i-B 
 1631 
 
 r-NRLF 
 
.EPORT OF DEPUTATION FROM 
 CLASSICAL ASSOCIATION TO 
 HE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD 
 OF EDUCATION 
 
 APRIL 27, 1917 
 
 LONDON 
 >HN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W. 
 
 1917 
 
h 
 
 * 
 
 CS 
 
 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 
 
MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS OF A DEPUTATION FROM 
 THE CLASSICAL ASSOCIATION 
 
 WHICH WAITED UPON THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOAED OF EDUCA- 
 TION (THE RIGHT HON. H. A. L. FISHER, LL.D., F.B.A.) 
 ON FRIDAY, APRIL 27TH, 1917, AT THE OFFICE OF THE BOARD 
 OF EDUCATION, WHITEHALL, S.W., AT 12 O'CLOCK NOON, 
 FROM THE CLASSICAL ASSOCIATION. 
 
 THE President was accompanied by : Sir L. Amherst Selby- 
 Bigge, K.C.B., Permanent Secretary of the Board; Mr. Gilbert 
 Murray; The Hon. W. N. Bruce, C.B., Principal Assistant 
 Secretary, The Secondary Schools Branch ; Mr. J. W. Mackail, 
 Assistant Secretary, Secondary Schools Branch; Sir Owen Edwards, 
 Chief Inspector, Welsh Department ; Mr. W. C. Fletcher, Chief 
 Inspector, Secondary Schools ; Mrs. M.Withi el, Woman Inspector ; 
 Mr. J. W. Headlam ; and Mr. F. H. Oates and Mr. N. D. Bos- 
 worth- Smith, Private Secretaries. 
 
 The Deputation consisted of The Right Hon. Viscount Bryce, 
 O.M., P.B.A. ; Sir Frederic George Kenyon, K.C.B., F.B.A., 
 Sir Archibald Geikie, O.M., K.C.B., F.R.S. ; Professor Haver- 
 field, F.B.A. ; Professor Sonnenschein ; Professor R. S. Conway ; 
 Professor Ure ; Professor D. A. Slater ; Dr. W. Rushbrooke ; 
 Mr. Walter Leaf ; the Headmaster of Marlborough (Mr. C. 
 Norwood); Mr. A. Mansbridge ; Mr. W. E. P. Pantin; Miss 
 Limebeer ; Miss Strudwick ; Miss H. L. Powell ; Miss M. H. 
 Wood ; Mr. E. R. Garnsey ; and Mr. W. Edwards. 
 
 Lord BRYCE : " Mr. Fisher, I have the honour to introduce to 
 you a deputation which comes to you under the auspices of the 
 Classical Association to make certain representations with regard 
 to the position of classical studies, which it is the duty, business 
 and occupation of the Classical Association to guard and promt e. 
 
 3 
 
::..:.-.. ( 4 ) 
 
 These representations deal with certain questions that have 
 recently engaged your attention in practical form. 
 
 I need say comparatively little in introducing the Deputation, 
 in the first place because these subjects are very familiar, and 
 long have been familiar to you, and in the next place because we 
 hare brought with us here a memorial addressed to you and 
 also a memorandum which has been prepared for the purpose by 
 the Classical Association, and which contains suggestions upon 
 this subject, which I am sure you will be glad to have, and will 
 weigh most carefully. 
 
 There is one specific point to which I may advert, because it 
 is a point most distinctly of a practical character to which your 
 attention will be directed by the members of the Deputation, and 
 particularly by those who have had some practical experience ; 
 it is that which may be done and ought to be done for giving an 
 opening for the acquisition of classical knowledge by promising 
 pupils existing in places where it is not always possible, within 
 the immediate reach of the residence of the pupil, to provide those 
 higher classical studies which it is our desire to promote and 
 secure, if possible, attention to in our schools. 
 
 You will have long felt that we are confronted here by two 
 difficulties, and I may say that these difficulties may most clearly 
 be appreciated by stating to you three propositions upon which 
 I think all those who have studied higher education are pretty 
 well agreed. I will not say that opinion is unanimous about 
 them, because we have seen extreme divergences on both sides. 
 Still, I think most people are practically agreed on these three 
 propositions, which may be taken as our point of departure. 
 
 In the first place, there are some studies which do not present 
 sufficient prospect, to the average mind of the average parent, 
 of a definite practical pecuniary advantage to induce him to 
 desire that his children should be educated in these subjects, or 
 to secure the support of a comparatively uninstructed opinion to 
 give attention to those studies. Those studies nevertheless, 
 although not making this immediate direct practical claim, are 
 studies which in our opinion are so essential to the true concep- 
 tion of the highest education, so essential to the complete fitting 
 out of a man for his duties in this world as a citizen and as a 
 Christian, so essential to what may be called the higher intel- 
 
( 5 ) 
 
 lectual and moral life of the Nation as a whole, that it is of great 
 importance that they should be retained, and that due provision 
 should be made for them in whatever curricula of instruction are 
 finally accepted by the country as fit to be generally adopted in 
 schools. 
 
 In the second place, these studies are not fit for all pupils; 
 it is only boys and girls of superior intellectual gifts, I might 
 perhaps also say of special intellectual gifts, who are fitted to 
 derive due benefit from them. They are also studies the full 
 benefit of which cannot be obtained without advancing in a con- 
 siderable direction in them. There are some studies in which 
 even a small knowledge is profitable and useful, but there are 
 other studies whose benefit is not obtained until you reach a 
 certain advance in them. For instance, in mathematics I would 
 venture to submit that even a slight acquaintance, which does 
 not go beyond the first two books of Euclid, is valuable intellectu- 
 ally. But a knowledge of Greek which does not go beyond the 
 Greek Accidence is of little or no value, I should say is practically 
 of no value at all. Therefore we have to consider that there is 
 a great difference between studies in which even a small know- 
 ledge is of use and those in which the full benefit does not begin 
 to be reached until you have made considerable progress in them. 
 
 The third proposition is this : It is practically impossible for 
 us to provide in all secondary schools instruction in some of these 
 higher studies for the pupils who attend those schools, and 
 therefore we shall be obliged to draw a distinction between two 
 kinds of secondary schools, those in which provision will be 
 made for those higher studies and those in which no provision or 
 comparatively an imperfect provision can be made. 
 
 And that brings us to the practical problem : How are we to do 
 the two things which in our view are essential to the maintenance 
 of the higher standard of education ; how are we to make pro- 
 vision to enable the promising boys and girls, who have an apti- 
 tude for these higher studies, to obtain them, and to advance 
 sufficiently far in them to begin to reap the benefits ? This really 
 is part of a larger question : How are we, through our mechanism 
 of elementary and secondary schools, to discover the promising 
 minds, the minds that have in them the hope of reaching high 
 excellence and making substantial contributions to the intellectual 
 
( 6 ) 
 
 wealth of the Nation ; how are we to reach these through our 
 machinery in schools ; how are we, even in the elementary 
 schools, to find the boy who will make the most out of a secondary- 
 education, and how, in the secondary schools in general, are we 
 to find those boys and girls who are fit to be sent to the schools 
 which will give that highest form of secondary education, to 
 which I have already referred ? 
 
 That seems to be the great practical problem. It is largely a 
 problem of organisation, and upon that question of organisation 
 there are many here in the Deputation who are much more 
 competent to speak than I should be, even if I desired to take up 
 your time in entering into what they will do much better. It is 
 a problem which you already, from your experience in the great 
 manufacturing City of Sheffield, must have been faced with, 
 and which I am sure you have already considered. But I 
 hope that the practical light which some of the members of 
 the Deputation can give you from their experience will not be 
 without its value. 
 
 Let me add that I venture to call your attention specially to 
 the third section of this memorial which we have the honour to 
 lay before you, which begins with ' Finally the Classical Associa- 
 tion desires to draw the attention of the Board of Education to 
 the existing tendency, by which the education given to the 
 cleverer children who come from the elementary schools bears a 
 different stamp from that given to children of the professional 
 classes, being directed more narrowly to material and industrial 
 well-being and less to the effective study of literature and 
 history.' This raises a larger question than that to which the 
 Deputation is specially directed. It raises the question not only 
 of classical studies but of higher studies altogether. The elements 
 of Philosophy, the study of History, are intimately concerned, 
 and I only mention it for the sake of expressing what I believe are 
 the views of the Deputation, that this is a matter of supreme 
 importance to the Nation. You have already done a great deal 
 to frame, and I trust that you, by the proposals you have laid 
 before Parliament, are to do still more to furnish, opportunities 
 by which the best intellectual force of the people can receive 
 the best training and be imbued with those studies from which 
 it will derive benefit. 
 
We are very anxious not to let those studies be the special 
 prerogative of those who have been the richer and the more 
 educated classes. We believe that the reserve of intellectual 
 power of our people ought to be introduced to them. We are 
 extremely anxious that everything should be done to give them a 
 chance of obtaining from education all that education can give, 
 and to fit them as they make their way upwards in life to do 
 everything that their natural talents, matured and polished by 
 education, can accomplish for the benefit of the Nation as a 
 whole. 
 
