fitness for reaching the end which reading books were meant to reach. Some of them even go a little too far in the effort to avoid dryness and pedantry and to be natural and interesting ; they contain rather too many abbreviations, too many words meant to imitate the noises of animals, and too much of that part of human utterance which may be called the inter jectional. The little children, for whom the books are designed, are apt to be rather puzzled by words of this kind, and, even if they were not, it is a fault in a short reading lesson to contain too much of them. But this fault, which certainly some of the best of the new reading books do not quite avoid, has at least the merit of being a fault on the right side. No more useful change has in my opinion ever been introduced into the programme of the pupil- teachers' studies than that which has lately added to it the learning by heart of passages from some standard author. How difficult it seems to do anything for their taste and culture I have often said. I have said how much easier it seems to get entrance to their minds and to awaken them by means of music or of physical science than by means of literature ; still if it can be done by literature at all, it has the best chance of being done by the way now proposed. General Report, 1863. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 93 Teachers and Self-culture IN England it is among the teachers that the desire for a better culture, and the attainment of it, most shows itself. It shows itself in those in my district by more and more numerous efforts to pass the examinations which the London University, with a wise liberality, makes accessible to so large and various a class of candidates. I gladly seize every opportunity to express the satisfaction which the sight of these efforts gives me. To the able, the ardent, and the aspiring among the young teachers of schools under my inspection, I say : " Your true way of advancing yourselves, of raising your position, of keeping alive and alert amidst your trying labours, is there." And the more the Government certificate comes to be regarded as a mere indispensable guarantee of competency, not as a literary distinction, the better ; literary distinction should be sought for from other and larger sources. General Report, 1863. A Learned and a Liberal Education IT is well to take the distinction which you have taken between liberal and learned education, because this is one of the things which the public has got into its head, and one can do most with the public by availing oneself of one of these things. To give the means of learning Greek, for instance, but not to make Greek obligatory, is a proposal, for secondary education, which half the world are now prepared to prick up their ears if you make. 1864. " Letters," i. p. 233. 94 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION The Reform of Eton IF Eton does not teach her pupils profound wisdom, we have Oxerstiern's word for it that the world is governed by very little wisdom. Eton, at any rate, teaches her aristocratic pupils virtues which are among the best virtues of an aristocracy, freedom from affectation, manliness, a high spirit, simplicity. It is to be hoped that she teaches something of these virtues to her other pupils also, who, not of the aristocratic class themselves, enjoy at Eton the benefit of contact with aristocracy. For these other pupils, perhaps, a little more learning as well, a somewhat stronger dose of ideas, might be desirable. Above all, it might be desirable to wean them from the easy habits and profuse notions of expense which Eton generates, habits and notions graceful enough in the lilies of the social field, but incon- venient for its future toilers and spinners. To con- vey to Eton the knowledge that the wine of Cham- pagne does not water the whole earth, and that there are incomes which fall below 5000 a year, would be an act of kindness towards a large class of British parents, full of proper pride, but not opulent. " A French Eton," pp. 3-4, French and English Literature IN the study of the mother-tongue the French schoolboy has a more real advantage over ours ; he does certainly learn something of the French language and literature, and of the English our THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 95 schoolboy learns nothing. French grammar, how- ever, is a better instrument of instruction for boys than English grammar, and the French literature possesses prose works, perhaps even poetical works, more fitted to be used as classics for schoolboys than any which English literature possesses. I need not say that the fitness of the works for this purpose depends on other considerations than those of the genius alone, and of the creative force, which they exhibit. " A French Eton," pp. 17-18. Lacordaire LACORDAIRE erred in making absolute devotion to the Church (malheur a qui trouble I'Eglise), the watch- word of a gifted man in our century ; one cannot doubt that he erred in affirming that " the greatest service to be rendered to Christianity in our day was to do something for the revival of the mediaeval religious orders." Still, he seized a great truth, when he proclaimed the intrinsic weakness and danger of a state of anarchy ; above all, when he applied this truth in the moral sphere he was incon- trovertible, fruitful for his nation, especially fruitful for the young. He dealt vigorously with himself, and he told others that the first thing for them was to do the same : he placed character above every- thing else. " One may have spirit, learning, even genius," he said, " and not character ; for want of character our age is the age of miscarriages. Let us form Christians in our schools, but, first of all, 96 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION let us form Christians in our own hearts ; the one great thing is to have a life of one's own." " One of the great consolations of my present life," he writes from Soreze, " is, that I have now God and the young for my sole companions." The young, with their fresh spirit, as they instinctively feel the presence of a great character, so, too, irresistibly receive an influence from souls which live habitually with God. " A French Eton," pp. 26, 28. Cost of Secondary Instruction FOR the serious thinker, for the real student of the question of secondary instruction, the problem respecting secondary instruction which we in England have to solve is this : Why cannot we have through- out England, as the French have throughout France, as the Germans have throughout Germany, as the Swiss have throughout Switzerland, as the Dutch have throughout Holland, schools where the children of our middle and professional classes may obtain, at the rate of from 20 to 50 a year, if they are boarders, at the rate of from 5 to 15 a year, if they are day-scholars, an education of as good quality, with as good guarantees, social character, and advantages for a future career in the world, as the education which French children of the corre- sponding class can obtain from institutions like that of Toulouse or Soreze ? There is the really important question. It is vain to meet it by propositions which may, very THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 97 likely, be true, but which are quite irrelevant. " Your French Etons," I am told, " are no Etons at all ; there is nothing like an Eton in France." I know that. Very likely France is to be pitied for having no Etons, but I want to call attention to the substitute, to the compensation. The English public school produces the finest boys in the world ; the Toulouse Lyceum boy, the Soreze College boy, is not to be compared with them. Well, let me grant all that too. But then there are only some five or six schools in England to produce this specimen-boy ; and they cannot produce him cheap. " A French Eton," pp. 37-38. The need of Securities for Efficiency No one who knows anything of the subject, will venture to affirm that these " educational homes " give, or can give, that which they " conscientiously offer." No one, who knows anything of the subject, will seriously affirm that they give, or can give, an education comparable to that given by the Toulouse and Soreze schools. And why ? Because they want the securities, which, to make them produce even half of what they offer, are indispens- able the securities of supervision and publicity. By this time we know pretty well that to trust to the principle of supply and demand to do for us all that we want in providing education is to lean upon a broken reed. " A French Eton," p. 43. 98 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION The Law of Supply and Demand Inapplicable THE mass of mankind know good butter from bad, and tainted meat from fresh, and the principle of supply and demand may, perhaps, be relied on to give us sound meat and butter. But the mass of mankind do not so well know what distinguishes good teaching and training from bad ; they do not here know what they ought to demand, and, there- fore, the demand cannot be relied on to give us the right supply. Even if they knew what they ought to demand, they have no sufficient means of testing whether or no this is really supplied to them. Securities, therefore, are needed. The great public schools of England offer securities by their very publicity ; by their wealth, importance, and con- nections, which attract general attention to them ; by their old reputation, which they cannot forfeit without disgrace and danger. The appointment of the Public Schools Commission is a proof, that to these moral securities for the efficiency of the great public schools may be added the material security of occasional competent supervision. I will grant that the great schools of the Continent do not offer the same moral securities to the public as Eton or Harrow. They offer them in a certain measure, but certainly not in so large measure; they have not by any means so much importance, by any means so much reputation. Therefore they offer, in far larger measure, the other security, the security of competent supervision. With them this supervision is not occasional and extraordinary, THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 99 but periodic and regular ; it is not explorative only; it is also, to a considerable extent, authoritative. " A French Eton," pp. 44-45. Delusive Examinations ANY one can see that the examination of a few select scholars from a school, not at the school itself, and not preceded or followed by an inspection of the school itself, affords no solid security for the good condition of their school. Any one can see that it is for the interest of an unscrupulous master to give all his care to his few cleverest pupils, who will serve him as an advertisement, while he neglects the common bulk of his pupils, whose backwardness there will be nobody to expose. I will not, however, insist too strongly on this last mischief, because I really believe that, serious as is its danger, it has not so much prevailed as to counterbalance the benefit which the mere stimulus of these examinations has given. All I say is, that this stimulus is an insuffi- cient security. " A French Eton," pp. 57-58. The Real Needs in Secondary Instruction ENGLISH secondary instruction wants, I said, two things : sufficient provision of good schools, sufficient security for these schools continuing good. Granting that the Universities may give us the second, I do not see how they are to give us the first. It is not enough merely to provide a staff of inspectors and examiners, and still to leave the children of our ioo THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION middle class scattered about through the numberless obscure endowed schools and " educational homes " of this country, some of them good, many of them middling, most of them bad ; but none of them great institutions, none of them invested with much consideration or dignity. What is wanted for the English middle class is respected schools as well as inspected ones. I will explain what I mean. The education of each class in society has, or ought to have, its ideal, determined by the wants of that class, and by its destination. Society may be imagined so uniform that one education shall be suitable for all its members ; we have not a society of that kind, nor has any European country. We have to regard the condition of the classes, in dealing with education ; but it is right to take into account not their immediate condition only, but their wants, their destination above all, their evident pressing wants, their evident proximate destination. Looking at English society at this moment, one may say that the ideal for the education of each of its classes to follow, the aim which the education of each should particularly endeavour to reach, is different. Mr. Hawtrey, whose admirable and fruitful labours at St. Mark's School entitle him to be heard with great respect, lays it down as an absolute proposition that the family is the type of the school. I do not think that is true for the schools of all classes alike. I feel sure my father, whose authority Mr. Hawtrey claims for this maxim, would not have laid it down in this absolute way. For the wants of the highest class, of the class which frequents Eton, for instance, THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 101 not school a family, but rather school a little world, is the right ideal. I cannot concede to Mr. Hawtrey that, for the young gentlemen who go to Eton, our grand aim and aspiration should be, in his own words, " to make their boyhood a joyous one, by gentle usage and friendly confidence on the part of the master." Let him believe me, the great want for the children of luxury is not this sedulous tenderness, this smoothing of the rose-leaf for them ; I am sure that, in fact, it is not by the predominance of the family and parental relation in its school-life that Eton is strongest ; and it is well that this is so. It seems to me that, for the class frequenting Eton, the grand aim of education should be to give them those good things which their birth and rearing are least likely to give them, besides mere book-learning, the notion of a sort of republican fellowship, the practice of a plain life in common, the habit of self-help. To the middle class, the grand aim of education should be to give largeness of soul and personal dignity ; to the lower classes, feeling, gentleness, humanity. Here, at last, Mr. Hawtrey's ideal of the family as the type for the school, comes in its due place ; for the children of poverty it is right, it is needful, to set oneself first to " make their boyhood a joyous one by gentle usage and friendly confidence on the part of the master ; " for them the great danger is not insolence from over- cherishing, but insensibility from over-neglect. " A French Eton," pp. 60-63. 102 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION The Middle Class and Higher Education IF secondary instruction were organised on a great and regular scale, if it were a national concern, it would not be by insuring to the offspring of the middle classes a more solid teaching at school, and a larger share of home comforts than they at present enjoy there (though certainly it would do this), that such secondary instruction would confer upon them the greatest boon. Its greatest boon to the offspring of these classes would be its giving them great, honourable, public institutions for their nurture institutions conveying to the spirit, at the time of fife when the spirit is most penetrable, the salutary influences of greatness, honour, and nationality influences which expand the soul, liberalise the mind, dignify the character. Such institutions are the great public schools of England, and the great Universities ; with these influences, and some others to which I just now pointed, they have formed the upper class of this country a class with many faults, with many shortcomings, but imbued, on the whole, and mainly through these influences, with a high, mag- nanimous, governing spirit, which has long enabled them to rule, not ignobly, this great country, and which will still enable them to rule it until they are equalled or surpassed. These institutions had their origin in endowments ; and the age of endowments is gone. Beautiful and venerable as are many of the aspects under which it presents itself, this form of public establishment of education, with THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 103 its limitations, its preferences, its ecclesiastical character, its inflexibility, its inevitable want of foresight, proved, as time rolled on, to be subject to many inconveniences, to many abuses. On the continent of Europe a clean sweep has in general been made of this old form of establishment, and new institutions have arisen upon its ruins. In England we have kept our great school and college foundations, introducing into their system what correctives and palliatives were absolutely necessary. Long may we so keep them ! " A French Eton," pp. 66-67. Middle Class Education and the State PEOPLE talk of Government interference, Government control, as if State-action were necessarily something imposed upon them from without ; something despotic and self-originated ; something which took no account of their will, and left no freedom to their activity. Can any one really suppose that, in a country like this, State-action, in education for instance, can ever be that, unless we choose to make it so ? We can give it what form we will. We can make it our agent, not our master. In modern societies the agency of the State, in certain matters, is so indispensable, that it will manage, with or without our common consent, to come into operation somehow ; but when it has introduced itself without the common consent when a great body, like the middle class, will have nothing to say to it then its course is indeed likely enough to be not 104 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION straightforward, its operation not satisfactory. But, by all of us consenting to it, we remove any danger of this kind. By really agreeing to deal in our collec- tive and corporate character with education, we can form ourselves into the best and most efficient of voluntary societies for managing it. We can make State-action upon it a genuine local government of it, the faithful but potent expression of our own activity. We can make the central Government that mere court of disinterested review and correction which every sensible man would always be glad to have for his own activity. We shall have all our self-reliance and individual action still (in this country we shall always have plenty of them, and the parts will always be more likely to tyrannise over the whole than the whole over the parts), but we shall have had the good sense to turn them to account by a powerful, but still voluntary, organisa- tion. Our beneficence will be " beneficence acting by rule," (that is Burke's definition of law, as insti- tuted by a free society), and all the more effective for that reason. Must this make us "a set of helpless imbeciles, totally incapable of attending to our own interests ? " Is this " a grievous blow aimed at the independence of the English character ? " Is " English self-reliance and inde- pendence " to be perfectly satisfied with what it produces already without this organisation ? In middle class education it produces, without it, the educational home and the classical and commercial academy. Are we to be proud of that ? Are we to be satisfied with that ? Is " the greatness of THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION , this country " to be seen in that ? But it will be said that, awakening to a sense of the badness of our middle class education, we are beginning to improve it. Undoubtedly we are ; and the most certain sign of that awakening, of those beginnings of improvement, is the disposition to resort to a public agency, to " beneficence working by rule," to help us on faster with it. " A French Eton," pp. 99-101. Public Establishment of Secondary Schools IN that great class, strong by its numbers, its energy, its industry, strong by its freedom from frivolity, not by any law of nature prone to immobility of mind, actually at this moment agitated by a spread- ing ferment of mind, in that class, liberalised by an ampler culture, admitted to a wider sphere of thought, living by larger ideas, with its provincialism dis- sipated, its intolerance cured, its pettinesses purged away, what a power there will be, what an element of new life for England. Then let the middle class rule, then let it affirm its own spirit, when it has thus perfected itself. J And I cannot see any means so direct and powerful for developing this great and beneficent power as the public establishment of schools for the middle class. By public establishment they may be made cheap and accessible to all. By public establish- ment they may give securities for the culture offered in them being really good and sound, and the best that our time knows. By public establishment 106 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION they may communicate to those reared in them the sense of being brought in contact with their country, with the national life, with the life of the world ; and they will expand and dignify their spirits by com- municating this sense to them. I can see no other mode of institution which will offer the same advantages in the same degree. " A French Eton," pp. 126-127. Effect of Middle Class Education on the Working Class I HOPE the middle class will not much longer delay to take a step on which its future value and dignity and influence so much depend. By taking this step they will indirectly confer a great boon upon the lower class also. This obscure embryo, only just beginning to move, travailing in labour and darkness, so much left out of account when we celebrate the glories of our Atlantis, now and then, by so mournful a glimpse, showing itself to us in Lambeth, or Spitalfields, or Dorsetshire, this immense working class, now so without a practicable passage to all the joy and beauty of life, for whom in an aristocratic class, which is unattainable by them, there is no possible ideal, for whom in a middle class, narrow, ungenial, and unattractive, there is no adequate ideal, will have, in a cultured, liberalised, ennobled, transformed, middle class, a point towards which it may hopefully work, a goal towards which it may with joy direct its aspirations. Children of the future, whose day has not yet THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 107 dawned, you, when that day arrives, will hardly believe what obstructions were long suffered to prevent its coming. You who, with all your faults have neither the aridity of aristocracies, nor the narrow-mindedness of middle classes, you, whose power of simple enthusiasm is your great gift, will not comprehend how progress towards man's best perfection the adorning and ennobling of his spirit should have been reluctantly undertaken ; how it should have been for years and years retarded by barren commonplaces, by worn-out clap-traps. You will wonder at the labour of its friends in proving the self-proving ; you will know nothing of the doubts, the fears, the prejudices they had to dispel ; nothing of the outcry they had to encounter, of the fierce protestations of life from policies which were dead, and did not know it, and the shrill querulous upbraiding from publicists in their dotage. But you, in your turn, with difficulties of your own, will then be mounting some new step in the arduous ladder whereby man climbs towards his perfection ; towards that unattainable but irresistible lode-star gazed after with earnest longing, and invoked with bitter tears ; the longing of thou- sands of hearts, the tears of many generations. " A French Eton," pp. 130-132. National Influence of the Intellectual Life THE subject being secondary instruction, an instruc- tion in direct correspondence with higher instruc- tion and intellectual life, I cannot admit that any io8 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION countries are more worth studying, as regards secondary instruction, than those in which intel- lectual life has been carried farthest Germany first, and, in the second degree, France. Indeed, I am convinced that as Science, in the widest sense of the word, meaning a true knowledge of things as the basis of our operations, becomes, as it does become, more of a power in the world, the weight of the nations and men who have carried the intel- lectual life farthest will be more and more felt ; indeed, I see signs of this already. That England may run well in this race is my deepest desire ; and to stimulate her and to make her feel how many clogs she wears, and how much she has to do in order to run in it as her genius gives her the power to run, is the object of all I do. 1865. " Letters," i. p. 245. Educative Effect of the Aristocratic Ideal IN Austria one feels that there is some truth in the talk which in England sounds such rubbish about the accessibility of the English aristocracy, but what is really the strength of England is the immense extent of the upper class the class with much the same education and notions as the aristocracy ; this, though it has its dangers, is a great thing. In Germany there is no such thing, and the whole middle class hates refinement and disbelieves in it ; this makes North Germany, where the middle class has it, socially though not governmentally, all its own way, so intensely unattractive and disagreeable. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 109 This too made them all such keen Northerners. " They say he is a tailor," said Haupt, the great classical professor of Berlin, of Johnson the American president : " Gott sey dank dass er ein Schneider ist ! " ,865. " Letters," i. p. 305. Oxford BEAUTIFUL city, so venerable, so lovely, so unravaged by the fierce intellectual life of our century, so serene ! There are our young barbarians, all at play ! And yet, steeped in sentiment as she lies, spread- ing her gardens to the moonlight, and whispering from her towers the last enchantments of the Middle Age, who will deny that Oxford, by her ineffable charm, keeps ever calling us nearer to the true goal of all of us, to the ideal, to perfection, to beauty, in a word, which is only truth seen from another side ? nearer, perhaps than all the science of Tubingen ? Adorable dreamer, whose heart has been so romantic, who hast given thyself so prodigally, given thyself to sides and to heroes not mine, only never to the Philistines ! home of lost causes, and forsaken beliefs, and unpopular names, and im- possible loyalties ! what example could ever so in- spire us to keep down the Philistine in ourselves, what teacher could ever so save us from that bondage to which we are all prone, that bondage which Goethe, in his incomparable lines on the death of Schiller, makes it his friend's highest praise (and nobly did Schiller deserve the praise) to have left no THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION miles out of sight behind him ; the bondage of " was uns alle bandigt, DAS GEMEINE ! " Oxford will forgive me, even if I have unwittingly drawn upon her a shot or two aimed at her unworthy son ; for she is generous, and the cause in which I fight is, after all, hers. Apparitions of a day, what is our puny warfare against the Philistines, compared with the warfare which this queen of romance has been waging against them for centuries, and will wage after we are gone ? Preface to " Essays in Criticism," p. xiii. Grammar and Science Teaching IF it is perception you want to cultivate in Florence, you had much better take some science (botany is perhaps the best for a girl, and I know Tyndall thinks it the best of all for educational purposes), and choosing a good handbook, go regularly through it with her. Handbooks have long been the great want for teaching the natural sciences, but this want is at last beginning to be supplied, and for botany a text-book based on Henslow's Lectures, which were excellent, has recently been published by Macmillan. I cannot see that there is much got out of learning the Latin Grammar except the mainly normal discipline of learning something much more exactly than one is made to learn anything else ; and the verification of the laws of grammar, in the examples furnished by one's reading, is certainly a far less fruitful stimulus of one's powers of obser- vation and comparison than the verification of the laws of a science like botany in the examples THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION in furnished by the world of nature before one's eyes. The sciences have been abominably taught, and by untrained people, but the moment properly trained people begin to teach them properly they fill such a want in education as that which you feel in Florence's better than either grammar or mathema- tics, which have been forced into the service because they have been hitherto so far better studied and known. Grammar and pure mathematics will fill a much less important part in the education of the young than formerly, though the knowledge of the ancient world will continue to form a most important part in the education of mankind generally. But the way grammar is studied at present is an obstacle to this knowledge rather than a help to it, and I should be glad to see it limited to learning thoroughly the example-form of words, and very little more for beginners, I mean. Those who have a taste for philosophical studies may push them further, and with far more intelligible aids than our elementary grammars afterwards. So I should inflict on Florence neither Latin nor English grammar as an elaborate discipline ; make her learn her French verbs very thoroughly, and do her French exercises very correctly ; but do not go to grammar to culti- vate in her the power you miss, but rather to science. 1866. "Letters,"!, p. 313. Class Division and State Authority NOT that I do not think it, in itself, a bad thing that the principle of authority should be so weak H2 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION here ; but whereas in France, since the Revolution, a man feels that the power which represses him in the State, is himself, here a man feels that the power which represses him is the Tories, the upper class, the aristocracy, and so on ; and with this feeling he can, of course, never without loss of self-respect accept a formal beating, and so the thing goes on smouldering. If ever there comes a more equal state of society in England, the power of the State for repression will be a thousand times stronger. "Letters," i. p. 335. Public Schools and the Middle Class WHEN I was over in England the other day, my poor friend Mr. Matthew Arnold insisted, with his usual blind adoration of everything English, on taking me down to admire one of your great public schools ; precious institutions, where, as I tell him, for 250 sterling a year your boys learn gentlemanly deport- ment and cricket. Well, down we went, and in the playing fields (which with you are the school) : " I declare," says Mr. Matthew Arnold, " if there isn't a son of that man you quarrelled with in the Reigate train ! And there, close by him, is the son of one of our greatest families, a Plantagenet ! It is only in England, Arminius, that this beautiful salutary intermixture of classes takes place. Look at the bottle-merchant's son and the Plantagenet being brought up side by side ; none of your absurd separations and seventy-two quarterings here. Very likely young Bottles will end by being a lord THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 113 himself." I was going to point out to Mr. Matthew Arnold that what a middle class wants is ideas, and ideas an aristocracy has nothing to do with ; so that that vulgar dog, Bottles, the father, in sending his son to learn only cricket and a gentle- manly deportment, like the aristocracy, had done quite the wrong thing with him. 1866. " Friendship's Garland," Letter iv. p. 25. The Three Classes of Philistine " MY dear friend," says he, " of the British species of the great genus Philistine there are three main varieties. There is the religious Philistine, the well-to-do Philistine, and the rowdy Philistine. The religious Philistine is represented by " " Stop, Arminius," said I, " you will oblige me by letting religion alone ! " " As you please," answered he ; " well, then, the rowdy Philistine is represented by the Daily Telegraph, and the well-to-do Philistine by the Times. The well-to-do Philistine looks to get his own view of the British world, that it is the best of all possible worlds as it is, because he has prospered in it, preached back to him ore rotundo in the columns of the Times. There must be no uncertain sound in his oracle, no faltering, nothing to excite mis- giving or doubts ; like his own bosom, everything his oracle utters must be positive, pleasant, and comfortable. So of course about the great first ii 4 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION article of his creed, the sacro-sanctity of property, there must in the Times be no trifling." " Friendship's Garland," Letter v. p. 35. Stein's Land Reform " WELL, then, what did Stein do ? " asked I. " He did this/' Arminius answered. " In these estates, where the landlord had his property-right on the one hand, and the tenant his tenant-right on the other, he made a compromise. In the first place he assigned, say, two-fifths of the estate to the land- lord in absolute property, without any further claim of tenant-right upon it thenceforth for ever. But the remaining three-fifths he compelled the landlord to sell to the tenant at eighteen years' purchase, so that this part should become the tenant's absolute property thenceforth for ever. You will ask, where could the tenant find money to buy ? Stein opened rent-banks in all the provincial chief towns, to lend the tenant the purchase-money required, for which the State thus became his ci editor, not the landlord. He had to repay this loan in a certain number of years. To free his land from this State mortgage on it and make it his own clear property, he had every inducement to work hard, and he did work hard ; and this was the grand source of the frugality, industry, and thrivingness of the Prussian peasant. It was the grand source, too, of his attachment to the State." " It was rotten bad political economy, though," exclaimed I. " Now I see what the Times meant THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 115 by saying in its leading article yesterday that Ireland is incomparably better governed than the United States, France, Germany, or Italy, because the excellence of government consists in keeping obstacles out of the way of individual energy, and you throw obstacles in the way of your great pro- prietors' energy, and we throw none in the way of ours. Talk of a commutation like the tithe-com- mutation, indeed ! Why it was downright spolia- tion ; it was just what Lord Clanricarde says some people are driving at in Ireland, a system of con- fiscation." " Well," says Arminius, calmly, " that is exactly what the Prussian junkers called it. They did not call it commutation, they called it confiscation. They will tell you to this day that Stein confiscated their estates. But you will be shocked to hear that the Prussian Government had, even before Stein's time, this sad habit of playing tricks with political economy. To prevent the absorption of small proprietors by a great landed aristocracy, the Prussian Government made a rule that a bauer-gut a peasant property, could not, even if the owner sold it, be bought up by the Lord Clanricarde of the neighbourhood ; it must remain a bauer-gut still. I believe you in England are for improving small proprietors off the face of the earth, but I assure you in Prussia we are very proud of ours, and think them the strength of the nation. Of late years the Hohenzollerns have taken up with junkers, but for a long time their policy was to uphold the batter class against the junker class ; and, if you n6 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION want to know the secret of the hold which the house of Hohenzollern has upon the heart of the Prussian people, it is not in Frederick the Great's victories that you will find it, it is in this policy of their domestic government." " My dear Arminius," said I, " you make me perfectly sick. Government here, government there ! We English are for self-government. What business has any Mr. Stein to settle that this or that estate is too large for Lord Clanricarde's virtues to expand in ? Let each class settle its own affairs, and don't let us have Governments and Hohenzollerns pre- tending to be more enlightened than other people, and cutting and carving for what they call the general interest, and God knows what nonsense of that kind. If the landed class with us has got the magis- tracy and settled estates and game laws, has not the middle class got the vestries, and business, and civil and religious liberty ? " " Friendship's Garland," Letter v. p. 36. Teaching at Eton and at Lycurgus House "Bur I want to know what his nephew learnt," interrupted Arminius, " and what Lord Lumpington learnt at Eton." " They followed," said I, " the grand, old, fortifying, classical curriculum." " Did they know anything when they left ? " asked Armi- nius. " I have seen some longs and shorts of Hittall's," said I, " about the Calydonian Boar, which were not bad. But you surely don't need me THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 117 to tell you, Arminius, that it is rather in training and bracing the mind for future acquisition a course of mental gymnastics we call it, than in teaching any set thing, that the classical curriculum is so valuable." " Were the minds of Lord Lump- ington and Mr. Hittall much braced by their mental gymnastics ? " inquired Arminius. " Well," I ans- wered, " during their three years at Oxford they were so much occupied with Bullingdon and hunting that there was no great opportunity to judge. But for my part I have always thought that their both getting their degree at last with flying colours, after three weeks of a famous coach for fast men, four nights without going to bed, and an incredible consumption of wet towels, strong cigars, and brandy and water, was one of the most astonishing feats of mental gymnastics I ever heard of." " That will do for the land and the Church," said Arminius. " And now let us hear about commerce." " You mean how was Bottles edu- cated ? " answered I. " Here we get into another line altogether, but a very good line in its way, too. Mr. Bottles was brought up at the Lycurgus House Academy, Peckham. You are not to suppose from the name of Lycurgus that any Latin and Greek was taught in the establishment ; the name only in- dicates the moral discipline, and the strenuous earnest moral character, imparted there. As to the instruction, the thoughtful educator who was principal of the Lycurgus House Academy Archi- medes Silverpump, Ph.D., you must have heard of him in Germany ? had modern views. ' We must n8 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION be men of our age/ he used to say. ' Useful knowledge, living languages, and the forming of the mind through observation and experiment, these are the fundamental articles of my educational creed.' Or, as I have heard his pupil Bottles put it in his expansive moments after dinner (Bottles used to ask me to dinner till that affair of yours with him in the Reigate train) : ' Original man, Silver- pump ! fine mind ! fine system ! none of your antiquated rubbish all practical work latest dis- coveries in science mind constantly kept excited lots of interesting experiments lights of all colours, fizz ! fizz ! bang ! bang ! That's what I call forming a man.' " " And pray," cried Arminius, impatiently, " what sort of man do you suppose this infernal quack really formed in your precious friend Mr. Bottles ? " " Well," I replied, " I hardly know how to answer that question. Bottles has certainly made an immense fortune ; but as to Silverpump's effect on his mind, whether it was from any fault in the Lycurgus House system, whether it was that with a sturdy self-reliance thoroughly English, Bottles, ever since he quitted Silverpump, left his mind wholly to itself, his daily newspaper, and the Particular Baptist minister under whom he sate, or from whatever cause it was, certainly his mind, qua mind " " You need not go on," inter- rupted Arminius, with a magnificent wave of his hand, " I know what that man's mind, qua mind, is, well enough." 