DEPARTMENT OF ARTS, 



ART AS EDUCATIOK 



BY ALFORD PAYNE. 



INTEODUCTION. 



Having been asked to prepare a paper for this scientific assem- 

 blage, I have chosen as a subject, Art as a means of Education. 

 But why comes one, unpractical, unscientific, into this learned 

 body ? The answer is, he comes in all sincerity to commend to 

 popular notice, through the prestige given by your academy, a 

 class of truths, as educational, which he thinks are not valued as 

 they should be. 



Are we not generally liable, if not to overestimate our own 

 special lines of study, at least to undervalue the departments of 

 knowledge which we have not much considered? Eare is the 

 man, who, with Lord Bacon can make all departments of knowl- 

 edge his province. The clergyman is thought to live too exclu- 

 sively in dogmatic theology ; the lawyer sees this, and listens with 

 a critical sharpness based on a conviction of the immense value 

 of a knowledge of jurisprudence, coupled with thorough legal 

 training ; and he may, perchance, undervalue theology, for, like 

 the physician in Chaucer, his study may be "but little in the 

 Bible." We may trace this tendency in all classes of men, even, 

 it may be, amongst students of physics and artists, and so on till 

 we find it illustrated in the shoemaker who knew there was noth- 

 ing like leather. Realizing this tendency in myself, but earnestly 

 desiring to value every department of knowledge justly, and feel- 



