Part 8 (1/2)
But whatever is good for y for schoolboys should be of a less academic cast
The natural history of anis the inborn curiosity of youth, that its subject-matter is universally at hand, accessible in holidays and in the absence of teachers or laboratories, and best of all that through biological study the significance of science appears i the true story of man's relation to the world From natural history the transition to the other sciences, especially to cheain natural In the study of life many of the fundamental conceptions of those sciences are met with on the threshold, and boys whose aptitudes are rather of the physical order will at once feel the iy is the ood che sometimes indeed more devoid of such comprehension than many a philosopher fresh froress froers Biology for the young readily degenerates into a mawkish ”nature-study,” or all-for-the-best claptrap about adaptation, but a sure re one of the best lessons science has to offer, the resolute rejection of authority
Soht as branches of science, but the fact that must permanently postpone arrival at this educational Utopia is that a great proportion of teachers are not and can never befroulation, or even Order of the Board be ever made to bear any colourable resemblance to science Moreover as has already been indicated, there are plenty of pupils also ill flourish and probably reach their highest developht by unscientific men, pupils whose minds would be sterilised or starved by that very nourishenerous Were we a hoht be justifiable, but as things are, we should offer the greatest possible variety
Fro their views, I suppose, froical conception of human equality, speak continually of the ” of our species conforical knowledge serves ress to record Dr Blakeslee[4], a well-known Aood illustration of this In a paper on education he showed photographs of two varieties of maize
The ripe fruits of both are colourless if their sheaths be unbroken
The one, if exposed to the light before ripening, by rupture of its sheath, turns red The second, otherwise indistinguishable, acquires no red colour though uncovered to the full sun If these maizes were two boys, not i to respond to treatment so efficacious in the case of the other When we hear that such a man has developed too exclusively one side of his nature, hat propriety do we assume that he had any other side to develop? Or e say that such-and-such a course of study tends to make boys too exclusively literary, or scientific, or what not, do we not really mean that it provides too exclusively for those whose aptitudes are of these respective kinds? Living in the rel population we note the divers powers of our fellows and we thoughtlessly i different had happened to us, we can't say what, we should have been able to rival them A little honest examination of our powers sho vain are such suppositions
The right course is toand unscientific persons will re of this universal and undifferentiated sort, provided for all in coin to show their tastes and aptitudes, in general about 16, after which stage such latitude of choice should be given as the resources of the school can provide
Of what should the undifferentiated teaching consist? Co from a cultivated home a boy of 10 may be expected to have learned the rudie, preferably French, _colloquially_, arithraphy, tales fro to a preparatory school he will read easy Latin texts _with translations_ and notes; French books, geography including the eleeo once a week, he will begin Greek, by ain with the translations beside hi the rest as before
Transferred at 14-1/2 to a public school he will go on with Latin, starting Latin prose, Greek texts, again read fast with translations
He will now have his first for up to lessons and demonstrations in chemistry and physics At about 16-1/2 heas his tastes have declared the science in all cases, greater or less in a to his proclivities
Boys with special mathematical ability will of course need special treatment Moreover provision of German for all has avowedly not been made For all it is desirable and for many indispensable But as the nue, seems likely to diminish, German may perhaps be reserved as a tool, the use of which must be acquired when necessary
Such a scheme, I sub indeed s in English or history Note the s worth learning is found by dropping _grammar_ as a subject of special study There are to be no lessons in grammar or accidence as such, nor of course any verse co in classics _Mathematics_ also is treated as a subject which need not be carried beyond the rudiments unless mathematical or physical ability is shown For other boys it leads literally nowhere, being a road iht as we learn them in later life, when the desire or necessity arises, by es with the translation at our side Our present practice not only fails to teach languages but it succeeds in teaching how _not_ to learn a language Who thinks of beginning Russian by studying the ”aspects” of the verbs, or by coray of Latin declensions?
Auxiliary verbs are the pedagogue's delight, but who begins Spanish by trying to discriminate between _tener_ and _haber_, or _ser_ and _estar_, or who learns tables of exceptions to is coes are treated not as lessons but as vehicles of speech, and if the authors are read so that we may find out what they say and how they say it, and at such a pace that we follow the train of thought or the story, all who have any sense of language at all can attend and with pleasure too What chance has a boy of enjoying an author when he knows hih, thirty lines at a time?
Sreat authors were s were lory, that Herodotus is telling of wonders that his friends, and we too, want to hear, that in the tragedies we hear the voice of Sophocles dictating, choked with emotion and tears; that even Ro to tell, and Caesar, dull proser that he is, corammatical curiosities, but as a record of extraordinary events To get into touch with any author heof that kind there is plenty of time for a boy before he reaches 17 to make acquaintance with much of the best literature both of Greek and Latin
Educationthat, we lose Greek, it will have been sacrificed to obstinate foric tradition The defence of classics as a basis of education is generally misrepresented by opponents The unique value of the classics is not in any begetting of literary style We are thinking of readers not of writers Much of the best literature is the work of unletteredus, but it is for the enjoy of books and of the world that continuity with the past should be uage but his own But how ments could he form? We want also to keep classics and especially Greek as the bountiful source of material and of colour, decoration for the jejune lives of coht and becoulf between the literary and the scientific will be made still wider Milton will need more explanatory notes than O Henry Who will trouble about us scientific students then? We shall be , and in the world of laboratories Hector, Antigone and Pericles will soon share the fate of poor Ananias and Sapphira
I coravest part of the whole question We plead for the preservation of literature, especially classical literature, as the staple of education in the na: but no less do we demand science in the name of truth and advancement Given that our de iued that even if scientific knowledge be widely diffused, any great change in the co classes is scarcely attainable under present conditions of social organisation Even if science stand equal with classics in exaeneral tenor of the public mind will in all likelihood be undisturbed Yet it is for such a revolution that science really calls, and coe Science saves us frolycerine, sho to econoh they decide national destinies, are : the harvest is behind For natural knowledge is destined to give man not only a direct control of the her probleland make a stand upon the ancient way, peoples elsewhere willof science, especially biological science, are feeling after new rules of conduct
The old criteria based on ignorance have little worth ”Rights,”
whether of persons or of nations, may be abstractions well-founded in law or philosophy, but the eneral ignorance of science has lasted so long that we have virtually two codes of right and duty, that founded on natural truth and that e from tradition, which almost alone finds public expression in this country Whether we look at the cruelty which passes for justice in our cri which custom demands as a part of medical ethics, at this very question of education, or indeed at any problem of social life, we see ahead and know that science proclaientler creeds
When in the wider sphere of national policy we read the declared ideals of states They bid us exalt national senti influence, and in the next breath proclai the world is to guarantee to all nations freedom to develop, ”unhindered, unthreatened, unafraid” So, forsooth, are we to end war
Nature laughs at such dreams The life of one is the death of another
Where are the tee populations of the West Indies, where the civilisations of Mexico or of Peru, where are the blackfellows of Australia? Since roup can increase or develop save at the expense of another is an illusion, instantly dissipated by appeal to biological fact, nor would a biologist-statesman look for per co in population Rather must a people fa is the pride of nations, knowing that both the peace of the world and the progress of civilisation are to be sought not by the hardening of national boundaries but in the substitution of cosmopolitan for national aspiration
[Footnote 1: _Les Lois de l'Imitation_, 1911, p 87]
[Footnote 2: Reported in _Evening Standard_, 11 Sept 1916]
[Footnote 3: Two Cah, the Chaire, for several years an Oxford professor]