V «/». 
 
 
 <H -?v 
 
 
 J.N 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ^. .^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 *• 
 
 
 
 
 
 V *£; 
 
 
 ■<r 
 
 
 
 ^ ^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
,v 
 
 I 
 
 
 ' 
 
 
 
 
 4- *+ * 1 
 
 
 % ;** 
 
 ,\ 
 
 ?% ^ 
 
 ^>%~ 
 
 
 y V 
 
 s r, 
 
 ,y 
 
 £^ 
 
 
 V 
 
 <\ y o„>. 
 
 %ji .-Ji 
 
 .*° 
 
 
 V 
 
 > V 
 
 •^^x 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 </"' 
 
 •c 
 
 
 
 
 / 
 
 % 
 
 
 - 
 
 
 V 
 
 ' B * 
 
 <» 
 
 *£> 
 
 V s 
 
 
 
 
 ■ "^ 
 
 aV «/ 
 
 
 vv 
 
 
 * oV 
 
 
 W 
 
 
 c.,.,- V* 
 
 . 
 
 
 ^<i 
 
 
 ,v 
 
 >' "^ 
 
 * 'V 
 
 ?2> ^ 
 
 \- 
 
 
 
 
 A^ 
 
 -*> .# : 
 
 %. 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2011 with funding from 
 The Library of Congress 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/scienceeducationOOroya 
 
LB 
 
 T 
 
 XT 
 
 / * i 
 
 ;# One Shilling Ne, 
 
 science ana 
 Education 
 
 Edited with an Introduction by 
 
 SIR RAY LANKESTER, K.C B. 
 
 
 "^HIS volume contains seven lectures which 
 were delivered by Whewell, Faraday, 
 Latham, Daubeny, Tyndall, Paget and 
 Hodgson before the Royal Institution in 1854. 
 For clarity of expression and a true grasp of the 
 highest educational ideal, they have never been 
 surpassed and they should prove an extremely 
 valuable contribution to the theory that should 
 guide educational reconstruction. Sir Ray 
 Lankester has added an Introduction and 
 Explanatory Notes. 
 
 LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN . 
 
Glass - ■■• 
 Book 
 
SCIENCE AND 
 EDUCATION 
 
UNIFORM WITH THIS VOLUME 
 
 MUTUAL AID : A Factor of Evolution 
 
 By Prince Kropotkin 
 
 THE NATURE OF MAN 
 
 By Blie Metchnikoit. Edited by Chalmers 
 Mitchell, F.R.S. 
 
 THE MIND AND HEALTH SERDjJS 
 
 Edited by H. Addington Bruce, A.M. 
 
 Each vol. Crown 8vo, 5s. net 
 
 HUMAN MOTIVES. By James Jackson 
 Putnam, M.D. 
 
 THE MEANING OP DREAMS. By Isador 
 
 H. Coriat, M.D. 
 SLEEP AND SLEEPLESSNESS. By H. 
 
 Addington Bruce, A.M. 
 THE INFLUENCE OF JOY. By GEORGE 
 
 Van Ness Dearborn 
 
 London : WILLIAM HEINEMANN 
 
SCIENCE AND 
 EDUCATION 
 
 LECTURES DELIVERED AT THE ROYAL 
 INSTITUTION OF GREAT BRITAIN 
 
 EDITED WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY 
 
 SIR E. RAY LANKESTER, K.C.B. 
 
 LONDON . WILLIAM HEINEMANN 
 

 L37 
 
 London : William Heinemann, 1917 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 The present volume is a reprint of one published in 1855, 
 and now out of print, consisting of seven lectures delivered 
 at the Royal Institution of Great Britain in 1854 by seven 
 of the most distinguished men of science of that day. The 
 purpose of the Managers of the Royal Institution was to set 
 before the public the views of scientific men as to the importance 
 of making Natural Science an integral part of the education of 
 all classes. Sixty-two years have passed and we are still so 
 far from having carried out the views of those lecturers that a 
 great outcry has arisen in this country — now suffering under 
 the pressure and difficulties of warfare — to the effect that 
 there has been " neglect of science," both in the management 
 of great public interests and in private enterprises. It is 
 maintained that the nation is in imminent danger owing to the 
 ignorance of and contempt for Natural Science in the governing 
 class, in the manufacturing and commercial classes, and among 
 the people generally. It is pointed out that the only remedy 
 for this is a complete change — a reformation in the education 
 given in our schools and universities. The effort to bring about 
 such a change began sixty-two years ago with the lectures 
 here reprinted — and it is interesting to look back at the reasons 
 for reform put forward by those lecturers so many years ago 
 and to consider what value they have at the present day and 
 why it is that they and the arguments and efforts of later 
 reformers have had so little result. For it is the fact that though 
 some improvement has been made, it is very small. Our 
 school education, especially that of the great public schools 
 and that rewarded and encouraged by the universities of 
 Oxford and Cambridge, does not yet comprise as a necessary 
 integral part the study of Natural Science. Natural Science 
 is still treated as a superfluity, an " extra," tolerated, but 
 
 5 
 
6 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 misunderstood and misdirected (as is natural enough) by the 
 devotees of the established old-fashioned and curious " classical 
 curriculum," which it must eventually completely replace. 
 The reasons which have led to the consumption of so vast a 
 proportion of the time of the youth of the well-to-do class in 
 a clumsy and ill-contrived attempt to force it into familiarity 
 with the actual writings of Latin and Greek authors — an 
 attempt which is almost invariably unsuccessful — are not 
 far to seek. Three hundred years ago a well-educated " gentle- 
 man " must read Latin if he would read anything and must 
 Avrite it too. This is convincingly set forth by the father of 
 the present Minister of Education in a paper contributed 
 by him to a volume of Essays on a Liberal Education,* 
 which contains several other essays of a most instructive 
 character for those who are to-day considering the question 
 of Educational Reform. Among these is an invaluable chapter 
 "On the History of Classical Education" by the late Charles 
 Stuart Parker, M.A., Fellow of University College, Oxford, 
 which furnishes to-day — as it did when written — information 
 of fundamental importance as to how it has come about that 
 this country is subjected to the preposterous and disastrous 
 tyranny of " classical education." The genial and gifted 
 Lord Houghton (Monckton-Milnes), in the essay contributed 
 by him " On the Present Social Results of Classical Education," 
 deplores the fact (and none could speak with greater authority 
 than he) " that the whole of the boyhood and the greater part 
 of the youth of the higher classes of our countrymen should 
 be occupied with the study of the language, history, and customs 
 of two nations which have long disappeared from the surface of 
 our globe, and which, but for the common conditions of all 
 humanity, have no more relation to us than the inhabitants of 
 another planet." He, a scholar and man of letters, asks 
 whether " the imagined attributes of a classical education are 
 not referable to circumstances and treatment with which classics 
 as such have nothing whatever to do — and whether the most 
 enlightened advocates of the retention of the system are not 
 unconsciously affected by a powerful literary superstition ? " 
 He makes the very significant observation that "it is as the 
 proper and recognized education of the governing classes, the 
 honourable accomplishment of all aristocracy, that the classical 
 * Macmillan, 1867. 
 
INTRODUCTION 7 
 
 teaching endures so firmly, even now when it has ceased to 
 be the mysterious speech of the Church and when it is no 
 longer the authoritative exposition of Law. For as soon as 
 it became the qualification of a gentleman to read and write 
 at all, it was Latin that he read and wrote." 
 
 After showing how small is the amount of classical learning 
 carried over from school and college into later life by those 
 whose whole youth is recklessly sacrificed to "a classical 
 education," Lord Houghton says : " However imperceptible 
 may be the effects of classical training in after-life, either in 
 manners or in mind, as long as the fashion of the education 
 endures, our higher classes will continue to subject their 
 children to it, and the large portion of society which desires, 
 at any cost, to give their progeny what seems to them the best 
 start in life will follow the example. Whilst a boy is placed, 
 on his arrival at school, according to his classical attainments, 
 the preliminary classical teaching becomes necessary, whatever 
 be the sacrifice of other natural, opportune, or more available 
 instruction." " It will," he continues, " require some very 
 strong impulse to decide what may be called the upper stratum 
 of the middle class to accept for their families any education 
 which almost appears a descent in the social scale. And yet 
 it is precisely this class which is the most palpable sufferer 
 under the present system. . . . When the young manufacturer 
 or banker begins what is to be the real business of his existence, 
 he leaves irrevocably behind him every object to which his ten 
 (or more) early years have been devoted, retaining little beyond 
 some taste in which only the idle or the independent can indidge 
 with impunity, and a certain dim conceit of his own superiority 
 over his fellows, who have only received a commercial training." 
 * * * * # 
 
 " There are too many flagrant examples in the history of 
 the human mind of the persistent adherence, not only of public 
 opinion and private judgment, but of the religious conscience 
 and the moral sense, to forms and ceremonies after the belief 
 on which they were founded have faded into shadows, to permit 
 the hope that any amount of negative experience will bring about 
 a reformation in the matter we are now considering. It is solely 
 to a growing conviction of the necessity of larger and wiser instruc- 
 tion of our governing classes, if they are to remain our governors, 
 that we must look as the source of any beneficial change." 
 
8 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 After sketching the extreme self-satisfaction with which 
 we regard the character of the present English gentleman, 
 and the notion that he is an ideal of humanity which it is 
 almost sinful to desire to improve or transcend, and that if he 
 in his youth were taught more or otherwise than he learns at 
 present some mysterious degradation would inevitably ensue, 
 Lord Houghton declares that there never was a greater eon- 
 fusion of post hoc with propter hoc than the theory that the 
 English gentleman's actual excellent characteristics have 
 anything to do with the method of instruction which has been 
 imparted to him. " It is admitted," he says, " that he may 
 become a landed proprietor without a notion of agriculture — a 
 coal-owner without an inkling of geology — a sportsman without 
 curiosity in natural history — a legislator without the elements 
 of law ; it is assumed that he may frequent foreign countries 
 without having even a convenient intimacy with their language, 
 and continually incur that ridicule which is especially disagree- 
 able to his nature ; and yet, in the face of all these admissions,* 
 every attempt to supply these deficiencies is regarded as little 
 less than revolutionary." 
 
 Such is the indictment of " the classical education " drawn 
 up fifty years ago by a great " man of the world," one who 
 knew perhaps more intimately than any man of his day, or of 
 later years, both what he was condemning and what he desired 
 to substitute for it. 
 
 We are frequently told that of late years there have been 
 great changes in these matters, that science and modern studies 
 have been " introduced " into the great public schools. It 
 is, on the contrary, the fact that " the classical education " 
 still dominates, still continues its hopeless and injurious 
 sacrifice of the golden hours of youth to its ill-eontrived methods 
 of teaching and its wasteful and unsuccessful attempt to develop 
 the intelligence of English boys by forcing upon them, necessarily 
 to the exclusion of other subjects, a mechanical study of the 
 language, literature, and history of the ancient Greeks and 
 Romans. This system continues, although it is universally 
 admitted that it completely fails to impart even a modicum of 
 knowledge of these subjects — worthless though it would be 
 
 * And we might add'to this list his ready admission of and satisfaction 
 with the fact that he knows nothing of the beauties of the English language 
 and its literature. — E. R. L. 
 
INTRODUCTION 9 
 
 were it gained — to the great majority of those submitted 
 to it. 
 
 If one wishes to know what is the amount of the concession 
 which has been made in our great schools to the demand for 
 education in the Natural Sciences, one has only to note how 
 small is the number of hours a week assigned to those sciences 
 for all boys in the school, how few is the number of masters 
 employed, how inferior their position, how little is the reward 
 and encouragement for scholars, and how small the pay 
 accorded to all concerned in Natural Science as compared with 
 the corresponding figures relating to the arrangements made 
 for the dominating, monopolizing, " classical " studies. 
 
 The Natural Sciences will not obtain the attention and 
 position in schools which is necessary for our national welfare 
 until the ancient traditional " classical curriculum " is not 
 merely modified and reformed but literally swept away. 
 This, of course, would not in any way interfere with the serious 
 study in this country of classical literature and classical 
 archaeology, but, on the contrary, assist its development. 
 
 The most interesting and in many respects the most 
 valuable of the seven lectures now reprinted is that by 
 the great Faraday. I should have been content to reprint 
 this lecture by itself, but Mr. Heinemann was willing to re- 
 produce the whole series. Not the least of the features 
 of interest attaching to these lectures is the presentation 
 in each of them of the conclusions and opinions held by 
 an authority in his subject three-quarters of a century ago. 
 In regard to some of the subjects — for instance, Chemistry 
 treated by Professor Daubeny of Oxford, and Physiology 
 dealt with by Sir James (then Mr.) Paget — the progress of 
 knowledge has been so great in the interval that much of what 
 is said by the lecturer is not precisely what he would say 
 were he speaking to-day. Facts have been ascertained and 
 theories established to which he would have made allusion. 
 But the spirit and purpose of his discourse is none the less of 
 value to-day as it was when given. 
 
 It would be foreign to my present object to annotate the 
 lectures of these great advocates of educational reform so as 
 to show in what respects investigation has progressed since 
 their day. It was my privilege in early years to listen to the 
 
10 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 teaching of some of them and to know all of them as friends 
 of my father. I am glad to be able to reproduce to-day their 
 testimony in favour of the reform in education which consists 
 in giving a leading place in it to a well-considered study of 
 Natural Science — whilst abolishing altogether the hopeless 
 waste of time and effort arising from the bad methods and 
 mistaken purpose of the traditional study of Latin and Greek. 
 
 In the case of Faraday's lecture on " Mental Education," 
 I have been so much impressed by its beauty, interest, and value 
 that I have looked up and made notes relating to one or two 
 matters which are referred to in it, but are obscure to a modern 
 reader— such, for instance, as " The Pasilalinic Compass." 
 I have also, with the aid of my friend Mr. Mark Barr, written 
 some notes which will render some of Faraday's references to 
 his own researches intelligible. These several notes are referred 
 to in the text by letters of the alphabet and are printed at the 
 end of the lecture. 
 
 Faraday was a vigorous opponent of the various fanciful 
 notions as to table-turning, spirit-rapping, and animal magnetism 
 current in his day. The modern " occultist " will not hesitate 
 to endeavour to weaken Faraday's " authority " in that 
 opposition by pointing to the fact that he is careful " to claim 
 an absolute distinction between religious and ordinary belief," 
 and that he says, " I shall be reproached with the weakness of 
 refusing to apply those mental operations which I think good 
 in respect of high things to the very highest." 
 
 Let me at once plainly say that in the Court of Science 
 evidence as to personal authority is not admitted. 
 
 The conclusiveness of an experimental demonstration and 
 the value of the experimental method are not affected either 
 by the religious beliefs or private opinions of the individual 
 to whom we are indebted for the demonstration, provided 
 that it is a demonstration. The opinions of Sir William Crook es, 
 of Sir Oliver Lodge, and the late Dr. Russel Wallace with 
 reference to so-called " spiritualism " have not in the smallest 
 degree lessened the value of their contributions to Chemistry, 
 Physics, and Zoology- ( ' ■ 
 
 E. RAY LANKESTER 
 
 October 2, 1 16 
 
PREFACE 
 
 TO THE FIRST EDITION 
 
 When the Managers of the Royal Institution decided, early in 
 the present year, upon the delivery, after Easter, of a series 
 of Lectures on Education, they appointed a sub-Committee to 
 make the necessary arrangements. 
 
 In accordance with the usual practice of the Royal Institution, 
 the number of the Lectures was unavoidably limited by the 
 number of weeks between Easter and the termination of the 
 session ; and the subjects of the Lectures could not be alto- 
 gether determined by the Committee, but in some instances 
 were necessarily left to the choice of the Lecturers. Each 
 Lecturer, also, was at perfect liberty to treat his subject in his 
 own mode ; and no communication upon the course to be 
 pursued took place between the different Lecturers. 
 
 Hence arises the limitation of the subjects and the want of 
 mutual connexion between the separate members of the group 
 of discourses here presented to the reader. Whatever advantage 
 may be thus lost is, however, perhaps counterbalanced by the 
 increased authority which is derived from so many and such 
 considerable names being found pleading together, though 
 independently of each other, the important cause of Scientific 
 Education. 
 
 It appeared desirable to the Managers that the widest cir- 
 culation should be given to these Lectures ; and each Lecturer, 
 by placing his manuscript at the disposal of the Committee, has 
 conferred an additional favour on the Members of the Royal 
 Institution, and has rendered possible the publication of the 
 present volume, which it is hoped will materially assist in 
 promoting the extension of Scientific Education among all 
 classes of the community. 
 
 Royal Institution 
 October 1854 
 
 11 
 
BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES OF THE 
 LECTURERS 
 
 Daubeny, Charles Giles Bridle, chemist and botanist, was 
 born in Gloucestershire in 1795, and educated at Winchester 
 and Magdalen College, Oxford, where he became Professor of 
 Chemistry and also of Botany. Daubeny devoted himself 
 chiefly to the study of natural phenomena in their relation to 
 chemical science. His chief work is A Description of Active 
 and Extinct Volcanoes (1826), but he wrote also on the Atomic 
 Theory, on Agriculture and Climate, as well as many papers on 
 botanical subjects. He died in 1867. 
 
 Faraday, Michael, was born in London in 1791. His father 
 was a blacksmith and he often spoke of his love for a smith's 
 shop and the work of the forge and hammer. At the age of 
 13 he was apprenticed to a bookbinder, but becoming interested 
 in science, he attended lectures at the Royal Institution, and in 
 1813 became laboratory assistant to Sir Humphry Davy. He 
 soon began research work on his own account, and a series of 
 experiments on chlorine compounds and the liquefaction of gases 
 led to his discovery of principles of great importance. In 
 1827 he succeeded Sir Humphry Davy as Fullerian Professor 
 of Chemistry, a position which he retained until 1865. 
 
 Faraday made many discoveries in chemistry and experi- 
 mental physics, but the great work of his life is the series of 
 experiments which, for forty years, he carried on in the domain 
 of electro-magnetism. His discoveries were of great value 
 and have laid the foundations of our knowledge of electricity. 
 It was Faraday's discovery that an electric current is in- 
 duced by the rotation of a magnet in the neighbourhood of 
 an induction coil which led to the invention of the dynamo. 
 Michael Faraday was a master of clear and lucid exposi- 
 
 13 
 
14 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 tion, and his lectures at the Royal Institution are models of 
 simplicity and happy illustration. He held very high what he 
 spoke of as " the honour of a philosopher." He died at Hamp- 
 ton Court in 1867. 
 
 Hodgson, William Ballantyne, educational reformer 
 and political economist, was born at Edinburgh in 1815, the 
 son of a printer. He entered the Edinburgh High School, and 
 after working for some time in a lawyer's office proceeded to 
 Edinburgh University. In 1844, after a period spent in 
 lecturing on literature, education, and phrenology in various 
 towns of Scotland, he became principal of the Liverpool Insti- 
 tute, and in 1847 went from there to the Chorlton High School, 
 Manchester, where he remained until 1851. He lectured on 
 economics at the Royal Institution in London and was examiner 
 in political economy in the London University from 1863 to 
 1868. In 1871 he returned to Edinburgh to fill the new chair of 
 commercial and political economy and mercantile law which 
 had been founded very largely as a result of his own efforts, and 
 this post he held until his death in 1880. He was president of 
 the Educational Institute of Scotland in 1875. 
 
 Latham, Robert Gordon, M.D., was born in 1812, and 
 educated at Eton and King's College, Cambridge. He studied 
 philology in Hamburg, Copenhagen, and Christiania, and in 1839 
 was elected professor of English Language and Literature in 
 University College, London. Some years later he entered the 
 medical profession and obtained the degree of M.D. at the 
 University of London, but he soon abandoned medicine and 
 devoted himself almost entirely to his favourite pursuits of 
 ethnology and philology. Latham was the author of many 
 works on the English language. He died at Putney in 
 1888. 
 
 Paget, Sir James, Bart., one of the greatest surgeons and 
 pathologists of modern times, was born at Yarmouth in 1814. 
 He was President of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1875, 
 Bradshawe Lecturer in 1882, Sergeant-Surgeon to Queen 
 Victoria and Consulting Surgeon to King Edward VII* when 
 the latter was Prince of Wales. His two chief works are 
 Lectures on Surgical Pathology (1853) and Clinical Lectures 
 (1875). He died in 1899. 
 
BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES OF THE LECTURERS 15 
 
 Tyndall, John, physicist, was bom in Ireland in 1820, the 
 son of a small tradesman. After working for some years on 
 the ordnance survey, and as a railway engineer in Manchester, 
 he went to Germany, where he studied at Marburg and in 
 Berlin, carrying on "researches in physical science. He was 
 elected F.R.S. in 1852, and in the following year became pro- 
 fessor at the Royal Institution. A visit to the Alps, made in 
 company with Professor Huxley in 1856, resulted in the famous 
 work on the structure and motion of glaciers, and in 1859 he 
 began those investigations into the phenomena of radiation 
 upon which his fame chiefly rests. Tyndall was an extremely 
 iable lecturer and writer, his style being distinguished by 
 ' vigour and lucidity of expression. His best-known works are 
 \Heat Considered as a Mode of Motion (1863), Fragments of 
 Science for Unscientific People (1871), and Hours of Exercise 
 in the Alps (1873), but he wrote many other books, including 
 volumes on Light, Sound, Electricity, and the Forms of Water 
 in Clouds, Rivers, Ice, and Glaciers. His works have been 
 translated into most European languages. Tyndall died in 
 1893. 
 
 Whewell, William, D.D., was born at Lancaster in 1794, 
 the son of a joiner. He was educated at the " Blue School " in 
 Lancaster, and afterwards at Heversham Grammar School, 
 whence he proceeded, as an exhibitioner, to Trinity College, 
 Cambridge. His career at the University was exception- 
 ally brilliant. He gained the Chancellor's medal for the English 
 prize poem in 1814 ; two years later he graduated as second 
 wrangler and second Smith's prizeman, and became a Fellow 
 and Tutor of Trinity. In subsequent years he filled the chairs 
 of Mineralogy and Moral Philosophy at Cambridge. In 1841 he 
 married and became Master of Trinity, and in 1855 was Vice- 
 Chancellor of the University. He was a prolific and lucid writer 
 and lecturer, producing works on astronomy, electricity and 
 magnetism, moral philosophy and ethics. His most valuable 
 and readable book is that on The History and Philosophy of 
 the Inductive Sciences. He died at Trinity in 1866. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 INTRODUCTION. By SIR E. RAY LANKESTER 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES OF THE LECTURERS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 5 
 11 
 13 
 
 19 
 
 39 
 
 75 
 
 LECTURE I 
 
 ON THE INFLUENCE OF THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE UPON INTELLECTUAL 
 EDUCATION. BY W. WHEWELL, D.D., F.R.S. 
 
 LECTURE II 
 
 OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION. BY PROFESSOR FARADAY, LL.D., 
 F.R.S. 
 
 LECTURE III 
 
 ON THE IMPORTANCE OF THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE AS A BRANCH OF EDUCA- 
 TION FOR ALL CLASSES. BY ROBERT GORDON LATHAM, M.D., F.R.S. 
 
 LECTURE IV 
 
 ON THE IMPORTANCE OF THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY AS A BRANCH OF EDUCA- 
 TION FOR ALL CLASSES BY CHARLES G. B. DAUBENY, M.D., F.R.S. 
 
 LECTURE V 
 
 ON THE IMPORTANCE OF THE STUDY OF PHYSICS AS A BRANCH OF EDUCA 
 
 TION FOR AT.T, CLASSES. BY PROFESSOR TYNDALL, F.R.S. 120 
 
 LECTURE VI 
 
 ON THE IMPORTANCE OF THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY AS A BRANCH OF EDUCA- 
 TION FOR ALL CLASSES. BY JAMBS PAGET, F.R.S. 143 
 
 LECTURE VII 
 
 ON THE IMPORTANCE OF THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE AS A BRANCH 
 
 OF EDUCATION FOR 'ALL CLASSES. BY W. B. HODGSON, LL.D. 170 
 
 17 . A * 
 
ON THE INFLUENCE OF THE HISTORY OF 
 
 SCIENCE UPON INTELLECTUAL 
 
 EDUCATION 
 
 A LECTURE DELIVERED AT THE ROYAL INSTITUTION OF GREAT 
 BRITAIN, BEFORE H.R.H. PRINCE ALBERT 
 
 By WILLIAM WHEWELL, D.D., F.R.S. 
 
 Master of Trinity College, Cambridge 
 
 The managers of the Royal Institution having determined to 
 provide for their members and others a series of Lectures upon 
 Education, and having expressed their wish that I should offer to 
 the audience here assembled any views which may appear to 
 me suited to such a purpose, I venture to do so, relying upon an 
 indulgence which I have more than once experienced here on 
 similar occasions. Of such indulgence I strongly feel the need, 
 on various accounts, but especially on these two — first, that 
 being so unfrequently in this metropolis, I do not know what 
 trains of thought are passing in the minds of the greater part 
 of my audience, who live in the midst of a stimulation produced 
 by the lively interchange of opinion and discussion on the 
 prominent questions of the day, to one of which what I have 
 now to say in a great degree refers ; and next, that in this hall, 
 where you are accustomed to listen to the most lively explana- 
 tions of scientific discoveries, illustrated by the most skilful and 
 striking experiments, / have to present to you a series of remarks 
 on subjects more or less abstract and vague, without being 
 able to aid my exposition by anything addressed to the eye. 
 The pictures which words can give of abstruse and general 
 mental conceptions, when they alone form a diorama on which 
 the mental eye of an assembly is to be directed for a whole 
 hour, always appears to me to be in great danger of fading 
 away into a dream of cloudland or a vacant blank. However, 
 
 19 
 
20 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 as to that point, I have an advantage in speaking on the History 
 of Science, which is my present subject in this room. To those 
 of yon who are in the habit of coming here, the walls must 
 appear, from their customary aspect, to be hung with pictures 
 which illustrate my theme. The striking facts in the history of 
 science which you have presented to you in this place, week 
 after week, are illustrations, in particular cases, of the general 
 views which I have to offer to you ; and if such expressions 
 as experience and theory, discovery and generalization, Baconian 
 ascents to comprehensive axioms, and descents thence to wonderful 
 works — if such expressions be in danger of being to others vague 
 and empty sounds, to you they will be, I may trust, all enlivened 
 and embodied by what you have again and again seen here. 
 
 The subject on which I am desirous of making a few remarks 
 to you at present is this : The Influence of Scientific Discovery 
 upon Intellectual Education — the influence of the scientific dis- 
 coveries of any period upon the intellectual education of the 
 succeeding period ; the influence, that is, of the intellectual 
 achievements of one or two gifted men, at various epochs of the 
 world's history, upon all those persons, in the next succeeding 
 generations, who have aimed to obtain, for themselves or for 
 their children, the highest culture, the best discipline, of which 
 man's intellectual faculties are capable. I wish to show that 
 there has been such an influence, and that it has been great 
 at all periods ; that is, at all those periods of intellectual 
 energy and activity which come within the conditions of the 
 terms ; — all periods which have been periods of discovery. 
 I wish to show that this influence has been so great that its 
 results constitute, at this day, the whole of our intellectual 
 education ; — that in virtue of this influence, intellectual educa- 
 tion has been, for those who avail themselves of the means 
 which time has accumulated, progressive ; — that our intellectual 
 education now, to be worthy of the time, ought to include in its 
 compass elements contributed to it in every one of the great 
 epochs of mental energy which the world has seen ; — that in 
 this respect, most especially, we are, if we know how to use our 
 advantage, inheritors of the wealth of all the richest times ; 
 strong in the power of the giants of all ages ; placed on the 
 summit of an edifice which thirty centuries have been employed 
 in building. 
 
INFLUENCE OF SCIENCE UPON EDUCATION 21 
 
 Perhaps I shall most simply make myself intelligible by stating 
 plainly and frankly a proposition which I wish to illustrate by 
 various examples, as it has been exemplified in various ages and 
 countries. The proposition is this : That every great advance 
 in intellectual education has been the effect of some considerable 
 scientific discovery, or group of discoveries. Every improvement 
 of the mental discipline of those who stand in the forefront of 
 humanity has followed some signal victory of their leaders ; 
 every addition to the means of intellectual culture has been the 
 result of some extraordinary harvest, some more than ordinary 
 bounty of the intellectual soil, bestowed on the preceding years. 
 
 Without further preface, let us proceed to examples. The 
 first great attempt made for the improvement of intellectual 
 education, so far as history tells us, was that undertaken and 
 prosecuted with persevering vigour by Socrates and Plato. The 
 aim of those philosophers was, I say, mainly and peculiarly, an 
 improvement of the intellectual education of their countrymen. 
 The Athenians of that time, — I mean the more eminent and 
 affluent classes of them, — had already an education in a very 
 considerable degree elaborate, and large and elevated in its 
 promises. The persons by whom this education was, in its 
 higher departments, conducted — the teachers whom Socrates 
 and Plato perseveringly opposed — have been habitually called 
 the Sophists ; because, though at the time their ascendancy 
 was immense, in the course of ages Plato's writings have super- 
 seded theirs, and he so describes them. But it has been shown 
 recently, in the most luminous and striking manner, by one 
 among ourselves, that the education which these teachers 
 professed to give, and frequently gave, was precisely what we 
 commonly mean by a good education. It was an education 
 enabling a young man to write well, speak well, and act efficiently 
 on all ordinary occasions, public and private. The moral 
 doctrines which they taught, even according to the most un- 
 favourable representation of them, were no worse than the moral 
 doctrines which are most commonly taught among ourselves at 
 the present day,— the morality founded upon utility ; but many 
 of them repudiated this doctrine as sordid and narrow, and 
 professed higher principles, which they delivered in graceful 
 literary forms, some of which are still extant in the books 
 which we put in the hands of the young. 
 
22 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 Such were the Sophists, against whom Socrates and Plato 
 carried on their warfare. And why did Socrates and Plato 
 contend against these teachers ; and how was it that they 
 contended so successfully that the sympathy of all posterity 
 has been with them in their opposition ? It was because 
 Socrates and Plato sought for solid principles in this specious 
 teaching, and found none. It was because, while these 
 professors of speaking well and acting well imparted their 
 precepts to their pupils, and exemplified them by their practice, 
 they could not bear the keen cross-questioning of Socrates, 
 when he tried to make them tell what it was to speak well and 
 to act well ; they could not tell Plato what was that " First 
 Good, First Perfect, and First Fair," from which everything 
 else derived goodness, beauty, and perfection. Socrates and 
 Plato were not content with illustrations, they asked for 
 principles ; they were not content with rhetoric, they wanted 
 demonstration ; it was not enough for them that these men 
 taught the young Athenian to persuade others, they wanted to 
 have him know, and to know toJiat he knew. These were the 
 demands, as many of you will recollect, that recur again and 
 again in the Platonic Dialogues. This is the tendency of all the 
 trains of irresistible logic which are put in the mouth of Plato's 
 imaginary Socrates. What do we know ? How do we know 
 it ? By what reasoning ? ■ From what principles ? These 
 questions are perpetually asked. They are never completely 
 answered. The respondent always breaks down at some 
 point or other ; and then Socrates says, with his calm irony, 
 " How disappointing ! How vexatious ! We are where we 
 were ! We must begin again. We have not yet found what 
 we were seeking. We have not yet got hold of the real and 
 essential truth." 
 
 And what was it that had put Socrates and Plato upon this 
 eager and obstinate search of a real and essential truth ? How 
 was it they could not be satisfied without it ? Why might not 
 that which had been taught by the wise and eloquent men of 
 previous generations suffice for their generation ? Why must 
 their inquiries go further than the inquiries of their ancestors 
 had done ? This real and essential truth which they sought, 
 what had put the notion of it into their heads ? What had made 
 them think that such a thing could be found ? Had they 
 
INFLUENCE OF SCIENCE UPON EDUCATION 23 
 
 seen any example of such truth ; had they seen any specimen 
 of this treasure which they sought for with so vehement and 
 persevering a quest ? 
 
 Yes : for this is the point to which I wish to draw your 
 attention ; they had seen specimens of this treasure. They 
 had had placed before them examples of real and certain truth ; 
 they had been admitted to contemplate clear and indisputable 
 truths ; truths which they could demonstrate to be true ; 
 truths which they could trace to principles of intuitive evidence ; 
 truths which it did not appear to be speaking too highly of 
 if they called them necessary and eternal. 
 
 Such truths they had already seen and known ; for they hac 
 known some of the truths of geometry. No doubt some of these 
 truths, — the truths of geometry, — some casual and happy 
 guesses — had been known at a much earlier period. Pythagoras 
 had known that the squares on the two sides of a right angled 
 triangle are equal to the square on the third. But the lore 
 of Pythagoras, imparted in a mysterious manner to an initiated 
 few, had long crept stealthily among the secret societies of the 
 Italian coast, and hardly made its way, in any considerable 
 degree, into Greece, till it was introduced by Plato and his 
 friends. But the age of Plato was an age of great geometrical 
 discovery in Greece. The general body of geometry, such as it 
 exists to this day, was then constructed. Plato himself was an 
 eminent geometer, not only by geometrical discoveries 
 which he made, but still more by his clear and strong perception 
 of the importance of the study. He repeatedly exhorts his 
 fellow-countrymen to pursue this study ; he promises that it 
 shall lead them to a true view of the heavens ; he discerns how 
 this is to be done ; he points out new branches of mathematical 
 science which must be constructed for this purpose ; he re- 
 peatedly refers to the Definitions, the Axioms, the Proofs of 
 Geometrical Propositions ; he writes over the gate of the 
 gardens of Academus, where his disciples meet to listen to his 
 teaching — OvBeis ayeojj.irpT]Tos exa-erw, " Let no one enter who 
 is destitute of Geometry." 
 
 And why this requirement ? Why this prohibition ? What 
 was the need of Geometry for his disciples ? What use was he 
 to make of it ? What inference was he to draw from it when 
 they had it ? 
 
24 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 Precisely the inference which I have mentioned : — that there 
 was a certain and solid truth ; a knowledge which was not mere 
 opinion ; science which was more than seeming ; that man has 
 powers by which such truth, such knowledge, such science, may 
 be acquired ; that therefore it ought to be sought, not in 
 geometry alone, but in other subjects also ; that since man can 
 know, certainly and clearly, about straight and curved in the 
 world of space, he ought to know, — he ought not to be content 
 without knowing, — no less clearly and certainly, about right 
 and wrong in the world of human action. That man has such 
 powers was the beginning of Plato's philosophy. To use 
 them for such purposes was the constant aim of his mental 
 activity. The impression which had been left upon his mind 
 by the geometrical achievements of his contemporaries, 
 and by those which he himself began, was that the powers by 
 which such discoveries are made are evidences of the exalted 
 nature of the human mind ; of its vast profundity ; of its 
 lofty destiny. He repeatedly, and with obvious gratification, 
 refers to geometrical truths as evidences of the nature of the 
 human mind, and even of its hope of immortality. Since 
 the mind can thus reason to certain truths, it must have in it the 
 principles of truth ; and whence did it derive them ? Since it 
 can know what it has not learned from the senses, it must have 
 some other source of knowledge ; and how much is implied in 
 this ! Since it can conceive and bring forth eternal truths, 
 how can it be the child of a day, a transient creature, born one 
 moment and perishing the next ? 
 
 Perhaps it may serve to add distinctness to the account I 
 am trying to give you of Plato's teaching if I give you, in 
 his own way, an example of this teaching of his. It shall be 
 very brief. In Plato's Dialogue called Meno, Socrates, in 
 discourse with Meno the Thessalian, is trying to discover 
 what Virtue is : and pressing his inquiry from point to point, 
 and finding the truth perpetually escape him, he is led to ask 
 at last, "What is meant by discovering anything ? Can we do 
 it ? If so, how ? " And on this, with more of' direct assertion 
 than he commonly ventures upon, he declares that we can do 
 it, and that he will show how we do it. He calls up a young 
 and intelligent boy, an attendant of Meno, and he propounds 
 to him a geometrical problem, simple, yet not quite obvious. 
 
INFLUENCE OF SCIENCE UPON EDUCATION 25 
 
 He draws a diagram in the sand, and asks him various questions 
 as to the lines which serve to illustrate this problem : and the 
 boy, though at first he says he does not know, is soon led to 
 answer rightly to these interrogations, by his natural appre- 
 hension of the relations of space. At every step, Socrates says, 
 " You see I tell him nothing. He goes on towards the truth, 
 but I do not teach him. He finds it in his own mind. He does 
 not learn from another, he recollects what he has already 
 known. His knowledge is recollection. His science is remi- 
 niscence." * 
 
 This doctrine — that knowledge is recollection, that science 
 is reminiscence — is the main result deduced in the Meno from 
 this geometrical investigation. In that Dialogue, as I have 
 said, the doctrine is applied to illustrate the nature of the 
 discovery of truth in general. In the Phedo — that Dialogue 
 which has so deeply moved thoughtful men in every age, in 
 which Socrates, standing before the gates of death, reasons 
 with his weeping friends as to what he shall find beyond them — 
 this same doctrine is employed to warm their hopes and elevate 
 their thoughts. Since, it is argued, the soul thus contains in 
 itself the principles of eternal truth, it must be itself eternal. 
 But it is not with this purpose that I here refer to the use 
 thus made of geometrical reasoning. My object is to establish 
 this view : — that the great step in pure scientific discovery 
 made by the Greeks of Plato's time, — the construction of a con- 
 nected and comprehensive body of geometrical truth, — led to the 
 conviction that geometry was an immensely valuable element 
 in intellectual education. The apprehensions of such truths 
 threw a new light upon the nature of all truth, and the means 
 of attaining to it. It was seen that, thenceforth, they who 
 were altogether ignorant of geometry were destitute of the 
 best means then known of showing them what is the genuine 
 aspect of essential truth, — what is the nature of the intellectual 
 vision by which it is seen, — what is the consciousness of intuitive 
 power on which its foundations rest. And thus, in virtue of the 
 geometrical discoveries of the Platonic epoch, geometry became 
 a part of the discipline of the Platonic school ; — became the 
 starting-point of the Platonic reformation of the intellectual 
 
 * This portion of Plato's Dialogue, the Meno, was given briefly in the Lecture, 
 a diagram being exhibited. See Note, p. 37. 
 
26 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 education of Athens ; — became an element of a liberal education. 
 And not only became so then, but has continued so to this day : 
 so that among ourselves, and in every other country of high 
 cultivation, no education is held to be raised on good founda- 
 tions which does not include geometry, — elementary geometry, 
 at least, — among its component portions. And thus, in our 
 Education, as in our Science, the completest form, in the 
 latest time, includes and assumes the earliest steps of real 
 progress : and this is so, in the one case as in the other, because 
 the one must always depend on the other ; because the progress 
 of Education is affected, at every great and principal step, by 
 the progress of Science. 
 
