58 Selections from Huxley 



on the contrary, he applies his simple theory of govern- 

 ment, and believes that his rulers are the cause of his suf- 

 ferings a belief which sometimes bears remarkable prac- 

 tical fruits. 



5 Least of all, does the child gather from this primary 

 " education " of ours a conception of the laws of the 

 physical world, or of the relations of cause and effect 

 therein. And this is the more to be lamented, as the 

 poor are especially exposed to physical evils, and are 



10 more interested in removing them than any other class 

 of the community. If any one is concerned in knowing 

 the ordinary laws of mechanics one would think it is the 

 hand-laborer, whose daily toil lies among levers and 

 pulleys; or among the other implements of artisan work. 



15 And if any one is interested in the laws of health, it is 

 the poor workman, whose strength is wasted by ill-pre- 

 pared food, whose health is sapped by bad ventilation and 

 bad drainage, and half whose children are massacred by 

 disorders which might be prevented. Not only does our 



20 present primary education carefully abstain from hinting 

 to the workman that some of his greatest evils are trace- 

 able to mere physical agencies, which could be removed 

 by energy, patience, and frugality; but it does worse 

 it renders him, so far as it can, deaf to those who could 



25 help him, and tries to substitute an Oriental submission 

 to what is falsely declared to be the will of God, for his 

 natural tendency to strive after a better condition. 



What wonder, then, If very recently an appeal has 

 been made to statistics for the profoundly foolish pur- 



30 pose of showing that education is of no good that it 

 diminishes neither misery, nor crime, among the masses 

 of mankind? I reply, why should the thing which has 

 been called education do either the one or the other? If 

 I am a knave or a fool, teaching me to read and write 



