SCIENCE AND CULTURE 35 



But even if there be, in present fact, any such in- 

 feriority as is supposed in the educational value of science, 

 this is, I believe, not the fault of science itself, but the 

 fault of the spirit in which science is taught. If its full 

 possibilities were realised by those who teach it, I believe 

 that its capacity of producing those habits of mind which 

 constitute the highest mental excellence would be at 

 least as great as that of literature, and more particularly 

 of Greek and Latin literature. In saying this I have no 

 wish whatever to disparage a classical education. I have 

 not myself enjoyed its benefits, and my knowledge of 

 Greek and Latin authors is derived almost wholly from 

 translations. But I am firmly persuaded that the Greeks 

 fully deserve all the admiration that is bestowed upon 

 them, and that it is a very great and serious loss to be 

 unacquainted with their writings. It is not by attacking 

 them, but by drawing attention to neglected excellences 

 in science, that I wish to conduct my argument. 



One defect, however, does seem inherent in a purely 

 classical education namely, a too exclusive emphasis 

 on the past. By the study of what is absolutely ended 

 and can never be renewed, a habit of criticism towards 

 the present and the future is engendered. The qualities 

 in which the present excels are qualities to which the 

 study of the past does not direct attention, and to 

 which, therefore, the student of Greek civilisation may 

 easily become blind. In what is new and growing 

 there is apt to be something crude, insolent, even a 

 little vulgar, which is shocking to the man of sensitive 

 taste ; quivering from the rough contact, he retires to 

 the trim gardens of a polished past, forgetting that they 

 were reclaimed from the wilderness by men as rough 

 and earth-soiled as those from whom he shrinks in his 

 own day. The habit of being unable to recognise merit 