 You will not be surprised to be thus told that our modern 
 education has derived something from the ancient Greek 
 education, because you know that our modern science has 
 derived much from the ancient Greek science. You know that 
 our science, in the ordinary sense of the term, has derived little 
 from the ancient Romans ; — little, that is, which is original ; 
 and therefore you will not be surprised if our education has 
 derived little from the Roman education. If the fact were so, 
 it would still be a negative illustration of the doctrine which I 
 am trying to elucidate ; — the dependence of the progress of 
 education on the progress of science. But if we take the term 
 science in a somewhat wider acceptation, we shall derive from 
 the Roman history, not a negative, but a positive exemplification 
 of our proposition. For in that wider sense there is a science 
 of which Rome was the mother, as Greece was of geometry and 
 mathematics. The term Science may be extended so widety as 
 to allow us to speak of the Science of Law — meaning the doctrine 
 of Rights and Obligations, in its most definite and yet most 
 comprehensive form ; — in short, the Science of Jurisprudence. 
 In this Science the Romans were really great discoverers : or 
 rather, it was they who made the subject a Science — who gave 
 it the precision of a Science, the generality of a science, the 
 method of a Science. And how effectually they did this we 
 may judge from the fact that the jurisprudence of Rome is 
 still the basis, the model, the guide, the core of the jurisprudence 
 of every civilized country ; — of our own, less than most, but 
 still, in no small degree, of our own. The imitators and pupils 
 of the Greeks in every other department of human speculation, 
 
INFLUENCE OF SCIENCE UPON EDUCATION 27 
 
 in jurisprudence the Romans felt themselves their masters. 
 Cicero says, proudly, but not too proudly, that a single page 
 of a Roman jurist contained more solid and exact matter than 
 a whole library of Greek philosophers. The labours of jurists 
 deserving this character, which thus began before Cicero, 
 continued through the empire, to its fall ;— continued even 
 beyond its fall. As Horace tells us that captive Greece captived 
 the conqueror and taught him arts ; so Rome subdued, subdued 
 the victor hordes, and taught them law. The laws of Rome 
 gave method to the codes of the northern nations, and are 
 the origin of much that is most scientific in the more recent 
 systems of legislation. That general law is a science we owe 
 to the Romans ; and we in England may be reminded of this 
 by our inability to translate the Roman word by which this 
 science is described : for though the term jus is the root of 
 jurist, and jurisprudence, and the like, it is, as yet, hardly 
 naturalized in its technical sense, as designating the general 
 Doctrine of Rights and Obligations : nor have we any word 
 which has that meaning, as Droit has in French, and Recht in 
 German. 
 
 Here is a great science, then, of which the discoverers were the 
 Romans : can we trace, as according to our view we ought to be 
 able to trace, any corresponding great step in intellectual 
 discipline ? Was jus a prominent part of Roman education ? 
 Is Roman jurisprudence a prominent part in the liberal educa- 
 tion in modern times? To both these questions we must 
 answer most emphatically, Yes. The law of Rome was the 
 main part of the education of the Roman youth. Cicero 
 reminds his brother Quintius that they had learnt the old laws 
 and the formulae of legal proceedings by heart, as a -sort of 
 domestic catechism or nursery rhyme. Every Roman of 
 eminence spent the early part of his morning in giving legal 
 opinions to his clients :— not like our Justices of the Peace, when 
 appealed to as a magistrate, but as an adviser and protector : 
 and every young member of the aristocracy had to fit himself 
 for this office. Every young Roman of condition was a Roman 
 jurist. And the study of the law, thus made a leading branch 
 of a liberal education, continued so through the Middle Ages- 
 continues so still. It occupied the great Italian universities — 
 Bologna, Pisa, Padua, and the like— in the darkest parts of the 
 
28 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 Dark Ages. It occupies most of the universities of Europe to 
 this day. The Roman law is still the main element of the 
 liberal education of Italy, of Germany, of Greece, and, in some 
 degree, even of France and Spain. In Germany its prevalence 
 has been such that in recent times all the great moral contro- 
 versies have been debated in the most strenuous and searching 
 manner in terms of the Civil Law, as the Roman law is still 
 called all over Europe. And we shall hardly doubt, if we look 
 into the matter, that these legal studies have given to the well- 
 educated men of those countries a precision of thought and an 
 exactness of logic on moral subjects which, without such a 
 study, would not have been likely to prevail. To define a 
 Right or Obligation, to use proper terms in framing a law, in 
 delivering a judicial sentence, in giving a legal opinion, is pre- 
 cisely the merit of an accomplished jurist ; as is emphatically 
 asserted by Cicero. And even our own law, fragmentary and 
 unscientific as it is, is not without a value of the same kind, as an 
 instrument of a liberal education. It may be a means of giving 
 exactness to the thoughts, method and clearness to the reasoning, 
 precision to the expressions of men, on the general interests of 
 man and of society ; and is so recommended, and often so 
 employed, by those who are preparing for active life. Of the 
 moral sciences, without some study of which no education can 
 be complete, the science of jurisprudence is most truly a science, 
 and most effectually a means of intellectual discipline. And, as 
 you see, the use of such discipline in education dates from the 
 period of that great advance in speculation on moral subjects 
 and social relations by which jurisprudence became a science. 
 And thus two of the great elements of a thorough intellectual 
 culture, Mathematics and Jurisprudence, are an inheritance 
 which we derive from ages long gone by ; from two great 
 nations ; from the two great nations of antiquity. They are 
 the results of ancient triumphs of man's spirit over the confusion 
 and obscurity of the aspects of the external world ; and even 
 over the waywardness and unregulated impulses of his own 
 nature, and the entanglements and conflicts of human society. 
 And being true sciences they were well fitted to become, as 
 they became, and were fitted to continue, as they have hitherto 
 continued, to be main elements in that discipline by which man 
 is to raise himself above himself; is to raise, — since that is 
 
INFLUENCE OF SCIENCE UPON EDUCATION 29 
 
 especially what we have now to consider, — his intellect into a 
 habitual condition, superior to the rudeness, dimness, confusion, 
 laxity, insecurity, to which the undisciplined impulses of 
 human thought in all ages and nations commonly lead. 
 
 x\nd before we proceed any further, let us consider, for an 
 instant, that such an education, consisting of the elements 
 which I have mentioned, might be, and would be, in well- 
 conducted cases, an education of no common excellence, even 
 according to our present standard of a good' intellectual educa- 
 tion. A mind well disciplined in elementary geometry and in 
 general jurisprudence would be as well prepared as mere dis- 
 cipline can make a mind for most trains of human speculation 
 and reasoning. The mathematical portion of such an education 
 would give clear habits of logical deduction, and a perception 
 of the delight of demonstration ; while the moral portion of the 
 education, as we may call jurisprudence, would guard the mind 
 from the defect, sometimes ascribed to mere mathematicians, of 
 seeing none but mathematical proofs, and applying to all cases 
 mathematical processes. A young man well imbued with these, 
 the leading elements of Athenian and Roman culttire, would, 
 we need not fear to say, be superior in intellectual discipline 
 to three-fourths of the young men of our own day, on whom all 
 the ordinary appliances of what is called a good education have 
 been bestowed. Geometer and jurist, the pupil formed by this 
 culture of the old world, might make no bad figure among the 
 men of letters or of science, the lawyers and the politicians of 
 our own times. 
 
 But there is another remark which I must make, tending to 
 show the defect of this education of antiquity, as compared with 
 the intellectual education of our own times ; or rather, as com- 
 pared with what the education of our own times ought to be. 
 The subjects which I have mentioned, geometry and juris- 
 prudence, are both deductive sciences — sciences in which, from 
 certain first principles, by chains of proof, conclusions are 
 deduced which constitute the doctrines of the science. In the 
 one case, geometry, these first principles are given by intuition ; 
 in the other, jurisprudence, they are either rules instituted by 
 authority and consent, or general principles of human nature 
 and human society obtained from experience interpreted by our 
 own human consciousness. We deduce properties of diagrams 
 
30 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 from geometrical axioms ; we deduce decisions of cases from 
 legal maxims. Jurisprudence, no less than geometry, is a deduc- 
 tive science ; and has been compared with geometry, by its 
 admirers, for the exactness of its deductive processes. They 
 have said (Leibnitz and others) that jural demonstrations are 
 as fine examples of logic as mathematical ; and that pure reason 
 alone determines every expression of a good jurist, no less than 
 a good mathematician ; so that there is no room for that play 
 of individual character which shows itself in the difference of 
 style of different authors. But however perfectly the habits of 
 deduction may be taught by these studies, such teaching cannot, 
 according to the enlarged views of modern times, compose a 
 complete intellectual culture. Induction, rather than deduc- 
 tion, is the source of the great scientific truths which form the 
 glory, and fasten on them the admiration of modern times ; 
 and a modern education cannot be regarded as giving to the 
 intellect that culture which the fullness of time, and the treasures 
 of knowledge now accumulated, render suitable and necessary, 
 except it convey to the mind an adequate appreciation of and 
 familiarity with the inductive process by which those treasures 
 of knowledge have been obtained. As the best sciences which 
 the ancient world framed supplied the best elements of intel- 
 lectual education up to modern times, so the grand step by 
 which, in modern times, science has sprung up into a magnitude 
 and majesty far superior to her ancient dimensions should 
 exercise its influence upon modern education, and contribute 
 its proper result to modern intellectual culture. 
 
 Who is to be taken as the representative of the great epoch 
 of the progress of science in modern times ; that is, beginning 
 from the sixteenth century? In different ways, Galileo, 
 Descartes, Bacon, Newton, may seem best suited to occupy that 
 position. But Galileo's immediate influence was limited, both 
 as to subjects and as to the number of admirers. It was when 
 Descartes summed up into a system the discoveries of Galileo 
 and his disciples, and added to them inventions of his own, 
 some true, many captivating, that the new physical philosophy 
 acquired a large and vigorous hold upon Europe north of the 
 Alps. In France especially, always eager in its admiration 
 of intellectual greatness, Descartes was unhesitatingly regarded 
 as the great man who brought in a new and more enlightened 
 
INFLUENCE OF SCIENCE UPON EDUCATION 31 
 
 age of philosophy. Indeed, for a large portion of philosophy, he 
 is still so regarded by French philosophers ; and though his 
 influence in metaphysics is to be distinguished from his authority 
 in physics, still the ascendancy of his more abstract and general 
 philosophical opinions was closely connected with his recog- 
 nized eminence as a physical philosopher, and with the admira- 
 tion which his system of the universe obtained. The Cartesian 
 philosophy was the proclaimed and acknowledged antagonist 
 of the Aristotelian philosophy ; it was the new truth of which 
 the standard was raised against the old falsehood. Any one 
 acquainted with the French literature of the seventeenth cen- 
 tury will recollect innumerable illustrations of this view of the 
 matter. You remember, perhaps (as an example), the noted 
 passage in Fontenelle's lively dialogues on The Plurality of 
 Worlds. There, the sages of antiquity, the Pythagorases, 
 Platos, Aristotles, are represented as looking at the spectacle 
 of the universe like so many spectators in the pit of the Opera 
 House looking at the ballet. The subject of the ballet is sup- 
 posed to be Phaeton carried away by the winds : and to 
 represent this, the dancer who enacts the part of Phaeton is 
 made to fly away through the upper part of the scene, to the 
 great admiration of the gazers. The more speculative of these 
 attempt to explain this extraordinary movement of Phaeton. 
 One says, " Phaeton has an occult quality, which carries him 
 away." This is the Aristotelian. Another says, " Phaeton 
 is composed of certain numbers which make him move upwards." 
 This is the Pythagorean. Another says, " Phaeton has a long- 
 ing for the top of the theatre. He is not easy till he gets there." 
 This is the philosophy which explains the universe by Love and 
 Hate. Another says, " Phaeton has not naturally a tendency 
 to fly ; but he prefers flying to leaving the top of the scene 
 empty." This is the doctrine of the fuga vacui, nature's horror 
 of a vacuum. And after all this, says the speaker, comes 
 Descartes and some other moderns ; and they say, Phaeton 
 goes up, because he is drawn by certain cords, and a weight, 
 heavier than he is, goes down behind the scenes. And in truth 
 the physical philosophy of Descartes did contain the greater 
 part of the true explanation of the phenomena of the universe 
 which was known up to this time. It contained the principles 
 of Mechanics, with few errors : the principles of Optics, and the 
 
32 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 beautiful explanation of the rainbow, in the discovery of which 
 Descartes had so large a share ; and a true system of Astronomy, 
 so far as the mere motions are concerned. And Descrates's 
 peculiar invention, the hypothesis of tourbillons — vortices or 
 whirlpools of celestial fluid, by which these motions are pro- 
 duced — though false, was not only separable from the other 
 parts of the system, but was capable, by modifications, of ex- 
 pressing many mechanical truths, as the Bernoullis and other 
 mathematicians who retained it for a century often showed. In 
 England, as in France, the Cartesian philosophy meant the 
 Mechanical Philosophy as opposed to the philosophy of sym- 
 pathies and antipathies, occult qualities, arbitrary notions of 
 Nature, and the like. The Cartesian philosophy, in this sense, 
 was introduced into England ; but I doubt whether the doctrine 
 of vortices was ever accepted here to any considerable extent. 
 It has been made, I may be allowed to say ignorantly and 
 absurdly made, an accusation against the University of Cam- 
 bridge that the Cartesian system found acceptance there. 
 Such an event showed a promptitude in accepting new scientific 
 views which has repeatedly been exemplified there. But I 
 much doubt whether the Cartesian system was ever presented to 
 Cambridge students without a refutation of the vortices being 
 put in the notes on the same page. Assuredly it was not taught 
 for more than a few years in any other form : but, I believe, not 
 at all. And in like manner, in other places, the new mechanical 
 philosophy, Cartesian in France, Newtonian in England, rapidly 
 superseded the verbal dogmatism of the Middle Ages. 
 
 And with this triumph of the new opinions, as a revolution 
 in science, came the introduction of the new doctrines as a 
 revolution, or extension, in education. The Cartesian philos- 
 ophy, — instantly in England transformed into the Newtonian 
 philosophy on the publication of Newton's mighty discoveries, 
 — was eagerly received, from its very first appearance, and 
 incorporated with the elements of a liberal education, both in 
 Newton's own university and elsewhere. And not only were 
 the new theories of the solar system rapidly diffused, by means 
 of lectures, books, and in other ways ; but the principles by 
 which such theories are collected from observation, — the 
 principles of that induction, on which this great fabric of science 
 rests, — became objects of attention, respect, and praise. Bacon, 
 
INFLUENCE OF SCIENCE UPON EDUCATION 33 
 
 with his majestic voice, — the trumpeter who stirred up the battle, 
 as he himself calls himself, — had already prepared men's minds 
 for this feeling of respect and admiration for inductive discovery, 
 even while the movement was only beginning : and in this 
 country at least, many persons, Gilbert, Cowley, and others, 
 had re-echoed the sentiment which he expressed. He had 
 declared that knowledge, far more ample and complete than 
 had yet been obtained by man, was to be gained by the use of 
 new methods of investigation : and the succeeding time, having 
 produced noble examples of such knowledge, had made men 
 see that they had entered upon a new epoch of science. And 
 it was natural and desirable that in this, as in other cases, the 
 possession of a body of new truths, and the admiration of the 
 method by which these had been acquired, should operate 
 upon the culture of the intellect among those who sought the 
 best means of such culture — should introduce new elements 
 into liberal education — should make it a part of the mental 
 discipline of the best taught classes, that they should learn to 
 feel the force and see the beauty of inductive reasoning ; as the 
 older elements of a liberal education, mathematics and juris- 
 prudence, had been employed, among other uses, to make men 
 feel the force, and see the beauty, of deductive reasoning. 
 
 And thus we are naturally led to ask, Has this been done ? 
 Has education in its most advanced form been thus extended ? 
 Is there, in the habitual culture of the intellect, in the best 
 system of education, this cultivation of the habit, or at least of 
 the appreciation, of inductive teaching in science ? How is 
 such culture to be effected ? How are we to judge whether it 
 . has been effected ? 
 
 These are very large questions, and yet the time admonishes 
 me, if nothing else did, that I must be very brief in any answers 
 that I may give to them. I must content myself with a hint 
 or two bearing upon the subject. And first, of the mode in 
 which this culture of the inductive habit of mind, or at least 
 appreciation of the method and its results, is to be promoted ; 
 if I might presume to give an opinion, I should say that one 
 obvious mode of effecting this discipline of the mind in induction 
 is the exact and solid study of some portion of inductive know- 
 ledge. I do not mean the mechanical sciences alone, Physical 
 Astronomy and the like ; though these undoubtedly have a 
 
84 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 prerogative value as the instruments of such a culture ; but 
 the like effect will be promoted by the exact and solid study 
 of any portion of the circle of natural sciences — Botany, Com- 
 parative Anatomy, Geology, Chemistry, for instance. But 
 I say the exact and solid knowledge ; not a mere verbal know- 
 ledge, but a knowledge which is real in its character, though 
 it may be elementary and limited in its extent. The knowledge 
 of which I speak must be a knowledge of things, and not merely 
 of names of things ; an acquaintance with the operations and 
 productions of nature, as they appear to the eye, not merely 
 an acquaintance with what has been said about them ; a know- 
 ledge of the laws of nature, seen in special experiments and 
 observations, before they are conceived in general terms ; a 
 knowledge of the types of natural forms, gathered from indi- 
 vidual cases already made familiar. By such study of one or 
 more departments of inductive knowledge the mind may 
 escape from the thraldom and illusion which reigns in the world 
 of mere words. 
 
 But there is another study which I may venture to mention, 
 of a more general and literary kind, also eminently fitted to 
 promote an appreciation of the nature and value of the inductive 
 treatment of nature. I mean the History of the Natural 
 Sciences ; for in such history we see how, in the study of every 
 portion of the universe, the human mind has ascended from 
 particular facts to general laws ; and yet in every different class 
 of phenomena by processes very different, at first sight at least. 
 And I mention this study of the history of science, and especially 
 recommend it, the rather because it supplies, as I conceive, a 
 remedy for some of the evils which, along with great advantages, 
 may result from another study which has long been, and at 
 present is, extensively employed as an element of a liberal 
 education— I mean the study of Logic. The study of Logic is of 
 great value as fixing attention upon the conditions of deductive 
 proof, and giving systematic and technical views of the forms 
 which such proof may assume. But by doing this for all sub- 
 jects alike it produces the impression that there is a close 
 likeness in the process of investigation of truth in different 
 subjects ;— closer than there really is. The examples of reasoning 
 given in books of Logic are generally so trifling as to seem a 
 mockery of truth-seeking, and so monotonous as to seem idle 
 
INFLUENCE OF SCIENCE UPON EDUCATION 35 
 
 variations of the same theme. But in the History of Science 
 we see the infinite variety of nature ; of mental no less than 
 bodily nature ; of the intellectual as well as of the sensible 
 world. The modes of generalization of particulars,— of ascent 
 from the most actual things to the most abstract ideas, — how 
 different are they in botany, in chemistry, in geology, in 
 physiology ! — yet all most true and real ; all most certain and 
 solid ; all of them genuine and indisputable lines of union and 
 connexion, by which the mind of man and the facts of the 
 universe are bound together ; by which the universe becomes a 
 sphere with intellect for its centre ; by which intellect becomes 
 in no small degree able to bend to its purposes the powers of the 
 universe. 
 
 The history of science, showing us how this takes place in 
 various forms, — ever and ever new, when they seem to have 
 been exhausted,— may do, and carefully studied must do, much 
 to promote that due apprehension and appreciation of inductive 
 discovery : and inductive discovery, now that the process has 
 been going on with immense vigour in the nations of Europe 
 for the last three hundred years, ought, we venture to say, to 
 form a distinct and prominent part of the intellectual education 
 of the youth of those nations. And having said this, I have 
 given you the ultimate result of the reflections which have 
 occurred to me on this subject of intellectual education on 
 which I have ventured to address you. And here, therefore, I 
 might conclude. But if it did not weary you, I should wish to 
 make a remark on the other of the two questions which I asked 
 a little while ago. I then asked, How is such a culture to be 
 effected ? and also, How are we to judge whether it has been 
 effected ? 
 
 With regard to the latter question, the remark which I have 
 to make is briefly this : In the inductive sciences, every step 
 of generalization is usually marked by some word, which, 
 adopted to mark that step, acquires thenceforth a fixed and 
 definite meaning ; and is always to be used in the sense so given 
 it, not in any other way in which other resemblances or incidents 
 may suggest. And the definition of technical words in inductive 
 science is contained in the history of the science ; is given by the 
 course of previous research and discovery. " The history of 
 science is our dictionary ; the steps of scientific induction are 
 
36 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 our definitions." Now this being so, we may remark that when 
 we hear a man, in the course of an argument, asking for Defi- 
 nitions, as something by which error is to be avoided and truth 
 learned, such a demand is evidence that his intellectual training 
 has been deductive, not inductive — logical, not scientific. In 
 geometry, and in other demonstrative sciences, Definitions are 
 the beginning of the science — the fountains of truth. But it is 
 not so in the inductive sciences. In such sciences a Definition 
 and a Proposition commonly enter side by side — the definition 
 giving exactness to the proposition ; the proposition giving 
 reality to the definition. 
 
 But further : — as technical terms, appropriate to a precise and 
 steady sense, mark every step of inductive ascent in science, the 
 exact and correct use of the technical terms of science is evidence 
 of good inductive culture of the mind ; and a vague and im- 
 proper use of such terms is evidence of the absence of such 
 culture. When we hear men speak, as we often do, of impetus 
 and momentum, of gravity and inertia, of centripetal and centri- 
 fugal force, and the like, using the terms mostly by guess, — and 
 assuming oppositions and relations among them which do not 
 exist ; — as, for instance, when they oppose the centrifugal and 
 centripetal force, as if they were forces in the same sense ; — we 
 cannot help saying that such persons, however ingenious and 
 quick they may be in picking a possible meaning out of current 
 words by means of their etymology or any other casual light, 
 have not the habit of gathering the meaning of scientific words 
 from the only true light, the light of induction. 
 
 And this remark may not be without a special use if we 
 recollect that there are at present a number of scientific words 
 current among us which are applied with the most fantastical 
 and wanton vagueness of meaning, or of no meaning. At all 
 periods of science, probably, scientific terms are liable to this 
 abuse, after scientific discoveries have brought them into 
 notoriety, and before the diffusion of science has made their true 
 meaning to be generally apprehended. The names, indeed, of 
 attraction, gravitation, and the like have probably now risen, 
 in a great degree, out of this sphere of confusion and obscurity, 
 in which any word may mean anything. But there are words 
 — belonging to sciences which have more recently reached 
 dignity, — which^ words every one pursuing fancies which are 
 
INFLUENCE OF SCIENCE UPON EDUCATION 37 
 
 utterly out of the sphere of science seems to think he may use 
 just as he pleases. Magnetism and Electricity, and the terms 
 which belong to these sciences, are especially taken possession 
 of for such purposes, and applied in cases in which we know that 
 the sciences from which the names are " conveyed " have not 
 the smallest application. Is Animal Magnetism anything ? 
 Let those answer who think they can : but we know that it is 
 not Magnetism. When I say we, I mean those who are in the 
 habit of seeing in this place the admirable exhibitions of what 
 Magnetism is, with which you have long been familiar. And 
 assuredly, on the same ground, I may say that you have been 
 shown, and know, what Electricity is, and what it can do ; and 
 what it cannot do, and what is not Electricity. And having 
 had the opportunity of seeing this, you, at least, have so much 
 of the culture of the intellect which inductive science supplies 
 as not to suppose that your words would have any meaning 
 if you were to say of any freak of fancy or will, shown in bodily 
 motion or muscular action, that it is a kind of Electricity. 
 
 NOTE TO p. 25 
 
 EXTRACT FROM THE " MENO " OF PLATO 
 
 S. Tell me, boy, do you know that this figure is a square"? — B. Yes, 
 I know. 
 
 8. Because all these four lines are equal (its sides) ? — B. Yes. 
 
 8. And also these other two lines are equal, which are drawn lacross the 
 middle ? (the diagonals) — B. Yes. 
 
 S. May there be a square greater or less than this ? — B. Yes. 
 
 S. May there be a square twice as great as this ? — B. Yes. 
 
 S. How long must one side be, that the square may be twice as great ? — 
 B. Twice as long as the side of the first square. 
 
 You see, Socrates says, I tell him nothing, I only 
 ask him questions. And now he thinks he has 
 answered right. But I must revive his recollec- 
 tion, that he may see his error. — So you say that 
 the square on a double line will be double of the 
 first square ? You know I mean a square, not a 
 figure that is long one way and narrow the other ; 
 but as broad as it is long, like this square, only 
 
 twice as large. Now let us fit to one end of the first square a second square- 
 which is equal to it. And let us fit two other squares of the same size to the 
 sides of those two squares. Then we have a new square, have we not ? — B. Yes. 
 
 S. And how many times is it greater than the first square ? — B. Four 
 .times greater. 
 
 S. Not twice as great, which you said ? — B. No : four times. 
 
 S. Well : but how long must the line be that the square upon it may be^ 
 twice as great as the first square ? — B. I do not know. 
 
 
38 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 Now, says Socrates, mark, that out of this not knowing, he will come to 
 know, by seeking with me, just as he comes to know when I question him 
 without my telling him anything. You will see that I do not give him my 
 opinion, I only get at his. — If we draw a line across this first square, from 
 corner to corner (the diagonal), it cuts it into two equal parts, does it not ? — 
 B. Yes. 
 
 8. And if in this square, which is made up of the four squares, we draw 
 the four diagonals, so as to cut off the four outside corners, each of these diagonals 
 will cut one of the squares into two halves ? — B. Yes. 
 
 S. And these four diagonals will be equal, and will make a new square ? — 
 B. Yes. 
 
 S. And this square is made up of the four inside halves of the four squares, 
 is it not ? — B. It is. 
 
 S. But the first square is made up of two such halves, is it not ? — B. Yes. 
 
 S. And how much is four times greater than twice ? — B. The double of it. 
 
 S. Then how many times is the new square greater than the first square ? — 
 B. It is the double of it. 
 
 S. Then you have got a square which is the double of the original square ? — 
 B. Yes. 
 
 S. Namely, the square upon the diagonal of the original square? — B. Yes. 
 
 You see, Socrates says, he was really possessed of all his knowledge before. 
 Those who do not know have still in their minds a latent knowledge. 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 
 
 A LECTURE DELIVERED AT THE ROYAL INSTITUTION OF GREAT 
 BRITAIN, BEFORE H.R.H. PRINCE ALBERT 
 
 By PROFESSOR FARADAY, LL.D., F.R.S. 
 
 I take courage, Sir, from your presence here this day, to speak 
 boldly that which is upon my mind. I feared that it might 
 be unpleasant to some of my audience, but as I know that 
 your Royal Highness is a champion for and desires the truth, 
 I will believe that all here are united in the same cause, and 
 therefore will give utterance, without hesitation, to what I 
 have to say regarding the present condition of Mental 
 Education. 
 
 If the term education may be understood in so large a sense 
 as to include all that belongs to the improvement of the mind, 
 either by the acquisition of the knowledge of others, or by 
 increase of it through its own exertions, then I may hope to be 
 justified for bringing forward a few desultory observations 
 respecting the exercise of the mental powers in a particular 
 direction, which otherwise might seem out of place. The 
 points I have in view are general, but they are manifest in a 
 striking manner, among the physical matters which have 
 occupied my life ; and as the latter afford a field for exercise 
 in which cogitations and conclusions can be subjected to the 
 rigid tests of fact and experiment — as all classes employ them- 
 selves more or less in the consideration of physical matters, 
 and may do so with great advantage, if inclined in the least 
 degree to profit by educational practices, so I hope that what 
 I may say will find its application in every condition of life. 
 
 Before entering upon the subject, I must take one distinction 
 which, however it may appear to others, is to me of the utmost 
 importance. High as man is placed above the creatures 
 around him, there is a higher and far more exalted position 
 
 39 
 
40 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 within his view ; and the ways are infinite in which he occupies 
 his thoughts about the fears, or hopes, or expectations of a 
 future life. I believe that the truth of that future cannot be 
 brought to his knowledge by any exertion of his mental powers, 
 however exalted they may be ; that it is made known to him 
 by other teaching than his own, and is received through simple 
 belief of the testimony given. Let no one suppose for a 
 moment that the self-education I am about to commend in 
 respect of the things of this life extends to any considerations 
 of the hope set before us, as if man by reasoning could find out 
 God. It would be improper here to enter upon this subject 
 further than to claim an absolute distinction between religious 
 and ordinary belief. I shall be reproached with the weakness 
 of refusing to apply those mental operations which I think 
 good in respect of high things to the very highest. I am 
 content to bear the reproach. Yet, even in earthly matters, 
 I believe that the invisible things of Him from the creation of 
 the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that 
 are made, even His eternal power and Godhead ; and I have 
 never seen anything incompatible between those things of man 
 which can be known by the spirit of man which is within him, 
 and those higher things concerning his future which he cannot 
 know by that spirit. 
 
 Claiming, then, the use of the ordinary faculties of the mind 
 in ordinary things, let me next endeavour to point out what 
 appears to me to be a great deficiency in the exercise of the 
 mental powers in every direction ; three words will express 
 this great want, deficiency of judgment. I do not wish to make 
 any startling assertion, but I know that in physical matters 
 multitudes are ready to draw conclusions who have little or 
 no power of judgment in the cases ; that the same is true of 
 other departments of knowledge ; and that, generally, mankind 
 is willing to leave the faculties which relate to judgment almost 
 entirely uneducated, and their decisions at the mercy of 
 ignorance, prepossessions, the passions, or even accident. 
 
 Do not suppose, because I stand here and speak thus, making 
 no exceptions, that I except myself. I have learned to know 
 that I fall infinitely short of that efficacious exercise of the 
 judgment which may be attained. There are exceptions to 
 my general conclusion, numerous and high ; but if we desire 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 41 
 
 to know how far education is required, we do not consider the 
 few who need it not, but the many who have it not ; and in 
 respect of judgment, the number of the latter is almost infinite. 
 I am moreover persuaded that the clear and powerful minds 
 which have realized in some degree the intellectual preparation 
 I am about to refer to, will admit its importance, and indeed 
 its necessity ; and that they will not except themselves, nor 
 think that I have made my statement too extensive. 
 
 As I believe that a very large proportion of the errors we 
 make in judgment is a simple and direct result of our perfectly 
 unconscious state, and think that a demonstration of the 
 liabilities we are subject to would aid greatly in providing a 
 remedy, I will proceed first to a few illustrations of a physical 
 nature. Nothing can better supply them than the intimations 
 we derive from our senses ; to them we trust directly, by 
 them we become acquainted with external things, and gain 
 the power of increasing and varying facts upon which we 
 entirely depend. Our sense perceptions are wonderful. Even 
 in the observant but unreflective infant they soon produce a 
 result which looks like intuition, because of its perfection. 
 Coming to the mind as so many data, they are stored up, and 
 without our being conscious of it are ever after used in like 
 circumstances in forming our judgment ; and it is not wonderful 
 that man is accustomed to trust them without examination. 
 Nevertheless, the result is the effect of education : the mind 
 has to be instructed with regard to the senses and their intima- 
 tions through every step of life ; and where the instruction 'is 
 imperfect, it is astonishing how soon and how much their 
 evidence fails us. Yet, in the latter years of life, we do not 
 consider this matter, but, having obtained the ordinary teaching 
 sufficient for ordinary purposes, we venture to judge of things 
 which are extraordinary for the time, and almost always with 
 the more assurance as our powers of observation are less 
 educated. Consider the following case of a physical impression, 
 derived from the sense of touch, which can be examined and 
 verified at pleasure : If the hands be brought towards each 
 other so that the tips of the corresponding fingers touch, the 
 end of any finger may be considered as an object to be felt 
 by the opposed finger, thus the two middle fingers may for the 
 present be so viewed. If the attention be directed to them, 
 
42 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 no difficulty will be experienced in moving each lightly in a 
 circle round the tip of the other, so that they shall each feel 
 the opposite, and the motion may be either in one direction or 
 the other — looking at the fingers, or with eyes employed else- 
 where — or with the remaining fingers touching quiescently, or 
 moving in a like direction ; all is easy, because each finger is 
 employed in the ordinary or educated manner whilst obeying 
 the will, and whilst communicating through the sentient organ 
 with the brain. But turn the hands half way round, so that 
 their backs shall be towards each other, and then, crossing 
 them at the wrists, again bring the like fingers into contact at 
 the tips. If it be now desired to move the extremities of the 
 middle fingers round each other, or to follow the contour of 
 one finger by the tip of the opposed one, all sorts of confusion 
 in the motion will ensue ; and as the finger of one hand tries, 
 under the instruction of the will, to move in one course, the 
 touched finger will convey an intimation that it is moving in 
 another. If all the fingers move at once, all will be in confusion, 
 the ease and simplicity of the first case having entirely dis- 
 appeared. If, after some considerable trial, familiarity with 
 the new circumstances have removed part of the uncertainty, 
 then, crossing the hands at the opposite sides of the wrists will 
 renew it. These contrary results are dependent, not on any 
 change in the nature of the sentient indication, or of the 
 surfaces or substances which the sense has to deal with, but 
 upon the trifling circumstance of a little variation from the 
 direction in which the sentient organs of these parts are usually 
 exerted, and they show to what an extraordinary extent our 
 interpretations of the sense impressions depend upon the 
 experience, i.e. the education which they have previously 
 received, and their great inability to aid us at once in circum- 
 stances which are entirely new. 
 
 At other times they fail us because we cannot keep a true 
 remembrance of former impressions. Thus, on the evening of 
 the eleventh of March last, I and many others were persuaded 
 that at One period the moon had a real green colour, and 
 though I knew that the prevailing red tints of the general sky 
 were competent to produce an effect of such a kind, yet there 
 was so little of that in the neighbourhood of the planet, that 
 I was doubtful whether the green tint was not produced on 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 43 
 
 the moon by some aerial medium spread before it, until, by 
 holding up white cards in a proper position, and comparing 
 them with our satellite, I had determined experimentally that 
 the effect was only one of contrast. In the midst of the 
 surrounding tints, my memory could not recall the true sentient 
 impression which the white of the moon most surely had 
 before made upon the eye. , 
 
 At other times the failure is because one impression is over- 
 powered by another ; for as the morning star disappears when the 
 sun is risen, though still above the horizon and shining brightly 
 as ever, so do stronger phenomena obscure weaker, even when 
 both are of the same kind ; till an uninstructed person is apt to 
 pass the weaker unobserved, and even deny their existence. 
 
 So, error results occasionally from believing our senses : it 
 ought to be considered, rather, as an error of the judgment than 
 of the sense, for the latter has performed its duty ; the indica- 
 tion is always correct, and in harmony with the great truth of 
 nature. Where, then, is the mistake ? — almost entirely with 
 our judgment. We have not had that sufficient instruction 
 by the senses which would justify our making a conclusion ; 
 we have to contrive extra and special means, by which their 
 first impressions shall be corrected, or rather enlarged ; and it 
 is because our procedure was hasty, our data too few, and our 
 judgment untaught, that we fell into mistake ; not because the 
 data were wrong. How frequently may each one of us perceive, 
 in our neighbours, at least, that a result like this derived from 
 the observation of physical things, happens in the ordinary 
 affairs of common life. 
 
 When I become convicted of such haste, which is not infre- 
 quently the case, I look back upon the error as one of " pre- 
 sumptuous judgment." Under that form it is easily presentable 
 to the mind, and has a useful corrective action. I do not think 
 the expression too strong ; for if we are led, either by simplicity 
 or vanity, to give an opinion upon matters respecting which 
 we are not instructed, either by the knowledge of others, or 
 our own intimate observation ; if we are induced to ascribe 
 an effect to one force, or deny its relation to another, knowing 
 little or nothing of the laws of the forces, or the necessary 
 conditions of the effect to be considered ; surely our judgment 
 must be qualified as " presumptuous." 
 
44 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 There are multitudes who think themselves competent to 
 decide, after the most cursory observation, upon the cause of 
 this or that event (and they may be really very acute and 
 correct in things familiar to them) : — a not unusual phrase with 
 them is, that " it stands to reason," that the effect they expect 
 should result from the cause they assign to it, and yet it is 
 very difficult, in numerous cases that appear plain, to show this 
 reason, or to deduce the true and only rational relation of cause 
 and effect. In matters connected with natural philosophy, we 
 have wonderful aid in the progress and assurance in the 
 character, of our final judgment, afforded us by the facts which 
 supply our data, and the experience which multiplies their 
 number and varies their testimony. A fundamental fact, like 
 an elementary principle, never fails us, its evidence is always 
 true ; but, on the other hand, we frequently have to ask what 
 is the fact ?■ — often fail in distinguishing it, — often fail in the 
 very statement of it, — and mostly overpass or come short of its 
 true recognition. 
 
 If we are subject to mistake in the interpretation of our mere 
 sense impressions, we are much more liable to error when we 
 proceed to deduce from these impressions (as supplied to us by 
 our ordinary experience), the relation of cause and effect ; and 
 the accuracy of our judgment, consequently, is more endangered. 
 Then our dependence should be upon carefully observed facts, 
 and the laws of nature ; and I shall proceed to a further 
 illustration of the mental deficiency I speak of, by a brief 
 reference to one of these. 
 
 The laws of nature, as we understand them, are the founda- 
 tion of our knowledge in natural things. So much as we know 
 of them has been developed by the successive energies of -the 
 highest intellects, exerted through many ages. After a most 
 rigid and scrutinizing examination upon principle and trial, a 
 definite expression has been given to them ; they have become, 
 as it were, our belief or trust. From day to day we still examine 
 and test our expressions of them. We have no interest in their 
 retention if erroneous ; on the contrary, the greatest discovery 
 a man could make would be to prove that one of these accepted 
 laws was erroneous, and his greatest honour would be the 
 discovery. Neither would there be any desire to retain the 
 former expression : — for we know that the new or the amended 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 45 
 
 law would be far more productive in results, would greatly 
 increase our intellectual acquisitions, and would prove an 
 abundant source of fresh delight to the mind. 
 
