PUBLIC SCHOOL EDUCATION. 



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History has been described — and rightly, I think — as the only 

 true philosophy, whose great lessons are for all time ; yet th's really 

 important branch of learning was made only permissive ! This 

 shows the mind of our oldest and most " distingue " University ! 



It is for the public school masters to put pressure on the Uni- 

 versities, and, if possible, to compel them to change their plans. 



I am an old man, and speak of some forty years ago. If I have 

 not been at a public school myself, I have met many who have ; 

 and whilst I have found their manners very good, I could not say 

 the same of their morals, which were conventional, or of their general 

 intelligence, which was commonplace. 



As to morals, a man might bilk his tradesman, but he must not 

 cheat at cards. 



I remember once in India making a whole mess-table impotently 

 furious when, in answer to a remark that officers as a whole were 

 honourable men, I answered to the effect that if they were so 

 they would look on it as dishonourable to cheat in horseflesh as 

 at the card-table. 



Referring to the remark of another speaker, that the great classical 

 scholars were the greatest successes in after life, I would say that 

 this seems to be putting the cart before the horse. Brilliancy in 

 classics connotes a prompt and retentive memory, a sign of natural 

 physical vigour — the true cause, humanly, of success. 



Author's Reply. 



Mr. CoSTLEY White, in his reply, thanked the speakers for their 

 generous and kindly criticism, with most of which he agreed. 

 Though a teacher's best training was gained in the school of 

 practical experience, he said that he always encouraged a young 

 master to take a course of preparation afforded by the admirable 

 Training Colleges now established at the Universities. In the 

 Divinity lesson the first and last principle must be to find out what 

 was the message which God was sending to all of us here and now 

 through the lips of the Biblical writers of the past ages. 



