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Title: Science & Education
Author: Thomas H.
Huxley
Release Date:
December, 2004 [EBook #7150] [This file was first posted on March 18, 2003]
Edition: 10
Language: English
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK,
SCIENCE & EDUCATION ***
SCIENCE AND CULTURE
Thomas H. Huxley
Six years ago, as some of
my present hearers may remember, I had the privilege of addressing a large
assemblage of the inhabitants of this city, who had gathered together to do
honour to the memory of their famous townsman, Joseph Priestley; [1] and, if
any satisfaction attaches to posthumous glory, we may hope that the manes of
the burnt-out philosopher were then finally appeased.
No man, however, who is endowed with a fair share of common
sense, and not more than a fair share of vanity, will identify either
contemporary or posthumous fame with the highest good; and Priestley's life
leaves no doubt that he, at any rate, set a much higher value upon the advancement
of knowledge, and the promotion of that freedom of thought which is at once the
cause and the consequence of intellectual progress.
Hence I am disposed to think that, if Priestley could be amongst
us to-day, the occasion of our meeting would afford him even greater pleasure
than the proceedings which celebrated the centenary of his chief discovery. The
kindly heart would be moved, the high sense of social duty would be satisfied,
by the spectacle of well-earned wealth, neither squandered in tawdry luxury and
vainglorious show, nor scattered with the careless charity which blesses
neither him that gives nor him that takes, but expended in the execution of a well-considered
plan for the aid of present and future generations of those who are willing to
help themselves.
We shall all be of one mind thus far. But it is needful to share
Priestley's keen interest in physical science; and to have learned, as he had
learned, the value of scientific training in fields of inquiry apparently far
remote from physical science; in order to appreciate, as he would have
appreciated, the value of the noble gift which Sir Josiah Mason has bestowed
upon the inhabitants of the Midland district.
For us children of the nineteenth century, however, the
establishment of a college under the conditions of Sir Josiah Mason's Trust,
has a significance apart from any which it could have possessed a hundred years
ago. It appears to be an indication that we are reaching the crisis of the
battle, or rather of the long series of battles, which have been fought over
education in a campaign which began long before Priestley's time, and will
probably not be finished just yet.
In the last century, the combatants were the champions of
ancient literature on the one side, and those of modern literature on the other;
but, some thirty years [2] ago, the contest became complicated by the
appearance of a third army, ranged round the banner of Physical Science.
I am not aware that any one has authority to speak in the name
of this new host. For it must be admitted to be somewhat of a guerilla force, composed
largely of irregulars, each of whom fights pretty much for his own hand. But the
impressions of a full private, who has seen a good deal of service in the
ranks, respecting the present position of affairs and the conditions of a
permanent peace, may not be devoid of interest; and I do not know that I could
make a better use of the present opportunity than by laying them before you.
* * * * *
From the time that the first suggestion to introduce physical
science into ordinary education was timidly whispered, until now, the advocates
of scientific education have met with opposition of two kinds. On the one hand,
they have been pooh-poohed by the men of business who pride themselves on being
the representatives of practicality; while, on the other hand, they have been
excommunicated by the classical scholars, in their capacity of Levites in
charge of the ark of culture and monopolists of liberal education.
The practical men believed that the idol whom they worship--rule
of thumb--has been the source of the past prosperity, and will suffice for the
future welfare of the arts and manufactures. They were of opinion that science
is speculative rubbish; that theory and practice have nothing to do with one
another; and that the scientific habit of mind is an impediment, rather than an
aid, in the conduct of ordinary affairs.
I have used the past tense in speaking of the practical men--for
although they were very formidable thirty years ago, I am not sure that the
pure species has not been extirpated. In fact, so far as mere argument goes,
they have been subjected to such a _feu d'enfer_ that it is a miracle if any
have escaped. But I have remarked that your typical practical man has an
unexpected resemblance to one of Milton's angels. His spiritual wounds, such as
are inflicted by logical weapons, may be as deep as a well and as wide as a
church door, but beyond shedding a few drops of ichor, celestial or otherwise,
he is no whit the worse. So, if any of these opponents be left, I will not
waste time in vain repetition of the demonstrative evidence of the practical
value of science; but knowing that a parable will sometimes penetrate where syllogisms
fail to effect an entrance, I will offer a story for their consideration.