1867. " Friendship's Garland," Letter vi. p. 49. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 119 Compulsion for all Classes Alike " You were talking of compulsory education, and your common people's want of it. Now, my dear friend, I want you to understand what this principle of compulsory education really means. It means that to ensure, as far as you can, every man's being fit for his business in life, you put education as a bar, or condition, between him and what he aims at. The principle is just as good for one class as another, and it is only by applying it impartially that you save its application from being insolent and invidious." " Friendship's Garland," Letter vii. p. 52. The Welsh Problem LET me venture to say that you have to avoid two dangers in order to work all the good which your friends could desire. You have to avoid the danger of giving offence to practical men by retarding the spread of the English language in the principality. I believe that to preserve and honour the Welsh language and literature is quite compatible with not thwarting or delaying for a single hour the intro- duction, so undeniably useful, of a knowledge of English among all classes in Wales. You have to avoid, again, the danger of alienating men of science by a blind, partial, and uncritical treatment of your national antiquities. When I see the enthusiasm these Eisteddfods can awaken in your whole people, and then think of the tastes, the literature, the amusements, of 120 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION our own lower and middle class, I am filled with admiration for you. It is a consoling thought, and one which history allows us to entertain, that nations disinherited of political success may yet leave their mark on the world's progress, and contribute powerfully to the civilisation of mankind. We in England have come to that point when the continued advance and greatness of our nation is threatened by one cause, and one cause above all. Far more than by the helplessness of an aristocracy whose day is fast coming to an end, far more than by the rawness of a lower class whose day is only just beginning, we are emperilled by what I call the " Philistinism " of our middle class. On the side of beauty and taste, vulgarity ; on the side of morals and feeling, coarseness ; on the side of mind and spirit, unintelligence this is philistinism. Now, then, is the moment for the greater delicacy and spirituality of the Celtic peoples who are blended with us, if it be but wisely directed, to make itself prized and honoured. In a certain measure the children of Taliesin and Ossian have now an oppor- tunity for renewing the famous feat of the Greeks, and conquering their conquerors. No service Eng- land can render the Celts by giving you a share in her many good qualities, can surpass that which the Celts can at this moment render England, by communicating to us some of theirs. " The Study of Celtic Literature," Intr. ix. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 121 The Bilingual Question (1867) I MUST say I quite share the opinion of my brother Saxons as to the practical inconvenience of per- petuating the speaking of Welsh. It may cause a moment's distress to one's imagination when one hears that the last Cornish peasant who spoke the old tongue of Cornwall is dead ; but, no doubt, Corn- wall is the better for adopting English, for becoming more thoroughly one with the rest of the country. The fusion of all the inhabitants of these islands into one homogeneous, English-speaking whole, the breaking-down of barriers between us, the swallowing up of separate provincial nationalities, is a con- summation to which the natural course of things irresistibly tends ; it is a necessity of what is called modern civilisation, and modern civilisation is a real, legitimate force ; the change must come, and its accomplishment is a mere affair of time. The sooner the Welsh language disappears as an instru- ment of the practical, political, social life of Wales, the better ; the better for England, the better for Wales itself. " The Study of Celtic Literature," p. 10. Payment by Results I OBSERVE one or two of my colleagues say in their reports that school managers get pleased with the new mode of examination, and with the idea of pay- ment by results, as they become familiarised with it. I think this is very true ; the idea of payment by results was just the idea to be caught up by the 122 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION ordinary public opinion of this country and to find favour with it ; no doubt the idea has found favour with it, and is likely, perhaps, to be pressed by it to further application. But the question is, not whether this idea, or this or that application of it suits ordinary public opinion and school managers ; the question is whether it really suits the interests of schools and of their instruction. In this country we are somewhat unduly liable to regard the latter suitableness too little, and the former too much. I feel sure, from my experience of foreign schools as well as of our own, that our present system of grants does harm to schools and their instruction by resting its grants too exclusively, at any rate, upon an individual examination, prescribed in all its details beforehand by the Central Office, and necessarily mechanical ; and that we have to relax this exclusive stress rather than to go on adding to it. The growing interest and concern in education will of itself tend to raise and swell the instruction in the primary schools ; if we wish fruitfully to co-operate with this happy natural movement we shall, in my opinion, best do so by some such relaxation as that which I have indicated. General Report, 1867. Would Compulsory Education Succeed? THROUGHOUT my district I find the idea of com- pulsory education becoming a familiar idea with those who are interested in schools. I imagine that THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 123 with the newly awakened sense of our shortcomings in popular education a sense which is just, the statistics brought forward to dispel it being, as every one acquainted with the subject knows, entirely fallacious the difficult thing would not be to pass a law making education compulsory ; the difficult thing would be to work such a law after we had got it. In Prussia, which is so often quoted, edu- cation is not flourishing because it is compulsory, it is compulsory because it is flourishing. Because people there really prize instruction and culture, and prefer them to other things, therefore they have no difficulty in imposing on themselves the rule to get instruction and culture. In this country people prefer to them politics, station, business, money- making, pleasure, and many other things ; and till we cease to prefer these things, a law which gives instruction the power to interfere with them, though a sudden impulse may make us establish it, cannot be relied on to hold its ground and to work effectively. When instruction is valued in this country as it is in Germany it may be made obligatory here ; mean- while the best thing the friends of instruction can do is to foment as much as they can the national sense of its value. The persevering extension of provisions for the schooling of all children em- ployed in any kind of labour is probably the best and most practicable way of making education obligatory that we can at present take. But the task of seeing these provisions carried into effect should not be committed to the municipal authori- ties, less trustworthy with us than in France, 124 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Germany, or Switzerland, because worse chosen and constituted. General Report, 1867. The choice of School Books IN this country, where little importance is attached to the science of public administration, a public department is apt first to attempt to exercise a critical function with insufficient means, and then, when the result appears unsatisfactory, hastily to retreat altogether from exercising it. The better way, perhaps, would be to exercise it properly. Nothing is more remarkable in the school administra- tion of Germany than the care with which every branch is confided to experts, and experts of recog- nised expertness. The control of school books and school examinations in literature is there strictly given to persons of proved qualifications in letters ; the control of school books and school examinations in the mathematical and natural sciences to persons of proved qualifications in those sciences ; and so on. It would surely be well if we followed this example, instead of either exercising this control with imperfect instruments or abandoning it alto- gether, and suffering private speculation to have unchecked play. General Report, 1867. The Old Private School THE stamp of plainness, or the freedom from charla- tanism given to the instruction of our primary THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 125 schools, through the public character which in the last thirty years it has received, and through its having been thus rescued, in great measure, from the influences of private speculation, is perhaps the best thing about them. It is in this respect that our primary schools compare so favourably with the private adventure schools of the middle class, that class which, Mr. Bright says, is perfectly competent to manage its own schools and education. The work in the one is appraised by impartial educated persons ; in the other, by the common run of middle-class parents. To show the difference in the result, I will conclude by placing in juxta- position a letter written in school by an ordinary scholar in a public elementary school in my district, a girl of eleven years old, with one written by a boy in a private middle-class school, and furnished to one of the Assistant Commissioners of the Schools Inquiry Commission. The girl's letter I give first : DEAR FANNY, I am afraid I shall not pass in my examination ; Miss C says she thinks I shall. I shall be glad when the Serpentine is frozen over, for we shall have such fun ; I wish you did not live so far away, then you could come and share in the game. Father cannot spare Willie, so I have as much as I can do to teach him to cipher nicely. I am now sitting by the school fire, so I assure you I am very warm. Father and mother are very well. I hope to see you on Christmas Day. Winter is coming ; don't it make you shiver to think of ? 126 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Shall you ever come to smoky old London again ? It is not so bad, after all, with its bustle and business and noise. If you see Ellen T will you kindly get her address for me. I must now conclude, as I am soon going to my reading class ; so good-bye. From your affectionate friend, M And now I give the boy's : MY DEAR PARENTS, The anticipation of our Christmas vacation abounds in peculiar delights. Not only that its " festivities," its social gatherings, and its lively amusements crown the old year with happiness and mirth, but that I come a guest com- mended to your hospitable love by the performance of all you bade me remember when I left you in the glad season of sun and flowers. And time has sped fleetly since reluctant my departing step crossed the threshold of that home whose indulgences and endearments their temporary loss has taught me to value more and more. Yet that restraint is salutary, and that self-reliance is as easily learnt as it is laudable, the propriety of my conduct and the readiness of my services shall ere long aptly illustrate. It is with confidence I promise that the close of every year shall find me advancing in your regard by constantly observing the precepts of my excellent tutors and the example of my ex- cellent parents. We break up on Thursday the nth of December THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 127 instant, and my impatience of the short delay will assure my dear parents of the filial sentiments of Theirs very sincerely, N P.S. We shall re-assemble on the igth of January. Mr. and Mrs. P. present their respectful compli- ments. To those who ask what is the difference between a public and a private school, I answer, It is this. General Report, 1867. Origin of our Secondary Schools POPULAR education has sprung out of the ideas and necessities of modern times, and the elementary school for the poor is an institution which has no remote history. With the secondary school it is otherwise. The secondary school has a long history ; through a series of changes it goes back, in every European country, to the beginning of civilised society in that country ; from the time when this society had any sort of organisation, a certain sort of schools and schooling existed, and between that schooling and the schooling which the children of the richer class of society at this day receive there is an unbroken connection. In no country is this continuity of secondary instruction more visible than in France, notwithstanding her revolutions ; and in some respects France, in that which concerns the historical development of secondary instruction, is a typical country. " A French Eton," p. 218. 128 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION The University of Paris ALL the countries of Western Europe had their early contact with Greek and Roman civilisation, a con- tact from which their actual books and schools and science begin ; France had this more than any of them, except Italy. All the countries of Western Europe had hi the feudal and Catholic Middle Age their universities, under whose wings were hatched the colleges and teachers that formed the germ of our actual secondary instruction ; and the great Middle Age university was the University of Paris. Hither repaired the students of other countries and other universities, as to the main centre of mediaeval science, and the most authoritative school of mediaeval teaching. It received names expressing the most enthusiastic devotion ; the fountain of knowledge, the tree of life, the candlestick of the house of the Lord. " The most famous University of Paris, the place at this time and long before whither the English, and mostly the Oxonians, resorted," says Wood. Tandem fiat hie velut Parisiis . . . ad instar Parisiensis studii . . . quemadmodum in Parisiensi studio . . ., say the rules of the University of Vienna, founded in 1365. Here came Roger Bacon, St. Thomas Aquinas, and Dante ; here studied the founder of the first university of the Empire, Charles the Fourth, Emperor of Germany and King of Bohemia, founder of the University of Prague ; here Henry the Second in the twelfth century proposed to refer his dispute with Becket ; here, in the fourteenth the schism in the papacy and the THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 129 claims of the rival popes were brought for judgment. In Europe and Asia, in foreign cities and on battle- fields, among statesmen, princes, priests, crusaders, scholars, passed in the Middle Ages this word of recognition, Nos fuimus simul in Galandia the Rue de Galande, one of the streets of the old univer- sity quarter, the quartier latin of Paris. But the importance of the University in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries was extra- ordinary. Men's minds were possessed with a wonderful zeal for knowledge, or what was then thought knowledge, and the University of Paris was the great fount from which this knowledge issued. The University and those depending on it made at this time, it is said, actually a third of the population of Paris ; when the University went on a solemn occasion in procession to St. Denis, the head of the procession, it is said, had reached St. Denis before the end of it had left its starting place in Paris. It had immunities from taxation, it had jurisdiction of its own, and its members claimed to be exempt from that of the provost of Paris ; the kings of France strongly favoured the University, and leaned to its side when the municipal and academical authorities were in conflict ; if at any time the University thought itself seriously aggrieved it had recourse to a measure which threw Paris into dismay it shut up its schools and suspended its lectures. In a body of this kind the discipline could not be strict, and the colleges were created to supply K 130 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION centres of discipline which the University in itself, an apparatus merely of teachers and lecture-rooms, did not provide. The fourteenth century is the time, when, one after another, with wonderful rapidity, the French colleges appeared. Navarre, Montaigu, Harcourt, names so familiar in the school annals of France, date from the first quarter of the fourteenth century. The College of Navarre was founded by the Queen of Philip the Fair, in 1304 ; the College of Montaigu, where Erasmus, Rabelais, and Ignatius Loyola were in their time students, was founded in 1314 by two members of the family of Montaigu, one of them Archbishop of Rouen. The majority of these colleges were founded by magnates of the church, and designed to maintain a certain number of bursars, or scholars, during their university course. Frequently the bursarships were for the benefit of the founder's native place, and poverty, of which among the students of that age there was no lack, was specified as a title of admission. " A French Eton," pp. 210-212, 229-231. Paris and Oxford OUR Stephen Harding, the third Abbot of Citeaux, and the true founder of the great Order of the Cistercians, was studying at the School of Paris in 1070. The name of Abelard recalls the European celebrity and immense intellectual ferment of this school in the twelfth century. But it was in the first year of the following century, the thirteenth, THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 131 that it received a charter from Philip Augustus, and thenceforth the name of University of Paris takes the place of that of School of Paris. Forty- nine years later was founded University College, Oxford, the oldest College of the oldest English University. Four nations composed the University of Paris the nation of France, the nation of Picardy, the nation of Normandy, and (signal mark of the close intercourse which then existed between France and us) the nation of England. The four nations united formed the faculty of arts. The faculty of theology was created in 1257, tnat f ^ aw m I2 7 I > tnat of medicine in 1274. Theology, law, and medicine had each their Dean ; arts had four Procurators, one for each of the four nations composing the faculty. Arts elected the rector of the University and had possession of the University chest and archives. " A French Eton," pp. 226-227. Studies in the University of Paris ONE asks oneself with interest what was the mental food to which this vast turbulent multitude pressed with such inconceivable hunger. Theology was the great matter ; and there is no doubt that this study was by no means always that barren verbal trifling which an ill-informed modern contempt is fond of representing it. When the Bishop of Paris publicly condemned as current in the University, such propositions as these : Quod sermones theologi sunt fundati in fabulis : Quod nihil plus scitur 132 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION propter scire theologiam ; Quod fabulae et falsa sunt in lege Christiana sicut et in aliis ; Quod lex Christiana impedit addiscere ; Quod sapientes mundi sunt philosophi tantum, it is evident that around the study of theology in the mediaeval University of Paris there worked a real ferment of thought, and very free thought. But the University of Paris culminated as the exclusive devotion to theological study declined, and culminated by virtue of that declension. A teaching body with a lay character could not have been created by the simple impulse to theological study. The glory of the University of Paris was its Faculty of Arts, its artiens as they were called ; it was among the students in this faculty that the great ardour showed itself, the great increase in numbers. The study of this faculty was the seven arts of the trivium and quadrivium ; the three arts of the trivium were grammar, rhe- toric, and dialectic ; the four of the quadrivium, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, music. This was the liberal education of the Middle Age, and it came direct from the schools of ancient Rome. Such an education was apparently possible with the programme offered by the seven arts. Rhetoric included poetry, history, composition the human- ities in general; dialectic took in the whole of philosophy. The great monastery schools of Cluny, Saint Victor, and the Bernardines, assigned three years to grammatical studies, and the University pro- fessed to admit to its teaching no student who was THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 133 not already grounded in them ; qui nescit paries, in vanum tendit ad artes. The eminence of the University of Paris was in the scholastic philosophy ; its culminating moment was the fourteenth century, its greatness was mediaeval. It did not follow the growth of the time, assimilate the new studies of the Renaissance and the sixteenth century, make itself their organ, and animate with them the French schools of which it was the head. " A French Eton," pp. 232-233, 234, 237. The College of France THE languor of the retrograde spirit took possession of the University, and, with the University, of the colleges and schools of France, which depended on it. The one learned institution which imbibed the spirit of the Renaissance, which seriously established, for the first time in France, instruction in Greek and Hebrew, which kept meeting by the creation of successive chairs, chairs for mathematics, philo- spohy, medicine and surgery, anatomy and botany, the wants of the modern spirit, and which was spared by the Revolution when all the other public establishments for education were swept away the College of France this institution was a royal foundation of Francis the First's, and unconnected with the University. " A French Eton," p. 238. 134 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Schools of the Jesuits THE Jesuits invaded the province long ruled by the University alone. By that adroit management of men for which they have always been eminent, and by the more liberal spirit of their methods, they outdid in popularity their superannuated rival. Their first school in Paris was established in 1565, and in 1762, two years before their dissolution, they had eighty-six colleges in France. They were followed by the Port Royalists, the Benedictines, the Oratorians. The Port Royal schools from which perhaps a powerful influence upon education might have been looked for, restricted this influence by limiting very closely the number of their pupils. Meanwhile the main funds and endowments for public education in France were in the University's hands, and its administration of these was as in- effective as its teaching. Paid or gratuitous, however, its instruction was quite inadequate to the wants of the time, and when the Jesuits were expelled from France in 1764, their establishments closed, and their services as teachers lost, the void that was left was strikingly apparent, and public attention began to be drawn to it. It is well known how Rousseau among writers, and Turgot among statesmen, busied themselves with schemes of education ; but the interest in the subject must have reached the whole body of the community, for the instructions of all three orders of the States General in 1789 are unanimous in demanding the THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 135 reform of education, and its establishment on a proper footing. " A French Eton," pp. 239-240. Condorcet's Plan of Secondary Education FOR the work of reconstruction Condorcet's memor- able plan had in 1792 been submitted to the Com- mittee of Public Instruction appointed by the Legislative Assembly. This plan proposed a secondary school for every 4000 inhabitants ; for each department, a departmental institute or higher school ; nine lycees, schools carrying their studies yet higher than the departmental institute, for the whole of France ; and to crown the edifice, a National Society of Sciences and Arts, corre- sponding in the main with the present Institute of France. The whole expense of national instruction to be borne by the State. " A French Eton," p. 241. Napoleon's Work THE present secondary instruction of France dates directly from the Consulate. The four greatest of the old schools of Paris were adopted, renamed, and set to work. In the course of a year and a half 30 lycees and 250 secondary schools were started and in operation. More than 350 private schools received aid, while inspectors-general and members of the Institute traversed France to ascertain the educational condition of the country, and what were 136 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION its most pressing requirements. The Normal School, the unique and best part of French secondary instruction, was launched at last ; "a boarding establishment for 300 pupils, for the purpose of training them in the art of teaching the letters and sciences." In 1810 it was fairly at work. Mean- while, from 1806 to 1808 Napoleon had established the centre in which all these schools, and all the schools of France, were to meet, the new University, the University of France. The legislation of the Empire accomplished little for the primary instruction of France, but the secondary instruction it established on a firm footing, and with the organisation which in the main it still retains. In 1809 a statute restored to Greek and Latin their old preponderance in this instruction, effacing a mark which the Revolution, by the prominence given to scientific and mathe- matical studies, had left upon it. It thus resumed the mainly classical character common to it in the corresponding institutions all through Europe. The University had been made by Napoleon an endowed corporation, and not a ministerial depart- ment, in order to give it more stability and greater independence. " A French Eton," pp. 245-246, 248, 252. Revenue of the New University of France THE University was not a mere department of that State, it was an endowed corporation. It had a revenue of about 2,500,000 francs. Of this the THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 137 fixed part proceeded from a permanent charge, granted to the University, of 400,000 francs a year upon the public funds. The variable portion of the University revenues was far the most important. This consisted of dues paid for examination and degrees, and of a contribution, one-twentieth of the fee paid for their schooling, from all the scholars in the secondary schools of France. In 1834, after a long discussion, the special budget of the University was suppressed, and the collection of its revenues and the control of its accounts assimilated to that of the other public departments. It was left in the possession of its endowment and property, an honour more nominal than real, since it no longer had the management of them ; but it was thought that by retaining, as the possessor of an endowment and property, the character of a personne civile, it might attract bequests and fresh endowments, of which a department of State had no chance. " A French Eton," pp. 247, 253-4. Guizot's Law of Primary Instruction THE Government of Louis Philippe, having under- taken the serious task of dealing with primary education, was unable at first to give much attention to secondary ; when, however, M. Guizot's memor- able law of 1833 had founded primary instruction, a succession of ministers set themselves to improve and develop the secondary schools. " A French Eton," pp. 251-252. 138 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Ministry and Council of Public Instruction THE Minister of Public Instruction is the head of this vast organisation. His office, in Paris, has six divisions, under himself and his secretary-general. Each of these six divisions has its chief, and is divided into two bureaux, each, again, with its head. First come the three divisions for superior instruction, secondary instruction, primary instruc- tion. The first bureau of each of these is for the personnel of the branch of public instruction adminis- tered by the division treats, that is, all matters relating to appointment, and studies ; the second bureau is for the materiel and comptabiliti whatever relates to buildings, finance or accounts. The three remaining divisions have charge, one, of the department's business with the Institute, and with the public libraries ; another, of its business with the scientific and literary establishments (such as the Museum of Natural History, the French School at Athens, the observatories of Paris and Marseilles, etc.), in connection with it ; the third, of the expense of the central office, and of the general revision of the whole finance and accounts of the department- Under the Minister's presidency is the Imperial Council of Public Instruction, which in concert with him fixes the programmes of study in the State schools, and the books to be used in them. It is also consulted as to the formation of new State schools, and as to the whole legislation and regula- tion of French public instruction. The important measures which have lately been introduced and THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 139 passed for the furtherance of professional instruction, as it is called measures of which I shall have to speak presently were all of them thus brought by M. Duruy, the present minister, before the Council, and there discussed. Certain members of the Council formerly proceeded from election ; in 1852, under the pressure which then caused, in France, the strengthening of the hand of government everywhere, proposal by the Minister of Public Instruction and nomination by the President of the Republic was substituted for election in these cases. The Emperor still nominates on the Minister's proposal ; but M. Duruy's disposition has certainly been rather to enlarge the part of action for others than to keep all action for himself ; thus he has lately given to the functionaries of public instruction, whom the law of 1852 gave him the power to dismiss offhand, the security of a committee of five, chosen out of the Council of Public Instruction, by whom the case of the functionary whose conduct may be in question is to be examined, his defence heard, and the merits of the case reported on. " A French Eton," pp. 266, 267. The Normal School THE pupils of the Normal School (Ecole Normale Supdrieure) can hold the place of professor without being agr/ges ; but they cannot hold the more important and better paid post of professeur titulaire without this test ; they can only be divisional, acting, or assistant professors (professeurs divisionnaires, 140 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION suppleants or adjoints). And the examinations of the Normal School are in themselves a test, and a very strict one, of the fitness of its pupils for their business. I have already mentioned this admirable institution ; it enjoys a deserved celebrity out of France as well as at home, and nowhere else does there exist anything quite like it. Decreed by the revolutionary Government, and set to work by that of the first Napoleon, it had two periods of difficulty one under the Restoration, when it attracted hostility as a nest of liberalism, and it was proposed to abate its importance by substituting for one central Normal School several local ones ; another after the revolution of February, when the grant to it was greatly reduced, and the number of its pupils fell off. But it has now recovered its grants and its numbers, and few institutions in France are so rooted in the public esteem. Its main function is to form teachers for the public schools. It has two divisions ; one literary, the other scientific. Its pupils at present number no ; they are all bursars, holding a scholarship of 40 a year, which entirely provides for the cost of their maintenance. The course is a three years' one ; but a certain number of the best pupils are retained for a fourth and fifth year ; these, however, are lost to the secondary schools, being prepared for the doctorate and for the posts of superior instruction, such as the professorships in the faculties. Last year 344 candidates presented themselves for 35 vacancies, and these candidates were all picked men. To compete, a youth must in the THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 141 first place be over 18 years of age and under 24, must produce a medical certificate that he has no bodily infirmity unfitting him for the function of teacher, and a good-conduct certificate from his school. He must enter into an engagement to devote himself, if admitted, for 10 years to the service of public instruction, and he must hold the degree of bachelor of arts if he is a candidate in the literary section of the school, of bachelor of sciences if in the scientific. He then undergoes a preliminary examination, which is held at the same time at the centre of each academy throughout France. This examination weeds the candidates ; those who pass through it come up to Paris for a final examina- tion at the Ecole Normale, and those who do best in this final examination are admitted to the vacant scholarships. A bare list of subjects of examination is never very instructive ; the reader will better understand what the final examination is, if I say that the candidates are the very /lite of the lycees, who in the highest clasess of these lyctes have gone through the course of instruction, literary or scientific, there prescribed. In the scientific section of the Normal School the first year's course comprehends the differential and integral calculus, and it will at once be seen what advanced progress in the pupil such a course implies. " A French Eton," pp. 279, 283-285. Oxford and Cambridge as higher Lycees EVERY Englishman who has been at Oxford or Cambridge must in France remark with surprise 142 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION that institutions like these universities of ours, taking a young man at the age of eighteen or nine- teen, and continuing his education, with the shelter of a considerable, though modified control and discipline till the age of twenty-three or twenty-four, seem to be there, for laymen, quite wanting. It is true that in France, as in Germany, there is a superior instruction, a faculty instruction, much more com- plete than ours, and that our Oxford and Cambridge are, in fact, as Signer Matteucci, who has studied them well, said to me at Turin, not establishments of superior instruction at all, but simply hauls lycees. This is true, and it is to be regretted that we have not a better organised superior instruction ; still Oxford and Cambridge, in prolonging a young man's term of tuition and prolonging it under discipline, instead of his being thrown at large on the life of a great city, Paris or London, where he follows lectures, are invaluable, and it is in this direction that foreigners may find most to envy in English education. " A French Eton," p. 281. French and English Masters A FRENCH professor has his three, four, or five hours' work a day in lessons and conferences, and then he is free ; he has nothing to do with the discipline or religious teaching of the lycee, he has not to live in its precincts ; he finishes his teaching and then he leaves the lycee and its cares behind him altogether. The provisor, the censor, the chaplains, THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 143 the superintendents, have the business of govern- ment and direction, and they are chosen on the ground of their aptitude for it. A young man wishing to follow a profession which keeps him in contact with intellectual studies and enables him to continue them, but who has no call and no talent for the trying post of teacher, governor, pastor, and man of business all in one, will hesitate before he becomes a master in an English public school, but he may very well become a professor in a French one. Accordingly the service of public instruction in France attracts a far greater proportion of the intellectual force of the country than in England. Two of the most eminent of modern Frenchmen, M. Cousin and M. Villemain, were originally pro- fessors in the French public schools ; they were both, also, Ministers of Public Instruction. M. Duruy, the present Minister, was a professor, an author of a very good school-book, and an inspector. M. Taine and M. Prevost-Paradol, personages so important in the French literature of the present day, were both of them distinguished pupils of the Normal School. It is clear that this abundance of eminent names gives dignity and consideration to the profession of public teaching in France ; it tends to keep it fully supplied, and with men who carry weight with the pupils they teach and command their intellectual respect. And this is a very important advantage. I was informed that from all these sources the income of an able Paris professor of the first rank in his calling reached very nearly 10,000 francs (400) a year. For my own part I would sooner have this, 144 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION with the freedom and leisure a French professor has with it, than 800 a year as one of the under masters of a public school in England. " A French Eton," pp. 288, 290-292. Examinations in France and England THE French lycees are guiltless of one preposterous violation of the laws of life and health committed by our own great schools, which have of late years thrown open to competitive examination all the places on their foundations. The French have plenty of examinations ; but they put them almost entirely at the right age for examinations, between the years of fifteen and twenty-five, when the candidate is neither too old nor too young to be examined with advantage. To put upon little boys of nine or ten the pressure of a competitive examination for an object of the greatest value to their parents, is to offer a premium for the violation of nature's elementary laws, and to sacrifice, as in the poor geese fatted for Strasburg pies, the due development of all the organs of life to the premature hypertrophy of one. It is well known that the cramming of the little human victims for their ordeal of competition tends more and more to become an industry with a certain class of small schoolmasters, who know the secrets of the process, and who are led by self-interest to select in the first instance their own children for it. The foundations are no gainers, and nervous exhaustion at fifteen is the price which many a clever boy pays for over-stimulation at THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 145 ten ; and the nervous exhaustion of a number of our clever boys tends to create a broad reign of intellectual dullness in the mass of youths from fifteen to twenty, whom the clever boys, had they been rightly developed and not unnaturally forced, ought to have leavened. You can hardly put too great a pressure on a healthy youth to make him work between fifteen and twenty-five ; healthy or unhealthy, you can hardly put on him too light a pressure of this kind before twelve. The bursarships in the lycees are, therefore, not given away by competitive examination among children from eight to twelve ; they are given on the ground of poverty, either to the children of persons having some public claim, or to the most promising subjects from the primary schools. This seems to me quite right, and I wish the English reader to remark how here, as elsewhere, we suffer from our dread of effective administration and from the feudal and incoherent organisation of our society. In the hands of individuals and small local bodies patronage like that of our foundation schools becomes outrageously jobbed ; at last the public attention gets directed to this, and the patronage has to be otherwise dealt with ; but there is no body of trained and competent persons with authority to decide deliberately how it may best be dealt with ; so it ends by the local people through whose laches the difficulty has arisen throwing a sop to Cerberus, and gratifying an ignorant public's love of clap-trap by throwing everything open to competitive examina- tion. On the Continent, there is an Education L 146 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Minister and a Council of Public Instruction to weigh matters of this kind ; so far from jobbing being promoted by this, the examination test is much more strictly applied in France than with us, but there is a competent authority to decide when it is rational to apply it, and when absurd. Neither are there any complaints of the way the lycee bursarships it being judged best not to give these by competitive examination are distributed ; because here again all that is done is done with the safeguards of joint action between several competent agencies, of publicity, and of responsibility. It is a mistake to suppose that a government bureau, in an administrative organisation like that of France, has no checks ; it has far more checks than a govern- ment bureau here, which has been extemporised to meet some urgent want, and is not part of a well-devised whole. The secretary of our Education Department is almost invited to settle of his own authority education-questions which M. Duruy, though a minister, would not settle without referring them to a Council composed as we have seen. Nay, and even supposing our secretary refers them to his chiefs and they refer them to the Committee of Council how is this Committee of Council com- posed ? Of three or four Cabinet Ministers with no special acquaintance with educational matters. " A French Eton," pp. 328-331. Private Schools in France and England PRIVATE or free schools in France are not free in the sense that any man may keep one who likes. