TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION B. 603 



tunity than the present for pointing out some of the causes that appear to hinder 

 (uir growth. Let no one think I wish to disparage the University. I should be 

 the last person to do so. I owe to my old college the opportunity, the help, and 

 the example which made me a chemist, and gave me an interest in life. I only 

 wish to see more general tlie advantages it was my luck to meet with in Christ 

 Church. 



Chemistry in modern Oxford is accorded a place side by side with older studies. 

 No one can complain that scholarships are not offered broadcast, that money has 

 not been freely given for laboratories ; and yet I think the student does not feel 

 around him the atmosphere in which an experimental science should be cultivated. 

 We see Chemistry endowed and extended, we do not see it respected by the bulk 

 of students and of learned men. In my undergraduate days a rhyme was current 

 here (I think it was coined in Cambridge — the Parnassus of parodies) expressing 

 views which were undoubtedly held concerning the claims of chemistry as a sub- 

 ject for a degree. One verse ran — it was from the Lamentation of a would-be 

 Bachelor — 



' I thought to pass some time before, but here, alas, I am. 

 Having managed to be plucked in every classical exam. 

 I cannot get up Plato, so my reverend tutor thinks 

 I had better take up Chemistry, which is commonly called " Stinks." ' 



I do not quarrel with the versifier (except as a poet), I do not even quarrel 

 with the reverend tutor, whose opinion of us is obviously small, because I do not 

 think myself that Chemistry as it is taught is a very good subject for a degi'ee. 

 Still less is it a subject which we should allow to monopolise the schoolboy's time. 

 While holding strongly that the elements of Physics and Chemistry form a neces- 

 sary part of a liberal education, I believe we have made two mistakes with regard 

 to the teaching of science. We have by our science scholarships encouraged too 

 early specialisation at school ; we have overburdened our undergraduates here 

 with a multitude of facts they cannot retain. A boy specialises for two years at 

 school ; he learns a prodigious array of facts from the latest text-book, and also 

 acquires some skill in the art of quickly reproducing what he has learnt. He wins 

 a science scholarship. We then tell him he must go back to, or begin, the study 

 of the classical languages we look on as essential for our degrees. By a certain 

 time he must reach a certain (rather low) standard, or his scholarship lapses. He 

 learns that it is advisable to get assistance from those who have made a special 

 study of preparing candidates for pass examinations. He crams ; or he goes to a 

 crammer and is crammed. Let us suppose, as is usually the case, that the obstacle 

 is Greek. I will not deny that the standard of Greek demanded may imply some 

 important discipline at school, and some real culture of the mind, provided the 

 instruction given is on wholesome lines and forms part of a liberal course. Got 

 up in a hiu-ry as it too often is, solely with the object of passing, it means time 

 and effort wasted and worse than wasted. It is of no value in itself, for it is 

 forgotten in less time than it took to acquire ; and it gives the student the first 

 pernicious taste of that superficiality and false knowledge it should be our special 

 aim to remove. Is it not desirable that scholarships should be the reward of pro- 

 gress and ability in the general subjects of school education among which the 

 elements of science should have a place ? The brightest and most persevering boys 

 would come to the University, and there make choice of the special course they 

 wished to pursue. 



My second complaint is that we teach too many facts. They are not all 

 important. After three or four years' steady accumulation our men go into the 

 schools walking dictionaries of chemistry. Parents not unnaturally think that 

 their sons, after four years of college training, should be fit to take responsible 

 places wherever chemists are in demand. But manufacturers, as a rule, do not 

 care for University graduates. I cannot blame them. We cannot guarantee that 

 the men we send out with honours in Chemistry can attack a new problem, can 

 work out new processes, can prepare new dyes. German manufacturers, on the 

 other hand, prefer a University graduate, for they have in their degree a guarantee 



