PLACE OF BOTANY IN EDUCATION 25 



specialist, one who knows something well, it matters 

 not so much what, and has sympathy for other things. 

 Of this condition all Education' should take account, 

 as it is doing plainly enough in its higher grades. 

 But even for the schools the value of the principle 

 of specialization needs no argument, for it is there 

 admitted even though its operation is confined to but 

 one group of subjects, the Classics. Curiously enough, 

 however, it is those who contend for the value of 

 spending half of the school time through several of 

 the school years upon the single subject of foreign 

 languages who are quickest to condemn any such de- 

 votion to another group of subjects. I think their 

 system for their own subjects is entirely correct, and 

 it is simply the same privilege for the Sciences, and 

 no more, that I ask for. 



Aside, however, from this particular phase of the 

 subject, I think that, simply as an educational prin- 

 ciple, specialization of the proper sort, i.e. the ut- 

 most possible thoroughness in some one subject or 

 related group of subjects, and the use of this as a 

 centre for the grouping of others, cannot begin too 

 early. From the individual's standpoint, there is in 

 such an education certainly the greatest happiness, 

 and, through that, the greatest profit. It makes him 

 also at the same time a more valuable member of 

 the community to which he belongs. The minds of 

 children come to the teacher somewhat as the blocks 



