instruct them in husbandry, &c., and so combine linguistic knowledge with 'real' knowledge.

In the fourth book of the 'Dunciad,' the most consummate master of words thus uses his power to satirise verbal education:

Then thus since man from beast by words is known,
Words are man's province, words we teach alone.

To ask, to guess, to know, as they commence,
As fancy opens the quick springs of sense,
We ply the memory, we load the brain,
Bind rebel wit, and double chain on chain,
Confine the thought to exercise the breath,
And keep them in the pale of words till death.
(Lines 148 ff.)

Cowper, too, says :

And is he well content his son should find
No nourishment to feed his growing mind
But conjugated verbs, and nouns declined?
For such is all the mental food purveyed
By public hackneys in the schooling trade;
Who feed a pupil's intellect with store
Of syntax truly, but with little more;

Dismiss their cares when they dismiss their flock;
Machines themselves, and governed by a clock.
Perhaps a father blest with any brains
Would deem it no abuse or waste of pains,
T'improve this diet, at no great expense,
With sav'ry truth and wholesome common sense;
To lead his son, for prospects of delight
To some not steep tho' philosophic height,
Thence to exhibit to his wondering eyes
Yon circling worlds, their distance and their size,
The moons of Jove and Saturn's belted ball,
And the harmonious order of them all;
To show him in an insect or a flower
Such microscopic proof of skill and power,
As, hid from ages past, God now displays
To combat atheists with in modern days;
To spread the earth before him, and commend,
With designation of the finger's end,
Its various parts to his attentive note,
Thus bringing home to him the most remote:
To teach his heart to glow with generous flame
Caught from the deeds of men of ancient fame.*

Tirocinium.
X

On the other side we have Dr. Johnson :

The truth is, that the knowledge of external nature and the sciences which that knowledge requires or includes, are not the great or the frequent business of the human mind. Whether we provide for action or for conversation, whether we wish to be useful or pleasing, the first requisite is the religious and moral knowledge of right and wrong: the next is an acquaintance with the history of mankind, and with those examples which may be said to embody truth and prove by events the reasonableness of opinions. Prudence and justice are virtues and excellences of all times and of all places; we are perpetually moralists, but we are geometricians only by chance. Our intercourse with intellect, not nature, is necessary; our speculations upon matter are voluntary and at leisure. Physiological learning is of such rare emergence, that one may know another half his life without being able to estimate his skill in hydrostatics or astronomy; but his moral and prudential character immediately appears. Those authors therefore are to be read at schools that supply most axioms of prudence, most principles of moral truth, and most materials for conversation; and these purposes are best served by poets, orators, and historians."

In more recent times the increasing importance of natural science has drawn many of the best intellects into its service. Linguistic and literary instruction now finds few supporters in theory, though its friends have not yet. made much alteration in their practice. Our two last School Commissions have recommended a compromise between the claims of literature and natural science. Both reports state clearly the importance of a training in language and literature, to which our present theorists hardly seem to do justice. The Public Schools Report says:

Grammar is the logic of common speech, and there are few educated men who are not sensible of the advantages they gained, as boys, from the steady practice of composition and translation, and from their introduction to etymology. The study of literature is the study, not indeed of the physical, but of the intellectual and moral world we live in, and of the thoughts, lives, and characters of those men whose writings or whose memories succeeding generations have thought it worth while to preserve.†

*Life of Milton.

† Public Schools Report, vol. i. § 8, p. 28.

The Commissioners on Middle Schools express a similar opinion:

The 'human' subjects of instruction, of which the study of language is the beginning, appear to have a distinctly greater educational power than the material.' As all civilisation really takes its rise in human intercourse, so the most efficient instrument of education appears to be the study which most bears on that intercourse, the study of human speech. Nothing appears to develop and discipline the whole man so much as the study which assists the learner to understand the thoughts, to enter into the feelings, to appreciate the moral judgments of others. There is nothing so opposed to true cultivation, nothing so unreasonable, as excessive narrowness of mind; and nothing contributes to remove this narrowness so much as that clear understanding of language which lays open the thoughts of others to ready appreciation. Nor is equal clearness of thought to be obtained in any other way. Clearness of thought is bound up with clearness of language, and the one is impossible without the other. When the study of language can be followed by that of literature, not only breadth and clearness, but refinement becomes attainable. The study of history in the full sense belongs to a still later age: for till the learner is old enough to have some appreciation of politics, he is not capable of grasping the meaning of what he studies. But both literature and history do but carry on that which the study of language has begun, the cultivation of all those faculties by which man has contact with man.'

AXIOMATIC TRUTHS OF METHODOLOGY.

