476 
NAL ORE 
[Afarch 10, 1870 
In addition to these courses there are similarly extensive 
programmes for (A) the department of Architecture, and 
(C) the department of Mechanical Engineering. The 
number of regular students in the year 1867, was in these 
subjects (A) department of Architecture, 33 ; (B) depart- 
ment of Civil Engineering, 103 ; (C) department of 
Mechanical Engineering, 87. 
That the Polytechnic system of science education finds 
favour, at any rate, with the German State Governments, 
and therefore probably also with the people, is apparent 
from the fact that large institutions of the kind have just 
been built in Prussia (at Aix-la-Chapelle), in Austria (at 
Vienna), and in Bavaria (at Munich). In this latter city 
no less a sum than 125,000/. has been expended on the 
building of the new Polytechnicum, erected in a very 
costly style of architecture, and covering five acres of 
ground, whilst distinguished men from all parts of Ger- 
many have been called to fill the newly-founded professor- 
ships. The cost of the buildings at both Vienna and 
Aix-la-Chapelle will probably not be far short of the above 
amount, and it must be remembered that labour and 
material are very much (probably one-half) lower in Ger- 
many than with us. The expenses of education at the 
Polytechnica are very small; at Carlsruhe attendance on 
the regular courses of lectures costs 5/. 10s. for the 
session of nine months ; the fee for chemical laboratory 
practice for the same length of time is 32 155. to 
regular students, and 5/. to occasional students, At 
Ziirich the fees are even lower, as any of the regular 
courses of the distinct departments or schools can be 
attended for the payment of 109 francs, or about 4/. 45. 
for the session of nine months. 
The age for entrance into the Polytechnic Schools is 
one year younger than that forthe German Universities, viz. 
seventeen: the duration for study is the same, three years. 
Here, too, evidence of fitness is vigorously exacted of 
those who propose to enter as regular students, in the 
shape of an adequate school certificate, either from a 
gymnasium, a real-gymnasium, or a Real-Schule; or, in 
default of that, an entrance examination must be passed. 
A much higher mathematical preparation is demanded 
than is needed for entering the University, a knowledge 
at least up to, and in some schools including, the dif- 
ferential calculus being required. Persons of all ages, 
however, and not possessing such qualification, are ad- 
mitted freely and without examination, as occasional 
students in the several departments. Many of these occa- 
sional students are often poorly prepared ; but it is con- 
sidered that the gain to such auditors, and to society 
through them, is great ; and that, whatever tendency might 
arise from this practice towards the lowering of the stan- 
dard of instruction could be guarded against by rigidly 
keeping up the standard of admission for regular students. 
To many of the Polytechnica is attached a preliminary 
school, in which those who are not ripe for the full studies 
of the Polytechnicum can supply their deficiencies. The 
age for entrance to this Vorschu/e is sixteen. 
In all the Polytechnica with which the writer is ac- 
quainted, it is the schools of civil and mechanical 
engineering, building construction, and architecture which 
really flourish. These departments of applied science 
are not represented in the German university system, 
whereas the study of chemistry in its various divisions, 
and of mechanics and physics in their numerous branches, 
forms a portion of every university course. Indeed, as a 
tule, the lectures delivered in the Polytechnic Schools on 
chemistry and physics differ very slightly, if at all, in 
character and scope from those which the University 
professor delivers. The fact is that the teaching of special 
technical chemistry in the Polytechnica has been found to 
be impossible. All that can be done in any school is, in 
the first place, to teach the groundwork of the science 
without regard to its applications, and then to point out 
the scientific principles upon which certain technical pro- 
cesses depend. No system of theoretical school instruc- 
tion will fit a man to be a dyer or a calico-printer, or even 
a chemical manufacturer. These arts can only be learnt 
by practice on the large basis of practical experience, 
and all that Polytechnic Schools can do is to prepare the 
ground for a proper reception of that practical experience 
by a sound training in scientific principles.* This 
scientific training is, however, just as much the special 
work of the University as of the Polytechnicum, and 
there appears to be no valid reason for the separate ex- 
istence, often side by side in one town, of a University 
and a Polytechnic School. On many grounds the absorp- 
tion of the Polytechnicum by the University appears 
advisable. In the first place there is room to fear that 
a due supply of thoroughly good teachers, especially in 
science—at least in the higher positions—cannot be 
secured for institutions perpetually growing in number, 
while, on the other hand, a great waste of power is caused 
where such institutions exist side by side, as many of the 
professorships, being common to Universities and Poly- 
technic Schools, are thus twice represented. 
Again, serious harm must come from the tendency 
which this separation of the Polytechnic School from the 
University has to foster the narrow one-sidedness already 
so strong in the extreme partisans of the one and the 
other group of studies. The Universities would suffer by 
the weakening in them of those branches of pure and 
applied science which have always been and must continue 
to be studied there. The Polytechnic schools would suffer 
(and already do suffer) from the tendency, thus encouraged, 
to neglect the educational aspects of science in considering 
its practical applications. How great the gain has been 
to the branches of the liberal arts and sciences from their 
alliance in Universities, the history of Universities from 
their first foundation abundantly shows: and it is difficult 
to see any sufficient reason why the applied sciences, such 
as Engineering, in their professional aspect should not 
have their proper place in the organisation of the Univer- 
sity, exactly as Theology, Law, and Medicine have long 
had their place, to the great advantage both of these stu- 
dies themselves and of the non-professional studies with 
which they have been brought into contact. 
Signs are already observable in Germany, according 
to the highest authorities, that the zeal for teaching 
science in its application to the practical arts is 
encroaching on the domain of science proper, and that 
science will be deteriorated without, at the same time, 
industry being advanced. The true work of institutions, 
* This is clearly admitted in certain cases by the Polytechnic authorities 
themselves. Thus I find in the regulations of the Carlsruhe Agricultural 
School the following words printed in large type :—‘ This school is concerned 
with the cultivation of the mind of the student, not with learning the technical 
operations of agriculture.” 
