98 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XX. No. 499. 



edge. Grammar, rhetoric and dialectics 

 were taught to all who entered the schools ; 

 arithmetic, geometry, astronomy and music 

 were reserved for the more advanced, who 

 were~ few in number. The former were 

 language studies; it was understood then 

 as now that language, one's own language, 

 is the most important subject for the begin- 

 ner to study. It is a significant fact that 

 the Greeks studied no language but their 

 own. In Rome, too, aU knowledge was 

 found in the Trivium. Having little else 

 to study, the Greeks and Romans each built 

 up a language and a literature which have 

 never been surpassed, the former for its sci- 

 entific accuracy, the latter for the beauty of 

 its thought and the elegance of its diction. 

 The sciences of the Quadrivium were slowly 

 developed by the Greeks, the Romans and 

 the Arabs, and in the case of geometry and 

 music were brought to a high degree of 

 perfection. But science in these early as 

 in later days met with much opposition 

 from those whose chief study was language 

 or philosophy. Socrates believed that the 

 study of science was profitless and wrong, 

 ' for he did not think that such matters were 

 discoverable by men, nor did he believe 

 that those acted dutifully towards the gods 

 who searched into things that they did not 

 wish to make known.' Locke must have 

 been reading Socrates when two thousand 

 years later in his 'Thoughts on Education' 

 he said: "Natural pliilosophy as a specu- 

 lative science, I imagine we have none, and 

 perhaps I may think I have reason to say 

 we never shall be able to make a science of 

 it. The works of nature are contrived by 

 a Wisdom and operate by ways too far sur- 

 passing our faculties to discover or capac- 

 ities to conceive, for us ever to be able to 

 reduce them to a science." During the 

 dark ages ignorance and superstition 

 blotted out all education and all desire for 

 education among European peoples, the 

 Mooi-s of Spain alone excepted. Some 



remnant of learning remained in the mon- 

 asteries, but it was only enough to accentu- 

 ate the intellectual darkness which envel- 

 oped the nations. 



The rise of the mediaeval universities 

 marked the revival of learning. In Paris, 

 Oxford, Bologna, Prague, Vienna and 

 many other cities were established great 

 schools of the liberal arts, law, medicine 

 and theology. The Trivium and the 

 Quadrivium were still the principal sub- 

 jects studied. Learning was surrounded 

 by a high wall and the only entrance to the 

 sacred enclosure was through the Latin 

 gate. All books were in Latin; Latin 

 grammar and rhetoric were first studied. 

 Pupils slowly repeated grammatical rules 

 recited by the teacher and then learned by 

 rote the Avorks of the classic authors. Dia- 

 lectics next received attention and pupils 

 spent years in wrangling in Latin over 

 disputed constructions in grammar or 

 knotty points of law and theology. There 

 was no vernacular literature. The lore of 

 the ages had been concentrated in Greece 

 and Rome, and though these countries were 

 now shorn of their ancient splendor, they 

 still dominated the world of learning. This 

 was but natural, as the languages of west- 

 ern Europe were crude and unformed, while 

 the classic tongues were polished and re- 

 fined. Latin was the language of the edu- 

 cated ; a knowledge of it opened the door to 

 all art, literature and science. It was the 

 badgeof an aristocracy, a secret brother- 

 hood of learning. Those within the order 

 had certain privileges not possessed by 

 others and they looked down upon those 

 outside their ranks. The education of this 

 period lifted men out of the ignorance in 

 which they had been engulfed for centuries 

 and gave them all the knowledge of the 

 world. This knowledge was centuries old, 

 it is true, but it was fresh and new for 

 those who had rediscovered it. They 

 churned it over and over, pressed it into 