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 147 To keep one a man must be twenty-five years old, must have had five years' practice in a school, and must hold either the degree of bachelor, or a certificate which is given after an examination of the same nature as the examination he would have to pass for the degree of bachelor. Thus, he cannot, as in England, be perfectly ignorant and inexperienced hi his business ; neither can he, as in England, be a ticket-of-leave-man, for the French law declares every man who has undergone a criminal condemna- tion incapable of keeping a school. Neither can he have his school-room in ruins or under conditions dangerous to his pupil's health or morality ; for if it is a new school he is establishing, he has to signify his intention beforehand to the academic authority of his department, and if this authority makes objection, the Council of Public instruction in Paris, in the last resort, decides. If within a month the academic authority makes no objection, he is then free to open his school ; but it is at all times liable to inspection by the academic authority or the inspectors-general of secondary instruction, to ascer- tain that nothing contrary to health, morality, or the law, is suffered to go on there. The inspector of a school of this kind does not meddle with its instruction. " A French Eton," pp. 337-338. Discipline in French and English Schools OUR government through prepositors or prefects, and our fagging, are unknown in French schools ; 148 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION for the former, the continual presence and super- vision of the maitre d 'etude leaves no place ; the latter is abhorrent to French ideas. The set of modern opinion is undoubtedly against fagging, and perhaps also against government through the sixth form ; one may doubt, however, whether the force of old and cherished custom, the removal of excess and abuses in the exercise of these two powers, and certain undeniable benefits attending that of, at any rate, the latter of the two, may not yet long preserve them in the great English schools. The same can hardly be said of flogging, which, without entering into long discussions about it, one may say the modern spirit has irrevocably condemned as a school punishment, so that it will more and more come to appear half disgusting, half ridiculous, and a teacher will find it more and more difficult to inflict it without a loss of self-respect. The feeling on the Continent is very strong on this point. The punish- ments in the French schools are impositions and confinement. " A French Eton," pp. 366-367. Growing Disbelief in Greek and Latin As one may say of flogging, that the set of the modern spirit is so decisively against it that it is doomed, whatever plausible arguments may be urged on its behalf, so is the set of the modern spirit so decisively in favour of the new instruction, that M. Duruy's creation, whatever reasons may be given why it should not succeed, will probably in the end succeed in some shape or other. This current of THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 149 opinion is, indeed, on the Continent, so wide and strong as to be fast growing irresistible ; and it is not the work of authority. Authority does all that can be done in favour of the old classical training ; ministers of State sing its praises ; the reporter of the Commission charged to examine the new law is careful to pay to the old training and its pre- eminence a homage amusingly French.* Men of the world envy us a House of Commons where Latin quotations are still made, school authorities are full of stories to show how boys trained in Latin and Greek beat the pupils of the new instruction even in their own field. Still in the body of society there spreads a growing disbelief in Greek and Latin, at any rate, as at present taught, a dis- position to make modern languages and the natural sciences take their place. I remark this in Germany as well as in France ; and in Germany, too, as in France, the movement is in no wise due to the school authorities, but is rather in their despite, and against their advice and testimony. I shall have an opportunity, by and by, to say a few words respecting what appears to me the real import of this movement, and the part of truth and of error in the ideas which favour it. All I wish now to lay stress upon is its volume and irresistibility. " A French Eton," pp. 394-395. * " On ne saurait trop exalter 1'importance sociale des lettres classiques. Ce sont elles qui ont assure depuis des siecles la suprematie intellectuelle de la France" Enseignement secondaire special, p. 438. 150 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Appointment by Examination PUBLIC establishments such as these which I have enumerated serve a twofold purpose. They fix a standard of serious preparation and special fitness for every branch of employment ; a standard which acts on the whole intellectual habit of the country. To fix a standard of serious preparation is a very different thing, and a far more real homage to intelligence and study, than to demand as we have done since the scandal of our old mode of appoint- ment to public functions grew too evident a single examination, by a single board with a staff of examiners, as a sole preliminary to all kinds of civil employment. Examinations preceded by prepara- tion in a first-rate superior school, with first-rate professors, give you a formed man ; examinations preceded by cramming under a crammer give you a crammed man, but not a formed one. I once bore part in the examinations for the Indian Civil Service, and I can truly say that the candidates to whom I gave the highest marks were almost without exception the candidates whom I would not have appointed. They were crammed men, not formed men ; the formed men were the public school men, but they were ignorant on the special matter of examination English literature. A superior school forms a man at the same time that it gives him special knowledge. " A French Eton," p. 412. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 151 Value of Public Establishments / A SECOND purpose which such public establishments ^serve is this. pThey represent the State, the country, the collective community, in a striking visible shape, which is at the same time a noble and civilising one ; giving the people something to be proud of, and which it does them good to be proud of.J The State is in England singularly without means" of civilisation of this kind. But a modern state cannot afford to do without them, and the action of individuals and corporations cannot fully compensate for them the want of them has told severely on the intelligenc e and refinement of our middle and lower class. It makes a difference to the civilisation of these classe s whether it is the Louvre which represents their country to them, or the National Gallery ; and whether the State consecrates in the eyes of the people the great lines of intellectual culture by national institutions for them, or leaves them to take care of themselves. What the State, the collective permanent nation, honours, the passing people honour ; what the State neglects, they think of no great consequence. " A French Eton," pp. 414-415. Motto from Humboldt " The thing is not to let the schools and universi- ties go on in a drowsy and impotent routine ; the thing is, to raise the culture of the nation ever higher and higher by their means." " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. iv. 152 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION The Experience of the Continent IT is expedient for the satisfactory resolution of those educational questions, which are at length beginning seriously to occupy us, both that we should attend to the experience of the Continent, and that we should know precisely what it is which this experience says. As to compulsory education, denominational education, secular education, the Continental precedents are to be studied ; and they are to be studied for the sake of seeing what they really mean, and not merely for the sake of furnishing ourselves with help from them for some thesis which we uphold. Most English "Liberals seem persuaded that our elementary schools should be undenominational, and their teaching secular ; and that with a system of public elementary schools it cannot well be other- wise. Let us clearly understand, however, that on the Continent generally, everywhere except in Holland, the public elementary school is denomina- tional ; * and its teaching religious as well as secular. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. ix. Compulsory Education THEN, again, as to compulsory education. The example of the Continent proves, and nothing which Mr. Pattison or I have said disproves, that in general, where popular education is most prosperous, there it is also compulsory. The compulsoriness Of course with what we should call a conscience clause. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 153 is in general, found to go along with the prosperity, though it cannot be said to cause it ; but the same high value among a people for education which leads to its prospering among them, leads also in general to its being made compulsory. Where the value for it is not ardent enough to make it, as it is in Prussia and Zurich, compulsory, it is not, for the most part, ardent enough to give it the prosperity it has in Prussia and Zurich. After seeing the schools of North Germany and of German Switzer- land, I am strongly of this opinion. But the English friends of compulsory education, in their turn, will do well to inform themselves how far on the Continent compulsory education extends, and the conditions under which alone the working classes, if they respect themselves, can submit to its application. In the view of the English friends of compulsory education, the educated and in- telligent middle and upper classes among us are to confer the boon of compulsory education upon the ignorant lower class which needs it while they do not. But on the Continent, instruction is obligatory for lower, middle, and upper class alike. I doubt whether our educated and intelligent classes are at all prepared for this. I have an acquaintance in easy circumstances, of distinguished connections, living in a fashionable part of London, who, like many other people, deals rather easily with his son's schooling. Sometimes the boy is at school, then for months together he is away from school, and left to run idle at home. He is not in the least an invalid, but it pleases his father and mother to 154 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION bring him up in this manner. Now I imagine no English friends of compulsory education dream of dealing with such a defaulter as this ; and certainly his father, who perhaps is himself a friend of com- pulsory education for the working classes, would be astounded to find his education of his own son inter- fered with. But if my worthy acquaintance lived in Switzerland or Germany, he would be dealt with as follows. I speak with the school-law of Canton Neufchatel immediately under my eyes, but the regulations on this matter are substantially the same in all the states of Germany and of German Switzer- land. The Municipal Education Committee of the district where my acquaintance lived would address a summons to him, informing him that a comparison of the school-rolls of their district with the municipal list of children of school-age showed his son not to be at school ; and requiring him, in consequence, to appear before the Municipal Committee at a place and time named, and there to satisfy them either that his son did attend some public school, or that, if privately taught, he was taught by duly trained and certificated teachers. On the back of the summons my acquaintance would find printed the penal articles of the school-law sentencing him to a fine if he failed to satisfy the Municipal Com- mittee ; and, if he failed to pay the fine, or was found a second time offending, to imprisonment. In some Continental States he would be liable, in case of repeated infraction of the school-law, to be deprived of his parental rights, and to have the care of his son transferred to guardians named by the THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 155 State. It is indeed terrible to think of the consterna- tion and wrath of our educated and intelligent classes under a discipline like this ; and I should not like to be the man to try and impose it on them. But I assure them most emphatically and if they study the experience of the Continent they will convince themselves of the truth of what I say that only on these conditions of its equal and universal application is any final law of compulsory education possible. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. x-xii. Higher Education SECONDARY and higher education is not, like popular education, a subject which very keenly interests at present our educated and intelligent classes. It is their own education ; and with their own education they are, it seems, tolerably well satisfied. Yet I hope that here again these classes above all, I hope that the great middle class, which has much the widest and the gravest interests concerned in the matter, will not refuse their attention to the experience afforded by the Continent. Before con- cluding that they can have nothing to learn from it, let them at any rate know and weigh it. To three points particularly let me invite their consideration. In the first place, let them consider in its length and breadth the fact that on the Continent the middle class in general may be said to be brought up on the first plane, while in England it is brought up on the second plane. In the public 156 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION higher schools of Prussia or France some 65,000 of the youth of the middle and upper classes are brought up ; in the public higher schools of England even when we reckon as such many institutions which would not be entitled to such a rank on the Continent only some 15,000. Has this state of things no bad effect upon us ? The second point is this. The study of Conti- nental education will show our educated and in- telligent classes that many things which they wish for cannot be done as isolated operations, but must, if they are to be done at all, come in as parts of a regularly designed whole. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. xv. Technical Schools OUR educated and intelligent classes, in their solicitude for our backward working class, and their alarm for our industrial pre-eminence, are beginning to cry out for technical schools for our artizans. Well-informed and distinguished people seem to think it is only necessary to have special schools of arts and trades, as they have abroad, and then we may take a clever boy from our elementary schools, perfected by the Revised Code, and put him at once into a special school. A study of the best Conti- nental experience will show them that the special school is the crown of a long co-ordered series, designed and graduated by the best heads in the country. A clever boy in a Prussian elementary school, passes first into a Mittelschule, or higher THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 157 elementary school, then into a modern or real school of the second class, then into a real school of the first class, and finally, after all these, into the special school. A boy who has had this preparation is able to profit by a special school. To send him there straight from the elementary school, is like sending a boy from the fourth form at one of our classical public schools to hear Professor Ritschl lecture on Latin inscriptions. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. xviii. Council of Education I COME, lastly, to the third point for our remark in Continental education. These foreign Governments which we think offensively arbitrary, do at least take, when they administer education, the best educational opinion of the country into their counsels, and we do not. This comes partly from our dis- belief in government, partly from our belief in machinery. Our disbelief in government makes us slow to organise government perfectly for any matter. Our belief in machinery makes us think that when we have organised a department, however imperfectly, it must prove efficacious and self- acting. The result is that while, on the Continent, through Boards and Councils, the best educational opinion of the country by which I mean the opinion of men like Sir James Shuttleworth, Mr. Mill, Dr. Temple, men who have established their right to be at least heard on these topics necessarily reaches the Government and influences its actions, 158 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION in this country there are no organised means of its ever reaching our Government at all. The most important questions of educational policy may be settled without such men being even heard. A number of grave matters affecting public instruction in this country our system of competitive examina- tions, our regulation of studies, our whole school- legislation, are at the present moment settled one hardly knows how, certainly without any care for the best counsel attainable being first taken on them. On the Continent it is not so ; and the more our Government is likely, in England, to have to intervene in educational matters, the more does the Continental practice, in this particular, invite and require our attention. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. xix. Obstacles to Profiting by Continental Experience IN conclusion. There are two chief obstacles, as it seems to me, which oppose themselves to our consulting foreign opinion with profit. One is, our notion of the State as an alien intrusive power in the community, not summing up and representing the action of individuals, but thwarting it. This notion is not so strong as it once was, but still it is strong enough to make it opportune to quote some words from a foreign Report before me, which sets this much obscured point in its true light : " Le Gouvernement ne repr/sente pas un interet particulier distinct, puisqu'il est au contraire la plus haute et THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 159 la plus sincere expression de tous les intevets du pays." This is undoubtedly what a Government ought to be ; and, if it is not this, it is the duty of its citizens to try and make it this, not to try and get rid of so powerful and essential an agency as much as possible. The other obstacle is our high opinion of our own energy and prosperity. This opinion is just ; but it is possible to rely on it too long, and to strain our energy and our prosperity too hard. At any rate our energy and our prosperity will be more fruitful and safer, the more we add intelligence to them. Here, if anywhere, is an occasion for applying the words of the wise man : "If the iron be blunt, and a man do not whet the edge, then must he put forth more strength ; but wisdom is profitable to direct." " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. xx-xxi. The Initial Defect in English Schools PERHAPS one reason why in England our schools have not had the life and growth of the schools of Germany and Holland is to be found in the separation with us, of the power of the Reformation and the power of the Renascence. With us, too, the Reformation triumphed and got possession of our schools ; but our leading reformers were not at the same time, like those of Germany, the nation's leading spirits in intellect and culture. In Germany the best spirits of the nation were then the reformers. In England our best spirits Shakspeare, Bacon, Spenser were men of the Renascence, not men of 160 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION the Reformation, and our reformers were men of the second order. The Reformation, therefore, getting hold of the schools in England was a very different force, a force far inferior in light, resources, and prospects, to the Reformation getting hold of the schools in Germany. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. 2. Reform of Classical Studies To reform the old methods of teaching the classics, to reduce their preponderance, to make school studies bear more directly upon the wants of practical life, and to aim at imparting what is called " useful knowledge," were projects not unknown to the seventeenth and eighteenth century as well as to ours. Comenius, a Moravian by birth, who in 1641 was invited to England in order to remodel the schools here, and in the following century Rousseau in France, and Basedow in Germany, promulgated, with various degrees of notoriety and success, various schemes with one or other of these objects. The Philanthropinum of Dessau, an institution established in pursuance of them, was an experiment which made much noise in its day. It was broken up about 1780, but its impulse and the ideas which set this impulse in motion, continued, and bear fruit in the Realschulen. The name Realschule was first used at Halle ; a school with that title was established there by Christoph Semler, in 1738. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. 13. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 161 Prussian School Law THERE is no organic school-law in Prussia like the organic school-law of France, though sketches and projects of such a law have more than once been prepared. But at present the public control of the higher schools is exercised through administrative orders and instructions, like the minutes of our Committee of Council on Education. But the administrative authority has in Prussia a very different basis for its operations from that which it has in England, and a much firmer one. It has for its basis these articles of the Allgemeine Landrecht, or common law of Prussia, which was drawn up in writing in Frederick the Great's reign, and pro- mulgated in 1794, in the reign of his successor : " Schools and universities are State institutions, having for their object the instruction of youth in useful information and scientific knowledge. " Such establishments are to be instituted only with the State's previous knowledge and consent. " All public schools and public establishments of education are under the State's supervision, and must at all times submit themselves to its exami- nations and inspections. " Whenever the appointment of teachers is not by virtue of the foundation or of a special privilege vested in certain persons or corporations, it belongs to the State. " Even where the immediate supervision of such schools and the appointment of their teachers is committed to certain private persons or corporations, 1 62 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION new teachers cannot be appointed, and important changes in the constitution and teaching of the school cannot be adopted, without the previous knowledge or consent of the provincial school authorities. " The teachers in the gymnasiums and other higher schools have the character of State function- aries." To the same effect the Prussian Deed of Con- stitution (Verfassungs-Urkunde) of 1850 has the following : " For the education of the young sufficient provision is to be made by means of public schools." " Every one is free to impart instruction, and to found and to conduct establishments for instruction, when he has proved to the satisfaction of the proper State authorities that he has the moral, scientific, and technical qualifications requisite. " All public and private establishments are under the supervision of authorities named by the State." With these principles to serve as a basis, adminis- trative control can be exercised without much difficulty. These principles, however, may with real truth be said to form part of the common law of Prussia, for they form part of almost every Prussian citizen's notions of what is right and fitting in school concerns. It would be a mistake to suppose that the State in Prussia shows a grasping and centralising spirit in dealing with education ; on the contrary, it makes the administration of it as local as it possibly can ; but it takes care that education shall not be left to the chapter of accidents. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 20-22. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 163 Prussian Leaving Examinations A PUBLIC school boy, who, to evade the rule requiring two years in prima, leaves the gymnasium in secunda, goes to a private school or private tutor, and offers himself for examination within two years, needs a special permission from the minister in order to be examined. So well do the Prussian authorities know how insufficient an instrument for their object that of promoting the national culture and filling the professions with fit men is the bare examination test ; so averse are they to cram ; so clearly do they perceive that what forms a youth, and what he should in all ways be induced to acquire, is the orderly development of his faculties under good and trained teaching. With this view, all the instructions for the examinations are drawn up. It is to tempt candi- dates to no special preparation and effort, but to be such as " a scholar of fair ability and proper diligence may at the end of his school course come to with a quiet mind, and without a painful preparatory effort tending to relaxation and torpor as soon as the effort is over." The total cultivation (Gesammtbil- dung) of the candidate is the great matter, and this is why the two years of prima are prescribed : " that the instruction in this highest class may not degenerate into a preparation for the examination, that the pupil may have the requisite time to come steadily and without overhurrying to the fulness of the measure of his powers and character, that he may be securely and thoroughly formed, instead of being 164 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION bewildered and oppressed by a mass of information hastily heaped together." All tumultuarische Vorbereitung and all stimulation of vanity and emulation is to be discouraged, and the examination, like the school, is to regard das Wesentliche und Dauernde the substantial and enduring. Accord- ingly, the composition and the passages for transla- tion are great matters in German examinations, not those papers of questions by which the examiner is so led to show his want of sense, and the examinee his stores of cram. That a boy shall have been for a certain number of years under good training is what, in Prussia, the State wants to secure ; and it uses the examina- tion test to help it to secure this. We leave his training to take its chance, and we put the examina- tion test to a use for which it is quite inadequate to try and make up for our neglect. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 54-56. Pedagogic THE Germans, as is well known, attach much im- portance to the science of pedagogic. That science is as yet far from being matured, and much nonsense is talked on the subject of it ; still, the total un- acquaintance with it, and with all which has been written about it, in which the intending school- master is, in England, suffered to remain, has, I am convinced, injurious effects both on our school- masters and on our schools. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. 67. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 165 Teachers of Modern Languages A SPECIAL facultas docendi is given to the foreign teacher of modern languages ; but even he, besides the modern language he is to teach, must know as much Latin, history, geography, and philosophy as is required of candidates who are to teach in the middle division of a gymnasium. This provision guards against the employment of subjects so unfit by their training and general attainments to rule a class, as those we too often see chosen as teachers of modern languages. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 68-69. The Art of Teaching WOLF'S great rule in all these lessons was that rule which all masters in the art of teaching have followed to take as little part as possible in the lesson himself ; merely to start it, guide it, and sum it up, and to let quite the main part in it be borne by the learners. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. 73. Need of an Education Minister I CANNOT but think an education Minister a necessity for modern States, yet I know that in the employment of such an agency there are inconveniences, and I do not wish to hide any of them from the English reader. I have said that in France political con- siderations are in my opinion too much suffered to 166 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION influence the whole working of the system of public education. In Prussia the minister is armed with powers, and issues instructions showing how he interprets those powers, which in England would excite very great jealousy. He tells the provincial authorities that no reproach must attach to the private and public life, any more than to the know- ledge or ability, of a candidate for school employ- ment ; he tells them that they are to take into consideration the whole previous career, extra professional as well as professional (das gesammte bisherige und ausseramtliche Verhalten], of such a candidate ; and that schoolmasters should be men who will train up their scholars in notions of obedience towards the sovereign and the State. It is not, indeed, at all likely that in England, with the forces watching and controlling him here, a minister would use language such as I have quoted ; and even if it were, I am not at all sure that to have a minister using such language, though it is language which I cordially dislike, is in itself so much more lamentable and baneful a thing than that anarchy and ignorance in education matters under which we contentedly suffer. However, what I wish now to say is, that in spite of this language, the political influence which has such real effect upon the public education of France, has no effect, or next to none, upon that of Prussia. I do not believe that it has more on that of Prussia than it has on that of this country. I took great pains to inform myself on this head. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 82-83. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 167 Prussian Belief in Culture THE truth is, that when a nation has got the belief in culture which the Prussian nation has got, and when its schools are worthy of this belief, it will not suffer them to be sacrificed to any other interest ; and however greatly political considerations may be paramount in other departments of administration in this they are not. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. 85. Religious Instruction in Prussian Schools I HAVE spoken several times of the religious instruc- tion as forming part of school work and of examina- tions. The two legally-established forms of religion in Prussia are the Protestant (evangelisch] and the Catholic. All public schools must be either Protes- tant, Catholic, or mixed (Simultananstalteri) . But the constitution of a mixed school has not been authoritatively denned, and though the practice has grown up, especially in Realschulen, of appoint- ing teachers of the two confessions indifferently, yet these Simultananstalten retain the character of Christian schools, and indeed usually follow the rule either that the director and the majority of the masters shall be Catholic or that they shall be Protestant. In general, the deed of foundation or established custom determines to what confession a school shall belong. The religious instruction and the services follow the confession of the school. The ecclesiastical authorities the consistories for Protestant schools, the bishops for Catholic schools i68 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION must concur with the school authorities in the appointment of those who give the religious instruc- tion in the schools. The consistories and the bishops have likewise the right of inspecting, by themselves or by their delegates, this instruction, and of addressing to the Provincial Boards any remarks they may have to make on it. The ordinarius, or class-master, who has general charge of the class, as distinguished from the teachers who give the different parts of the instruction in it, is generally, if possible, the religious instructor. In Protestant schools the religious instructor is usually a layman ; in Catholic, an ecclesiastic. The public schools are open to scholars of all creeds ; in general, one of the two confessions, evangelical or Catholic, greatly preponderates, and the Catholics, in especial, prefer schools of their own confession. But the State holds the balance quite fairly between them ; where the scholars of that confession which is not the established confession of the school are in considerable numbers, a special religious instructor is paid out of the school funds to come and give them this religious instruction at the school. Thus, in the gymnasium at Bonn, which is Catholic, I heard a lesson on the Epistle to the Galatians (in the Greek] given to the Protestant boys by a young Protestant minister of the town, engaged by the gymnasium for that purpose. When the scholars whose confession is in the minority are very few in number, their parents have to provide by private arrangements of their own for their children's religious instruction. