152 LIFE AND EXPERIENCES CHAP. 



composition, though tolerably grammatical, did not touch my 

 conscience (as the French say) and signed. Stuart's lectures 

 in Liverpool seem to have done no harm, rather otherwise. 

 I do not myself believe in Science of any kind as the principal 

 pabulum of the half-cultivated mind ; crude notions in Science 

 are about as unwholesome as Lempriere's dictionary in a 

 slightly different way. They appear as if they would satisfy 

 the love of the marvellous, but they soon get stale for want of 

 human interest. For beginners the best mental pabulum is 

 some kind of history about people, expressed in good style. 

 These things remain in the mind ; and if it is the practice for 

 everybody to learn the same thing, then when they meet in 

 after life they associate upon a common understanding. The 

 Greek knew his Homer, the Jew knew his Bible and so did 

 the Britisher until of late, the M.P. used to know his Horace, 

 &c. And even in Science it is when we take some interest 

 in the great discoverers and their lives that it becomes endur- 

 able, and only when we begin to trace the development of ideas 

 that it becomes fascinating. 



Yours truly, 



J. CLERK MAXWELL. 



n, SCROOP TERRACE, CAMBRIDGE, 



$tk Feb., 1873. 

 DEAR STEWART, 



Many thanks for the three primers. I have not much time 

 on my hands, but it is possible I might do geometrical optics 

 if such a book were wanted. The mechanics, that is to say 

 the doctrines of matter and motion stated simply, is the most 

 important, but at the same time the most difficult subject of all. 

 The thing to remember with beginners is that it is as easy for 

 them to learn right notions as wrong ones, and that precise 

 language is as intelligible as loose language. Above all 

 things, never argue against any prejudice which they have not 

 had time to imbibe as if they were already (like ourselves say, 

 when boys) imbued with it, for by the diffusion of Science, its 

 paradoxes are transformed into truisms. 



This is not criticism of the primers, it is criticism " at large." 



Magnetism is a very good subject for beginners to experi- 

 ment on, but I think optics still better. The experiments 

 succeed so much better than in most other subjects. 



I would arrange the subject in the order which I think best 

 also for Nature students begin with experiments on lenses 

 and mirrors, and show how to use them so as to produce 



