LEARNING FOREIGN LANGUAGES 569 



the language of the foreigner he is trying to teach, so much the better. 

 But this knowledge is not essential. In this way the most ignorant 

 person will soon acquire a few hundred words and phrases which will 

 be a nucleus about which he may enlarge his vocabulary as much as he 

 pleases. Although his pronunciation will be very faulty, he will be 

 able to express himself in a way, and to understand fairly well what is 

 said to him. When teacher and pupil are equally in earnest progress 

 will usually be quite rapid up to a certain point. This point is difficult 

 to pass. For the successful teaching of Latin and Greek to schoolboys 

 a much higher degree of pedagogical ability is essential. Here the 

 teacher has to deal with complex thoughts strangely expressed and more 

 or less above the comprehension of the learner, one of the objects of this 

 kind of instruction being to train his mind up to them. The instructor 

 should not only have a competent knowledge of the language he teaches ; 

 he should also have psychological insight, fertility in resources, vivacity 

 of manner and a good measure of literary training. When pupils are 

 only half in earnest or somewhat defective in verbal memory, and the 

 teacher lacks any or all of the above-named qualifications, instruction is 

 " up-hill work," and the results decidedly unsatisfactory. My personal 

 observation of the teaching of Latin and Greek leads me to believe that 

 there is generally too much grammatical hair-splitting and too little 

 reading. A teacher needs to know very little about a language to be 

 able to spend day after day with a class discussing verbal niceties. The 

 serious student of a foreign language soon discovers the method that is 

 best for him, and his progress is usually rapid. In any case the text- 

 book ought to occupy an inconspicuous place. 



With the advancing years our educational system will supply more 

 and more fully the needs of the rising generation. The time is not far 

 distant when schools will be called into being wherein everything will 

 be taught that is worth learning. So far as languages are concerned, 

 there will always be persons who will study them for their literature 

 rather than for their practical value. There will always be professors 

 of Latin and Greek, although it is a misnomer to call the latter a dead 

 language. It is more alive than the English of Chaucer. Besides, it 

 may be predicted with confidence that those persons whose native tongue 

 is English will have less and less need to learn any other, except for a 

 more or less permanent residence abroad. 



vol. lxxvii.— 39. 



