TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION G. 717 



The other usual nine subjects have gradually been added to the curriculum 

 for examination purposes ; they are taught in water-tight compartments — 

 or, rather, they are only crammed, and not taught at all. Our school S3'steni 

 resembles the ordinary type of old-established works, where gradual accretion has 

 produced a higgledy-piggledy set of shops which one looks at with stupe- 

 faction, for it is impossible to get business done in them well and promptly, and 

 yet it seems impossible to start a reform anywhere. What is wanted is an 

 earthquake or a fire — a good tire — to destroy the whole works and enable the 

 business to be reconstructed on a consistent and simple plan. And for much iht 

 same reason our whole public-school system ought to be ' scrapped.' What we 

 want to -see is that a boy of fifteen shall be fond of reading, shall be able to com- 

 pute, and shall have some knowledge of natural science ; or, to put it in another 

 way, that he shall have had mental training in the study of his own language, in 

 the experimental study of mathematics, and in the methods of the student of 

 natural science. Such a boy is fit to begin any ordinary profession, and whether 



different position from that of the others. If any proof of this statement is wantecf, 

 it will be found in the published utterances of all sorts of men — military officers, 

 business men, lawyers, men of science, and others — who, confessedly ignorant of 'the 

 tongues,' get into a state of rapture over their school experiences and the efficiency 

 of Latin as a means of education. All this comes from the fact, which schoolboys 

 are sharp enough to observe, that English schoolmasters can teach Latin well, and 

 they do not take much interest in teaching anything else. It is a power inherited 

 from the Middle Ages, when there really was a simple system of education. I asb 

 for a return to simplicity of system. English (the King's English ; I exclude 

 Johnsonese) is probably the richest, the most complex language, the one most worthy 

 of philologic study ; English literature is certainly more valuable than any ancient 

 or modern literature of any one other country, yet admiration for it among learned 

 Englishmen is wonderfully mixed with patronage and even contempt. At present, 

 is there one man who can teach English as Latin is taught by nearly every master of 

 every school ? Just imagine that English could be so taught by teachers capable of 

 rising to the level of our literature I 



I have often to give advice to parents. I find the average parent exceedingly 

 ignorant of his son's character or inclinations or ability. He pays a schoolmaster 

 handsomely for taking his son off his hands except during holidays. During the 

 holidays, so terrible to a parent, he sees his son as little as possible. One question 

 always asked is : Do you think it better to have ' theoretical ' instruction (they 

 alwa3's call it by this absurd name) before or after an actual apprenticeship in 

 works 7 Of course, such a question canuot be answered offhand. You tell the parent, 

 to his great astonishment, that you must see the boy himself. When at length youi 

 see him, the chances are that you will find him to be what the schoolmasters are 

 making of all our average boys. No part of his school work has been a pleasure to 

 him, and, although he has had to work hard at his books, not one of the above three 

 powers is his— power to use books and to write his own language ; the language of 

 his nurse, his mother, his mistress that is to be, his enemies and friends ; the only 

 language in which he thinks — power to compute and a liking for computation — 

 power to understand a little of natural phenomena. Honestly I practically never 

 find that such a boy has had any education at all except what he has obtained at home 

 or from his school companions or from his sports. Even his sports are to keep him 

 healthy of body only and not at all to cultivate his mental powers. Those old games- 

 like ' Prisoners' Base,' which really developed in a wonderful way not only all the 

 muscles of the body, but also the thinking power, are scorned in the public schools. 

 Think now how such a boy is handicapped if we pitchfork him into works where it 

 is nobody's duty to teach him anything, or send him to college, where he cannot 

 understand the lectures. Of course, if he is very eager to be an engineer he will, by 

 hook or by crook, get to understand things. I have met some such men— clever, suc- 

 cessful engineers in spite of all sorts of adverse circumstances — but the best of them 

 are willing to admit that they are, and have always been, greatly hurt by the absence 

 of the three powers which I have specified. And if this has been so in the past, when^ 

 the scientific principles urkderlying engineering have been simple, how much more- 

 60 is it now, when every new discovery in physics is producing new branches of 

 engineering ! 