 These laws are numerous, and are more or less comprehensive. 
 They are also precise ; for a law may present an apparent 
 exception, and yet not be less a law to us, when the exception 
 is included in the expression. Thus, that elevation of tempera- 
 ture expands all bodies is a well-defined law, though there be 
 an exception in water for a limited temperature ; because we 
 are careful, whilst stating the law, to state the exception and 
 its limits. Pre-eminent among these laws, because of its 
 simplicity, its universality, and its undeviating truth, stands 
 that enunciated by Newton (commonly called the law of 
 gravitation), that matter attracts matter with a force inversely 
 as the square of the distance. Newton showed that, by this 
 law, the general condition of things on the surface of the earth 
 is governed ; and the globe itself, with all upon it, kept together 
 as a whole. He demonstrated that the motions of the planets 
 round the sun, and of the satellites about the planets, were 
 subject to it. During and since his time, certain variations in 
 the movements of the planets, which were called irregularities, 
 and might, for aught that was then known, be due to some 
 cause other than the attraction of gravitation, were found to 
 be its necessary consequences (see Note A). By the close and 
 scrutinizing attention of minds the most persevering and careful, 
 it was ascertained that even the distant stars were subject to this 
 law ; and, at last, to place as it were the seal of assurance to 
 its never-failing truth, it became, in the minds of Leverrier and 
 Adams (1845), the foreteller and the discoverer of an orb 
 rolling in the depths of space, so large as to equal nearly sixty 
 earths, yet so far away as to be invisible to the unassisted eye. 
 What truth, beneath that of revelation, can have an assurance 
 stronger than this ! 
 
 Yet this law is often cast aside as of no value or authority, 
 because of the unconscious ignorance amidst which we dwell. 
 You hear at the present day, that some persons can place their 
 fingers on a table, arid then elevating their hands, the table 
 will rise up and follow them ; that the piece of furniture, though 
 heavy, will ascend, and that their hands bear no weight, or are 
 not drawn down to the wood ; you do not hear of this as a 
 
46 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 conjuring manoeuvre, to be shown for your amusement, but are 
 expected seriously to believe it ; and are told that it is an 
 important fact, a great discovery amongst the truths of nature. 
 Your neighbour, a well-meaning, conscientious person, believes 
 it ; and the assertion finds acceptance in every rank of society, 
 and amongst classes which are esteemed to be educated. Now 
 what can this imply but that society, speaking generally, is 
 not only ignorant as respects education of the judgment, but is 
 also ignorant of its ignorance. The parties who are thus 
 persuaded, and those who are inclined to think and to hope 
 that they are right, throw up Newton's law at once, and that 
 in a case which of all others is fitted to be tested by it ; or if 
 the law be erroneous, to test the law. I will not say they 
 oppose the law, though I have heard the supj^osed fact quoted 
 triumphantly against it ; but as far as my observation has 
 gone, they will not apply it. The law affords the simplest 
 means of testing the fact, and if there be, indeed, anything in 
 the latter new to our knowledge (and who shall say that new 
 matter is not presented to us daily, passing away unrecognized), 
 it also affords the means of placing that before us separately in 
 its simplicity and truth. Then why not consent to apply the 
 knowledge we have to that which is under development ? 
 Shall we educate ourselves in what is known, and then casting 
 away all we have acquired, turn to our ignorance for aid to 
 guide us among the unknown ? If so, instruct a man to write, 
 but employ one who is unacquainted with letters to read that 
 which is written ; the end will be just as unsatisfactory, though 
 not so injurious, for the book of nature, which we have to read, 
 is written by the finger of God. Why should not one who can 
 thus lift a table proceed to verify and simplify his fact, and 
 bring it into relation with the law of Newton ? Why should 
 he not take the top of his table (it may be a small one), and 
 placing it in a balance, or on a lever, proceed to ascertain how 
 much weight he can raise by the draught of his fingers upwards ; 
 and of this weight, so ascertained, how much is unrepresented 
 by any pull upon the fingers downward ? He will then be able 
 to investigate the further question, whether electricity, or any 
 new force of matter, is made manifest in his operations ; or 
 whether action and reaction being unequal, he has at his com- 
 mand the source of a perpetual motion. Such a man, furnished 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 47 
 
 with a nicely constructed carriage on a railway', ought to travel 
 by the mere draught of his own fingers. A far less prize than 
 this would gain him the attention of the whole scientific and 
 commercial world ; and he may rest assured, that if he can 
 make the most delicate balance incline or decline by attraction, 
 though it be only with the force of an ounce, or even a grain, he 
 Avill not fail to gain universal respect and most honourable 
 reward. 
 
 When we think of the laws of nature (which by continued 
 observation have become known to us) as the proper tests to 
 which any new fact or our theoretical representation of it 
 should, in the first place, be subjected, let us contemplate their 
 assured and large character. Let us go out into the field and 
 look at the heavens with their solar, starry, and planetary 
 glories ; the sky with its clouds ; the waters descending from 
 above or wandering at our feet ; the animals, the trees, the 
 plants ; and consider the permanency of their actions and con- 
 ditions under the government of these laws. The most delicate 
 flower, the tenderest insect, continues in its species through count- 
 less years ; always varying, yet ever the same (see Note B). 
 When we think we have discovered a departure, as in the 
 Aphides, Medusae, Distomce, &c.,* the law concerned is itself the 
 best means of instituting an investigation, and hitherto we have 
 always found the witness to return to its original testimony. 
 These frail things are never-ceasing, never-changing evidence 
 of the law's immutability (see Note C). It would be well for 
 a man who has an anomalous case before him, to contemplate 
 a blade of grass, and when he has considered the numerous 
 ceaseless, yet certain, actions there located, and his inability 
 to change the character of the least among them (see also 
 Note C), to recur to his new subject; and, in place of accepting 
 unwatched and unchecked results, to search for a like certainty 
 and recurrence in the appearances and actions which belong 
 to it. 
 
 Perhaps it may be said, the delusion of table-moving is past, 
 and need not be recalled before an audience like the present ; *}" 
 — even granting this, let us endeavour to make the subject 
 
 * See Claparede's Account of Alternating Generation and the Metamorphoses 
 of Inferior Animals. — Bib. Univ., March 1854, p. 229. 
 t See Note, p. 67. 
 
48 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 leave one useful result ; let it serve for an example, not to pass 
 into forgetf ulness. It is so recent, and was received by the 
 public in a manner so strange, as to justify a reference to it, in 
 proof of the uneducated condition of the general mind. I do 
 not object to table-moving for itself ; for being once stated it 
 becomes a fit though a very unpromising subject for experi- 
 ment ; but I am opposed to the unwillingness of its advocates 
 to investigate ; their boldness to assert ; the credulity of the 
 lookers-on ; their desire that the reserved and cautious objector 
 should be in error ; and I wish, by calling attention to these 
 things, to make the general want of mental discipline and 
 education manifest. 
 
 Having endeavoured to point out this great deficiency in the 
 exercise of the intellect, I will offer a few remarks upon the 
 means of subjecting it to the improving processes of instruction. 
 Perhaps many who watch over the interests of the community, 
 and are anxious for its welfare, will conclude, that the develop- 
 ment of the judgment cannot properly be included in the 
 general idea of education ; that as the education proposed must, 
 to a very large degree, be of self, it is so far incommunicable ; 
 that the master and the scholar merge into one, and both 
 disappear ; that the instructor is no wiser than the one to be 
 instructed, and thus the usual relations of the two lose their 
 power. Still, I believe that the judgment may be educated to 
 a very large extent, and might refer to the fine arts as giving 
 proof in the affirmative ; and though, as respects the com- 
 munity and its improvement in relation to common things, any 
 useful education must be of self, I think that society, as a body, 
 may act powerfully in the cause. Or it may still be objected 
 that my experience is imperfect, is chiefly derived from exercise 
 of the mind within the precincts of natural philosophy, and has 
 not that generality of application which can make it of any 
 value to society at large. I can only repeat my conviction, 
 that society occupies itself nowadays about physical matters, 
 and judges them as common things. Failing in relation to 
 them, it is equally liable to carry such failures into other matters 
 of life. The proof of deficient judgment in one department 
 shows the habit of mind, and the general want, in relation to 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 49 
 
 others. I am persuaded that all persons may find in natural 
 things an admirable school for self-instruction, and a field for 
 the necessary mental exercise ; that they may easily apply 
 their habits of thought, thus formed, to a social use ; and that 
 they ought to do this, as a duty to themselves and their 
 generation. 
 
 Let me first try to illustrate the former part of the case, and 
 at the same time state what I think a man may and ought to 
 do for himself. 
 
 The self-education to which he should be stimulated by the 
 desire to improve his judgment, requires no blind dependence 
 upon the dogmas of others, but is commended to him by the 
 suggestions and dictates of his own common sense. The first 
 part of it is founded in mental discipline : happily it requires 
 no unpleasant avowals ; appearances are preserved, and vanity 
 remains unhurt ; but it is necessary that a man examine himself, 
 and that not carelessly. On the contrary, as he advances, he 
 should become more and more strict, till he ultimately prove 
 a sharper critic to himself than any one else can be ; and he 
 ought to intend this, for, so far as he consciously falls short of 
 it, he acknowledges that others may have reason on their side 
 when they criticize him. A first result of this habit of mind 
 will be an internal conviction of ignorance in many things 
 respecting which his neighbours are taught, and, that his opinions 
 and conclusions on such matters ought to be advanced with 
 reservation. A mind so disciplined will be open to correction 
 upon good grounds in all things, even in those it is best acquainted 
 with ; and should familiarize itself with the idea of such being 
 the case : for though it sees no reason to suppose itself in error, 
 yet the possibility exists. The mind is not enfeebled by this 
 internal admission, but strengthened ; for, if it cannot distin- 
 guish proportionately between the probable right and wrong 
 of things known imperfectly, it will tend either to be rash or to 
 hesitate ; whilst that which admits the due amount of proba- 
 bility is likely to be justified in the end. It is right that we 
 should stand by and act on our principles ; but not right to 
 hold them in obstinate blindness, or retain them when proved 
 to be erroneous. I remember the time when I believed a spark 
 was produced between voltaic metals as they approached to 
 contact (and the reasons why it might be possible yet remain) ; 
 
50 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 but others doubted the fact and denied the proofs, and on re-ex- 
 amination I found reason to admit their corrections were well 
 founded (see Note D). Years ago I believed that electrolytes could 
 conduct electricity by a conduction proper ; that has also been 
 denied by many through long time : though I believed myself 
 right, yet circumstances have induced me to pay that respect to 
 criticism as to reinvestigate the subject, and I have the pleasure 
 of thinking that nature confirms my original conclusions (see 
 Note E). So though evidence may appear to preponderate 
 extremely in favour of a certain decision, it is wise and proper 
 to hear a counter-statement. You can have no idea how often 
 and how much, under such an impression, I have desired that 
 the marvellous descriptions which have reached me might 
 prove, in some points, correct ; and how frequently I have 
 submitted myself to hot fires, to friction with magnets, to the 
 passes of hands, etc., lest I should be shutting out discovery ; — 
 encouraging the strong desire that something might be true, 
 and that I might aid in the development of a new force of 
 nature. 
 
 Among those points of self-education which take up the form 
 of mental discipline, there is one of great importance, and, more- 
 over, difficult to deal with, because it involves an internal 
 conflict, and equally touches our vanity and our ease. It 
 consists in the tendency to deceive ourselves regarding all we wish 
 for, and the necessity of resistance to these desires. It is impos- 
 sible for any one who has not been constrained, by the course of 
 his occupation and thoughts, to a habit of continual self- 
 correction, to be aware of the amount of error in relation to 
 judgment arising from this tendency. The force of the tempta- 
 tion which urges us to seek for such evidence and appearances 
 as are in favour of our desires, and to disregard those which 
 oppose them, is wonderfully great. In this respect we are all, 
 more or less, active promoters of error. In place of practising 
 wholesome self-abnegation, we ever make the wish the father 
 to the thought : we receive as friendly that which agrees with, 
 we resist with dislike that which opposes us ; whereas the very 
 reverse is required by every dictate of common sense. Let me 
 illustrate my meaning by a case where the proof being easy, the 
 rejection of it under the temptation is the more striking. In 
 old times, a ring or a button would be tied by a boy to one end 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 51 
 
 of a long piece of thread, which he would then hold at the other 
 end, letting the button hang within a glass, or over a piece of 
 slate-pencil, or sealing-wax, or a nail ; he would wait and 
 observe whether the button swung, and whether in swinging it 
 tapped the glass as many times as the clock struck last, or 
 moved along or across the slate-pencil, or in a circle or oval. 
 In late times, parties in all ranks of life have renewed and 
 repeated the boy's experiment. They have sought to ascertain 
 a very simple fact — namely, whether the effect was as reported ; 
 but how many were unable to do this ? They were sure they 
 could keep their hands immovable, — were sure they could do 
 so whilst watching the result, — were sure that accordance of 
 swing with an expected direction was not the result of their 
 desires or involuntary motions. How easily all these points 
 could be put to the proof by not looking at the objects, yet how 
 difficult for the experimenter to deny himself that privilege. I 
 have rarely found one who would freely permit the substance 
 experimented with to be screened from his sight, and then its 
 position changed. 
 
 When engaged in the investigation of table-turning, I con- 
 structed a very simple apparatus,* serving as an index, to show 
 the unconscious motions of the hands upon the table. The 
 results were either that the index moved before the table, or 
 that neither index nor table moved ; and in numerous cases 
 all moving power was annihilated. A universal objection was 
 made to it by the table- turners. It was said to paralyse the 
 powers of the mind ; — but the experimenters need not see the 
 index ; they may leave their friends to watch that, and their 
 minds may revel in any power that their expectation or their 
 imagination can confer. So restrained, a dislike to the trial 
 arises ; but what is that except a proof that whilst they trust 
 themselves they doubt themselves, and are not willing to proceed 
 to the decision, lest the trust which they like should fail them, 
 and the doubt which they dislike rise to the authority of truth. 
 
 Again, in respect of the action of magnets on the body, it is 
 almost impossible for an uninstructed person to enter profitably 
 upon such an inquiry. He may observe any symptom which 
 his expectation has been accidentally directed to : yet be 
 
 * Athenceum, July 2, 1853. — Newman, Philosophical Instrument Maker, 
 122 Regent Street (see Note F). 
 
52 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 unconscious of any, if unaware of his subjection to the magnetic 
 force, or of the conditions and manner of its application (see 
 Note G). 
 
 As a proof of the extent of this influence, even on the minds 
 of those well aware of its force, and desirous under every 
 circumstance to escape from it, I will mention the practice of 
 the chemist, who, dealing with the balance, that impartial 
 decider which never fails in its indication, but offers its evidence 
 with all simplicity, durability, and truth, still remembers he 
 should doubt himself ; and, with the desire of rendering himself 
 inaccessible to temptation, takes a counterpoised but unknown 
 quantity of the substance for analysis, that he may remain 
 ignorant of the proportions which he ought to obtain, and only 
 at last compares the sum of his products with his counterpoise. 
 
 The inclination we exhibit in respect of any report or opinion 
 that harmonizes with our preconceived notions, can only be 
 compared in degree with the incredulity we entertain towards 
 everything that opposes them ; and these opposite and 
 apparently incompatible, or at least inconsistent, conditions are 
 accepted simultaneously in the most extraordinary manner. 
 At one moment a departure from the laws of nature is admitted 
 without the pretence of a careful examination of the proof ; and 
 at the next, the whole force of these laws, acting undeviatingly 
 through all time, is denied, because the testimony they give is 
 disliked. 
 
 It is my firm persuasion, that no man can examine himself in 
 the most common things, having any reference to him personally, 
 or to any person, thought, or matter related to him, without 
 being soon made aware of the temptation and the difficulty of 
 opposing it. I could give you many illustrations personal to 
 myself, about atmospheric magnetism, lines of force, attraction, 
 repulsion, unity of power, nature of matter, etc. ; or in things 
 more general to our common nature, about likes and dislikes, 
 wishes, hopes, and fears ; but it would be unsuitable and also 
 unnecessary, for each must be conscious of a large field sadly 
 uncultivated in this respect. I will simply express my strong 
 belief, that that point of self-education which consists in teaching 
 the mind to resist its desires and inclinations, until they are proved 
 to be right, is the most important of all, not only in things of 
 natural philosophy, but in every department of daily life. 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 53 
 
 There are numerous precepts resulting more or less from the 
 principles of mental discipline already insisted on as essential, 
 which are very useful in forming a judgment about matters of 
 fact, whether among natural things or between man and man. 
 Such a precept, and one that should recur to the mind early in 
 every new case is, to know the conditions of the matter, respecting 
 which we are called upon to make a judgment. To suppose 
 that any would judge before they professed to know the condi- 
 tions would seem to be absurd ; on the other hand, to assume 
 that the community does wait to know the conditions before it 
 judges, is an assumption so large that I cannot accept it. Very 
 few search out the conditions ; most are anxious to sink those 
 which oppose their preconceptions ; yet none can be left out if 
 a right judgment is to be formed. It is true that many condi- 
 tions must ever remain unknown to us, even in regard to the 
 simplest things in nature : thus as to the wonderful action of 
 gravity, whose law never fails us, we cannot say whether the 
 bodies are acting truly at a distance, or by a physical line of 
 force as a connecting-link between them. The great majority 
 think the former is the case ; Newton's judgment is for the 
 latter.* But of the conditions which are within our reach we 
 should search out all ; for in relation to those which remain 
 unknown or unsuspected, we are in that very ignorance 
 (regarding judgment) which it is our present object, first to 
 make manifest, and then to remove. 
 
 One exercise of the mind, which largely influences the power 
 and character of the judgment, is the habit of forming clear and 
 iprecise ideas. If, after considering . a subject in our ordinary 
 manner, we return upon it with the special purpose of noticing 
 the condition of our thoughts, we shall be astonished to find 
 how little precise they remain. On recalling the phenomena 
 relating to a matter of fact, the circumstances modifying them, 
 the kind and amount of action presented, the real or probable 
 result, we shall find that the first impressions are scarcely fit 
 for the foundation of a judgment, and that the second thoughts 
 will be best. For the acquirement of a good condition of mind 
 in this respect, the thoughts should be trained to a habit of 
 clear and precise formation, so that vivid and distinct impres- 
 
 * Newton' 8 Works, Horsley's Edition, 1783, iv, p. 438 — or the Third Letter 
 to Bentley. 
 
 D 
 
54 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 sions of the matter in hand, its circumstances and consequences, 
 may remain. 
 
 Before we proceed to consider any question involving physical 
 principles, we should set out with clear ideas of the naturally 
 possible and impossible. There are many subjects uniting 
 more or less of the most sure and valuable investigations of 
 science with the most imaginary and unprofitable speculation, 
 that are continually passing through their various phases of 
 intellectual, experimental, or commercial development : some 
 to be established, some to disappear, and some to recur again 
 and again, like ill weeds that cannot be extirpated, yet can be 
 cultivated to no result as wholesome food for the mind. Such, 
 for instance, in different degrees, are the caloric engine, the 
 electric light, the Pasilalinic sympathetic compass,* mesmerism, 
 homoeopathy, odylism, the magneto-electric engine, the per- 
 petual motion, etc. : all hear and talk of these things ; all use 
 their judgment more or less upon them, and all might do that 
 effectively, if they were to instruct themselves to the extent 
 which is within their reach. I am persuaded that natural 
 things offer an admirable school for self-instruction, a most 
 varied field for the necessary mental practice, and that those 
 who exercise themselves therein may easily apply the habits 
 of thought thus formed to a social use. As a first step in such 
 practice, clear ideas should be obtained of what is possible and 
 what is impossible (see Note I). Thus, it is impossible to create 
 force. We may employ it ; we may evoke it in one form by its 
 consumption in another ; we may hide it for a period ; but we can 
 neither create nor destroy it. We may cast it away ; but where 
 we dismiss it, there it will do its work. If, therefore, we desire 
 to consider a proposition respecting the employment or evolu- 
 tion of power, let us carry our judgment, educated on this 
 point, with us. If the proposal include the double use of a 
 force with only one excitement, it implies a creation of power, 
 and that cannot be. If we could by the fingers draw a heavy 
 piece of wood or stone upward without effort, and then, letting 
 it sink, could produce by its gravity an effort equal to its 
 weight, that would be a creation of power, and cannot be. 
 
 So again we cannot annihilate matter, nor can we create it. 
 But if we are satisfied to rest upon that dogma, what are we to 
 * See Chambers's Journal, 1851, Feb. 15th, p. 105 (see Note H). 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 55 
 
 think of table-lifting ? If we could make the table to cease 
 from acting by gravity upon the earth beneath it, or by reaction 
 upon the hand supposed to draw it upwards, we should annihi- 
 late it, in respect of that very property which characterizes it 
 as matter. 
 
 Considerations of this nature are very important aids to the 
 judgment ; and when a statement is made claiming our assent, 
 we should endeavour to reduce it to some consequence which 
 can be immediately compared with, and tried by, these or like 
 compact and never-failing truths. If incompatibility appears, 
 then we have reason to suspend our conclusion, however 
 attractive to the imagination the proposition may be, and 
 pursue the inquiry further, until accordance is obtained ; it 
 must be a most uneducated and presumptuous mind that can 
 at once consent to cast off the tried truth and accept in its 
 place the mere loud assertion. We should endeavour to 
 separate the points before us, and concentrate each, so as to 
 evolve a clear type idea of the ruling fact and its consequences ; 
 looking at the matter on every side, with the great purpose of 
 distinguishing the constituent reality, and recognizing it under 
 every variety of aspect. 
 
 In like manner we should accustom ourselves to clear and 
 definite language, especially in physical matters, giving to a 
 word its true and full, but measured meaning, that we may be 
 able to convey our ideas clearly to the minds of others. Two 
 persons cannot mutually impart their knowledge, or compare 
 and rectify their conclusions, unless both attend to the true 
 intent and force of language. If by such words as attraction, 
 electricity, polarity, or atom, they imply different things, they 
 may discuss facts, deny results, and doubt consequences for an 
 indefinite time without any advantageous progress. I hold it 
 as a great point in self-education that the student should be 
 continually engaged in forming exact ideas, and in expressing 
 them clearly by language. Such practice insensibly opposes 
 any tendency to exaggeration or mistake, and increases the 
 sense and love of truth in every part of life. 
 
 I should be sorry, however, if what I have said were under- 
 stood as meaning that education for the improvement and 
 strengthening of the judgment is to be altogether repressive of 
 the imagination, or confine the exercise of the mind to processes 
 
56 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 of a mathematical or mechanical character. I believe that, in 
 the pursuit of physical science, the imagination should be 
 taught to present the subject investigated in all possible, and 
 even in impossible views ; to search for analogies of likeness 
 and (if I may say so) of opposition — inverse or contrasted 
 analogies ; to present the fundamental idea in every form, 
 proportion, and condition ; to clothe it with suppositions and 
 probabilities, that all cases may pass in review, and be touched, 
 if needful, by the Ithuriel spear of experiment. But all this 
 must be under government, and the result must not be given to 
 society until the judgment, educated by the process itself, has 
 been exercised upon it. Let us construct our hypotheses for 
 an hour, or a day, or for years ; they are of the utmost value in 
 the elimination of truth, " which is evolved more freely from 
 error than from confusion " ; but, above all things, let us not 
 cease to be aware of the temptation they offer, or, because they 
 gradually become familiar to us, accept them as established. 
 We could not reason about electricity without thinking of it as 
 a fluid, or a vibration, or some other existent state or form. 
 We should give up half our advantage in the consideration of 
 heat if we rdfused to consider it as a principle, or a state of 
 motion. We could scarcely touch such subjects by experiment, 
 and we should make no progress in their practical application, 
 without hypothesis ; still it is absolutely necessary that we 
 should learn to doubt the conditions we assume, and acknow- 
 ledge we are uncertain, whether heat and electricity are 
 vibrations or substances, or either. 
 
 When the different data required are in our possession, and 
 we have succeeded in forming a clear idea of each, the mind 
 should be instructed to balance them one against another, and 
 not suffered carelessly to hasten to a conclusion. This reserve 
 is most essential ; and it is especially needful that the reasons 
 which are adverse to our expectations or our desires should be 
 carefully attended to. We often receive truth from unpleasant 
 sources ; we often have reason to accept unpalatable truths. 
 We are never freely willing to admit information having this 
 unpleasant character, and it requires much self-control in this 
 respect, to preserve us even in a moderate degree from errors. 
 I suppose there is scarcely one investigator in original research 
 who has not felt the temptation to disregard the reasons and 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 57 
 
 results which are against his views. I acknowledge that I 
 have experienced it very often, and will not pretend to say that 
 I have yet learned on all occasions to avoid the error. When a 
 bar of bismuth or phosphorus is placed between the poles of a 
 powerful magnet, it is drawn into a position across the line 
 joining the poles ; when only one pole is near the bar, the latter 
 recedes ; this and the former effect is due to repulsion, and is 
 strikingly in contrast with the attraction shown by iron. To 
 account for it, I at one time suggested the idea that a polarity 
 was induced in the phosphorus or bismuth the reverse of the 
 polarhy induced in iron, and that opinion is still sustained by 
 eminent philosophers. But observe a necessary result of such 
 a supposition, which appears to follow when the phenomena 
 are referred to elementary principles. Time is shown, by every 
 result bearing on the subject, to be concerned in the coming on 
 and passing away of the inductive condition produced by 
 magnetic force, and the consequence, as Thomson pointed out, 
 is, that if a ball of bismuth could be suspended between the 
 poles of a magnet, so as to encounter no resistance from the 
 surrounding medium, or from friction or torsion, and were once 
 put in motion round a vertical axis, it would, because of the 
 assumed polar state, go on for ever revolving, the parts which 
 at any moment are axial moving like the bar; so as to become 
 the next moment equatorial. Now, as we believe the mecha- 
 nical forces of nature tend to bring things into a stable, and not 
 into an unstable condition ; as we believe that a perpetual 
 motion is impossible ; so because both these points are involved 
 in the notion of the reverse polarity, which itself is not supposed 
 to be dependent on any consumption of power, I feel bound to 
 hold the judgment balanced, and therefore hesitate to accept a 
 conclusion founded on such a notion of the physical action ; the 
 more especially as the peculiar test facts * which prove the 
 polarity of iron are not reproduced in the case of diamagnetic 
 bodies (see Note K). 
 
 As a result of this wholesome mental condition, we should be 
 able to form a proportionate judgment. The mind naturally 
 desires to settle upon one thing or another ; to rest upon an 
 affirmative or a negative ; and that with a degree of absolutism 
 which is irrational and improper. In drawing a conclusion it 
 * Experimental Researches in Electricity, paragraphs 2657-268 1- 
 
58 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 is very difficult, but not the less necessary, to make it propor- 
 tionate to the evidence : except where certainty exists (a case 
 of rare occurrence), we should consider our decisions as probable 
 only. The probability may appear very great, so that in 
 affairs of the world we often accept such as certainty, and 
 trust our welfare or our lives upon it. Still, only an uneducated 
 mind will confound probability with certainty, especially when 
 it encounters a contrary conclusion drawn by another from like 
 data. This suspension in degree of judgment will not make a 
 man less active in life, or his conclusions less certain as truths ; 
 on the contrary, I believe him to be the more ready for the 
 right amount and direction of action on any emergency ; and 
 am sure his conclusions and statements will carry more weight 
 in the world than those of the incautious man. 
 
 When I was young, I received from one well able to aid a 
 learner in his endeavours toward self-improvement, a curious 
 lesson in the mode of estimating the amount of belief one might 
 be induced to attach to our conclusions. The person was 
 Dr. Wollaston, who, upon a given point, was induced to offer 
 me a wager of two to one on the affirmative. I rather imperti- 
 nently quoted Butler's well-known lines * about the kind of 
 persons who use wagers for argument, and he gently explained 
 to me, that he considered such a wager not as a thoughtless 
 thing, but as an expression of the amount of belief in the mind 
 of the person offering it ; combining this curious application of 
 the wager, as a meter, with the necessity that ever existed of 
 drawing conclusions, not absolute but proportionate to the 
 evidence (see Note L). 
 
 Occasionally and frequently the exercise of the judgment 
 ought to end in absolute reservation. It may be very distasteful, 
 and great fatigue, to suspend a conclusion, but as we are not 
 infallible, so we ought to be cautious ; we shall eventually find 
 our advantage, for the man who rests in his position is not so 
 far from right as he who, proceeding in a wrong direction, is 
 ever increasing his distance. In the year 1824, Arago dis- 
 covered f that copper and other bodies placed in the vicinity 
 of a magnet, and having no direct action of attraction or 
 
 * " Quoth she, ' I've heard old cunning stagers, 
 
 Say fools for arguments use wagers.' " 
 t Annales de Chimie, xxviii, p. 325. 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 59 
 
 repulsion upon it, did affect it when moved, and was affected 
 by it. A copper plate revolving near a magnet carried the 
 magnet with it ; or if the magnet revolved, and not the copper, 
 it carried the copper with it. A magnetic needle vibrating 
 freely over a disc of glass or wood, was exceedingly retarded in 
 its motion when these were replaced by a disc of copper. Arago 
 stated most clearly all the conditions, and resolved the forces 
 into three directions, but not perceiving the physical cause of 
 the action, exercised a most wise and instructive reservation as 
 to his conclusion. Others, as Haldat,- considered it as the proof 
 of the universality of a magnetism of the ordinary kind, and 
 held to that notion though it was contradicted by the further 
 facts ; and it was only at a future period that the true physical 
 cause, namely, magneto-electric currents induced in the copper, 
 became known to us.* What an education Arago's mind must 
 have received in relation to philosophical reservation ; what an 
 antithesis he forms with the mass of table-turners ; and what 
 a fine example he has left us of that condition of judgment to 
 which we should strive to attain ! 
 
 If I may give another illustration of the needful reservation 
 of judgment, I will quote the case of oxygen and hydrogen 
 gases, which, being mixed, will remain together uncombined for 
 years in contact with glass, but in contact with spongy platinum 
 combine at once (see Note M). We have the same fact in many 
 forms, and many suggestions have been made as to the mode 
 of action, but as yet we do not know clearly how the result 
 comes to pass. We cannot tell whether electricity acts or not. 
 Then we should suspend our conclusions. Our knowledge of 
 the fact itself, and the many varieties of it, is not the less 
 abundant or sure ; and when the truth shall hereafter emerge 
 from the mist, we ought to have no opposing prejudice, but be 
 prepared to receive it. 
 
 The education which I advocate will require patience and 
 labour of thought in every exercise tending to improve the 
 judgment. It matters not on what subject a person's mind is 
 occupied, he should engage in it with the conviction that it will 
 require mental labour. A powerful mind will be able to draw 
 a conclusion more readily and more correctly than one of 
 moderate^character, but both will surpass themselves if they 
 * Philosophical Transactions, 1832, p. 146. 
 
60 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 make an earnest, careful investigation, instead of a careless or 
 prejudiced one ; and education for this purpose is the more 
 necessary for the latter, because the man of less ability may, 
 through it, raise his rank and amend his position. I earnestly 
 urge this point of self-education, for I believe it to be more or 
 less in the power of every man greatly to improve his judgment. 
 I do not think that one has the complete capacity for judgment 
 which another is naturally without. I am of opinion that all 
 may judge, and that we only need to declare on every side the 
 conviction that mental education is wanting, and lead men to 
 see that through it they hold, in a large degree, their welfare 
 and their character in their own hands, to cause in future years 
 an abundant development of right judgment in every class. 
 
 This education has for its first and its last step humility. It 
 can commence only because of a conviction of deficiency ; and 
 if we are not disheartened under the growing revelations which 
 it will make, that conviction will become stronger unto the end. 
 But the humility will be founded, not on comparison of our- 
 selves with the imperfect standards around us, but on the 
 increase of that internal knowledge which alone can make us 
 aware of our internal wants. The first step in correction is to 
 learn our deficiencies, and having learned them, the next step 
 is almost complete : for no man who has discovered that his 
 judgment is hasty, or illogical, or imperfect, would go on with 
 the same degree of haste, or irrationality, or presumption as 
 before. I do not mean that all would at once be cured of bad 
 mental habits, but I think better of human nature than to 
 believe that a man in any rank of life, who has arrived at the 
 consciousness of such a condition, would deny his common 
 sense, and still judge and act as before. And though such self- 
 schooling must continue to the end of life to supply an experience 
 of deficiency rather than of attainment, still there is abundant 
 stimulus to excite any man to perseverance. What he has lost are 
 things imaginary, not real; what he gains are riches before unknown 
 to him, yet invaluable ; and though he may think more humbly of 
 his own character, he will find himself at every step of his progress 
 more sought for than before, more trusted with responsibility and 
 held in pre-eminence by his equals, and more highly valued by 
 those whom he himself will esteem worthy of approbation. 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 61 
 
 And now a few words upon the mutual relation of two 
 classes, namely, those who decline to educate their judgments 
 in regard to the matters on which they decide, and those who, 
 by self-education, have endeavoured to improve themselves ; 
 and upon the remarkable and somewhat unreasonable manner 
 in which the latter are called upon, and occasionally taunted, by 
 the former. A man who makes assertions, or draws conclusions, 
 regarding any given case, ought to be competent to investigate 
 it. He has no right to throw the onus on others, declaring 
 it their duty to prove him right or wrong. His duty is to 
 demonstrate the truth of that which he asserts, or to cease from 
 asserting (see Note N). The men he calls upon to consider and 
 judge have enough to do with themselves, in the examination, 
 correction, or verification of their own views. The world little 
 knows how many of the thoughts and theories which have 
 passed through the mind of a scientific investigator have been 
 crushed in silence and secrecy by his own severe criticism and 
 adverse examination ; that in the most successful instances not 
 a tenth of the suggestions, , the hopes, the wishes, the pre- 
 liminary conclusions have been realized. And is a man so 
 occupied to be taken from his search after truth in the path he 
 hopes may lead to its attainment, and occupied in vain upon 
 nothing but a broad assertion ? 
 
 Neither has the assertor of any new thing a right to claim an 
 answer in the form of Yes or No ; or think, because none is 
 forthcoming, that he is to be considered as having established 
 his assertion. So much is unknown to the wisest man that he 
 may often be without an answer : as frequently he is so, 
 because the subject is in the region of hypothesis, and not of 
 facts. In either case he has the right to refuse to speak. I 
 cannot tell whether there are two fluids of electricity or any 
 fluid at all. I am not bound to explain how a table tilts any 
 more than to indicate how, under the conjurer's hands, a 
 pudding appears in a hat. The means are not known to me. 
 I am persuaded that the results, however strange they may 
 appear, are in accordance with that which is truly known, and 
 if carefully investigated would justify the well-tried laws of 
 nature ; but, as life is limited, I am not disposed to occupy 
 the time it is made of in the investigation of matters which, in 
 what is known to me of them, offer no reasonable prospect of 
 
62 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 any useful progress, or anything but negative results. We deny 
 the right of those who call upon us to answer their speculations 
 " if we can," whilst we have so many of our own to develop 
 and correct ; and claim the right for ourselves of withholding 
 either our conclusions or the reasons for them, without in the 
 least degree admitting that their affirmations are unanswerable. 
 We are not even called upon to give an answer to the best of 
 our belief : nor bound to admit a bold assertion because we do 
 not knozv to the contrary. No one is justified in claiming our 
 assent to the spontaneous generation of insects, because we 
 cannot circumstantially explain how a mite or the egg of a mite 
 has entered into a particular bottle. Let those who affirm the 
 exception to the general law of nature, or those others who 
 upon the affirmation accept the result, work out the experi- 
 mental proof. It has been done in this case by Schulze,* and 
 is in the negative ; but how few among the many who make, 
 or repeat, the assertion, would have the requisite self-abnega- 
 tion, the subjected judgment, the perseverance, and the 
 precision which has been displayed in that research. 
 
 Wrien men, more or less marked by their advance, are led 
 by circumstances to give an opinion adverse to any popular 
 notion, or to the assertions of any sanguine inventor, nothing 
 is more usual than the attempt to neutralize the force of such 
 an opinion by reference to the mistakes which like educated 
 men have made ; and their occasional misjudgments and 
 erroneous conclusions are quoted, as if they were less competent 
 than others to give an opinion, being even disabled from judging 
 like matters to those which are included in their pursuits by 
 the very exercise of their minds upon them. How frequently 
 has the reported judgment of Davy, upon the impossibility of 
 gas-lighting on a large scale, been quoted by speculators 
 engaged in tempting monied men into companies, or in the 
 pages of journals occupied with the popular fancies of the day ; 
 as if an argument were derivable from that in favour of some 
 special object to be commended. Why should not men taught 
 in the matter of judgment far beyond their neighbours, be 
 expected to err sometimes, since the very education in which 
 they are advanced can only terminate with their lives ? What 
 is there about them, derived|from this education, which sets up 
 * Muller's Physiology, or Poggendobf's Annalen, 1836, xxxix, p. 487. 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 63 
 
 the shadow of a pretence to perfection ? Such men cannot 
 learn all things, and may often be ignorant. The very progress 
 which science makes amongst them as a body is a continual 
 correction of ignorance — i.e. of a state which is ignorance in 
 relation to the future, though wisdom and knowledge in relation 
 to the past. In 1823, Wollaston discovered that beautiful 
 substance which he called Titanium, believing it to be a simple 
 metal : and it was so accepted by all philosophers. Yet this 
 was a mistake, for Wohler,* in 1850, showed the substance 
 was a very compound body. This is no reproach to Wollaston 
 or to those who trusted in him ; he made a step in metallurgy 
 which advanced knowledge, and perhaps we may hereafter, 
 through it, learn to know that metals are compound bodies. 
 Who, then, has a right to quote his mistake as a reproach 
 against him ? Who could correct him but men intellectually 
 educated as he himself was ? Who does not feel that the 
 investigation remains a bright gem in the circlet that memory 
 offers to his honour ? 
 
 If we are to estimate the utility of an educated judgment, do 
 not let us hear merely of the errors of scientific men, which 
 have been corrected by others taught in the same careful 
 school ; but let us see what, as a body, they have produced, 
 compared with that supplied by their reproachers. Where are 
 the established truths and triumphs of ring-swingers, table- 
 turners, table- speakers ? What one result in the numerous 
 divisions of science or its applications can be traced to their 
 exertions ? Where is the investigation completed, so that, as 
 in gas-lighting, all may admit that the principles are established 
 and a good end obtained, without the shadow of a doubt ? 
 
 If we look to electricity, it, in the hands of the careful investi- 
 gator, has advanced to the most extraordinary results : it 
 approaches at the motion of his hand ; bursts from the metal ; 
 descends from the atmosphere ; surrounds the globe : it talks, 
 it writes, it records, it appears to him (cautious as he has learned 
 to become) as a universal spirit in nature. If we look to 
 photography, whose origin is of our own day, and see what it 
 has become in the hands of its discoverers and their successors, 
 how wonderful are the results ! The light is made to yield 
 impressions upon the dead silver or the coarse paper, beautiful 
 * Annates de Chimie, xxix, p. 166. 
 