Once upon a time, a boy, with nothing to depend upon but his own
vigorous nature, was thrown into the thick of the struggle for existence in the
midst of a great manufacturing population. He seems to have had a hard fight,
inasmuch as, by the time he was thirty years of age, his total disposable funds
amounted to twenty pounds. Nevertheless, middle life found him giving proof of
his comprehension of the practical problems he had been roughly called upon to
solve, by a career of remarkable prosperity.
Finally, having reached old age with its well-earned
surroundings of "honour, troops of friends," the hero of my story
bethought himself of those who were making a like start in life, and how he
could stretch out a helping hand to them.
After long and anxious reflection this successful practical man
of business could devise nothing better than to provide them with the means of
obtaining "sound, extensive, and practical scientific knowledge." And
he devoted a large part of his wealth and five years of incessant work to this
end.
I need not point the moral of a tale which, as the solid and
spacious fabric of the Scientific College assures us, is no fable, nor can anything
which I could say intensify the force of this practical answer to practical
objections.
* * * * *
We may take it for granted then, that, in the opinion of those
best qualified to judge, the diffusion of thorough scientific education is an
absolutely essential condition of industrial progress; and that the College
which has been opened to-day will confer an inestimable boon upon those whose
livelihood is to be gained by the practise of the arts and manufactures of the
district.
The only question worth discussion is, whether the conditions,
under which the work of the College is to be carried out, are such as to give it
the best possible chance of achieving permanent success.
Sir Josiah Mason, without doubt most wisely, has left very large
freedom of action to the trustees, to whom he proposes ultimately to commit the
administration of the College, so that they may be able to adjust its
arrangements in accordance with the changing conditions of the future. But,
with respect to three points, he has laid most explicit injunctions upon both
administrators and teachers.
Party politics are forbidden to enter into the minds of either,
so far as the work of the College is concerned; theology is as stonily banished
from its precincts; and finally, it is especially declared that the College
shall make no provision for "mere literary instruction and
education."
It does not concern me at present to dwell upon the first two injunctions
any longer than may be needful to express my full conviction of their wisdom.
But the third prohibition brings us face to face with those other opponents of
scientific education, who are by no means in the moribund condition of the
practical man, but alive, alert, and formidable.
It is not impossible that we shall hear this express exclusion
of "literary instruction and education" from a College which, nevertheless,
professes to give a high and efficient education, sharply criticised. Certainly
the time was that the Levites of culture would have sounded their trumpets
against its walls as against an educational Jericho.
How often have we not been told that the study of physical
science is incompetent to confer culture; that it touches none of the higher problems
of life; and, what is worse, that the continual devotion to scientific studies
tends to generate a narrow and bigoted belief in the applicability of
scientific methods to the search after truth of all kinds? How frequently one
has reason to observe that no reply to a troublesome argument tells so well as
calling its author a "mere scientific specialist." And, as I am
afraid it is not permissible to speak of this form of opposition to scientific
education in the past tense; may we not expect to be told that this, not only
omission, but prohibition, of "mere literary instruction and
education" is a patent example of scientific narrow-mindedness?
I am not acquainted with Sir Josiah Mason's reasons for the
action which he has taken; but if, as I apprehend is the case, he refers to the
ordinary classical course of our schools and universities by the name of
"mere literary instruction and education," I venture to offer sundry
reasons of my own in support of that action.
For I hold very strongly by two convictions--The first is, that
neither the discipline nor the subject-matter of classical education is of such
direct value to the student of physical science as to justify the expenditure
of valuable time upon either; and the second is, that for the purpose of
attaining real culture, an exclusively scientific education is at least as
effectual as an exclusively literary education.
