4 6 



to gracefully give place before Nature's command. If not, the 

 only hope is that a strong genius will burst the repressing bonds 

 and shoot into its proper place by the energy of its own explosion, 

 a method which is at all events wasteful. 



In regard to the relative importance of subjects in the 

 " something of everything" class we may follow the order of 

 Spencer. First, those relating to direct self-preservation should 

 include sufficient physiology and hygiene, so as to give a chance of 

 keeping in good health. Indirect self-preservation comes next : 

 those parts of knowledge conducing to the attainment of a liveli- 

 hood. Reading, writing, and arithmetic are the first needs. 

 Arithmetical tables should be learned purely by rote, so as to be 

 available without thought for immediate use when required. 

 Any cumbrous short cuts of a so-called rational character, 

 or of the nature of mnemonics, should therefore be avoided. 



Among the more directly practical subjects may be mentioned 

 some of the modern languages and book-keeping for boys, and 

 household economics, cookery and dressmaking for girls. Then 

 come principles underlying trades and occupations as the 

 following, among which the pupil might take up as many and 

 as much of each as he felt able for, mechanics, physics, 

 chemistry : these should of course be learned experimentally, 

 the student working out his own experiments, drawing his own 

 conclusions, training hand and eye and mind at once : geo- 

 graphy, studied graphically : economics, a subject on which 

 there is too great a want of knowledge. Mathematics — especially 

 geometry (not the empirical abomination called " Practical 

 Geometry " taught by South Kensington Art Schools, but 

 logical geometry), geology, botany, biology (these by actual 

 observation of the minerals, plants and animals treated of), 

 and astronomy, also by observation, as referred to before, are 

 most important. 



The next division is that of subjects relating to parenthood, 

 perhaps more needed by girls than boys, including again hygiene, 

 physiology, and the science of education, none of which, as I 

 have already hinted, has been considered worth the study of the 