64 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 as those it produced upon the living and sentient retina : its 
 most transient impression is rendered durable for years ; it is 
 made to leave a visible or an invisible trace ; to give a result 
 to be seen now or a year hence ; made to paint all natural forms 
 and even colours (see Note O) ; it serves the offices of war, of 
 peace, of art, science, and economy : it replaces even the mind 
 of the human being in some of its lower services ; for a little 
 camphine lamp is set down and left to itself, to perform the duty 
 of watching the changes of magnetism, heat, and other forces 
 of nature, and to record the results, in pictorial curves, which 
 supply an enduring record of their most transitory actions. 
 
 What has clairvoyance, or mesmerism, or table-rapping done in 
 comparison with results like these ? What have the snails at Paris 
 told us from the snails at NeAV York (see Note G) ? What have 
 any of these intelligences done in aiding such developments ? 
 Why did they not inform us of the possibility of photography ? 
 or when that became known, why did they not favour us with 
 some instructions for its improvement ? They all profess to 
 deal with agencies far more exalted in character than an 
 electric current or a ray of light : they also deal with mechanical 
 forces ; they employ both the bodily organs and the mental ; 
 they profess to lift a table, to turn a hat, to see into a box, or 
 into the next room, or a town : — why should they not move a 
 balance, and so give us the element of a new mechanical power ? 
 take cognizance of a bottle and its contents, and tell us how 
 they will act upon those of a neighbouring bottle ? either see 
 or feel into a crystal, and inform us of what it is composed ? 
 Why have they not added one metal to the fifty ( see Note N ) known 
 to mankind, or one planet to the number daily increasing under 
 the observant eye of the astronomer ? Why have they not 
 corrected one of the mistakes of the philosophers ? There are 
 no doubt very many that require it. There has been plenty of 
 time for the development and maturation of some of the 
 numerous public pretences that have risen up in connexion with 
 these supposed agencies ; how is it that not one new power 
 has been added to the means of investigation employed by the 
 philosophers, or one valuable utilitarian application presented 
 to society ? 
 
 In conclusion, I will freely acknowledge that all I have said 
 regarding the great want of judgment manifested by society 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 65 
 
 as a body, and the high value of any means which would tend 
 to supply the deficiency, have been developed and declared on 
 numerous occasions, by authority far above any I possess. The 
 deficiency is known hypothetically, but I doubt if in reality ; 
 the individual acknowledges the state in respect of others, but 
 is unconscious of it in regard to himself. As to the world at 
 large, the condition is accepted as a necessary fact ; and so it 
 is left untouched, almost ignored. I think that education in 
 a large sense should be applied to this state of the subject, and 
 that society, though it can do little in the way of communicated 
 exjDerience, can do much, by a declaration of the evil that exists 
 • and of its remediable character ; by keeping alive a sense of 
 the deficiency to be supplied ; and by directing the minds of 
 men to the practice and enlargement of that self-education 
 which every one pursues more or less, but which under con- 
 viction and method would produce a tenfold amount of good. 
 I know that the multitude will always be behindhand in this 
 education, and to a far greater extent than in respect of the 
 education which is founded on book learning. Whatever 
 advance books make, they retain ; but each new being comes 
 on to the stage of life, with the same average amount of conceit, 
 desires, and passions, as his predecessors, and in respect of self- 
 education has all to learn. Does the circumstance that we can 
 do little more than proclaim the necessity of instruction justify 
 the ignorance ? or our silence ? or make the plea for this 
 education less strong ? Should it not, on the contrary, gain its 
 strength from the fact that all are wanting more or less ? I 
 desire we should admit that, as a body, we are universally 
 deficient in judgment. I do not mean that we are utterly 
 ignorant, but that we have advanced only a little way in the 
 requisite education, compared with what is within our power. 
 
 If the necessity of the education of the judgment were a 
 familiar and habitual idea with the public, it would often 
 afford a sufficient answer to the statement of an ill-informed or 
 incompetent person ; if quoted to recall to his remembrance 
 the necessity of a mind instructed in a matter, and accustomed 
 to balance evidence, it might frequently be an answer to the 
 individual himself. Adverse influence might, and would, arise 
 from the careless, the confident, the presumptuous, the hasty, 
 and the dilatory man, perhaps extreme opposition ; but I 
 
66 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 believe that the mere acknowledgment and proclamation of the 
 ignorance, by society at large, would, through its moral influence, 
 destroy the opposition, and be a great means to the attainment 
 of the good end desired (for if no more be done than to lead 
 such to turn their thoughts inwards, a step in education is 
 gained) if they are convinced in any degree, an important 
 advance is made ; if they learn only to suspend their judgment, 
 the improvement will be one above price. 
 
 It is an extraordinary thing that man, with a mind so 
 wonderful that there is nothing to compare with it elsewhere 
 in the known creation, should leave it to run wild in respect of 
 its highest elements and qualities. He has a power of com- 
 parison and judgment, by which his final resolves, and all those 
 acts of his material system which distinguish him from the 
 brutes, are guided : — shall he omit to educate and improve 
 them when education can do much ? Is it towards the very 
 principles and privileges that distinguish him above other 
 creatures, he should feel indifference ? Because the education 
 is internal, it is not the less needful ; nor is it more the duty of 
 a man that he should cause his child to be taught than that he 
 should teach himself. Indolence may tempt him to neglect 
 the self-examination and experience which form his school, and 
 weariness may induce the evasion of the necessary practices ; 
 but surely a thought of the prize should suffice to stimulate 
 him to the requisite exertion : and to those who reflect upon 
 the many hours and days, devoted by a lover of sweet sounds, 
 to gain a moderate facility upon a mere mechanical instrument, 
 it ought to bring a correcting blush of shame, if they feel 
 convicted of neglecting the beautiful living instrument, wherein 
 play all the powers of the mind. 
 
 I will conclude this subject ; — believe me when I say I have 
 been speaking from self-conviction. I did not think this an 
 occasion on which I ought to seek for flattering words regarding 
 our common nature ; if so, I should have felt unfaithful to the 
 trust I had taken up ; so I have spoken from experience. In 
 thought I hear the voice, which judges me by the precepts I 
 have uttered. I know that I fail frequently in that very 
 exercise of judgment to which I call others ; and have abundant 
 reason to believe that much more frequently I stand manifest 
 to those around me, as one who errs, without being corrected 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 67 
 
 by knowing it. I would willingly have evaded appearing 
 before you on this subject, for I shall probably do but little 
 good, and may well think it was an error of judgment to 
 consent : having consented, my thoughts would flow back 
 amongst the events and reflections of my past life, until I 
 found nothing present itself but an open declaration, almost a 
 confession, as the means of performing the duty due to the 
 subject and to you. 
 
 NOTE REFERRED TO ON p. 47. 
 
 As an illustration of the present state of the subject, I will quote one letter 
 from among many like it which I have received — M. F. 
 
 " , April 5, 1854. 
 
 " Sir,— I am one of the clergymen of this parish,' and have had the subject 
 of table-turning brought under my notice by some of my younger parishioners ; . 
 I gave your solution of it as a sufficient answer to the mystery. The reply was 
 made, that you had since seen reason to alter your opinion. Would you have 
 the politeness to inform me if you have done so ? With many apologies for 
 troubling you, 
 
 " I am, your obedient servant, 
 
 (See also Note Q.) 
 
 NOTES REFERRED TO BY CAPITAL LETTERS IN PROFESSOR 
 FARADAY'S LECTURE— E. R. L. 
 
 Note A. — Since the date at which Faraday wrote, it has been found that 
 certain forces may possibly modify, not " the law of gravitation," but the net 
 result of its operation in agglomerations of matter. -Thus the pressure exerted 
 upon bodies by light from the sun — though its repulsive effect is so small as 
 to be negligible in the case of a body of which the illuminated surface is minute 
 as compared with its mass (as, for instance, spheres of such size as the planets 
 and fixed stars) yet becomes appreciable when the illuminated surface is 
 greatly increased in proportion to the mass of the body under observation, as 
 in the case of particles of the size of very fine powder. The light pressure 
 on the earth's surface amounts to 74,000 tons, literally " negligible " when 
 opposed to the earth's weight, which is six thousand million times a billion 
 tons ! Professor Poynting has shown that if the earth were subdivided into 
 spheres, each of one forty-seven-billionth of its present radius, and were 
 spread out in a thin layer so that each should receive on its surface the 
 impact of sunshine — then the total light pressure of the sun on the surface 
 of the particles so produced would just equal the gravitational pull. The 
 particles supposed to be produced would have a diameter of about one- 
 millionth of an inch. The material of the earth would then apparently 
 fail to obey the law of gravitation. Similarly, each particle of cosmic 
 dust (such as actually exists in vast quantity, and is a normal part of the 
 Solar System) must be subject to the action of the sun's light rays anta- 
 gonizing its gravitational attraction. Thus it might be contended by a rash 
 critic that the law of gravitation is not to be applied universally. Clearly, 
 however, the interference with gravitational attraction by the pressure of light 
 
68 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 does not justify any such conclusion. Both light repulsion and gravitational 
 attraction are operative, and the result is the difference of their respective 
 pull and push. This is merely one of the innumerable and necessary instances 
 of the summation and balancing of effects due to interacting causes with which 
 the student of nature is familiar. 
 
 Note B. — It must be remembered that at the time when Faraday adduced 
 organic form as an illustration of the permanency of natural law, the doctrine 
 of organic evolution had not been generally accepted. His statement would 
 be modified at the present day by the recognition of the fact that organic 
 forms have been slowly altered in the course of ages by very slight changes — 
 so slight as to be scarcely perceptible by the human observer of a few succeeding 
 generations, yet accumulating in the course of ages so as to lead to the produc- 
 tion and establishment of new species, and in longer lapses of time to the 
 derivation of the most complex living things from simpler ancestors, and of 
 these again from yet simpler forms. 
 
 Note C. — The man who to-day considers the ceaseless yet certain actions 
 located in a blade of grass, recognizes, not his inability to change the character 
 of the least among them, but his ability by " crossing " and the selection of 
 modified offspring for further breeding, to bring about marked changes in 
 some, at least, of the minor characters presented by those actions. The 
 statement as to the long-enduring persistence of the natural characters of 
 organic species is correct, but we no longer accept a general doctrine of the 
 absolute permanency of the characters produced by natural forces — though we 
 still adhere (with some reservations) to the doctrines of the persistence of 
 " force " and the indestructibility of " matter." 
 
 Note T>. — With a sufficiently large voltaic battery there is certainly a spark 
 visible when the wires approach. Though air is practically a non-conductor, a 
 current may be forced through it with sufficiently high electrical pressure or 
 " voltage." The passage of a current through air is accompanied by a spark 
 which is due to a sudden disruption of the highly resistent or " non-conducting " 
 atmosphere. Faraday explains in his Experimental Researches that inasmuch 
 as the voltaic metal couple will send a current through a highly conduct- 
 ing circuit, he expected a slight amount to flow through the air if the length 
 of the air-path were made sufficiently small : and the surmise is perfectly 
 correct. His doubt can only have been due to the low pressure or voltage 
 which was at his command and the consequent weakness of the spark. Nowa- 
 days, with voltaic batteries of enormous energy, the spark can be easily seen 
 (and heard) by a large audience at a distance. 
 
 Note E. — Later investigation has shown that electric conduction is a 
 complex process both in solids and liquids, and that the phrase " conduction 
 proper " must not be applied equally to solid silver and to a solution of a salt 
 or to a " fused " substance. The occurrence of electrolytic decomposition in 
 liquids at once suggests that conduction in such liquids differs in kind from 
 that in solid metal. It is interesting to note that Faraday was himself the 
 first to point this out. If one observes what occurs in a certain few non- 
 conducting solids, one finds that they conduct only when melted. Thus, 
 relatively, ice insulates and water conducts. One might come to the conclusion 
 that the state of " liquidity" governs the phenomenon, and by some it would 
 be considered a hair-splitting distinction to say that it is heat and not the 
 " liquidity" that governs. If the state which we call " fluid" always accom- 
 panies the power to conduct, a certain type of mind is satisfied to look no 
 further. But the method of " concomitant variation " requires careful anaylsis 
 of the phenomena which show concomitant variation, if the method is to lead 
 us to a safe conclusion as to the cause or causes at work. The discovery of 
 substances such as cerium oxide and boron (which appreciably "conduct" 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 69 
 
 only when heated, whilst yet remaining solid) exposes the danger of coming to 
 a conclusion when the facts have not been fully examined. That discovery 
 renders it obvious that the conductivity acquired by certain bodies when 
 brought into the liquid condition by the application of heat does not depend 
 upon the assumption of the liquid state, but upon other consequences of increased 
 temperature of which " liquidity " is only one, and not a necessary antecedent 
 in all cases, of the acquirement of electric conductivity. Minds untrained in 
 the analysis of phenomena by means of experimental investigation and the 
 consequent determination of the relations to one another of a large series of 
 facts, are apt to accept as demonstrated conclusions what are merely probable 
 or possible hypotheses. The study of philology and of human history fails to 
 train the mind in the definite ascertainment of a large number of relations 
 among facts. The facts dealt with in those studies are related in apparently 
 arbitrary ways which defy the efforts of philologists and historians to trace 
 perfectly consequential laws of cause and effect. It is on this account, among 
 others, that those studies are of little value as mental training, compared with 
 the experimental sciences, the votaries of which have in hypothesis and verifica- 
 tion by experiment an almost unlimited power of ascertaining the innumerable 
 relations of a whole universe of facts, and find in the consequent joy of the 
 creation of new knowledge and understanding, an unceasing stimulation to the 
 exercise of that power. 
 
 Note F. — -The original model of " the very simple apparatus " made by 
 Faraday for the purpose of showing the unconscious pressure of the hands 
 upon the table in what was called " table-turning " was given by him to my 
 father in 1855 — and was for a long time in my possession. It consisted of two 
 sheets of stiff millboard of royal octavo size, between which were laid, at right 
 angles to the length of the boards, two cylindrical glass rods, each about five 
 inches long and three-tenths of an inch in diameter. The upper board was 
 thus supported on the glass rods, which acted as rollers. It was freely movable 
 upon them to and fro when one placed the tips of the fingers of one or both 
 of one's hands lightly on the board. A couple of elastic india-rubber bands 
 were passed round the two boards transversely to their length so as to bind 
 the boards together, but yet to allow of free back and forth movement of the 
 upper board and to permit by the elasticity of the bands a small amount of 
 lateral displacement. Faraday, having had several of his little pieces of 
 apparatus manufactured, now invited would-be " table-turners " to make use 
 of it. Such a " planchette " (as it was subsequently termed) was placed on 
 the table beneath the fingers of each operator in a " table-turning " experiment, 
 and it was found that whereas in previous experiments without a planchette 
 the table had been made to move by the hands lightly resting on it, now there 
 was no movement of the table but a slight forward displacement, more or less 
 conspicuous, of the upper board of the planchette as it moved on its glass 
 rollers under the gentle pressure of the operator's fingers. In this way Faraday 
 showed that it was possible for honest experimenters to apply unconsciously a 
 slight push to a table, and so for their united unconscious efforts to cause it 
 to move or turn in a manner which was to them mysterious and supernatural, 
 whereas when their fingers were separated from the table by the mobile plan- 
 chette the " push " in each case merely caused the upper board of that little 
 intermediary to move instead of acting upon the table itself. By the irony of 
 human fate, Faraday's detective " planchette " was subsequently fitted with 
 a pencil and used by " occultists " to obtain writing caused by the unconscious, 
 though sometimes conscious, direction of its movements by the hands of an 
 inquirer lightly laid on it. Such writing was interpreted by the " occultists " 
 as " messages from the spirit world." On the other hand, " planchette- 
 writing " and similar experimental methods offer to the psychologist a valuable 
 
 E 
 
70 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 means of exploring the directive movements given unconsciously to the muscles 
 of the body by the brain in many persons when thus subjected to properly 
 guarded and well -devised experiment. 
 
 Note G. — I may refer the reader to the account given in my little book, 
 From an Easy Chair (Constable, 1909), p. 60, of a decisive experiment on 
 this subject made by me in Charcot's laboratory at the Salpetriere Hospital 
 some thirty years ago. A female out-patient there was supposed to acquire 
 anaesthesia or want of sensation in the arm by holding in her hand a bar of 
 iron connected with a voltaic battery so that the bar became magnetized when 
 the battery was in action. At other times her arm and hand were proved to 
 be normally sensitive. But when the iron bar was magnetized, sensation 
 disappeared and (her face being turned away so that she could not see what 
 was being done) large carpet needles were run into and through her hand and 
 arm without causing in her the slightest indication of pain or of any knowledge 
 that she had been pierced by the needles. The iron bar was held in the girl's 
 hand for some minutes, and then the " making " of it into a magnet by allowing 
 the electric current to pass to it was directed by Charcot himself, who gave 
 "the word of command." At once, as the students and visitors saw and 
 established by pricking the girl's arm with needles, there was apparently a 
 complete loss of sensation, which returned, however, as soon as (by Charcot's 
 spoken order) the electric current was stopped and the iron bar ceased to be a 
 magnet. The tests were sufficiently severe and numerous, and watched with 
 such care on various successive days, as to make it extremely improbable that 
 the girl was pretending to insensibility. It is well established that such 
 insensibility can be effectively produced in various ways. The question here 
 was, " Is it due to the action of a magnet ? " By chance, after witnessing this 
 experiment with Charcot, I had, and took, the opportunity of emptying the 
 voltaic battery in use, when the room was cleared and no other person was 
 present except a medical friend whom I took into my confidence as witness. 
 An hour or so later Charcot returned with other visitors and the patient to 
 repeat the demonstration. So when the emphatic order was given to " make 
 contact" and the voltaic current was believed by Charcot's assistants and by 
 every one present (except my medical friend and myself) to have made the 
 iron bar into a magnet, no current passed, and the bar was not magnetized. 
 Nevertheless the girl's arm was "anaesthetized" as usual with complete 
 success, and the demonstration was as convincing as ever. The " suggestion " 
 and conviction in the girl's mind set up by Charcot's word of command, " Make 
 contact," was sufficient. There was no " magnetism " in operation at all, but 
 merely the suggestion to her that the bar had become a magnet and that it 
 being a magnet, her arm must, of course, become insensitive. I explained, 
 with apologies to Charcot, what I had done, and his assistants at once verified 
 the fact that the voltaic battery had been put out of action. The experiment 
 was a decisive one, and I was at once forgiven by the great physician for the 
 liberty I had taken and congratulated on having carried it through. 
 
 Note H. — The various wonderful things here cited by Faraday as being 
 heard and talked about by all in 1854, are, some of them, familiar to us under 
 the same names sixty-two years later. But not all are familiar. In a later 
 part of his discourse he speaks of " ring-swingers, table-turners, table-speakers " 
 — names which, with perhaps the exception of the second, are not familiar at 
 the present day. " Ring-swinging," I may say, was a mode of " divination " 
 to be classed with " Bible-swinging " and the throwing of rods and other appeals 
 to " chance," the revelations of which were supposed to be influenced by the 
 interference of a tutelary deity, or demon. I am informed by Prof. Perry, F.R.S., 
 that the old " caloric engine " mentioned by Faraday is now called the gas- 
 engine or the petrol-engine or the Diesel motor. There has been no change in 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 71 
 
 principle since 1852, but a great change in methods of applying the principle. 
 These air-engines of 1851-4 were called heat-engines by men like Rankine and 
 Thomson, but they were called caloric engines by the general public, especially 
 in America. If an American had spoken of a " caloric engine " in 1854, he 
 would have meant Ericsson's air-engine, which was used to drive a boat. The 
 •" electric light " and the " magneto-electric machine " are, of course, great 
 inventions which have now come into general use and vast importance. " Mes- 
 merism," about which much that was fanciful and incorrect was, at one time, 
 believed, is better known to-day under the name " hypnotism," and is concerned 
 with a very real and remarkable mental condition, the study of which has 
 yielded and is still yielding most important results. " Homoeopathy," in so 
 far as it was the assertion that physiological disorders must be " cured " by 
 drugs which produce similar disorders has been experimentally tested and 
 rejected : it is no longer entertained as a serious proposition. " Odylism " has 
 vanished into obscurity. It was the assertion of the existence of a mysterious 
 force, called " odyl," by the Baron von Reichenbach in 1845, supposed to be 
 connected with certain crystals, magnets, and the human body. The supposed 
 facts brought forward by believers in this mysterious force were long ago 
 shown to be illusions due in some instances to fraud and in others to hypnotic 
 suggestion. Varieties of this form of illusion still nourish at the present day. 
 " Perpetual motion " refers to the attempt to construct a piece of mechanism 
 which, once set going, shall perpetually go on producing useful work without 
 drawing on any external source of energy. In the eighteenth century the 
 attempt excited a good deal of attention, but it is now recognized, after 
 examination of a vast variety of proposed apparatus, that the result sought is 
 one which is a contradiction of the fundamental laws of matter and motion. 
 " The Pasilalinic sympathetic compass " is perhaps the most foolish and 
 ridiculous of all the fanciful pretences to discovery cited by Faraday. Accord- 
 ing to the article in Chambers's Journal, 1851, referred to by Faraday, a trans- 
 lation from the French of a M. Jules Allix, two French experimenters had 
 discovered that individuals of the common snail have a mysterious sympathy 
 with one another, and actually influence at a distance and determine the 
 movements of other snails — even at a great distance. These experimenters are 
 related to have shown that snails kept under observation in New York cause 
 " sympathetic " movements corresponding to their own in similar snails kept 
 in Paris. The " experimenters " state that they suppose that threads like the 
 gossamer of spiders issue from snails and keep them in communication with 
 one another, and that these threads are infinitely fine and invisible, and can 
 be extended to such vast length as to connect snails separated from one another 
 by the Atlantic Ocean. Accordingly the "discoverers" of this invisible 
 connexion between widely separated snails introduce for their pretended 
 discovery the name " Pasilalinic — which is being translated " universal 
 talking — sympathetic compass." The whole story is obviously rubbish. But 
 whether it was a hoax which was played on the editor of Chambers' 's Journal or 
 a jocose parody of the effusions of the mesmerists and " odylists " of the day, 
 does not appear. Had it first appeared in recent years it might reasonably be 
 regarded as a burlesque of the assertions of the believers in " thought trans- 
 ference " and " brain-waves " and their pretentious invention of the word 
 " telepathy," which is fairly matched by the word " Pasilalinic." Faraday 
 refers again to the snails on page 64. 
 
 Note I. — Faraday here speaks of " clear ideas as to what is possible and 
 what is impossible." The terms "possible" and "impossible" are liable to 
 lead to misconception, and as a rule they are to be avoided in the discussion 
 of narratives of extraordinary or marvellous occurrences. A statement of a 
 supposed occurrence may be logically absurd. It may involve a contradiction 
 
2 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 in terms, and then it would be correct to call the supposed occurrence " impos- 
 sible." But it is generally recognized at the present day that the proper 
 attitude of the scientific inquirer when confronted with the narration of a 
 supposed marvel is not the consideration of its improbability or impossibility, 
 but simply the taking of steps to decide whether the fact is or is not as narrated. 
 He must demand the evidence in favour of the supposed marvel and examine 
 it and determine its value. If he thinks the narration so highly improbable 
 and the persons who make it so little likely to be correct in their observation 
 and statement that his time will be wasted if given to its examination he can, 
 of course, decline to occupy himself with the matter. But he is not justified 
 in stating that the occurrence is " impossible " and that on that account he 
 will not inquire into it, unless it is in its terms a logical absurdity or else 
 necessarily involves the direct denial of some established principle which he 
 can at once demonstrate to be operative in this particular matter. An impres- 
 sive warning as to the need for great caution in using the unqualified word 
 " impossible " is furnished by the example given by the French philosopher, 
 Comte, of something " which is conceivable and yet is now for ever impossible." 
 He gave as his example a knowledge as to what chemical elements are present 
 in the sun and stars — a thing readily conceivable, but for ever, he said, out of 
 the bounds of possibility. Within twelve years of Comte' s assertion the 
 determination of the bright lines characteristic of each of the chemical elements 
 as shown by the spectroscope when applied to the light given off by each of 
 them in the incandescent condition was made known, and these lines were 
 found to be identical with lines in the spectrum of the fight of the sun and 
 some fixed stars. By this identification the presence of certain chemical 
 elements in the heavenly bodies was ascertained, and what Comte had chosen 
 as an example of something impossible though conceivable was accomplished. 
 On the other hand, we say it is "impossible" to create force or annihilate 
 matter, because such proceedings involve a contradiction in terms. When we 
 say this we use the words " create " and " annihilate " in a strict sense as 
 terms defined to mean operations beyond human experience and power. In a 
 less strict and secondary, somewhat figurative sense, we are justified in saying 
 that we continually " create " and " annihilate" both matter and force — that 
 is to say, we cause matter and force to appear or become obvious to our senses 
 here and now in various forms. On other occasions we cause them to disappear. 
 Even Milton did not imagine " the creation " of animals out of nothing, but 
 described it as a transformation of existing matter — a " bringing forth " or 
 birth from the womb of the earth. But the physical philosopher uses the 
 terms " create " and " annihilate " in a strict and absolute sense — meaning 
 "produce from nothing" and "reduce to nothing" — and rightly does not 
 hesitate to assert that they are both " impossibilities." 
 
 Note K. — This question has been answered by the modern theory of 
 "permeability." It is not a matter of polarities. Iron is more highly per- 
 meable than a vacuum, that is to say, than ether unaffected by the presence of 
 matter, whilst bismuth is less permeable than ether. 
 
 Note L. — In an article published in the Rationalist Press Association's Annual 
 for 1915 with the title. " Science and the Limits of Belief," I wrote as follows, 
 without any recollection at the time of the advocacy by the great Faraday of a 
 numerical expression of " the amount of belief " in the mind of one who as a 
 rule contents himself with vaguely indicating that he believes this or that : 
 
 " Turning now from the specific question of belief in ghosts or spirits to the 
 question of belief in general, we must all admit that the word ' belief ' is a 
 misleading one, since it is applied to a condition of mind which presents such 
 varieties of intensity that, unless some measure of that intensity is given by 
 one who uses it, there are apt to be confusion and misunderstanding. When 
 
OBSERVATIONS ON MENTAL EDUCATION 73 
 
 a man wishes to express the highest degree of conviction as to some future 
 occurrence — for instance, that the sun will appear above the horizon to-morrow 
 — he says that he has the ' belief ' that it will do so. He ' believes,' or has the 
 belief, that all living things, including himself, will sooner or later die. He 
 ' believes ' that if he throws a heavy body into the air it will fall to the ground. 
 But if he is asked whether a friend is in London about whose movements he 
 is incompletely informed, he will say : ' I believe that he is.' He will say 
 that he has the ' belief ' that it is ' unlucky ' to start on a journey on a Friday, 
 or to sit down to dinner in a party of thirteen. 
 
 "It is clear that these ' beliefs ' are of very different degrees of intensity, 
 and it would often help towards the definite expression of one's state of mind 
 were separate words used to convey the degrees of intensity of a belief, or if a 
 numerical scale were used for the purpose like that of a thermometer. One 
 would say of those beliefs which are based on demonstration and repeated 
 verification, or on the probability of the continuation of the order of events 
 observed by mankind from time immemorial : ' My belief about this is 100.' 
 With regard to some probabilities one would place it at 85 : or, again, at 50 
 (an even 'chance,' as it is called). And so on down to 5, 3, and 1, the last 
 indicating the merest inkling of a belief, and meaning no ' belief ' at all. 
 Then we should come to beliefs below zero — namely, greater or less intensity 
 of the ' belief ' that the thing propounded or the conditions leading to its 
 occurrence do not exist. It would be of some interest to the student of the 
 human mind were educated men who express their ' belief ' in the ' existence ' 
 of ghostly ' entities ' and ' discarnate intelligences interacting with us on the 
 material side ' willing to classify their ' beliefs ' by reference to such a scale. 
 
 " An important feature about the intensity of a belief is that it exists often 
 at a very high degree in persons who admit that they are unable to give reason- 
 able ground for that belief, and are unable to state how they have become 
 possessed of it. The emotional conditions of hope, fear, love, and hate produce 
 this result, and are excited by rhetoricians in order to implant beliefs in their 
 hearers' minds. Similar is the effect of that remarkable suspension of the 
 reasoning process and subjection of the mind to ' suggestion ' which is called 
 ' hypnotism.' The intensity of the ' beliefs ' suggested by external agents to 
 an individual whose brain is in the ' hypnotized ' condition (resembling, if not 
 identical with, that which occurs in sleep-walking) is sufficiently high to lead 
 to the action — possibly of a violent or dangerous character — which is the 
 habitual outcome of the belief. But since the belief is implanted by the 
 deliberately false or arbitrary suggestion of an experimenter (so-called 
 ' operator ' ), or by the accidental influence of some sight, sound, smell, or 
 touch upon the brain of an individual who has ' fallen ' (as we all do more or 
 less at times) into the condition like that of sleep-walking — with the reasoning 
 faculty in abeyance — the actions of such persons appear astonishing and 
 ludicrous to onlookers. Thus we see that the intensity of a belief is no measure 
 of the probability of its truth, and that there are exceptional or unhealthy con- 
 ditions of the brain in which preposterous beliefs may become implanted in men 
 who are usually capable of sound thought, and even of scientific discovery. 
 
 " When we appreciate the fact that a ' belief ' is a state of mind which may 
 be produced by the thorough application of the scientific method, or, on the 
 other hand, by hypnotism, it becomes obvious that we cannot logically contrast 
 ' scientific knowledge ' and ' belief.' The word ' belief ' is often used to signify 
 ' mere belief,' or ' empty belief,' or ' fanciful belief,' which is not based on 
 experiment and verification. When some one says, ' I believe that this is 
 so-and-so,' it is necessary, if we are to apprehend his state of mind, that he 
 should state the evidence on which his ' belief ' is founded and the degree of 
 probability which exists that the belief is a correct interpretation of the 
 
74 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 evidence. Moreover, it is the fact that there is as great need to look into the 
 meaning of the word ' knowledge ' and what we ' know ' as there is to be 
 careful about what we mean by a ' belief.' What can we ' know ' of what 
 we call ' matter,' or of what we call ' mind ' ? The answer is, so far as the 
 ultimate nature of either is concerned, ' Nothing ! ' " 
 
 Note M. — Professor Baker, by purifying hydrogen and oxygen to a point 
 not previously attained, has discovered that the combination of these gases is 
 delayed under all conditions, even those which determine instantaneous com- 
 bination of mixtures of the two gases not previously brought to this high 
 degree of purity. We have here the suggestion that a " catalyzing'* impurity 
 may not be merely an accelerator, but a necessary adjuvant for chemical 
 combination in many cases where the rapid occurrence of combination is usually 
 ascribed to supposed " great " or urgent affinity. 
 
 Note N. — The statement by Faraday that a man " has no right " to make 
 a statement and to declare that it is the duty of others to prove him right or 
 wrong, is, perhaps, open to misinterpretation. It is difficult to show that a 
 man " has no right " — putting it in that bald, unqualified way — to say or to 
 do many things which according to the circumstances and occasion may be 
 or may not be deserving of condemnation. In the case which Faraday is 
 considering — that of the assertor of a new thing who demands an answer in 
 the form of " Yes " or " No " to his assertion — the fact is that he has a perfect 
 " right " as a " citizen of a free country " to make a foolish demand, compliance 
 with which he cannot enforce. Supposing that at the same time he claims to 
 be judged as a reasonable being — it is clear that " he has no right," as such, 
 to conclude that his assertion is correct or in any way verified by the refusal 
 or even the inability of the person or persons addressed by him to give him 
 the answer " Yes " or " No." Nor have interested bystanders, if claiming to 
 be guided by reason, the right to conclude that his assertion is correct because 
 no one undertakes to show that it is incorrect. That method of " forcing a 
 conclusion" is rarely admitted even in a court of law or a friendly debate. 
 Yet it is true to-day as it was sixty years ago, that the wonder-monger and the 
 scaremonger are encouraged to make fantastic statements and to demand 
 that they shall be either accepted as true or else shown to be false, because a 
 large portion of the public is habitually unreasonable and prefers the emotional 
 excitement accompanying credulity to the suspension of judgment and the 
 ultimate certainty proper to the exercise of reason. The education of the youth 
 of all classes in the methods and results of the natural sciences, as advocated in 
 these lectures, is the only cure for the dangerous, and possibly disastrous state 
 of irrationality which still prevails in the most highly civilized communities. 
 
 Note 0. — Faraday does not here refer to photographs in colours — such as 
 are obtained by the Lumiere process, invented long after his death, but to the 
 reproduction of the varied colours of natural scenes and objects by correspond- 
 ing variations of paler or darker tint in the photographer's monotone pictures. 
 
 - Note P. — The number of metals at present known to chemists has been 
 increased from -the fifty known in 1854 to sixty-three. In addition to these 
 metals, eighteen non-metallic elements are known at the present day (1916). 
 
 Note Q. — The " state of the subject " revealed by the clergyman's note in 
 1854 persists to a very large extent at the present moment. There are to-day 
 but few clergymen or other persons who have " enjoyed " a university educa- 
 tion who are competent to deal with the preposterous statements in regard to 
 " occultism " and such pretended " wonders " which are constantly in circula- 
 tion. The ignorance of the well-to-do class and the readiness of newspaper 
 editors to enliven their columns with baseless gossip, and of newspaper readers 
 to feed their minds with it, still lead to the propagation of such false reports 
 as that cited by Faraday's correspondent. E. Ray Lankester. 
 
ON THE IMPORTANCE OF THE STUDY OF 
 
 LANGUAGE AS A BRANCH OF EDUCATION 
 
 FOR ALL CLASSES 
 
 A LECTURE DELIVERED AT THE ROYAL INSTITUTION OF 
 GREAT BRITAIN 
 
 By ROBERT GORDON LATHAM, M.D., F.R.S. 
 
 The subject I have the honour of illustrating is " The Impor- 
 tance of the Study of Language as a means of Education for all 
 Classes." 
 
 I open it by drawing a distinction. 
 
 A little consideration will show that that difference between 
 the study of a given subject in its general and abstract and the 
 study of one in its applied or concrete form, which finds place 
 in so many departments of human knowledge, finds place in 
 respect to Language and Languages. It finds place in the 
 subject before us as truly as it does in that science which one 
 of my able successors will have the honour of illustrating — the 
 science of the laws of Life — Physiology or Biology. Just as 
 there is therein a certain series of laws relating to life and 
 organization, which would command our attention if the whole 
 animal and vegetable world consisted of but a single species, so 
 the study of Speech would find place in a well-devised system. 
 of education, even if the tongues of the whole wide world were 
 reduced to a single language, and that language to a single 
 dialect. This is because the science of life is one thing, the 
 science of the forms under which the phenomena of life are 
 manifested, another. And just as Physiology, or Biology, is,. 
 more or less, anterior to and independent of such departments, 
 of study as Botany and Zoology, so, in the subject under notice,, 
 there is the double division of the study of Language in respect, 
 to structure and development, and the study of Languages as 
 
76 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 instances of the variety of form in which the phenomenon of 
 human speech exhibits, or has exhibited, itself. Thus — 
 
 When (as I believe once to have been the case) there was 
 but a single language on the face of the earth, the former of 
 these divisions had its subject-matter. And — 
 
 When (as is by no means improbable) one paramount and 
 exclusive tongue, developed, at first, rapidly and at the expense 
 of the smaller languages of the world, and, subsequently, slowly 
 and at that of the more widely diffused ones, shall have replaced 
 the still numerous tongues of the nineteenth century ; and 
 when all the dialects of the world shall be merged into one 
 Universal Language, the same subject-matter for the. study of 
 the structure of Language, its growth and changes, will still 
 exist. 
 
 So that the study of Language is one thing, the study of 
 Languages, another. 
 
 They are different ; and the intellectual powers that they 
 require and exercise are different also. The greatest compara- 
 tive philologists have, generally, been but moderate linguists. 
 
 A certain familiarity with different languages they have, of 
 course, had ; and as compared with that of the special scholar 
 — the Classic or the Orientalist, for instance — their range of 
 language (so to say) has been a wide one ; but it has rarely 
 been of that vast compass which is found in men after the 
 fashion of Mezzofanti, etc. — men who have spoken languages 
 by the dozen, or the score ; — but who have left comparative 
 philology as little advanced as if their learning had beem 
 bounded by the limits of their own mother tongue. 
 
 Now this difference, always of more or less importance in 
 itself, increases when we consider Language as an object of 
 education ; and it is for the sake of illustrating it that the 
 foregoing preliminaries have been introduced. No opinion is 
 given as to the comparative rank or dignity of the two studies ; 
 no decision upon the nobility or ignobility of the faculties 
 involved in the attainment of excellence in either. The 
 illustration of a difference is all that has been aimed at. There 
 is a difference between the two classes of subjects, and a 
 difference between the two kinds of mental faculties. Let us 
 make this difference clear. Let us also give it prominence and 
 importance. 
 
THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE 77 
 
 One main distinction between the study of Language and the 
 study of Languages lies in the fact of the value of the former 
 being constant, that of the latter, fluctuating. The relative 
 importance of any two languages, as objects of special attention, 
 scarcely ever remains steady. The value, for instance, of the 
 German — to look amongst the contemporary forms of speech — - 
 has notably risen within the present century. And why ? 
 Because the literature in which it is embodied has improved. 
 Because the scientific knowledge which, to all who want the 
 key, is (so to say) locked up in it, has increased some hundred 
 per cent. 
 
 But it may go down again. Suppose, for instance, that hew 
 writers of pre-eminent merit ennoble some of the minor 
 languages of Europe — the Danish, Swedish, Dutch, etc. Such 
 a fact would divide the attention of savants — attention which 
 can only be bestowed upon some second, at the expense of 
 some first, object. In such a case, the extent to which the 
 German language got studied would be affected much in the 
 same way as that of the French was by the development of the 
 literature of Germany. 
 
 Or the area over which a language is spoken may increase ; 
 as it may, also, diminish. 
 
 Or the number of individuals that speak it may multiply — 
 the area being the same. 
 
 Or the special application of the language, whether for the 
 purposes of commerce, literature, science, or politics, may 
 become changed. In this way, as well as in others, the English 
 is becoming, day by day, more important. 
 
 There are other influences. 
 