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 85-87. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 169 Salaries of Prussian Schoolmasters THE whole scale of incomes in Prussia is, however, much lower than with us, and the habits of the nation are frugal and simple. The rate of schoolmasters' salaries was raised after 1815, and has been raised again since ; it is not exceptionally low as compared with the rates of incomes in Germany generally. The rector of Schulpforta with his 300 a year and a house, has in all the country round him where there is great well-doing and comfort few people more comfortably off than himself ; he can do all he wants to do, and all that anybody about him does, and this is wealth. The schoolmasters of the higher school enjoy, too, great consideration ; and con- sideration in a country not corrupted has a value as well as money. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. 96. The Ancient Authors as Literature THE great superiority of the Germans, and where they show how much further they have gone in Alterthumswissenschaft than we have, is in their far broader notion of treating, even in their schools, the ancient authors as literature, and conceiving the place and significance of an author in his country's literature, and in that of the world. In this way the student's interest in Greek and Latin becomes much more vital, and the hold of these languages upon him is much more likely to be permanent. This is to be set against the superior finish and 170 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION elegance of the best of our boys in Latin and Greek composition ; above all, in Latin and Greek verse. Greek verse, indeed, can scarcely be said to be a school exercise at all, so far as I could see or hear, in the foreign schools. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 109-110. Wise Choice of Text-Books I MUST in passing observe how greatly some intelligent censorship like that of the Provincial Boards and the Minister in Prussia, or that of the Council of Public Instruction in France, is needed for school- books in England. Many as are the absurdities of our state of school anarchy, perhaps none of them is more crying than the book-pest which prevails under it. Every school chooses at its own discre- tion ; many schools make a trade of book-dealing, and therefore it is for their interest to have books which are not used elsewhere, and which the pupil will not bring with him from his last school ; so that a boy who has been at three or four English schools has often had to buy a complete new set of school- books for each. The extravagance of this is bad enough ; but then, besides, as there exists no intelligent control or selection of them, half at least of our school-books are rubbish, and to the other defects of our school system we may add this, that in no other secondary schools in Europe do the pupils spend so much of their time in learning such utter nonsense as they do in ours. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 112-113. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 171 Games at German Schools AT Schulpforta they are very proud of their playing- field, which is indeed, with a wooded hill arising behind it, a pleasant place ; but the games of English playing-fields do not go on there ; instead of goals or a cricket-ground, one sees apparatus for gymnastics. The Germans, as is well known, now cultivate gymnastics in their schools with great care. Since 1842, gymnastics have been made a regular part of the public-school course ; there is a Central Turnanstalt at Berlin, with eighteen civilian pupils who are being trained expressly to supply model teachers of gymnastics for the public schools. The teachers profess to have adapted their exercises with precision to every age, and to all the stages of a boy's growth and muscular development. The French are much impressed by what seems to them the success of the Germans in this kind of instruction, and certainly in their own lycces they have not at present done nearly so much for it. Nothing, however, will make an ex-schoolboy of one of the great English schools regard the gymnastics of a foreign school without a slight feeling of wonder and compassion, so much more animating and interesting do the games of his remembrance seem to him. This much, however, I will say ; if boys have long work hours, or if they work hard, gym- nastics probably do more for their physical health in the comparatively short time allotted to recreation than anything else could. In England the majority of public schoolboys work far less than the foreign 172 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION schoolboy, and for this majority the English games are delightful ; but for the few hard students with us there is in general but the constitutional, and this is not so good as the foreign gymnastics. For little boys, again, I am inclined to think that the carefully taught gymnastics of the foreign school are better than the lounging shiveringly about, which in my time used often at our great schools to be the portion of those who had not yet come to full age for games. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 124-125. Value of Classical Training DR. JAGER, the director of the united school well- placed, therefore, for judging, and as I have said, an able man assured me it was the universal conviction with those competent to form an opinion that the Realschulen were not, at present, successful institutions. He declared that the boys in the corresponding forms of the classical school beat the Realschule boys in matters which both do alike, such as history, geography, the mother-tongue, and even French, though to French the Realschule boys devote so far more time than their comrades of the classical school. The reason for this, Dr. Jager affirms, is that the classical training strengthens a boy's mind so much. This is what, as I have already said, the chief school authorities everywhere in France and Germany testify : I quote Dr. Jager's testimony in particular, because of his ability and because of his double experience. In Switzerland you do not hear the THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 173 same story, but the regnant Swiss conception of secondary instruction is, in general, not a liberal but a commercial one ; not culture and training of the mind, but what will be of immediate palpable utility in some practical calling, is there the chief matter ; and this cannot be admitted as the true scope of secondary instruction. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 131-132. The Privatdocent OTHER countries have full professors and pro- fessors extraordinary. France, for instance, has her professeurs titulaires, and her professeurs suppleants ; but the Privatdocent is peculiar to Germany, and is the great source of vigour and renovation to her superior instruction. Sometimes he gives private lessons, like the private tutors of our universities ; these lessons have the title of Privatissima. But this is not his main business. His main business is as unlike the sterile business of our private tutors as possible. The Privatdocent is an assistant to the professorate ; he is free to use, when the professors do not occupy them, the university lecture-rooms, he gives lectures like the professors, and his lectures count as professors' lectures for those who attend them. His appoint- ment is on this wise. A distinguished student applies to be made Privatdocent in a faculty. He produces certain certificates and performs certain exercises before two delegates named by the faculty, and this is called his Habilitation, If he passes, 174 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION the faculty names him Privatdocent. The authorisa- tion of the minister is also requisite for him, but this follows his nomination by the faculty as a matter of course. He is then free to lecture on any matters proper to his faculty. He is on his probation, he receives no salary whatever ; and depends entirely on his lectures ; he has, therefore, every motive to exert himself. In general, as I have said, the professors and Privatdocenten arrange together to parcel out the field of instruction between them, and one supplements the other's teaching ; still a Privatdocent may, if he likes, lecture on just the same subject that a professor is lecturing on ; there is absolute liberty in this respect. The one precaution taken against undue competition is, that a Privat- docent lecturing on a professor's subject is not allowed to charge lower fees than a professor. It does honour to the disinterested spirit in which science is pursued in Germany, that with these temptations to competi- tion the relations between the professors and the Privatdocenten are in general excellent ; the dis- tinguished professor encourages the rising Privat- docent, and the Privatdocent seeks to make his teaching serve science, not his own vanity. But it is evident how the neighbourhood of a rising young Privatdocent must tend to keep a professor up to the mark, and hinder him from getting sleepy and lazy. If he gets sleepy and lazy, his lecture-room is deserted. The Privatdocent, again, has the standard of eminent men before his eyes, and everything stimulates him to come up to it. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 142-14 j. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 175 Brodstudien and Examinations THERE are, of course, many idlers ; the proportion of students in a German university who really work I have heard estimated at one-third ; certainly it is larger than in the English universities. But the pressure put upon them in the way of com- pulsion and university examinations is much less than with us. The paramount university aim in Germany is to encourage a love of study and science for their own sakes ; and the professors, very unlike our college tutors, are constantly warning their pupils against Brodstudien, studies pursued with a view to examinations and posts. The examinations within the university course itself are far fewer and less important in Germany than in England. It is Austria, a country which believes in the things of the mind as little as we do, which is the great country for university examinations. There they are applied with a mechanical faith much like ours, and come as often as once a month ; but the general intellectual life of the Austrian universities is lower, though Vienna and Prague are good medical schools, than that of any other universities of Germany. " Le pays a 1'examens, 1'Autriche," exclaims an eminent French professor, M. Laboulaye, who has carefully studied the German university system with a view to reforming that of France " Le pays a 1'examens, 1'Autriche, est precisement celui dans lequel on ne travaille pas ; " and every competent authority in Germany will confirm what M. Laboulaye says. I do not say that in countries like Austria and 176 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION England, where there is so little real love for the things of the mind, examinations may not be a protection from something worse. All I say is that a love of the things of the mind is what we want, and that examinations will never give it. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 148-149. The System of the German Universities Lehrfreiheit and Lernfreiheit, liberty for the teacher and liberty for the learner ; and Wissenschaft, science, knowledge systematically pursued and prized in and for itself, are the fundamental ideas of that system. The French, with their ministerial programmes for superior instruction, and their ministerial authorisations required for any one who wants to give a course of public lectures authorisa- tions which are by no means a matter of form are naturally most struck with the liberty of the German universities, and it is in liberty that they have most need to borrow from them. To us, ministerial programmes and ministerial authorisations are un- known ; our university system is a routine, indeed, but it is our want of science, not our want of liberty, which makes it a routine. It is in science that we have most need to borrow from the German universi- ties. The French university has no liberty, and the English universities have no science ; the German universities have both. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. 152. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 177 The Conflict Between Classical and Modern Studies SEVERAL times in the foregoing chapters I have touched upon the conflict between the gymnasium and the Realschule, between the partisans of the old classical studies and the partisans of what are called real, or modern, or useful studies. This conflict is not yet settled, either by one side crushing the other by mere violence, or by one side clearly getting the best of the other in the dispute between them. We in England, behindhand as our public instruction in many respects is, are nevertheless in time to profit, and to make our schools profit by the solution which will certainly be found for this difference. I am inclined to think that both sides will, as is natural, have to abate their extreme pretensions. The modern spirit tends to reach a new conception of the aim and office of instruction ; when this conception is fully reached, it will put an end to conflict, and will probably show both the humanists and the realists to have been right in their main ideas. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. 153. The True Aim of Instruction THE aim and office of instruction, say many people, is to make a man a good citizen, or a good Christian, or a gentleman, or it is to fit him to get on in the world, or it is to enable him to do his duty in that state of life to which he is called. It is none of these, and the modern spirit more and more discerns N 178 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION it to be none of these. These are at best secondary and indirect aims of instruction ; its prime direct aim is to enable a man to know himself and the world. Such knowledge is the only sure basis for action, and this basis it is the true aim and office of instruction to supply. To know himself, a man must know the capabilities and performances of the human spirit ; and the value of the humanities, of Alterthumswissenschaft, the science of antiquity, is, that it affords for this purpose an unsurpassed source of light and stimulus. Whoever seeks help for knowing himself from knowing the capabilities and performances of the human spirit will nowhere find a more fruitful object of study than in the achievements of Greece in literature and the arts during the two centuries from the birth of Simonides to the death of Plato. And these two centuries are but the flowering-point of a long period, during the whole of which the ancient world offers, to the student of the capabilities and performances of the human spirit, lessons of capital importance. This the humanists have perceived, and the truth of this perception of theirs is the stronghold of their position. It is a vital and formative know- ledge to know the most powerful manifestations of the human spirit's activity, for the knowledge of them greatly feeds and quickens our own activity ; and they are very imperfectly known without knowing ancient Greece and Rome. But it is also a vital and formative knowledge to know the world, the laws which govern nature, and man as a part of nature. This the realists have perceived, and the THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 179 truth of this perception, too, is inexpugnable. Every man is born with aptitudes which give him access to vital and formative knowledge by one of these roads ; either by the road of studying man and his works, or by the road of studying nature and her works. The business of instruction is to seize and develope these aptitudes. The great and complete spirits which have all the aptitudes for both roads of knowledge are rare. But much more might be done on both roads by the same mind, if instruction clearly grasped the idea of the entire system of aptitudes for which it has to provide ; of their correlation, and of their equipollency, so to speak as all leading, if rightly employed, to vital know- ledge ; and if then, having grasped this idea, it provided for them. The Greek spirit, after its splendid hour of creative activity was gone, gave our race another precious lesson, by exhibiting in the career of men like Aristotle and the great students of Alexandria, this idea of the correlation and equal dignity of the most different departments of human knowledge, and by showing the possibility of uniting them in a single mind's education. A man like Eratosthenes is memorable by what he per- formed, but still more memorable by his commanding range of studies, and by the broad basis of culture out of which his performances grew. As our public instruction gets a clearer view of its own functions, of the relations of the human spirit to knowledge, and of the entire circle of knowledge, it will certainly more learn to awaken in its pupils an interest in that entire circle, and less allow them to remain THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Aal strangers to any part of it. Still, the circle is so vast and human faculties are so limited, that it is for the most part through a single aptitude, or group of aptitudes, that each individual will really get his access to intellectual life and vital knowledge ; and it is by effectually directing these aptitudes on definite points of the circle, that he will really obtain his comprehension of the whole. Meanwhile, neither our humanists nor our realists adequately conceive the circle of knowledge, and each party is unjust to all that to which its own aptitudes do not carry it. The humanists are loath to believe that a man has any access to vital know- ledge except by knowing himself the poetry, philosophy, history, which his spirit has created ; the realists, that he has any access except by knowing the world the physical sciences, the phenomena and laws of nature. I, like so many others who have been brought up in the old routine, imperfectly as I know letters the work of the human spirit itself know nothing else, andjay judgment, there- fore, may fairly be impeached^EBut it seems to me that so long as the realists persist in cutting in two the circle of knowledge, so long do they leave for practical purposes the better part to their rivals, and in the government of human affairstjjeir rivals will beat them. And for this reason. ^|^Jhe study of letters is the study of the operation of human force, of human freedom and activity ; the study of nature is the study of the operation of non-human forces, of human limitation and passivity. The contempla- tion of human force and activity tends naturally to THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 181 heighten our own force and activity ; the contempla- tion of human limits and passivity tends rather to check it. Therefore the men who have had the humanistic training have played, and yet play, so prominent a part in human affairs, in spite of their prodigious ignorance of the universe ; because their training has powerfully fomented the human force in them."} And in this way letters are indeed runes, like tho^e magic runes taught by the Valkyrie Brynhild to Sigurd, the Scandinavian Achilles, which put the crown to his endowment and made him invincible. Still, the humanists themselves suffer so much from the ignorance of physical facts and laws, and from the inadequate conception of nature, and of man as a part of nature the conduct of human affairs suffers so much from the same cause that the intellectual insufficiency of the humanities, conceived as the one access to vital knowledge, is perhaps at the present moment yet more striking than their power of practical stimulation ; and we may willingly declare with the Italians that no part of the circle of knowledge is common or unclean, none is to be cried up at the expense of another. To say that the fruit of classics, in the boys who study them, is at present greater than the fruit of the natural sciences, to say that the realists have not got their matters of instruction so well adapted to teaching purposes as the humanists have got theirs, comes really to no more than this : that the realists are but newly admitted labourers in the field of practical instruction, and that while the leading 182 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION humanists, the Wolfs, and the Buttmanns, have been also schoolmasters, and have brought their mind and energy to bear upon the school-teaching of their own studies, the leaders in the natural sciences, the Davys and the Faradays, have not. When scientific physics have as recognised a place in public instruction as Latin and Greek, they will be as well taught. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 154-160. Routine in our Public Schools THE Abbe Fleury, than whom no man is a better authority, says of the mediaeval universities, the parents of our public secondary schools : " Les universites ont eu le malheur de commencer dans un temps ou le gout des bonnes etudes etait perdu." They were too late for the influences of the great time of Christian literature and eloquence, the first five centuries after Christ ; they were even too late for the influences of the time of Abelard and Saint Bernard. And Fleury adds : " De la (from these universities founded in a time of inferior insight) nous est venu ce cours regie d' etudes qui subsiste encore." He wrote this in 1708, but it is in the main still true in 1867. All the historical part of this volume has shown that the great movements of the human spirit have either not got hold of the public schools, or not kept hold of them. What reforms have been made have been patchwork, the work of able men who into certain departments of school study which were dear to them infused THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 183 reality and life, but who looked little beyond these departments, and did not concern themselves with fully adjusting instruction to the wants of the human mind. There is, therefore, no intelligent tradition to be set aside in our public schools ; there is only a routine, arising in the way we have seen, and destined to be superseded as soon as ever that more adequate idea of instruction, of which the modern spirit is even now in travail, shall be fully born. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 161-162. Alterthumswissenschaft I WAS myself brought up in the straitest school of Latin and Greek composition, and am certainly not disposed to be unjust to them. Very often they are ignorantly disparaged. Professor Ritschl, I am told, envies the English schools their Latin verse, and he is no bad judge of what is useful for knowing Latin. The close appropriation of the models, which is necessary for good Latin or Greek composition, not only conduces to accurate and verbal scholarship ; it may beget, besides, an intimate sense of these models, which makes us sharers of their spirit and power ; and this is of the essence of true Alterthumswissenschaft. Herein lies the reason for giving boys more of Latin composition than of Greek, superior though the Greek literature be to the Latin ; but the power of the Latin classic is in character, that of the Greek is in beauty. Now, character is capable of being taught, learnt, and assimilated ; beauty hardly ; and it is for enabling 184 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION us to learn and catch some power of antiquity, that Greek or Latin composition is most to be valued. Who shall say what share the turning over and over in their mind, and masticating, so to speak, in early life as models of their Latin verse, such things as Vergil's " Disce, puer, virtutem ex me, verumque laborem " or Horace's " Fortuna saevo laeta negotio " has not had in forming the high spirit of the upper class in France and England, the two countries where Latin verse has most ruled the schools, and the two countries which most have had, or have, a high upper class and a high upper class spirit ? All this is no doubt to be considered when we are judging the worth of the old school trainings. But, in the first place, dignity and a high spirit is not all, or half all, that is to be got out of Alter- thumswissenschaflfawha.i else is to be got out of it the love of the things of the mind, the flexibility, the spiritual moderation is for our present time and needs still more precious, and our upper class suffers, greatly by not having got it. In the second placej^hough I do not deny that there are persons with such eminent aptitudes for Latin and Greek composition that they may be brought in contact with the spirit and power of Alterthumswissenschaft and thus with vital knowledge, through them as neither do I deny that there are persons with such eminent aptitudes for grammatical and philological studies, that they may be brought in contact with \ THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 185^ vital knowledge through them nevertheless,[l am convinced that of the hundreds whom our present system tries without distinction to bring into contact with Alterthumswissenschaft through composition and philology almost alone, the immense majority would have a far better chance of being brought into vital contact with it through literature, by treating the study of Greek and Latin as we jreat our French, or Italian, or German studies J In other words, the number of persons with aptitudes for being carried to vital knowledge by the literary or historical, or philosophical, or artistic sense to each of which senses we give a chance by treating Greek and Latin as Literature, and not as mere scholarship is infinitely greater than the number of those whose aptitudes are for composition and " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 167-170. The Commercial Theory of Education WE have still to make the mother-tongue and its literature a part of the school course ; foreign nations have done this, and we shall do it ; but neither foreign nations nor we have yet quite learnt how to deal, for school purposes, with modern foreign languages. The great notion is to teach them for speaking purposes, with a view to practical convenience. This notion clearly belongs to what I have called the commercial theory of education, and not the liberal theory ; and the faultiness of the commercial theory is well seen by examining this i86 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION notion and its fruits. Mr. Marsh, the well-known author of the History of the English Language, who has passed his life in diplomacy, and is himself at once a savant and a linguist, told me he had been much struck by remarking how, in general, the accomplishment of speaking foreign languages tends to strain the mind, and to make it superficial and averse to going deep in anything. He instanced the young diplomatists of the new school, who, he said, could rattle along in two or three languages, but could do nothing else. Perhaps in old times the young diplomatists could neither do that nor anything else, so in their case there may be now a gain ; but there is great truth in Mr. Marsh's remark that the speaking several languages tends to make the thought thin and shallow, and so far from in itself carrying us to vital knowledge, needs a com- pensating force to prevent its carrying us away from it. But the true aim of schools and instruction is to develope the powers of our mind and to give us access to vital knowledge. Again : if the speaking of foreign languages is a prime school aim, this aim is clearly best reached by sending a boy to a foreign school. Great numbers of English parents, accordingly, who from their own want of culture are particularly prone to the more obvious theory of education the commercial one send their boys abroad to be educated. Yet the basis of character and aptitudes proper for living and working in any country is no doubt best formed by being reared in that country, and passing the ductile and susceptible time of boyhood there ; THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 187 and in this case Solomon's saying applies admirably : " As a bird that wandereth from her nest, so is a man that wandereth from his place." That, therefore, can hardly be a prime school-aim, which to be duly reached requires from the scholar an almost irre- parable sacrifice. So the learning to speak foreign languages, showy as the accomplishment always is, and useful as it often is, must be regarded as a quite secondary and subordinate school-aim. Something of it may be naturally got in connection with learning the languages ; and, above all, the instructor's precept and practice in pronunciation should be sound, not, as in our old way of teaching these languages through incompetent English masters it too often was, utterly barbarous and misleading ; but all this part is to be perfected elsewhere, and is not to be looked upon as true school business. It is as literature, and as opening fresh roads into knowledge, that the modern foreign languages, like the ancient, are truly school business ; and far more ought to be done with them, on this view of their use, than has ever been done yet. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 172-175. The Conclusion of the Whole Matter To sum up, then, the conclusions to which these remarks lead. The idea of a general, liberal training, is to carry us to a knowledge of ourselves and the world. We are called to this knowledge by special aptitudes which are bora with us ; the grand thing i88 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION in teaching is to have faith that some aptitudes of this kind every one has. This one's special aptitudes are for knowing men the study of the humanities ; that one's special aptitudes are for knowing the world the study of nature. The circle of know- ledge comprehends both, and we should all have some notion, at any rate, of the whole circle of knowledge. The rejection of the humanities by the realists, the rejection of the study of nature by the humanists, are alike ignorant. He whose aptitudes carry him to the study of nature should have some notion of the humanities ; he whose aptitudes carry him to the humanities should have some notion of the phenomena and laws of nature. Evidently, there- fore, the beginnings of a liberal culture should be the same for both. The mother-tongue, the elements of Latin, and of the chief modern languages, the elements of history, of arithmetic and geometry, of geography, and of the knowledge of nature, should be the studies of the lower classes in all secondary schools, and should be the same for all boys at this stage. So far, therefore, there is no reason for a division of schools. But then comes a bifurcation, according to the boy's aptitudes and aims. Either the study of the humanities or the study of nature is henceforth to be the predominating part of his instruction. Evidently there are some advantages in making one school include those who follow both these studies. It is the more economical arrange- ment ; and when the humanities and the real studies are in the same school there is less likelihood of the social stamp put on the boy following the one THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 189 of them being different from that put on a boy following the other. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 175-176. Our Middle Class Education NEITHER is the secondary and superior instruction given in England as good on the whole, if we regard the whole number of those to whom it is due, as that given in Germany or France, nor is it given in schools of so good a standing. Of course, what good instruction there is, and what schools of good stand- ing there are to get it in, fall chiefly to the lot of the upper class. It is on the middle class that the injury, such as it is, of getting inferior instruction, and of getting it in schools of inferior standing, mainly comes. This injury, as it strikes one after seeing attentively the schools of the Continent, has two aspects. It has a social aspect, and it has an intellectual aspect. The social injury is this. On the Continent the upper and middle class are brought up on one and the same plane. In England the middle class, as a rule, is brought up on the second plane. One hears many discussions as to the limits between the middle and the upper class in England. From a social and educational point of view these limits are perfectly clear. Ten or a dozen famous schools, Oxford or Cambridge, the church or the bar, the army or navy, and those posts in the public service supposed to be posts for gentlemen these are the lines of training, all or any of which give a cast of igo THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION ideas, a stamp or habit, which make a sort of associa- tion of all those who share them ; and this association is the upper class. Except by one of these modes of access, an Englishman does not, unless by some special play of aptitude or of circumstances, become a vital part of this association, for he does not bring with him the cast of ideas in which its bond of union lies. This cast of ideas is naturally in the main that of the most powerful and prominent part of the association the aristocracy. The professions furnish the more numerous but less prominent part ; in no country, accordingly, do the professions so naturally and generally share the cast of ideas of the aristocracy as in England. Judged from its bad side, this cast of ideas is characterised by over- reverence for things established, by an estrangement from the powers of reason and science. Judged from its good side, it is characterised by a high spirit, by dignity, by a just sense of the greatness of great affairs all of them governing qualities ; and the professions have accordingly long recruited the governing force of the aristocracy, and assisted it to rule. But they are separate, to a degree unknown on the Continent, from the commercial and industrial classes with which in social standing they are naturally on a level. So we have amongst us the spectacle of a middle class cut in two in a way unexampled anywhere else ; of a professional class brought up on the first plane, with fine and governing qualities, but disinclined to rely on reason and science ; while that immense business class, which is becoming so important a power in all countries, THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 191 on which the future so much depends, and which in the great public schools of other countries fills so large a place, is in England brought up on the second plane, cut off from the aristocracy and the professions, and without governing qualities. If only, in compensation, it had science, sys- tematic knowledge, reason ! But here comes in the intellectual mischief of the bad condition of the mass of our secondary schools. In England the business class is not only inferior to the professions and aristocracy in the social stamp of its places of training ; it is actually inferior to them, maimed and incomplete as their development of reason is, in its development of reason. Short as the offspring of our public schools and universities come of the idea of science and systematic knowledge, the off- spring of our middle-class academies probably come, if that be possible, even shorter. What these academies fail to give in social and governing qualities, they do not make up for in intellectual power. Their intellectual result is as faulty as their social result. If this be true, then that our middle class does not yet itself see the defects of its own education, is not conscious of the injury to itself from them, and is satisfied with things as they are, is no reason for regarding this state of things without disquietude. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," chap, ix. p. 187. 192 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Relative Efficiency of Public and Private Schools FROM the moment you seriously desire to have your schools efficient, the question between public and private schools is settled. Of public schools you can take guarantees, of private schools you cannot. Guarantees cannot be absolutely certain. It is possible for a private school, which has given no guarantees, to be good ; it is possible for a public school, which has given guarantees, to be bad. But even in England the disbelief in human reason is hardly strong enough to make us seriously contend that a rational being cannot frame for a known purpose guarantees which give him, at any rate, more numerous chances of reaching that purpose than he would have without them. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. 200. Functions of a Council of Education A HIGH Council of Education, such as exists in France, and Italy, comprising without regard to politics the personages most proper to be heard on questions of public education, a consultative body only, but whose opinion the minister should be obliged to take on all important measures not purely administrative, would be an invaluable aid to an English Education Minister, an invaluable institution in our too political country. One or two matters which I have already approached or touched in the course of this volume THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 193 are matters on which it would be the natural function of such a Council to advise. It would be its function to advise on the propriety of subjecting children under a certain age to competitive examination,, in order to determine their admission to public founda- tions. It would be its function to advise on the employment of the examination test for the public service ; whether this security should, as at present, be relied on exclusively, or whether it should not be preceded by securities for the applicant having previously passed a certain time under training and teachers of a certain character, and stood certain examinations in connection with that training. It would be its function to advise on the organisation of school and university examinations, and their adjustment to one another. It would be its function to advise on the graduation of schools in proper stages, from the elementary to the highest school ; it would be its function to advise on school books, and, above all, on studies, and on the plan of work for schools ; a business which, as I have said, is more and more inviting discussion and ripening for settlement. We have excellent materials in England for such a Council. Properly composed, and pro- perly representing the grave interests concerned in the questions it has to treat, it would not only have great weight with the minister, but great weight as an illustrious, unpaid, deliberative, and non- ministerial body, with the country, and would greatly strengthen the minister's hand for important reforms. