OBJECT OF EDUCATION 167 



which I have found unattractive — which it would not have 

 been pleasant to me to follow, so far as I could go ; and I have 

 yet to meet with any form of art in which it has not been 

 possible for me to take as acute a pleasure as, I believe, it is 

 possible for most to take." 



In allusion to his wide experience of races and castes 

 he says : — 



" And I have never found, in any of these conditions of life, 

 a deficiency of something which was attractive. Savagery has 

 its pleasures, I assure you, as well as civilization, and I may even 

 venture to confess — if you will not let a whisper of the matter 

 get back to London, where I am known — I am even fain to 

 confess, that sometimes in the din and throng of what is called 

 ' a brilliant reception,' the vision crosses my mind of waking up 

 from the soft plank which had afforded me satisfactory sleep 

 during the hours of night, in the bright dawn of a tropical 

 morning, when my comrades were yet asleep, when every sound 

 was hushed, except the little lap-lap of the ripples against the 

 sides of the boat, and the distant twitter of the sea-bird on the 

 reef. And when that vision crosses my mind, I am free to con- 

 fess I desire to be back in the boat again." 



His previous opinions about the educational value of 

 physical science are reaffirmed, given a proper selection 

 of topics, practical teaching, practical teachers, and a 

 sufficiency of time. Otherwise the subject is best left 

 alone : — 



" The whole object of education is, in the first place, to train 

 the faculties of the young in such a manner as to give their 

 possessors the best chance of being happy and useful in their 

 generation ; and, in the second place, to furnish them with the 

 most important portions of that immense capitalized experience 

 of the human race which we call knowledge of various kinds." 



Education should involve reasoning and feeling, in- 

 tellectual exercise and aesthetic training, in other words 

 both Science and Art, though between these there is no 