 We think that in the construction of some machinery for that 
 purpose, to turn to higher account, and better and fuller account, 
 all of that intellectual reserve in the Nation, we shall do more 
 than perhaps we can do by anything else to maintain for our 
 people that position in the world, in the practical world and in 
 the intellectual world, which they have held, and which we hope 
 they will continue to hold. That, above all things, is the subject 
 which we desire to commend to your attention. I have the 
 pleasure of asking Sir Frederic Kenyon, whom you know, to 
 follow with some remarks on that subject." 
 
 Sir FREDERIC KENYON : "I have the honour, sir, as Chairman 
 of the Council of the Classical Association, formally to put before 
 you these proposals which have already been sent to you. I do 
 not think it is necessary for me to say much in explanation of 
 them. The principle is quite clear, and I hope it is so obviously 
 just that it will commend itself not only to you, but to all who 
 have to deal with the matter here and outside. On the other 
 hand, the matters of detail which are so important will necessarily 
 have to be dealt with by the experts of your Board and those 
 teachers who are concerned with the administration of secondary 
 education in the schools which we have in mind. 
 
 What I want to emphasise, if I may, is this : that these pro- 
 posals are not an attempt of a selfish character on the part of the 
 advocates of Greek and Latin ; they are part of a larger scheme 
 of educational reform in which the Classical Association is asso- 
 ciated with other bodies representing not only other branches of 
 the humanities, but also natural science. 
 
 There have been during the past year a series of conferences 
 and discussions between organisations of this kind which have 
 
( 8 ) 
 
 achieved, I think I may say, a very remarkable amount of unan- 
 imity. Their object has been to secure harmony between the 
 different interests which have so often been wasting their time in 
 attacking one another, and to arrive at some common programme 
 for secondary education in this country. 
 
 We are not asking therefore I want to make this plain for 
 any privileged position on behalf of the classics. We recognise, 
 of course, that the classics have held a privileged position in what 
 are known ordinarily as the Public Schools the Public Schools 
 of the older type. Those are schools founded by people who 
 believed in the classics, and they were founded in times when 
 scientific education, as we know it now, did not exist. 
 
 I will not take up time in eulogising the work they have done 
 or the aim of the classical education given by them. We recog- 
 nise fully now that provision must be made in those schools for 
 more time to be given to Natural Science, and in many cases to 
 other branches of the humanities, and that that time must be 
 obtained by economies at the expense of classical teaching. The 
 definite proposals, of course, must be made by the representatives 
 of these other subjects concerned, and our share is only, so far as 
 we have influence, to receive them sympathetically, and to do our 
 best to see that they are given fair play. 
 
 What we have to do, as representing the interests of classical 
 education, is the converse of that proposition, to ask that in 
 schools in which provision for classical teaching does not exist or 
 is inadequate such provision of a good class should be made. 
 We feel that the aptitude for classical study is not confined to one 
 social class, and our object is to secure that opportunity for 
 studying Greek and Latin should be within the reach of all boys 
 and girls who have sufficient aptitude to benefit by it, in whatever 
 class of society they may be born. When I say ' have sufficient 
 aptitude ' for it I do not mean only that they are likely to become 
 proficient teachers of classics. We believe that the benefit of 
 classical education spreads much wider than that, and that there 
 are in those classes of society, as in those classes that go to the 
 Public Schools, a large proportion of boys and girls who could 
 profit by a first-hand acquaintance with Greek and Latin language 
 and literature, and our object is that they shall have the oppor- 
 tunity of receiving it. 
 
( 9 ) 
 
 We are not asking that classics should be made compulsory 
 upon anyone ; we are asking that ignorance of the classics should 
 not be compulsory upon anyone. Our claim, of course, rests on 
 our belief in the educational value of Greek and Latin. That no 
 doubt is denied by some, and it has been argued that all the benefit 
 that most people could hope to get from Greek and Latin can be 
 derived from translations. I do not think it is necessary to argue 
 that point at any length here. I do not question that there are 
 many students who would not benefit from Greek and Latin to a 
 sufficient extent to make it worth while for them to persevere 
 with those languages, and for them the best thing they can do is 
 to get what benefit can be got from translations ; but no one who 
 is conversant with the subject at all, no one who is conversant 
 with those languages, would regard it as an arguable proposition 
 that you can get as much benefit from translations as from 
 originals, if you have the capacity of understanding the originals. 
 
 We are not asking that education in the Greek and Latin lan- 
 guages should be made compulsory on those who have not got 
 the capacity to benefit from them. We are asking, however and 
 we regard it as an obvious proposition that those who have the 
 aptitude for going far enough really to learn and appreciate these 
 languages should be enabled to do so, and that it be admitted also 
 that they would get more benefit from the knowledge of the lan- 
 guages and the literature themselves than they possibly could 
 from translations. 
 
 The next point I should wish to make is that we are looking at 
 this from the point of view of the education of the citizen. It ia 
 again universally admitted that a knowledge of human nature 
 is at least as essential to the future citizen as a knowledge of 
 the material natural world by which we are surrounded, and 
 what we desire is to put within the reach of boys of all classes 
 both branches of education. Why should an acquaintance at 
 first hand with the finest literature in the world, or the linguistic 
 training which ancient languages can give more effectually than 
 modern, be confined to the clever boys of the Public-School class ? 
 Why should not the clever boy of the Board School have his chance 
 of benefits which are only denied by a small proportion even of 
 those who have themselves had no experience of them ? 
 
 Our conception of citizenship has, of course, expanded very 
 
( 10 ) 
 
 largely since the days when classical schools were almost the only 
 schools in the country, and the result has been that the large 
 majority of our future citizens is growing up now with a different 
 style of education, one which is mainly confined to natural science 
 and to what may be called the more material branches of educa- 
 tion which are likely to bring a return of a commercial kind. What 
 we want is that these future citizens should have added to their 
 education a knowledge of human nature, of the thoughts and 
 purposes of men in the past, in order that their experience may 
 be widened. Such knowledge is a knowledge of history, a know- 
 ledge of the thoughts of men in the past ; it is in effect the widen- 
 ing of experience, and no country can have stable institutions 
 which does not possess experience. I do not think I need labour 
 that point at any length ; it is admitted by those for whom I 
 am now speaking, and also by those who are concerned with the 
 other main branches of a liberal education. 
 
 In the memorandum which we have laid before you we have 
 quoted a recent declaration of the Workers' Educational Associa- 
 tion. It states ' That since the character of British Democracy 
 ultimately depends on the collective wisdom of its adult members, 
 no system of education can be complete that does not promote 
 serious thought and discussion on the fundamental interests and 
 problems of life and society.' That declaration we should 
 thoroughly endorse, with the addition that no serious thought 
 and discussion on the fundamental interests and problems of life 
 and society can be complete which does not include a knowledge, 
 and a knowledge at first hand, of the way in which those problems 
 were dealt with in ancient Greece and Rome. 
 
 With regard to this declaration, there is no one who can speak 
 with more authority on behalf of the Workers' Educational 
 Association than Mr. Albert Mansbridge, who is here to-day, so 
 I will say no more on that head. On the other hand, we have also 
 the assent of the representatives of natural science, as well as of 
 other branches of the humanities. 
 
 There was a conference held recently between two bodies known 
 as the Council for Humanistic Studies and the Educational Sub- 
 Committee of the Board of Scientific Societies. The Council for 
 Humanistic Studies includes such bodies as the British Academy, 
 the Classical Association, the English, Geographical, Historical, 
 
( 11 ) 
 
 and Modern Language Associations, and other kindred bodies, 
 while the Board of Scientific Societies includes representatives 
 of the Royal Society and of the leading Societies which are con- 
 nected with natural science. At that Conference this resolution 
 was passed unanimously. 
 
 * While it is probably impossible to provide adequate 
 instruction in both Latin and Greek in all secondary schools, 
 provision should be made in every area for teaching in these 
 subjects, so that every boy and girl who is qualified to profit 
 from them shall have the opportunity of receiving adequate 
 instruction in them.' 1 
 
 So the principle of these proposals which I have laid before 
 you, sir, is only one of which the desirability is admitted by 
 practically all those who are qualified to speak on educational 
 subjects, and I think it may be claimed to the credit of the con- 
 ferences and discussions which have taken place during the past 
 year that so much unanimity has been arrived at. 
 
 As to the actual condition of things, and the extent to which 
 it falls short of this ideal, there are others here who will follow 
 me, and who can speak from first-hand experience, so I will leave 
 that part of the subject entirely to them. 
 
