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until the position held has been assailed, to argue the point 

 is mere waste of time, particularly if there be no definition given 

 of the term "literary." Again, one might ask, if it be now 

 necessary to press the point that the real object of a general 

 education is to learn to employ one's leisure rationally. It is 

 a truism in one sense, although a curious limitation of the object 

 of a general education ; here again we are met by the tacit 

 assumption that the words "general education" are synonymous 

 with " classical education " or " education on classical lines." 

 To other points the writer has referred in a letter to the Times 

 of July 4. Dr. Gow's address as a whole, however, reflects 

 so peculiarly the limitations of the classical mind that it may 

 be advisable to repeat the criticism offered elsewhere in a more 

 or less modified form. In the first place Dr. Gow states " it is 

 probable that, where Latin is neglected, no very close study 

 is given to any other language." It is permissible perhaps 

 to doubt the legitimacy of the inference ; if it be true, it is 

 indeed a terrible indictment of our schools. We may fairly 

 ask what work is done on the modern side during the hours 

 in which the classical side is struggling with the rules and 

 exceptions of Latin and Greek grammar. Surely a more 

 logical deduction — on the assumption that a certain proportion 

 of any time-table is allotted to literary work — is that the 

 neglect or rather the omission as a formal subject of Latin 

 implies that more time is available for other languages, in 

 particular, let us hope, the mother tongue. In fact, Dr. Gow, 

 like the majority of his colleagues, confuses the words classical 

 and literary. There is no doubt that, in the past, the words 

 had the same connotation ; surely the assumption is neither 

 necessary nor expedient in these days. No one denies, no one 

 has ever questioned the value of a literary education for any 

 purpose ; but it is puerile to argue that study of the classics 

 alone — such study as can be given to them by the average 

 schoolboy— can be regarded as literary education. However 

 far the study of classics may trend in the direction of literary 

 culture— and it would be idle to deny that it does so trend, for 

 this is practically its only claim to the consideration of those 

 interested in education — there is little doubt that the pains and 

 penalties endured by the average boy in acquiring this — to him 

 apparently useless — knowledge, go far to neutralise whatever 

 cultural value such a study may have, apart from the fact that 



