THE ACQUISITION OF LANGUAGE 537 



a portion of Tomline on the Thirty-nine Articles, and a little ancient 

 and modern geography." A few months after leaving school, he told 

 Arthur Stanley that " Eton was a very good place for those who 

 liked boating and Latin verses." It was the painful study of genders 

 and cases, of dactyls and spondees, which contributed little by little 

 to the building up of the logic-weaving machine in his brain. Let 

 any one who can remember his school-boy days try honestly to recall 

 the sentiments which accompanied the translation of a passage whether 

 from the commonplace ' Anabasis ' or an incomprehensible chorus. 

 Let him feel again the emotions which a struggle with the language- 

 puzzle evoked, and he will, if he can remember those days, find that 

 the real meaning of the passage interested him not a whit. He was 

 engaged in the by no means unattractive task of disarticulating a 

 puzzle covered on one side with Greek characters, and so rearranging 

 the pieces that when he turned the whole thing over on to its back he 

 would find that the other side was English. 



No argument could be more disingenuous than that of the would-be 

 reformers who reply to those who, though they recognize the proved 

 potency of the classics as educational instruments, nevertheless ask 

 whether other subjects are not available, if not equally good as instru- 

 ments, yet more prolific of practical results : " Although the classical 

 vehicles have produced such admirable results, you will be amazed to 

 find how much more beneficent they are if you substitute for the 

 vehicles their contents." This is proposing a new venture. It is 

 embarking upon a new scheme of education, which has neither experi- 

 ence nor tradition to support it. No rational man doubts the buman 

 interest of Greek letters; none doubts their moral and aesthetic in- 

 fluence; yet it may be open to question whether boys would not find 

 the Arthurian legends as inspiring as the ' Odyssey,' and the plays of 

 Shakspere as full of wit and precept as Sophocles, JEschyhis and 

 Euripides. However great the Greek example, there are reasons for 

 endeavoring to form the character of English boys upon noble types 

 from nearer home. Besides, the noblest masterpieces of the Greeks 

 have been nobly translated. In English they will do more for a boy's 

 mind than the 'Anabasis' will do in Greek. Boys, whatever their 

 career, must have some literary training, say the apologists for the 

 present system of teaching classics. This is my contention also, but 

 I advance it with still greater emphasis. The literary training ob- 

 tained whilst learning Latin and Greek is indirect, accidental. It is 

 too serious a part of education to be thus left to chance. The gram- 

 mar schools did not aim at giving to a boy the capacity of appreciating 

 the literature of his own land. The old classical training was a drill, 

 boys were taught to mark time, not to march. Generations of jurists 

 and men of action have proved that when they left their grammar 

 schools they were amongst the most vigorous of marchers. No one 