 What, in conclusion, I want earnestly to press is that this is a 
 unique opportunity for introducing reforms in secondary educa- 
 tion which will have a practically unanimous backing. We are 
 agreed now that education is the essential basis of citizenship. 
 We are agreed that a well-balanced education includes instruction 
 both in the humanities and in natural science, and I should add 
 too that it includes a respect for knowledge in both those branches, 
 and that those concerned with each branch should reciprocally 
 respect the knowledge which is the province of the other branch. 
 We are agreed also that different students have different aptitudes, 
 and that provision should be made to satisfy all aptitudes of a 
 healthy kind. 
 
 1 The Executive Committee of the Board of Scientific Societies 
 accepted this resolution in a modified form, viz. : " While it is impossible 
 and undesirable to provide adequate instruction in both Latin and 
 Greek in all secondary schools, provision should be made in every 
 area for teaching in these subjects." 
 
( 12 ) 
 
 In all this we are agreed. What we ask is that opportunities 
 may be given so that our future citizens, in whatever class of 
 society they are born, may be able to extend their knowledge 
 over the spheres of ancient history and of ancient languages, 
 and that the finest literature in the world, some of the greatest 
 experience of the world, the history of the empire which is 
 nearest akin to our own in its various problems, should be 
 accessible to those who are capable of profiting by it at first 
 hand, and in the languages in which all this knowledge is 
 enshrined. The other parts of our subject I will leave to the 
 speakers who follow me." 
 
 Lord BEYCE : " I have now the pleasure of asking Mr. Edwards, 
 who is the Headmaster of the Bradford Grammar School, to say 
 a few words on the matter." 
 
 Mr. EDWARDS : "Mr. Fisher, Lord Bryceand Sir Frederic Kenyon 
 have dealt with the general consideration of the subject, and I do 
 not want to do more in that connection except just to emphasise 
 paragraph 3 from the point of view of one who lives in a Pro- 
 vincial town. No one in that position can fail to realise the 
 growing importance of Municipal Government and the increasing 
 necessity that our leading citizens, and indeed as many citizens 
 as possible, should be led to clearness of views and balance of 
 mind and a wide mental outlook. Now the lack of these qualities 
 at the present time is perfectly obvious. It is distressingly obvious 
 to the statesman, and perhaps consolingly obvious to the politician ; 
 and if classical education does contribute, as we believe it does 
 contribute, to giving those qualities, then I think it will not be 
 a mistaken policy on the part of the State to provide facilities 
 for it. 
 
 I shall speak only of course of the boys the ladies can speak 
 of the girls who go to our Local Secondary Schools and especi- 
 ally those who come from the Public Elementary Schools. The 
 well-to-do parent can always get a good classical education for 
 his boy by sending him to a good classical boarding school, but 
 the poorer boys in very many cases indeed are cut off from all 
 opportunities of obtaining a classical education, simply because 
 there are no facilities for it at the local school to which alone they 
 can afford to go. I am, therefore, going to deal more particularly 
 with three points. First the capacity of these boys for a classical 
 
( 13 ) 
 
 education. I am going to try to show that they have a capacity 
 for classics equal to that of any other type of boy ; and then I am 
 going to try to show that where facilities are provided there is, 
 at any rate, a certain readiness on the part of these boys to take 
 advantage of them ; and lastly I hope to show, in some cases, 
 how inadequate the existing provision is. 
 
 Now with regard to the first point, that is, the capacity of the 
 boys of this type to take up a classical education, I think, in the 
 short time at my disposal, the best proof that I can give is to 
 adduce concrete instances. I will take my own school; you 
 know that Bradford Grammar School is a school of about 640 
 boys, and as you know it is a very democratic school. There 
 are sons of local professional men, there are sons of well-to-do 
 parents, especially well-to-do at the present time in many cases, 
 and besides these there is a very large number indeed of Public 
 Elementary School boys, who have mostly come into the school 
 with free scholarships provided by the City Council, so that in 
 Bradford we have exactly the type of boy who is under con- 
 sideration to-day. 
 
 I suppose it is generally admitted that the highest standard to 
 which a school education in classics can reach is the standard 
 required for open scholarships and exhibitions at Oxford and 
 Cambridge. I have looked up the statistics at Bradford Grammar 
 School for the past ten years and I find that 102 scholarships have 
 been won, 14 for Modern History, 25 for Mathematics, 30 for 
 Science, and 33 for Classics. You will notice that the number 
 of scholarships won in Classics is greater than the number won 
 in any other subject. The important point is that, with one 
 or two exceptions, these scholarships have been won by boys 
 who would never have had any opportunity of having a classical 
 education if Latin and Greek had not been taught at their local 
 schools. 
 
 Further, of these 33 classical scholarships, 23 were boys who 
 held free places in the schools. I do not say that every one of 
 these boys had been to a Public Elementary School, but by far 
 the greater proportion had. As I am not talking to an audience 
 of Yorkshiremen, I may venture to say that there is no reason to 
 suppose that the Bradford Public Elementary School or even the 
 
 Yorkshire Public Elementary School boy is phenomenally superior 
 ** 
 
to the rest of the country, and therefore these figures, to my 
 mind at any rate, prove conclusively, first that these boys have 
 as great a capacity for classics as for any other subject, and 
 secondly, that they have as great a capacity for classics as boys 
 of any other type. 
 
 Further, fully one-third I am understating the case of the 
 total number of boys at Bradford Grammar School who take 
 Latin and Greek hold free places in the school. As a parent has 
 a perfectly free option to put his boy on the Modern or the Classical 
 side, that fact seems to indicate that there is at least a desire to 
 profit and take advantage of the classical education when it is 
 offered. 
 
 But if a classical education is a good thing and we know that 
 with you there is no need to press that point and if there is 
 capacity for it and readiness to take advantage of it when pro- 
 vided, then I think there is a just claim that the State should 
 provide facilities for it. 
 
 But as a matter of fact what are the facilities at the present 
 time ? I have taken Bradford not only because I have first-hand 
 knowledge of it, but because the conditions there do very closely 
 approximate to the very conditions which these proposals aim at 
 producing. There is a Classical School in the area of accessi- 
 bility at which scholarships are provided out of public funds, 
 scholarships covering full fees, books and in certain instances a 
 maintenance allowance, and the result is that the poorest boy 
 from the Elementary School if he has ability and if he desires a 
 classical education can obtain it ; that is, if he has the good 
 fortune to live in the Educational area of the County Borough of 
 Bradford. 
 
 Now I come to the importance of the words ' area of accessi- 
 bility ' and the necessity of some provision for a combined scheme 
 for the transference of scholarships from one area to another. 
 Step across the border of the Borough of Bradford, in one direc- 
 tion less than two miles from the centre of the City and from the 
 school a penny tram ride of ten minutes' duration and no boy 
 has the chance of obtaining a classical education unless he can 
 afford to pay full fees and expenses out of his own pocket (or out 
 of the pocket of his parents of course) , simply because he is then 
 in another area of Educational Administration, and there is no 
 
( 15 ) 
 
 accessible school which gives classical instruction within the 
 control of that Education Authority, and there is no combined 
 scheme which will enable him to be transferred into the Educa- 
 tional Authority of Bradford. 
 
 Now this is a case where there is a school within the area of 
 accessibility, but I believe I should be right in saying that in the 
 whole of the West Hiding area of Yorkshire outside the County 
 Boroughs there are only one or two ; I would almost go so far as 
 to say there are practically no schools giving classical education. 
 
 I cannot speak with definiteness on this point. I am only 
 convinced that you, sir, will be easily able to get the statistics 
 from your officials at once. 
 
 The Educational Authority of the West Riding area is not the 
 least progressive Educational Authority in the country, and I 
 think it is reasonable to infer that this typifies the condition of 
 the country generally. The newer municipal secondary schools 
 and the corresponding schools in the country areas do not teach 
 Greek ; to a certain extent they do teach Latin, very largely 
 because of the regulation made by the Board of Education ; and 
 the effect of that regulation shows what a great influence you 
 have. If you suggest that a subject shall be taught, people begin 
 to think there is some value in it. From the smaller Grammar 
 Schools too, where they have been taken over by the Local 
 Authorities, Greek has practically disappeared ; but I do not 
 think there will be any grave reluctance at any attempt to 
 revive it. 
 
 But even in the County Boroughs, where there generally is a 
 local Classical School, the provision of scholarships out of public 
 funds is quite inadequate. Bradford I feel is an exception. 
 I feel that even here on this occasion it would be ungrateful of 
 me if I did not testify to what I consider was the enlightened 
 policy of the Bradford Education Authority, but I wish you 
 would examine the statistics in this respect with regard to 
 County Boroughs generally, and for that matter with regard to 
 the Counties. For instance, how many scholarships provided 
 out of public funds are tenable at Leeds Grammar School or the 
 School at Sheffield ? I cannot speak at all with any definite 
 knowledge of these places, but I can with regard to one County 
 Borough, that of Halifax. The Halifax Town Council provides 
 
( 16 ) 
 
 plenty of free scholarships to its municipal secondary schools, 
 where no Greek is taught, but only ten scholarships, ten in all, 
 not ten a year, to the Grammar School, which is the only school 
 in the district for miles round, I might say, where Greek is 
 taught. And yet that is a school which is one of the Board of 
 Education Grant Schools and it is a school of which the Halifax 
 'Town Council is the Local Education Authority. These ten 
 scholarships work out at an average of two scholarships a year, 
 as a matter of fact, so that so far as provision from the public 
 funds is concerned, that means that only two boys a year from 
 the whole of the Elementary Schools of Halifax have any chance 
 of obtaining a classical education whatever. 
 