 High as is the value of the great classical languages of Greece 
 and Rome, we can easily conceive how that value might be 
 enhanced. Let a manuscript containing the works of some of 
 the lost, or imperfectly preserved, writers of antiquity be 
 discovered. Let, for instance, Gibbon's desiderata — the lost 
 Decads of Livy, the Orations of Hyperides, or the Dramas of 
 Menander — be made good : the percentage of classical scholars 
 would increase ; little or much. 
 
 Some years back it was announced that the Armenian 
 language contained translations, made during the earlier 
 centuries of our era, of certain classical and ecclesiastical 
 
78 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 writings, of which the originals had been lost — lost in the 
 interval. This did not exactly make the Armenian, with its 
 alphabet of six-and-thirty letters, a popular tongue ; but it 
 made it, by a fraction, more popular than it was in the days of 
 Whiston and La Croze when those two alone, of all the learned 
 men of Europe, could read it. 
 
 Translations tell in another way. Whatever is worth reading 
 in the Danish and Swedish is forthwith translated into German. 
 E.g. Professor Rctzius of Stockholm wrote a good Manual of 
 Anatomy. He had the satisfaction of seeing it translated into 
 German. He had the further satisfaction of hearing that the 
 translation ran through five editions in less time than the 
 original did through one. 
 
 Now, if the Germans were to leave off translating, the value 
 of the language in which Professor Retzius wrote his Anatomy 
 would rise. 
 
 Upon the whole, the French is, perhaps, the most important 
 language of the nineteenth century ; yet it is only where we 
 take into consideration the whole of its elements of value. To 
 certain special savants, the German is worth more ; to the artist, 
 the Italian ; to the American, the Spanish. It fell, too, in 
 value because it became less indispensable ; and another cause, 
 now in operation, affects the same element of indispensability. 
 The French are beginning to learn the languages of other nations. 
 Their own literature will certainly be none the worse for their 
 so doing. But it by no means follows that that literature will 
 be any the more studied ; on the contrary, Frenchmen will 
 learn English more, and, pro tanto, Englishmen learn French 
 less. 
 
 If all this has illustrated a difference, it may also have done 
 something more. It may have given a rough sketch, in the 
 way of classification, of the kind of facts that regulate the value 
 of special languages as special objects of study. At any rate 
 (and this is the main point), the subject-matter of the present 
 Address is narrowed. It is narrowed (in the first instance at 
 least) to the consideration of that branch of study whereof the 
 value is constant ; for assuredly it is this which will command 
 more than a moiety of our consideration. 
 
 This may be said to imply a preference to the study of 
 Language as opposed to that of Languages — a singular prefer- 
 
THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE 79 
 
 ence, as a grammarian may, perhaps, be allowed to call it. It 
 cannot be denied that, to a certain extent, such is the case ; 
 but it is only so to a certain extent. The one is not magnified 
 at the expense of the other. When all has been said that logic 
 or mental philosophy can say about the high value of compara- 
 tive philology, general grammar, and the like, the lowest value 
 of the least important language will still stand high, and pre- 
 eminently high that of what may be called the noble Languages. 
 No variations in the philological barometer, no fluctuations in 
 the Exchange of Language, will ever bring down the advantage 
 of studying one, two, or even more foreign languages to so low 
 a level as to expel such tongues as the Latin, the Greek, the 
 French, or the German, one and all, from an English curriculum 
 r— and vice versa, English from a foreign one. 
 
 Now, if this be the case, one of the elements in the value of 
 the study of Language in general will be the extent to which it 
 facilitates the acquirement of any one language in particular, 
 and this element of value will be an important — though not 
 the most important — one. 
 
 The structure of the human body is worth knowing, even if 
 [the investigator of it be neither a practitioner in medicine nor a 
 teacher of anatomy ; and, in like manner, the structure of the 
 human language is an important study irrespective of the particular 
 jforms of speech whereof it may facilitate the acquirement. 
 
 The words on the diagram-board will now be explained. 
 They are meant to illustrate the class of facts that comparative 
 philology supplies. The first runs — 
 
 KLEIN : CLEAN : : PETIT : PETITUS. 
 
 It shows the extent to which certain ideas are associated. It 
 shows, too, something more ; it shows that such an association 
 s capable of being demonstrated from the phenomena of 
 anguage instead of being a mere a priori speculation on the 
 part of the mental philosopher. 
 
 Klein is the German for little ; clean is our own English 
 idjective, the English of the Latin word munolus. In German 
 :he word is rein. * 
 
 Now, notwithstanding the difference of meaning in the two 
 ;ongues, clean and klein are one and the same word. Yet, how 
 ire the ideas of cleanliness and littleness connected ? The 
 
80 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 Greek language has the word hypocorisma, meaning a term oj 
 endearment, and the adjective hypocoristic. Now, clean-ness, or 
 neat-ness, is one of the elements that make hypocoristic terms 
 (or terms of endearment) applicable. And so is smallness. We 
 talk of pretty little dears, a thousand times, where we talk oi 
 pretty big dears once. This, then, explains the connexion ; this 
 tells us that clean in English is klein in German, word for word. 
 
 You doubt it, perhaps. You shake your head, and say that 
 the connexion seems somewhat indefinite ; that it is just one 
 of those points which can neither be proved nor disproved. Be 
 it so. The evidence can be amended. Observe the words 
 petit and petitus. Petit (in French) is exactly what klein is in 
 German, i.e. little. Petitus (in Latin) is very nearly what 
 clean is in English, i.e. desired, or desirable. That petit comes 
 from petitus is undeniable. 
 
 Hence, where the German mode of thought connects the 
 ideas of smallness and cleanness, the Latin connects those oi 
 smallness and desirability ; so that as petit is to petitus, so \i 
 klein to clean. In the diagram this is given in the formula oi 
 a sum in the Rule of Three. 
 
 The words just noticed explain the connexion of ideas in the 
 case of separate words. The forthcoming help us in a mucr 
 more difficult investigation. What is the import of sue! 
 sounds as that of the letter s in the word father-,? ? It is the 
 sign of the plural number. 
 
 Such is the question — such the answer ; question and answe] 
 connected in the word fathers solely for the sake of illustration 
 Any other word, and any other sign of case, number, person, oj 
 tense, would have done as well. 
 
 But is the ansAver a real one ? Is it an answer at all ? Hov 
 come such things as plural numbers, and signs of plural numbers 
 into language ? How the particular plural before us came inte 
 being, I cannot say ; but I can show how some plurals have 
 Let us explain the following — 
 
 NGI =1. NGI-N-DE = WE. 
 NGO = THOU. NGO-N-DA = YE. 
 NGU = HE. NGE-N-DA = THEY. 
 
 DA = WITH. 
 
 ME - CUM = ME. 
 
THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE 81 
 
 The da (or de) in the second column, is the sign of the plural 
 number in a language which shall at present be nameless. It 
 is also the preposition with. Now with denotes association ; 
 association 'plurality. Hence 
 
 Ngi - n - de = I + = we- 
 Ngo - n - da = thou + = ye. 
 Nge - n - da — he + = they. 
 
 I This is just as if the Latins, instead of wo* and vos, said 
 me-cum and te-cum. 
 
 Such is the history of one mode of expressing the idea of 
 plurality ; we can scarcely say of a plural number. The words 
 plural number suggest the idea of a single word, like fathers, 
 where the s is inseparably connected with the root, at least so 
 far inseparably connected as to have no independent existence 
 iof its own. Ngi-n-de, however, is no single word at all, but a 
 pair of words in juxtaposition, each with a separate existence 
 of its own. But what if this juxtaposition grow into amalgama- 
 tion ? What if the form in da change ? What if it become t 
 or 2, or th, or s ? What if, meanwhile, the separate preposition 
 da change in form also ; in form or meaning, or, perhaps, in 
 both ? In such a case a true plural form is evolved, the history 
 'of its evolution being a mystery. 
 * So much for one of the inflections of a noun. The remaining 
 words illustrate one of a verb. 
 
 Hundreds of grammarians have suggested that the signs of 
 the persons in the verb might be neither more nor less than the 
 personal pronouns appended, in the first instance, to the verb, 
 but afterwards amalgamated or incorporated with it. If so> 
 jthe -m in inqua-m, is the m in me, etc. The late Mr. Garnett, a 
 | comparative philologist whose reputation is far below his 
 (merits, saw that this was not exactly the case. He observed 
 that the appended pronoun was not so much the Personal as 
 fthe Possessive one : that the analysis of a word like inqua-m 
 I was not so much, say + I, as saying + my ; in short, that the 
 verb was a noun, and the pronoun either an adjective (like 
 mens) or an oblique case (like mei), agreeing with, or governed 
 by, it. 
 
 It is certainly so in the words before you. In a language, 
 which, at present, shell be nameless, instead of saying my 
 
82 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 apple, thy apple, they say what is equivalent to apple-m, 
 apple-th, etc. ; i.e. they append the possessive pronoun to the 
 substantive, and by modifying its form, partially incorporate 
 or amalgamate it. They do more than this. They do (as the 
 diagram shows us) precisely the same with the verbs in their 
 personal as they do with the nouns in their possessive relations. 
 Hence, olvas-om, etc., is less / read than my-reading ; less 
 read + 1, than reading + my. 
 
 
 1 
 
 — OM 
 
 = I READ. 
 
 OD 
 
 = THOU READEST 
 
 UK 
 
 = WE READ. 
 
 ATOK 
 
 = YE READ. 
 
 lA— M 
 
 2 
 = MY APPLE. 
 
 D 
 
 = THY APPLE. 
 
 NK 
 
 = OUR APPLE. 
 
 TOK = YOUR APPLE. 
 
 I submit that facts of this kind are of some value, great or 
 small. But the facts themselves are not all. How were they 
 got at ? They were got at by dealing with the phenomena of 
 language as we found them, by an induction of no ordinary 
 width and compass ; and many forms of speech had to be 
 investigated before the facts came out in their best and most 
 satisfactory form. 
 
 The illustration of the verb (olvasom, and almam, etc.) is 
 from the LIungarian ; that of the plural number (nginde, etc.), i 
 from the Tumali — the Tumali being a language no nearer than 
 the negro districts to the south of Kordovan, between Sennaar 
 and Darfur, and (as such) not exactly in the highway of 
 literature and philology. 
 
 Now I ask whether there be, or whether there be not, certain 1 
 branches of inquiry which are, at one and the same time, 
 recognized to be of the highest importance, and yet not even 
 remarkable for either unanimity of opinion, precision of 
 language, or distinctness of idea on the part of their professors. 
 
THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE 83 
 
 I ask whether what is called, with average clearness, Mental 
 Philosophy, and, with somewhat less clearness, Metaphysics, 
 be not in this predicament ? I ask whether, in this branch of 
 investigation, the subject-matter do not eminently desiderate 
 something definite, palpable, and objective, and whether these 
 same desiderated tangibilities be not found in the wide field of 
 j Language to an extent which no other field supplies ? Let 
 I this field be a training-ground. The facts it gives are of value. 
 The method it requires is of value. 
 
 As the languages of the world, the forms of speech mutually 
 unintelligible, are counted by the hundred, and the dialects by 
 the thousand, the field is a large one — one supplying much 
 exercise, work, and labour. But the applications of the results 
 obtained are wide also ; for, as long as any form of mental 
 philosophy remains susceptible of improvement, as long as its 
 improved form remains undiffused, so long will a knowledge of 
 the structure of language in general, a knowledge of compara- 
 tive philology, a knowledge of general grammar (for we may 
 choose our term), have its use and application. And, assuredly, 
 this will be for some time. 
 
 As to its special value in the particular department of the 
 ethnologist, high as it is, I say nothing, or next to nothing, 
 about it ; concerning myself only with its more general 
 applications. 
 
 Let it be said, then, that the study of language is eminently 
 disciplinal to those faculties that are tasked in the investigation 
 Of the phenomena of the human mind ; the value of a know- 
 ledge of these being a matter foreign to the present dissertation, 
 but being by no means low. High or low, however, it measures 
 that of the studies under notice. 
 
 But how is this general philology to be taught ? Are youths 
 to seek for roots and processes in such languages as the Hun- 
 garian and the Tumali ? No. The teaching must be by 
 haeans of well-selected suggestive examples, whereby the student 
 may rise from particulars to generals, and be taught to infer 
 i-Jie uncertain from the certain. I do not say that the s in 
 fathers arose exactly after the fashion of the Tumali plural ; 
 but, assuredly, its development was the same in kind, if not in 
 letail. At all events, language must be dealt with as a growth. 
 
 In the first stage of speech, there are no inflections at all, 
 
84 XECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 separate words serving instead of them : just as if, instead of 
 saying fathers, we said father many, or father father ; reduplica- 
 tion being one of the makeshifts (so to say) of this period. The 
 languages allied to the Chinese belong to this class. 
 
 In the second stage, the separate words coalesce, but not so 
 perfectly as to disfigure their originally separate character. 
 The Hungarian persons have illustrated this. Language now 
 becomes what is called agglutinate. The parts cohere, but the 
 cohesion is imperfect. The majority of languages are agglu- 
 tinate. 
 
 The Latin and Greek tongues illustrate the third stage. The 
 parts originally separate, then agglutinate, now become so 
 modified by contact as to look like secondary parts of a single 
 word ; these original separate substantive characters being a 
 matter of inference rather than a patent and transparent fact. 
 The s in fathers (which is also the s in patre-s and Trarepe-?) is 
 in this predicament. 
 
 Lastly, inflections are replaced by prepositions and auxiliary 
 verbs, as is the case in the Italian and French when compared 
 with the Latin. 
 
 Truly, then, may we say that the phenomena of speech are 
 the phenomena of growth, evolution, or development ; and as 
 such must they be taught. A cell that grows — not a crystal 
 that is built up — such is language. 
 
 But these well-devised selections of suggestive examples, 
 whereby the student may rise from particulars to generals, etc.. 
 is not to be found in the ordinary grammars. Indeed, it is the 
 very reverse of the present system ; where there are twenty 
 appeals to the memory in the shape of what is called a rule, foi 
 one appeal to the understanding in the shape of an illustrated 
 process. So much the worse for the existing methods. 
 
 Moulds applied to growing trees — cookery-book recipes foi 
 making a natural juice — these are the parallels to the artificia 
 systems of grammar in their worst forms. The better can b< 
 excused, sometimes recommended ; even as the Linnseai 
 system of botanical teaching can, in certain cases, be used witl 
 safety, 'provided always that its artificial character he explainet 
 beforehand, and insisted on throughout. 
 
 To stand on the level of the Linnsean system, an artificia 
 grammar must come under the following condition : It mus 
 
THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE 85 
 
 leave the student nothing to unlearn when he comes to a natural 
 one. 
 
 How can this be done ? It can be done, if the grammarian 
 will be content to teach forms only, leaving processes alone. 
 Let him say (for instance) that the Latin for : 
 
 I call is voc-o. 
 
 Thou callest, voc-as. 
 Calling, voc-ans. 
 
 I called, voc-avi, etc. 
 
 But do not let him say that active aorists are formed from 
 futures, and passive ones from the third person singular of the 
 perfect. His forms, his paradigms, will be right ; his rules, in 
 nine cases out of ten, wrong. I am satisfied that languages can 
 be taught without rules, and by paradigms only. 
 
 This recognition of what has been called artificial grammar 
 for the teaching of special languages, as opposed to the general 
 grammar of the comparative philologist, should serve to 
 anticipate an objection. " Would you," it may be asked, 
 " leave the details of languages like the Latin, Greek, French, 
 German, etc. — languages of eminent practical utility — untaught 
 until such time as the student shall have dipped into Chinese, 
 touched upon Hungarian, and taken a general idea of the 
 third stage from the Latin, and of the fourth from the French ? 
 If so, the period of life when the memory for words is strongest 
 will have passed away before any language but his own mother- 
 tongue has been acquired." 
 
 The recognition of such a thing as artificial grammar answers 
 this in the negative. If a special language be wanted, let it 
 be taught betimes : only if it cannot be taught in the most 
 scientific manner, let it be taught in a manner as little 
 unscientific as possible. 
 
 In this lies an argument against the ordinary teaching 
 (I speak as an Englishman) of English. What do we learn 
 by it ? 
 
 In the ordinary teaching of what is called the grammar of 
 the English language there are two elements. There is some- 
 thing professed to be taught which is not, but which, if taught, 
 would be worth learning ; and there is something which, from 
 being already learned better than any man can teach it, requires 
 
 F 
 
86 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 no lessons. The one (the latter) is the use and practice of the 
 English tongue. This the Englishman has already. The other 
 is the principles of grammar. With existing text-books this 
 is an impossibility. What then is taught ? Something (I am 
 quoting from what I have written elsewhere) undoubtedly. 
 The facts that language is more or less regular ; that there is 
 such a thing as grammar ; that certain expressions should be 
 avoided, are all matters worth knowing. And they are all 
 taught even by the worst method of teaching. But are these 
 the proper objects of systematic teaching ? Is the importance 
 of their acquisition equivalent to the time, the trouble, and the 
 displacement of more valuable subjects which are involved in 
 their explanation ? I think not. Gross vulgarity of language 
 is a fault to' be prevented ; but the proper prevention is to be 
 got from habit — not rules. The proprieties of the English 
 language are to be learned, like the proprieties of English 
 manners, by conversation and intercourse ; and a proper 
 school for both is the best society in which the learner is 
 placed. If this be good, systematic teaching is superfluous ; if 
 bad, insufficient. There are undoubted points where a young 
 person may doubt as to the grammatical propriety of a certain 
 expression. In this case let him ask some one older and more 
 instructed. Grammar, as an art, is, undoubtedly, the art of 
 speaking and writing correctly- — but then, as an art, it is only 
 required for foreign languages. For our own we have the 
 necessary practice and familiarity. 
 
 The true claim of English grammar to form part and parcel 
 of an English education stands or falls with the value of the 
 philological knowledge to which grammatical studies may serve 
 as an introduction, and with the value of scientific grammar as 
 a disciplinal study. I have no fear of being supposed to under- 
 value its importance in this respect. Indeed, in assuming that 
 it^is very great, I also assume that wherever grammar is studied 
 as grammar, the language which the grammar so studied should 
 represent must be the mother-tongue of the student ; whatever 
 hat mother-tongue may be — English for Englishmen, Welsh for 
 Welshmen, French for Frenchmen, German for Germans, etc. 
 This study is the study of a theory ; and for this reason it 
 should be complicated as little as possible by points of practice. 
 For this reason a man's mother-tongue is the best medium for 
 
THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE 87 
 
 the elements of scientific philology, simply because it is the one 
 which he knows best in practice. 
 
 Limit, then, the teaching of English, except so far as it is 
 preparatory to the study of language in general ; with which 
 view, teach as scientifically as possible. 
 
 Go further. Except in special cases, limit the teaching of 
 the classical tongues to one out of the two. One, for all disci- 
 plinal purposes, is enough. In this, go far. Dead though the 
 tongue be, and object of ridicule as the occupation is becoming, 
 go to the length of writing verses, though only in a few com- 
 moner metres. Go far, and go in one direction only. There 
 are reasons for this singleness of path. I fear that there is 
 almost a necessity. As long as men believed that the ordinary 
 Latin and Greek grammars were good things of themselves, 
 and that, even if they did not carry the student far into the 
 classics, they told him something of value respecting language 
 in general, a little learning in the dead languages was a good 
 thing. But what if the grammars are not good things ? What 
 if they are absolutely bad ? In such a case, the classical 
 tongues cease to be learnt except for themselves. Now, one of 
 the few things that is more useless than a little Latin is a little 
 Greek. 
 
 Am I wrong in saying that, with nine out of ten who learn 
 both Latin and Greek, the knowledge of the two tongues con- 
 jointly is not greater than the knowledge of one of them singly 
 ought to be ? 
 
 Am I wrong in believing that the tendencies of the age are 
 in favour of decreasing rather than increasing the amount of 
 time bestowed upon classical scholarship ? 
 
 Unless I be so, the necessity for a limitation is apparent. 
 
 To curtail English — to eliminate one of the classical tongues 
 — possibly that of Pericles, at any rate, either that of Pericles 
 or of Cicero — to substitute for the ordinary elements of a 
 so-called classical education illustrations from the Chinese, the 
 Hungarian, or the Tumali — this is what I have recommended. 
 
 I cannot but feel that in so doing I may seem to some to 
 have been false to my text, which was to eulogize things 
 philological. They may say, Call you this backing your friends ? 
 I do. It is not by glorifying one's own more peculiar studies 
 that such studies gain credit. To show the permanent, rather 
 
88 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 than the accidental, elements of their value, is the best service 
 that can be done for them. It is also good service to show that 
 they can be taught with a less expenditure of time and labour 
 than is usually bestowed on them. But the best service of all 
 is to indicate their disciplinal value ; and to show that, instead 
 of displacing other branches of knowledge, they so exercise 
 certain faculties of the mind as to prepare the way to them. 
 
ON THE IMPORTANCE OF THE STUDY 
 
 OF CHEMISTRY AS A BRANCH OF 
 
 EDUCATION FOR ALL CLASSES 
 
 A LECTURE DELIVERED AT THE ROYAL INSTITUTION OF 
 GREAT BRITAIN 
 
 By CHARLES G. B. DAUBENY, M.D., F.R.S. 
 
 Professor of Chemistry and of Botany in the 
 University of Oxford 
 
 I can imagine one of the regular frequenters of this theatre, 
 who had caught the first part only of the title which announces 
 the Lecture I am about to deliver, marvelling not a little that 
 your managers should have thought it worth their while to 
 invite a professor from Oxford to indoctrinate the members of 
 the Royal Institution with respect to the " Importance of 
 Chemistry." 
 
 That arguments for such a purpose might be useful in the 
 provinces, or even to an academic body occupied for the most 
 part on the literature of past ages, would appear but natural ; 
 but that any considerations of the kind should be pressed upon 
 the attention of those who are in the daily habit of watching 
 the unfolding of those scientific truths of which this Institution 
 may be said to be the birthplace, might seem to them little better 
 than an unprofitable waste of time. 
 
 I must, therefore, begin by reminding you that the subject 
 of this Lecture is not the importance of chemistry, considered 
 in itself, but only as it is an instrument of general education ; 
 and, in this point of view, it appears to me that the very circum- 
 stance which may to some appear to render such a discussion 
 here superfluous, imparts to it a peculiar propriety, when we 
 regard the place in which it is delivered, and the audience I am 
 now addressing. 
 
 Education, gentlemen, I need hardly say, is framed with 
 
90 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 reference to the requirements of the great mass of society, rather 
 than of that small number of individuals who are capable of 
 rising to eminence. Genius under any circumstances, and 
 despite of almost every amount of discouragement, will carve 
 for itself a path to distinction : it grows up under the most 
 dissimilar modes of mental culture ; and is capable of extracting 
 nourishment, for its own development, from the hardest and 
 most indigestible food. 
 
 But it is for the sake of those not intended by nature as the 
 pioneers of discovery, or as the originators of new principles in 
 science, that our systems of education are chiefly framed ; and 
 such men would be rather deterred from the study than invited 
 to it, by having put before them so frequently, as is the case 
 within this theatre, the results of those original and profound 
 investigations which have signalized the march of modern 
 chemistry. 
 
 In consequence of having their attention riveted upon points 
 of scientific research, which are placed on heights to them 
 inaccessible, they are the more likely to overlook the harvest 
 that lay at their very feet, and which came within the compass of 
 those powers and energies of mind, which fall to the common 
 lot of mankind. 
 
 It will therefore be my purpose to show, that even to those 
 who do not feel within themselves the capacity of originating 
 new truths, or even of fully apprehending the higher problems 
 with which this science has to grapple, chemistry is a study, not 
 only of lively interest, but also of great utility, with a view to 
 attaining those objects which are aimed at in every complete 
 and well-digested scheme of national education. 
 
 And in employing the term " national education," I mean to 
 include in it that of the highest as well as of the humblest grade 
 of society ; for although the difference is great indeed between 
 the completeness of the instruction provided, and consequently 
 between the machinery employed, in these two cases, I can 
 recognize no fundamental difference in the objects aimed at. 
 
 Primary education, I conceive, independently of the reference 
 it ought to have to the inculcation of right principles in religion 
 and morality, objects which, although the most important of 
 any, do not fall within the scope of this lecture — has two distinct 
 ends to accomplish : namely, first, that of disciplining and 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 
 
 developing the several powers of the mind ; and, secondly, 
 that of imparting to it certain kinds of useful general information. 
 
 Although some have insisted exclusively upon the former, 
 whilst others have attached the greatest weight to the latter 
 of these objects, it is certain that they can neither be disjoined 
 in practice, nor ought to be separated in theory, by any judicious 
 system of education. With the exception perhaps of logic and 
 pure mathematics there are none of the sciences which do not 
 at once supply materials for thought and reflection, as well as 
 improve the faculty of apprehending and comparing them ; 
 nor, on the other hand, would it be easy to pitch upon any 
 species of knowledge worthy of a place in a system of liberal 
 instruction which does not also, to a certain extent, exercise 
 and discipline the understanding. 
 
 This, however, supplies no reason why we should not keep 
 distinct in theory the two ends above mentioned, and consider 
 separately the best means by which each may be attained — 
 and first, then, beginning with that which we regard as the more 
 important of the two, let us consider what kind of education is 
 likely to operate most effectually in disciplining and developing 
 the mental organization. 
 
 The intellectual principle in man is in its early state scarcely 
 to be distinguished from the instinct of brutes, and is in some 
 respects inferior to it ; but it yet contains within itself the 
 capacity of reasoning, of imagination, of taste, of tracing 
 resemblances, and thus of classifying the objects presented 
 before it — the germs, in short, of all the powers and endowments 
 which we find afterwards unfolded. In whatever degree these 
 gifts may in each instance be apportioned, it is hardly possible 
 to conceive a rational being totally destitute of any one of them ; 
 incapable, that is, either of deducing inferences from the facts 
 before him, of combining the images presented to his mind by 
 the senses into new forms, of being pleasurably affected by 
 certain arrangements of ideas more than by others, or of placing 
 together individual facts in some sort of order or method. 
 
 Now, it is the primary object of education to impart to each 
 of these faculties its proper development, and no system which 
 overlooks any one of them can be regarded as complete. Any 
 method which should mature the judgment without calling into 
 play the inventive faculty, or which cultivated the taste, to the 
 
92 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 neglect of the powers of classifying, combining, or reasoning 
 upon the objects brought before the mind, must be condemned 
 as defective. 
 
 Now it will be my endeavour to show that the study of 
 chemistry is conducive to more than one of the great ends above 
 pointed out as the general aim of Education. 
 
 It has been objected to, indeed, that its principles are as yet 
 not sufficiently defined, or susceptible of that degree of mathe- 
 matical precision which befits them for the purpose of training 
 the powers of reasoning. 
 
 Nor would I by any means desire that by those who have the 
 leisure and ability to pursue to any extent the study of mathe- 
 matics, chemistry should be admitted as a substitute. 
 
 Whilst, however, there are many in every class of society, 
 even, indeed, in the highest, upon whose minds abstract pro- 
 positions scarcely take any hold ; there are probably none who 
 would not reap advantage from having their attention directed 
 to a class of subjects upon which the premises are presented to 
 them in a more palpable form, and the conclusions to be de- 
 duced are of that contingent character which bear a nearer 
 analogy to those relating to the ordinary events of man's life. 
 
 But the cultivation of the reasoning powers constitutes 
 only a part, and even the smallest part, of the services rendered 
 by chemistry in the cultivation of the intellect. No one of the 
 physical sciences, perhaps, is equally well calculated to promote 
 habits of close observation ; a rigorous attention to all the 
 peculiarities of each phenomenon ; that aptitude in forming 
 new combinations out of the impressions received from without, 
 which constitutes imagination and gives birth to invention ; 
 and that power of detecting similitudes and differences which 
 enables the mind to arrange and classify in some sort of order 
 the diversified objects presented to it. 
 
 Nor is this so common an endowment as might be at first 
 supposed. " One man," says Mr. Mill, " from inattention, or 
 attending only in the wrong place, overlooks half of what he 
 sees ; another sets down much more than he sees, confounding 
 it with what he imagines, or with what he infers ; another 
 takes note of the kind of all the circumstances, but being 
 inexpert in estimating their degree, leaves the quantity of each 
 vague and uncertain ; another sees, indeed, the whole, but 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 93 
 
 makes such an awkward division of it into parts, throwing things 
 into one mass which requires to be separated, and separating 
 others which might more conveniently be considered as one, 
 that the result is much the same, sometimes even worse, than 
 if no analysis had been attempted at all. 
 
 " To point out what qualities of mind or modes of mental 
 culture fit a man for being a good observer is a question which 
 belongs to the theory of education. There are rules of self- 
 culture which render us capable of observing, as there are arts for 
 strengthening the limbs.'''' * 
 
 In ascribing to the study of this science all these several 
 advantages, I am not, of course, considering it as if it were to be 
 prosecuted exclusively from books, or consisted in the mere 
 committal to memory of a certain number of facts and principles. 
 The student who embarks with any degree of zeal or ardour in 
 this branch of philosophy is almost irresistibly led on from 
 theory to experiment, and becomes impelled by mere curiosity, 
 if not by some higher motive, to observe with his own eyes, and 
 to verify by his own senses, those properties of matter which 
 verbal description can, after all, only faintly and imperfectly 
 delineate. 
 
 Once entered upon this line of pursuit, he engages in it with 
 something of the same zest which the sportsman entertains in 
 tracking his game — he soon begins to experience a personal 
 pride in the success of his trials, and feels himself humbled in 
 his own estimation, if they should chance to disappoint his 
 anticipations. 
 
 There is also always enough of uncertainty with respect to the 
 success of an experiment, especially in unpractised hands, to 
 keep awake his attention, and to bring the subject, as respects 
 himself, under the category of contingent events. 
 
 Every chemist, indeed, soon becomes aware on how many 
 minute and apparently unimportant points the success of any 
 of his processes depends, and how much incidental knowledge 
 of other bodies, besides those upon which he is operating, 
 becomes requisite, in order to guard against defeat. 
 
 The student, also, after following for some time in the foot- 
 steps of others, and satisfying himself by ocular proof of the 
 * Mill's Logic, vol. i, p. 438. 
 
94 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 facts which first attracted his curiosity, is led on to question 
 Nature himself for further information, and to engage in inde- 
 pendent lines of research, which will, to a certain extent at least, 
 partake of the character of originality. 
 
 And here the inventive faculty is at once disciplined and 
 excited ; for whilst his imagination is checked in its random 
 flights by the penalty of failure imposed upon unsound and 
 visionary speculation, his power of combining into new arrange- 
 ments the ideas presented to his mind is promoted, by the 
 necessity of contriving new processes, and of meditating upon 
 what is likely to occur under another set of conditions. 
 
 Illustrations of this will occur during every attempt at analysis, 
 during the examination of every new substance submitted to 
 the chemist. 
 
 In each case the solution of the problem can only be arrived 
 at by a number of tentative efforts, each of which requires, on 
 the part of the operator, the exercise of invention, of memory, 
 and of judgment. 
 
 Simple as the principle elicited may appear to be, when the 
 key to its solution has been found, often, indeed, the more 
 simple in proportion to the elevated rank it holds amongst 
 the truths of the science, the discoverer alone knows through 
 how many devious paths of error the clue to its attainment had 
 to be followed, and how much his own intellectual vigour was, 
 in the meantime, promoted by the pursuit. 
 
 Let me remind you, for instance, of that important yet simple 
 law which established the connexion between electrical attrac- 
 tion and chemical affinity, the investigation of which led the 
 illustrious individual who first gave celebrity to this institution 
 to some of the greatest discoveries of modern chemistry. 
 
 We are at present so familiarized with the fact that water 
 is resolved by voltaic electricity into oxygen and hydrogen 
 gases alone, as to be scarcely able to estimate the difficulties 
 that beset the earlier experimentalists, or to account for the 
 number of conflicting hypotheses suggested for a phenomenon 
 now considered as so simple. 
 
 Nevertheless, when Davy first turned his attention to the 
 subject, the constant association of acid with the oxygen, and 
 of alkali, and even lime, with the hydrogen of the water decom- 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 95 
 
 posed, complicated the phenomenon in such a manner that it 
 was difficult to arrive at any satisfactory explanation of it. 
 
 It required, perhaps, no particular sagacity to conjecture 
 that these foreign ingredients might be derived from the vessels, 
 or other bodies, in contact with the electrolyzed water, but the 
 difficulty consisted in demonstrating that such was the case. 
 Davy was soon led by this suspicion to discontinue the use of 
 vegetable or animal substances for connecting the poles, finding 
 that all such materials yielded, by their decomposition, muriatic 
 acid ; and, for the same reason, he also abandoned glass vessels, 
 as yielding soda. 
 
 ■ By substituting, therefore, agate for glass, and fibres of pure 
 amianthus for cotton, he had reason to flatter himself that every 
 source of fallacy had been removed ; but to his surprise, 
 muriatic acid still made its appearance at the positive pole, and 
 soda at the negative. 
 
 Here a fanciful or an indolent operator might have been 
 tempted to stop ; for at that period it was regarded by no means 
 so self-evident as it may appear to us at present that such bodies 
 as alkalies and acids might not be generated by an agent of 
 which so little was known, and from whose mysterious operation 
 everything might be expected. 
 
 Davy, however, was not to be diverted from his inquiries by 
 any such visionary speculations. By ascertaining that the 
 quantity of saline matter diminished when the experiments 
 were again and again repeated, he felt justified in concluding 
 that the agate must have yielded it. Still, however, a constant, 
 although a smaller quantity of alkali was generated in each 
 experiment ; and to determine its source, cups of pure gold 
 were substituted for those of agate. Yet, even then, the same 
 alkali was obtained, and as the only other conceivable source 
 was the water, this, though it had been already carefully dis- 
 tilled, was submitted to analysis, and found to contain in the 
 quart seven-tenths of a grain of saline matter. 
 
 Davy now fancied that he should cut off every remaining 
 source of error by re-distilling the water in silver vessels, with 
 the most scrupulous care. The water was thus obtained in a 
 state of absolute purity, but still the alkali, although diminished 
 in quantity, did not altogether disappear when the water was 
 electrolyzed. Upon a more critical examination, however, 
 
96 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 it turned out that the alkali thus generated was no longer soda, 
 but ammonia. 
 
 It thus appeared that even when every apparent means of 
 impurity had been removed, alkaline matter was evolved during 
 the electrolyzation of water ; and the same conclusion seemed 
 deducible with respect to the other extraneous product, which, 
 however, now that all vegetable matter had been excluded, 
 Avas found to consist, not as before of muriatic, but of nitric 
 acid. 
 
 If then occurred to Davy's sagacious mind that both these 
 products might have arisen from the affinity of the nitrogen 
 of the surrounding air, for the oxygen of the water on the one 
 hand, and for its hydrogen on the other. 
 
 He therefore next performed the experiment under an 
 exhausted receiver, employing for the purpose of electrolyzation 
 water deprived of air by careful boiling. His method succeeded 
 at least in cutting off the supply of ammonia, and thus satisfied 
 him that he had hit upon the real cause of its previous 
 occurrence. 
 
 But a difficulty still remained to be got over ; for even under 
 these circumstances nitric acid continued to be present, although 
 in much smaller quantities than before. 
 
 The crowning experiment therefore had still to be achieved ; 
 the receiver under which the voltaic action was to take place, 
 after being exhausted, was carefully filled with hydrogen, and 
 then a second time exhausted, so as to secure the entire exclusion 
 of atmospheric air. 
 
 When this final step was taken, the operator had at length 
 the satisfaction of finding that all sources of fallacy were 
 removed, neither acid nor alkali being generated, even when 
 the voltaic process had been continued during twenty-four 
 hours ; thus justifying him in laying down, as now beyond the 
 reach of doubt, that nothing but hydrogen and oxygen is 
 produced by the decomposition of pure water. 
 
 
 I have been the more disposed to dwell upon this particular 
 train of research because it seems to me to place the philo- 
 sophical character of Sir Humphry Davy under rather a 
 different aspect than that in which superficial observers are 
 wont to regard it : exhibiting him, not as the individual who 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 97 
 
 by the sudden inspiration of his genius lighted at once upon 
 those brilliant discoveries which changed the face of the science ; 
 but as one who, by a long and laborious train of research, 
 succeeded in realizing the vision which his sagacious intellect 
 had, in the first instance, dimly conceived. 
 
 If we regard, as the two most important services rendered by 
 this great philosopher to his favourite science, the discovery of 
 the alkaline and earthy Bases, and the correction of our views 
 with respect to the nature of Chlorine — the former as being his 
 greatest contribution to the facts of chemistry, the latter to its 
 logic — we shall find that in both instances the results were 
 arrived at by much patient inquiry, many minute and appa- 
 rently trivial manipulations, and a tenacity of purpose not to 
 be turned aside by the difficulties which everywhere beset his 
 path. 
 
 And it is well for the student thus to obtain a timely warning 
 that such is the general case with genius, not merely when 
 occupied in the walks of science, but also in every other branch 
 of mental exertion — exemplified equally in a Davy and a 
 Liebig, as in a Fox and a Sheridan ; for that by the same law 
 which is found to prevail over the physical organization of 
 man's nature, although we may digest, assimilate, and combine, 
 with different degrees of facility, the materials placed within 
 our reach, we cannot, in a strict sense, create them ; and, 
 accordingly, that no intellect, however vigorous — no imagina- 
 tion, however prolific — can operate to any good purpose, unless 
 it has drawn largely from the intellectual stores of others, as 
 well as from those accumulated by its own experience and 
 observation. 
 
 It is thus that the majestic Aloe, which pushes forth innu- 
 merable blossoms in a single day, has had the materials which 
 enabled it to achieve so astonishing an effort stored up within 
 its cells by a long-continued process of assimilation, in readiness 
 on the first favourable opportunity to become rapidly developed 
 into an exuberance of flowers and of fruit. 
 
 The establishment of the doctrine of atoms affords another 
 striking instance of a number of minute, trivial, and apparently 
 only technical investigations concurring to build up a theory 
 which, as Sir John Herschel has truly said, is perhaps, after the 
 
98 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 laws of mechanics, the most important which the study of 
 human nature has yet disclosed — a truth, indeed, which had 
 occupied the minds of the first philosophers of antiquity 1 , but 
 which it was reserved for the experimentalists of the present 
 age fully to substantiate. 
 
 Depending as it does on questions involving chiefly minute 
 differences in weight and volume, it might seem at first sight 
 to owe more to the skill of the balance-maker, and to the eye 
 and hand of the operator, than to the sagacity which availed 
 itself of the one, and which directed the other ; but those who 
 take this low view of the matter should be reminded that the 
 father of the atomic theory himself was by no means famous 
 for skill in manipulating, but derived most of his success from 
 his penetration in interpreting, and in combining together the 
 facts of others. 
 