I need hardly point out to you that these opinions, especially
the latter, are diametrically opposed to those of the great majority of educated
Englishmen, influenced as they are by school and university traditions. In
their belief, culture is obtainable only by a liberal education; and a liberal
education is synonymous, not merely with education and instruction in
literature, but in one particular form of literature, namely, that of Greek and
Roman antiquity. They hold that the man who has learned Latin and Greek,
however little, is educated; while he who is versed in other branches of
knowledge, however deeply, is a more or less respectable specialist, not
admissible into the cultured caste. The stamp of the educated man, the
University degree, is not for him.
I am too well acquainted with the generous catholicity of
spirit, the true sympathy with scientific thought, which pervades the writings
of our chief apostle of culture to identify him with these opinions; and yet
one may cull from one and another of those epistles to the Philistines, which
so much delight all who do not answer to that name, sentences which lend them
some support.
Mr. Arnold tells us that the meaning of culture is "to know
the best that has been thought and said in the world." It is the criticism
of life contained in literature. That criticism regards "Europe as being, for
intellectual and spiritual purposes, one great confederation, bound to a joint
action and working to a common result; and whose members have, for their common
outfit, a knowledge of Greek, Roman, and Eastern antiquity, and of one another.
Special, local, and temporary advantages being put out of account, that modern
nation will in the intellectual and spiritual sphere make most progress, which
most thoroughly carries out this programme. And what is that but saying that we
too, all of us, as individuals, the more thoroughly we carry it out, shall make
the more progress?" [3]
We have here to deal with two distinct propositions. The first,
that a criticism of life is the essence of culture; the second, that literature
contains the materials which suffice for the construction of such a criticism.
I think that we must all assent to the first proposition. For
culture certainly means something quite different from learning or technical skill.
It implies the possession of an ideal, and the habit of critically estimating
the value of things by comparison with a theoretic standard. Perfect culture
should supply a complete theory of life, based upon a clear knowledge alike of
its possibilities and of its limitations.
But we may agree to all this, and yet strongly dissent from the assumption
that literature alone is competent to supply this knowledge. After having
learnt all that Greek, Roman, and Eastern antiquity have thought and said, and
all that modern literatures have to tell us, it is not self-evident that we
have laid a sufficiently broad and deep foundation for that criticism of life,
which constitutes culture.
Indeed, to any one acquainted with the scope of physical
science, it is not at all evident. Considering progress only in the
"intellectual and spiritual sphere," I find myself wholly unable to
admit that either nations or individuals will really advance, if their common
outfit draws nothing from the stores of physical science. I should say that an army,
without weapons of precision and with no particular base of operations, might
more hopefully enter upon a campaign on the Rhine, than a man, devoid of a
knowledge of what physical science has done in the last century, upon a
criticism of life.
* * * * *
When a biologist meets with an anomaly, he instinctively turns
to the study of development to clear it up. The rationale of contradictory opinions
may with equal confidence be sought in history.
It is, happily, no new thing that Englishmen should employ their
wealth in building and endowing institutions for educational purposes. But, five
or six hundred years ago, deeds of foundation expressed or implied conditions
as nearly as possible contrary to those which have been thought expedient by
Sir Josiah Mason. That is to say, physical science was practically ignored,
while a certain literary training was enjoined as a means to the acquirement of
knowledge which was essentially theological.
The reason of this singular contradiction between the actions of
men alike animated by a strong and disinterested desire to promote the welfare
of their fellows, is easily discovered.
At that time, in fact, if any one desired knowledge beyond such
as could be obtained by his own observation, or by common conversation, his
first necessity was to learn the Latin language, inasmuch as all the higher
knowledge of the western world was contained in works written in that language.
