foreign language, and something of the world we live in. The present education, or rather half-education, is not the fault of the preparatory schools. They are dominated by the great public schools, and the great public schools again by the universities. The universities must bear the responsibility. They offer, no doubt, excellent teaching; they prepare learned specialists, but are places of instruction rather than of education. The most profound classical scholar, if he knows nothing of science, is but a half-educated man after all; a boy in a good elementary school has had a better education. The universities have indeed excellent science schools and eminent professors, but they treat the knowledge of Nature as an extra, an ornamental, but not an integral part of education, not necessary for the degree. No knowledge of science is required for admission to our universities, and the lion's share of the prizes, scholarships, and fellowships goes to classics and mathematics. Naturally, therefore, the great public schools feel that they can spare but little time for science and modern languages, and as it is neglected in the public schools it is almost ignored in preparatory schools.

Scientific men submit that a certain amount of

science should be demanded in the entrance examination of our universities. Were this done, it would be a necessary subject in public and other schools.

A great deal of nonsense is, it seems to me, talked about the necessity of knowing things "thoroughly." In the first place, no one knows anything thoroughly. To confine the attention of children to two or three subjects is to narrow their minds, to cramp their intellect, to destroy their interest, and in most cases make them detest the very thing you wish them to love. Should we teach a child all we could about Europe, and omit Africa, Asia, and America, to say nothing of Australasia? Would that be teaching geography? Should we teach him one century, and omit the rest? Would that be history? And in the same way, to teach one branch of science and ignore the rest is not teaching science.

Let me give the opinion of another great authority on education, the late Bishop of London, Dr. Creighton. In his Thoughts on Education he says: "In your own egulations for matriculation I am glad to see that ience is included. But I am rather sorry to see that

expression is a science,' the prescribed sciences mechanics, chemistry, and physiography. Suppose

then that chemistry is taken. A man may get a degree without knowing the difference between a planet and a star, or why the moon goes through phases. At this early stage of education should not science be treated as one subject, and a general knowledge of the rudiments be required?".

Perhaps, however, it may be said that the picture have drawn of our schools is too dark. Let me, then, quote the opinion of the same great authority. "Since 1870 we have talked about educational progress. I fear that I am not able to believe that we have made any real educational progress during that time. I am not even sure whether we have not gone back."*

And again: "The more subjects people can study at the same time, the better they will get on with every one of them. By increasing your religious knowledge you gain a larger background, and then your other work will surely go on better.” **

Canon E. Lyttelton, the present Head-master of Eton, who was previously selected by the Education Department to report on Preparatory Schools, so that

* Mandell Creighton, Thoughts on Education.

** Ibid.

he speaks with the highest authority, admirably sums up the situation. He tells us that "the request proffered again and again by the Association of Head-Masters of Preparatory Schools, that some change be made in the entrance scholarship examinations, allowing due recognition of other subjects than the one for which the scholarships are now awarded, seems to have much sense in it.

"The head-masters take their stand on what one would imagine to be an incontrovertible principle, viz. that specialisation in the Preparatory School age (ie. under fourteen) is undesirable. They then point out that under present arrangements it is absolutely unavoidable, the constraining cause being the value set on classics. This means that a boy barely twelve years old will discontinue all but a modicum of mathematics and other subjects, and be pressed on in Latin verses and Greek sentences, and the construing of difficult classical authors, till by the time he is thirteenand-a-half he is able to reproduce remarkably skilful bits of translation, but is contentedly ignorant of English and other history, and has no knowledge whatever of the shape, size, and quality of the countries of the

habitable globe, and, perhaps more injurious still, does not know whether the Reform Bill came before Magna Charta, or the sense of either. The result is that not only a false ideal of learning is set upon the pupils from their earliest years, but that the hurry and scurry of the preparation forbids patient, thorough, and gradual grounding, even in classics."

This is surely a very serious statement. Nobody wishes-scientific men would certainly not wish-to exclude classics. What we plead for is that science, the knowledge of the beautiful world in which we live, should also be included.

Everyone would admit that it is a poor thing for a man to be even a great ichthyologist or botanist, unless he has some general knowledge of the world he lives in; and the same applies to a mathematician or a classical scholar. Before a child is carried far in any one subject, it should at least be explained to him that our earth is one of several planets, revolving round the sun; that the sun is a star; that the solar system is one of many millions occupying the infinite depths of space: he should be taught the general distribution of land and sea, the continents and oceans, the position of Eng