258 The Microscope. 



do not understand, it will do them no more good than seeing a 

 conjuring trick, perhaps hardly so much ; but if children are en- 

 couraged to examine first the more simple vegetable structures, 

 making their own sections and proceeding gradually from low 

 powers to higher ones, from coarse to minute and complex struc- 

 tures, they can hardly fail, if capable of enlightenment at all, 

 to obtain such new notions of the universe in which they live as 

 will never wholly cease to influence their minds. The lore ac- 

 tually gained may perhaps be comparatively small ; but the true 

 gain will be in the power to think about occurrences, to discover 

 real resemblances between things which are externally differ- 

 ent, and to perform that wonderful work of ratiocination through 

 which two ideas, similar or contrasted, become the parents of a 

 third. It is difficult to believe that a child who was not only 

 permitted to work with a Microscope, but who was assisted to 

 do so in a rational way, encouraged to collect his own objects, 

 to examine them in his own fashion, to try to overcome his own 

 difficulties and doubts, would ever grow up into an entirely stu- 

 pid man or woman. There are but few who are gifted with the 

 infinite patience and the love of truth for its own sake which 

 form the raw material, so to speak, of the philosopher; but the 

 instances are at least equally few in which the lessons in obser- 

 vation and reflection, which even a small Microscope is calcu- 

 lated to afford, would not serve to raise the mind of the user to a 

 higher level, and to develop a higher degree of intelligence than 

 could have been obtained without such help. 



In a few very good schools, chiefly for the children of the 

 more wealthy classes, natural history teaching by the aid of Mic- 

 roscopes is systematically conducted, the classes collecting their 

 own specimens, and being expected to give the best account 

 they can of them before being assisted towards a better one by 

 the teacher. Our argument is that all this should be done much 

 more widely and generally ; education, in fact, being made to 

 advance along a road which is rendered comparatively smooth 

 by the perfection of modern appliances. The tasks of school, in 

 too many cases, appeal to the memory rather than to the under- 

 standing, and cultivate stupidity rather than intelligence. It is 

 impossible to doubt that much which is taught, say in Board 

 schools, might be relinquished without any appreciable loss to 