 Now can it be said that any national system of education is 
 satisfactory where these conditions exist ? We believe that our 
 scheme will go far to remedy these evils. We believe the scheme 
 is reasonable and is feasible. We do not wish to impose a 
 classical curriculum on all schools ; we do not wish to make it 
 compulsory on all boys ; we are ready to recognise that the 
 demand for a classical education will never be in the nature of 
 things so great as a demand for more modern subjects, but the 
 demand is there and it is in bulk considerable. 
 
 All we ask for is facilities, first, that in every area of accessi- 
 bility there should be a school giving adequate instruction in 
 Latin and Greek. The area of accessibility may be quite large ; 
 boys for instance come into Bradford every day from Harrogate, 
 a distance of twenty-five miles. That may be an extreme 
 instance, although Manchester and Birmingham can match it, 
 but in any case it may be quite large. 
 
 Secondly that scholarships shall be provided out of public 
 funds to these schools ; out of public funds, not out of the funds 
 of the school, as the school cannot possibly afford to give free 
 education to any more scholars or even education at a reduced 
 rate. These scholarships should of course cover tuition, books, 
 and travelling allowances. And last of all, that by a combined 
 scheme there should be some means of transferring scholarships 
 granted by one Education Authority so that they are tenable 
 in the area of another. These proposals form the gist of our 
 scheme, and we think if they are carried a classical education 
 will be brought within the reach of every boy the opportunity 
 
( 17 ) 
 
 for it will be brought within the reach of every boy whether he is 
 rich or poor." 
 
 Lord BRYCE : " I will ask Mr. Mansbridge, the representative 
 of the Workers' Educational Association, to say a few words 
 now." 
 
 Mr. MANSBRIDGE : " Mr. President, it is my privilege to speak 
 to you as one who has concerned himself for many years with 
 the development of education among working men and women 
 and their children. I am sorry I am not privileged to speak 
 to you on behalf of the Workers' Educational Association, 
 unfortunately, being no longer Secretary of that body, but 
 what I have to say is based on my twelve years' experience 
 as Secretary. 
 
 In the nature of the case I have had little to do with the promo- 
 tion of the study of the Greek and Latin languages, although I 
 have had something to do with the provision of opportunities for 
 the spread of knowledge concerning the Greek and Roman 
 civilisations. Working people are displaying an increasing 
 interest in such subjects as Greek Democracy and Greek Moral 
 and Political Thought. The use of translations of Plato and other 
 writers is increasing among such students as those of the Uni- 
 versity Tutorial Class. It is not too much to say that there are 
 to-day many working people in all parts of the country who 
 associate the name of Greece with the cause of humanism, and 
 who eagerly seize every opportunity of extending their acquaint- 
 ance with classical civilisations ; and this in spite of deep-rooted 
 ignorant prejudice in one sense against a nation which had such 
 a sharp division of the classes. 
 
 All this will have its influence in shaping the form of education 
 which working people desire for their children, and will in time 
 produce a widespread if not intense demand for the study of the 
 classical languages. 
 
 It is in view of this that I desire to endorse the plea, and it is 
 indeed the only plea that I am competent to endorse, that the 
 Board of Education and the Local Education Authorities should 
 ' make such provision for the teaching of Latin and Greek in every 
 local area as will place these studies everywhere within the reach 
 of pupils from all classes of the nation,' although I would not 
 emphasise my endorsement more strongly than I would for a plea 
 
( 18 ) 
 
 for the accessibility of modern languages or science, or indeed for 
 any other classical languages if so strong a case could be made 
 for them as for Latin and Greek. 
 
 Roughly speaking, I suppose it is true that opportunities for 
 the study of Latin and Greek have been confined almost entirely 
 of late years to the children of well-to-do parents this is of course 
 more true of Greek than of Latin although owing to the per- 
 sistence of good Grammar Schools and the establishment of certain 
 municipal secondary schools, the number of children of poor 
 parents who have had opportunity to study Latin has been 
 steadily increasing. It is probable that opportunities for the 
 study of Greek have not increased. I am told that in the county, 
 not the educational area, of Lancashire, very few schools provide 
 opportunities for Greek probably only eight, including Manchester 
 Grammar School and two Roman Catholic Schools, in the whole 
 county of Lancashire. It has been suggested by some that the 
 Public Schools will provide sufficient opportunity in the future 
 for the maintenance of this study, but that, in effect, would 
 mean, unless radical alterations are made in the near future (and 
 they are unlikely), that only the well-to-do would enjoy it. 
 That, obviously, would be an injustice which working men and 
 women, developing as they are in appreciation of education, 
 would not tolerate for one moment. It is unthinkable from 
 the point of view certainly from which I speak. 
 
 It is generally remarked that many students of Latin and 
 Greek, even though possessing University degrees, have no 
 aptitude for classical studies, and seldom, if ever, get more from 
 them than a certain mental discipline which, it is argued, could 
 be obtained more profitably in other ways. 
 
 I should like to see a redistribution of the opportunities for 
 classical studies, and the necessity for studying Latin and Greek 
 removed from those to whom they are at best simply a means of 
 passing certain entrance examinations, whether to the Univer- 
 sities or professions. The opportunities should be open to those 
 whose minds are potentially at least full of passionate interest, 
 and who would utilise them for the development of joyous and 
 powerful scholarship in the world. 
 
 I use the term ' joyous ' deliberately because it has always 
 seemed to me that the best of those engaged iu all useful occupa- 
 
( 19 ) 
 
 tions will find true joy in communion with the great masters of 
 thought. 
 
 It has been well said by Mr. Snow of Oxford that ' literary 
 studies ought to be the studies of the poor.' They afford an 
 opportunity to reach the best things of life in the scanty leisure 
 which industrial life affords, and may even brighten the hours 
 of toil, facilitating rather than hindering the performance of 
 their monotonous tasks. They banish banal pleasures, and 
 Yicious thoughts have no place in their presence. 
 
 It may be argued that a knowledge of language is not essential 
 to the satisfaction of this desire, but it seems to me that there 
 must be representative working men and women who do know 
 the languages well, if the working classes as a whole are to derive 
 the benefit from them that they might easily do. No one can 
 become a successful missionary unless he feels the joy of his gospel, 
 and it is just this joy I should imagine which is apt to evaporate 
 from even the best of translations. Of course working men and 
 women are already to be found who study Latin and Greek for 
 the sake of the sheer joy which they get from reading the master- 
 pieces in the original. In my own experience I have met several 
 such, and particularly one foundry worker who made creditable 
 translations from Horace and Pindar. It is well known that 
 there is a great deal of study of the Greek Testament amongst 
 working men and women. I remember fixing up opportunities 
 for a railway shunter to get to work upon his New Testament 
 Greek (and it was not merely confined to that) with a Fellow at 
 a college of your University, Mr. President. I am sure there 
 will be a large demand for the study of the Greek Testament 
 whilst the Christian religion has any force in England. For 
 myself, I could wish that the Greek Testament were more com- 
 monly used in classical study, and that is a belief which I find 
 widespread, if not unanimous. It is, of course, used in some 
 public schools. 
 
 It will be obvious that I do not wish scholarship to be confined 
 to those who are able to give their lives to it, but that I want men 
 engaged in all occupations to have the opportunity of developing 
 it. I hope the day may come when a working man may be able 
 to enjoy Homer in the original and excite no more comment than 
 his enjoyment of Shakespeare does now. Why should it ? 
 
( 20 ) 
 
 It would be a calamity beyond expression if the study of the 
 classical languages, so entrancing not only in their construction 
 but in the doors which they open to the place of understanding, 
 were confined to those who could undertake it as a luxury or as 
 the result of exceptionally good fortune, such as living in the 
 City of Bradford, and not just over the border. The permanent 
 continuance of development of a scholastic caste, speaking a lan- 
 guage and making allusions not to be understood of others, would 
 be disastrous, exercising, as it would, influences working against 
 the social and intellectual unity of the nation and tending to 
 narrow the range and outlook of classical studies themselves. I 
 remember a statesman, a scholar statesman, quoting Greek in 
 the House of Commons. There were remarks from certain benches 
 in the House, and I imagine it is more difficult to make classical 
 allusions in the House since then than it was before. 
 
 But apart from all this, and this is perhaps the point I really 
 want to make for practical purposes, those who exercise control 
 over the entry to certain occupations in life demand evidence of 
 the study of Latin and Greek. This alone seems to me to justify 
 my contention that Latin and Greek shall be accessible in every 
 local area to all classes of the community. 
 