Hence, Latin grammar, with logic and rhetoric, studied through Latin, were the
fundamentals of education. With respect to the substance of the knowledge
imparted through this channel, the Jewish and Christian Scriptures, as
interpreted and supplemented by the Romish Church, were held to contain a
complete and infallibly true body of information.
Theological dicta were, to the thinkers of those days, that
which the axioms and definitions of Euclid are to the geometers of these. The business
of the philosophers of the middle ages was to deduce from the data furnished by
the theologians, conclusions in accordance with ecclesiastical decrees. They
were allowed the high privilege of showing, by logical process, how and why
that which the Church said was true, must be true. And if their demonstrations
fell short of or exceeded this limit, the Church was maternally ready to check
their aberrations; if need were by the help of the secular arm.
Between the two, our ancestors were furnished with a compact and
complete criticism of life. They were told how the world began and how it would
end; they learned that all material existence was but a base and insignificant
blot upon the fair face of the spiritual world, and that nature was, to all
intents and purposes, the play-ground of the devil; they learned that the earth
is the centre of the visible universe, and that man is the cynosure of things
terrestrial; and more especially was it inculcated that the course of nature
had no fixed order, but that it could be, and constantly was, altered by the
agency of innumerable spiritual beings, good and bad, according as they were moved
by the deeds and prayers of men. The sum and substance of the whole doctrine
was to produce the conviction that the only thing really worth knowing in this
world was how to secure that place in a better which, under certain conditions,
the Church promised.
Our ancestors had a living belief in this theory of life, and
acted upon it in their dealings with education, as in all other matters. Culture
meant saintliness--after the fashion of the saints of those days; the education
that led to it was, of necessity, theological; and the way to theology lay
through Latin.
That the study of nature--further than was requisite for the satisfaction
of everyday wants--should have any bearing on human life was far from the
thoughts of men thus trained. Indeed, as nature had been cursed for man's sake,
it was an obvious conclusion that those who meddled with nature were likely to
come into pretty close contact with Satan. And, if any born scientific
investigator followed his instincts, he might safely reckon upon earning the
reputation, and probably upon suffering the fate, of a sorcerer.
Had the western world been left to itself in Chinese isolation,
there is no saying how long this state of things might have endured. But, happily,
it was not left to itself. Even earlier than the thirteenth century, the
development of Moorish civilisation in Spain and the great movement of the
Crusades had introduced the leaven which, from that day to this, has never
ceased to work. At first, through the intermediation of Arabic translations,
afterwards by the study of the originals, the western nations of Europe became
acquainted with the writings of the ancient philosophers and poets, and, in
time, with the whole of the vast literature of antiquity.
Whatever there was of high intellectual aspiration or dominant
capacity in Italy, France, Germany, and England, spent itself for centuries in taking
possession of the rich inheritance left by the dead civilisations of Greece and
Rome. Marvellously aided by the invention of printing, classical learning
spread and flourished. Those who possessed it prided themselves on having
attained the highest culture then within the reach of mankind.
And justly. For, saving Dante on his solitary pinnacle, there
was no figure in modern literature at the time of the Renascence to compare with
the men of antiquity; there was no art to compete with their sculpture; there
was no physical science but that which Greece had created. Above all, there was
no other example of perfect intellectual freedom--of the unhesitating
acceptance of reason as the sole guide to truth and the supreme arbiter of
conduct.
The new learning necessarily soon exerted a profound influence
upon education. The language of the monks and schoolmen seemed little better than
gibberish to scholars fresh from Virgil and Cicero, and the study of Latin was
placed upon a new foundation. Moreover, Latin itself ceased to afford the sole
key to knowledge. The student who sought the highest thought of antiquity,
found only a second-hand reflection of it in Roman literature, and turned his
face to the full light of the Greeks. And after a battle, not altogether
dissimilar to that which is at present being fought over the teaching of
physical science, the study of Greek was recognised as an essential element of
all higher education.
Thus the Humanists, as they were called, won the day; and the
great reform which they effected was of incalculable service to mankind. But the
Nemesis of all reformers is finality; and the reformers of education, like
those of religion, fell into the profound, however common, error of mistaking
the beginning for the end of the work of reformation.