 This association of minute details, with grand generalizations, 
 will serve to show that Chemistry wields a weapon, like the 
 trunk of an elephant, which can pick up a needle and uproot 
 an oak ; or may be compared to the Genie of the Eastern fable, 
 who, although rather a dangerous and unruly servant when 
 directed by rash or ignorant masters, would stoop to the 
 homeliest, and accomplish the most stupendous labours, when 
 brought under the dominion of the Lamp. 
 
 Nor, indeed, is Chemistry without its region of romance, even 
 now that it has emancipated itself from the fictions of the 
 Alchemist, and from the mysticism of the Rosicrucian philo- 
 sophy. 
 
 The Philosopher who, by the aid of his crucible and his 
 balance, can thus obtain glimpses of the ultimate constitution 
 of matter — who can pronounce with so much confidence on the 
 relative weight and volume of corpuscles too minute, not only 
 to be recognized by the senses, but even to be conceived by the 
 imagination — who can render it probable that many substances 
 which defy our powers of analysis are nevertheless compounds, 
 and have been made to reveal their elements to a subtler 
 alchemy than that of actual experiment — invests his subject, I 
 conceive, in some degree, with the same attributes of grandeur 
 and sublimity which we associate with the contemplation of 
 the great works of external nature. 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 99 
 
 Let me remind you, for instance, of the speculations which 
 are naturally suggested by considering the mutual convertibility 
 of the several imponderable agents, light, heat, electricity, 
 magnetism ; and by the relation of them all to mechanical 
 force.* 
 
 Let me bring before you those suggestions of my late friend 
 Dr. Prout, as to the probability of all elementary bodies being 
 exact multiples of hydrogen, to the realization of which idea 
 we seem to be brought nearer by every year's additional 
 experience."}* 
 
 And let me, by reference to the Table suspended in the 
 room,'!: point out to you the still further relation which can be 
 traced between the numbers representing the atomic weights of 
 several of these elements — relations which, as some of you may 
 recollect, induced M. Dumas, at the Ipswich meeting of the 
 British Association, two years ago, to place certain of them in 
 groups, each consisting of three members, and to conjecture 
 that one of each triad might be a compound of the other two. 
 
 This, however, as has been pointed out in an ingenious paper 
 by a young American chemist, § from whom I have borrowed 
 the Table just referred to, may probably be considered as an 
 imperfect and partial view of the subject ; and, it must be 
 confessed, that in the existing state of our knowledge many 
 hypotheses might be framed, all quite as plausible as that of 
 the French philosopher. || 
 
 Nevertheless, it can hardly be denied, after inspecting the 
 
 * See Mr. Grove's Pamphlet on The Correlation of Physical Forces. 
 
 t It has been suggested in the paper of the American chemist referred to just 
 below, that the deviations from this rule, which still appear to exist in certain 
 elements, may not always arise from error in experiment (although this is in 
 most cases a sufficiently plausible explanation), but may hereafter be found 
 to be a secondary result of the very cause which has determined the distribution 
 of the atomic weights according to a numerical law, just as the perturbations 
 in astronomy are a necessary consequence of the very law they seemed at first 
 to invalidate. 
 
 % ■ See Table I, p. 117, " Of the Relations between certain Elementary Bodies." 
 
 § Mr. Cooke, Professor of Chemistry at Harvard College, in Cambridge. U.S. 
 
 j) I cannot, however, admit the soundness of Mr. Cooke's suggestion that 
 the atoms of the nine series are formed of an atom of oxygen as a nucleus, with 
 the addition of one or more groups of atoms, each weighing nine, to which 
 the corresponding element has not yet been discovered ! We know that 
 cyanogen, one of the series, is not so formed, for it is a compound of N 1 C 2, 
 and as such, has been excluded from the list of bodies belonging to the nine 
 series, although its atomic weight is 8 + n = 2. 
 
100 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 above Table, that there are really some remarkable relations 
 between the atomic weights of those elements which are most 
 nearly connected with each other by the circumstances of 
 homology and of isomorphism, that is, by the similar proportions 
 in which they respectively combine with other bodies, and by 
 the similar crystallization of the resulting products. 
 
 These relations, indeed, admit of being expressed alge- 
 braically, in the case, at least, of some groups which have been 
 most thoroughty investigated, just as may be done with 
 reference to organic compounds, as may be seen by the Table 
 of the Fatty Acids,* which is placed by the side of the one 
 before referred to. 
 
 Hence there would seem in this respect to be an analogy 
 between the simple radicals of inorganic bodies and the com- 
 pound ones which are recognized as existing in Organic 
 Chemistry, each member of the latter group being formed by 
 the addition of C 2 H 2 , or a multiple of the same, to the atoms 
 composing the lowest member in the series, namely, formic 
 acid. 
 
 We may also detect in both instances a similar increase in 
 density in proportion to the increase of atomic weight. Thus, 
 in the former class of bodies, if we take the series of nines, 
 oxygen is gaseous at all known temperatures and pressures ; 
 chlorine becomes liquid under four atmospheres ; bromine 
 is a volatile liquid at common temperatures ; iodine, whose 
 atomic weight is highest, exists as an easily volatilizable 
 solid. 
 
 And in like manner, in the latter class of bodies, we find a 
 transition from formic acid and methylic alcohol, substances 
 of great volatility and low atomic weight, to the fatty acids, 
 and to ethal, which are dense solids. 
 
 These generalizations, indeed, must not be allowed to warp 
 our experimental conclusions ; but they are eminently sugges- 
 tive, and may be looked upon as examples of what may be 
 termed the poetry of science, which is not without its use 
 amongst the means of education, if only, like other poetry, it 
 serves to impart a livelier conception of the beauty and harmony 
 of creation, by affording experimental proof of that which the 
 earliest sages of antiquity regarded as intrinsically probable, 
 * See Table II, p. 118. 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 101 
 
 namely, that God had " ordered all things in measure, number, 
 and weight." 
 
 TravTa nerpw kcu apiO/uw ical crra6/ui(i) SieraPa? 
 
 The study of Chemistry seems to me also peculiarly adapted 
 to initiate the youthful mind in the office of tracing the natural 
 affinities betwixt bodies, and thus to induce methodical and 
 systematic views of that subordination of properties which is 
 the basis of all classification. 
 
 This is a service not to be rendered by the mathematical 
 sciences, which proceed upon exact definitions, and habituate 
 the mind to reject whatever does not come within the scope of 
 rigorous deduction. For the relations between natural objects 
 are based, not upon mutual identity, but upon degrees of 
 resemblance ; and the characters of each of them pass by such 
 imperceptible gradations into the next in the series that every 
 classification must, to a certain extent, be considered arbitrary, 
 inasmuch as the limits of the divisions recognized can never 
 be strictly defined. 
 
 Thus the class of metals graduates into that of the simple 
 combustibles through the intervening links of sulphur and 
 selenium; the acids into the bases through alumina; the 
 supporters of combustion into the combustibles through sulphur 
 and phosphorus ; the electrics into conductors through the 
 fibre of the nerves and muscles of animals. 
 
 The study of organic types, introduced by Dumas, and 
 extended by Laurent and Gerhardt, may also initiate the mind 
 ^n the idea which serves as a key to all the arrangements in the 
 natural sciences— an idea which will be equally serviceable in 
 grouping together the facts concerning our moral nature and 
 the ordinary transactions of life, namely, that of adopting for 
 our classification of bodies some character of primary impor-' 
 tance, whilst we neglect those minor differences which must 
 ever exist between one individual object and another. 
 
 Chemistry also appears to be calculated to afford useful 
 lessons in the art of nomenclature. 
 
 In no other of the sciences has so perfect a specimen of this 
 kind been exhibited as by Guyton Morveau, in his adaptation 
 of the names of chemical substances to the theory of Lavoisier ; 
 and although the newer views entertained with" respect to the 
 
 G 
 
102 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 nature of the combinations then recognized may have rendered 
 some part of this nomenclature inapproj^riate, yet its original 
 merits may be estimated by the fact that no modifications in 
 it have been proposed except what were forced upon us by 
 changes in theory, and that the principal attempts at nomen- 
 clature since made have been rather extensions of the rules laid 
 down in this scheme than a substitution of any new principle 
 for the one which had served for their basis.* 
 
 But it is time to hasten on to the second branch of my 
 subject — namely, the propriety of making Chemistry a part 
 of that kind of primary instruction which aims at imparting 
 a certain amount of general information to the youthful 
 mind. 
 
 The crude notions so currently entertained with respect to 
 what is called General Knowledge have created a prejudice 
 against this Department of Education, which has induced many 
 to contend that the sole aim of the latter is to train and develop 
 the powers of the understanding. 
 
 Nevertheless, although nothing can be more absurd than to 
 encumber the youthful mind with a heap of heterogeneous facts, 
 without connexion one with the other, without interest to the 
 pupil, and without any reference to his peculiar genius or future 
 destination ; yet it cannot be doubted that the period set 
 apart for education is the one best fitted for storing up in the 
 mind materials for thought, as well as those general principles 
 and laws of the moral and physical world which are likely to 
 be called into requisition in the course of his future life. 
 
 This, indeed, is acknowledged to be the case with reference 
 to what concerns man as an individual and as a member of 
 
 * I would not defend the practice of affixing to simple substances names 
 founded upon theoretical considerations, but conceive that, in the case of 
 compound ones, it was a great gain to science, when Lavoisier substituted for the 
 arbitrary designations then in use, words which at least indicated those ingre- 
 dients by the union of which the bodies in question were commonly prepared. 
 That oil of vitriol is obtained by combining sulphur with oxygen, and Glauber 
 salt by bringing together sulphuric acid and soda, are facts sufficient to justify 
 the names of sulphuric acid and of sulphate of soda assigned to these bodies ; 
 and their truth remains as before, whether we regard them with Lavoisier, 
 respectivley S 3 + H 0, and S 3 + Na ; or S 4 + H, and S 4 + Na, 
 as the Binary Theory represents them. Nor would the facts be altered, even 
 if the latter view of the constitution of salts, which is now in favour, were 
 hereafter to be superseded by some other more plausible hypothesis. 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 103 
 
 society ; on which accounts the events of history, the laws 
 and constitution of our own country, and the principles of the 
 philosophy of the human mind, hold a prominent part in every 
 system of education. 
 
 But is it not also important, whatever our pupil's destination 
 may be, that he should not leave us in entire ignorance of the 
 laws and constitution of the objects that surround him— his 
 companions from the cradle to the grave — bodies with which 
 he will be brought into contact, as agents of good or of evil, at 
 every moment of his existence ? 
 
 And if the vast extent of the field thus opened be pleaded as 
 a reason for limiting the student's range to particular branches 
 of physical inquiry, those sciences which lie at the root of all 
 our knowledge of the material world, and without some insight 
 into which our acquaintance with individual facts must be 
 merely empirical, unquestionably deserve the preference. 
 
 Now, if we classify the different departments of Natural 
 Science, as I have done in the Table suspended in the room,* it 
 will be manifest that the more fundamental ones, occupying 
 the first division in the scheme submitted, will be those which 
 comprise a knowledge of — 
 
 1. The general laws common to all matter whatsoever. 
 
 2. The special properties and relations of those bodies, 
 which are either most familiar to us, most useful, or most 
 
 * NATURAL SCIENCE INCLUDES, AS PRIMARY, OR FUNDAMENTAL BRANCHES, 
 A KNOWLEDGE OF 
 
 f Celestial. 
 The properties common to all matter — Physics . . 4 rp . -' i 
 
 The properties distinctive of Bodies in general — Chemistry n ° • 
 
 r c & J | Organic. 
 
 The properties distinctive of living Bodies in particular — f Vegetable. 
 
 Physiology ........ \ Animal. 
 
 AS SPECIAL OR SUBORDINATE BRANCHES, THE NATURAL HISTORY OF 
 
 Inorganic bodies viz j Of the Atmosphere . . . Meteorology. 
 5 ' ■ | Of the Earth and its contents . Mineralogy 
 
 Lithology. 
 Geological Dy- 
 namics. 
 Palaeontology. 
 'Of Vegetables . . . 1 Systematic Botany. 
 
 ° t rrfannrrrnnhTT 
 
 Organic bodies, viz. 
 
 1 Organography. 
 
 C* Animals. . . . ff°\ ^- 
 
 (Anatomy. 
 
104 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 generally diffused throughout nature, so far as they are not 
 influenced by vital forces. 
 
 3. The general laws which govern life, both as it exists in the 
 animal and in the vegetable kingdom. 
 
 Of these, the first named is termed mechanical philosophy, 
 or physics ; the second is included under chemistry ; the third 
 under general physiology.* 
 
 With regard to those other departments of natural science 
 which often enter, to a certain extent, into a scheme of popular 
 education, it may be remarked that in so far as they are parts, 
 not of natural history, but of philosophy, they are to be regarded 
 simply as expansions of, or as deductions from, one or other of 
 the primary ones before cited ; and therefore cannot be 
 acquired, except as mere aggregates of undigested facts, until 
 a knowledge of some one at least of the above fundamental 
 sciences has been attained. 
 
 Thus let us take the case of geology, and suppose our pupil, 
 just emancipated from school or college, to find himself at the 
 foot of a volcano, and to witness some of the more striking 
 manifestations of subterranean energy there exhibited. Sub- 
 lime and impressive as the spectacle may be, how entirely will 
 he be in the dark, not only as to the cause of the movement, 
 but even as to the nature of the phenomena which he witnesses, 
 if unaided by chemistry. What will he know of the constitu- 
 tion of the substances ejected, of the gases and vapours evolved, 
 or of the condition of the surface overspread by these volcanic 
 materials, which is sometimes so favourable, at other times so 
 unpropitious to vegetation ? 
 
 With how much more abiding an interest will he contemplate 
 the phenomena, when he views them in connexion with any 
 chemical hypothesis, which, however conjectural, as every 
 hypothesis must be which relates to processes going on so far 
 beyond the limits of human observation, professes at least to 
 account for the particular events that come before him, as well 
 as for the order of their sequence. 
 
 Or let him turn his steps to a country where extensive rocks 
 are forming, not by igneous forces, but by slow deposition 
 
 * See this explained in a pamphlet of mine, entitled, Brief Remarks on the 
 Correlation of the Natural Sciences. Oxford : Vincent, 1848. 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 105 
 
 from water, as in the Travertine of Italy, of which the most 
 celebrated temples of Rome, as well as those of Psestum, are 
 constructed. How much greater interest will he feel in them, 
 when, by the lights of chemistry, he traces the action which 
 had brought about their deposition, the relation which they 
 bear to stratified rocks of older formation, and the probable 
 source of the carbonic acid which communicated its solvent 
 power to the waters of the district. 
 
 Or suppose him to direct his attention to those branches of 
 natural history which relate to living beings, and to concern 
 himself, not merely in the external forms of animals or plants, 
 but also in their structure and functions. 
 
 Such inquiries will make him acquainted with the law of 
 Endosmose, which, as the physiologist will inform him, is seen 
 in operation during every process of secretion and excretion 
 which takes place in the animal or vegetable kingdom, but 
 which the chemist will trace to the still more widely operating 
 law of Diffusion, which is seen alike in gases and in liquids, in 
 organic and in inorganic bodies, as the late researches of Liebig 
 and of Graham have explained to us. 
 
 Or if the occurrence of one of those epidemics, which have of 
 late years been so frequent, should call his attention to the 
 laws of contagion, even here the most philosophical explanation 
 of the spread of the disease may be afforded him by the sugges- 
 tions of a chemist, who has traced a very close analogy between 
 the propagation of miasmata in the animal organism, and the 
 transmission of the fermentative process in fluids susceptible 
 of change from one to the other ; referring both to a law 
 common alike to living and to dead matter, which renders any 
 motion set up in one compound liable to extend itself to others, 
 whose particles are in a similar condition of unstable equilibrium. 
 
 It will be seen that I have drawn my examples from subjects 
 which at first sight appear to be as far removed as possible 
 from the jurisdiction of Chemistry, for it seemed to me needless 
 to remind the audience I am addressing that a Science which 
 embraces under its consideration all those properties which are 
 not either common to all bodies whatsoever, or, on the other 
 hand, attributable to the agency of the vital principle, must be 
 indispensable to the due understanding — of the processes of the 
 
106 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 manufactures — of the operations of agriculture — of all the 
 changes, in short, in the material world which take place 
 through the instrumentality either of art or of nature. 
 
 I need not, therefore, detain you with discussing a truth so 
 self-evident ; but will proceed to consider how far the study 
 of this science can, without unduly displacing others, be made 
 to constitute a part of the education of the different classes of 
 society. 
 
 And first, with respect to that of the lower orders — upon 
 which, however, I should hardly venture to pronounce, if I 
 were not backed by the authority of others, who have made 
 this subject their particular study, and especially the Dean of 
 Hereford, whose diligence and success in organizing schemes of 
 secular education for the people are now fully appreciated. 
 There are many subjects upon which a knowledge of a few 
 elementary facts in Chemistry will not only supply food for 
 the mind, but also convey useful practical hints to the labouring 
 population of our towns and villages. 
 
 I may mention, amongst the rest, economy with regard to 
 the selection of food, and its preparation for human subsistence 
 by the modes of cooking in common use — provisions for the 
 better ventilation of cottages, and for their sanitary condition 
 generally — instruction with respect to handicraft work and 
 various mechanical occupations — information with respect to 
 the different qualities of water, and its relative fitness for 
 washing and drinking purposes. 
 
 The Dean has pointed out with how very simple and inexpen- 
 sive an apparatus the village schoolmaster may demonstrate 
 some of the leading truths which illustrate these several heads 
 of information, and thus impress them more vividly upon the 
 minds of his pupils than could be done by mere oral instruction. 
 
 If from the lowest class of society we pass on to those higher 
 in the scale, who are designed for various trades and manufac- 
 tures, for the pursuits of agriculture, or for the inferior grades in 
 the professions of law and medicine ; we shall see reasons for 
 recommending to them the study of chemistry, both as a 
 discipline for the mind, and also as the basis of much useful and 
 practical knowledge. 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 107 
 
 In their case, the necessity of commencing at an early age the 
 active business of life precludes the possibility of entering deeply 
 into the mathematics, and therefore renders it more important 
 that the gap should be supplied by the study of a science which 
 may, to a certain extent, supply its place, by training and 
 developing the mental faculties. 
 
 The pupil, if agriculture is to be his future calling, will learn 
 from chemistry how to economize his manures ; how to bring 
 the land in a condition to impart its latent resources to the 
 crop ; how to supply what is necessary for the growth of the 
 plant he cultivates. 
 
 Without superseding the necessity of experience, or of that 
 vigilant survey of his farming operations, which of all requisites 
 is the one most essential to success, science will be valuable both 
 in suggesting new modes of culture, and in enlightening him as 
 to the causes of failure, when the ordinary system of operations 
 has chanced to disappoint his expectations. 
 
 We have heard, indeed, of cases where, after the scientific 
 man has corrected the practical, the result has proved the latter 
 to have been in the right ; but in those instances it has generally 
 turned out upon inquiry that the error was to be attributed to 
 the imperfection of our knowledge, and that the correction must 
 be applied by a more complete scientific investigation of the 
 subject. 
 
 Thus, the chemist has often reprobated the practice adopted 
 in some of the western counties of adding quicklime to manure- 
 heaps, as tending to dissipate the ammonia disengaged before 
 it could influence the crop. Lately, however, we have been 
 reminded that nitric acid, as well as ammonia, is produced 
 during the process of animal putrefaction, and that the former, 
 instead of being dissipated, would be only more effectually 
 fixed by the application of an alkaline earth to the substances 
 containing it. 
 
 The practice, therefore, is not so improper as it had appeared 
 from theory to be ; but the practical man should nevertheless 
 be reminded that the' aid of chemistry is required to enlighten 
 him under what conditions the first or the second of these 
 products is elicited,* so that he may learn when lime may be 
 added with advantage, and when with loss. 
 
 * See Kuhlman's Papers on the production of Nitre. 
 
108 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 Probably indeed, in the west-country practice alluded to, the 
 addition of an absorbing substance to the manure-heap may 
 serve to counteract the bad effects of the quicklime, even where 
 ammonia is the principal product ; but the farmer, who should 
 imitate this practice without understanding the conditions 
 upon which its success depends, would be very likely to 
 omit these accessories, and thus to bring about an opposite 
 result. 
 
 With regard to the applications of Chemistry to the useful 
 arts, the instances of it are so numerous and so familiar to all 
 that it seems needless to insist upon the advantages of its study 
 to all who are destined for such employments ; and it is equally 
 clear that, for those who intend to make the healing art, in 
 any of its branches, their future profession, a more than super- 
 ficial knowledge of it is all but indispensable. 
 
 I proceed, then, to consider how far Chemistry deserves a 
 place in that more complete system of education which is 
 designed for the learned professions, as well as for the higher 
 Orders of Society in general. My recommending it as a fit 
 study for the middling and the lower classes would alone 
 render it imperative upon me to impose it upon the upper — for 
 under the circumstances of the present age, and in this country 
 more especially, the maintenance of a superior position, and of 
 superior moral influence, involves the necessity of superior 
 mental culture. 
 
 The idea of imparting a special direction to the primary 
 education of youth, in accordance with their respective rank or 
 future destination, is not only in itself unphilosophical, but also 
 in manifest contradiction * to the principle which has always 
 guided us in our schools and colleges — namely, that of exacting 
 from all for whom a liberal education is designed the same 
 basis of classical and mathematical learning. And the adoption 
 of an opposite principle, by the exclusion from the curriculum 
 of any study which is admitted as an integral part of the 
 training given to the people at large, must tend to the isolation 
 of the class to which it is applied, and consequently weaken its 
 connexion with those below it. 
 
 * See Davison's Remarks on this subject, and Father Newman's Discourses 
 on University Education, p. 241 et seq. 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 109 
 
 In a Protestant community, for example, the legitimate 
 influence of the priest over the laiety can only be duly main- 
 tained by the ascendancy of his character, and by the extent 
 of his information with respect to subjects on which the people 
 with whom he mixes are able to estimate his superiority. 
 
 By enlightening them on common matters, in which a little 
 knowledge of Chemistry will afford them such material assis- 
 tance, and thereby becoming the instrument of enabling them 
 to better their own condition, and to economize their means of 
 living, he paves his way to their confidence on subjects more 
 strictly appertaining to his sacred profession. 
 ■ There seems to me also to be a peculiar propriety in thus 
 intercalating a somewhat fluctuating, though advancing science, 
 like Chemistry, in a course of education, the principal elements 
 of which, such as the mathematics or the literature of past ages, 
 are little susceptible of change. 
 
 A study of this description familiarizes the pupil with the 
 idea of progress ; it exercises a distinct set of faculties, just as 
 a new gymnastic exercise calls into play a new set of muscles ; 
 and it guards against that stagnation which is apt to supervene, 
 when the mind is chiefly made the passive recipient of truths 
 which rest upon authority. 
 
 To those, indeed, who regard a knowledge of what other men 
 have said and done, the sole aim of education, the example of 
 the Chinese may serve as an instructive warning. 
 
 We here see a nation which has retrograded in the scale of 
 civilization, in consequence of having reposed entirely upon the 
 wisdom of its ancestors ; of following implicitly those principles 
 in the arts which had been handed down to it from an early 
 period ; and of occupying its learned leisure chiefly in pondering 
 over the intricacies of a language which it would seem to require 
 the labour of a life fully to master. 
 
 It must indeed be confessed, in justice to this people, that 
 they had a better excuse for their tenacity in adhering to their 
 ancient paths than other nations would be able to plead. Long 
 before Europe had emerged from barbarism, China was in 
 possession of the art of printing, of gunpowder, and of the 
 nariner's compass — her population was clad in silks, a royal 
 uxury even in the days of Queen Elizabeth — had perfected the 
 
110 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 manufacture of porcelain — and had brought agriculture and 
 many of the industrial arts to a high pitch of perfection. Her 
 vast empire enjoyed a patriarchal government ; an aristocracy 
 founded only upon the enlightened principle of intellectual 
 superiority, tested by public competition ; a complete system 
 of internal communication by roads and canals ; and a code of 
 laws which, viewed even by the lights of the present day, is 
 considered by good judges to savour throughout of practical 
 sagacity and European good sense. 
 
 Is it to be wondered at that surrounded as she was with 
 hordes of mere savages, and receiving no favourable report, if 
 any, of nations more distant, China should have overestimated 
 both her material and her intellectual superiority, and should 
 have imagined that in her palmy condition change was the only 
 danger against which she had to guard ? 
 
 And yet, after ten centuries of stagnation, what is the 
 spectacle this nation presents to us ? a population at once 
 effeminate and degraded, inferior to ourselves even in those 
 industrial arts, on which they chiefly plume themselves, and 
 incapable of adopting to any extent the inventions of other 
 nations — a monied class sordid and sensual — and a body of 
 Literati indifferent to all abstract science, and curious only on 
 points of information which promise some palpable and 
 immediate end of utility. 
 
 It is of course foreign from my intention to compare the 
 philosophy of Confucius with that of Aristotle, or the literary 
 productions of a Mongolian nation with those which emanated 
 from the highest type of intellect which the human race probably 
 has ever developed ; but the evil consequences I have pointed 
 out seem to me to have arisen, not so much from the inferior 
 character of the models held out for them to copy, as from their 
 servile adherence to them. 
 
 " Truth," says Milton, " is compared in Scripture to a 
 streaming fountain ; if her waters flow not in a perpetual pro- 
 gression, they sicken into a muddy pool of conformity and 
 tradition ; " and all experience will serve to show that wherever 
 due provision has not been made for advancement the seeds oi 
 decay are sure to find admittance. 
 
 Hence, if on the one hand it be useful to impress upon the 
 mind a reverence for the great lights that have illumined the 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 111 
 
 walks of learning in former periods of the world ; it is not less 
 desirable on the other that some of the studies pursued in early 
 youth should have a tendency to encourage an independent 
 search after Truth, and to induce the habit of interrogating 
 nature as well as of leaning upon the traditions of men. 
 
 With these sentiments it may be supposed that I am not 
 prepared to defend the system pursued in my own university 
 till within the last two years, which consisted in merely securing 
 the delivery of lectures on Chemistry for the sake of those who 
 might desire, of their own accord, to improve themselves in 
 that science, without holding out any encouragement to its 
 prosecution, or treating the subject as though it were considered 
 in any sense an integral part of our scheme of education. 
 
 In these respects, however, Chemistry was at least in no 
 worse position than other branches of physical science, or even 
 than the history and philosophy of modern times, no one of 
 which studies was insisted upon, or even promoted amongst us 
 by academical distinctions or emoluments. 
 
 The defenders of this exclusive system might, indeed, appeal 
 to the long train of distinguished men whom the university had 
 sent forth, as a practical proof of its efficacy in refining and 
 expanding the mental powers ; and I am far from disputing 
 the position that, supposing the attention of youth required to 
 be limited to one description of literature, the great writers of 
 antiquity deserve in many respects a preference over those of 
 later times. There is a simple grandeur, an absence of all 
 affectation and straining after effect, a native vigour and fresh- 
 ness about the early Greek writers in particular, which seem 
 better calculated to win the sympathies of youth, and to induce 
 habits of just thinking and correct taste, than the more elaborate 
 and recondite productions of men of modern days. 
 
 The faults, as well as the beauties of these authors, are those 
 of precocious youth ; and if we were to suppose a Being of a 
 superior order to man to appear upon our globe, although his 
 matured intellect might strike out deeper truths, and teem with 
 loftier imaginations, his earlier thoughts might be imagined to 
 find their most appropriate expression in the language of Homer 
 or of Herodotus. 
 Nevertheless, the advocates of a purely classical education 
 
112 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 appear to have overlooked certain considerations which are not 
 without weight in arriving at a right conclusion on such a 
 subject. 
 
 In the first place, as I have already remarked, it is desirable 
 to train and develop the faculty of minutely observing, of 
 clearly apprehending, and of correctly classifying the objects 
 that present themselves ; talents which can be best fostered at 
 an early period of life, and can in no way be more fully unfolded 
 than by a course of chemical study. 
 
 Secondly, the many urgent motives, of one kind or another, 
 which force the student to plunge into active life immediately 
 upon escaping from the trammels of the school or university, 
 will often prevent his possessing any sound knowledge of 
 physical science, if it be not made a part of his early educa- 
 tion. 
 
 Lastly, a very large proportion of mankind want the ability 
 to obtain that proficiency in any of the branches of learning 
 cultivated at our universities which is requisite to enable them 
 to reap from their study the advantages anticipated. 
 
 In an Institution intended to educate the youths of the 
 country generally, however high the qualification for distinction 
 may be raised, a low standard of attainments can alone be 
 insisted upon ; and yet it is notorious that a large proportion 
 of the youths who resort to a university, although they are 
 capable of reaching the prescribed point with little mental 
 exertion, never aspire to go beyond it. - 
 
 Nor is this indifference on their part to be ascribed, primarily 
 at least, to indolence of disposition, or to deficiency in ordinary 
 intelligence ; for these very persons in after life will often 
 evince much power of application, and soundness of judgment, 
 in the capacity of magistrates, of parochial clergymen, or even 
 of members of the legislature. Their previous intellectual 
 torpor, so far as all academical studies were concerned, arose, 
 I am convinced, in a great degree, from their incapacity to 
 grapple with the deeper philosophy of the ancient world, 
 or to imbibe any keen relish for its orators, its poets, or its 
 historians. 
 
 If to this inaptitude for literary pursuits be conjoined an 
 equal disinclination for abstract studies or for the higher 
 branches of the mathematics, one can readily understand that 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 113 
 
 such youths should make but little progress beyond the point 
 to which they had already advanced at school, and that the 
 time spent at the university should have been chiefly wasted in 
 field sports, or even more frivolous occupations. 
 
 Now it is for men of this character of mind that the study of 
 the experimental sciences is particularly valuable, because the 
 very practical tendency of their minds, which, to a certain 
 extent, prevents them from profiting so largely from the 
 favourite studies of a university, is the very quality most likely 
 to befit them for the observation of external nature, and is, 
 moreover, most commonly accompanied with that tact and 
 .sagacity which are most serviceable in its interpretation. 
 
 Thus the recognition of Chemistry in a university like the one 
 to which I belong is little likely to detract unduly from the 
 attention paid to the classical studies of the place ; whilst its 
 pursuit is only so much clear gain to the general stock of 
 knowledge, as it would be chiefly confined either to youths who 
 are not likely to apply themselves with any vigour and success 
 to literary subjects ; to those" who have a peculiar genius and 
 aptitude for physical investigations ; or, lastly, to the few who 
 have energy and capacity enough to embrace both literature 
 and science within the circle of their studies. 
 
 It was not, therefore, without good reason that the University 
 of Oxford, in the year 1849, determined that henceforward the 
 physical sciences should be made the subjects of examination, 
 and be held out to its students as reckoning amongst the 
 qualifications, not only for a simple degree, but also for certain 
 academical distinctions. 
 
 But something more than this will be required, if we would 
 secure to these branches of study their proper place in such a 
 body as our own. In order to afford effectual encouragement 
 to any department of learning, substantial rewards are necessary, 
 and fortunately the liberality of our Founders and benefactors 
 has supplied us with means ample enough, if judiciously applied, 
 to spread their fertilizing influence over every field of intel- 
 lectual culture, instead of being limited, as at present, to a 
 few. 
 
 At any rate, as I have observed in another place,* no one can 
 
 * See a Pamphlet entitled. Can Physical Science find a Home in an English 
 University? Oxford : Vincent, 1854. 
 
114 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 have a right to pronounce the atmosphere of Oxford uncon- 
 genial to the investigation of physical truth, until it has been 
 ascertained what would be the result, supposing a certain 
 proportion of our Fellowships were awarded as prizes for 
 scientific acquirements ; and supposing, as would be the natural 
 consequence, that the student who distinguished himself in this 
 line were placed, in the estimation of his contemporaries, on the 
 same level as if he had bestowed a similar amount of mental 
 exertion upon pursuits of a literary character. 
 
 If this rule were adopted, there seems to me no reason why 
 Oxford should not rank as high in physical science as she has 
 long done in other departments of human knowledge ; for I, 
 for one, cannot understand why the contemplation and study 
 of nature should not be carried on at least as well within the 
 retirement of a university as amidst the noise and bustle of a 
 crowded metropolis. 
 
 It would rather seem that for the prosecution of experiments 
 requiring often considerable abstraction of mind, as well as 
 long-continued exertion ; and promising no immediate result, 
 beyond the pleasure of arriving at a new truth, the pecuniary 
 resources of our collegiate establishments, and the exemption 
 they afford from the cares and distractions of ordinary life, 
 supply the most ample facilities ; and that whilst the prospect 
 of attaining a Fellowship might attract students into this path 
 of research, the possession of one would afterwards enable them 
 to dedicate their lives to its prosecution. 
 
 And this application of our academical funds is, I contend, 
 entirely in harmony with an enlightened view of the objects for 
 which they were designed ; for although the older universities 
 of the realm were, doubtless, primarily intended, as those of 
 later creation are, for the purposes of education, they, from the 
 very first, aimed at something beyond it. 
 
 The entire tendency of the collegiate system — the foundation 
 of fellowships— their tenure extending far beyond the period to 
 which the education of their holders could be supposed to be 
 prolonged, and in most cases, indeed, without any limitation 
 as to the period of their retention — are circumstances all of 
 which imply that the views of our Founders contemplated the 
 creation of a permanent body of men devoted to the prosecution 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 115 
 
 of literary and scientific objects, under the presiding influence 
 of religion.* There is, indeed, no other possible explanation of 
 their motives, unless we were to adopt the monastic view of 
 these Institutions, which the perverse ingenuity of a few persons 
 of late years has ventured to uphold ; but which was disavowed 
 by their own Members at the time of the Reformation, as a plea 
 of exemption from the common fate which then awaited the 
 Religious Houses ; and which seems to have been repudiated 
 by the earliest and most catholic-minded of our Founders, in 
 
 * Although the Bill now before Parliament for furthering the good government 
 of the University and of the Colleges has in general my hearty concurrence, 
 there are, nevertheless, two provisions in it which I cannot but consider as 
 detrimental to the interests of Oxford, whether regarded in the light of a 
 focus of literature, or as a nursery of education. 
 
 I allude to the clause fixing a limit to the tenure of Fellowships, and to that 
 rendering residence, except in a few particular cases, compulsory upon those who 
 enjoy them. 
 
 The former of these appears to be calculated to check the growth of a class of 
 men, at present perhaps not very numerous, but which it is highly important 
 to foster — those I mean who devote themselves to literary and scientific occupa- 
 tions without any ulterior object in life : nor can it fail to damp the exertions 
 even of others who come to us for education, since it will deprive the academical 
 emoluments, which are held out to them as the rewards of success, of a con- 
 siderable portion of their value. 
 
 It ought not to be overlooked that a Fellowship is coveted less on account 
 of its pecuniary amount than for the security it affords that its possessor may 
 hold it for any length of time, if his necessities or ill success in life should 
 render it of importance for him to retain it. 
 
 It thus serves as a guarantee to the disinterested and unambitious student 
 that he will be free to prosecute his favourite pursuits so long as he pleases, in 
 comparative indifference as to their bearing upon the practical concerns of 
 life, or on his own future advancement in it. And with respect to the abuses 
 complained of at present in the tenure of Fellowships, I have sufficient faith 
 in the working of the Bill to conceive that when Colleges have the power of 
 selecting candidates from the whole University, the cases will be few where a 
 FeUow shall linger on, as a burden to his Society, beyond the period which the 
 interests of learning would justify ; and if this were to happen now and then, 
 the evil would be small compared to that of spreading abroad the feeling that 
 inasmuch as the provision made for study is henceforward to cease at the period 
 of life when it may be most wanted, the application of any portion of the means 
 supplied to obtain other than personal objects would be an act of imprudence. 
 
 On the other hand, the clause compelling residence strikes me as either un- 
 necessary or injurious ; unnecessary when the Fellowships are properly be- 
 stowed, and of an injurious tendency when they are not. 
 
 Supposing, for instance, the successful candidate to possess literary tastes 
 and attainments, why seek to compel him to do that to which his own inclina- 
 tions would naturally prompt him and from which he would only be drawn 
 aside when, as in the case of a lawyer or physician, his studies could be more 
 advantageously prosecuted elsewhere ? 
 
 On the other hand, supposing the Fellowship to be filled up without due 
 reference to the claims of merit, the enforcement of residence would have the 
 
116 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 the distinct prohibition which their statutes contain against 
 any member of a conventual establishment holding a position 
 within our colleges. 
 
 I should apologize, Gentlemen, for detaining you so long on 
 these topics if I did not feel that the English universities not 
 only are, but will be recognized by you all as national establish- 
 ments — national, not only because there is perhaps no one in 
 an assembly like the present whose nearest relatives may not 
 at some time or other be assisted in their education by the 
 scholarships, or rewarded for their exertions by the Fellowships, 
 of which we have the disposal ; but also because the existence 
 of a high standard of education anywhere within our common 
 country is a national benefit even to those who do not directly 
 partake of it. 
 
 It would seem a happy circumstance that in a country of 
 great proprietors like our own, some portion of the land should 
 have been removed from the grasp of individuals, by being held, 
 as it were, in mortmain for the benefit of the community at 
 
 effect of fixing at the University men of uncongenial habits, whose presence 
 must be equally detrimental to themselves and to others. 
 
 It would indeed be a singular act of inconsistency in the members of the 
 Legislature if, when they felt themselves authorized by considerations of public 
 utility to overrule the injunctions of Founders with respect to matters in which 
 the most earnest reformers within our walls have felt themselves precluded, from 
 conscientious motives, from proposing changes ; they should at the same time 
 compel us to return to our statutes on a point wherein the altered condition of 
 Society reconciles the most scrupulous of our members to that departure from 
 their strict letter which has long taken place. 
 
 The enforcement of residence upon Fellows, beyond the amount necessary 
 for the purposes of instruction, and of carrying on the concerns of the College, 
 could only have reference, in the minds of Founders, either to the advancement 
 of learning or to the observance of monastic discipline. 
 
 So far as the former was their object, it would at present be sufficiently 
 consulted by the many inducements to residence which the University holds 
 out to the real student ; if the latter made any part of their intentions, Parlia- 
 ment, in the nineteenth century, can hardly desire to go out of its way to further 
 them, by inculcating, or rendering more inveterate, those conventual habits 
 and feelings which cause religious observances to be regarded, not as the proper 
 preparation for the duties of life, but as its sole business ; this latter being the 
 only assignable ground for enforcing residence in Colleges on persons not fitted 
 or disposed to avail themselves to any extent of the means and appliances for 
 literary occupation which Oxford so abundantly affords. 
 