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 201-203. O I 9 4 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Public Supervision of Endowed Schools SOME of our present chief schools, like Eton and Westminster and Christ's Hospital, are royal founda- tions. Here the right of the State to have a share in the whole administration of the institution, and a voice in the nomination of the masters, immediately arises. Others, like Winchester, Rugby, and Harrow, are not royal foundations, but all of them are founda- tion schools, and therefore to all of them, as such, a right of public supervision applies. The best form this supervision can possibly take is that of a partici- pation, as in Germany, by the public authority represented through the Provincial School Boards or through members of the High Council of Educa- tion, in their main examinations. On these examina- tions matriculation at the university, and access to all the higher lines of public employment should be made to depend. The pupils of private schools should be admitted to undergo them. In this way every endowed school in the kingdom would have yearly an all-important examination following a line traced or sanctioned by the most competent authority, the Superior Council of Education ; and with a direct or indirect representation of this authority taking part in it. The organisation of studies in our very best schools could not fail to gain by this ; in all but the very best it would be its regeneration. Even in England, where the general opinion would be opposed to requiring, as in Germany, for the appointment of all public schoolmasters the sanction of a public authority, there could be no respectable THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 195 objection urged to such a mode of public intervention as this ; the one bulwark, to repeat Wilhelm von Humboldt's words, which we can set up against the misuse of their patronage by private trustees. And we should at the same time get the happiest check put to the cram and bad teaching of private schools, by compelling them either to adjust their studies to sound and serious examinations, or to cease to impose upon the credulity of ignorant parents. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 206-208. English Universities merely Hauts Lycees THE want of the idea of science, of systematic know- ledge, is, as I have said again and again, the capital want, at this moment, of English education and of English life ; it is the university, or the superior school, which ought to foster this idea. The university or the superior school ought to provide facilities, after the general education is finished, for the young man to go on in the line where his special aptitudes lead him, be it that of languages and literature, of mathematics, of the natural sciences, of the application of these sciences, or any other line, and follow the studies of this line syste- matically under first-rate teaching. Our great universities, Oxford and Cambridge, do next to nothing towards this end. They are, as Signer Matteucci called them, hauls lycees; and though invaluable in their way as places where the youth of the upper class prolong to a very great age, 1 96 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION and under some very admirable influences, their school education, and though in this respect to be envied by the youth of the upper class abroad, and, if possible, instituted for their benefit, yet, with their college and tutor system, nay, with their examination and degree system, they are still, in fact, schools, and do not carry education beyond the stage of general and school education. The examina- tion for the degree of bachelor of arts, which we place at the end of our three years' university course, is merely the Abiturientenexamen of Germany, the fyreuve du baccalaureat of France, placed in both of these countries at the entrance to university studies instead of, as with us, at their close. Scientific instruction, university instruction, really begins when the degree of bachelor (bas chevalier, knight of low degree) is taken, and the preparation for mastership in any line of study, or for doctorship (fitness to teach it), commences. But for master- ship or doctorship, Oxford and Cambridge have, as is well known, either no examination at all, or an examination which is a mere form ; they have consequently no instruction directed to these grades ; no real university-instruction, therefore, at all. A machinery for such instruction they have, indeed, in their possession ; but it is notorious that they do not practically use it. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 209-210. Provincial Universities Foreshadowed IT is with our superior instruction as with so much else ; we have plenty of scattered materials, but THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 197 these materials need to be co-ordered, and made, instead of being useless or getting in one another's way as at present, to work harmoniously to one great design. The design should be, to form centres of superior instruction in at least ten different parts of England, with first-rate professors to give this instruction. These professors should of course be grouped in faculties, each faculty having its dean. So entirely have Oxford and Cambridge become mere hauls lycees, so entirely has the very idea of a real university been lost by them, that the professors there are not even organised in faculties ; and their action is on this account alone, if it were not on other accounts also, perfectly feeble and incoherent. The action of professors grouped in faculties, and con- certing, as the professors and Privatdocenten of a faculty concert in Germany, their instruction to- gether, is quite another thing. In a place like London all the five faculties of arts, mathematical and natural sciences, theology, law, and medicine, should, of course, be represented ; but it is by no means necessary that each centre of superior instruction should have all these five faculties. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 218-219. Limitation of Degree-Giving Powers NEITHER is it by any means necessary, or even expedient, that each centre of faculties should have the power of conferring degrees. To maintain a uniform standard of examination and a uniform value for degrees is most important, and this is 198 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION impossible when there are too many bodies examining for degrees and giving them. Germany suffers from having too many universities granting degrees, and from these degrees bearing a very unequal value. We have two very old and important universities, Oxford and Cambridge ; one new and important university, London, and we want no more degree- granting bodies than these. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. 220. State Appointment of Professors IT is not from any love of bureaucracy that men like Wilhelm von Humboldt, ardent friends of human dignity and liberty, have had recourse to a depart- ment of State in organising universities ; it is because an Education Minister supplies you, for the discharge of certain critical functions, the agent who will perform them in the greatest blaze of daylight and with the keenest sense of responsibility. Convoca- tion made me formerly a professor ; and I am very grateful to Convocation ; but Convocation is not a fit body to have the appointment of professors. It is far too numerous, and the sense of responsibility does not tell upon it strongly enough. A board is not a fit body to have the appointment of professors ; men will connive at a job as members of a board who single-handed would never have perpetrated it. Even the Crown that is, the Prime Minister is not the fit power to have the appointment of professors ; for the Prime Minister is, above all, a political functionary, and feels political influences THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 199 overwhelmingly. An Education Minister, directly representing all the interests of learning and intelli- gence in this great country, a full mark for their criticism and conscious of his responsibility to them, that is the power to whom to give the appointment of professors, not for his own sake, but for the sake of public education. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," pp. 222-223. Training a Better Security of Fitness than Examinations THE end to have in view is, that every one who presents himself to exercise any calling shall have received for a certain length of time the best in- struction preliminary to that calling. This is not, it must be repeated again and again, an absolute security for his exercising the calling well, but it is the best security. It is a thousand times better security than the mere examination-test on which with such ignorant confidence we are now, in cases where we take any security at all, leaning with our whole weight. " Higher Schools and Universities in Germany," p. 225. The English Character BUT afterwards the conversation became general. It then took a wider range ; and I remember Mr. Frederic Harrison beginning to harangue, with his usual fiery eloquence, on the enervation of England and on the malignancy of all the brute mass of us 200 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION who are not Comtists. Arminius checked him. " Enervation ! " said he : " depend upon it, yours is still the most fighting people in the whole world. Malignancy ! The best character of the English people ever yet given, friendly as the character is, is still this of Burke's : ' The ancient and inbred integrity, piety, good nature, and good humour of the people of England.' Your nation is sound enough, if only it can be taught that being able to do what one likes, and say what one likes, is not suffi- cient for salvation. Its dangers are from a surfeit of claptrap, due to the false notion that liberty and publicity are not only valuable for the use to be made of them, but are goods in themselves, nay, are the summum bonum." 1871. " Friendship's Garland," Dedicatory Letter. Obedience and Right Action "THERE are many lessons to be learned from the present war ; I will tell you what is for you the great lesson to be learned from it : obedience. That, instead of every man airing his self-consequence, thinking it bliss to talk at random about things, and to put his finger in every pie, you should seriously understand that there is a right way of doing things, and that the bliss is, without thinking of one's self-consequence, to do them in that way, or to forward their being done, this is the great lesson your British public, as you call it, has to learn, and may learn, in some degree, from the Germans in this war ! Englishmen were once famous for the power THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 201 of holding their tongues and doing their business, and, therefore, I admire your nation. The business now to be done in the world is harder than ever, and needs far more than has been ever needed for thought, study, and seriousness ; miscarry you must, if you let your daily doses of clap-trap make you imagine that liberty and publicity can be any substitutes for these." " Friendship's Garland," p. xii. National Need of a Serious Conception of Righteousness IT is an unspeakable relief to have the war, I suppose, over ; but one may well look anxiously to see what is in the future for the changed Europe that we shall have. Immense as are her advantages and resources, it does not seem as if France could recover herself now as she did in 1815, or indeed could recover herself within our time at all. Whatever may be said of the harshness of such a sentence, it is yet true that her fall is mainly due to that want of a serious conception of righteousness and the need of it, the consequences of which so often show them- selves in the world's history, and in regard to the Graeco-Latin nations more particularly. The fall of Greece, the fall of Rome, the fall of the brilliant Italy of the fifteenth century, and now the fall of France, are all examples. Nothing gives more freshness and depth to one's reading of the Bible than the sense that this is so, and that this testimony 202 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION is perpetually being borne to the book of righteous- ness, though the nation out of which it came was itself a political failure so utter and miserable. "Letters," ii. p. 47. 1871. Recitation as a Formative Influence " RECITATION " is the special subject which produces at present, so far as I can observe, most good. The great fault of the instruction in our elementary schools (of the secular part of it, at any rate), is, that it at most gives to a child the mechanical possession of the instruments of knowledge, but does nothing to form him, to put him in a way of making the best possible use of them. As things now are, the time is not ripe for laying down a theory of how this is to be thoroughly done and following it ; all that can be said is, that what practically will be found to contribute most towards forming a pupil is familiarity with masterpieces ; familiarity with them, for the less advanced pupil, in a very limited number and with each object of his study standing singly ; for the more advanced pupil, in a series arranged according to some well-planned order. If the " recitation " is carefully watched, as to the authors and pieces selected, it does give us something, though only a commencement, of that which for the less advanced pupil is needed. I can already see the good effects of it, and they may be extended much further. Music, now that instruction in it is made universal, ought to lay the foundation in the children THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 203 of our elementary schools of a cultivated power of perception ; " recitation," in the present absence of any attempt even to raise their reading into some- thing of a literary study, must be relied upon for carrying the power of perception onward. General Report, for 1872. Latin in Elementary Schools IT may seem over-sanguine, but I hope to see Latin, also, much more used as a special subject, and even adopted, finally, as part of the regular instruc- tion in the upper classes of all elementary schools. Of course, I mean Latin studied in a very simple way ; but I am more and more struck with the stimulating and instructing effect upon a child's mind of possessing a second language, in however limited a degree, as an object of reference and com- parison. Latin is the foundation of so much in the written and spoken language of modern Europe, that it is the best language to take as a second language ; in our own written and book language, above all, it fills so large a part that we, perhaps, hardly know how much of their reading falls meaningless upon the eye and ear of children in our elementary schools, from their total ignorance of either Latin or a modern language derived from it. For the little of languages that can be taught in our elementary schools, it is far better to go to the root at once ; and Latin, besides, is the best of all languages to learn grammar by. But it should by no means be taught as in our classical schools ; far less time 204 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION should be spent on the grammatical framework, and classical literature should be left quite out of view. A second language, and a language coming very largely into the vocabulary of modern nations, is what Latin should stand for to the teacher of an elementary school. I am convinced that for his purpose the best way would be to disregard classical Latin entirely, to use neither Cornelius Nepos, nor Eutropius, nor Caesar, nor any delectus from them, but to use the Latin Bible, the Vulgate. A chapter or two from the story of Joseph, a chapter or two from Deuteronomy, and the first two chapters of St. Luke's Gospel would be the sort of delectus we want ; add to them a vocabulary and a simple grammar of the main forms of the Latin language, and you have a perfectly compact and cheap school book, and yet all that you need. In the extracts the child would be at home, instead of, as in extracts from classical Latin, in an utterly strange land ; and the Latin of the Vulgate, while it is real and living Latin, is yet, like the Greek of the New Testament, much nearer to modern idiom, and therefore much easier for a modern learner than classical idiom can be. True, a child whose delectus is taken from Cornelius Nepos or Caesar will be better prepared, perhaps, for going on to Virgil and Cicero than a child whose delectus is taken from the Vulgate. But we do not want to carry our elementary schools into Virgil or Cicero ; one child in 5000, with a special talent, may go on to higher schools and to Virgil, and he will go on to them all the better for the little we have at any rate given him. But what we want to give to our THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 205 elementary schools in general is the vocabulary, to some extent, of a second language, and that language one which is at the bottom of a great deal of modern life and modern language. This, I am convinced, we may give in some such method as the method I have above suggested, but in no other. I strongly urge the teachers of our leading elementary schools, and all who are interested in raising the instruction in these schools, to reflect on what I have here said. General Report, 1872. Educational Interest of "A Bible Reading for Schools " INTO the education of the people there comes, with us, at any rate, absolutely nothing grand ; now there is a fatal omission (alles Grandioses bildet, as Goethe says), and my little book in an attempt to remedy it. I am afraid it will be used first in schools of a higher kind, but I am not without hope it will reach the Volksschule at last. 1872. " Letters," ii. p. 86. Importance of Letters in Schools for the People AND why is the attempt made ? It is made because of my conviction of the immense importance in education of what is called letters ; of the side which engages our feelings and imagination. Science, the side which engages our faculty of exact knowledge, 2o6 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION may have been too much neglected ; more par- ticularly this may have been so as regards our know- ledge of nature. This is probably true of our secondary schools and universities. But on our schools for the people (by this good German name let us call them, to mark the overwhelmingly pre- ponderant share which falls to them in the work of national education) the power of letters has hardly been brought to bear at all ; certainly it has not been brought to bear in excess, as compared with the power of the natural sciences. And now, perhaps, it is less likely than ever to be brought to bear. The natural sciences are in high favour ; it is felt that they have been unduly neglected, they have gifted and brilliant men for their advocates, schools for the people offer some special facilities for introducing them ; on the other hand, the Bible, which would naturally be the great vehicle for conveying the power of letters into these schools, is withdrawn from the list of matters with which Government inspection concerns itself, and, so far, from attention. At the same time, good com- pendiums for the teaching of the natural sciences in schools for the people are coming forth ; and the advantage to any branch of study of possessing good and compendious text-books it is impossible to overrate. The several natural sciences, too, from their limited and definite character, admit better of being advantageously presented by short text-books than such a wide and indefinite subject-matter nothing less than the whole history of the human spirit as that which belongs to letters ; and this THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 207 inherent advantage men of skill and talent, like the authors of the text-books I speak of, are just the people to turn to the best account. So that at the very time when the friends of the natural sciences have the public favour with them in saying to letters : " Give place, you have had more than your share of attention ! " their case is still further improved by their being able to produce their own well-planned text-books for physics, and then to point to the literary text-books now in use in schools for the people, and to say to the friend of letters : " And this is what you have to offer ! this is what you make such a fuss over! this is what you keep our studies out in the cold for ! " And in truth, while for those branches of study which belong partly to letters, partly to science language, geography, history our schools for the people have no text- books meriting comparison with the new text-books in physics, the schools are in a worse plight still when we come to their means of acquainting their scholars with letters strictly so called, with poetry, philosophy, eloquence. A succession of pieces not in general well-chosen, fragmentary, presented without any order or plan, and very ill-comprehended by the pupil, is what our schools for the people give as letters ; and the effect wrought by letters in these schools may be said, therefore, to be absolutely null. " A Bible Reading for Schools," pp. vi-vii. 2o8 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Value of a Classical Education IT is through the apprehension, either of all litera- ture the entire history of the human spirit or of a single great literary work, as a connected whole, that the real power of letters makes itself felt. Our leading secondary schools give the best share of their time to the literature of Greece and Rome. We shall not blame them for it ; this literature is, indeed, only a part of the history of the human spirit, but it is a very important part. Yet how little, let us remark, do they conceive this literature as a whole ! how little, therefore, do they get at its significance ! how little do they know it ! how little does it become a power, in their hands, towards wide and complete knowledge ! N But though in our secondary schools the scholar is not led to apprehend Greek and Latin literature as a whole, he is (and this is a very important matter) led and often enabled to lay hold of single great works or connected portions of great works, of that literature as wholes. Even supposing that the Iliad and Odyssey and Aeneid and Oresteia are seldom entirely read at school, yet we must admit that portions of the Iliad, Odyssey, and Aeneid, and single plays of the Oresteia do form important wholes by themselves, and that all the upper scholars in our chief schools have read them. What these scholars read or learn of English litera- ture may be no more than what the scholars in our schools for the people read or learn of it short single pieces, or else bits detached here and there from longer works. But the last book of the Iliad, THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 209 or the sixth book of the Aeneid, or the Agamemnon, are considerable wholes in themselves, and these and other wholes of like beauty and magnitude they do read. And all their training has been such as to help them to understand what they read ; they have always been hearing and learning (far too much so, many people think) about the objects and personages they meet with in it ; Helicon and Parnassus are far more familiar names to them than Snowdon or Skiddaw ; Troy and Mycenae than Berlin or Vienna ; Zeus and Phoebus than the gods of their own ancestors, Odin and Thor. So they are brought into " the presence and the power of great- ness," as Wordsworth calls it, in these indisputably great works and great wholes ; and when they are so brought, they may, if they attend, " perceive " it ; they have the equipment of notions and of previous information qualifying them to perceive it. Now to know what Greece is, as a factor in the history of the human spirit, is one thing ; to take in and enjoy the Agamemnon is another. But each is a whole ; the two wholes are of a very different degree of value, nevertheless the second is a whole, and a worthy whole, as well as the first ; and the apprehension of it leads, however rudimentarily, towards the first, and towards the whole of which the first is itself but a part. For it tends how much we cannot exactly determine, not much in one case, in another more than we could have believed possible it does tend, as Wordsworth again says, in lines which if not exactly good verse are at any rate good philosophy, to p 210 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION " Nourish imagination in her growth, And give the mind that apprehensive power, Whereby she is made quick to recognise The moral properties and scope of things." " A Bible Reading for Schools," pp. vii-viii. Relation of Classical to Modern Poetry IN general, the scholars in our schools for the people come in contact with English literature in a mere fragmentary way, by short pieces or by odds and ends ; and the power of a great work as a whole they have, therefore, no chance of feeling. But attempts are now sometimes made to acquaint them with some whole work, which is supposed to be clear and simple, such as, for instance, Goldsmith's Deserted Village or his Traveller. The Deserted Village and the Traveller, works of a very different rank from the same author's Vicar of Wakefield, may be called good poems, but they are good poems amongst poetry of the second or even the third order, and it would be absurd to speak of feeling the power of poetry through them as one feels it through the Agamemnon. But besides this, the modern literatures have so grown up under the influence of the literature of Greece and Rome, that the forms, fashions, notions, wordings, allusions of that literature have got deeply into them, and are an indispensable preparation for understanding them ; now this preparation the scholars in our secondary schools, we have seen, have ; all their training is such as to give it them, and it has thus THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 211 passed into all the life and speech of what are called the cultivated classes. The people are without it ; and how much of English literature is, therefore, almost unintelligible to the people, or at least to the people in their commencements of learning to the children of the people we can hardly perhaps enough convince ourselves. What the people can under- stand is such speech as " He sees his little lot the lot of all ; " but how small a proportion do lines like these bear, in Goldsmith's poetry, to lines like " The pregnant quarry teem'd with human form." Or " See opulence, her grandeur to maintain. Lead stern depopulation in her train ; " and everything of this kind falls on the ear of the people simply as words without meaning. Such diction is a reminiscence, bad or good, of Latin literature with its highly artificial manner ; and such has been the influence of classical antiquity that this sort of diction, and the sort of notions that go with it, pervade in some shape or other nearly all our literature pervade works of infinitely higher merit than these poems of Goldsmith. And where- ever this sort of diction and of notions presents itself, the people, one may say generally, are thrown out. A preparation is required which they have not had. " A Bible Reading for Schools," pp. ix-x. 212 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION The Bible the only Possible Classic for the People ONLY one literature there is, one great literature, for which the people have had a preparation the literature of the Bible. However far they may be from having a complete preparation for it, they have some ; and it is the only great literature for which they have any. Their bringing up, what they have heard and talked of ever since they were born, have given them no sort of conversance with the forms, fashions, notions, wordings, allusions, of literature having its source in Greece and Rome ; but they have given them a good deal of conversance with the forms, fashions, notions, wordings, allusions, of the Bible. Zion and Babylon are their Athens and Rome, their Ida and Olympus are Tabor and Hermon, Sharon is their Tempe ; these and the like Bible names can reach their imagination, kindle trains of thought and remembrance in them. The elements with which the literature of Greece and Rome conjures, have no power on them ; the elements with which the literature of the Bible conjures, have. Therefore I have so often insisted, in reports to the Education Department, on the need, if from this point of view only, for the Bible in schools for the people. If poetry, philosophy, and eloquence, if what we call in one word letters, are a power, and a beneficent wonder-working power, in education, through the Bible only have the people much chance of getting at poetry, philosophy, and eloquence. Perhaps I may here quote what I have at former THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 213 times said : " Chords of power are touched by this instruction which no other part of the instruction in a popular school reaches, and chords various, not the single religious chord only. The Bible is for the child in an elementary school almost his only contact with poetry and philosophy. What a course of eloquence and poetry (to call it by that name alone) is the Bible in a school which has and can have but little eloquence and poetry ! and how much do our elementary schools lose by not having any such source as part of their school-programme. All who value the Bible may rest assured that thus to know and possess the Bible is the most certain way to extend the power and efficacy of the Bible." " A Bible Reading for Schools," pp. x-xi. Hindrances to Bible Reading in Schools I ABSTAIN from touching here on the political and ecclesiastical causes which obstruct such a use of the Bible in our popular schools. A cause more real is to be found in the conditions which at present rule our Bible-reading itself. If letters are a power, and if the first stage in feeling this power is, as we have seen, to apprehend certain great works as connected wholes, then it must be said that there are hardly any means at present for enabling young learners to get at this power through the Bible. And for two reasons. The Catholics taunted the Reformers with their Bible-Babel; and indeed that grand and vast miscellany which presents itself to us between the two covers of the Bible has in it 214 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION something overpowering and bewildering. And its mass has never been grappled with, and separated, and had clear and connected wholes taken from it and arranged so that learners can use them, as the literature of Greece and Rome has. The Bible stands before the learner as an immense whole ; yet to know the Bible as a whole, to know it in its historical aspect and in its connection, to have a systematic acquaintance with its documents, is as great an affair as to know Greek literature as a whole ; and we have seen how far our best education is from accomplishing this. But our best education does at any rate prepare the way for it, by presenting to the learner great connected wholes from Greek literature, like the Agamemnon, and does give the learner every help for understanding them ; nothing or next to nothing of this kind has been done for the Bible. This is one reason why the fruitful use of the Bible, as literature, in our schools for the people, is at present almost impossible. The other reason lies in the defects of our translation, noble as it is ; defects which abound most in those very parts of the Bible which, considered merely as literature, might have most power. Grant that we had definite wholes taken out of those parts of the Bible which exhibit its poetry and eloquence most conspicuously ; grant that these wholes were furnished with all the explanations and helps for the young learner with which a Greek master- piece is furnished ; he would still again and again be thrown out by finding what he reads, though English, though his mother tongue, though always THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 215 rhythmical, always nobly sounding, yet fail to be intelligible, fail to give a connexion with what precedes and follows, fail, as we commonly say, to make sense. This is a more serious matter than we might perhaps think. To be thrown out by a passage clean unintelligible, impairs and obscures the reader's understanding of much more than that particular passage itself ; the entire connexion of ideas is broken for him and he has to begin again ; and after several such passages have occurred in succession, he often reads languidly and hopelessly where he had begun to read with animation and joy ; or, at any rate, even if the beauty of single phrases and verses still touches him, yet all grasp on his subject as a whole is gone. But we have seen that it is by being apprehended as a whole, that the true power of a work of literature makes itself felt. " A Bible Reading for Schools," pp. xi-xii. Disregard of the Civilising Power of Letters AN ounce of practice, they say, is better than a pound of theory ; and certainly one may talk for ever about the wonder-working power of letters, and yet produce no good at all, unless one really puts people in the way of feeling this power. The friends of physics do not content themselves with extolling physics ; they put forth school-books by which the study of physics may be with proper advantage brought near to those who before were strangers to it ; and they do wisely. For any one who believes in the civilising power of letters and often talks of 216 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION this belief, to think that he has for more than twenty years got his living by inspecting schools for the people, has gone in and out among them, has seen that the power of letters never reaches them at all and that the whole study of letters is thereby dis- credited, and its power called in question, and yet has attempted nothing to remedy this state of things, cannot but be vexing and disquieting. He may truly say, like the Israel of the prophet : " We have not wrought any deliverance in the earth ! " and he may well desire to do something to pay his debt to popular education before he finally departs, and to serve it, if he can, in that point where its need is sorest, where he has always said its need was sorest, and where, nevertheless, it is as sore still as when he began saying this, twenty years ago. Even if what he does cannot be of service at once, owing to special prejudices and difficulties, yet these pre- judices and difficulties years are almost sure to dissipate, and it may be of service hereafter. " A Bible Reading for Schools," p. xii Culture Needed for All THE poor require culture as much as the rich ; and at present their education, even when they get education, gives them hardly anything of it. Yet hardly less of it, perhaps, than the education of the rich gives to the rich. For when we say that culture is : To know the best that has been thought and said in the world, we imply that, for culture, a system directly tending to this end is necessary THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 217 in our reading. Now, there is no such system yet present to guide the reading of the rich, any more than of the poor. Such a system is hardly even thought of ; a man who wants it must make it for himself. And our reading being so without purpose as it is, nothing can be truer than what Butler says, that really, in general, no part of our time is more idly spent than the time spent in reading. Still, culture is indispensably necessary, and culture implies reading ; but reading with a purpose to guide it, and with system. He does a good work who does anything to help this ; indeed, it is the one essential service now to be rendered to educa- tion. And the plea, that this or that man has no time for culture, will vanish as soon as we desire culture so much that we begin to examine seriously our present use of our time. It has often been said , and cannot be said too often : Give to any man all the time that he now wastes, not only on his vices (when he has them), but on useless business, weari- some or deteriorating amusements, trivial letter- writing, random reading ; and he will have plenty of time for culture. " Die Zeit ist unendlich lang," says Goethe ; and so it really is. Some of us waste all of it, most of us waste much, but all of us waste some. "Literature and Dogma," pp. 71-73. German and English Law-Making LAWS in Germany about public instruction come from statesmen, and so too, it may be said, do laws in 2i8 THOUGHTS 'ON EDUCATION England. Now, a statesman can hardly rise to power without being superior in range of experience and largeness of judgment to the mass of mankind ; at least, if he can, it speaks ill for those who employ him. And, in Germany, a law about public in- struction may be taken to be the best which a states- man, superior to the bulk of the community in experience and judgment, and free to use these unhampered, can devise. But we in England are, as is well known, a self-governing people. This is probably in the long run the best possible training for a nation, but let us observe how it acts on our statesmen and on our law-making. A statesman having to make a law about public instruction is not, with us, free to make it according to the best lights of his own experience and judgment ; he is hampered by the likes and dislikes of the bulk of the community ; or of some large body or bodies in the community which are necessary to his support. And of the men in general who compose these the judgment and experience are, by the supposition we follow, and indeed by the very nature of things, inferior to his own. Probably at the very best it will be a give and take between him and them ; he will concede something to their prejudices, and will try, along with this concession, to slip in as much of what he judges to be really right and expedient as he can. But the more he slips in of this the less he will tell the body of his supporters that their pre- judices are prejudices ; he will even make out, in passing, the best case for these he can, and will soothe and humour them, in order that what he THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 219 does gain he may gain safely. Therefore in any matter which, like education, touches many passions and prejudices, we do not get the best our statesmen would naturally devise ; and what we do get is given in a manner not to correct popular prejudices, but rather to humour them. Our statesmen, therefore, and their measures do directly hardly anything to check and set right widespread errors amongst the community. Our most popular newspapers do even less ; because, while they have all the temptations of statesmen to coax popular prejudices rather than counteract them, they have not the same chance of being, by experience and strength of judgment, raised really above them. But it is evident that the whole value of its training, to a nation which gets the training of self-government, depends upon its being told plainly of its mistakes and prejudices ; for mistakes and prejudices a large body will always have, and to follow these without let or hindrance is not the training we want, but freedom to act, with the most searching criticism of our way of acting. Now a criticism of our way of acting, in any matter, is tacitly supplied by the practice of foreign nations, in a like manner, put side by side with our practice ; and this criticism by actual examples is more practical, more interesting, and more readily attended to than criticism by speculative arguments. And the practice of Germany supplies a searching criticism of this kind ; for we know how German practice is governed by the notion that what is to be done should be done scientifically, as they say ; 220 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION that is, according to the reason of the thing, under the direction of experts, and without suffering ignorance and prejudice to intrude. But this criticism our politicians and newspapers having always, as we have seen, to consider the prejudices of those bodies on which they lean for support will never apply stringently and unflinchingly. The practice of foreign nations they will always try to exhibit by a side which may make their own supporters feel proud and comfortable, rather than humiliated and uneasy, and perhaps it is to this cause, even more than to simple carelessness and ignorance, that those inaccurate assertions about foreign universities by our public men, on which foreigners comment, are attributable. Therefore we have always said that in this country the functions of a disinterested literary class a class of non- political writers, having no organised and embodied set of supporters to please, simply setting themselves to observe and report faithfully, and looking for favour to those isolated persons only, scattered throughout the community, whom such an attempt may interest are of incalculable importance. 