The representatives of the Humanists, in the nineteenth century,
take their stand upon classical education as the sole avenue to culture, as firmly
us if we were still in the age of Renascence. Yet, surely, the present
intellectual relations of the modern and the ancient worlds are profoundly
different from those which obtained three centuries ago. Leaving aside the
existence of a great and characteristically modern literature, of modern
painting, and, especially, of modern music, there is one feature of the present
state of the civilised world which separates it more widely from the
Renascence, than the Renascence was separated from the middle ages.
This distinctive character of our own times lies in the vast and
constantly increasing part which is played by natural knowledge. Not only is
our daily life shaped by it, not only does the prosperity of millions of men
depend upon it, but our whole theory of life has long been influenced,
consciously or unconsciously, by the general conceptions of the universe, which
have been forced upon us by physical science.
In fact, the most elementary acquaintance with the results of scientific
investigation shows us that they offer a broad and striking contradiction to
the opinion so implicitly credited and taught in the middle ages.
The notions of the beginning and the end of the world
entertained by our forefathers are no longer credible. It is very certain that
the earth is not the chief body in the material universe, and that the world is
not subordinated to man's use. It is even more certain that nature is the
expression of a definite order with which nothing interferes, and that the
chief business of mankind is to learn that order and govern themselves
accordingly. Moreover this scientific "criticism of life" presents
itself to us with different credentials from any other. It appeals not to
authority, nor to what anybody may have thought or said, but to nature. It
admits that all our interpretations of natural fact are more or less imperfect
and symbolic, and bids the learner seek for truth not among words but among things.
It warns us that the assertion which outstrips evidence is not only a blunder
but a crime.
The purely classical education advocated by the representatives
of the Humanists in our day, gives no inkling of all this. A man may be a better
scholar than Erasmus, and know no more of the chief causes of the present
intellectual fermentation than Erasmus did. Scholarly and pious persons, worthy
of all respect, favour us with allocutions upon the sadness of the antagonism
of science to their mediaeval way of thinking, which betray an ignorance of the
first principles of scientific investigation, an incapacity for understanding
what a man of science means by veracity, and an unconsciousness of the weight
of established scientific truths, which is almost comical.
There is no great force in the _tu quoque_ argument, or else the
advocates of scientific education might fairly enough retort upon the modern
Humanists that they may be learned specialists, but that they possess no such sound
foundation for a criticism of life as deserves the name of culture. And,
indeed, if we were disposed to be cruel, we might urge that the Humanists have
brought this reproach upon themselves, not because they are too full of the
spirit of the ancient Greek, but because they lack it.
The period of the Renascence is commonly called that of the
"Revival of Letters," as if the influences then brought to bear upon
the mind of Western Europe had been wholly exhausted in the field of
literature. I think it is very commonly forgotten that the revival of science, effected
by the same agency, although less conspicuous, was not less momentous.
In fact, the few and scattered students of nature of that day
picked up the clue to her secrets exactly as it fell from the hands of the
Greeks a thousand years before. The foundations of mathematics were so well laid
by them, that our children learn their geometry from a book written for the
schools of Alexandria two thousand years ago. Modern astronomy is the natural
continuation and development of the work of Hipparchus and of Ptolemy; modern
physics of that of Democritus and of Archimedes; it was long before modern
biological science outgrew the knowledge bequeathed to us by Aristotle, by
Theophrastus, and by Galen.
We cannot know all the best thoughts and sayings of the Greeks
unless we know what they thought about natural phaenomena. We cannot fully apprehend
their criticism of life unless we understand the extent to which that criticism
was affected by scientific conceptions. We falsely pretend to be the inheritors
of their culture, unless we are penetrated, as the best minds among them were,
with an unhesitating faith that the free employment of reason, in accordance
with scientific method, is the sole method of reaching truth.
