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parted to this study years before the child begins to study 

 words in learning to read. Sidgwick also in Essays on a Liberal 

 Education says, " The very fact that the same instrument is 

 made to serve various educational purposes which seems at first 

 sight a very plausible argument in its favour is really for the 

 majority of boys a serious disadvantage." 



Thring thought classics the only means of real culture, but 

 his argument seems to me weak, and he can scarcely be con- 

 sidered a capable judge, as he was, I believe, himself quite 

 unacquainted with the sciences ; and if it be true, as he says, that 

 few comparatively arrive at any real application of the literary 

 excellence of the classical authors it is- difficult to see where 

 their advantage as an educational study comes in. Mr. James 

 MacAlister in his lecture on Literature thinks modern literature 

 has at least equal value. At all events English and German, 

 with their Shakespeare and Goethe, contain mines of wealth 

 not easily exhausted. 



I would here draw attention to the depraving of the literary 

 taste of young children which goes on by cramming their 

 minds with the rubbish that is inserted as "poetry " in elemen- 

 tary " Readers." The children call it " portry," an appropriate 

 name, no doubt derived from the porcine nature of its authors. 

 Here is an example from the Royal Reader. Compare it with 

 "The Wreck of the Hesperus," " Casabianca," or "Battle of 

 Blenheim," poems which a child of four can, after having 

 heard them read a few times, learn to repeat, comprehend, and 

 appreciate : — 



i. " Butter is made from the milk of the cow, 



2. Pork is the flesh of the pig or the sow, 



3. Cork is the bark of a very large tree, 



4. Sponge grows like a plant in the deep, deep sea, 



5. Oil is obtained from fish and from flax, 



6. Candles are made of tallow and wax, 



7. Linen is made from the fibres of flax, 



8. Paper is made from straw and from rags." 



1. Butter is really a product of the cream only, and a child who 

 does not know that much has no business learning to read. 