1874. " A French Eton," pp. 137-140. University Education in Ireland Now we come to the principle of the English Govern- ment in regard to university education in Ireland. This principle is, as we have seen, that for the future we must not, in Ireland, endow religion in any way THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 221 whatever. Now it is remarkable that in the sound- ness of this their principle many of the chief members of the English Government appear, if we may judge by their own admissions, not to believe. However, a principle may no doubt be sound, even though its upholders do not themselves believe in it ; the question is, Does the principle of the English Government, when we examine it, turn out to be sound in itself ? Because if it is not, it can never be likely to succeed, much as it may be written up and called a great and necessary principle. So much written up, indeed, it is, and asserted so confidently, that it has come to be treated by a great many people as almost a truism, as something which in its general form, that the State ought to have nothing to do with religion, one must begin by admitting as a matter of course, though circumstances may here and there prevent our as yet shaping our action in conformity to it. A truism, as is well known, is something true, and trite. Now, the principle in question is not exactly a truism, but it is next door to it ; it is what Archbishop Whately used to call a falsism. A truism is something true and trite, and a falsism is something trite and false ; and that is just what the maxim we are now dealing with is ; something trite but false, a falsism. " A French Eton," pp. 153-154, 155. The Need of Religion THE nations of Europe have all provided themselves with an organisation of religion just as they have 222 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION provided themselves with an organisation of society ; the one was made a public affair for the same reason as the other, because both were felt to interest the public profoundly as human needs of primary importance. And when it is said that this or that thing has not been made a matter of public organisa- tion, and why should religion be, we shall always find, if we look close enough, that this was because the thing in question did not interest the public profoundly, was not held (whatever its real merits may have been) to be a thing worth instituting publicly, a public need of primary importance ; whereas religion was. Religion has been publicly instituted because it is a recognised public need ; it has not been made a public need by being publicly instituted. Roman Catholicism does not disappear in Ireland, where it has no public organisation, any more than in Germany, where it has ; but it is a thousand times more superstitious and unprogressive. So that the maxim of Secularism, that the State must have nothing to do with religion, a maxim which is grounded on the notion that the inconveniences of religion will disappear quicker if the State treats it as if it did exist, turns out to be, as we say, a falsism : that is, it is false because the notion on which it is grounded is false, at the same time that it is trite because so many Liberals are constantly saying it. The truth is, religion is too great a thing, too universal a want, to be dealt with except nationally. Men in general may think little and feel bluntly ; THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 223 but the chief exercise of their higher thought and emotion which they have, is their religion. Their conduct may be very imperfect, but the chief guide and stay of conduct, so far as it has any at all, is their religion. Nothing, therefore, is of so much importance to them. And the Liberal party so much values itself upon its intelligence that with them we ought to begin, and show them, as we have been trying to show them here, that this old stock maxim of theirs : " The State (that is, the nation in its collective and corporate character) is of no religion," is quite unsound. In exchange for it we ought to solicit them, with a persistency which never tires, to take a better : "It is false to say the State is of no religion ; the State is of the religion of all its citizens without the fanaticism of any of them." " A French Eton," pp. 159, 161, 191,201-202. State-appointed Professors A WISE Government will always regard the nation, and rely on its reasonableness, if its genuine wants and wishes are fairly met, for controlling the un- reasonableness or ambition of individuals or corpora- tions. Experience proves that the appointment and dismissal of professors is best in the hands of no corporation less large and public than the nation itself ; your professors shall be nominated and 224 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION removed ,* not by the bishops, but by a responsible Minister of State acting for the Irish nation itself. " A French Eton," pp. 188-189. Clap-Trap and Catchwords BUT in this and all the matters most important to us, progress, at the point where our nation now stands, depends on our getting just, clear, well- ordered thoughts about them, and setting at defiance clap-trap and catchwords. " A French Eton," p. 215. Confectioner and Doctor BUT for an active politician to go counter to clap-trap is, as we have seen, hard ; and indeed, by the nature of things it must be hard. And therefore it is that we rejoice to see a moment of lull in their active political life come to so many of our Liberal friends, because they thus escape from great temptation, and are set free to use their intelligence. For the active politician can hardly get on without deferring to clap-trap and even employing it. Nay, as Socrates amusingly said, the man who defers to clap-trap and the man who uses his intelligence * In the first instance. But the body of Professors once formed, and constituting the Academical Senate, might present names to the minister for vacant professorships. With the minister, however, the ultimate responsibility of appointment and dismissal should always rest. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 225 are, when they meet in the struggle of active politics, like a doctor and a confectioner competing for the suffrages of a constituency of schoolboys ; the confectioner has nearly every point in his favour. The confectioner deals in all that the constituency like ; the doctor is a man who hurts them, and makes them leave off what they like and take what is disagreeable. And accordingly the temptation, in dealing with the public and with the trade of active politics, the temptation to be a confectioner is extremely strong, and we see that almost all our leading newspapers and leading politicians do in fact yield to it. Only the confectioner is not at this moment what we most require. Our wants are the same as those which made Socrates, again, say, that though himself no confectioner and taking quite another line from the active politicians round him, indeed, just because of this, he, or any man who held the same course as to current clap-trap that he did, " was the only true politician of men now living." " A French Eton," pp. 215-216. Good Recitation as Helping Intelligence THE great majority of my schools now take, I am glad to say, recitation as an extra subject. It is, in my view, that part of the work in elementary schools which does most, under our existing circum- stances, to promote general intelligence. But the passages to be learnt are by no means chosen with Q 226 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION sufficient care, and the learner is still, although there is improvement in this respect, very in- sufficiently taught the sense and allusions of what he recites. More and more the recitation should be turned into a literature lesson. None but classical poetry should be taken ; we are far too much afraid of restriction and uniformity. The young ought in school to be as much as possible restricted to good models ; the merit of the old classical education was that it kept the pupil in continual contact with a few first-rate models. We laugh at the French Minister who took out his watch and said with satisfaction that in all French lycees the boys were at that moment doing the same thing. But really, is it so lamentable to think that all schoolboys should at a given moment be reading the fourth eclogue of Virgil ; or is it so delightful to think that at a given moment all schoolboys may be reading different pieces of rubbish, out of in- numerable and equally accepted collections of it ? If the Education Department would yearly name in its syllabus a short work of classical English poetry for the candidates for admission, this work might with great advantage be adopted for the recitation and literature-lesson in the school. Thus carefully studied it would have a good chance of being appropriated and assimilated by both pupils and pupil-teachers, and only thus can such a work produce its due effect. Its due effect, when pro- duced, is invaluable, and is precisely that of which our elementary schools stand most in need. These are details ; but it is attention to these THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 227 details of study, and not to details of mere adminis- tration, which we so much need. I limit myself even as to these details of study, because it is easy to attempt too much, difficult to get teachers to attend to more than one thing at a time. General Report, 1874. The Regulation of Studies I DO not like the course for the History School at all ; nothing but read, read, read, endless histories ! in English, many of them by quite second-rate men ; \ nothing to form the mind as reading truly great authors forms it, or even to exercise it as learning a new language, or mathematics, or one of the natural sciences exercises it. If they merely put in these works in other languages into their History Tripos, Thucydides, Tacitus, and either Montes- quieu's Esprit des Lois, or Guizot's Civilisation in France, the Tripos would be incalculably improved, and would be a real training. As it is, I am not sure that I would not sooner Dick had the discipline of the mere degree examination in classics than the no discipline of even honours in history. The one matter which gave the mind something to school it, the Roman Law, which used to go along with the History, they have now taken away. The fact is, it is at Oxford as it is at our schools. The regulation of studies is all important, and there is no one to regulate them, and people think that any one can regulate them. We shall never do any good till we get a man like Guizot or W. von Humboldt to 228 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION deal with the matter, men who have the highest mental training themselves, and this we shall probably in this country never get, and our intellectual pro- gress will therefore be a thousand times slower than it need be, and generations will be sacrificed to bungling. 1875. "Letters," ii. p. 123. Grammar as a Class-Subject THE spread of interest in education was already doing much to re-awaken and re-invigorate our schools, bound in a narrow routine and dispirited as many of them certainly were. The introduction of the class subjects of grammar, geography, and history, has also done much in the same direction, and will do more. Grammar and geography should be the first of the class subjects chosen, and in the schools under my inspection they generally are so. I cannot understand the doubts of some of my colleagues as to the use of teaching grammar. The programme of a French elementary school is notori- ously scanty, but it always includes the elements of French grammar. Grammar is an exercise of the children's wits ; all the rest of their work is in general but an exercise of their memory. To learn the definitions and rules of grammar is, indeed, but an exercise of memory. But, after learning the definition of a noun, to recognise nouns when one meets with them, and to refer them to their definition, that is an exercise of intelligence. I observe that it animates the children, even amuses them. Indeed, THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 229 all that relates to language, that familiar but wonder- ful phenomenon, is naturally interesting if it is not spoiled by being treated pedantically. In teaching grammar, not to attempt too much, and to be thoroughly simple, orderly, and clear, is most important. The teacher, I have often said, should be fettered as little as possible, and our Codes tend to fetter him too much. General Report, 1876. Science and Letters Ax last year's meeting of the British Association the President of the Section for Mechanical Science told his hearers that, " in such communities as ours, the spread of natural science is of far more immediate urgency than any other secondary study. Whatever else he may know, viewed in the light of modern necessities, a man who is not fairly versed in exact science is only a half-educated man, and if he has substituted literature and history for natural science, he has chosen the less useful alternative." And more and more pressure there will be, especially in the instruction of the children of the working classes, whose time for schooling is short, to sub- stitute natural science for literature and history as the more useful alternative. And what a curious state of things it would be if every scholar who had passed through the course of our primary schools knew that, when a taper burns, the wax is converted into carbonic acid and water, and thought, at the 230 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION same time, that a good paraphrase for Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased, was, Can you not wait upon the lunatic I The problem to be solved is a great deal more complicated than many of the friends of natural science suppose. They see clearly enough, for instance, how the working classes are, in their ignorance, constantly violating the laws of health, and suffering accordingly ; and they look to a spread of sound natural science as the remedy. What they do not see is that to know the laws of health ever so exactly, as a mere piece of positive | knowledge, will carry a man in general no great way. / To have the power of using, which is the thing / wished, these data of natural science, a man must, f in general, have first been in some measure moralised ; \ and for moralising him it will be found not easy, I think, to dispense with those old agents, letters, poetry, religion. So let not our teachers be led to imagine, whatever they may hear and see of the call for natural science, that their literary cultiva- tion is unimportant. The fruitful use of natural science itself depends, in a very great degree, on having effected in the whole man, by means of letters, a rise in what the political economists call the standard of life. General Report, 1876. Natur-Kunde WE ought surely to provide that some knowledge of the system of nature should form part of the regular THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 231 class course. Some fragments of such knowledge do in practice form part of the class course at present. Children in learning geography are taught something about the form and motion of the earth, about the causes of night and day and the seasons. But why are they taught nothing of the causes, for instance, of rain and dew, which are at least as easy to explain to them, and not less interesting ? And this is what the teaching of Natur-kunde or natural philosophy (to use the formerly received, somewhat over-ambitious, English name for the kind of thing) should aim at ; it should aim at systematising for the use of our schools a body of simple instruction in the facts and laws of nature, so as to omit nothing which is requisite, and to give all in right proportion. Of course the best agency for effecting this would be a gifted teacher ; but as gifted teachers are rare, what we have most to wish for is the guidance of a good text-book. Such a text- book does not at present, so far as I know, exist ; some man of science, who is also a master of clear and orderly exposition, should do us the benefit of providing one. But meanwhile there is no reason for delaying the attempt to teach in a systematic way an elementary knowledge of nature. Text- books abound from which a teacher may obtain in separate portions what he requires ; there can be no better discipline for him than to combine out of what he finds in them the kind of whole suited to the simple requirements of his classes. Some teachers will do this a great deal better than others, but all will gain something by attempting it ; and 232 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION their classes too, however imperfectly it is at first often effected, will gain by its being attempted. General Report, 1878. The Formative Power of Poetry IF we consider it, the bulk of the secular instruction given in our elementary schools has nothing of that formative character which in education is demanded. As regards sewing, calculating, writing, spelling, this is evident. They are necessary, they have utility, but they are not formative. To have the power of reading is not in itself formative. It is neces- sary to have it, and here is the defence of our promiscuous reading books and of allowing them all to be used freely ; the power of reading has to be acquired by the pupil, and for acquiring the power of reading it must be owned that our reading books, with the promiscuous variety of their con- tents, serve well enough. But for a higher purpose, to serve in any way to form the pupil in addition to giving him the mere power of reading, no serious person would maintain that our reading books are at present fitted. But good poetry is formative ; it has, too, the precious power of acting by itself and in a way managed by nature, not through the instrumentality of that somewhat terrible character, the scientific educator. I believe that even the rhythm and diction of good poetry are capable of exercising some formative effect, even though the sense be imperfectly understood. But, of course THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 233 the good of poetry is not really got unless the sense of the words is known. And more and more I find it learnt and known ; more and more it will be easy to refuse to let the recitation count for anything unless the meaning of what is recited is thoroughly learnt and known. It will be observed that thus we are remedying what I have noticed as the signal mental defect of our school children their almost f incredible scantiness of vocabulary. We enlarge { their vocabulary, and with their vocabulary their I circle of ideas. At the same time we bring them' under the formative influence of really good litera- ture, really good poetry. We must not, of course, be so rigid as to exclude all poetry but the very best. Poetry like that of Scott or Mrs. Hemans, for instance, is no doubt of texture different from that of the best poetry, yet it has excellent qualities, and qualities to which our school children are very sensible ; we may be glad to have them learning it. Still an effort should be made, for this one exercise, to fix the standard high. Gray's Elegy and extracts from Shakespeare should be chosen in preference to the poetry of Scott and Mrs. Hemans, and very much of the poetry in our present school reading books should be entirely rejected. General Report, 1878. Education of the Middle Classes for the Sake of the Working Class I HAVE to make an address to the Working Men's College at Ipswich, the largest College of the kind 234 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION in England. The inducement to me was that I might try and interest them in founding a system of public education for the middle classes, on the % ground that the working class suffered by not having a more civilised middle class to rise into, if they do rise ; this is in my opinion a very true plea, but you may imagine the difficulty and delicacy of urging it in a public meeting in a provincial town, where half the audience will be middle class. However, the speech is meant for the working men, the hands in the great factories for agricultural implements there. They are said to be an intelligent set, and I do not despair of making them follow me. 1879. " Letters," ii. p. 151. The Influence of Poetry I FIND that of the specific subjects English litera- ture, as it is too ambitiously called in plain truth the learning by heart and reciting of a hundred lines or two of standard English poetry continues to be by far the most popular. I rejoice to find it so ; there is no fact coming under my observation in the working of our elementary schools which gives me so much satisfaction. The acquisition of good poetry is a discipline which works deeper than any other discipline in the range of work of our schools ; more than any other, too, it works of itself, is independent of the school teacher, and cannot be spoiled by pedantry and injudiciousness on his part. Some people regard this my high estimate of the THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 235 value of poetry in education with suspicion and displeasure. Perhaps they may accept the testi- mony of Wordsworth with less suspicion than mine. Wordsworth says, "To be incapable of a feeling of poetry in my sense of the word, is to be without love of human nature and reverence for God." And it is only through acquaintance with poetry, and with good poetry, that this " feeling of poetry " can be given. Good poetry does undoubtedly tend to form the soul and character ; it tends to beget a love of beauty and of truth in alliance together, it suggests, however indirectly, high and noble principles of action, and it inspires the emotion so helpful in making principles operative. Hence its extreme importance to all of us ; but in our elementary schools its importance seems to me to be at present quite extraordinary. General Report, 1880. Influences Affecting Voluntary Schools ONE might expect that the class of people for whose children these schools are required would prefer public rate-supported schools to others, as being schools which they support (so far as they pay rates) themselves, and which in no way make them dependent on private charity. One might expect that teachers would prefer schools where they both get, in general, higher salaries than in voluntary schools, and are free, besides, from the control of private and clerical managers. In a report written 236 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION many years ago by me after seeing the elementary schools abroad, I said that for parents and teachers to prefer really public schools seemed the natural thing, and that they would with time come in this country also to prefer them. And so, in fact, per- haps, it is the natural thing, and they will in the end come to prefer it. Yet experience shows that where funds are forth- coming for the support of voluntary schools, they at present hold their own and are sought after. Parents send their children to them, although the fees are higher than at other schools within reach. Teachers continue in them at lower salaries than they could earn in board schools. That this should be so, proves the moderation of the English character, proves the absence, in general, of arbitrariness and meddlesomeness on the part of managers, the absence of irritable vanity on the part of parents and teachers. A strong element of irritable vanity on the one side, or of arbitrariness on the other, would be fatal to voluntary schools. But the moderation, the English moderation, on both sides, keeps those elements of ruin out ; and so long as they are kept out, and the voluntary schools prosper, these schools serve, I think, several important ends, of which I shall here mention two only. One is economic, the other moral. It has so often been said that people value more highly, and use more respectfully, what they pay a price for, that one is almost ashamed to repeat it. But the advocates of free education seem never to have THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 237 heard or at least considered it. In a country where there is public support for the education of one class only, as in our country, to defend a very high expenditure upon it by the very high expenditure on publicly supported education abroad, where it is for all classes, is, of course, a mere blunder. To have an expensive public education for one class of the community only, and to make it gratuitous, is practi- cally to fall in with the ideas of Jack Cade. But suppose that public schools are provided for the whole community, and that schooling without fee is then defended on the plea that parents have suffi- ciently paid for their children's schooling by paying rates and taxes. Even then, unless the payment is so made by a direct school tax that both in form and in amount it comes to much the same thing as the payment of a school fee, I doubt whether its effect upon the payers is so wholesome as the payment of a school fee. In our board schools fees are paid, but they are in general much lower than in volun- tary schools, and there is pressure constantly being applied to make them lower still, or even to get rid of them altogether. A certain number of free schools and a certain number of free places in paying schools there ought to be ; but I hope that school boards will not discontinue the school fee generally, and that where it is now too low, and less than parents can fairly pay, they will raise it. The high character of voluntary schools in Westminster is certainly very much due to the value set upon the schooling for which what is felt to be a real and adequate price has to be paid. I do not say that 238 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION the price paid in board schools ought to be so high as in those voluntary schools, it ought not ; but it ought to be as high relatively to the means of the parents to pay, and I do not think it is at present. I visited the other day a voluntary school with a 6d. fee, where id. had just been added to this for school stationery, which the boys had hitherto provided as they could. They got it much better for the extra id., they felt themselves to be paying for it, and they were greatly pleased with it. I could not help reflecting how wholesome this kind of pleasure is, and how it is quite lost in board schools where the gratuitous distribution of stationery is the rule. And as with stationery, so with the rest of what is furnished at school. Another source of strength to voluntary schools is the natural and intimate connexion between the schools and their managers, and the influences thence arising. The more experience I get, the higher I value this source of strength. In a town like London especially, many a man must feel that while others, as Solomon says, " have many friends," he himself " is separated from his neighbour " ; and the feeling that in their manager they have really a " neighbour " who knows them, and to the best of his power will help them, is an influence which tends to keep both teacher and scholar faithful to voluntary schools. It is an influence of a very valuable kind. Of course it is not exercised in every case where it might be, but, on the whole, it is exercised to an extent and with a power beyond one's expectations. Teachers will remain at salaries THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 239 below the board school rate, and scholars will pay fees above the common board school fee, while they feel this influence. I have schools in my district where every teacher and every child in the school feel that in their manager they have a friend, and this is no little thing in London. General Report, 1882. Cramming and the Creative Spirit FRESH matters of instruction are continually being added to our school programmes ; but it is well to remember that the recipient for this instruction, the child, remains as to age, capacity, and school time, what he was before, and that his age, capacity, and school time, must in the end govern our proceedings. Undoubtedly there is danger at present of his being over-urged and over-worked, of his being taught too many things, and not the best things for him. I am very glad that the New Code confines the grant for specific subjects to the standards above the fourth. This is a defence against the danger of teaching too much, and for children in the Fourth Standard the specific subjects are in general too much. Teachers know very well, however, that the strain upon a learner's mind arises not only from the quantity of what is put into it, but also from the quality and character ; and that the strain may be relieved not only by diminishing the quantity, but also by altering that quality and character. This is an extremely important matter. Attention has lately been called to the break- 240 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION down, in India, of a number of young men who had won their appointments after severe study and severe examination. No doubt the quantity of mental exertion required for examinations is often excessive, but the strain is much the more severe, because the quality and character of mental exertion required are so often injudicious. The mind is less strained the more it reacts on what it deals with, and has a native play of its own, and is creative. It is more strained the more it has to receive a number of " knowledges " passively, and to store them up to be reproduced in an examination. But to acquire a number of " knowledges," store them, and reproduce them, was what in general those candidates for Indian employment had had to do. By their suc- cess in doing this they were tested, and the examina- tion turned on it. In old days examinations mainly turned upon Latin and Greek composition. Composition in the dead languages is now wholly out of favour, and I by no means say that it is a sufficient test for candidates for Indian employment. But I will say that the character and quality of mental exertion required for it is more healthy than the character and quality of exertion required for receiving and storing a number of " knowledges." And the candidate whom the former test brings to the front is likely to be a healthier man in body and mind, both then and afterwards, than the man whom the latter test brings to the front. Of such high importance, in relieving the strain of mental effort, is the sense of pleasurable activity and of creation. Of course a great deal of the work THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 241 in elementary schools must necessarily be of a me- chanical kind. But whatever introduces any sort of creative activity to relieve the passive reception of knowledge is valuable. The kindergarten exercises are useful for this reason, the management of tools is useful, drawing is useful, singing is useful. The poetry exercise, if properly managed, is of very great use, and this is why I have always been in favour of it and am glad to see further development given to it by the New Code. People talk contemptuously of " learning lines by heart " ; but if a child is brought, as he easily can be brought, to throw him- self into a piece of poetry, an exercise of creative activity has been set up in him quite different from the effort of learning a list of words to spell, or a list of flesh-making and heat-giving foods, or a list of capes and bays, or a list of reigns and battles, and capable of greatly relieving the strain from learning these and of affording a lively pleasure. It is true, language, and geography, and history, and the elements of natural science are all capable of being taught in a less mechanical and more in- teresting manner than that in which they are com- monly taught now ; they may be so taught as to call forth pleasurable activity in the pupil. But those disciplines are especially valuable which call this activity forth most surely and directly. General Report, 1882. 242 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION The Governing Aim of Education As to " knowledges," a teacher should, in my opinion, aim at having every child who passes through an elementary school not only taught reading, writing, and arithmetic, but furnished in addition with some knowledge of the English language and of grammar, and also with some in- struction in natural science, geography, and history. A select class capable of being carried further with profit should be formed for specific subjects. But governing the teacher's whole design of instruc- tion in these knowledges should be the aim of calling forth, by some means or other, in every pupil a sense of pleasurable activity and of creation ; he should resist being made a mere ladder with " information." There is an admirable sermon of Butler's, preached in 1745 on behalf of the charity schools of London and Westminster, which every one concerned with popular education ought to read.* It is far too little known ; the Christian Knowledge Society would do well to reprint it, as they have reprinted Bishop Wilson's manual. Every point is taken in it which most needs to be taken : the change in the world which makes " knowledges " of universal * A sermon preached in the Parish Church of Christchurch, London, on Thursday, May the gth, 1745, being the time of the Yearly Meeting of the children educated in the Charity schools, in and about the Cities of London and Westminster. By the Right Rev. Joseph, Lord Bishop of Bristol. ... To which is annexed an account of The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. Printed by J. Oliver, printer to the said Society, in Bartholomew Close ; and sold by B. Dod, bookseller, at the Bible and Key in Ave-Maria Lane. MDCCXLV. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 243 necessity now which were not so formerly, the hard- ship of exclusion from them, the absurdity and selfishness of those who are " so extremely appre- hensive of the danger that poor persons will make a perverse use of even the least advantage, whilst they do not appear at all apprehensive of the like danger for themselves or their own children, in respect of riches or power, how much soever ; though the danger of perverting these advantages is surely as great, and the perversion itself of much greater and worse consequence." But there is, perhaps, no sentence in the sermon which more deserves to be pondered by us than this : "Of education," says Butler, " information itself is really the least part." Reports on Elementary Schools, 1880. The Aim of Education WHAT a man seeks through his education is to get to know himself and the world ; next, that for this knowledge it is before all things necessary that he acquaint himself with the best which has been thought and said in the world ; finally, that of this best the classics of Greece and Rome form a very chief portion, and the portion most entirely satisfactory. With these conclusions lodged safe in one's mind, one is staunch on the side of the humanities. 