TECHNICAL EDUCATION I 59 



largements made from time to time in the system of aid to 

 science instruction have now rendered it a system which may 

 fairly be said to meet the requirements of the country, as far as 

 elementary science is concerned.' From that assertion I most 

 thoroughly dissent, but I am not prepared to join the ranks of 

 those who think that no good thing can come out of South 

 Kensington. South Kensington has done something for ele- 

 mentary scientific instruction; it has established a system of 

 examinations and rewards, which have stimulated the study of 

 the elements of science. Although I do not approve of all that 

 has been done, although I think that much remains to be done, 

 I will not therefore refuse such assistance as is given, but will 

 rather endeavour to state how I think the value of that assist- 

 ance can be greatly increased and the sphere of its action greatly 

 enlarged. If therefore, in what I am about to say, I criticise 

 freely the acts of the Science and Art Department, I beg you 

 will consider that the criticism is not hostile, but is made with 

 a view to the improvement, not to the injury, of the depart- 

 ment. 



Now, I will draw your attention to what has been done by 

 the department in support of mechanical drawing, and you will 

 thus understand better why I dissent from Captain Donnelly's 

 opinion that the system meets the requirements of the country. 

 I choose mechanical drawing, because I think that a knowledge 

 of the elements of this art is the most useful of all to the work- 

 man. "Why do we think reading, writing, and arithmetic so 

 useful and essential ? Because, without a knowledge of these, 

 little accurate knowledge of any kind can be acquired. These 

 are the tools we put into all men's hands with which to work at 

 the mine of learning, and the knowledge of mechanical drawing 

 is almost as essential a tool as the three others for the workino- 



O 



man. Without a knowledge of this art he cannot represent his 

 own mechanical ideas; worse still, he cannot understand the 

 ideas of others, which he is called upon in his business, as a 

 mason, mechanic, carpenter, joiner, fitter, erecter, and so forth, 

 to carry out ; perhaps, worst of all, he is debarred from learnin^ 

 any of the principles of his special business from books or 

 journals, because he cannot understand the diagrams. So true 

 is this that most skilled artisans and all foremen do contrive 



