948 REPORT. -1885. 
most unfortunate results: in no case, probably, is inexperience so inexcusable as im 
an examiner. Too often, also, the examinations are in the hands of pure specialists, 
who take too formal a view of their duty, and expect from boys and girls at school 
as much as from their own students, who are older and devote more time to the 
work. Such examiners are prone to discourage science by marking too severely ; 
and as their questions govern the teaching, instruction is given in schools without 
due reference to educational requirements, and in a purely technical style: this, I 
fear, is the effect of some of the universities’ local examinations. 
I have it on good authority that the recent changes in the scheme of the 
examinations for admission at Sandhurst have forced one large school, well known 
for the attention paid in it to the teaching of science, to cease to give instruction in 
science to those of its pupils who propose to compete at these examinations, at once- 
on their deciding to do so. Then, not only are the science scholarships at the uni- 
versities few in proportion, but the great majority of students pass through their 
university career without being called upon to gain the slightest knowledge of” 
physical science: yet, more often than not, the teachers are chosen from these. A 
large proportion become clergymen, and considering the demands upon them and 
the unbounded opportunities which they have of imparting useful information, there 
cannot be a doubt that to no other class of the community is a knowledge of 
natural science likely to be of more value.’ Let us hope that the time is near 
when our universities will no longer be open to this reproach. Whatever steps 
they may elect to take, it is before all things important that it be not forgotten 
that their main purpose must be to influence the schools, so that experimental 
science may be used as an educational weapon at the most appropriate time, and not 
when the faculties to be fashioned by it have become atrophied through neglect, 
as I fear is too often the case, ere the university is reached. 
We must carefully guard against being satisfied with the mere introduction of 
one or more science subjects into the school curriculum: some of those who 
strenuously advocate the introduction of science teaching perhaps do not sufficiently 
bear this in mind. Chemistry, physics, &c., may be—and I fear are, more often than 
not—taught in such a way that it were better had no attempt whatever been made 
to teach them. I hold that it is of no use merely to set lads to prepare oxygen, &c., 
or to make experiments which please them in proportion as they more nearly re- 
semble fireworks; and it is not the duty of the schoolmaster to train his boys as 
though they were to become chemists, any more than it is his duty to fit them to 
enter any other particular profession or trade: the whole of the science teaching 
in a school should be subservient to the one object of developing certain faculties. 
Unfortunately, two great difficulties stand in the way at present—viz. the want of 
suitable books and of a rational system of teaching science from the point of view 
here advocated; and the requirements of the universities and other examining” 
bodies. Both books and examinations are of too special a character: they may 
suit the specialist, but do not meet educational requirements. I have already 
somewhat fully expressed my views on this subject in a paper read at the Educa- 
tional Conference in London last year. Although much more might be said, I will 
only now call attention to the important service which we may render in removing” 
these difficulties. 
1 ©] sometimes dream,’ said Kingsley, ‘of a day When it will be considered’ 
necessary that every candidate for ordination should be required to have passed’ 
creditably in at least one branch of physical science, if it be only to teach him the 
method of sound scientific thought.’ 
2 | learnt with the most lively satisfaction, but a few days ago, that Dr. Percival, 
the late head-master of Clifton College, speaking at a meeting of Convocation at 
Oxford last term, said: ‘If twenty years ago this university had said: from this time 
forward the elements of natural science shall take their place in responsions side 
by side with the elements of mathematics, and shall be equally obligatory, you would 
long ago have effected a revolution in school education.’ This remark elicited some 
warm expressions of approval. Dr. Percival, I am sure, has the cordial approval of 
all science teachers, and ‘he will earn their gratitude, and deserve that of the public - 
at large, if he can succeed in inducing his university to take action in accordance : 
with his enlightened views. 
