616 TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION L. 



think of headmasters who have attained what I can only call an ill-deserved 

 reputation, because their pupils have won numerous scholarships and exhibitions 

 upon leaving school, when those same pupils had been mentally exhausted in 

 youth, and their after-life in no way answered to the promise of their early 

 days. ' By their fruits ye shall know them ' ; but the fruits of a true education 

 are seen not in the spring but in the summer or the autumn of a well-spent life. 



It is with reference to the final goal of education that the subjects suited 

 to the secondary curriculum must be judged. If the possible subjects are too 

 many, it becomes necessary to strike the balance between utility and culture, 

 and so to decide which subjects are indispensable and which may fairly be 

 subordinated or postponed. 



The most striking change which has come over secondary education has 

 arisen from the number of subjects now claiming admission to the curriculum. 

 Scarcely more than fifty years ago the headmaster of a public school was almost 

 at his wits' end to fill up the time-table of his pupils. Dr. Arnold was 

 appointed to the headmastership of Rugby in 1S28, and Dean Stanley says of 

 him that ' he was the first Englishman who drew attention in our public schools 

 to the historical, political, and philosophical value of philology of the ancient 

 writers, as distinguished from the mere verbal criticism and elegant scholarship 

 of the last century.' He adds that ' besides the general impulse which he gave 

 to miscellaneous reading both in the regular examinations and by encouraging 

 the tastes of particular boys for geology and other like pursuits, he incorporated 

 the study of modern history, modern languages, and mathematics into the work 

 of the school, which attempt, as it was the first of its kind, so it was at one 

 time the chief topic of blame and praise in his system of instruction.' Other 

 public-school masters followed suit, but they followed slowly. What the system 

 of education had hitherto been may be judged from Malim's ' Consuetudin- 

 arium,' which specifies no subject of instruction except Latin, with a little 

 Greek grammar in the sixth and seventh forms. The dancing-master was a 

 more ancient and more honourable figure in some public schools than any 

 mathematical-master. Mathematics, in fact, were not introduced into Eton until 

 1836. Other subjects in addition to the classics came even later. 



But within the last fifty years, not only mathematics but the English 

 language and literature, foreign languages, natural science in its various 

 branches, history, and geography, have become competitors with the ancient 

 classical languages for recognition in the curriculum of public schools. There 

 is no one of them which is not worthy of such recognition. But the average 

 intelligence of a public-school boy has remained the same, and the average 

 length of his life in the public school has been diminished by as much as one- 

 half. It has become necessary therefore to make a selection between the subjects 

 which might well, if they could, be taught to all boys alike. Nor is this truth 

 less applicable to girls than to boys. 



It may be thought that not enough attention has been paid to the order in 

 which particular subjects are taught. The number of subjects imposed upon 

 a child of ten to twelve years is at times not less alarming than forbidding. 

 Psychology suggests the adaptation of particular subjects to the awakening of 

 particular powers at different ages. Even in literature there is a natural affinity 

 which is too often disregarded between books and the ages at which they ought 

 to be read. How many children have read ' The Pilgrim's Progress ' at too late, 

 or have read ' Hamlet ' and ' Paradise Lost ' at too early, an age for true appre- 

 ciation ! In literature as elsewhere discrimination is the watchword of educa- 

 tional success. 



From these considerations it seems to follow that the scientific educator must 

 choose certain subjects as the basis of secondary education, and I venture to 

 think that these subjects should be as nearly as possible common to boys and 

 to girls. Other subjects can be left to the choice of particular students at a 

 later period of their lives. Not all subjects are possible or useful to all students. 

 Soon or late, then, uniformity of teaching must give way to specialisation. 



Yet education loses a great part of its value unless it ensures to all educated 

 men and women what may be described as a common educational property. It 

 is desirable that they should not only all learn some things which are worth 

 knowing, but that they should learn the same things. For upon community 

 of information or of interest depends the sympathy of all educated people. 