 There is no opportunity, nor indeed is there necessity, for me 
 to deal with the matter in relation to many occupations, but there 
 is one in particular to which I desire to allude. It is the concern 
 of the churches to draw to their sacred ministry men of all classes, 
 but, partly owing to the inequalities of our educational system, 
 far too few men of the working classes have had opportunity to 
 study Latin and Greek at an age sufficiently early to enable 
 them to achieve that excellence which even if not essential is 
 desirable. * A lad who is going in for the ministry,' writes a 
 leading member of the Free Churches and incidentally a head- 
 master, 'needs to live with his Greek Testament. It is impos- 
 sible for him to know it too well.' There are few more pathetic 
 figures than those of men who otherwise are highly equipped and, 
 having obtained the opportunity of a University Course, torture 
 themselves at a late age over the initial study of Latin and Greek, 
 whether they are striving to fit themselves for the ministry, or 
 whether because of their capacity they have been given an oppor- 
 tunity of a University Course. 
 
( 21 ) 
 
 I am perplexed by the difficulties which are consequent upon 
 the admission of such a plea as I make. It is difficult to deter- 
 mine whether there shall be classical and modern schools in the 
 area, or whether some schools shall serve all the interests of a 
 general education in its breadth, having sides serving the interests 
 of classical languages, modern languages and science respectively ; 
 but the essential point is that there shall be one school in every 
 local area which gives opportunity for the study of both Latin 
 and Greek, and there should be not merely facilities for but 
 actual policy to secure the transference of approved boys and 
 girls from other schools to this school at the right age. If main- 
 tenance allowances, scholarships or hostels prove to be helpful, 
 their provision must be extended or instituted. 
 
 Again my plea is as much for the scholars in the village school 
 as in the town school. 
 
 It is difficult for a headmaster who has no classical knowledge 
 to discover the capacity of boys for these studies. I wish that 
 every school master had a working knowledge of Latin, for he 
 would then have opportunity to train the lads of parts, and girls 
 who lived remote from towns, in the beginnings of classical know- 
 ledge at small expense. In this way there should be revived one 
 of the most interesting and satisfactory features in the education 
 of a past day. 
 
 I am quite sure that if the Board of Education and the Local 
 Authorities strive in co-operation to remove the difficulties which 
 are consequent upon the plea of accessibility, much progress will 
 be made even at the outset. 
 
 It is characteristic of the States of Australia that they strive 
 by additional care and additional expenditure to equalise the 
 educational opportunity of the son of the boundary rider, working 
 a thousand miles from the capital city, with the opportunity of 
 the child living under the shadow of the University. That is the 
 characteristic which working men and women expect to see more 
 pronounced in English educational administration, and it is par- 
 ticularly necessary, it seems to me, in its application to studies 
 such as these we are considering to-day, which, because of the 
 importance which is being attached at present to more directly 
 useful studies, and perhaps because the necessity for them has 
 been unduly exaggerated in times past, in the wrong places, are 
 
( 22 ) 
 
 in danger of being forgotten by those new forces pressing for the 
 education of the children of the people, or left over till a time which 
 seems to be less pressing. Such a time may easily prove to be too 
 late for their full operation, the complete operation which we 
 desire for social and political life and religious life too." 
 
 Lord BRYCE : " Miss Limebeer, who is Principal of the High 
 School for Girls at Pendleton close to Manchester, will now address 
 you." 
 
 Miss LIMEBEER : " Mr. Fisher, I have to confine my remarks 
 to classical teaching in Girls' Schools, and so I will say nothing 
 about the general aspects of such teaching and the training 
 capacity which I fully believe in and value, nor shall I lay any 
 special stress on the elementary child's career, because I do feel 
 that these children have become so utterly a part of our school 
 system that what applies to the whole school applies no less to 
 them. (I should like to say here that the last speech was an in- 
 spiration to those who teach in schools.) 
 
 Just a few practical points with regard to girls. Some girls 
 are really born Latinists and at once make for a classical degree 
 with honours ; others are going on to other Arts ; many more 
 hope to take up medical work, and whatever the regulations for 
 entrance may be, we feel there ought to be some Latin at the 
 back of all these girls' minds. I have been told by a science 
 mistress that ordinary pupils at school are very much afraid of 
 tackling new words if they do not know any Latin. There is a 
 great difference in the English literature of a VI Form girl if 
 she takes Latin and if she does not. 
 
 With regard to the future professions for women we have long 
 lists of these, but surely the two professions that will far out- 
 weigh all the others, after the war, will still be teaching and 
 secretarial work ; and teaching, and certainly the higher forms 
 of secretarial work, seem to me to need that clearness of thought 
 and expression which we make one of our aims and hopes in 
 teaching classics. Therefore it is hard lines that Latin should 
 not be available for all girls. It should be within their reach 
 though not compulsory. One way of doing this is suggested in 
 the first resolution submitted to the Board. 
 
 As for Greek, probably a comparatively small number of girls 
 learn it at school, but again it should be available. For 
 
( 23 ) 
 
 one thing I think that the present Latin teaching in Girls' Schools 
 must be suffering, to a certain extent, from the number of Latin 
 teachers without Greek who have control of the Latin right up 
 to the top of a big school. They are most useful as second in 
 their department, but it is a pity that they should control the 
 whole of the teaching. 
 
 There is one practical difficulty that will arise after the war 
 in connection with Latin, especially in Girls' Schools. If girls 
 take up secretarial work, they will often need modern languages 
 for all kinds of international intercourse, commercial and other- 
 wise. It seems to me madness to put more modern languages 
 into our crowded school curriculum. I have even heard Spanish 
 and Russian mentioned in this connection. What we really 
 want are post-schools for languages, with any amount of transla- 
 tion from and into the language, very little philology, no side 
 issues, the main business being to write and speak the language ; 
 and these schools should not be private ventures, but should be 
 under the segis of the University ; they should have the support 
 of the Local Authority, and the encouragement and support of 
 the Board of Education. 
 
 There seems to be a tendency to talk about education as if it 
 stopped at the age of nineteen or earlier. A little very closely 
 packed study after school will do a great deal if people will only 
 realise it. 
 
 The question of the curriculum is one which we must face, and 
 in what follows I cannot confine my remarks only to classics ; 
 we cannot think in watertight compartments, but must deal 
 with the whole question, and that is the loss of power and the 
 loss of standard at present in schools in which all subjects are 
 studied at the same pressure. It is not difficult to solve the 
 problem for the dull girl, nor for the fairly good girl who perhaps 
 drops one or two of the deeper subjects after two or three years, 
 nor for the brilliant girl. But the mass of really clever girls 
 whom we introduce into the world is of immense importance to 
 the future of the nation, and I am not sure that we are doing 
 our best for them ; they lose power through this dissipation of 
 i nterest. 
 
 I am not asking exactly for a narrower curriculum, but I am 
 asking that certain subjects should be limited, and others have 
 
( 24 ) 
 
 more chances ; and this scheme of transferring scholarships 
 seems, in a way I have hardly time to indicate, to make it possible 
 for every pupil to have a chance, not only of studying any subject, 
 but also of making a more intensive study of it, if she shows 
 any special aptitude. 
 
 Schools used to be allowed to be weak in certain subjects, or 
 rather to have a limited aim in certain subjects. I wish they had 
 this again. Nowadays the problem is worse than ever. There 
 are many home duties which the girls have to perform ; domestic 
 work is taken seriously at school, music examinations run riot, 
 and there are other problems that boys' schools do not have to 
 face. Still in spite of that I want to keep Latin and to make it 
 really good Latin. In Girls' Schools you can get good value 
 out of Latin for individual girls, even if it does not go on for 
 more than two or three years. Apart from the girl who really 
 does good matriculation work in Latin, there will always be a 
 number of girls who for one reason or another do not carry on 
 to matriculation standard. Real good can be got out of those 
 two or three years' study, and it would be a great pity if a school 
 which could not carry on Latin beyond an elementary stage 
 had to drop the subject. The girls like it, the parents are tract- 
 able about it and would be sorry to see it dropped. 
 
 The Board's Circular 849 gives two grades of school leaving 
 examinations. The first hardly solves the difficulty of the 
 crowded pre-matriculation years, but the second should be a 
 great help to us in raising the standard of the work of those girls 
 who pass from us to the University and return as teachers to 
 our schools. As it is, far too many pupils just manage to get 
 through the matriculation, take a Pass degree or an Honours 
 degree of a low standard, and then attempt to teach Matriculation 
 Latin, with disastrous results. This higher leaving examination 
 will be a good starting-point for an Honours course. It will, 
 moreover, help a school to be strong in one subject, and that 
 strength will not only affect the subject concerned, but will 
 react on the whole work of the school. 
 
