^^Tarch 8, 1877] 



NATURE 



391 



during the whole motion the condition that the optic axes 

 shall intersect at some point of the object whose mo- 

 tions we are following. Besides this, the motion of each 

 eye about its optic axis is found to be connected in a 

 ; remarkable way with the motion of the axis itself. 

 i The mode in which Helmholtz discusses these pheno- 

 [mena, and illustrates the conditions of our command over 

 the motions of our bodies, is well worth the attention of 

 those who are conscious of no limitation of their power 

 of moving in a given manner any organ which is capable 

 of that kind of motion. 



In his other great work on the '" Sensation of Tone as 

 a Physiological Basis for the Theory of Music," he illus- 

 trates the conditions under which our senses are trained 

 in a yet clearer manner. We quote from Mr. Ellis's 

 translation, p. 95 : — 



" Now practice and experience play a far greater part 

 in the use of our senses than we are usually inclined to 

 assume, and since, as just remarked, our sensations 

 derived from the senses are primarily of importance only 

 for enabling us to form a correct conception of the world 

 without us, our practice in the observation of these sensa- 

 tions usually does not extend in the slightest degree 

 beyond what is necessary for this purpose. We are 

 certainly only far too much disposed to believe that we 

 must be immediately conscious of all that we feel and of 

 all that enters into our sensations. This natural belief, 

 however, is founded only on the fact that we are always 

 immediately conscious, without taking any special trouble, 

 of everything necessary for the practical purpose of form- 

 ing a correct acquaintance with external nature, because 

 during our whole life we have been daily and hourly 

 using our organs of sense and collecting results of expe- 

 rience for this precise object." 



Want of space compels us to leave out of consideration 

 that paper on Vortex Motion, in which he establishes 

 principles in pure hydrodynamics which had escaped the 

 penetrative power of all the mathematicians who preceded 

 him, including Lagrange himself; and those papers on 

 electrodynamics where he reduces to an intelligible and 

 systematic form the laborious and intricate investigations 

 of several independent theorists, so as to compare them 

 with each other and with experiment. 



But we must not dwell on isolated papers, each of which 

 might have been taken for the work of a specialist, though 

 few, if any, specialists could have treated them in so able 

 a manner. We prefer to regard Helmholtz as the author 

 of the two great books on Vision and Hearing, and now 

 that we are no longer under the sway of that irresistible 

 power which has been bearing us along through the 

 depths of mathematics, anatomy, and music, we may 

 venture to observe from a safe distance the whole figure 

 of the intellectual giant as he sits on some lofty cliff 

 watching the waves, great and small, as each pursues its 

 independent course on the surface of the sea below. 



" I must own," he says, " that whenever I attentively 

 observe this spectacle, it awakens in me a peculiar kind 

 of intellectual pleasure, because here is laid open before 

 the bodily eye what, in the case of the waves of the in- 

 visible atmospheric ocean, can be rendered intelligible 

 only to the eye of the understanding, and by the help 

 of a long series of complicated propositions." — (" Ton- 

 empfindungen," p. 42). 



Helmholtz is now in Berlin, directing the labours of 

 able men of science in his splendid laboratory. Let us 

 hope that from his present position he will again take a 



comprehensive view of the waves and ripples of our intel- 

 lectual progress, and give us from time to time his idea 

 of the meaning of it all. 



J. Clerk Maxwfxl 



THE UNIVERSITIES BILL 



PEOPLE'S notions of "reform" differ very much 

 according to their interest in or knowledge of the 

 kind of thing to be reformed. At present there is much 

 talk of university reform, but there is really no proposi- 

 tion before the public for reforming the universities. 

 The Government Bill is simply intended to adjust 

 certain parts of the machinery of the ancient corpora- 

 tions at Oxford and Cambridge and to oil the wheels 

 which with the lapse of time hive become rusty. 

 There is no intention to make Oxford and Cambridge 

 what they were three centuries ago — namely universities 

 in the sense in which the word " university " is applied 

 (excepting the cases of London and Durham) to every 

 other institution claiming the title in civilised Europe. 

 The historic process by which the endowed boarding- 

 houses at Oxford and Cambridge known as colleges fell 

 into the hands of the clerical party, and subsequently 

 became possessed of the sole control of the university, 

 suppressing the higher Faculties, with the exception of 

 the Theological, and driving from the university all 

 students but those who could afford to make a ruinous 

 annual payment to the cooks, butlers, scouts, and tutors 

 of one college or another in exchange for indifferent board 

 and lodging and a " religious education " in a school-boy's 

 horn-book, under the disciplinary system devised by the 

 Jesuits, is not to be reversed. No re-constitution of the 

 Faculties — the absolutely essential step in the reformation 

 of decayed universities — is proposed, nor is the Bachelor- 

 of-Arts curriculum to be relegated to its proper place — 

 the preparatory schools. The colleges are still to have it 

 all their own way, are to be allowed still to compete with 

 one another in buying at the rate of 100/. a year the 

 chances of distinction which a promising school-boy can 

 give by entering his name on the college-books ; they are 

 still to pursue the fruitless task of training these youths 

 so as to obtain for the college the largest possible number 

 of " first classes " in an examination arranged and con- 

 ducted by the colleges (whose representatives far outnum- 

 ber the professoriate) in subjects and methods which the 

 student should either have dropped at the threshold of 

 the university or should pursue in a spirit and with a 

 thoroughness incompatible with the conditions of these 

 competitive examinations. Prize fellowships awarded 

 by competitive examination are still to be the in- 

 centives to these mercenary studies on the part of 

 the young men ; the university professor, even though 

 he may be multiplied by two, is still to occupy the am- 

 biguous position which is at present his lot — by right the 

 director of the studies connected with his chair, but, in 

 fact, shorn of the privileges and functions of his office 

 through the eager competition of colleges for examina- 1, 

 tion honours and tutorial fees. Worse than all, the ridi- ^ 

 culous "matriculation" examinations are 7iot to be 

 superseded by a thorough university matriculation exami- 

 nation — to the want of which the disgraceful inefficiency 

 of school- teaching in all our public schools is due. 



