56 MY LIFE 



to give class preferences in the expenditure of public money. 

 If we follow this principle, national education is not forbidden, 

 whether given in schools supported by the State, or in 

 museums, or galleries, or gardens fairly distributed over the 

 whole kingdom, and so regulated as to be equally available 

 for the instruction or amusement of all classes of the com- 

 munity. But here a line must be drawn. Hie schools, the 

 museums, the galleries, the gardens must all alike be popular 

 — that is, adapted for and capable of being fully used and 

 enjoyed by the people at large — and must be developed by 

 means of public money to such an extent only as is needful 

 for the highest attainable popular instruction and benefit. All 

 beyond this should be left to private munificence, to societies, 

 or to the classes benefited, to supply. 



' In art, all that is needed only for the special instruction of 

 artists or for the delight of amateurs, should be provided by 

 artists or amateurs. To expend public money on third-rate 

 prints or pictures, or on an intrinsically worthless book, both 

 of immense money value on account of their rarity, and as 

 such of great interest to a small class of literary and art 

 amateurs, and to them only, I conceive to be absolutely wrong. 

 So, in science, to provide museums such as will at once elevate, 

 instruct, and entertain all who visit them may be a worthy and 

 just expenditure of public money; but to spend many times 

 as much as is necessary for this purpose in forming enormous 

 collections of all the rarities that can be obtained, however 

 obscure and generally uninteresting they may be, and however 

 limited the class who can value or appreciate them, is, as 

 plainly, an unjust expenditure. It will perhaps surprise some 

 of your readers to find a naturalist advocating such doctrines 

 as these; but though I love nature much, I love justice more, 

 and would not wish that any man should be compelled to con- 

 tribute towards the support of an institution of no interest to 

 the great mass of my countrymen, however interesting to 

 myself. 



" For the same reason, I maintain that all schools of art or 

 of science, or for technical education, should be supported by 

 the parties who are directly interested in them or benefited 



