370 ON THE STUDY OF ZOOLOGY 



are intellectual tools, whose use should, before all things, 

 be learned, and learned thoroughly ; so that the youth 

 may be enabled to make his life that which it ought to be, 

 a continual progress in learning and in wisdom. 



But, in addition, primary education endeavours to fit a 

 boy out with a certain equipment of positive knowledge. 

 He is taught the great laws of morality ; the religion of 

 his sect ; so much history and geography as will tell him 

 where the great countries of the world are, what they are, 

 and how they have become what they are. 



Without doubt all these are most fitting and excellent 

 things to teach a boy ; I should be very sorry to omit any 

 of them from any scheme of primary intellectual education. 

 The system is excellent, so far as it goes. 



But if I regard it closely, a curious reflection arises. I 

 suppose that, fifteen hundred years ago, the child of any 

 well-to-do Roman citizen was taught just these same 

 things ; reading and writing in his own, and, perhaps, the 

 Greek tongue ; the elements of mathematics ; and the 

 religion, morality, history, and geography current in his 

 time. Furthermore, I do not think I err in affirming, that, 

 if such a Christian Roman boy, who had finished his 

 education, could be transplanted into one of our public 

 schools, and pass through its course of instruction, he 

 would not meet with a single unfamiliar line of thought ; 

 amidst all the new facts he would have to learn, not one 

 would suggest a different mode of regarding the universe 

 from that current in his own time. 



And yet surely there is some great difference between the 

 civilization of the fourth century and that of the nineteenth, 

 and still more between the intellectual habits and tone of 

 thought of that day and this ? 



And what has made this difference ? I answer fearlessly, 

 The prodigious development of physical science within 

 the last two centuries. 



Modern civilization rests upon physical science ; take 

 away her gifts to our own country, and our position among 

 the leading nations of the world is gone to-morrow ; for it 

 is physical science only, that makes intelligence and moral 

 tnrrgy stronger than brute force. 



The whole of modern thought is steeped in science ; it 

 has made its \vny into the works of our best poets, and even 

 the mere man of letters, who affects to ignore and despise 

 science, is unconsciously impregnated with her spirit, and 



