110 SECTIONAL ADDRESSES. 



the fundamental economic relations between man and natural resources, 

 or those elementary social units by which the food-quest and other essential 

 activities have been carried on. A modern Cretan village is amazingly 

 like its Minoan predecessor, at all points where we can compare their 

 arrangements and economy. In secluded districts Greek city states have 

 preserved their corporate life, and even their constitutional structure, 

 from classical to modern times, and more of those communities have 

 been first remodelled since their release from Turkish rule than were 

 disorganised by Turkish conquest. 



There is therefore, I think, good reason to urge that at whatever 

 stage the history of the ' classical ' civilisation is included in the programme 

 of education, the regional geography of the Mediterranean basin should 

 be its customary counterpart, and that the two courses should be carried 

 on with habitual cross-reference to each other. And conversely, when 

 the proper moment comes for the study of the Mediterranean basin 

 geographically, the history-course should be planned so as to supplement 

 it in respect of the more significant achievements of Mediterranean 

 peoples, and also to illustrate — what can nowhere else be attempted over 

 so long a range of time — those effects of long-continued human occupancy 

 which have disfigured some Mediterranean lands beyond repair and 

 paralysed the later periods of their history. 



Ancient Geography in ' Simple Bible Teaching.' 

 For the earlier periods of history, and for that other great factor of 

 our own civilisation which is our inheritance from the Ancient East, the 

 difficulties of correlation, which at first sight might appear greater, are in 

 fact insignificant. For here we have ready to hand a great textbook 

 already in compulsory use ; at the same time great literature and great 

 history ; a great classic of Oriental life and its surroundings, and a master- 

 piece of English prose ; the historical books of the Hebrew people, in our 

 own Authorised Version. With this example before us of what is not 

 only practicable but prescribed irresistibly by public opinion as a funda- 

 mental element in public education, and with the knowledge we have of 

 the profound influence which, in this shape, ancient geography, ancient 

 history, and ancient literature alike have had in the formation of our 

 national outlook, can anyone fairly say either that ancient geography, 

 so conceived and illustrated as the regional aspect of great historical 

 events, is without direct utilitarian value in modern life, or that there is 

 no room for it in the curriculum of our schools ? 



We all know very well that the Old Testament is sometimes taught more 

 as if it were a collection of parables or allegories than as geography, or 

 history, or even literature ; but I venture to suggest that it is in proportion 

 as we teach it as geography, as well as history and literature, that its value 

 as parable or allegory will be most surely appreciated. The more 

 impartially and objectively we bring to Hebrew history and literature the 

 geographical commentary and illustration which we devote as a matter 

 of course to the records of other Great Peoples, the more thoroughly we 

 accustom ourselves and our pupils to treat these texts as a current source 

 for incidents and illustrations of certain phases of human adventure, the 

 more conspicuously do their remarkable qualities, both as history and 