 My last point refers to the second resolution on the paper, 
 that the Board be asked to regard a training in Latin language 
 and literature, and at least some knowledge of the typical parts 
 of Greek literature, as an important and generally necessary 
 
( 25 ) 
 
 element in the training of teachers of English literature. We 
 all admit that people can speak good English without classics. 
 Of course, there are people of genius, originality, deep interest 
 in some big thing, vivid and wide experience of life who write 
 excellent English unaided by Latin or Greek. But the qualities 
 I have just mentioned are not always apparent in the candidates 
 for posts in the secondary schools. We have to deal with what 
 we can get, and a great many headmistresses, not only classical 
 headmistresses, are not satisfied with the result of the present 
 Honours English School. There are brilliant exceptions, first- 
 rate Honours English graduates who are excellent, but I am 
 speaking of the mass. 
 
 We think that there is too much Anglo-Saxon, too much re- 
 search into corners of literature that might as well remain obscure 
 for a time and are hardly worth looking into. There is no real 
 grip of language or of the essentials of literature. What we want is 
 a foundation of classics rather than a superstructure of research. 
 
 Many of us would like University students to have two years 
 of classics, and then one or two years of English Literature on 
 the top of this. The purely classical mistress would want to 
 teach classics only. She could teach English, but she would be 
 better equipped if, after her classical course, she had switched 
 her thoughts off on to English for one or two years, either two 
 complete years, or first a year of specialised English study and 
 then a year devoted to training for a Teacher's Diploma with 
 English literature, so that her powers of teaching and her know- 
 ledge of her subject would progress at the same time. 
 
 I think, however, that the Council would support me in saying 
 that we do not want to urge or insist upon this as the only training 
 for an English teacher. Some people prefer the existing arrange- 
 ments. We think they are wrong, but are quite prepared to let 
 both courses of training stand on their own merits. We shall all, 
 however, agree as to the immense importance of the teaching 
 of English. It is the subject which is taught throughout every 
 secondary school of every type, and every elementary school in 
 the whole nation." 
 
 Lord BRYCE : " The last of the deputation who will have a few 
 words to say to you, Mr. Fisher, is Dr. Conway, who is Professor 
 of Latin in the University of Manchester." 
 
( 26 ) 
 
 Professor CON WAY : " The only possible excuse I have for 
 adding anything to what has been already said is that what comes 
 at the tail shall, if possible, have something of a practical sting. 
 I want to draw your attention extremely briefly to two points 
 which I think have a close practical bearing. The first is that in 
 any steps which are taken for this end, I am quite certain the 
 Board can count upon the cordial co-operation of the Local 
 Education Authorities. 
 
 The people whose only conception of education is education as 
 practised in Public Schools often think the member of the Local 
 Education Authority is a rather exigent person whose only idea 
 is to care for the rates and establish classes in reading, writing 
 and arithmetic. These are the schools which are most grossly 
 incompetent. The members of Local Education Authorities 
 have the keenest admiration for their work. The very fact that 
 such requests as we are making this morning should be possible 
 in the world is to my mind an extraordinary evidence of the zeal 
 and generosity with which Local Education Authorities have 
 worked for higher education, and also, if you will allow me to say 
 so, of the enlightened guidance which we have received from 
 the permanent officers of this great Department. 
 
 I am quite sure that the way to persuade a Local Education 
 Authority to do something is to make it clear that it is a step in 
 advance. If incidentally you can point out that it will bring 
 more distinction to this particular Local Authority than to the 
 Local Authority in the neighbouring town or county you will 
 clinch your case. They are not in the least afraid of higher 
 standards in my experience. 
 
 Secondly I want to say that there is at the present moment a 
 very great danger of waste of public money by driving a large 
 number of what for brevity I will call round boys and girls into 
 square holes, and forcing a boy or girl by the accident of extraneous 
 encouragement to take up subjects for which he has no par- 
 ticular taste. The national army of intellect, which is not too 
 large, as the other speakers have pointed out, demands that the 
 natural bent of a boy or girl should be carefully studied, and he 
 should be carefully led to that form of work which will make him 
 the most useful citizen. You can only do that with success if you 
 enlist the sympathy of his schoolmasters from the beginning; 
 
( 27 ) 
 
 especially his primary schoolmaster. In some parts of the 
 country with which I am acquainted there is a positive reluctance 
 on the part of primary schoolmasters to let their boys go on to 
 secondary schools, because they say ' you are robbing our primary 
 schools of our best boys.' In the County of London and New- 
 castle-on-Tyne they have a scheme by which the boys are picked 
 out it is not by any means a universally adopted scheme with 
 the help of their primary teacher. He follows their career with 
 interest and takes as much pride in their getting a scholarship at 
 a secondary school as a headmaster of a secondary school in their 
 getting a scholarship at Oxford or Cambridge. 
 
 I have only one thing to add. No one who has listened to the 
 remarkable speeches we have had this morning will doubt the 
 enthusiasm with which classical studies are pursued by children 
 who come from poor homes. Classical study is in fact the romance 
 of the poor. The access to that romance is at present obtained 
 at rather too heavy a cost. It has been my privilege to teach 
 many boys who have done well, and distinguished themselves 
 afterwards in classics, from such homes. I have in mind four 
 or five in particular who have naturally gone into teaching 
 themselves. Out of those four or five, one, having attained 
 the head-mastership of a very large and important school in a 
 very wide area, died at the age of thirty-five, and one other, 
 who was recently holding a distinguished Chair in one of the 
 Dominions, has just been obliged to resign his Chair in order 
 to fight a disease which besets those whose youth has given 
 them plenty of intellectual stimulus, but too little food and 
 too little fresh air. 
 
 I venture to hope that after what Mr. Edwards has said the 
 area of accessibility will not be construed in too largely a geo- 
 graphical sense, so that the boys and girls who come into our 
 scheme, although they may be encouraged, and encouraged I 
 hope by liberal grants for maintenance, to attend a classical school, 
 shall not have to do so at the cost of spending in the train hours 
 that they ought to be spending in physical exercises. I hope they 
 will be encouraged to travel by tram rather than by train, and 
 that the time that they will spend in either will be measured by 
 minutes rather than by hours." 
 
( 28 ) 
 
 THE PRESIDENT'S REPLY 
 
 THE PRESIDENT : " Lord Bryce, Ladies and Gentlemen, you 
 have come here on behalf of the Council of the Classical Associa- 
 tion to represent to me the just place of the study of Classical 
 Antiquity in our scheme of National Education. You do not 
 claim any special privilege for Classical Studies. You expressly 
 realise the importance of an education in Science, and in the 
 modern Humanities, and you realise also that in the past the 
 classical studies have enjoyed a position of prerogative which 
 you no longer desire to defend. 
 
 Your point, as I understand it, is this, that in our ancient 
 Public Schools, classical studies are forced upon many boys who 
 are quite unfit to profit by them, but that on the other hand in 
 the Municipal and County Schools the facilities for becoming 
 acquainted with the literature, the language, and the history of 
 Greece and Rome are at present deplorably insufficient ; and you 
 desire the Board to use its influence in the direction of making 
 such provision for the teaching of Latin and Greek in every local 
 area as will place those studies everywhere within reach of pupils 
 from all classes of the nation. 
 
 Now I am cordially in agreement with the members of this 
 Deputation as to everything which has been said with respect to 
 the great value of classical studies as an instrument of humane 
 education. A study of classical antiquity not only introduces us 
 to some of the most beautiful literature in the world, but it has 
 been a very living and progressive branch of intellectual activity 
 in the past generation. I remember very well that when I took 
 my degree I came to the deliberate conclusion that there was no 
 f ui'ther room for fruitful research in Greek history, and in token 
 of that precipitate and erroneous opinion I parted with my copy 
 of Miiller's Fragments of Greek Historians to my friend Professor 
 Gilbert Murray. Immediately afterwards Sir Frederic Kenyon 
 discovered among the papyri of the British Museum Aristotle's 
 long lost Constitution of Athens, and from that moment onwards 
 there has been a succession of discoveries in the field of Greek 
 Antiquity more thrilling and fruitful than any which the world has 
 known since the days of Aldus and Poggio. 
 
 I feel myself, and I know that it is the feeling of the Board, that 
 
( 29 ) 
 
 the complete disappearance of Greek Education from this country 
 would be a great and irredeemable loss and that the study of 
 Classical Antiquity stands on an entirely different footing from 
 any highly specialised pursuit, such as Hebrew, let us say, or 
 Armenian. 
 
 I have already outlined to the House of Commons a scheme for 
 the development of our Secondary Schools, and I think that the 
 new Kegulations for our Secondary Schools coupled with the new 
 grants which it is proposed to attach to advanced courses in those 
 Secondary Schools will go some way to meet the desires expressed 
 by this Deputation. 
 
 We propose to encourage advanced courses in all the main sub- 
 jects of secondary education, in Science, in Mathematics, in the 
 Modern Humanities, and in Classics, and we hope that the schools 
 offering these advanced classes will be so co-ordinated that every 
 great subject of secondary education may be accessible to every 
 student in a given ' area of accessibility.' 
 
