366 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



possible to appeal to experience, and to test abstract principles 

 by the results of practice. 



I propose, therefore, to take each of the propositions to 

 which I have just referred, to prove, in each case, that I am 

 not misrepresenting our author by asserting that he supports 

 them, and to inquire how far they can be maintained in the 

 light of the wider knowledge and longer experience of 

 to-day. 



It is difficult to discuss separately the questions as to 

 whether the most useful teaching is that for which there is 

 most popular demand, and as to how such teaching is best to 

 be secured, as the two are very closely connected ; but it may 

 be pointed out in the first place that Adam Smith admits 

 that the proposition that the best teaching is that which most 

 directly meets the desires of the student, cannot apply to very 

 young children. " Force and restraint," he says, " may, no 

 doubt, be in some degree requisite, in order to oblige children, 

 or very young boys, to attend to those parts of education 

 which it is thought necessary for them to acquire during 

 that early period of life." 



He also admits that the principle under discussion will 

 not apply to the elementary education of the children of the 

 poorer classes. 



"For a very small expense," he says, "the public can 

 facilitate, can encourage, and can even impose upon almost 

 the whole body of the people, the necessity of acquiring [the] 

 most essential parts of education. 



" The public can facilitate this acquisition by establishing 

 in every parish or district a little school, where children may 

 be taught, for a reward so moderate, that even a common 

 labourer may afford it ; the master being partly, but not wholly 

 paid by the public ; because if he was wholly, or principally 

 paid by it, he would soon learn to neglect his business. . . . 



"The public can encourage the acquisition of those most 

 essential parts of education, by giving small premiums, and 

 little badges of distinction, to the children of the common 

 people who excel in them. 



" The public can impose upon almost the whole body of the 

 people the necessity of acquiring the most essential parts of 

 education, by obliging every man to undergo an examination 

 or probation in them, before he can obtain the freedom in any 