Thus I venture to think that the pretensions of our modern
Humanists to the possession of the monopoly of culture and to the exclusive inheritance
of the spirit of antiquity must be abated, if not abandoned. But I should be
very sorry that anything I have said should be taken to imply a desire on my
part to depreciate the value of classical education, as it might be and as it
sometimes is. The native capacities of mankind vary no less than their
opportunities; and while culture is one, the road by which one man may best
reach it is widely different from that which is most advantageous to another.
Again, while scientific education is yet inchoate and tentative, classical
education is thoroughly well organised upon the practical experience of generations
of teachers. So that, given ample time for learning and destination for
ordinary life, or for a literary career, I do not think that a young Englishman
in search of culture can do better than follow the course usually marked out
for him, supplementing its deficiencies by his own efforts.
But for those who mean to make science their serious occupation;
or who intend to follow the profession of medicine; or who have to enter early upon
the business of life; for all these, in my opinion, classical education is a
mistake; and it is for this reason that I am glad to see "mere literary
education and instruction" shut out from the curriculum of Sir Josiah
Mason's College, seeing that its inclusion would probably lead to the
introduction of the ordinary smattering of Latin and Greek.
Nevertheless, I am the last person to question the importance of
genuine literary education, or to suppose that intellectual culture can be
complete without it. An exclusively scientific training will bring about a
mental twist as surely as an exclusively literary training. The value of the
cargo does not compensate for a ship's being out of trim; and I should be very
sorry to think that the Scientific College would turn out none but lop-sided
men.
There is no need, however, that such a catastrophe should
happen. Instruction in English, French, and German is provided, and thus the three
greatest literatures of the modern world are made accessible to the student.
French and German, and especially the latter language, are
absolutely indispensable to those who desire full knowledge in any department
of science. But even supposing that the knowledge of these languages acquired
is not more than sufficient for purely scientific purposes, every Englishman
has, in his native tongue, an almost perfect instrument of literary expression;
and, in his own literature, models of every kind of literary excellence. If an
Englishman cannot get literary culture out of his Bible, his Shakespeare, his
Milton, neither, in my belief, will the profoundest study of Homer and Sophocles,
Virgil and Horace, give it to him.
Thus, since the constitution of the College makes sufficient
provision for literary as well as for scientific education, and since artistic instruction
is also contemplated, it seems to me that a fairly complete culture is offered
to all who are willing to take advantage of it.
But I am not sure that at this point the "practical"
man, scotched but not slain, may ask what all this talk about culture has to do
with an Institution, the object of which is defined to be "to promote the prosperity
of the manufactures and the industry of the country." He may suggest that
what is wanted for this end is not culture, nor even a purely scientific
discipline, but simply a knowledge of applied science.
I often wish that this phrase, "applied science," had
never been invented. For it suggests that there is a sort of scientific
knowledge of direct practical use, which can be studied apart from another sort
of scientific knowledge, which is of no practical utility, and which is termed
"pure science." But there is no more complete fallacy than this. What
people call applied science is nothing but the application of pure science to
particular classes of problems. It consists of deductions from those general
principles, established by reasoning and observation, which constitute pure
science. No one can safely make these deductions until he has a firm grasp of
the principles; and he can obtain that grasp only by personal experience of the
operations of observation and of reasoning on which they are founded.
Almost all the processes employed in the arts and manufactures
fall within the range either of physics or of chemistry. In order to improve them,
one must thoroughly understand them; and no one has a chance of really understanding
them, unless he has obtained that mastery of principles and that habit of
dealing with facts, which is given by long-continued and well-directed purely
scientific training in the physical and the chemical laboratory. So that there
really is no question as to the necessity of purely scientific discipline, even
if the work of the College were limited by the narrowest interpretation of its
stated aims.
And, as to the desirableness of a wider culture than that
yielded by science alone, it is to be recollected that the improvement of manufacturing
processes is only one of the conditions which contribute to the prosperity of
industry. Industry is a means and not an end; and mankind work only to get
something which they want. What that something is depends partly on their
innate, and partly on their acquired, desires.