 We also contemplate a system of transfers. Of course the 
 Deputation will realise that a system of transfers is a somewhat 
 difficult matter to arrange. There will be a great number of 
 practical obstacles to overcome before such a system can be 
 brought into smooth and continuous operation. My feeling is 
 that the plan can only really succeed when the secondary schools 
 in any given ' area of accessibility ' shall have established special 
 reputations for themselves in special branches of study ; and of 
 course a system of transfers, to be successful, would have to be 
 accompanied by a system of scholarships and maintenance 
 allowances. 
 
 I ought perhaps here to interpolate a warning. The Board is 
 not in a position to impose curricula upon schools. We can 
 of course through our system of grants bring influence to bear 
 upon schools, but as George Washington said c influence is not 
 Government ' ; and although it is the policy of the Board to secure 
 the development in every area of advanced courses in all the 
 main branches of secondary-school study, we shall have to depend 
 upon the co-operation of the governing bodies of the schools and 
 upon the co-operation of the Local Education Authorities, if 
 full effect is to be given to our desires. 
 
 I notice the Deputation laid stress upon the transfer of all able 
 
( 30 ) 
 
 pupils from Primary to Secondary Schools at an age early enough 
 to em ble them to profit duly by a Secondary Course, and on their 
 remaining at school long enough to complete it. Well, the policy 
 of the Board has for long been directed towards these two objects. 
 The Board has tried to induce children to leave the Elementary 
 School for the Secondary School at a sufficiently early age, and has 
 attempted to stimulate the length of school life. We have been 
 perhaps more successful in securing the first object than the 
 second ; but progress has been made in both directions and the 
 Deputation may be assured that neither of these two important 
 objects will escape our consideration. 
 
 You are also concerned to point out how important it is that a 
 knowledge of classical literature should be possessed by the teachers 
 of English in our schools. No doubt it is ideally desirable that a 
 teacher of English literature in its higher forms should be ac- 
 quainted with the masterpieces of the Greek and Latin genius, 
 but the Board, as I think the Deputation will realise, could not 
 insist upon a knowledge of Greek and Latin literature from every 
 teacher of English literature in our schools. 
 
 One final observation. I notice that the Classical Association 
 speaks of the Municipal and Council Schools as being directed 
 more narrowly to material and industrial well-being, and less to 
 the effective study of literature and history. I think that the 
 Board would not accept such a statement without some qualifica- 
 tion. It is true of course that the provision for the humane 
 studies has not hitherto been so effective in some of these newer 
 schools as it has been made by long and established tradition in 
 many of the older schools ; still there is a steady progress towards 
 a better general education in the County Schools and in the 
 Municipal Schools ; the level is being steadily raised, and I hope 
 very much that one of the results of the new grants to Secondary 
 Education will be to enable us to raise it still further. After all 
 success in secondary-school education depends upon the quality 
 of the teacher, and the quality of the teacher has some relation to 
 the scale of his remuneration." 
 
 Lord BRYCE : "On behalf of the Deputation I have to thank 
 you for the very careful and patient attention which you have 
 given to the case which we have presented to you and for the 
 
( 31 ) 
 
 assurance that you have given of the care which will be devoted 
 by the Board ; and as the Board is somewhat impersonal and its 
 members are not so familiar to us as you are, we attach even more 
 importance to the assurance you have given us that you are in 
 eympathy with the general objects which we come before you to 
 advocate, and that they will have your own careful consideration. 
 
 I should like to express the fullest concurrence I think I may 
 venture to do this on behalf of the Deputation with the last 
 remark you made with regard to the teacher. Any attempt to 
 increase and improve classical teaching will of course very largely 
 depend upon what is done for the teachers themselves. As you 
 are aware there are countries, such as Scotland, in which a know- 
 ledge of Classics, and especially of Latin, is far more generally 
 diffused among Elementary teachers than it is in England, and 
 one of the things which we hope, from the plan which you 
 presented to the House of Commons the other day, is that the 
 improved prospects opened up to the Elementary teacher will 
 have their effect in, by degrees, raising the standard and range of 
 attainments of the teachers in Elementary as well as in other 
 schools. I beg to thank you for the very great care with which 
 you have listened to us." 
 
 The Deputation then withdrew. 
 
 The following Memorandum, drawn up by a member of the 
 Council, was, with the approval of the Council, forwarded to the 
 President along with the proposals of the Association : 
 
 " It is desired to call attention to a serious danger at the present 
 time that the Classics, and in particular Greek, may lose the posi- 
 tion in national education and the influence on national life which 
 we believe they ought to have. In the past they may have been 
 taught to too many boys ; it would be an ill compensation if in the 
 future they were taught to too few. Such a danger is real. Com- 
 pared with science or modern languages they start at a disad- 
 vantage. A parent, however enlightened his views, in choosing 
 his son's education is bound to take practical as well as ideal 
 reasons into account, and to consider whether a particular course 
 will enable the boy to earn his bread. Now modern languages 
 are of obvious use in Commerce, Industry and Banking, in the 
 Diplomatic and Consular services, and in the teaching profession ; 
 
( 32 ) 
 
 they are valuable in the Army, the Navy and the Law, and there 
 is no walk of life, except perhaps the Church, in which they are 
 not an immediate monetary asset. The immediate uses of science 
 in the modern world are hardly fewer. But with Latin and Greek 
 it is otherwise if we ignore their influence on mind and character, 
 and think only of their obvious mercantile and professional uses- 
 They have some professional value for the future lawyer or 
 minister of religion ; they will enable a man to be a schoolmaster > 
 so long as Latin and Greek occupy an important place in our 
 education ; and while the State, recognising their value, gives 
 weight to them in the Civil Service Examinations, they will attract 
 many of the best brains in the country. But it is only to the 
 last three of these ways of life that they lead directly and by 
 an unbroken bridge ; and in the last, and most important, of 
 them their position depends directly on the State. Elsewhere 
 they have no direct market value ; and though they afford, 
 to those who are adapted to profit by them, an unequalled 
 training of mind and character, which in the long run will be a 
 commercial as well as a spiritual asset, they are not, like scientific 
 or modern languages, of immediate use, and, in the present state 
 of public opinion, they are sometimes regarded with disfavour 
 and suspicion. 
 
 Of the two classical languages, Greek is at present in most 
 danger. Our own and other countries afford striking examples 
 of its tendency to disappear before the competition of subjects 
 which are commercially more paying. The following table shows 
 the place of the Classics in American secondary education (figures 
 taken from Commissioner of Education's Report) : 
 
 Total No. of Pupils in Public Pupils Pupils 
 
 High Schools and Academies. taking Latin. taking Greek. 
 
 1889-90 . . 297,894 100,144 12,869 
 
 1897-98 . . 554,825 274,293 24,994 
 
 1909-10 . . 1,039,461 405,502 10,739 
 
 It will be noted that Latin has retained, and indeed improved, 
 its position in these years. Greek shows a rise up to the year 
 1897-98. The immediate cause of its subsequent decline was 
 that between 1897 and 1904 many important colleges in the North 
 Central States ceased to require Greek for a degree. But the 
 general deeper causes are admitted to be the attractiveness of 
 
( 33 ) 
 
 modern subjects for those who propose to enter business, and a 
 falling-off in the candidates for the ministry. The figures for 
 France (taken from the Board of Education Special Report) 
 point in the same direction. Before 1902 Latin and Greek were 
 necessary for entrance to ' the Faculty of Letters at the Uni- 
 versities, to the medical and legal professions, and to a vast number 
 of minor administrative appointments.' In that year this 
 ceased to be the case. As a result, in 1901, 18,045 boys in the 
 Colleges and Lycees took Greek; in 1908, 4,155 boys took it. 
 Latin did not lose ground, the explanation given being that many 
 families in determining the education of their children united Latin 
 and Science, thus combining ' les preoccupations utilitaires tres 
 jegi times et le souci d'une culture plus desinteressee. 5 Greek, 
 to its advantage, shook off a number of unsuitable pupils. But 
 it is a question whether it has not lost along with them many 
 students who would profit by it. It is now confined largely to 
 boys ' qui . . . se destinent au Professorat ' ; others take it 
 because their parents have learnt it and consider it indispensable 
 to a liberal education, or because they dislike Science. It still 
 enjoys an important protection, for it is necessary, with Latin, 
 to the degree of licencie es lettres. Without this it may be fairly 
 conjectured that it would have suffered far more seriously. 
 
