‘TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION L. 603 
expert in things already known, but who can take their places in the forefront of 
the onward march. 
But meanwhile the claims of literary culture, as part of the general higher 
education, must not be neglected or undervalued. It may be that, in the pre- 
scientific age, those claims were occasionally stated in a somewhat exaggerated or 
one-sided manner. But it remains as true as ever that literary studies form an 
indispensable element of a really liberal education. And the educational value of 
good literature is all the greater in our day, because the progress of knowledge 
more and more enforces early specialisation. Good literature tends to preserve 
the breadth and variety of intellectual interests. It also tends to cultivate the 
sympathies ; it exerts a humanising influence by the clear and beautiful expression 
of noble thougbts and sentiments; by the contemplation of great actions and 
great characters ; by following the varied development of human life, not only 
as an evolution governed by certain laws, but also as a drama full of interests 
which intimately concern us. Moreover, as has well been said, if literature be 
viewed as one of the fine arts, it is found to be the most altruistic of them all, 
since it can educate a sensibility for other forms of beauty besides its own. The 
genius of a Ruskin can quicken our feeling for masterpieces of architecture, sculp- 
ture, and painting. Even a very limited study of literature, if it be only of the 
right quality, may provide permanent springs of refreshment for those whose prin- 
cipal studies and occupations are other than literary. We may recall here some 
weighty words written by one of the very greatest of modern men of science. ‘If 
I had to live my life again,’ said Charles Darwin, ‘I would have made it a rule to 
read some poetry and listen to some music at least once every week... . The 
loss of these tastes is a loss of happiness, and may possibly be injurious to the 
intellect, and more probably to the moral character, by enfeebling the emotional 
part of our nature.’ The same lesson is enforced by John Stuart Mill, in that 
remarkable passage of his Autobiography where he describes how, while still a 
youth, he became aware of a serious defect, a great lacuna, in that severe 
intellectual training which, for him, had commenced in childhood. It was a 
training from which the influences of imaginative literature had been rigidly 
excluded. He turned to that literature for mental relief, and found what he 
wanted in the poetry of Wordsworth. ‘I had now learned by experience —this 
is his comment—‘ that the passive susceptibilities needed to be cultivated as well 
as the active capacities, and required to be nourished and enriched as well as 
guided.’ Nor is it merely to the happiness and mental well-being of the individual 
that literature can minister. By rendering his intelligence more flexible, by 
deepening his humanity, by increasing his power of comprehending others, by 
fostering worthy ideals, it will add something to his capacity for co-operating 
with his fellows in every station of life and in every phase of action; it will make 
him a better citizen, and not only a more sympathetic but also a more efficient 
member of society. 
One of the urgent problems of the higher education in our day is how to secure 
an adequate measure of literary culture to those students whose primary concern 
is with scientific and technical pursuits. Some of the younger English Uni- 
versities, which give degrees in Science, contribute to this purpose by providing 
certain options in the Science curriculum; that is, a given number of scientific 
subjects being prescribed for study with a view to the degree of B.Sc., the candidate 
is allowed to substitute for one of these a subject taken from the Arts curriculum, 
such, for instance, as the Theory and Practice of Education. This is the case in 
the University of Wales and in the University of Birmingham; and there are 
indications, I believe, that this example will be followed elsewhere. Considering 
how hard and sustained is the work exacted from students of science, pure or 
applied, it seems important that the subjects from which they are to derive their 
literary culture should be presented to them, not in a dryasdust fashion, not 
chiefly as subjects of examination, but rather as sources of recreation and changes 
of mental activity. From this point of view, for British students of science the 
best literature of the English language offers unequalled advantages. It may be 
mentioned that the Board of Education in London is giving particular attention to 