If the wealth resulting from prosperous industry is to be spent
upon the gratification of unworthy desires, if the increasing perfection of manufacturing
processes is to be accompanied by an increasing debasement of those who carry
them on, I do not see the good of industry and prosperity.
Now it is perfectly true that men's views of what is desirable
depend upon their characters; and that the innate proclivities to which we give
that name are not touched by any amount of instruction. But it does not follow
that even mere intellectual education may not, to an indefinite extent, modify
the practical manifestation of the characters of men in their actions, by
supplying them with motives unknown to the ignorant. A pleasure-loving
character will have pleasure of some sort; but, if you give him the choice, he
may prefer pleasures which do not degrade him to those which do. And this
choice is offered to every man, who possesses in literary or artistic culture a
never-failing source of pleasures, which are neither withered by age, nor
staled by custom, nor embittered in the recollection by the pangs of
self-reproach.
If the Institution opened to-day fulfils the intention of its
founder, the picked intelligences among all classes of the population of this district
will pass through it. No child born in Birmingham, henceforward, if he have the
capacity to profit by the opportunities offered to him, first in the primary
and other schools, and afterwards in the Scientific College, need fail to
obtain, not merely the instruction, but the culture most appropriate to the
conditions of his life.
Within these walls, the future employer and the future artisan
may sojourn together for a while, and carry, through all their lives, the stamp
of the influences then brought to bear upon them. Hence, it is not beside the
mark to remind you, that the prosperity of industry depends not merely upon the
improvement of manufacturing processes, not merely upon the ennobling of the
individual character, but upon a third condition, namely, a clear understanding
of the conditions of social life, on the part of both the capitalist and the
operative, and their agreement upon common principles of social action. They
must learn that social phaenomena are as much the expression of natural laws as
any others; that no social arrangements can be permanent unless they harmonise
with the requirements of social statics and dynamics; and that, in the nature
of things, there is an arbiter whose decisions execute themselves.
But this knowledge is only to be obtained by the application of
the methods of investigation adopted in physical researches to the investigation
of the phaenomena of society. Hence, I confess, I should like to see one addition
made to the excellent scheme of education propounded for the College, in the
shape of provision for the teaching of Sociology. For though we are all agreed
that party politics are to have no place in the instruction of the College; yet
in this country, practically governed as it is now by universal suffrage, every
man who does his duty must exercise political functions. And, if the evils which
are inseparable from the good of political liberty are to be checked, if the
perpetual oscillation of nations between anarchy and despotism is to be
replaced by the steady march of self-restraining freedom; it will be because
men will gradually bring themselves to deal with political, as they now deal
with scientific questions; to be as ashamed of undue haste and partisan
prejudice in the one case as in the other; and to believe that the machinery of
society is at least as delicate as that of a spinning-jenny, and as little
likely to be improved by the meddling of those who have not taken the trouble
to master the principles of its action.
In conclusion, I am sure that I make myself the mouthpiece of
all present in offering to the venerable founder of the Institution, which now
commences its beneficent career, our congratulations on the completion of his
work; and in expressing the conviction, that the remotest posterity will point
to it as a crucial instance of the wisdom which natural piety leads all men to
ascribe to their ancestors.
* * * * *
Footnotes:
[1] See the first essay in this volume.
[2] The advocacy of the introduction of physical science into
general education by George Combe and others commenced a good deal earlier; but
the movement had acquired hardly any practical force before the time to which I
refer.
[3] _Essays in Criticism_, p. 37.
Note 1. Originally delivered as an address, in 1880, at the opening of Mason College, Birmingham, England, now the University of Birmingham. [back]
Note 2. The advocacy of the introduction of physical science into general education by George Combe and others commenced a good deal earlier; but the movement had acquired hardly any practical force before the time to which I refer. [back]
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