1866.] Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. 127 



passages of Mr. Macleod's address, which I will read. He says, " Not- 

 withstanding some brilliant exceptions, the great hulk of our scholars 

 never attain more than a very superficial knowledge either of English 

 or of the subjects they study in that language, while the mental 

 training imparted is, as a general rule, of a purely imitative character, 

 ill-calculated to raise the nation to habits of vigorous and independent 

 thought :" and " The youths who are attracted to our schools and 

 colleges are, for the most part, those who desire only to qualify them- 

 selves for public employ, or to acquire a colloquial knowledge of 

 English, seldom or never including youths of those classes who are 

 used to devote themselves wholly to the cause of learning." These 

 observations very much tally with those made by another distinguish- 

 ed man and great thinker, at the late meeting of the Calcutta Univer- 

 sity, by the Vice- Chancellor, Mr. Maine. He also dwelt on the want 

 of masculine vigour — on the imitative character of the present Native 

 Education. He told the students that their acquisitions were too 

 much an effort of memory, and too little an exercise of the reasoning 

 faculties, and he recommended the greater cultivation of exact sciences, 

 as distinguished from mere English literature. Now it seems evident, 

 that the acquisition of a strange language must be in the main a 

 severe and long continued effort of memory, and that there now stands 

 in the way a great obstacle to the cultivation of those European 

 sciences which Mr. Maine recommends. Such are the drawbacks as 

 respects the natives. Another and, I think, no inconsiderable draw- 

 back of the present system is in its effects on Europeans. It seems 

 to me to be indisputable that, during the last quarter of a century, 

 there has not been among Europeans in India the same Oriental zeal 

 and learning as formerly. We have made comparatively few such 

 brilliant discoveries as illustrated the generation which commenced with 

 Sir William Jones : we have even to a great degree neglected to work 

 those rich mines of knowledge opened out by our predecessors, those 

 splendid gold-bearing veins which we inherited from them. Major 

 Lees has justly pointed out, that now more than ever their labours are 

 bearing fruit in Europe. Now more than ever is it seen that the 

 key to the history of language, to the history of man, has been found 

 in India. But I lament to say that progress in India itself has not of 

 late years kept pace with the vast importance of the subject. I have 



