Science in National Education 



happened has been that during the controversy between the 

 representatives of the old academic life and those of the new 

 knowledge each set has learned something from the other. . . . 

 The lesson which the naturalists have taught to the classicists 

 is that no department of life in a past age can be fully under- 

 stood except by the man who has mastered that department of 

 life in the present, and therefore that the methodical knowledge 

 of the world which is called science, so far from being antago- 

 nistic to a due appreciation of the ancients, is one of the keys 

 by which the ancient mind can be unlocked. One special 

 branch of modern inquiries has profoundly influenced the 

 whole range of classical studies. It is that of comparative 

 grammar. The discovery of Bopp that the Greek and Latin 

 languages are identical in the main lines of their structure and 

 the bulk of their substance with the language of the Vedic 

 hymns and the exposition first carried out by Jacob Grimm of 

 the growth of all the modern German or Germanic dialects 

 from the same original stem showed Greek and Latin scholars 

 that the languages with which they were dealing were to be 

 regarded not as edifices of finished structure like a Pyramid or 

 a Parthenon, but as living organisms, and therefore passing 

 through the perpetual changes of growth and decay. Thus the 

 idea of evolution made its way into the domain of classical 

 scholarship, in which it fertilised and regenerated every de- 

 partment. To-day this idea and the historical method which 

 is inseparable from it are the common property of both parties. 

 The naturalists have come to admit the justification of the 

 study of ancient life, and the humanists to see that their ancient 

 world, with its languages and literatures, becomes more intel- 

 ligible and more interesting when regarded from the point of 

 view of growth, that is, as a living thing. 



" There is no limitation of studies by the time and place of 

 the subject. The purpose of them all is the same to enable 

 us to know ourselves and the world we live in. The moment 

 that the Greeks and the Romans are studied with that purpose 

 they cease to be mere bygone peoples and have a living in- 

 terest. The schoolmaster's function is to introduce the boy to 

 the world and to life. Provided he will do that, neither the prac- 

 tical man nor the naturalist will carp at his choice of subject. 



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