 The two countries in which the Classics still hold a pre- 
 dominant place in education are Germany and Belgium not the 
 worst educated nations in Europe. In the former, in 1911, 
 240,000 out of 400,000 students in secondary schools were learning 
 Latin ; and of these, 170,000 were learning Greek as well. Thus, 
 the Classics, though they have lost ground in recent years, still 
 maintain a commanding position in Germany. This is chiefly 
 due to the fact that till 1901 the University was closed to all but 
 pupils from the Gymnasium, with the exception of students of 
 Mathematics, Natural Science, and Modern Languages, from 
 whom Greek and Latin ceased to be required after 1870. This 
 rule enabled the Classics to take a very strong hold of German 
 education. They have maintained it since 1901 (when the 
 Universities became open without reserve to pupils from the 
 Realschulen) owing partly to the ubiquitousness of the Gymnasium, 
 partly to its great prestige in a country which had always believed 
 in secondary education, and has for so long been accustomed to 
 
( 34 ) 
 
 identify it with the study of Latin and Greek. The figures for 
 secondary education in Belgium, which are less familiar, are given 
 below in full : 
 
 
 
 Total Nos. 
 in Secondary 
 .Schools. 
 
 Boys taking 
 Ancient 
 Humanities 
 (including 
 Greek). 
 
 Boys taking 
 Latin 
 Humanities 
 (including 
 Latin but 
 not Greek). 
 
 Boya 
 taking Modern 
 Humanities 
 (including 
 neither Greek 
 nor Latin). 
 
 Athenees . 
 Ecoles dirigees par les 
 eveques 
 Ecoles dirigees par les 
 Congregations 
 Colleges Communaux 
 Colleges patronnes . 
 
 6,322 
 
 8,297 
 
 9,510 
 
 782 
 958 
 
 1,776 
 5,504 
 
 4,329 
 
 282 
 879 
 
 507 
 30 
 
 4,039 
 2,793 
 
 5,181 
 470 
 79 
 
 Totals . 
 
 25,869 
 
 12,770 
 
 537 
 
 12,562 
 
 Finally, Scotland, for which the figures are supplied by Professor 
 Harrower of Aberdeen. Here Greek ceased to be compulsory 
 for entrance to the Universities after the year 1891-2 (Latin is 
 still necessary). In the year 1890-1, 934 students took Greek, 
 in the year 1904-5 this was reduced to 320. The numbers have 
 fallen still further since that date. It is said that the loss is 
 principally in Pass Students, and Honours Students have kept 
 their numbers up. This is a result which to many believers in 
 Greek will not seem unsatisfactory. It should, however, be 
 remembered that Greek still enjoys a certain protection, owing 
 to the fact that many of the most promising Scotch students 
 proceed to Oxford and Cambridge, where Greek is at present a 
 compulsory subject. It is very doubtful whether many pupils 
 take it, except those who have this end or else a career in the 
 Civil Service in view, or who are destined for the ministry. 
 
 In calling attention to these facts, we wish to make it clear that 
 we are not advocating ' compulsory Greek,' on which this Asso- 
 ciation has always refrained from expressing an opinion, and 
 to which many of its members are strongly opposed. 1 But 
 
 1 By " compulsory Greek " is meant the system under which a know- 
 ledge of Greek is necessary for entrance to Oxford and Cambridge. 
 On the other hand much is to be said for a provision that at certain 
 Universities a knowledge of Greek should be required from students 
 taking certain courses; Philosophy, Law and English Literature, 
 
( 35 ) 
 
 we desire to emphasise the precariousness of the position which 
 classical study, and in particular Greek, holds in modern educa- 
 tion, and the danger that so-called utilitarian considerations, alien 
 from the true interests of education and ultimately of national 
 life itself, may destroy or reduce to insignificance an element in 
 our educational system, on the importance of which it is not 
 necessary before this Board to dwell ; and, while we think that 
 great care should be taken not to teach the Classics to pupils for 
 whom they are unsuitable, we believe that it is in the interests of 
 the country that they should keep such a place in our educational 
 system as will enable them to act as a leavening force in national 
 life. We would therefore urge the importance of securing that 
 in the reconstruction of national education no measures should 
 be taken which would unfairly prejudice the position of the 
 Classics. 
 
 Of such possibilities we will give one example. If the recom- 
 mendations for the establishment of Scholarships in Science put 
 forward in the Interim Report of the Consultative Committee of 
 the Board of Education on Scholarships are carried out, it is 
 obvious that the heavy endowment there proposed will attract 
 a large number of students, and in so far give an advantage to 
 Science over other subjects. If effect is given to the proposals 
 of the Committee, which suggest grants for scholarships to be 
 held by Science Students at a University, it would seem just that 
 a classical training should not prejudice a boy who wishes to 
 compete for these scholarships, and that the examination should 
 permit boys who have gone through the ordinary classical course 
 to compete on equal terms with those whose education has been 
 mainly in Science. There is much in itself to commend the plan 
 of building a modern science education on a foundation of the 
 older humanistic training ; and it is perhaps worth notice that 
 the combination of the two was usual in Germany in days before 
 the Eealschule gave entrance to the University, and that both 
 then and since it has been strongly commended by eminent men 
 of science in that country." 
 
 Foreign European Languages, and possibly Modern, as well as Ancient, 
 History are such courses. It would be a real advantage to ensure that 
 a class of students should exist in this country who had traced to their 
 springs the rivers of the languages, history, and thought of Europe. 
 
( 36 ) 
 
 The proposals submitted by the Deputation to the President of 
 the Board of Education were as follows : 
 
 " The Council of the Classical Association respectfully asks 
 the President of the Board of Education to receive a deputation 
 from them, in order that they may lay before him the following 
 proposals with regard to the provision of such teaching of Latin 
 and Greek in every local area, as will place these studies every- 
 where within reach of pupils from all classes of the Nation. 
 
 1. That the Board of Education be asked to use its influence 
 and resources towards securing : 
 
 (a) That in each area of accessibility for school attendance, 
 there should be at least one Secondary School for boys, and 
 one for girls, at which efficient teaching may be provided in 
 both Greek and Latin to a standard enabling pupils of 
 ability to enter a specialised classical course of a high standard 
 in some British University. In order to do so they must 
 under present conditions be fitted to compete with reasonable 
 chance of success for entrance scholarships at the different 
 Universities. 
 
 (6) That in every area a system should be arranged by 
 which pupils who so desire can be transferred to such schools 
 in the area ; and that in the case of the holders of scholar- 
 ships an additional allowance should be made to cover any 
 increase in the cost of daily attendance where travelling is 
 involved. If more than one local authority is concerned in 
 such an area, a combined scheme should be organised for 
 transferring the tenure of scholarships for this purpose. 
 
 (c) That, besides the School or Schools in which Greek is 
 taught, the number of Secondary Schools maintained or 
 aided by the local Education Authority, which provide 
 teaching in more than one language other than English, 
 should be steadily increased ; and if the first language is a 
 modern language, the second language should always be 
 Latin, unless for special reasons Greek were preferred in 
 some particular cases. 
 
 (d) In the case of pupils who do not pass directly from an 
 elementary into the Classical Secondary School, facilities by 
 
( 37 ) 
 
 means of scholarships for transfer into the Classical School 
 from other secondary schools should be provided. The 
 successful working of any such scheme depends upon the 
 general facilities existing in the area (i) for the transfer of 
 all able pupils from Primary to Secondary Schools at an age 
 early enough to enable them to profit duly by a Secondary 
 Course, and (ii) for their remaining at school long enough to 
 complete it. 
 
 2. That the Board be asked to regard a training in Latin 
 language and literature, and at least some knowledge in the 
 original of the typical parts of Greek literature, as an important 
 and generally necessary element in the training of all teachers 
 of English Literature above the elementary stage ; and to use 
 its influence to encourage the application of this principle in 
 Secondary Schools. 
 
 3. Finally the Classical Association desires to draw the atten- 
 tion of the Board of Education to the existing tendency, by which 
 the education given to the cleverer children who come from the 
 elementary schools bears a different stamp from that given to 
 children of the professional classes, being directed more narrowly 
 to material and industrial well-being and less to the effective 
 study of literature and history. 
 
 Among the pupils from the elementary schools will be many 
 who are likely to exercise influence in the public life, both munici- 
 pal and national, of the coming generation ; and in the interest 
 of the whole community it is of high importance that these future 
 leaders of their fellow citizens should have some knowledge of 
 the past history of mankind, especially of its political institutions 
 and experiments; and should acquire an enduring interest in 
 the ideals of both private and public character, by which the 
 noblest sides of civilisation have been moulded. The Classical 
 Association observes with interest the declaration of the Workers' 
 Educational Association (Educational Reconstruction, Eecom- 
 mendation 12) : 
 
 * That since the character of British Democracy ultimately 
 depends on the collective wisdom of its adult members, no 
 
( 38 ) 
 
 system of education can be complete that does not promote 
 serious thought and discussion on the fundamental interests 
 and problems of life and society.' 
 
 The Classical Association believes that this end can be secured 
 only if the same freedom of access to the thought and history of 
 the greatest races of the past as is given to the children of the more 
 privileged classes is also, by a wise system of national education, 
 opened to children from every class of the community." 
 
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