220 THE STRUGGLE FOR EXISTENCE v 



terns fashioned as they were to meet the wants 

 of a bygone condition of society. There is a wide- 

 spread and, I think, well- justified complaint that 

 it has too much to do with books and too little 

 to do with things. I am as little disposed as 

 any one can well be to narrow early education 

 and to make the primary school a mere annexe 

 of the shop. And it is not so much in the in- 

 terests of industry, as in that of breadth of culture, 

 that I echo the common complaint against the 

 bookish and theoretical character of our primary 

 instruction. 



If there were no such things as industrial 

 pursuits, a system of education which does noth- 

 ing for the faculties of observation, which trains 

 neither the eye nor the hand, and is compatible 

 with utter ignorance of the commonest natural 

 truths, might still be reasonably regarded as 

 strangely imperfect. And when we consider that 

 the instruction and training which are lacking 

 are exactly those which are of most importance 

 for the great mass of our population, the .fault 

 becomes almost a crime, the more that there is 

 no practical difficulty in making good these de- 

 fects. There really is no reason why drawing 

 should not be universally taught, and it is an ad- 

 mirable training for both eye and hand. Artists 

 are born, not made; but everybody may be taught 

 to draw elevations, plans, and sections; and pots 

 and pans are as good, indeed better, models for 