 P.S. June 10th. The above clauses are, I am happy to see, excluded from the 
 Bill " as amended in Committee and on recommitment," but provisions of a 
 similar tendency seem still to be left within the powers with which the Com- 
 missioners are to be invested. 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 
 
 117 
 
 ° 2 
 
 O CO 00 00 
 
 9 © 
 
 © CO 
 
 »c ifl i o 
 
 O Tfl »0 CO -# O CD 
 
 
 s s s s 
 
 a a a 
 
 CO 
 
 H 
 
 O 
 O 
 pq 
 
 « 
 Eh 
 
 <3 
 
 H 
 tf 
 
 O 
 
 o 
 
 I— I 
 H 
 
 w 
 
 H 
 O 
 
 PQ 
 <H 
 
 H 
 
 .6? 
 
 J^-jS O0 00 <N 
 
 "o WWWM 
 
 a 
 
 a s a 
 
 S .5 •" 03 
 
 ^§ a .a 
 oopqw 
 
 oo 
 
 WWW 
 
 3 0.3 
 
 as " 
 
 i-^h 03 i — l 
 
 F <5 '03 
 "OJEH 
 
 CO 
 
 -O -Q ,£! 
 
 PhPhPh 
 
 a a a a a 
 
 ■^ W lO O! ffl 
 
 HWfNO 
 
 CO CO 00 CO 00 
 
 ooooc 
 
 |2;pL,<lcopq 
 
 to 
 
 B >> 
 
 a o a ^5 
 
 03 rj O O 43 
 
 |zjP4<3<Jpq 
 
 CO CO 
 
 OO 
 
 oooo 
 
 ww^g 
 
 OO 
 Ph<J 
 
 o"o" 
 
 
 a a a a a a a 
 
 poof 
 h mcboD 
 
 r-H TjH t> 
 
 oooo 
 
 be 3 d -a 
 o a a co 
 s .3 a °° 
 
 ooo 
 
 S g 8 a 
 H MrH 
 
 <M <N <N 
 
 OOO 
 
 _c§ m 
 
 c3 
 
 ocopq 
 ooo 
 
 * l a 
 
 oc»pq 
 
 S -2 a 
 
 I -Si 
 
 5 o 'G 
 
 i-^coPh OcoPq 
 
 <M M <NI 
 
 OOO 
 OOO 
 
 do 6 
 
 S h * 
 
 OcoPh 
 
 (C 03 
 
 H 
 H 
 
 + 
 
118 
 
 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 W W 
 
 i— I CO 
 
 go 
 
 A • 
 
 ^h co 
 W W 
 
 o o 
 
 A 
 
 M 
 
 o 
 
 H 
 
 H 
 
 < 
 
 H 
 
 to 
 
 H 
 W 
 
 H 
 
 a & 
 
 M P* 
 
 n 
 
 w 
 
 ft 
 
 O 
 i— i 
 H 
 <l 
 h) 
 
 « 
 H 
 
 O 
 
 i-l 
 
 PQ 
 <J 
 H 
 
 OhNW*W!O1>00 0) 
 
 ssssssssss sss 
 
 OOOOOCOOOO OOO 
 
 WWWWWWWWWW WWW 
 
 ++++++++++ ++ I 
 
 COM«M«MCOM«M CO CO CO 
 
 OOOOOOOOOO OOO 
 
 ++++++++++ +++ 
 
 i— 1 HM>01>05r-ic010I>01 MlOt- 
 
 ^Hr^^HrH^H (N <M <N 
 
 W jxj ffi W S W W W W W W WWW 
 
 o OOOOOOOOOO ooo 
 
 
 m 
 
 T3 
 
 
 o 
 
 
 
 
 a 
 
 
 
 
 
 <D 
 
 O 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 t) 
 
 
 2 
 
 d 
 
 < 
 
 a 
 
 '5 
 
 o 
 
 o 
 
 o 
 o 
 eS 
 
 
 1 
 
 o 
 'o 
 
 d 
 
 >> 
 
 o 
 fcjj 
 
 
 o 
 
 M 
 
 8 
 
 
 P. 
 
 O 
 
 d 
 
 e 
 
 c6 0> cS 
 
 OPmO 
 
 w 
 
 + 
 
 
 o.S'43 
 
 ■a .a .2 
 
 Lau 
 
 Coc 
 Myr 
 
 II II 
 
 oo 
 WW 
 
 + + 
 
 CO CO 
 
 OO 
 
 + + 
 
 <-* CO 
 CO CO 
 
 WW 
 
 CO CO 
 
 OO 
 
 PM§ 
 
 W 
 
THE STUDY OF CHEMISTRY 119 
 
 large ; and not less so that amongst a nation so absorbed in 
 the pursuit of wealth, and holding out to all classes such strong 
 temptations to plunge into active life at as early a period as 
 possible, establishments should exist, by the aid of which the 
 educated classes may be induced to linger a little over those 
 studies which exert a generous and ennobling influence upon 
 the character of a people, and tend to counteract the too 
 practical and utilitarian tendencies of the age in which we live. 
 
 The genius of Oxford, indeed, has, I believe, on many occa- 
 sions operated beneficially upon the general surface of English 
 society. May we not also hope that, in return, those without 
 her walls may react with advantage upon the university itself, 
 by putting forth so strong an expression of public opinion as 
 may induce our Members to hold for the future in equal esteem, 
 and to foster with an equal degree of encouragement each one 
 of the liberal branches of intellectual culture. 
 
 Should such hereafter be the case, and should the application 
 of a portion of our endowments to the advancement of physical 
 science be admitted as a natural consequence of such a view, 
 great indeed would be the stimulus thus afforded to this class of 
 pursuits, and great the advancement in the sciences which 
 might be expected to accrue. 
 
 The English universities might then again become, as they 
 were of old, the principal seats of physical research, as well as 
 the main repositories of existing knowledge in the country ; 
 and as at the present time the amateurs of science at Oxford 
 wend their way to the Royal Institution to obtain the first 
 announcement of the researches of a Faraday, so it may 
 happen that at some future day the inhabitants of the metro- 
 polis may be induced to crowd to our University in order to 
 become acquainted with the discoveries worked out by some 
 new Roger Bacon, within the cloisters of his Academic Home. 
 
ON THE IMPORTANCE OF THE STUDY OF PHYSICS 
 
 AS A BRANCH OF EDUCATION FOR 
 
 ALL CLASSES 
 
 A LECTURE DELIVERED AT THE ROYAL INSTITUTION OF 
 GREAT BRITAIN 
 
 By PROFESSOR TYNDALL, F.R.S. 
 
 There is a word in the title of this Lecture which does not clearly 
 convey the idea by which I shall be guided in its delivery. I 
 hold in my hand a soiled proof of the syllabus of the present 
 course, and the title of the present lecture is there stated to be 
 " On the Importance of the Study of Physics as a Means of 
 Education." The corrected proof, however, contains the following 
 title : " On the Importance of the Study of Physics as a Branch 
 of Education." Small as the alteration may seem from means to 
 branch, the two words appear to me to suggest two radically 
 distinct modes of viewing the subject before us. The term 
 Education is sometimes applied to a single faculty or organ, 
 and if we know wherein the education of a single organ or 
 faculty consists, this knowledge will enable us to form a clearer 
 notion regarding the education of the sum of all the faculties, 
 or of the mind. When, for example, we speak of the education 
 of the voice, what do we mean ? There are certain membranes 
 at the top of the windpipe which are capable of being thrown 
 into vibration by the air forced between them from the lungs, 
 and thus caused to produce sound. These membranes are, to 
 some extent, under the control of the will : it is found that they 
 can be so modified by exercise as to produce notes of a clearer 
 and more melodious character, and this exercise we call the 
 education of the voice. We may choose for our exercise a new 
 song or an old song, a festive song or a solemn chant ; and, the 
 education of the voice being the .object we have in view, the 
 
 120 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSICS 121 
 
 songs may be regarded as the means by which this education 
 is accomplished. I think this expresses the state of the case 
 more clearly than if we were to call the songs a branch of educa- 
 tion. Regarding also the education of the human mind as the 
 improvement and development of the mental faculties, I consider 
 the study of Physics to be a means towards the attainment of 
 these objects. Of course, from this point of view, I degrade 
 Physics into an implement of culture, and I mean to do so, to a 
 great extent ; for the general expansion of the intellectual 
 powers implies both the acquisition of specific knowledge and 
 the ability to render it productive. There is this great difference 
 between those who pursue a thing as a branch and those who 
 use it as a means : in the latter case the knowledge imparted 
 is truly power ; whereas, in the former case, it may be the 
 reverse. Viewing, then, the development of the mental 
 faculties as the end of mental education, it will be my endeavour 
 to state to you some of the claims of Physical Science as a means 
 towards the attainment of this end. 
 
 I do not think that it is the mission of this age, or of any other 
 particular age, to lay down a system of education which shall 
 hold good for all ages. The basis of human nature is, perhaps, 
 permanent, but not so the forms under which the spirit of 
 humanity manifests itself. It is sometimes peaceful, sometimes 
 warlike, sometimes religious, sometimes sceptical, and history 
 is simply the record of its mutations. 
 
 " The eternal Pan 
 Who layeth the world's incessant plan 
 Halteth never in one shape, 
 But for ever doth escape 
 Into new forms." 
 
 This appears to be the law of things throughout the universe, and 
 it is therefore no proof of fickleness or destructiveness, properly 
 so called, if the implements of human culture change with the 
 times, and the requirements of the present age be found different 
 from those of the preceding. Unless you can say to me that 
 the past world, or some portion of it, has been the final expres- 
 sion of human competency ; that the wisdom of man has 
 already reached its climax ; that the intellect of to-day possesses 
 feebler powers, or a narrower scope than the intellect of earlier 
 times ; you cannot, with reason, demand from me an uncon- 
 ditional acceptance of the systems of the past, nor are you 
 
122 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 justified in divorcing me from the world and times "in which I 
 live, and confining my conversation to the times gone by. Who 
 can blame me if I cherish the belief that the world is still young ; 
 that there are great possibilities in store for it ; that the English- 
 man of to-day is made of as good stuff, and has as high and 
 independent a vocation to fulfil, as had the ancient Greek or 
 Roman. While thankfully accepting what antiquity has to 
 offer, let us never forget that the present century has just as 
 good a right to its own forms of thought and methods of culture 
 as any former centuries had to theirs, and that the same sources 
 of power are open to us to-day as were ever open to man in 
 any age of the world. 
 
 In the earliest religious writings, we find man described as a 
 mixture of the earthly and the divine. The existence of the 
 latter implies, in his case, that of the former : and hence the 
 holiest and most self-denying saint must, to a certain extent, 
 protect himself against hunger and cold. But every attempt to 
 restrict man to the dominion of the senses has failed, and will 
 continue to fail. He is the repository of forces which push him 
 beyond the world of sense. He has an intellect as well as a 
 palate, and the demands of the latter being satisfied, the former 
 inevitably puts in its claim. We cannot quench these desires 
 of the intellect. They are stimulated by the phenomena which 
 surround us in our present state of existence as the body is by 
 oxygen ; and in the presence of these phenomena man thirsts 
 for knowledge as an Arab longs for water when he smells the 
 Nile. The Chaldean shepherds could not rest contented with 
 their bread and milk, but made the discovery that man had other 
 wants to satisfy. The stars shed their light upon the shepherd 
 and his flock, but in both cases with very different results. 
 The quadruped cropped the green herbage and slept contented ; 
 but that power which had already made man the lord of the 
 quadruped was appealed to night after night, and thus the 
 intellectual germ which lay in the nature of these Chaldeans 
 was stimulated and developed. Surely, if man be not made, 
 and stars scattered, by guess-work, there is strong reason for 
 assuming that it was intended that mental power should be 
 developed m this way. As the nurse holds her glittering toy 
 before the infant that she would encourage to take its first step, 
 so it would appear as if one of the ends of the Creator, in setting 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSICS 123 
 
 those shining things in heaven, was to woo the attention and 
 excite the intellectual activity of his earthborn child. But if 
 this be granted, then it must be admitted that we have the very 
 highest sanction for the prosecution of physical research. 
 Sanction, indeed, is a term too weak to express the inference 
 suggested by a comparison of Man's powers with his position 
 upon earth ; it points to an imperative command to search and 
 to examine, rather than to a mere toleration of physical inquiry. 
 The term Physics, as made use of in the present Lecture, 
 refers to that portion of natural science which lies midway 
 between astronomy and chemistry. The former, indeed, is 
 Physics applied to masses of enormous weight, while the latter 
 is Physics applied to atoms and molecules. The subjects of 
 Physics proper are, therefore, those which lie nearest to human 
 perception — the light and heat of the sun, colour, sound, motion, 
 the loadstone, electrical attractions and repulsions, thunder and 
 lightning, rain, snow, dew, and so forth. The senses of Man 
 stand between these phenomena, between the external world 
 and the world of thought. He observes the fact, but is not 
 satisfied with the mere act of observation : he must render an 
 account of the fact : he takes his images from Nature and trans- 
 fers them to the domain of thought : he looks at them, compares 
 them, observes their mutual relations and connexions, and thus 
 brings them clearer and clearer before his mental eye, until, 
 finally, he alights upon the cause which unites them. This is the 
 last act of the mind, in this centripetal direction, in its progress 
 from the multiplicity of facts to the central cause on which they 
 depend. But, having guessed the cause, he is not yet contented : 
 he now sets out from his centre and travels in the other direction : 
 he sees that if his guess be true, certain consequences must 
 follow from it, and he appeals to the law and testimony of 
 experiment whether the thing is so. Thus he completes the 
 circuit of thought — from without inward, from multiplicity to 
 unity, and from within outward, from unity to multiplicity. 
 He traverses the line between cause and effect both ways, and, 
 in so doing, calls all his reasoning powers into play. For the 
 mental effort involved in these processes may be justly com- 
 pared to those exercises of the body which invoke the co- 
 operation of every muscle, and thus confer upon the whole 
 frame the benefits of healthy action. 
 
124 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 The first experiment a man makes is a physical experiment : 
 he is a natural philosopher by instinct, and the suction-pump 
 is but an imitation of the first act of every new-born infant. 
 Nor do I think it calculated to lessen that infant's reverence, or 
 to make him a worse citizen, when his riper experience shows 
 him that the atmosphere was his helper in extracting the first 
 draught from his mother's breast. The child grows, but is still 
 an experimenter : he grasps at the moon, and his failure teaches 
 him to respect distance. At length his little fingers acquire 
 sufficient mechanical tact to lay hold of a spoon. He thrusts 
 the instrument into his mouth ; hurts his little gums, and thus 
 learns the impenetrability of matter. He lets the spoon fall, 
 and jumps with delight to hear it rattle against the table. The 
 experiment made by accident is repeated with intention, and 
 thus the young Newton receives his first lessons upon sound and 
 gravitation. There are pains and penalties, however, in the 
 path of the young inquirer : he is sure to go wrong, and Nature 
 is just as sure to inform him of the fact. He falls downstairs, 
 burns his fingers, cuts his hand, scalds his tongue, and in this 
 way learns the conditions of his physical well-being. This is 
 Nature's way of proceeding, and it is wonderful what progress 
 her pupil makes. His enjoyments for a time are physical, and 
 the confectioner's shop occupies the foreground of human happi- 
 ness ; but the blossoms of a finer life are already beginning to 
 unfold themselves, and the relation of cause and effect dawns 
 upon the boy. He begins to see that the present condition of 
 things is not final, but depends upon one that has gone before, 
 and will be succeeded by another. He becomes a puzzle to 
 himself ; and to satisfy his newly awakened curiosity, asks all 
 manner of inconvenient questions. The needs and tendencies of 
 human nature express themselves through these early yearnings 
 of the child. He desires to know the character and causes of the 
 phenomena presented to him ; and unless this desire has been 
 granted for the express purpose of having it repressed, unless the 
 attractions of natural phenomena be like the blush of the for- 
 bidden fruit, conferred merely for the purpose of exercising our 
 self-denial by letting them alone ; then I claim for the study of 
 Physics the recognition that it answers to an impulse implanted 
 by nature in the human constitution, and he who would oppose 
 such study must be prepared to exhibit the credentials which 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSICS 125 
 
 authorize him to contravene Nature's manifest designs. Such 
 credentials were never given ; and the opposition, where it 
 exists, is in most, if not in all cases, due to the fact that at the 
 time when the opponent of Science was beginning to inquire 
 like the little boy, it was so arranged by human institutions that 
 the train of thought suggested by natural objects should, in his 
 case, be supplanted by another. But is this unavoidable ? Is, 
 for example, the knowledge of grammatical concord and govern- 
 ment so utterly antagonistic to the scientific discernment of the 
 same two principles in Nature, as to render the complete ex- 
 trusion of the one necessary to the existence of the other ? A 
 few days ago, a Master of Arts, who is still a young man, and 
 therefore the recipient of a modern education, stated to me that 
 until he had reached the age of twenty years he had never been 
 taught anything regarding Light, Heat, Magnetism, or Elec- 
 tricity : twelve years of his life previously had been spent among 
 the ancients, all connexion being thus severed between him and 
 natural phenomena. Now, we cannot, without prejudice to 
 humanity, separate the present from the past. The nineteenth 
 century strikes its roots into the centuries gone by, and draws 
 nutriment from them. The world cannot afford to lose the 
 record of any great deed or utterance ; for such deeds and such 
 utterances are prolific throughout all time. We cannot yield 
 the companionship of our loftier brothers of antiquity — of our 
 Socrates and Cato — whose lives provoke us to sympathetic 
 greatness across the interval of two thousand years. As long 
 as the ancient languages are the means of access to the ancient 
 mind, they must ever be of priceless value to humanity ; but it 
 is as the avenues of ancient thought, and not as the instrument 
 of modern culture, that they are chiefly valuable to Man. 
 Surely these avenues might be kept open without making such 
 sacrifices as that above referred to universal. We have con- 
 quered and possessed ourselves of continents of land, concerning 
 which antiquity knew nothing ; and if new continents of 
 thought reveal themselves to the exploring human spirit, shall 
 we not possess them also ? In these latter days, the study of 
 Physics has given us glimpses of the methods of Nature which 
 were quite hidden from the ancients, and it would be treason to 
 the trust committed to us if we were to sacrifice the hopes and 
 aspirations of the Present out of deference to the Past. 
 
126 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 I dare say the bias of my own education manifests itself in a 
 desire I always feel to seize upon every possible opportunity of 
 checking my assumptions and conclusions by experience. I 
 might, it is true, appeal directly to your own consciousness in 
 proof of the tendency of the human mind to inquire into the 
 phenomena presented to the senses ; but I trust you will excuse 
 me if, instead of doing this, I take advantage of the facts which 
 have fallen in my own way through life, referring to your 
 judgment to decide whether such facts are truly representative 
 and general, and not merely individual and local. At an 
 agricultural college in Hampshire, with which I was connected 
 for some time, and which is now converted into a school for the 
 general education of youth, a Society was formed among the 
 boys, which met weekly for the purpose of reading reports and 
 papers upon various subjects. The Society had its president 
 and treasurer ; and abstracts of its proceedings were published 
 in a little monthly periodical issuing from the school press. One 
 of the most remarkable features of these weekly meetings was 
 that after the general business had been concluded each member 
 of the Society enjoyed the right of asking questions on any sub- 
 ject on which he desired information. The questions were either 
 written out previously in a book devoted to the purpose, or, 
 if a question happened to suggest itself during the meeting, it was 
 written upon a slip of paper and handed in to the secretary, who 
 afterwards read all the questions aloud. A number of teachers 
 were usually present, and they and the boys made a common 
 stock of their wisdom in furnishing replies. As might be ex- 
 pected from an assemblage of eighty or ninety boys, varying 
 from eighteen to eight years old, many extraordinary questions 
 were proposed. To the eye which loves to detect in the ten- 
 dencies of the young the instincts of humanity generally, such 
 questions are not without a certain philosophic interest, and I 
 have therefore thought it not derogatory to the present course of 
 Lectures to copy a few of these questions, and to introduce them 
 here. They run as follows : 
 
 What are the duties of the Astronomer Royal ? 
 What is frost ? 
 
 Why are thunder and lightning more frequent in summer than 
 in winter ? 
 
 What occasions falling stars ? 
 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSICS 127 
 
 What is the cause of the sensation called " pins and needles " ? 
 
 What is the cause of waterspouts ? 
 
 What is the cause of hiccup ? 
 
 If a towel be wetted with water, why does the wet portion 
 becomes darker than before ? 
 
 What is meant by Lancashire witches ? 
 
 Does the dew rise or fall ? 
 
 What is the principle of the hydraulic press ? 
 
 Is there more oxygen in the air in summer than in winter ? 
 
 What are those rings which we see round the gas and sun ? 
 
 What is thunder ? 
 • How is it that a black hat can be moved by forming round it a 
 magnetic circle, while a white hat remains stationary ? 
 
 What is the cause of perspiration ? 
 
 Is it true that men were once monkeys ? 
 
 What is the difference between the soul and the mind ? 
 
 Is it contrary to the rules of Vegetarianism to eat eggs ? 
 
 In looking over these questions, which were wholly un- 
 prompted, and have been copied almost at random from the 
 book already alluded to, we see that many of them are suggested 
 directly by natural objects, and are not such merely as had an 
 interest conferred on them by previous culture. Now the fact is 
 beyond the boy's control, and so certainly is the desire to know 
 its cause. The sole question then is, is this desire to be gratified 
 or not ? Who created the fact ? Who implanted the desire ? 
 Certainly not Man — and will any man undertake to place him- 
 self between the mind and the fact, and proclaim a divorce 
 between them ? Take, for example, the case of the wetted 
 towel, which at first sight appears to be one of the most un- 
 promising questions in the list. Shall we tell the proposer to 
 repress his curiosity, as the subject is improper for him to know, 
 and thus interpose our wisdom to rescue the boy from the con- 
 sequences of Nature's atrocity in implanting a desire which 
 acts to his prejudice ? Or, recognizing the propriety of the 
 question, how shall we answer it ? It is impo sible to answer 
 it without reference to the laws of optics — impossible to answer 
 it without making the boy to some extent a natural philosopher. 
 You may say that the effect is due to the reflection of light at the 
 common surface of two media of different refractive indices. 
 But this answer presupposes on the part of the boy a knowledge 
 
128 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 of what reflection and refraction are, or reduces you to the 
 necessity of explaining them. On looking more closely into the 
 matter, we find that our wet towel belongs to a class of phen- 
 nomena exhibited by tabasheer and hydrophane, which have 
 long excited the interest of philosophers. These bodies are 
 opaque when dry, but when dipped into water or beech-nut oil 
 they become transparent. The towel is white for the same 
 reason that snow is white, that foam is white, that pounded 
 granite or glass is white, and that the salt we use at table is white. 
 On quitting one medium and entering another, a portion of light 
 is always reflected, but with this restriction, the media must 
 possess different refractive indices. Thus, when we immerse 
 glass in water, light is reflected from the common surface of both, 
 and it is this light which enables us to see the glass. But take a 
 transparent solid and immerse it in a liquid of the same refractive 
 index as itself, it will immediately disappear. I remember once 
 dropping the eyeball of an ox into water ; it vanished as if by 
 magic, with the exception of the crystalline lens, and the sur- 
 prise was so great as to cause a bystander to suppose that the 
 mass had been instantly dissolved. This, however, was not the 
 case, and a comparison of the refractive index of the vitreous 
 humour with that of water cleared up the whole matter. The 
 indices were identical, and hence the light pursued its way 
 through both bodies as if they formed one continuous mass. In 
 the case of snow, powdered quartz, or salt, we have a trans- 
 parent solid body mixed with air ; at every transition from solid 
 to air, or from air to solid, a portion of light is reflected ; this 
 takes place so often that the light is wholly intercepted, and thus 
 from the mixture of two transparent bodies we obtain an 
 opaque one. Now the case of the towel is precisely similar. The 
 tissue is composed of semi-transparent vegetable fibres, with the 
 interstices between them filled with air ; repeated reflection 
 takes place at the limiting surfaces of air and fibre, and hence 
 the towel becomes opaque like snow or salt. But if we fill the 
 interstices of the towel with water, we diminish the reflection ; 
 a portion of the light enters the mass, and the darkness of the 
 towel is due to its increased transparency. Thus the hydro- 
 phane, tabasheer, the tracing paper used by engineers, and many 
 other considerations of the highest scientific interest are in- 
 volved in the simple inquiry of this unsuspecting little boy. 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSICS 129 
 
 Again, take the question regarding the rising or falling of the 
 dew — a question long agitated, and finally set at rest by the 
 beautiful researches of Wells and Melloni. I do not. think that 
 any boy of average intelligence will be satisfied with the simple 
 answer that the dew falls. He will wish to learn how you know 
 that it falls, and, if acquainted with the notions of the Middle 
 Ages, may refer to the opinion of Father Laurus, that, if you 
 fill a goose egg with the morning dew and expose it to the sun, 
 it will rise like a balloon — a swan's egg being better for the 
 experiment than a goose egg. It is impossible to give the boy 
 a clear notion of the beautiful phenomenon to which his question 
 refers, without first making him acquainted with the radiation 
 and conduction of heat. Take, for example, a blade of grass, 
 from which one of these orient pearls is depending. During the 
 day the grass, and the earth beneath it, possess a certain 
 amount of warmth imparted by the sun ; during a serene night, 
 heat is radiated from the surface of the grass into space, and to 
 supply the loss there is a flow of heat from the interior portions 
 of the blade towards its surface. Thus the surface loses heat 
 by radiation, and gains heat by conduction. Now, in the case 
 before us, the power of radiation is great, whereas the power 
 of conduction is small ; the consequence is that the blade loses 
 more than it gains, and hence becomes more and more refrige- 
 rated. The light vapour floating around the surface so cooled 
 is precipitated upon it, and there accumulates to form the little 
 pearly globe which we call a dewdrop. 
 
 Thus the boy finds the simple and homely fact which 
 addressed his senses to be the outcome and flower of the deepest 
 laws. The fact becomes, in a measure, sanctified as an object 
 of thought, and invested for him with a beauty for evermore. 
 He thus learns that things which, at first sight, seem to stand 
 isolated and without apparent brotherhood in Nature are united 
 by their causes, and finds the detection of these analogies a 
 source of perpetual delight. To enlist pleasure on the side of 
 intellectual performance is a point of the utmost importance ; 
 for the exercise of the mind, like that of the body, depends for 
 its value upon the spirit in which it is accomplished. Every 
 physician knows that something more than mere mechanical 
 motion is comprehended under the idea of healthful exercise — 
 that, indeed, being most healthful which makes us forget all 
 
130 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 ulterior ends in the mere enjoyment of it. What, for example, 
 could be substituted for the jubilant shout of the playground, 
 where the boy plays for the mere love of playing, and without 
 reference to physiological laws ; while kindly Nature accom- 
 plishes her ends unconsciously, and makes his very indifference 
 beneficial to him. You may have more systematic motions, 
 you may devise means for the more perfect traction of each 
 particular muscle, but you cannot create the joy and gladness 
 of the game, and where these are absent, the charm and the 
 health of the exercise are gone. The case is similar with 
 mental education ; but the extent to which this has been, and 
 continues to be forgotten, would justify us in doubting whether 
 Nature is so sparing of her gifts as to cause those souls which 
 mark epochs in human history to be separated from each other 
 by centuries, or whether the fact be not attributable to human 
 mismanagement, by which the gifts referred to are squandered 
 and misapplied. Why should the mind of youth be so com- 
 pletely warped from its healthful and happy action, so utterly 
 withdrawn from those studies to which its earliest tendencies 
 point, and in the cultivation of which the concurrence of its 
 ardour would powerfully tend to the augmentation of its 
 strength, as to leave the man in after-life, unless enlightened by 
 his visits to an institution such as that in which we are now 
 assembled, in absolute ignorance as to whether the material 
 world is governed by law or chance, or indeed whether those 
 phenomena which excited his youthful questionings be not 
 really the jugglery of Scandinavian Jotuns, or some similar 
 demonic power ? 
 
 The study of Physics, as already intimated, consists of two 
 processes, which are complementary to each other — the tracing 
 of facts to their causes, and the logical advance from the cause 
 to the fact. In the former process, called induction, certain 
 moral qualities come into play. It requires patient industry, 
 and an humble and conscientious acceptance of what Nature 
 reveals. The first condition of success is an honest receptivity 
 and a willingness to abandon all preconceived notions, however 
 cherished, if they be found to contradict the truth. Believe 
 me, a self-renunciation which has something noble in it, and of 
 which the world never hears, is often enacted in the private 
 experience of the true votary of science. And if a man be not 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSICS 131 
 
 capable of this self-renunciation — this loyal surrender of himself 
 to Nature, he lacks, in my opinion, the first mark of a true philo- 
 sopher. Thus the earnest prosecutor of science, who does not 
 work with the idea of producing a sensation in the world, who 
 loves the truth better than the transitory blaze of to-day's fame, 
 who comes to his task with a single eye, finds in that task an 
 indirect means of the highest moral culture. And although the 
 virtue of the act depends upon its privacy, this sacrifice of self, 
 this upright determination to accept the truth, no matter how 
 it may present itself — even at the hands of a scientific foe, if 
 necessary — carries with it its own reward. When prejudice is 
 put under foot and the stains of personal bias have been washed 
 away — when a man consents to lay aside his vanity and to 
 become Nature's organ — his elevation is the instant consequence 
 of his humility. I should not wonder if my remarks provoked 
 a smile, for they seem to indicate that I regard the man of 
 science as an heroic, if not indeed an angelic, individual ; and 
 cases may occur to you which seem to indicate the reverse. 
 You may point to the quarrels of scientific men, to their 
 struggles for priority, to that unpleasant egotism which screams 
 around its little property of discovery like a scared plover 
 about its young. I will not deny all this ; but let it be set 
 down to its proper account, to the weakness — or, if you will — 
 to the selfishness of Man, but not to the charge of Physical 
 Science. 
 
 The second process in physical investigation is deduction, or 
 the advance of the mind from fixed principles to the conclusions 
 which flow from them. The rules of logic are the formal 
 statement of this process, which, however, was practised by 
 every healthy mind before ever such rules were written. In 
 the study of Physics, induction and deduction are perpetually 
 married to each other. The man observes, strips facts of their 
 peculiarities of form, and tries to unite them by their essences ; 
 having effected this, he at once deduces, and thus checks his 
 induction. Here the grand difference between the methods at 
 present followed, and those of the ancients, becomes manifest. 
 They were one-sided in these matters : they omitted the process 
 of induction, and substituted conjecture for observation. They 
 do not seem to have possessed sufficient patience to watch the 
 slow processes of Nature, and to make themselves acquainted 
 
132 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 with the conditions under which she operates. They could 
 never, therefore, fulfil the mission of Man given at the commence- 
 ment, " Replenish the earth, and subdue it." The subjugation 
 of Nature is only to be accomplished by the penetration of her 
 secrets and the mastery of her laws. This not only enables us 
 to turn her forces against each other, so as to protect ourselves 
 from their hostile action, but makes them our slaves. By the 
 study of Physics we have indeed opened to us treasuries of 
 power of which antiquity never dreamed : we lord it over 
 Matter, and in so doing have become better acquainted with 
 the laws of Mind ; for to the mental philosopher the study of 
 Physics furnishes a screen against which the human spirit 
 projects its own image, and thus becomes capable of self- 
 inspection. 
 
 Thus, then, as a means of intellectual culture, the study of 
 Physics exercises and sharpens observation : it brings the most 
 exhaustive logic into play : it compares, abstracts, and 
 generalizes, and provides a mental scenery admirably suited to 
 the conducting of these processes. The strictest precision of 
 thought is everywhere enforced, and prudence, foresight, and 
 sagacity are demanded. By its appeals to experiment, it 
 continually checks itself, and thus walks on a foundation of 
 facts. Hence the exercise it invokes does not end in a mere 
 game of intellectual gymnastics, such as the ancients delighted 
 in, but tends to the mastery of natural agents. This gradual 
 conquest of the external world, and the consciousness of 
 augmented strength which accompanies it, render the study of 
 Physics as delightful as it is important. Its effects upon the 
 imagination I have not observed closely, but certain it is that 
 the cool results of physical induction furnish conceptions which 
 transcend most of those of imagination proper. Take, for 
 example, the idea of an all-pervading ether which transmits a 
 tingle, so to speak, to the finger-ends of the universe every time 
 a street lamp is lighted. The little billows of this ether can be 
 measured with the same ease and certainty as that with which 
 an engineer measures a base and two angles, and from these 
 finds the distance across the Thames. Now there is just as 
 much poetry in the measurement of the river as in that of an 
 ethereal undulation ; for the intellect, during the acts of 
 measurement and calculation, destroys those notions of size 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSICS 133 
 
 which appeal to the poetic faculty. It is a mistake to suppose, 
 with Dr. Young, that 
 
 " An undevout astronomer is mad ; " 
 
 there being no necessary connexion between a devout state of 
 mind and the observations and calculations of a practical 
 astronomer. For it is not until the man withdraws from his 
 calculation, as a painter from his work, and thus realizes the 
 great idea at which he has been engaged, that imagination and 
 wonder are excited. Now here, I confess, is a possible danger. 
 If the arithmetical processes of science be too exclusively 
 pursued, they may, I think, impair the imagination, and thus 
 the study of Physics is open to the same objection as philo- 
 logical, theological, or political studies, when carried to excess. 
 But even in this case, the injury done is to the investigator 
 himself : it does not reach the mass of mankind. Indeed the 
 conceptions furnished by his cold unimaginative reckonings may 
 furnish themes for the poet, and excite in the highest degree 
 that sentiment of wonder which, notwithstanding all its foolish 
 vagaries, table-turning included, I, for my part, should be sorry 
 to see banished from the world. 
 
 I have thus far dwelt upon the study of Physics as an agent 
 of intellectual culture ; but like other things in Nature, this 
 study subserves more than a single end. The colours of the 
 clouds delight the eye, and, no doubt, accomplish moral purposes 
 also, but the selfsame clouds hold within their fleeces the mois- 
 ture by which our fields are rendered fruitful. The sunbeams 
 excite our interest and invite our investigation ; but they also 
 extend their beneficent influences to our fruits and corn, and 
 thus accomplish, not only intellectual ends, but minister, at the 
 same time, to our material necessities. And so it is with 
 scientific research. While the love of science is a sufficient 
 incentive to the pursuit of science, and the investigator, in the 
 prosecution of his inquiries, is raised above all material con- 
 siderations, the results of his labours may exercise a potent 
 influence upon the physical condition of Man. This is the 
 arrangement of Nature, and not that of the scientific investi- 
 gator himself ; for he usually pursues his object without regard 
 to its practical applications. And let him who is dazzled by 
 such applications — who sees in the steam-engine and the electric 
 
134 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 telegraph the highest embodiment of human genius and the only 
 legitimate object of scientific research — beware of prescribing 
 conditions to the investigator. Let him beware of attempting 
 to substitute for that simple love with which the votary of 
 science pursues his task, the calculations of what he is pleased 
 to call utility. The professed utilitarian is unfortunately, in 
 most cases, the very last man to see the occult sources from, 
 which useful results are derived.. He admires the flower, but is 
 totally ignorant of the conditions of its growth. The scientific 
 man must approach Nature in his own way ; for if you invade 
 his freedom by your so-called practical considerations, it may 
 be at the expense of those qualities on which his success as a 
 discoverer depends. Let the self-styled practical man look to 
 those from the fecundity of whose thought he and thousands 
 like him have sprung into existence. Were they inspired in 
 their first inquiries by the calculations of utility ? Not one of 
 them. They were often forced to live low and lie hard, and to 
 seek a compensation for their penury in the delight which their 
 favourite pursuits afforded them. In the words of one well 
 qualified to speak upon this subject, " I say not merely look at 
 the pittance of men like John Dalton, or the voluntary starva- 
 tion of the late Graff ; but compare what is considered as 
 competency or affluence by your Faradays, Liebigs, and 
 Herschels with the expected results of a life of successful 
 commercial enterprise : then compare the amount of mind put 
 forth, the work done for society in either case, and you will be 
 constrained to allow that the former belong to a class of workers 
 who, properly speaking, are not paid, and cannot be paid for 
 their work, as indeed it is of a sort to which no payment could 
 stimulate." 
 
 But while the scientific investigator, who, standing upon the 
 frontiers of human knowledge, and aiming at the conquest of 
 fresh soil from the surrounding region of the unknown, makes 
 the discovery of truth his exclusive object for the time, he 
 cannot but feel the deepest interest in the practical application 
 of the truth discovered. There is something ennobling in the 
 triumph of Mind over Matter : apart even from its uses to 
 society, there is something sublime in the idea of Man having 
 tamed that wild force which rushes through the telegraphic 
 wire, and made it the minister of his will. Our attainments in 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSICS 135 
 
 these directions appear to be commensurate with our needs. 
 We had already subdued horse and mule, and obtained from 
 them all the service which it was in their power to render : we 
 must either stand still or find more potent agents to execute 
 our purposes. To stand still, however, was not in the plan of 
 Him who made motion a condition of life, and, as if by His 
 high arrangement, the steam-engine appeared. Remember 
 that these are but new things ; that it is not long since we 
 struck into the scientific methods which have produced these 
 extraordinary results. We cannot for an instant regard them 
 as the final achievements of Science, but rather as an earnest 
 of what she is yet to do. They mark our first great advances 
 upon the dominion of Nature. Animal strength fails, but here 
 are the forces which hold the world together, and the instincts 
 and successes of Man assure him that these forces are his when 
 he is wise enough to command them. Is it not an object 
 worthy the contemplation of a philosopher, to see a man 
 experimenting in a corner, pondering in a closet, and gathering, 
 by slow degrees, the mighty agencies of Nature into the 
 sphericity of his little head : to see him come forth, and, in the 
 application of his private thought, realize morally the physical 
 dream of Archimedes, by lifting at an effort the whole world 
 to a higher level. This has been done, and will probably be 
 done again ; but the study of Physics always was, and ever 
 must remain, the forerunner of such achievements. 
 
