57 8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



an accomplished fact. Grateful as I am for all that is now being done, 

 in the same direction, in our higher schools and universities, I have 

 ceased to have any anxiety about the wealthier classes. Scientific 

 knowledge is spreading by what the alchemists called a " distillatio 

 per ascensum ; " and nothing now can prevent it from continuing 

 to distill upward and permeate English society, until, in the re- 

 mote future, there shall be no member of the Legislature who does 

 not know as much of science as an elementary schoolboy ; and even 

 the heads of houses in our venerable seats of learning shall acknowl- 

 edge that natural science is not merely a sort of university back-door, 

 through which inferior men may get at their degrees. Perhaps this 

 apocalyptic vision is a little wild ; and I feel I ought to ask pardon 

 for an outbreak of enthusiasm, which, I assure you, is not my com- 

 monest failing. 



I have said that the Government is already doing a great deal in 

 aid of that kind of technical education for handicraftsmen which, to 

 my mind, is alone worth seeking. Perhaps it is doing as much as it 

 ought to do, even in this direction. Certainly there is another kind 

 of help of the most important character, for which we may look else- 

 where than to the Government. The great mass of mankind have 

 neither the liking, nor the aptitude, for either literary, or scientific, 

 or artistic, pursuits ; nor, indeed, for excellence of any sort. Their 

 ambition is to go through life with moderate exertion and a fair share 

 of ease, doing common things in a common way. And a great bless- 

 ing and comfort it is that the majority of men are of this mind ; for 

 the majority of things to be done are common things, and are quite 

 well enough done when commonly done. The great end of life is not 

 knowledge, but action. What men need is as much knowledge as they 

 can assimilate and organize into a basis for action; give them more 

 and it may become injurious. One knows people who are as heavy 

 and stupid from undigested learning as others are from over-fullness 

 of meat and drink. But a small percentage of the population is born 

 with that most excellent quality, a desire for excellence, or with spe- 

 cial aptitudes of some sort or another ; Mr. Galton tells us that not 

 more than one in four thousand maybe expected to attain distinction, 

 and not more than one in a million some share of that intensity of in- 

 stinctive aptitude, that burning thirst for excellence, which is called 

 genius. 



Now, the most important object of all educational schemes is to 

 catch these exceptional people and turn them to account for the good 

 of society. No man can say where they will crop up ; like their 

 opposites, the fools and knaves, they appear sometimes in the palace 

 and sometimes in the hovel ; but the great thing to be aimed at, I 

 was almost going to say the most important end of all social arrange- 

 ments, is to keep these glorious sports of Nature from being either 

 corrupted by luxury or starved by poverty, and to put them into the 