1882. " Irish Essays," p. 184 (A Speech at Eton). 244 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Formative Influence of Masterpieces THE best, in literature, has the quality of being in itself formative ; of bringing out its own signifi- cance as we read it. It is better to read a master- piece much, even if one does that only, than to read it a little, and to be told a great deal about its significance, and about the development and sense of the world from which it issues. Sometimes what one is told about the significance of a work, and about the development of a world, is extremely question- able. At any rate, a schoolboy, who, as they did in the times of ignorance at Eton, read his Homer and Horace through, and then read them through again, and so went on until he knew them by heart, is not, in my opinion, so very much to be pitied. " Irish Essays," p. 184. Eutrapelia As Goethe says of life : Strike into it anywhere, lay hold of it anywhere, it is always powerful and interesting so one may almost say of classical literature. Strike into it where you like, lay hold of it where you like, you can nearly always find a thread which will lead you, if you follow it, to large and instructive results. Let us follow to-night a single Greek word in this fashion, and try to com- pensate ourselves, however imperfectly, for having to divert our thoughts, just for one evening's lecture, from the diameter of the sun and moon. THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 245 The word I will take is the word eutrapelos, eutrapelia. Let us consider it first as it occurs in the famous Funeral Oration put by Thucydides into the mouth of Pericles. The word stands there for one of the chief of those qualities which have made Athens, says Pericles, " the school of Greece ; " for a quality by which Athens is eminently repre- sentative of what is called Hellenism : the quality of flexibility. " A happy and gracious flexibility," Pericles calls this quality of the Athenians ; and it is no doubt a charming gift. Lucidity of thought, clearness and propriety of language, freedom from prejudice and freedom from stiffness, openness of mind, amiability of manners, all these seem to go along with a certain happy flexibility of nature, and to depend upon it. Nor does this suppleness and flexibility of nature at all necessarily imply, as we English are apt to suppose, a relaxed moral fibre and weakness. In the Athenian of the best time it did not. " In the Athenians," says Professor Curtius, " the sense of energy abhorred every kind of waste of time, their sense of measure abhorred bombast and redundancy, and their clear intelligence everything partaking of obscurity or vagueness ; it was their habit in all things to advance directly and resolutely to the goal. Their dialect is characterised by a superior seriousness, manliness, and vigour of language." There is no sign of relaxation of moral fibre here ; and yet at the same time, the Athenians were eminent for a happy and gracious flexibility. That quality, as we all know, is not a characteristic quality 246 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION of the Germanic nations, to which we ourselves belong. Men are educable, and when we read of the abhorrence of the Attic mind for redundancy and obscurity of expression, its love for direct and telling speech, and then think of modern German, we may say with satisfaction that the circumstances of our life have at any rate educated us into the use of straightforward and vigorous forms of language. But they have not educated us into flexibility. All around us we may observe proofs of it. The state of Ireland is a proof of it. We are rivals with Russia in Central Asia, and at this moment it is particularly interesting to note, how the want of just this one Athenian quality of flexibility seems to tell against us in our Asiatic rivalry with Russia. " Russia," observes one who is perhaps the first of living geographers an Austrian, Herr von Hellwald " possesses far more shrewdness, flexibility, and congeniality than England ; qualities adapted to make the Asiatic more tractable." And again : " There can be no dispute which of the two, England or Russia, is the more civilised nation. But it is just as certain that the more civilised English under- stand but indifferently how to raise their Asiatic subjects to their own standard of civilisation ; whilst the Russians attain, with their much lower standard of civilisation, far greater results among the Asiatic tribes, whom they know how to assimilate in the most remarkable manner. Of course they can only bring them to the same level which they have reached themselves ; but the little which they can and do communicate to them counts actually for THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 247 much more than the great boons which the English do not know how to impart. Under the auspices of Russia the advance in civilisation amongst the Asiatics is indeed slow and inconsiderable, but steady, and suitable to their natural capacities and the disposition of their race. On the other hand, they remain indifferent to British civilisation, which is absolutely incomprehensible to them." Our word " flexibility " has here carried us a long way, carried us to Turkestan and the valleys of the Jaxartes and Oxus. Let us get back to Greece, at any rate. The generation of Pericles is succeeded by the generation of Plato and Aristotle. Still the charming and Athenian quality of eutrapelia continues to be held in high esteem. Only the word comes to stand more particularly for flexibility and felicity in the give-and-take of gay and light social intercourse. With Aristotle it is one of the virtues : the virtue of him who in this pleasant sort of inter- course, so relished by the Greeks, manages exactly to hit the happy and right mean ; the virtue opposed to buffoonery on the one side, and to morose rusticity, or clownishness, on the other. It is hi especial the virtue of the young, and is akin to the grace and charm of youth. When old men try to adapt themselves to the young, says Plato, they betake themselves, in imitation of the young, to eutrapelia and pleasantry. Four hundred years pass, and we come to the date of the Epistle to the Ephesians. The word eutrapelia rises in the mind of the writer of that Epistle. It rises to St. Paul's mind, and he utters it ; 248 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION but in how different a sense from the praising and admiring sense in which we have seen the word used by Thucydides and Aristotle ! Eutrapelia, which once stood for that eminently Athenian and Hellenic virtue of happy and gracious flexibility, now conveys this favourable sense no longer, but is ranked, with filthiness and foolish talking, among things which are not convenient. Like these, it is not to be even so much as once named among the followers of God T " neither filthiness, not foolish talking, nor jesting (eutrapelia}, which are not convenient." This is an extraordinary change, you will say. But now, as we have descended four hundred years from Aristotle to St. Paul, let us ascend, not four hundred, not quite even one hundred years, from Thucydides to Pindar. The religious Theban poet, we shall see (and the thing is surely very remarkable) , speaks of the quality of eutrapelia in the same dis- approving and austere way as the writer of the Epistle to the Ephesians. The young and noble Jason appears at lolcos, and being questioned about himself by Pelias, he answers that he has been trained in the nurture and admonition of the old and just Centaur, Chiron. " From his cave I come, from Chariclo and Philyra, his stainless daughters, who there nursed me. Lo, these twenty years am I with them, and there hath been found in me neither deed nor word that is not convenient ; and now, behold, I am come home, that I may recover my father's kingdom." The adjective eutrapelos, as it is here used in connexion with its two nouns, THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 249 means exactly a word or deed, in Biblical phrase, of vain lightness, a word or deed such as is not convenient. There you have the history of the varying use of the words eutrapelos, eutmpelia. And now see how this varying use gives us a clue to the order and sense, as we say, of all that Greek world, so nearly and wonderfully connected with us, so profoundly interesting for us, so full of precious lessons. " Irish Essays " (A Speech at Eton), p. 187. Regular Reading I AM glad to find that in the past year I have at ! least accomplished more than usual in the way of f reading the books which at the beginning of the year - I had put down to be read. I always do this, and ( I do not expect to read all I put down, but some- I times I fall much too short of what I proposed, and this year things have been a good deal better. The importance of reading, not slight stuff to get through the time, but the best that has been written, forces itself upon me more and more every year I live ; it is living in good company, the best company, and people are generally quite keen enough, or too keen, about doing that, yet they will not do it in the simplest and most innocent manner by reading, i However, if I live to be eighty, I shall probably be \ the only person left in England who reads anything | but newspapers and scientific publications. 1882. " Letters," ii. p. 196. 250 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION The Reading of Books Hindered by Newspapers THE influence of poetry and literature appears at this moment diminishing rather than increasing. The newspapers have a good deal to do with this. The Times, which has much improved again, is a world, and people who read it daily hardly feel the necessity for reading a book ; yet reading a book a good book is a discipline such as no reading of even good newspapers can ever give. But literature has in itself such powers of attraction that I am not over anxious about it. 1884. " Letters," ii. p. 268. Light also a Moral Cause INFELICITOUS the general direction of our affairs may be ; but the individual Englishman, whenever and wherever called upon to do his duty, does it almost invariably with the old energy, courage, virtue. And this is what we gain by having had, as a people, in the ground of our being, a firm faith in conduct ; by having believed, more steadfastly and fervently than most, this great law that moral causes govern the standing and the falling of men and nations. The law gradually widens, indeed, so as to include light as well as honesty and energy ; to make light, also, a moral cause. Unless we are transformed we cannot finally stand, and without more light we cannot be transformed. But in the trying hours through which before our transformation THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 251 we have to pass, it may well console us to rest our thoughts upon our life's law even as we have hitherto known it, and upon all which even in our present imperfect acceptation of it it has done for us. 1885. " Discourses in America," pp. x-xi. The Things of the Mind as a Political Force " WHATSOEVER things are true, whatsoever things are elevated, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are amiable, whatsoever things are of good report ; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise ; have these in your mind, let your thoughts run upon these." * This is what both Plato and the prophets mean by loving righteousness, and making one's study in the law of the Eternal. Now the matters just enumerated do not come much into the heads of most of us, I suppose, when we are thinking of politics. But the philosophers and prophets maintain that these matters, and not those of which the heads of politicians are full, do really govern politics and save or destroy States. They save or destroy them by a silent, inexorable fatality ; while the politicians are making believe, plausibly and noisily, with their American institu- tions, British Constitution and civilising mission of France. And because these matters are what do really govern politics and save or destroy States, Socrates maintained that in his time he and a few philosophers, who alone kept insisting on the good * Philippians iv. 8. 252 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION of righteousness, and the unprofitableness of iniquity, were the only real politicians then living. I say, if we are to derive comfort from the doctrine of the remnant (and there is great comfort to be derived from it), we must also hold fast to the austere but true doctrine as to what really governs politics, overrides with an inexorable fatality the combinations of the so-called politicians, and saves or destroys States. Having in mind things true, things elevated, things just, things pure, things amiable, things of good report ; having these in mind, studying and loving these, is what saves States. There is nothing like positive instances to illus- trate general propositions of this kind and to make them believed. I hesitate to take an instance from America. Possibly there are some people who think that already, on a former occasion, I have said enough about America, without duly seeing and knowing it. So I will take my instances from England, and from England's neighbour and old co-mate in history, France. The instance from England I will take first. I will take it from the grave topic of England's relations with Ireland. I am not going to reproach either England or Ireland. To reproach Ireland here would probably be indiscreet. As to England, anything I may have to say against my own country- men I prefer to say at home ; America is the last place where I should care to say it. However, I have no wish or intention now to reproach either the English or the Irish. I want to show you from THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 253 England's relations with Ireland how right the philo- sophers and prophets are. Every one knows that there has been conquest and confiscation in Ireland. So there has elsewhere. Every one knows that the conquest and the confiscation have been attended with cupidity, oppression, and ill-usage. So they have elsewhere. " Whatsoever things are just " are not exactly the study, so far as I know, of conquerors and confiscators anywhere ; certainly they were not the study of the English conquerors of Ireland. A failure in justice is a source of danger to States. But it may be made up for and got over ; it has been made up for and got over in many communities. England's confiscations in Ireland are a thing of the past ; the penal laws against Catholics are a thing of the past ; much has been done to make up for the old failure in justice ; Englishmen generally think that it has been pretty well made up for, and that Irishmen ought to think so too. And politicians invent Land Acts for curing the last results of the old failure in justice, for insuring the contentment of the Irish with us, and for consolidat- ing the Union ; and are surprised and plaintive if it is not consolidated. But now see how much more serious people are the philosophers and prophets than the politicians. Whatsoever things are amiable: the failure in amiability, too, is a source of danger and insecurity to States, as well as the failure in justice. And we English are not amiable, or at any rate, what in this case comes to the same thing, do not appear so. The politicians never thought of that. Quite outside their combinations lies this 254 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION hindrance, tending to make their most elaborate combinations ineffectual. Thus the joint operation of two moral causes together the sort of causes which politicians do not seriously regard tells against the designs of the politicians with what seems to be an almost inexorable fatality. If there were not the failure in amiability, perhaps the original failure in justice might by this time have been got over ; if there had not been the failure in justice, perhaps the failure in amiability might not have mattered much. The two failures together create a difficulty almost insurmountable. Public men in England keep saying that it will be got over. I hope that it will be got over, and that the Union between England and Ireland may become as solid as that between England and Scotland. But it will not become solid by means of the contrivances of the mere politician, or without the intervention of moral causes of concord to heal the mischief wrought by moral causes of division. Everything, in this case, depends upon the " remnant," its numbers, and its powers of action. " Discourses in America," pp. 30-37. The Love of France To France I have always felt myself powerfully drawn. People in England often accuse me of liking France and things French far too well. At all events I have paid special regard to them, and am always glad to confess how much I owe to them. M. Sainte-Beuve wrote to me in the last years of THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 255 his life : " You have passed through our life and literature by a deep inner line, which confers initiation, and which you will never lose." Vous avez traversj noire vie et notre literature par une ligne interieure, profonde, quifait les initite: et que vous ne perdrez jamais. I wish I could think that this friendly testimony of that accomplished and charm- ing man, one of my chief benefactors, were fully deserved. But I have pride and pleasure in quoting it ; and I quote it to bear me out in saying, that whatever opinion I may express about France, I have at least been a not inattentive observer of that great country, and anything but a hostile one. " Discourses in America," pp. 38-39. The Rivalry of Literature and Science in Education Now education, many people go on to say, is still mainly governed by the ideas of men like Plato, who lived when the warrior caste and the priestly or philosophical class were alone in honour, and the really useful part of the community were slaves. It is an education fitted for persons of leisure in such a community. This education passed from Greece and Rome to the feudal communities of Europe, where also the warrior caste and the priestly caste were alone held in honour, and where the really useful and working part of the community, though not nominally slaves as in the pagan world, were practically not much better off than slaves, and not more seriously regarded. And how absurd it is, 256 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION people end by saying, to inflict this education upon an industrious modern community, where very few indeed are persons of leisure, and the mass to be considered has not leisure, but is bound, for its own great good, and for the great good of the world at large, to plain labour and to industrial pursuits, and the education in question tends necessarily to make men dissatisfied with these pursuits and unfitted for them! That is what is said. So far I must defend Plato, as to plead that his .view of education and studies is in the general, as it seems to me, sound enough, and fitted for all sorts and conditions of I men, whatever their pursuits may be. " An in- | telligent man," says Plato, " will prize those studies I which result in his soul getting soberness, righteous- i ness, and wisdom, and will less value the others." I cannot consider that a bad description of the aim of education, and of the motives which should govern us in the choice of studies, whether we are preparing ourselves for a hereditary seat in the English House of Lords or for the pork trade in Chicago. Still I admit that Plato's world was not ours, that his scorn of trade and handicraft is fantastic, that he had no conception of a great industrial community such as that of the United States, and that such a community must and will shape its education to suit its own needs. If the usual education handed down to it from the past does not suit it, it will certainly before long drop this and try another. The usual education in the past has been THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 257 mainly literary. The question is whether the studies which were long supposed to be the best for all of us are practically the best now; whether others are not better. The tyranny of the past, many think, weighs on us injuriously in the pre- dominance given to letters in education. The question is raised whether, to meet the needs of our modern life, the predominance ought not now to pass from letters to science ; and naturally the question is nowhere raised with more energy than here in the United States. The design of abasing what is called "mere literary instruction and education," and of exalting what is called " sound, extensive and practical scientific knowledge," is, in this intensely modern world of the United States even more perhaps than in Europe, a very popular design, and makes great and rapid progress. I am going to ask whether the present movement for ousting letters from their old predominance in education, and for transferring the predominance in education to the natural sciences, whether this brisk and flourishing movement ought to prevail, and whether it is likely that in the end it really will prevail. An objection may be raised which I will anticipate. My own studies have been almost wholly in letters, and my visits to the field of the natural sciences have been very slight and inadequate, although those sciences have always strongly moved my curiosity. A man of letters, it will perhaps be said, is not competent to discuss the comparative merits of letters and natural science as means of education. To this objection I reply, first of all, s 258 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION that his incompetence, if he attempts the discussion but is really incompetent for it, will be abundantly visible ; nobody will be taken in ; he will have plenty of sharp observers and critics to save mankind from that danger. But the line I am going to follow is, as you will soon discover, so extremely simple, that perhaps it may be followed without failure even by one who for a more ambitious line of discussion would be quite incompetent. Some of you may possibly remember a phrase of mine which has been the object of a good deal of comment ; an observation to the effect that in our culture, the aim being to know ourselves and the world, we have, as the means to this end, to know the best which has been thought and said in the world. A man of science, who is also an excellent writer and the very prince of debaters, Professor Huxley, in a discourse at the opening of Sir Josiah Mason's college at Birmingham, laying hold of this phrase, expanded it by quoting some more words of mine, which are these : " The civilised world is to be regarded as now being, for intellectual and spiritual purposes, one great confederation, bound to a joint action and working to a common result ; and whose members have for their proper outfit a knowledge of Greek, Roman, and Eastern antiquity, and of one another. Special local and temporary advan- tages being put out of account, that modern nation will in the intellectual and spiritual sphere make most progress which most thoroughly carries out this programme." Now on my phrase, thus enlarged, Professor THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 259 Huxley remarks that when I speak of the above- mentioned knowledge as enabling us to know our- selves and the world, I assert literature to contain the materials which suffice for thus making us know ourselves and the world. But it is not by any means clear, says he, that after having learnt all which ancient and modern literatures have to tell us, we have laid a sufficiently broad and deep foundation for that criticism of life, that knowledge of ourselves and the world, which constitutes culture. On the contrary, Professor Huxley declares that he finds himself " wholly unable to admit that either nations or individuals will really advance, if their outfit draws nothing from the stores of physical science. An army without weapons of precision, and with no particular base of operations, might more hopefully enter upon a campaign on the Rhine, than a man devoid of a knowledge of what physical science has done in the last century, upon a criticism of life." This shows how needful it is for those who are to discuss any matter together, to have a common understanding as to the sense of the terms they employ how needful, and how difficult. What Professor Huxley says, implies just the reproach which is so often brought against the study of belles lettres, as they are called ; that the study is an elegant one, but slight and ineffectual ; a smattering of Greek and Latin and other ornamental things, of little use for any one whose object is to get at truth, and to be a practical man. So, too, M. Renan talks of the " superficial humanism " of a school- course which treats us as if we were all going to be 260 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION poets, writers, preachers, orators, and he opposes this humanism to positive science, or the critical search after truth. And there is always a tendency in those who are remonstrating against the pre- dominance of letters in education, to understand by letters belles lettres, and by belles lettres a superficial humanism, the opposite of science or true know- ledge. But when we talk of knowing Greek and Roman antiquity, for instance, which is the knowledge people have called the humanities, I for my part mean a knowledge which is something more than a superficial humanity, mainly decorative. " I call all teaching scientific," says Wolf, the critic of Homer, " which is systematically laid out and followed up to its original sources. For example : a knowledge of classical antiquity is scientific when the remains of classical antiquity are correctly studied in the original languages." There can be no doubt that Wolf is perfectly right ; that all learning is scientific which is systematically laid out and followed up to its original sources, and that a genuine humanism is scientific. When I speak of knowing Greek and Roman antiquity, therefore, as a help to knowing ourselves and the world, I mean more than a knowledge of so much vocabulary, so much grammar, so many portions of authors in the Greek and Latin languages. I mean knowing the Greeks and Romans, and their life and genius, and what they were and did in the world ; what we get from them, and what is its value. That, at least, is the ideal ; and when we THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 261 talk of endeavouring to know Greek and Roman antiquity, as a help to knowing ourselves and the world, we mean endeavouring so to know them as to satisfy this ideal, however much we may still fall short of it. The same also as to knowing our own and other modern nations, with the like aim of getting to understand ourselves and the world. To know the best that has been thought and said by the modern nations, is to know, says Professor Huxley, " only \ what modern literatures have to tell us ; it is the j criticism of life contained in modern literature." And yet, " the distinctive character of our times," he urges, " lies in the vast and constantly increasing part which is played by natural knowledge." And how, therefore, can a man, devoid of knowledge of what physical science has done in the last century, enter hopefully upon a criticism of modern life ? Let us, I say, be agreed about the meaning of the terms we are using. I talk of knowing the best which has been thought and uttered in the world ; Professor Huxley says this means knowing literature. Literature is a large word ; it may mean everything written with letters or printed in a book. Euclid's Elements and Newton's Principia are thus literature. All knowledge that reaches us through books is literature. But by literature Professor Huxley means belles lettres. He means to make me say, that knowing the best which has been thought and said by the modern nations is knowing their belles lettres and no more. And this is no sufficient equipment, he argues, for a criticism of modern life. 262 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION But as I do not mean, by knowing ancient Rome, knowing merely more or less of Latin belles lettres, and taking no account of Rome's military and political, and legal, and administrative work in the world ; and as, by knowing ancient Greece, I under- stand knowing her as the giver of Greek art, and the guide to a free and right use of reason and to scientific method, and the founder of our mathematics and physics and astronomy and biology I understand knowing her as all this, and not merely knowing certain Greek poems, and histories, and treatises, and speeches so as to the knowledge of modern nations also. By knowing modern nations, I mean not merely knowing their belles lettres , but knowing also what has been done by such men as Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, Darwin. " Discourses in America," pp. 76-92. Science Teaching and Human Nature MORE than this, however, is demanded by the reformers. It is proposed to make the training in natural science the main part of education, for the great majority of mankind at any rate. And here, I confess, I part company with the friends of physical science, with whom up to this point I have been agreeing. In differing from them, however, I wish to proceed with the utmost caution and diffi- dence. The smallness of my own acquaintance with the disciplines of natural science is ever before my mind, and I am fearful of doing these disciplines an injustice. The ability and pugnacity of the THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 263 partisans of natural science makes them formidable persons to contradict. The tone of tentative enquiry, which befits a being of dim faculties and bounded knowledge, is the tone I would wish to take and not to depart from. At present it seems to me, that those who are for giving to natural knowledge, as they call it, the chief place in the education of the majority of mankind, leave one important thing out of their account ; the constitu- tion of human nature. But I put this forward on the strength of some facts not at all recondite, very far from it ; facts capable of being stated in the simplest possible fashion, and to which, if I so state them, the man of science, will, I am sure, be willing to allow their due weight. Deny the facts altogether, I think, he hardly can. He can hardly deny, that when we set ourselves to enumerate the powers which go to the building up of human life, and say that they are the power of conduct, the power of intellect and knowledge, the power of beauty, and the power of social life and manners he can hardly deny that this scheme, though drawn in rough and plain lines enough, and not pretending to scientific exactness, does yet give a fairly true representation of the matter. Human nature is built up by these powers ; we have the need for them all. When we have rightly met and adjusted the claims of them all, we shall then be in a fair way for getting soberness and righteousness, with wisdom. This is evident enough, and the friends of physical science would admit it. " Discourses in America," pp. 99-102. 264 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Mediaeval Universities The great mediaeval Universities were not brought into being, we may be sure, by the zeal for giving a jejune and contemptible education. Kings have been their nursing fathers, and queens have been their nursing mothers, but not for this. The mediaeval Universities came into being, because the supposed knowledge, delivered by Scripture and the Church, so deeply engaged men's hearts, by so simply, easily, and powerfully relating itself to their desire for conduct, their desire for beauty. All other knowledge was dominated by this supposed knowledge, and was subordinated to it, because of the surpassing strength of the hold which it gained upon the affections of men, by allying itself pro- foundly with their sense for conduct, their sense for beauty. " Discourses in America," pp. 115-116. The Middle Ages, Science and Letters THE Middle Ages could do without humane letters, as it could do without the study of nature, because its supposed knowledge was made to engage its emotions so powerfully. Grant that the supposed knowledge disappears, its power of being made to engage the emotions will of course disappear along with it but the emotions themselves, and their claim to be engaged and satisfied, will remain. Now if we find by experience that humane letters have an undeniable power of engaging the emotions, the importance of humane letters in a man's training THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 265 becomes not less, but greater, in proportion to the success of modern science in extirpating what it calls " mediaeval thinking." " Discourses in America," pp. 117-118. The Final Need of Letters in Education AND the more that men's minds are cleared, the more that the results of science are frankly accepted, the more that poetry and eloquence come to be received and studied as what in truth they really are, the criticism of life by gifted men, alive and active with extraordinary power at an unusual number of points; so much the more will the value of humane letters, and of art also, which is an utterance having a like kind of power with theirs, be felt and acknowledged, and their place in education be secured. Let us therefore, all of us, avoid indeed as much as possible any invidious comparison between the merits of humane letters, as means of education, and the merits of the natural sciences. But when some President of a section for Mechanical Science insists on making the comparison, and tells us that " he who in his training has substituted literature and history for natural science has chosen the less useful alternative," let us make answer to him that the student of humane letters only, will, at least, know also the great general conceptions brought in by modern physical science ; for science, as Pro- fessor Huxley says, forces them upon us all. But the student of natural sciences only will, by our very hypothesis, know nothing of humane letters ; not 266 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION to mention that in setting himself to be perpetually accumulating natural knowledge, he sets himself to do what only specialists have in general the gift for doing genially. And so he will probably be unsatisfied, or at any rate incomplete, and even more incomplete than the student of humane letters only. " Discourses in America," pp. 124-126. The Study of Greek EVEN if literature is to retain a large place in our education, yet Latin and Greek, say the friends of progress, will certainly have to go. Greek is the grand offender in the eyes of these gentlemen. The attackers of the established course of study think that against Greek, at any rate, they have irresistible arguments. Literature may perhaps be needed in education, they say ; but why on earth should it be Greek literature ? Why not French or German ? Nay, " has not an Englishman models in his own literature of every kind of excellence ? " As before, it is not on any weak pleadings of my own that I rely for convincing the gainsayers, it is on the constitution of human nature itself, and on the instinct of self-preservation in humanity. The instinct for beauty is set in human nature, as surely as the instinct for knowledge is set there, or the instinct for conduct. If the instinct for beauty is served by Greek literature and art as it is served by no other literature and art, we may trust to the instinct of self-preservation in humanity for keeping Greek as part of our culture. We may THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 267 trust to it for even making the study of Greek more prevalent than it is now. Greek will come, I hope, some day to be studied more rationally than at present ; but it will be increasingly studied as men increasingly feel the need in them for beauty, and how powerfully Greek art and Greek literature can serve this need. Women will again study Greek, as Lady Jane Grey did ; I believe that in that chain of forts, with which the fair host of the Amazons are now engirdling our English universities, I find that here in America, in colleges like Smith College in Massachusetts, and Vassar College in the State of New York, and in the happy families of the mixed universities out West, they are studying it already. " Discourses in America," pp. 130-132. The Necessity for Literature As with Greek, so with letters generally ; they will some day come, we may hope, to be studied more rationally, but they will not lose their place. What will happen will rather be that there will be crowded into education other matters besides, far too many ; there will be, perhaps, a period of unsettlement and confusion and false tendency ; but letters will not in the end lose their leading place. If they lose it for a time, they will get it back again. We shall be brought back to them by our wants and aspira- tions. And a poor humanist may possess his soul in patience, neither strive nor cry, admit the energy and brilliancy of the partisans of physical science, m\ re *\ 268 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION and their present favour with the public, to be far greater than his own, and still have a happy faith that the nature of things works silently on behalf of the studies which he loves, and that, while we shall all have to acquaint ourselves with the great results reached by modern science, and to give ourselves as much training in its disciplines as we can conveniently carry, yet the majority of men will always require humane letters ; and so much the more, as they have the more and the greater results of science to relate to the need in man for conduct, and to the need in him for beauty. " Discourses in America," pp. 136-137. Free Education in Saxony DR. BORNEMANN was of opinion that the general establishment of gratuitous popular instruction in Germany, though everywhere a good deal discussed at the present moment, will not actually come. If it does come, he said, it will lead to a great develop- ment of private schools. Poor children cannot learn so much as the better off, who have more means for preparation at home ; the schools will drop to the level of the poorer children, and the better off will go to private elementary schools. " Special Report on Elementary Education in Germany, Switzerland and France, 1886," p. 6. Quality of Education ALONG with the fuller programme and longer course of German schools I found, also, a higher state of instruction than in ours. I speak of what I saw and THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 269 heard and of the impression which it made upon me after seeing English schools for more than thirty years. The methods of teaching in foreign schools are more gradual, more natural, more rational, than in ours ; and in speaking here of foreign schools I include Swiss and French schools as well as German. I often asked myself why, with such large classes, the order was in general so thoroughly good, and why with such long hours, the children had in general so little look of exhaustion or fatigue ; and the answer I could not help making to myself was, that the cause lay in the children being taught less mechanically and more naturally than with us, and being more interested. In the teaching of arithmetic, geometry, and natural science I was particularly struck with the patience, the clinging to oral question and answer, the avoidance of over- hurry, the being content to advance slowly, the securing of the ground. This struck me the more because in these matters, in which I am not naturally quick, I always had, as a learner, the sense of being over-hurried myself by my teachers, and in the foreign schools I constantly felt that if I had been taught these matters in the way in which I heard them taught there I could have made progress. I am told that young men studying for Woolwich, who go to Germany to learn the German language, are at first struck in the schools there with the mathematics being much less advanced than at home ; but presently they find that the slower rate of advance is more than compensated by the thoroughness of the teaching and the hold gained 270 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION upon the matter of study. I speak with hesitation, however, on these matters, and often I wished for some of my more competent colleagues to be with me that I might have pointed out to them what struck me, and have asked them if they could help owning that it was so. At any rate the impression strongly made upon me was as I have described. " Special Report on Elementary Education in Germany, Switzerland and France, 1886," pp. 13-14. Careful Grounding THE same thing in teaching the elements of writing and reading, and in training children to answer questions put to them ; the same patience, the same care to make the child sure of his ground. A child asked a question is apt to answer by a single word, or a word or two, and the questioner is apt to fill out the answer in his own mind and to accept it. But in Germany it is a regular exercise for children to be made to give their answers complete, and the discipline in accuracy and collectedness which is thus obtained is very valuable. " Special Report on Elementary Education in Germany, Switzerland and France, 1886," p. 14. The Humanising Touch BUT the higher one rises in a German school the more is the superiority of the instruction over ours visible. Again and again I find written in my notes, The children human. They had been brought under THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 271 teaching of a quality to touch and interest them, and were being formed by it. The fault of the teaching in our popular schools at home is, as I have often said, that it is so little formative ; it gives the children the power to read the newspapers, to write a letter, to cast accounts, and gives them a certain number of pieces of knowledge, but it does little to touch their nature for good and to mould them. You hear often people of the richer class in England wishing that they and their children were as well educated as the children of an elementary school ; they mean that they wish they wrote as good a hand, worked sums as rapidly and correctly, and had as many facts of geography at command ; but they suppose themselves retaining all the while the fuller cultivation of taste and feeling which is their advantage and their children's advantage over the pupils of the elementary school at present, and they forget that it is within the power of the popular school, and should be its aim, to do much for this cultivation, although our schools accomplish for it so very little. The excellent maxim of that true friend of education, the German schoolmaster, John Comenius, " The aim is to train generally all who are born to all which is human," does in some considerable degree govern the proceedings of popular schools in German countries, and now in France also, but in England hardly at all. " Special Report on Elementary Education in Germany, Switzerland and France, 1886," p. 14. 