LEARN AND SEARCH. 449 



the background. Those to the understanding of whose branches 

 the ancient languages as such contribute directly no essential part 

 have to consider how far a full training in mathematics and sci- 

 ence can furnish for their branches and for general cultivation as 

 well an adequate substitute for the want of classical training. 

 Experience has not supplied a decision on this point. It can be 

 remarked only that among the foreigners who have been admitted 

 to our classes are many who have not enjoyed a gymnasial 

 training in our sense, and who yet attend the lectures with com- 

 mendable interest and with evident good results. 



There undeniably exists an essential difference in respect to 

 the demands which individual faculties have to make on the 

 preparation of those coming to them from the schools. The fu- 

 ture must teach us whether a single kind of higher schools can 

 satisfy these various demands. But a definite answer can already 

 be given respecting one of them. If the classical languages are 

 no longer competent to supply the unifying bond that formerly 

 connected all the different directions of learned culture, a substi- 

 tute for them can be found only in that golden triad of mathe- 

 matics, philosophy, and science on the development of which all 

 modern civilization touches. 



It is a matter of secondary importance for this discussion 

 whether the roots of this culture should be sought still further in 

 the East, in Egypt or in Babylonia. The continuity of Western 

 civilization actually begins for us on the western coasts of Asia 

 Minor with those Ionian Greeks who first laid mathematical study 

 of the heavenly bodies at the base of their discussions concerning 

 the universe, and who produced the first natural philosophy, in 

 which all that man knew about Nature was reduced to a harmoni- 

 ous picture. In this philosophy lies the actual beginning of that 

 universal consideration of the world which has been significantly 

 called " world wisdom," and which has gradually led to a funda- 

 mental transformation of the old conceptions of the heavens and 

 the earth and of man himself. That is the imperishable title of 

 the Grecian philosophy to be held in honor. 



The full comprehension of this fact arose very late among the 

 Western peoples. When, after the fall of Constantinople, Greek 

 scholars fled to Italy, and Greek literature spread rapidly at that 

 time, when the humanists arose in Germany, and one university 

 after another was founded, then the independent spirit of investi- 

 gation first lifted itself up in all nations. Mathematicians and 

 naturalists abounding in original strength appeared, and philoso- 

 phers were soon active in adapting the conceptions of men to the 

 new views and in grasping the fundamentals of intellectual life. 



Right in the beginning of this memorable period appeared the 

 man whose great achievement mankind has just been festively 



VOL. XLIII. 80 



