174 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



love. The group system of the Johns Hopkins University seems to be 

 the best plan hitherto devised for securing the advantages and avoid- 

 ing the dangers of the elective system. 



Even an undiscriminating use of the elective system appears to 

 me better than the obsolescent required course in Latin, Greek and 

 elementary mathematics. Latin was once as much of a professional 

 study as electrical engineering is to-day. By a natural evolution it 

 became part of the insignia of a leisured aristocracy, educated with 

 priests and by them. The use of quotations in which the quantities 

 were given in accord with the peculiar accent of the English universities 

 was a mark of birth and breeding, as are to-day the scars on the face of 

 a German student. Literature and art based themselves on the clas- 

 sical tradition; the intrinsic beauty of the Greek civilization and the part 

 played by Eome in history added to its strength. Even the most icono- 

 clastic must regret the bankruptcy of classical culture, but at the same 

 time the most conservative must acknowledge that the idol is broken. 

 We certainly still feel entitled to sneer at the millionaire who orders 

 a painting of Jupiter and Io and complains that only one of the ten 

 is supplied, and she without her clothes; whereas it is not regarded as 

 a lack of culture when an eminent historian regards the Fissure of 

 Eolando as a chasm in the Pyrenees. But Latin versification is becom- 

 ing as obsolete and as little used to mark the fine gentleman as the 

 carrying of a rapier. A classical education is essential for certain 

 lines of research, and will always attract its full share of the keenest 

 intellects; but it is no longer wise or possible for a boy to devote 

 eight years of his life to the dead languages in order that he may be 

 admitted to an artificial aristocracy. Latin will survive for a long 

 time in the secondary school on the ground that its illogical construc- 

 tions supply an intellectual gymnastic, or because its roots are useful 

 in learning French, understanding law terms and naming new species; 

 but its part in education is no longer leading or dignified. In the twi- 

 light of the classical tradition it is the once radiant elder sister that I 



regret : 



Miiszig kehrten zu dem Dichterlande 



Heim die Gotter, unnfitz einer Welt, 



Die, entwachsen ihrem Gangelbande 



Sich durch eignes Schweben halt. 



There should surely be in our system liberal education, as well as 

 opportunity to learn a trade. I can not, however, believe that superficial 

 knowledge of many subjects is culture, while a thorough knowledge of 

 a few is not; that studies are liberal in direct proportion to their use- 

 lessness; or that certain studies are humanistic and others inhuman. 

 Greek literature may be a 'Brodstudien' and dentistry may be followed 

 as a liberal art. That education is liberal which enlarges the sym- 