1. The method of nature is the archetype of all methods, and especially of the method of learning languages.

2. The classification of the objects of study should mark out to teacher and learner their respective spheres of action.

3. The ultimate objects of the study should always be kept in view, that the end be not forgotten in pursuit of the means. 4. The means ought to be consistent with the end.

5. Example and practice are more efficient than precept and theory.

6. Only one thing should be taught at one time; and an accumulation of difficulties should be avoided, especially in the beginning of the study.

7. Instruction should proceed from the known to the unknown,

* Middle Schools Report, vol. i. c. i. p. 22.

from the simple to the complex, from concrete to abstract notions, from analysis to synthesis.

8. The mind should be impressed with the idea before it takes cognisance of the sign that represents it.

9. The development of the intellectual powers is more important than the acquisition of knowledge; each should be made auxiliary to the other.

10. All the faculties should be equally exercised, and exercised in a way consistent with the exigencies of active life.

11. The protracted exercise of the faculties is injurious: a change of occupation renews the energy of their action.

12. No exercise should be so difficult as to discourage exertion, nor so easy as to render it unnecessary: attention is secured by making study interesting.

13. First impressions and early habits are the most important, because they are the most enduring.

14. What the learner discovers by mental exertion is better known than what is told him.

15. Learners should not do with their instructor what they can do by themselves, that they may have time to do with him what they cannot do by themselves.

16. The monitorial principle multiplies the benefits of public instruction. By teaching we learn.

17. The more concentrated is the professor's teaching, the more comprehensive and efficient his instruction.

18. In a class, the time must be so employed, that no learner shall be idle, and the business so contrived, that learners of different degrees of advancement shall derive equal advantage from the instructor.

19. Repetition must mature into a habit what the learner wishes to remember.

20. Young persons should be taught only what they are capable of clearly understanding, and what may be useful to them in after life.*

FROM JANUA LINGUARUM.'

480. Of Journeyes and Passages.-Let a traveller go straightway whither he is going without turnings; let him not turn or stray out of the way into by-wayes. 481. Let him not leave the highway for a foot-path; unless it be a beaten path or a way much

* From Marcel on Language. London, 1853. As M. Marcel shows a thorough mastery of his subject, he may be trusted as giving the commonly received conclusions.

used, or that the guide or companion know the way. 483. A forked way or carfax (bivium aut quadrivium) is deceitful and uncertain... 486. Boots are fit for one that goeth far from home, or shoes of raw leather because of the mire and dirt; and a broad hat or cover of the head because of the sunne, and a cloak to keep from rain, and a staffe to rely or lean upon, for it is a help and a support. 487. There is likewise need of provision to make expenses, and to bear the charges, or at least of letters of exchange. 488. But of patience withall; for it happeneth or cometh to pass sometimes to be all the night abroad or in the open aire. 489. Wheresoever or in what place soever thou be consider with whom thou art. 490. For robbers and thieves seek for a prey or bootie; pirates a spoil; yea, which is more, a guest or stranger is not sure or out of danger from his host. (Latrones enim prædantur: piratæ spoliant: imo in hospitio non hospes ab hospite tutus.) 491. Bags, packs, or fardles, wherein they carry their own things or baggage trussed; are a budget, a wallet, cap case, a pouch, a sachell, a male, a purse, a bag of leather. 492. To be more ready, do not burthen nor charge or aggravate thyself with lets. 493. If there be necessity to make haste, it's better to use running horses or swift geldings or hunting nags than post-horses. 494. Being returned home safe and sound, thine shall receive and entertain thee with joy and gladness.—(Edition of 1639, p. 84.)

LOCKE ON POETRY.

If he have a poetic vein, it is to me the strangest thing in the world that the father should desire or suffer it to be cherished or improved. Methinks the parents should labour to have it stifled and suppressed as much as may be; and I know not what reason a father can have to wish his son a poet, who does not desire to have him bid defiance to all other callings and business: which is not yet the worst of the case; for if he prove a successful rhymer, and gets once the reputation of a wit, I desire it to be considered what company and places he is like to spend his time in, nay, and estate too; for it is very seldom seen that any one discovers mines of gold or silver in Parnassus. It is a pleasant air, but a barren soil; and there are very few instances of those who have added to their patrimony by anything they have reaped from thence. Poetry and gaming, which usually go together, are alike in this too, that they seldom bring any advantage but to those who have nothing else to live on. Men of estates almost constantly go away losers; and it is well if they escape at a cheaper rate than their whole estates, or the greatest part of them. If, therefore, you would not have your son the fiddle to every jovial company, without whom the sparks could not relish their wine, nor know how