NATURE 



229 



THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 23, 1922. 



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The Function of English in Scientific 

 Education. 



HE Report of Mr. Fisher's Committee on the 

 Teaching of English in England (pp. 394, 

 [.M.S.O., 1921, i^. dd. net) has a refreshing 

 3velty of outlook. As the serious study of English 

 the schools has an even shorter history than that 

 science, this Committee is little affected by peda- 

 5gic prejudices and vested interests, so that it is 

 )ld enough to treat all subjects taught in schools 

 as coming Avithin one or other of two groups, 

 l-.nglish and Science. 



This classification calls for wide definitions; it 

 is laid down that " in school, science must be, for 

 teacher and for student, the methodical pursuit of 

 truth and the conquest of the physical world by 

 human intelligence and skill." The term " English" 

 lias in the past been interpreted in many w-ays. 

 i'he public-school master of thirty or forty years 

 ago would think of it as connoting geography, tiie 

 history of England, and a little analysis and pars- 

 ing, syntax and accidence. The Committee's 

 definition is very different; it does not concern itself 

 primarily with history or geography or with the 

 study of language, but with the English language 

 is a means of communication, oral and written, 

 tnd with the content of books written in English 

 as a storehouse of ideas, whether native or trans- 

 lated, and as an agent of emotional and aesthetic 

 ulture. Thus education is divided into " the train- 

 ing of the will (morals), the training of the intel- 

 lect (science), and the training of the emotions (ex- 

 pression or creative art)," corresponding to the 

 view that " the three main motives which actuate 

 tlie human spirit are the love of goodness, the love 

 "f truth, and the love of beauty." 

 NO. 2730, VOL. 109] 



A separation of .function of this kind has some 

 value, if only to make us realise the necessity of 

 each of the different components of a complete 

 education. In practice, however, any one subject 

 of study can and does perform several functions, 

 overlapping those of other subjects which are akin 

 to it. Thus some aspects of the study of English 

 are of essential utilitarian value to a man of science, 

 such as training in the power to write or speak 

 clearly, lucidly, without ambiguity or prolixity, and 

 if possible with a sense of style such that the reader 

 may be attracted as well as instructed. But this 

 power cannot be developed in the student without 

 traversing much of the same ground as would be 

 covered if the chief aim were the development of 

 other faculties. So there will be economy of time 

 and effort if English is used as the vehicle for an 

 education in the humanities. It is universally 

 agreed that, even for full efficiency in his own 

 department, the science specialist must have such 

 an education ; it is the chief concern of the Com- 

 mittee to show how completely English can be made 

 to fulfil that function. 



The Committee mentions with approval the 

 methods which have been developed at Osborne and 

 Dartmouth in the training of naval cadets for their 

 future career, which may be regarded as predomin- 

 antly scientific, but in which they will need all the 

 faculties of a liberally educated mind and char- 

 acter. For they may have to be diplomatists, tac- 

 ticians, and strategists, and must certainly be 

 leaders of men no less than practical scientific 

 workers ; they must be equipped for controlling 

 minds as well as machines. This problem is not 

 peculiar to the Navy, though perhaps it is more 

 obvious there owing to the close contact, under one 

 controlling authority, between those who train and 

 those who employ the product of the naval college, 

 a contact closer than is practicable, for example, 

 between schoolmasters and leaders in the business 

 world. Hence the experience of Dartmouth may 

 be of more than local interest. 



It says much for the prescience of the Admiralty 

 that it should have committed itself, so far back 

 as 1903, on the advice of the eminent man of 

 science. Sir Alfred Ewing, who was then Director 

 of Naval Education, to the faith that, given ade- 

 quate time and skilled treatment, most of the values 

 hitherto judged to accrue solely from a classical 

 education were to be derived from the study of 

 English. . The experience gained during the past 

 eighteen years in acting on this belief has gone far 

 to justify it, and it is satisfactory to note that 

 the methods which have been elaborated are in close 



