2 ON THE RELATION OF 



sence of the whole University, I have thought it well to 

 try and take, as far as is permitted by the narrow stand- 

 point of a single student, a general view of the connection 

 of the several sciences, and of their study. 



It may, indeed, be thought that, at the present day, 

 those relations between the different sciences which have 

 led us to combine them under the name Univeraitas Lit- 

 terarum, have become looser than ever. We see scholars 

 and scientific men absorbed in specialities of such vast 

 extent, that the most universal genius cannot hope to 

 master more than a small section of our present range of 

 knowledge. For instance, the philologists of the last 

 three centuries found ample occupation in the study of 

 Greek and Latin ; at best they added to it the know- 

 ledge of two or three European languages, acquired for 

 practical purposes. But now comparative philology aims 

 at nothing less than an acquaintance with all the lan- 

 guages of all branches of the human family, in order 

 to deduce from them the laws by which language itself 

 has been formed, and to this gigantic task it has already 

 applied itself with superhuman industry. Even classical 

 philology is no longer restricted to the study of those 

 works which, by their artistic perfection and precision of 

 thought, or because of the importance of their contents, 

 have become models of prose and poetry to all ages. On 

 the contrary, we have learnt that eveiy lost fragment of 

 an ancient author, every gloss of a pedantic grammarian, 

 eveiy allusion of a Byzantine court-poet, every broken 

 tombstone found in the wilds of Hungaiy or Spain or 

 Africa, may contribute a fresh fact, or fresh evidence, and 

 thus serve to increase our knowledge of the past. And 

 so another group of scholars are busy with the vast 

 scheme of collecting and cataloguing, for the use of their 

 successors, every available relic of classical antiquity. 