272 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION Religious Teaching in Germany No one will deny that religion can touch the sources of thought, feeling, and life, and I had not been prepared for the seriousness with which the religious instruction is given in Germany, even in Protestant Germany, and for the effect which it produces. Little or nothing was said in Lutheran schools, about the church and its authority, about the clergy and their attributes, but I was surprised to find with what energy and seriousness points raised by the catechism for example, the question in what sense it can be said that God tempts men were handled, and of the intelligence and interest with which the children followed what was said and answered the questions put to them. The chief effect of the religious teaching, however, certainly lies in the Bible passages, and still more in the evangelical hymns, which are so abundantly learnt by heart and repeated by the children. No one could watch the faces of the children, of the girls particularly, without feeling that something in their nature responded to what they were repeating, and was moved by it. It is said that two thirds of the working classes in the best educated countries of Protestant Germany are detached from the received religion, and the inference is drawn that the religious teaching in the schools must be a vain formality. But may it not happen that chords are awakened by the Bible and hymns in German schools which remain a possession even though the course of later THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 273 life may carry the German adult far away from Lutheran dogma ? " Special Report on Elementary Education in Germany, Switzerland and France, 1886," p. 14. Organisation the Secret of Superiority THE instruction is better in the foreign popular schools than in ours, because the teachers are better trained, and of the training of teachers I shall have to speak presently. This is the main reason of the superiority, that the teachers are better trained. But that they are better trained comes from a cause which acts for good upon the whole of education abroad, that the instruction as a whole is better organised than with us. Indeed, with us it is not, and cannot at present be organised as a whole at all, for the public administration, which deals with the popular schools, stops at those schools, and takes into its view no others. But there is an article in the constitution of Canton Zurich which well expresses the idea which prevails everywhere abroad of the organisation of instruction from top to bottom as one whole : Die hohern Lehranstalten sollen mit der Volkschule in organische Verbindung gebracht werden ; the higher establishments for teaching shall be brought into organic connexion with the popular school. And men like Wilhelm von Humboldt in Germany and Guizot or Cousin in France have been at the head of the public administration of schools in those countries, and have organised popular instruction as a part of one T 274 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION great system, a part in correspondence of some kind with the higher parts, and to be organised with the same seriousness, the same thorough knowledge and large views of education, the same single eye to its requirements, as the higher parts. " Special Report on Elementary Education in Germany, Switzerland, and France, 1886," p. 15. Lack of Co-ordination WE may imagine the like in England if we suppose a man like Sir James Mackintosh at the head of the Education Department having to administer the public school system for intermediate and higher education as well as the popular schools, in continual intercourse with the representatives of that system as well as with representatives of the popular schools, and treating questions respecting popular instruction with a mind apt for all educational questions and conversant with them, aided, moreover, by the intercourse just spoken of. Evidently questions respecting codes and programmes would then present themselves under conditions very different from the present conditions. The popular school in our country is at present considered by the minister in charge of it not at all as one stage to be co-ordered with the other stages in a great system of public schools, and to have its course surveyed and fixed from the point of view of a knower and lover of education. Not at all ; the popular school is necessarily, for him, not so much an educational problem as a social and political one ; as a school dealing with a few elementary matters, simple THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 275 enough, and the great thing is to make the House of Commons and the public mind satisfied that value is received for the public money spent on teaching these matters. Hence the Code which governs the instruction in our popular schools. And I have always felt that objections made in the pure interest of good instruction and education to the Code had this disadvantage, that they came before a man, often very able, but who, from his circumstances, would not and could not consider them from the point of a disinterested knower and friend of education at all, but from a point of view quite different. ''Special Report on Elementary Education in Germany; Switzerland, and France, 1886," p. 15. Co-ordination of Primary and Secondary Education IN this report I have not space for showing the many ways in which abroad the higher education of the country is in continual correspondence with the popular education, helping and strengthening the work of the training colleges, advising the Minister by commissions of experts on educational questions requiring study, and so forth. But it will be at once evident how directly schools like the hohere Volks- Schulen of Saxony, the Secundar-Schulen of Zurich, the Ecole Turgot at Paris, under one public adminis- tration with the ordinary popular schools, and receiving boys from them to be prepared for com- mercial and industrial pursuits, and to continue up to the age of sixteen or seventeen the education 276 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION commenced in the popular school, it will be at once evident, I say, how this continuation and corre- spondence must naturally affect the programme of the popular school. That programme cannot be treated as something isolated and quite simple, having merely to satisfy, not those who look well into the matter, but the so-called practical man and the public mind. " Special Report on Elementary Education in Germany, Switzerland and France, 1886," p. 16. Status, Training, and Pensioning of Teachers THE training school course there lasts six years. But a youth enters at the age of about fourteen, with the attainments required for passing an examination for the Entlassungs-Zeugniss,oT certificate of discharge from a mittlere Volksschule, or popular school of the second grade, a school which in Saxony must be organised in at least four classes, with a two years' course for each. In the training school, instruction and lodging are free ; a small sum is paid for board, but a certain number of free boarders, " gifted poor children," are admitted. In the Friedrichstadt training school at Dresden, which I visited, there were more day students than boarders, only 88 out of 216 being boarders. But this is not the usual proportion ; students, however, are permitted to live at home or with families chosen by their parents, and there being much pressure for admission to the Friedrichstadt school, many, for whom there is not room as boarders, attend as day students rather THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 277 than not attend at all. The training school at Dresden for schoolmistresses takes no boarders ; all the students live at home or in private families. To the training school is attached a practising school, organised as a mittlere Schule, a middle school with four classes and 155 scholars. In this school the students see and learn the practice of teaching. Their own instruction they receive in small classes which may not have more than 25 scholars. Their hours in class may not exceed 36 a week, not counting the time given to music. The matters of instruction are religion (the Friedrichstadt school is Protestant) , German language and literature, Latin, geography, history, natural science both descriptive and theo- retical, arithmetic, geometry, pedagogy, including psychology and logic, music, writing, drawing, and gymnastics. All of these matters are obligatory, but after the first year students of proved incapacity for music are no longer taught it. At the end of the course, when the student is about twenty years old, he undergoes the Schulamts- kandidaten-Pru/ung or examination for office. The examination is both oral and in writing, and turns upon the work of the student's course in the training school. The examining commission is composed of the Minister's commissary, a church commissary, and the whole staff of the training college. The staff conduct the examination, the Minister's com- missary presides and superintends. If the student passes he receives his Reifezeugniss, or certificate of ripeness, and is now qualified to serve as assistant in a public popular school, or as 278 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION a private teacher where his work has not to go beyond the limits of popular school instruction. After two years of service as assistant, at the age of about twenty-two, the young teacher returns to the training school and presents himself for the Wahlfdhigkeits-Prufung or examination for definitive posting. For this examination the commission is composed of the Minister's commissary, a church commissary, the director of the seminar, and either two of its upper teachers, or else other approved schoolmen named by the Minister. This examina- tion again is both written and oral. I attended the oral part on two days at the Friedrichstadt training school, and heard and saw candidates examined in religion, music, German language, and literature, the history of education, pedagogy, psychology, logic and school law. The Minister's commissary was the Inspector for Dresden, Mr. Eichenberg ; he took an active part in the examination. The church commissary listened in silence, but his signature is required for the certificate. Of a batch, of ten students whom I heard examined together in the history of education I observed that seven wore spectacles. But in general the students gave me the impression of being better and more fully educated than ours, under a better planned system, and by better trained instructors. The school synod at Hamburg unites all the teachers of the city, and something of this union of the lower members of the teaching profession with the higher exists throughout Germany and is of great value. I found that Mr. Griillich, the inspector for the country THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 279 district round Dresden, a very accomplished and able man, held periodical conferences with the teachers of his district. The conferences were not fewer than six in the year, lasted a whole afternoon, and turned on matters settled by programme beforehand, matters of interest to those engaged in education. The Lehrziel, or aim to guide the teaching of the students' several subjects, which is given in the Saxon Seminar or dnung, or regulation for ordering of training schools, is in itself an instructor's manual full of counsel and suggestive- ness. The training school course for Saxon school- mistresses resembles in general that for school- masters, but it lasts for five years only instead of six. The obligatory matters are the same as for students of the other sex, except that French is substituted for Latin, and needlework is added. English and instrumental music are optional subjects. The rules for examination and certificate-granting are similar. Training schools for schoolmistresses are, how- ever, much less numerous in Germany than those for schoolmasters, because in German countries women are much less used in teaching than men. In Prussia, for instance, there are 115 training schools for schoolmasters, but only ten for school- mistresses. In Saxony there are sixteen for school- masters, one of the sixteen being for Catholics ; there are only two for schoolmistresses. It is held to be beyond question that certain matters of instruction in the upper classes of the popular 280 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION school women cannot teach satisfactorily. In general a woman may in boys' or mixed schools teach only the lower classes. The Hamburg school law directs that in the popular schools for girls in that city the head teacher and one other teacher at least shall always be men. At Zurich I found a very capable and pleasing schoolmistress, who had been employed at Versailles by the French Education Department (what a lesson for our Department !) during the year of the last Paris Exhibition, to conduct a primary school and show French teachers practically what the methods of a good Swiss school were. At Zurich she was teaching a lower class, and com- plained much that she could not rise higher. The French Education Department would gladly have retained her in France, and if it had not been for home duties she would gladly, she said, have stayed ; the career for a schoolmistress was so much better there. '' Special Report on Elementary Education in Germany, Switzerland and France, 1886," pp. 16-17. French Training Schools THE French training schools require separate notice. Not that the forms of the system established by the Training School Law of 1879, when M. Jules Ferry was Minister of Instruction, and organised by the decree of 1881, differ very greatly from those in Germany. Boarding is more generally the rule, and board, lodging, and instruction are all of them gratuitous ; but the age of admission is fifteen, though candidates are received up to eighteen. The THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 281 candidate must have the certificat d' etudes primaires, or certificate that he has passed the leaving examina- tion of the primary school, and he must engage himself to serve for ten years as a functionary of public instruction. His time passed in the training school, however, after the age of eighteen has been reached by him, counts towards the fulfilment of this engagement. The training school course lasts three years ; at the end of the first year the student has to pass his examination for the " elementary brevet of capacity," or certificate as we call it ; at the end of the third year that for the " superior brevet." The examination turns upon the obligatory matters of the training school course, which are moral and civic instruction, reading, writing, the French language and elements of French literature, history and geography, those of France in particular, and so on ; a programme less strong than that of a German training school, but taking the same line of subjects, except as to religion. One or more modern languages may be taken, but this is optional. To each training school a practising school is attached as in Germany. '' Special Report on Elementary Education in Germany, Switzerland and France, 1886," p. 18. General Reflections from Abroad I WAS sent to make inquiries, and I have tried to give, as succinctly as I could, the result of them. That I should add recommendations was not in my commission, but I may be allowed, perhaps, to put 282 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION forward one or two remarks which are very present to my mind in consequence of what I have seen. In the first place, the retention of school fees is not a very important matter. Simply from the point of view of a friend of education there are advantages in their retention, and advantages in their abolition, and the balance of advantage is decidedly, in my opinion, on the side of retention. But we must remember, on the other hand, that there are some questions which it is peculiarly undesirable to make matters of continued public discussion ; questions peculiarly lending themselves to the mischievous declamation and arts of demagogues, and that this question of gratuitous popular schooling is one of them. How often, if the question becomes a political one, will declaimers be repeating that the popular school ought to be made free because the wealthier classes have robbed the poor of endow- ments intended to educate them. The assertion is not true, indeed ; what we call " popular educa- tion is a quite modern conception ; what the pious founder in general designed formerly was to catch all promising subjects and to make priests of them. But how surely will popular audiences believe that the popular school has been robbed, and how bad for them to believe it, how will the confusion of our time be yet further thickened by their believing it ! I am inclined to think therefore that sooner than let free popular schooling become a burning political question in a country like ours, a wise statesman would do well to adopt and organise it. Only it will be impossible to organise it with THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION 283 the State limiting its concern, as it does now, to the popular school only ; and this can be so palpably shown to be a matter of common justice that one need not despair of bringing even the popular judgment to recognise it. Secondly, there is a danger, perhaps, lest when we have got very elaborate and complete returns, and these returns show a very satisfactory proportion between scholars in daily attendance and scholars on the books, a very satisfactory limit to the number of scholars allowed to each teacher, and a very satisfactory percentage of passes in the established matters of instruction, we should think that therefore we must be doing well with our popular schools, and that we have no cause to envy the popular schools abroad, and nothing to learn from them. On the contrary, the things on which we pride ourselves are mere machinery ; and what we should do well to lay to heart is that foreign schools with larger classes, longer holidays, and a school-day often cut in two as we have seen, nevertheless, on the whole, give, from the better training of their teachers, and the better planning of their school course, a superior popular instruction to ours. And this brings me thirdly and finally to the point raised at the end of my first remark, and urged by me so often and so vainly ever since my mission abroad in 1859 ; our need to organise our secondary instruction. This is desirable in the interest of our secondary and higher instruction, of course, principally j but it is desirable, I may say it is indispensable, in the interest of our popular 284 THOUGHTS ON EDUCATION instruction also. Every one now admits that popular instruction is a matter for public institution and supervision ; but so long as public institution and supervision stop there, and no contact and correlation are established between our popular instruction and the instruction above it, so long the condition of our popular instruction itself will and must be unsatisfactory. " Special Report on Elementary Education in Germany, Switzerland and France, 1886," pp. 24-25. INDEX * ACADEMY, lack of an English, Aim of instruction, 177, 242, 243 Alterthumswissenschaft. See ANCIENT AUTHORS. ^America, national character of, 13 tendency of democracy in, 44 ( Ancient authors (Alterthums- wissenschaft) as literature, 169, 185 ; 178, 183 i Aristocracy , influence of, 13, 43 ' Aristocratic ideal, educative effect of, 1 08 Arminius, 112-119 ...- Asiles ouvroirs, 34 : Austria and examinations, 175 BACON, 82. -Balladists, 86 Basedow, 160 -Bentley on Pope's translations, - Bible, humanizing influence of, as literature, 14 and Homer, 75 of the Athenians, 80 " A Bible reading for | Schools," 205, 206 the only classic for the I people, 212 hindrances to reading in j schools, 213 -Bilingual question, 121 ; cf. 4. "9 1 Books. See SCHOOL-BOOKS. Bright, John, 13, 125 Brodstudien, 175 Buff on, 77 Burke, definition of law, 104 Butler, Bishop, Sermon on Edu- cation, 242 CALDERON, 73 Cambridge compared to higher lycee, 141, 195, 197 Gary, 73 Certificates, 37 Chapman and Homer, 62, 63 complexity of thought, 64, 65.67 Character and culture, 20, 95, 245 English, 199, 236 Christian Brothers, schools of, 23 Clanricarde, Lord, 115 Claptrap and Catchwords, 224 Class division and State Autho- rity, in Classes, size of, 37 Classical poetry, relation to modern, 210 Classics, growing disbelief in, 148 ; reform of, 160 ; as literature, 169, 185 value of training in, 172, 208 conflict with modern studies, 177, 181 power of, 183, 240 ; Greek 266 286 INDEX Code, the, how shaped, 275 Napoleon, rational form of, 38 Co-education, 5, 32 College of France, 133 Comenius, 160, 271 Commercial theory of educa- tion, 185 Compulsory. See under EDU- CATION. Condorcet, plan of secondary education, 135 Confectioner and doctor in education, 224 Continent, experience of the, 152 contrasts, 158 obstacles to profiting by, 158 general reflections from, 281 Controversy, evils of literary, 76 Convention, schools founded by the, 24 Co-ordination, 274, 275 Corneille, 73 Council of public instruction, ^S, 157 I tf. 161, 192 Cousin, 47, 143, 273 Cowper, 66, 73 Cramming, and the creative spirit, 239 Critic, first duty of the, 84 Criticism needed against Eng- lish eccentricity, 70 use of ignorance in, 79 positive result in, 81 Culture, lack of, in pupil teachers, 5 and reading-books, 14 and character united at Athens, 20, 245 and teachers, 93 Prussian belief in, 167 needed for all, 216 defined, 258 sq. Cuvier, 47, 50 DANTE, 66, 68 73 D'Argenson, Degrees, 197 Democracy organized by France, 17 lacks ideals, 18 Denominational education, 152, 167 Dilettanteism, 78 Discipline, 3 in French and English schools, 147 ECCENTRICITY and Criticism, 70 Education, governing aim of, 242, 243 commercial theory of, 185 compulsory, alone is uni- versal, 7, 119, 153 would it succeed, 122 abroad, 152 and in England, 152 denominational, 152 expenditure on, in France and England, 32 free, 26, 236, 268, 282 higher, 102, 155. See MIDDLE CLASS. a learned and a liberal, 93 middle-class and the State, 103 proportion in, i quality of, 268 secondary, in England and France, 27 need of organizing, 3 1 summed up, 187 273-5, 283 secular, 152 the spread of, as dislocating society, 42 State interference in, 16, 102, 105 superiority in, due to organi- sation, 273, 274, 275 Education Council, 138, 157 functions of, 192 Minister, 138, 145 need of, 165 Educational results of the French Revolution, 24 ; cf> 135 INDEX 287 Efficiency, need of securities for, 97, 192 by training, 199 Endowed schools, inspection of, 194 Endowments, 102 England, lack of great ideas in, 13 English in Welsh schools, 4 more to be studied by pupil teachers, 6 poor anthologies of, 15 the Latin element in, 55 belief in machinery and disbelief in government, 157, 153 contrast with Prussia, 167 character, 199, 236 Epic poetry, best metres for, 7i Eton, reform of, 94 and France, 97 type of life at, 101 and Lycurgus House, 116 Eutrapelia, 244 Examinations, why severe for teachers, 10 for Dutch teachers, 48 delusive, 99 in France and England, 144 appointment by, 150, 199 German and French leaving examinations 163, 196 and Brodstudien, 175 and Austria, 175 FALSISMS, 221, 222 Foreign languages, 186 France, character of the masses in, 17 causes of the power of, 1 7 administrative divisions in, 22 free education in, 26, 236 primary schools in, 26 secondary education of, com- pared with England, 27, 127 effect of public education in, 29 France, educational expendi- ture in 1856. .32 schoolless children in, 33 liberal spirit of legislation, 40 and the State, 112 M. Arnold's love of, 254 Free education in France, 26, 236 in Saxony, 268, 282 French and English literature! 94 French Revolution, educationa results of, 24 ; cf. 135 GAMES in English and German schools, 171 General reflections from abroad , 281 Geography, 231 Germany and refinement, 108 Prussian school law, 161 games and gymnastics in, 171 University system in, 1 76 quality of education, 268 careful grounding, 270 religious teaching in, 272 Goethe, 73, 78, 109, 217, 244 Goldsmith, 210 Government, over-and under-, 22 English disbelief in, 157 Grammar teaching, no as class subject, 228 Grand style, 65, 67, 68, 73, 83, 84 Greek, 93, 148. See also CLASSICS. spirit, 178, 183 study of, 266 Grounding, careful, 270 Guizot, 24, 39, 40 law of primary instruction, 137, 227, 273 Gymnastics, 171 HAUPT, 109 Hawtrey, 100 Hexameter, the English, 74 288 INDEX History, school of, 227 Holland, primary schools in, 45 organized school inspection in, 46 position of teachers in, 47 teachers' examinations in, 47 pupil teachers in, 48 religious instructions in, 49 normal school at Haarlem, 50 schools of Utrecht and Leyden, 51 Homer, how to approach, 55 genius of, 76 the four qualities of his poetry, 56, 63 works in the grand style, 66, 68 unlikeness to Milton, 57 not rendered by Pope, 59, 60, 61 and Scott, 69 and Voltaire, 65, 87 and the Elizabethans, 64 and the Bible, 75, 80 Homeric unity, 67 Human nature and science teaching, 262 Humanizing influence of Bible, 14 touch in German schools, 270 Humanists, 178, 188 Humboldt, motto from, 151 ; 195, 227, 273 Huxley, Professor, 258 et seq. IDEALS, lacking in democracy, 18 value of, to a nation, 43, 108 Ignorance, saving grace of, 79 Inspection of private schools, of public schools, 98, 100 organized in Holland, 46 of endowed schools, 194 German method, 194 Inspectors, duty of, 7 as civil servants, 38 Instruction, true aim of, 177 Intellectual life, national in- fluence of, 107, 251 Ireland, university education in, 220, 252 JESUITS, schools of the, 134 Johnson, tailor and president 109 LACORDAIRE on character, 95 Latin, element of, in English, 55, 146. See also CLASSICS. power of, 183 verse, 183, 184 in elementary schools, 203 Law and rational language, 38 Burke's definition of, 104 educational in England and Germany, 217, 161 Letters, science, and the Middle Ages, 264 final need of, in education, 265 of school children quoted, 125 Leyden, 51 Liberal education, 93 Light as a moral cause, 250 Literary controversy, 76 opinion, English, 77 Literature, not belles lettres, 259 necessity for, 267 need to be apprehended as a whole, 210 civilizing power of, 215 need of, in popular schools, 205, 210 and science, 229, 255 French and English, 94 Lowe, 89 Lumpington, Lord, 116 Lycees, 25, 135 Oxford and Cambridge com- pared to, 141, 195, 197 and examinations, 144 uniformity in, 226 Lycurgus House, 116 INDEX MACAULAY, 87 Machinery, English belief in, 157 Managers, school, 238 Masterpieces, formative in- fluence of, 244 Masters, French and English, 142 Mathematical teaching in Ger- man schools, 269 Mediaeval Universities, 264 Metres for Epic poetry, 71, 73 Middle Ages, science and letters, 264 Middle-class children, lower, and discipline, 3 lack of public schools for, 19, 100, 112 relation to upper class, 29 and working class, 31, 106, 2 33 type of school life for, 101 and higher education, 102, 155 education and the State, 103 in Germany, 108 on the second, not the first, plane in England, 189 Milton, unlikeness to Homer, 57. 69. 73, 88 Mind, things of the, as a political force, 251 Ministry of public instruction, 138, 146 need of, 165 Mixed schools in France and Holland, 32; cf. CO-EDUCA- TION Modern language teachers, 165 Montaigne, 80 Montalembert on English public schools, 12 NAPOLEON, organization of Church and State, 13 as educator, 25, 135. See also CODE. National character, American, J 3 French, 17 National influence of the in- tellectual life, 107 National need of a serious con- ception of righteousness, 201 Natur-Kunde, 230 Needlework schools, 34 Newman, 67, 79, 87, 88 Normal school at Haarlem, 50 in France, 139 OBEDIENCE and right action, 200 Organization the secret of superiority, 273 Over-government, 22 Oxford, apostrophe to, 109 and Paris, 130 compared to higher lycJe, 141, 195, 197 I PAKINGTON, Sir John, 39 j Parents and religious educa- tion, 40 Paris, University of, 128 and Oxford, 130 range of studies in, 131, 134 Payment by results, 121 of schoolmasters, Prussian, 167 Pedagogic, 164 People, need of letters in schools for the, 205, 210 Philistines, three classes of, 113 Poetical monument, the most important, 42 Poetry, classical and modern, 210 English, for schools, 210, 226 formative power of, 232 influence of, 234, 241, 244 Poets, distinctive character of, 86 Political force of the things of the mind, 251 Pope and Homer, 55, 59, 60, 67. 85 a warning to translators, 61 290 INDEX Pope contrasted with Chap- man, 62 criticizes Chapman, 65 Priesthood, influence of, 13, 43 i Primary schools not co-ordi- nated with secondary, 274, 275 in France, 26 Guizot's law, 137 Prinsen, 50 Privatdocent, the, 173 Private schools, inspection of, in France, 35 the old, 124 in France and England, 146, 192 teaching, function of, 2 Professors, State appointment ! of, 198, 223 Prussian school law, 161 leaving examinations, 163 belief in culture, 167 religious instruction, 167 schoolmasters' pay, 169 Public establishment of second- i ary schools, 105 value of, 151 instruction, ministry and council of, 138, 157, cf. 161 schools, English, 12 Talleyrand on, 28 lack of, for the middle class, 19, 97, 100, 112 products, 97 securities offered by, 98, 192 discipline as compared with French, 147 routine in, 182 Pupil teachers, 36 lack of culture in, 5, 15 in Holland, 48 RATIONAL language and the law, 38 Reading, regular, 249 of newspapers, 250 Reading-books and culture, 14, 91, 124 Realists, 180, 188 Realschulen, 160, 167, 172, 177 Reason, the State as organ of the national, 41 Recitation, value of, 51, 91, 202, 225, 232, 241 Reformation and Renascence, influence in education, 159 Regulation of studies, 227 Regulations, Prinsen's view of, 5i Religion, no consensus as to teaching, 2 need of, 221 Religious teaching, 41 and rights of the parent, 40 in Holland, 49 in Prussia, 167 in Germany, 272 Renan, 259 Results, payment by, 121 Revised code, 89 Revolution, French, educa- tional results of, 24, 135 Righteousness, national need of, 201 Rousseau, 160 Routine in public schools, 182 SAINTE BEUVE, 82, 255 Salaries. See PAYMENT; SCHOOLMASTERS; and TEACHERS Saxony, free education in, 268 Schiller, 73, 109 School as a family or as a little world, 101 School-books, choice of, 124, 170 School inspector, duty of, 7 law, Prussian, 161 in England and Germany, 217 Schoolless children, 33 Schoolmaster, the, 9 qualification of, 10 training of, 10 the Dutch, 45, 47 pay of Prussian, 169 Schoolmasters to the nations 13, 43 INDEX 291 Schools. See also PUBLIC ; PRIVATE ; INSPECTION. English, initial defect in, 159 public establishment of secondary, 105 securities for culture in, 97, 98, 105 technical, 156 voluntary, 235 of the Jesuits, 134 of Leyden and Utrecht, 51 of Soreze and Toulouse, 97 of the teaching orders, 23, 27. 33 founded by the Convention, 24 primary, in France, 26 in Holland, 45 for the poor, 26, 31 needlework, 34 Science and letters, 229, 255 and the Middle Ages, 264 by nature teaching, 230 teaching and grammar, no teaching and human nature, 262 Scientific action denned, 219 teaching, 260 Scott, 69, 87 Secondary education. See also under EDUCATION. instruction in England and France, 27 cost of, 96 not governed by law of supply and demand, 98 real needs in, 99 result of organizing, 102 public establishment of, 105 and the intellectual life, 107 origin of our secondary schools, 127 Condorcet's plan of, 135 summed up, 187 Secular instruction, 41 education, 152 Self-government, 114 Shuttleworth, Sir James, 37, 90 Sisters' schools, 33 Society for the Public Good, 46 Specializing, 188 Spenser, 72 State as organ of the national reason, 41 appointment of professors, 198, 223 authority and class divi- sion, in establishment of second- ary schools, 105 interference in education, 16, 29 suspected in England, 159 religion, 223 Stein's Land reform, 114 Studies, regulation of, 227 Superiorities, elimination of, 44 Superiority in education due to organization, 273 Switzerland, tendencies of democracy in, 44 TAINE, 143 j Talleyrand on English public schools, 28 ' Teachers, training of, 10 self culture, 93 training and status of, in Germany, 276 Dutch, 45, 47 examination of, 48 French and English, 142 of modern languages, 165 payment of, Prussian, 167 women, 12 Teaching, uniformity in, 2 function of private, 2 the art of, 165 mechanical, 241 Teaching orders in France, 23, 27. 134 Technical schools, 156 Training a better guarantee than examination, 199 Training schools in German}', 279 in France, 280 INDEX Translation, the only tribunal of, 54 essential, 67 rhymed, 58 verse, 85 Translator, task of, 54 fidelity in, 58 Translators, Pope a warning to, 61 UNDENOMINATIONAL educa- tion, 152 Under-government, 22 Uniformity in French curri- culum, 226 in teaching, 2 Universities, English, 12, 31 contrasted with German and French systems, 176 provincial, foreshadowed, 196 mediaeval, 264 University education in Ire- land, 220 University of France, 136 revenue of, 136 University of Paris, 128, 130, 131. 134 Useful knowledge in schools, 160 Utrecht, 51 VIRGIL, 68 Vivacity, some excuse for, 88 Voltaire, 66 Voluntary schools, 235 WELLINGTON, Duke of, 80 Welsh schools and English language, 4, 119, 121 Wolf, 165, 260 Women teachers in 1855 .. 12 Wordsworth, 209, 235 Working-class and middle-class education, 31, 106, 233 Wright, 73 THE END PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES. 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