18671882] EDUCATION 44! 



Cornhill ? 1 They seem to me very clever, though obscurely Letter 773 

 written ; and I agree with almost everything he says, except 

 with some passages which appear to imply that no experi- 

 ments should be tried unless some immediate good can be 

 predicted, and this is a gigantic mistake contradicted by the 

 whole history of science. 



P.S.--That is a curious fact about babies. I remember 

 hearing on good authority that very young babies when 

 moved are apt to clutch hold of anything, and I thought of 

 your explanation ; but your case during sleep is a much more 

 interesting one. Very many thanks for the book, which I 

 much wanted to see ; it shall be sent back to-day, as from 

 you, to the Society. 



II. MISCELLANEOUS SUBJECTS, 1867 1882. 



To Canon Farrar. Letter 774 



The lecture which forms the subject of this letter was one delivered 

 by Canon Farrar at the Royal Institution, " On Some Defects in Public 

 School Education." 



Down, March 5th, 1867. 



I am very much obliged for your kind present of your 

 lecture. We have read it aloud with the greatest interest, 

 and I agree to every word. I admire your candour and 

 wonderful freedom from prejudice ; for I feel an inward 

 conviction that if I had been a great classical scholar I should 

 never have been able to have judged fairly on the subject. 

 As it is, I am one of the root and branch men, and would 

 leave classics to be learnt by those alone who have sufficient 

 zeal and the high taste requisite for their appreciation. You 

 have indeed done a great public service in speaking out so 

 boldly. Scientific men might rail for ever, and it would only 

 be said that they railed at what they did not understand. I 

 was at school at Shrewsbury under a great scholar, Dr. Butler ; 

 I learnt absolutely nothing, except by amusing myself by 

 reading and experimenting in chemistry. Dr. Butler somehow 

 found this out, and publicly sneered at me before the whole 

 school for such gross waste of time ; I remember he called me 



1 Fortnightly Review, XXX., p. 778 ; Cornhill Magazine, XLV., 

 p. 191. The articles are by the late Edmund Gurney, author of The 

 Power of Sound, 1880. 



