Liberal Education. 285 



urged from considerations of general culture, and 

 not of narrow utility. And for this we heartily 

 commend the writers. There is no reason what- 

 ever why Philistinism should be allowed the ex- 

 clusive protectorship of physical science. To as- 

 sail or defend the study of it, while taking into 

 account only its utilitarian aspects, is wholly to 

 ignore the true state of the question. It is to 

 commit a mistake like that committed by Ma- 

 caulay in his eloquent but superficial essay on 

 Bacon. The study of science, properly conducted, 

 is by no means subservient to objects of narrow 

 utility. The utilitarian point of view, in the lim- 

 ited sense of the word, is not at all apparent in 

 Laplace's explanation of the perturbed motions of 

 the planets, in Gerhardt's theory of atomicity, in 

 Cuvier's classification of animals, or in Darwin's 

 investigations into the principles of variation. 

 Indeed, that profound but somewhat chimerical 

 writer, Auguste Comte, expressly finds fault with 

 contemporary followers of science because they 

 do not sufficiently confine themselves to investi- 

 gations which have a perceptible bearing upon 

 the interests of society. In his pontifical fashion, 

 he authoritatively warns us against pursuing such 

 useless inquiries as those which concern stellar 

 astronomy, the cellular structure of organic be- 