 In the title of this Lecture, the study of Physics as a branch 
 of education " for all classes " is spoken of. I am not quite 
 sure that I understand the meaning intended to be conveyed 
 by the words " all classes " ; and I have regarded the question 
 with reference to those mental qualities which God has distri- 
 buted without reference to class. As an instrument of intel- 
 lectual culture, the study of Physics is profitable to all : as 
 bearing upon special functions, its value, though not so great, is 
 still more tangible. Why, for example, should Members of 
 Parliament be ignorant of the subjects concerning which they 
 are called upon to legislate ? In this land of practical physics, 
 why should they be unable to form an independent opinion 
 upon a physical question ? Why should the senator be left at 
 the mercy of interested disputants when a scientific question is 
 discussed, until he deems the nap a blessing which rescues him 
 
136 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 from the bewilderments of the committee-room ? The educa- 
 tion which does not supply the want here referred to, fails in 
 its duty to England. I state nothing visionary, when I say 
 that in a country like ours, whose greatness depends so much 
 upon the applications of physical science, it would be a whole- 
 some and rational test to make admission to the House of 
 Commons contingent on a knowledge of the principles of 
 Natural Philosophy. With regard to our working people, in 
 the ordinary sense of the term working, the study of Physics 
 would, I imagine, be profitable, not only as a means of mental 
 culture, but also as a moral influence to woo these people from 
 pursuits which now degrade them. A man's reformation 
 oftener depends upon the indirect, than upon the direct action 
 of the will. The will must be exerted in the choice of employ- 
 ment which shall break the force of temptation by erecting a 
 barrier against it. The drunkard, for example, is in a perilous 
 condition, if he content himself merely with saying, or swearing, 
 that he will avoid strong drink. His thoughts, if not attracted 
 by another force, will revert to the public-house, and to rescue 
 him permanently from this, you must give him an equivalent. 
 It would certainly be worth experiment to try what the study 
 of Physics would do here. By investing the objects of hourly 
 intercourse with an interest which prompts reflection, new 
 enjoyments would be opened to the working man, and every 
 one of these would be a point of force to protect him against 
 temptation. Besides this, our factories and our foundries 
 present an extensive field of observation, and were those who 
 work in them rendered capable, by previous culture, of appre- 
 ciating what they see, the results to science would be incal- 
 culable. Who can say what intellectual Samsons are at the 
 present moment toiling with closed eyes in the mills and forges 
 of Manchester and Birmingham ? Grant these Samsons sight, 
 give them some knowledge of Physics, and you multiply the 
 chances of discovery, and with them the prospects of national 
 advancement. In our multitudinous technical operations we 
 are constantly playing with forces where our ignorance is often 
 the cause of our destruction. There are agencies at work in a 
 locomotive of which the maker of it probably never dreamed, 
 but which nevertheless may be sufficient to convert it into an 
 engine of death. Again, when we reflect on the intellectual 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSICS 137 
 
 condition of the people who work in our coal mines, those 
 terrific explosions which occur from time to time need not 
 astonish us. If these men possessed sufficient physical know- 
 ledge, I doubt not, from the operatives themselves would 
 emanate a system by which these shocking accidents might be 
 effectually avoided. If they possessed the knowledge, their 
 personal interests would furnish the necessary stimulus to its 
 practical application, and thus two ends would be served at the 
 same time — the elevation of the men and the diminution of the 
 calamity. 
 
 Before the present Course of Lectures was publicly announced, 
 I had many misgivings as to the propriety of my taking a part 
 in them. I felt that my place might be better filled by an older 
 man, whose experience would be more entitled to respect. 
 Small as my experience was, however, I resolved to adhere to 
 it, and in what I have said regarding mental processes, I have 
 described things as they reveal themselves to my own eyes, and 
 have been enacted in my own limited practice. In doing this, 
 I have been supported by the belief that there is one mind 
 common to us all ; and that if I be true to the expression of 
 this mind, even in a small particular, the truth will attest itself 
 by a response in the convictions of my hearers. There may be 
 the same difference between the utterance of two individuals of 
 different ranges of intellectual power and experience on a sub- 
 ject like the present, as between The Descent from the Cross, 
 by Rubens, and the portrait of a spaniel dog. Neverthe- 
 less, if the portrait of the spaniel be true to nature, it recom- 
 mends itself as truth to the human mind, and excites, in some 
 degree, the interest that truth ever inspires. Thus far I have 
 endeavoured to keep all tints and features which really do not 
 belong to the portrait of my spaniel, apart from it, and I ask 
 your permission to proceed a little further in the same manner, 
 and to refer to a fact or two in addition to those already cited, 
 which presented themselves to my notice during my brief 
 career as a teacher in the establishment already alluded to. 
 The facts, though extremely humble, and deviating in some 
 slight degree from the strict subject of the present discourse, 
 [may yet serve to illustrate an educational principle. 
 
 One of the duties which fell to my share, during the period to 
 which I have referred, was the instruction of a class in mathe- 
 
138 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 matics, and I usually found that Euclid and the ancient 
 geometry generally, when addressed to the understanding, 
 formed a very attractive study for youth. But it was my 
 habitual practice to withdraw the boys from the routine of the 
 book, and to appeal to their self-power in the treatment of 
 questions not comprehended in that routine. At first the 
 change from the beaten track usually excited a little aversion : 
 the youth felt like a child amid strangers ; but in no single 
 instance have I found this aversion to continue. When utterly 
 disheartened, I have encouraged the boy by that anecdote of 
 Newton, where he attributes the difference between him and 
 other men mainly to his own patience ; or of Mirabeau, when 
 he ordered his servant, who had stated something to be impos- 
 sible, never to use that stupid word again. Thus cheered, he 
 has returned to his task with a smile, which perhaps had some- 
 thing of doubt in it, but which, nevertheless, evinced a resolu- 
 tion to try again. I have seen the boy's eye brighten, and, at 
 length, with a pleasure of which the ecstasy of Archimedes was 
 but a simple expansion, heard him exclaim, " I have it, sir." 
 The consciousness of self-power, thus awakened, was of immense 
 value ; and, animated by it, the progress of the class was truly 
 astonishing. It was often my custom to give the boys their 
 choice of pursuing their propositions in the book, or of trying 
 their strength at others not to be found there. Never in a 
 single instance have I known the book to be chosen. I was 
 ever ready to assist when I deemed help needful, but my offers 
 of assistance were habitually declined. The boys had tasted 
 the sweets of intellectual conquest and demanded victories of 
 their own. I have seen their diagrams scratched on the walls, 
 cut into the beams upon the playground, and numberless other 
 illustrations of the living interest they took in the subject. For 
 my own part, as far as experience in teaching goes, I was a 
 mere fledgling : I knew nothing of the rules of pedagogics, as 
 the Germans name it ; but I adhered to the spirit indicated at 
 the commencement of this discourse, and endeavoured to make 
 geometry a means and not a branch of education. The experi- 
 ment was successful, and some of the most delightful hours of 
 my existence have been spent in marking the vigorous and 
 cheerful expansion of mental power, when appealed to in the 
 manner I have described. 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSICS 139 
 
 And then again, the pleasure we all experienced was enhanced 
 when we applied our mathematical knowledge to the solution 
 of physical problems. Many objects of hourly contact had 
 thus a new interest and significance imparted to them. The 
 swing, the see-saw, the tension of the giant-stride ropes, the 
 fall and rebound of the football, the advantage of a small 
 boy over a large one when turning short, particularly in 
 slippery weather ; all became subjects of investigation. Sup- 
 posing a lady to stand before a looking-glass of the same height 
 as herself, it was required to know how much of the glass was 
 really useful to the lady ? and we learned, with great pleasure, 
 the economic fact that she might dispense with the lower half 
 and see her whole figure notwithstanding. It was also very 
 pleasant to prove the angular velocity of a reflected beam to 
 be twice that of the mirror which reflects it ; we also felt deep 
 interest in ascertaining from the hum of a bee the number of 
 times the little insect flaps its wings in a second. Following up 
 our researches upon the pendulum, we were interested to learn 
 how Colonel Sabine had made it the means of determining the 
 figure of the earth ; and we were also startled by the inference 
 which the pendulum enabled us to draw, that if the diurnal 
 velocity of the earth were seventeen times its present amount, 
 the centrifugal force at the equator would be precisely equal to 
 the force of gravitation, and hence an inhabitant of those 
 regions would have the same tendency to fall upwards as down- 
 wards. All these, things were sources of wonder and delight to 
 us : we could not but admire the perseverance of Man which 
 had accomplished so much ; and then when we remembered 
 that we were gifted with the same powers, and had the same 
 great field to work in, our hopes arose that at some future day 
 we might possibly push the subject a little further, and add our 
 own victories to the conquests already won. 
 
 I know I ought to apologize to you for dwelling so long upon 
 this subject. But the days I spent among these youthful 
 philosophers made a deep impression on me. I learned among 
 them something of myself and of human nature, and obtained 
 some notion of a teacher's vocation. If there be one profession 
 in England of paramount importance, I believe it to be that of 
 the schoolmaster ; and if there be a position where selfishness 
 and incompetence do most serious mischief, by lowering the 
 
140 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 moral tone and exciting contempt and cunning where reverence 
 
 and noble truthfulness ought to be the feelings evoked, it is 
 
 that of the governor of a school. When a man of enlarged 
 
 heart and mind comes among boys — when he allows his being 
 
 to stream through them, and observes the operation of his own 
 
 character evidenced in the elevation of theirs — it would be idle 
 
 to talk of the position of such a man being honourable. It is 
 
 a blessed position. The man is a blessing to himself and to all 
 
 around him. Such men, I believe, are to be found in England, 
 
 and it behoves those who busy themselves with the mechanics 
 
 of education at the present day, to seek them out. For no' 
 
 matter what means of culture may be chosen, whether physical 
 
 or philological, success must ever mainly depend upon the 
 
 amount of life, love, and earnestness which the teacher himself 
 
 brings with him to his vocation.* 
 
 * The following extract from a journal is, I think, too good to be omitted here. 
 The writer of it — a pupil of Dirichlet and Steiner — would doubtless have felt 
 himself more at home in dealing with elliptic functions than with the definitions 
 of Euclid. But the manner in which he contrived to render the latter mysteries 
 evident to a light-headed little boy, does credit to another faculty than his mere 
 mathematical one, and will, I trust, prove as pleasant to the reader as it has to 
 
 me. " K stammers distressingly, and this has impeded his progress very 
 
 much. I have often passed him in the class, knowing that I could not get any 
 intelligible answer from him, and had it not been for his eloquent eyes, which 
 said, ' I know it, Sir, if I could but speak,' I might have mistaken him for a 
 dunce, and thus done him great injustice. Through his love of mischief, how- 
 ever, and his inability to cope with his schoolfellows, on account of his defective 
 utterance, it was evident that he was losing interest in his work, or rather that 
 he had never felt much interest in it, and it became necessary to awaken him. 
 One day, after he had been more noisy and mischievous than usual, I told him 
 rather sternly to put on his cap and foUow me. He did so, and I walked forward, 
 while he, in a state of anxious suspense, walked behind me. After some moments' 
 
 silence, I asked, ' Do you know, K , what I am going to do with you ? ' 
 
 ' Ne-ne-ne — no, Sir,' he replied. ' Well,' I said, ' I will tell you. I have 
 spoken to you often enough, to no purpose, and now I intend to make you do 
 better for the future.' We walked forward for some distance, and at length, 
 putting my arm quietly around his neck, I broke silence once more. ' Can you 
 tell me what an angle is, my boy ? ' ' Ye — ye — ye — yes, Sir, an angle is a — a — 
 a — a — ,' he could get no further, and turned his eyes upon me beseechingly. 
 ' Well,' I replied to this silent appeal, ' go and pull two stalks of grass, and show 
 me what an angle is.' This he did, and with the grass stalks continued to 
 answer my questions on the geometrical definitions. We turned into a stubble 
 field — by this time he had lost all fear, and could speak quite distinctly — ' What 
 is a right angled triangle ? ' I asked. ' It has all its angles right angles, Sir.' 
 ' Indeed,' I replied, taking my arm from around his neck.. ' it has three right 
 angles, has it ? Will you just kneel down ? ' He saw his mistake, stammered 
 ' two,' looked at me piteously and hesitated. ' On your knees, Sir,' I cried, and 
 he knelt down, while I, falling on my knees beside him, said, ' Now pull up some 
 stubble, and make me a triangle having either two or three right angles.' At 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSICS 141 
 
 Such are some of the thoughts which have floated before me, 
 in a more or less distracted manner, in reference to the present 
 hour ; and nobody can be more conscious of their manifold 
 imperfections than 1 am myself. Apart from other disad- 
 vantages, I have had the pressure of various duties interfering 
 with the revival of my consciousness upon these matters, and 
 thus preventing me from making the discourse as true a record 
 of my own experience as I could wish it to be. I have through- 
 out been less anxious to make out a case for Physics than to 
 state the truth ; and I confess that the Lecture of this day 
 week causes me to doubt whether you are not entitled to 
 expect from me a more emphatic statement of the claims of 
 the science which I now represent than that which I have laid 
 before you. When I saw your Lecturer reduced to the necessity 
 of pleading for science, and meekly claiming for it, from the 
 Institution which we are accustomed to regard as the highest 
 in this land, a recognition equal to that accorded to philology, 
 I confess that the effect on me was to excite a certain revolu- 
 tionary tendency in a mind which is usually tranquil almost to 
 apathy in these matters. Science behind Philology ! The 
 knowledge of the laws by which God's universe is sustained, 
 and the perpetual advancement of humanity secured, inferior 
 to that of the manner in which ancient and savage tribes put 
 their syllables together, and express the varieties of mood, 
 tense, and case ! As the pole of a magnet acting upon soft 
 iron induces in the latter a condition opposed to its own, so the 
 irrationality of those who cast this slight upon Science tends, 
 no doubt, to excite an opposite error on the part of their 
 antagonists, and to cause them, in retaliation, to underrate the 
 real merits of Philology. But is there no mind in England 
 large enough to see the value of both, and to secure for each 
 of them fair play ? Oh ! let us not make this a fight of partisans 
 -let the gleaned wealth of antiquity be showered into the open 
 breast ; but while we " unsphere the spirit of Plato " and listen 
 
 Dnce he saw his error, and the absurdity of our position, as we knelt together, 
 faking geometrical diagrams with stubble. Springing to his feet, he shook 
 with laughter — ' It has only one right angle, Sir — only one, of course ! ' I 
 responded, ' Of course.' With my arm round his neck, we turned homewards, 
 ind continued our lesson successfully. ' This is the punishment I had in store 
 or you,' I said, when we reached home. ' Now go, and transgress no more,' to 
 ivhich his eyes responded, ' I will, Sir.' " 
 
142 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 with delight to the lordly music of the past, let us honour by 
 adequate recognition the genius of our own time. Let me 
 again remind you that the claims of that science which finds in 
 me to-day its unripened advocate, are the claims of God's 
 workmanship upon the attention of His creatures, and that its 
 exercises, as an agent of culture, are based upon the natural 
 relations subsisting between Man and the world in which he 
 dwells. Here, on the one side, we have the apparently lawless 
 shifting of phenomena ; on the other side, mind, which requires 
 law for its equilibrium, and in obedience to its own indestructible 
 instincts, believes that these phenomena are reducible to law. 
 To chasten this apparent chaos is a problem which man's 
 Creator has set before him. The world was built in order : it 
 is the visual record of the Creator's logic, and to us He has 
 trusted the will and power to follow Him through this great 
 argument. By the manifestations of Nature which He has 
 ordained, He appeals to the faculties which He has implanted, 
 and surrounds them from the cradle to the grave with objects 
 which provoke them to inquiry. Descending for a moment 
 from this high plea to considerations which lie closer to us as a 
 nation — as a land of gas and furnaces, of steam and electricity : 
 as a land which science, practically applied, has made great in 
 peace and mighty in war : — I ask you whether this " land of old 
 and just renown," which may God keep unimpaired, has not a 
 right to expect from her institutions a culture more in accordance 
 with her present needs than that supplied by declension and 
 conjugation ? And if the tendency should be to lower the 
 estimate of science, by regarding it exclusively as the instrument 
 of material prosperity, let it be their high mission to furnish the 
 proper counterpoise by pointing out its nobler uses, and lifting 
 the national mind to the contemplation of it as the last develop- 
 ment of that " increasing purpose " which runs through the 
 ages and widens the thoughts of men. 
 
ON THE IMPORTANCE OF THE STUDY OF 
 PHYSIOLOGY AS A BRANCH OF EDUCATION 
 FOR ALL CLASSES 
 
 A LECTURE DELIVERED AT THE ROYAL, INSTITUTION OF 
 GREAT BRITAIN 
 
 By JAMES PAGET, F.R.S. 
 
 Assistant-Surgeon and Lecturer on Physiology at St. Bartholomew's Hospital 
 
 It is my office to submit to you the importance of the study of 
 physiology as a branch of education for all classes ; to state 
 the grounds on which it seems desirable that every one should 
 learn somewhat of the structure of the human body, and of the 
 processes that are carried on within it, and the laws according 
 to which they are governed. 
 
 The advantages to be expected from the general teaching of 
 physiology may be grouped in two classes : the first, including 
 such as would tend to the promotion of the science : the second, 
 such as would belong to the students. 
 
 By a wider diffusion of the knowledge of physiology its 
 progress would be accelerated, as that of any other science 
 would, by the increased number of the competent observers of 
 its facts. 
 
 But a larger advantage, and one which, I think, physiology 
 needs more than any other science does, would arise in this ; 
 that the communication would be easier, which is now so 
 difficult, between those who are engaged in it, and those who 
 specially devote themselves to other sciences that might assist 
 it. Almost every process in the living body involves the 
 exercise of mechanical and chemical — perhaps, also, of electrical 
 — forces, whose effects are mingled with those of the more 
 proper vital force ; and although this special force may modify, 
 and in some sort veil, the effects of the others, yet must their 
 
144 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 influence be reckoned and allowed for in nearly every case we 
 have to study. Therefore the complete solution of any new 
 physiological problem must require such a master of all these 
 sciences of dead and living matter as cannot now, I believe, be 
 found, or else it must have the co-operation of many workers, 
 each skilled in some single science, and able to communicate 
 with all the rest. Such co-operation is, through the present 
 narrowness of teaching, almost impossible. The mere chemist, 
 or mechanical or electrical philosopher, and the mere physio- 
 logist (one, I mean, who studies it chiefly by anatomy or by 
 direct experiment), can scarcely so much as understand each 
 other's language : they work apart at the same subject ; and 
 sometimes even confuse each other, by showing the same facts 
 in different lights, and explained in different and mutually 
 unintelligible terms. I know well that it requires nearly all 
 the power of a strong mind so to master any of the physical 
 sciences as to be able to investigate its applications in the 
 living body ; and that, therefore, few could hope to be at once 
 excellent in physiology and in any science of dead matter ; but 
 the co-operation that I speak of would not need more than 
 that the skilled workman in each science should understand 
 the language, and the chief principles, and modes of working, 
 of the rest. I am sure that it is, in great measure, through the 
 want of help, such as it might hence derive, that the onward 
 steps of physiology are so slow, so retarded by backslidings, 
 and by the consciousness of insecurity. 
 
 And in yet another way I believe that the general 
 teaching of physiology would insure its more rapid progress 
 — namely, by finding out those who are especially fit for its 
 study. 
 
 If we mark the peculiar fitness of certain men for special 
 callings, who are even below an average ability in the common 
 business of life, one might imagine some natural design of 
 mutual adaptation between things to be done and men to do 
 them ; and certainly, it were to be wished that a wider scheme 
 of education should leave it less to chance whether a man will 
 fall, or fail to fall, in the way of that special work for which he 
 seems designed. Really, it has seemed like a chance that has 
 led nearly every one of our best physiologists to his appropriate 
 work : like a chance, the loss of which might have consigned 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY 145 
 
 him to a life of failures, or of mediocrity, in some occupation 
 for which he had neither capacity nor love. 
 
 Such are some of the chief benefits that might result to 
 physiology if it were more generally studied. I might tell of 
 more ; but I will not do so, nor enlarge on these ; for it might 
 be argued that it would be unjust to tax every one with 
 intellectual labour for the advancement of one science, even 
 though that science be the foundation of the healing art, in 
 whose improvement every one is interested. I will rather try 
 to show that, through such labour in the study of physiology, 
 every one would gain for himself some more direct advantage. 
 
 I believe that even a moderate acquaintance with the prin- 
 ciples of physiology, acquired in early life, would benefit a man, 
 with regard to both his body and his mind : and that it would 
 do this by guiding him in the maintenance and improvement of 
 health, by teaching him the true economy of his powers, whether 
 mental or corporeal, by providing worthy materials for thought, 
 and by cultivating peculiar modes, and suggesting peculiar 
 ends, of thinking. 
 
 But before I attempt to illustrate these things, let me meet 
 an objection which is likely to be made against any proposal 
 that physiology should be a subject of general education — 
 namely, that it cannot be generally taught, because (it is 
 supposed) its objects are difficult to show, and it requires 
 dissections and painful experiments for its illustration. 
 
 To such objections the answer is easy : that the rudiments 
 of physiology are taught already, largely and efficiently, in 
 several schools of both England and Scotland. For such 
 instruction, no general practice of dissection or of experiments 
 is at all necessary. For most of the illustrations, drawings 
 would suffice ; especially such as those which have been con- 
 structed with admirable art, and published for the use of 
 schools, under the direction of Mr. Marshall, of University 
 College, for the Board of Trade Department of Science. Other 
 things could be well taught with models.* The organs of 
 animals might, in some instances, be used ; and dried speci- 
 mens. Only let there be a demand for the materials of such 
 
 * Specimens were shown of models of the development of the chick, very 
 accurately executed in wax, from nature, by Mr. Tuson. 
 
146 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 teaching, and I will venture to promise that modern art, such 
 as these examples display, will soon supply them at no great 
 cost, and without offence to the most refined feelings. 
 
 But while I speak of what modern art would do, I am bound 
 to add that the teaching of physiology, not by representations, 
 but by the very objects of its study, was long ago sanctioned by 
 the highest and most venerated authority in the land. For, in 
 the Museum of the College of Surgeons, there are now several 
 beautiful specimens of the chief organs of the human body, 
 prepared by John Hunter, which formed part of a collection, 
 made at Kew, by His Majesty King George III, for the instruc- 
 tion of the princes, his sons. 
 
 But if it be admitted that physiology can be generally taught, 
 yet some may say that, so far as the improvement of health and 
 the economy of power are concerned, such teaching is unneces- 
 sary ; for that, to these ends, a man need only follow the 
 guidance of nature and of instinct. And, indeed, at first 
 thought, it may seem very strange that we should want instruc- 
 tion for keeping ourselves in health ; strange that man should 
 be left with no natural true guidance to so great a good : that 
 man alone, for whom the earth seems made, should need mental 
 labour to preserve or recover bodily health. Yet so it is : for 
 none of our untaught faculties, neither our senses nor our 
 instincts, are sufficient guides to good or guards from evil, in 
 even the ordinary conditions of civilized life. 
 
 The acuteness of our senses is not at all proportionate to the 
 vital importance of the things that we observe with them. 
 They are unable to discern the properties, or even the presence, 
 of some of the most deadly agents. For example, we have a 
 far keener sense of the temperature of the atmosphere than of 
 its composition, or fitness for breathing : yet the ordinary 
 changes in its temperature concern little more than our comfort ; 
 those in its composition may affect our life. And thus it is that, 
 seeking only the comfort of warmth, which their senses can 
 discern, men will breathe atmospheres laden with noxious gases, 
 which they can scarcely detect till they have accumulated to 
 the peril of their lives. 
 
 So with food : we have a keener sense of hunger and thirst 
 than of the sufficiency or fitness of our foods. We can at once 
 appreciate their flavour, but not their nutritive value ; and 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY 147 
 
 those we most affect are not always the most appropriate to 
 our state. 
 
 Our instincts avail us scarcely more. After childhood, in 
 civilized life, the instincts are almost in abeyance, and the 
 intellect and instruction have a share in the most ordinary acts 
 of life. The sensations of thirst and hunger impel us instinc- 
 tively to seek their satisfaction ; and by instinct we know how 
 to do so ; but in doing it, we drink in adaptation to instruments 
 of intellectual invention ; and we eat things intellectually 
 cooked, with apparatus of intellectual art : yes, intellectual, for 
 the meanest piece of cookery requires that control and manage- 
 ment of fire, which no mind lower than the human intellect has 
 ever reached, and the possession of which might alone suffice 
 to prove man's primacy among all the creatures of the earth. 
 
 But I need not multiply instances (I will not say of the 
 inutility, but) of the insufficiency of our untaught powers for 
 our guidance, in the commonest things of civilized life, relating 
 to our health. Every one has suffered from following what has 
 seemed some natural guidance, and has learned that we only 
 gradually attain some knowledge of these things by experience 
 or education ; i.e. by the exercise of the understanding as well 
 as of the senses. 
 
 If it be asked whether a state of ignorance regarding his own 
 health be natural to man, I must answer that I suppose Provi- 
 dence has taken ample care for his good, in all those things 
 which are of natural ordinance and independent of his will : but 
 that, for those conditions which he generates or incurs by his 
 own power and free-will, he is left by the same power to provide. 
 I suppose that men may, generally, be, like other creatures, 
 aware, by sense or instinct, of those things which are for their 
 good, when the simplest conditions of their existence are 
 undisturbed. But these are not the conditions in which we 
 live. Men have disturbed, in successive generations, almost 
 every simple and original condition of their existence. In every 
 generation they have been striving, with intellectual labour, to 
 add to the comforts and luxuries of life, to their control of the 
 forces, and their independence of the ordinary course, of 
 nature. And many of their successes in this strife, being 
 achieved by the disturbance of some natural and fit condition 
 If mere subsistence, have almost necessarily incurred some 
 
148 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 consequent evils, which have marred, though they may not 
 have neutralized, the good, and have gradually accumulated to 
 our damage. 
 
 If, indeed, in all the improvements of our means of life, only 
 half the trouble had been taken to prevent or remedy the 
 future evil that was taken to attain the present good, our state 
 might have been far different. If, for examples, men had been 
 as anxious to invent the means of destroying coal-smoke, as to 
 gain the myriad benefits of coal-fires ; if they had thought as 
 much and as soon of constructing drains below the ground, as* 
 of building above it ; as much even of clearing out the refuse 
 of our gas-lights, as of tempering and diffusing their brilliancy 
 for comfortable use ; — then we might have gained unalloyed 
 benefits from every such disturbance of the natural conditions 
 of life : the vast catalogue of diseases appertaining to our social 
 state might have been unwritten ; and that which one age 
 hailed as a national blessing might not have entailed upon the 
 next a national calamity. But this has not been done ; and 
 thus, from age to age, the evil residues of good things have 
 accumulated ; the good still, happily, preponderating, but the 
 evils such as every man, and every society of men, have now to 
 guard against, and such as can be averted or counteracted with 
 no other human power than that of the intellect instructed in 
 the science of health. 
 
 Perhaps, now, the only question is, whether this instruction 
 need be given to all, or whether it had not better be still left, as 
 it is by present custom, to a few, to exercise it in a special 
 profession. I cannot doubt that here, as in other cases, for aJ 
 ordinary care, tor all habitual management, each man should 
 be fit to be his own guardian ; while for emergencies, and the 
 more unusual events, he should accept and be able to choose 
 some more instructed guidance. It is not necessary, or likely, 
 that every one who has learnt somewhat of the structure of his 
 own body, and of the processes carried on in it, should seek tc 
 be his own doctor ; not more so than that every one who has 
 learnt the construction and principle of a steam-engine shoulc 
 be restless unless he be his own engineer. We need not fear i 
 misuse, through excessive use, of such physiology as can be 
 generally taught. Certainly, if I may speak as one of th( 
 medical profession, we see greater injury sustained through 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY 149 
 
 ignorance than is likely to accrue to imperfect knowledge, 
 whether it be the most timid or the most rash. 
 
 And here, when I speak of ignorance, I am obliged to say 
 that I do not mean only the state of those who are wholly 
 uneducated, but include the state of nearly all who have not 
 received some special teaching. For, really, in regard to all 
 that concerns our life and health, it seems as if no amount of 
 general education, no clearness of apprehension for science or 
 for the general business of life, were sufficient for security 
 against the grossest errors. I will not speak of the follies (as I 
 believe them to be), that are now regarded as truths, and even 
 Useful truths, by generally well-instructed, shrewd, and accom- 
 plished persons. I will only say that, at all times, such persons 
 have been as ready as the most uneducated to believe and 
 submit themselves to practices which the physiology even of 
 their own times could prove to be gross and mischievous 
 fallacies. In every age, it has been true that " the desire of 
 health, like the desire of wealth, brings all intellects to the same 
 level " ; that is, all that have not some special wisdom in the 
 art of health or of wealth. 
 
 If now it may be received that physiology should be generally 
 studied for the sake of health, it may be asked what parts of it 
 should be chiefly taught, and in what method ? I might leave 
 this to those who are occupied with general education, and with 
 younger students than I have had to teach. But considering 
 that the large majority of those to whom it would be taught 
 are to be engaged, in after life, in pursuits alien from science, 
 and that we therefore could not hope to do much more than 
 leave general impressions such as might abide for general 
 guidance, I feel nearly sure that the mere facts of physiology, 
 and much more those of anatomy, should be taught in subordi- 
 nation to their general principles. 
 
 If I try to illustrate this by an example, I fear lest to some I 
 seem almost unintelligible ; for I have never before lectured 
 except to students or members of my own profession, to whom 
 I could use technical terms, and whom I could suppose to be, 
 in some measure, already acquainted with my subject. 
 
 But, for an example, in relation to the economy of power, 
 suppose of muscular power, and thereby in regard to the main- 
 
150 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 tenance of health, it would have to be taught that, in the living 
 body, the apparent stability and persistence of its structures is 
 due, not to their being literally indestructible, but to the 
 constant operation of a process in them by which the particles 
 that decay, or are outworn in the exercise of their offices, are 
 constantly removed, and replaced by new ones like themselves. 
 We know that in all the actions of the body there is waste and 
 impairment of the active parts. But though, day after day, 
 we exert, even in the common acts of life, in walking, feeding, 
 breathing, thinking, talking, great amounts of force, and 
 though, with the use of force, there is always a proportionate 
 consumption of the material of our bodies, yet, year after year 
 (at least for many years), we appear to be and feel the same : 
 because the consumption, the wear and tear, of material that 
 occurs in the action of our several parts is constantly repaired 
 in the intervals of rest. 
 
 Then, following out this principle, it might be shown that 
 an economy of vital power is commonly maintained in the body 
 by the just regulation of alternate periods of action and repose ; 
 and this might be taken as a principle for useful illustration. 
 
 The climax of the exercise of muscular power seems to be 
 attained in the heart. Perhaps there is nothing, of equal 
 weight, that exerts in the same time so large an amount of 
 force as a heart does. In every second, or oftener, discharging 
 blood from its cavities with a force equal to the lifting of a 
 weight of from ten to fifteen pounds, it goes on hour after hour, 
 and year after year, untired and almost unchanged. Now, by 
 the similarity between the structure and mode of contraction 
 of the muscular fibres of the heart, and those of the muscles 
 over which we have control, we may be sure that its fibres are 
 subject to the same impairment in their actions as theirs are 
 known to be ; and that they must need the same repair in rest 
 as the voluntary muscles obtain in sleep. But the heart seems 
 never to sleep - ; and we explain the secret of its apparently 
 unceasing exercise of power by referring to its exact rhythm oi 
 alternating contractions and dilatations ; by the fact thai 
 every contraction by which it forces blood into the vessels 
 i.e. every act which we can feel as a beat or throb, is succeedec 
 by an interval of rest, or inaction, of the same length ; anc 
 by the probability that in each period of inaction (brief a; 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY 151 
 
 it is) the changes that occurred during the contraction are 
 repaired. 
 
 It is the same with the muscles for breathing, in their 
 ordinary and involuntary exercise. The alternation of their 
 action and repose is constant ; and they too, though exerting 
 forces that are truly enormous, neither waste nor weary them- 
 selves ; because (we may hold) in every period of inaction they 
 repair the changes wrought in them by their action. 
 
 Now the principle which is thus illustrated may probably be 
 applied to nearly all muscular exertion. Whatever work is to 
 be done, the largest amount of force may be utilized with the 
 least injury when rest and action are made to be alternate. 
 And this is to be observed, not only in that long rest which our 
 voluntary muscles have in sleep, but, equally, in more active 
 life ; wherein more force is always obtained by the alternate 
 action of certain groups of muscles than by the sustained 
 action of any single group. Thus, I think, it can be proved 
 that there are no voluntary actions in which the human body 
 can exercise larger amounts of force than in ordinary progres- 
 sion, as in walking or in running. And it is because of the 
 alternation of the similar acts done by the two halves of the 
 body, and especially by the two lower extremities. For if you 
 watch a man walking, you will see that each of his limbs is 
 doing exactly the opposite to what the other is doing, and to 
 what itself has just finished doing; and the corresponding 
 muscles are never in the same action upon both sides at once : 
 and so if one step has been made, say, chiefly, with the 
 muscular effort of the right limb, the next will be made with 
 a similar effort of the left, while the muscles of the right will 
 have an interval of comparative inaction. 
 
 In some measure, therefore, the principle of alternate action 
 and repose, typified in the case of the heart, is applied here. 
 But it is not so completely observed ; for we tire in walking, 
 even while our hearts may be growing more active. This, 
 however, is not only because of the motion, but because many 
 muscles must be in almost constant exercise for the maintenance 
 of the erect posture, and because, probabty, in these voluntary 
 exercises the rest of a muscle is never quite perfect, even in its 
 relaxing state. 
 
 This same principle, of the economy of force in the alternation 
 
152 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 of action and repose, is doubtless true of the nervous as of the 
 muscular system ; and on it we explain the need of repose, 
 prolonged and deep, in direct proportion to the length and 
 intensity of mental exercise. On the same principle we explain 
 the refreshment of the mind by change of occupation or of the 
 train of thought : so that, while one part of the brain is occupied, 
 another may be at rest after its work is done. And many like 
 things may be thus explained, which it would be well for all to 
 know, but chiefly for those who have to teach, and who need to 
 regulate their pupils' mental exercises with the best economy 
 they can. 
 
 There is another class of organs in which the alternations of 
 action and rest, of waste and repair, appear essential to the full 
 exercise and economy of power. The stomach is one of these ; 
 and a knowledge of the method of its office of digestion might 
 prevent somewhat of its almost universal misuse. 
 
 Its chief office in digestion is to produce a peculiar fluid 
 which, mingling with the food, may, by a process similar to 
 fermentation, reduce it to solution or to a state of extremely 
 minute division. This fluid, the gastric or digestive fluid, does 
 not merely ooze from the blood ; but is so formed in minute 
 cells that, for each minutest microscopic drop of it, a cell, of 
 complex structure, must be developed, grow, and burst or be 
 dissolved. 
 
 A diagram would very well show how the lining membrane 
 of the stomach is formed, almost entirely, of minute tubes, set 
 vertically in its thickness, like little flasks or test-tubes, close- 
 packed and upright. The outer walls of these are webbed over 
 with networks of most delicate blood-vessels, carrying streams 
 of blood. Within, the same tubes contain cells, and those 
 among them which chiefly secrete the digestive fluid are nearly 
 filled with cells, which have taken materials from the blood, and 
 from those materials have formed themselves and their contents. 
 In what way they have done this, we cannot tell : but we can 
 tell that the process is one of complicate though speedy develop- 
 ment and growth ; even such a process as that by which, more 
 slowly, the body grows, or any of its parts — the hair or the 
 nails, or any other that we can best watch. The act of 
 secretion or production of this fluid is, literally, the growth 
 and dissolution of the minute cells which, though they be very 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY 153 
 
 short-lived, yet must need a certain time for their complete 
 elaboration. 
 
 If this be so, it must follow that we cannot, with impunity, 
 interfere with that which seems a natural rule, of allowing 
 certain intervals between the several times of feeding. Every 
 act of digestion involves the consumption of some of these cells : 
 on every contact of food, some must quickly perfect themselves, 
 and yield up their contents ; and without doubt, the design of 
 that periodical taking of food, which is natural to our race, is 
 that, in the intervals, there may be time for the production of 
 the cells that are to be consumed in the next succeeding acts of 
 ■digestion. We can, indeed, state no constant rule as to the 
 time required for such constructions : it probably varies 
 according to age, and the kind of food, and the general activity 
 or indolence of life, and, above all, according to habit ; but it 
 may be certainly held that when the times are set, they cannot, 
 with impunity, be often interfered with ; and, as certainly, that 
 continual or irregular feeding is wholly contrary to the economy 
 of the human stomach. And yet such constant feeding is a 
 frequent custom — not infrequent among the adult rich, but 
 most frequent among the infants of the poor, for whom food is 
 the solace of every grief. 
 
 I would thus try to teach general principles of physiology ; 
 and with such principles there might easily be combined some 
 useful rules for prudence in the ordinary management of 
 personal or social health, and in the habitual exercise of power. 
 I will not venture to say that it is only by teaching physiology 
 that prudence can be taught ; for even in the cases I have cited, 
 physiology teaches no other rule than nature and experience 
 had already indicated. Still, even in regard to those rules, 
 when it shows their reason and their meaning, it gives them 
 strength, and it enlists the power of the understanding against 
 the overbearing of inclination and bad habit. And so, though 
 it might be impossible to teach more than a small part of the 
 whole body of physiology, yet one who had learned even this 
 part would have a better apprehension of the rest than one 
 untaught could have. One who had learned the general mode 
 of study, and the labour which is spent in ascertaining physio- 
 logical truths, and the great probability that what is generally 
 accepted is at least nearly true, would, more than an untaught 
 
154 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 man, act on the advice of those who are instructed. Thus 
 acting, he would, as a citizen, be no hinderer of improvements, 
 no block of utter ignorance in the way of amending the sanitary 
 condition of his fellows : with belief, if not with knowledge, he 
 would give his help to good. And for his own guidance, such 
 a one, though only partially instructed, would be a far better 
 judge than most men are of the probable value of professed 
 discoveries in medicine ; he would be doubtful of all unreserved 
 assertions ; wisely incredulous of all results, supposed to flow 
 from apparently incompetent sources. Even the desire of 
 health would bear frequent disappointment before it would 
 induce him to commit himself to the daring promises of 
 ignorance. 
 
 I have said that we might anticipate advantages to the mind, 
 as well as to the bodily health, from making physiology a branch 
 of general education. And some of these advantages must not 
 be widely separated from those of which I have been speaking : 
 for they are, in truth, closely correspondent, derived from the 
 same source and by the same method. The health of the mind, 
 so far as it is within our own control, is subject to the same 
 laws as is the health of the body. For the brain, the organ of 
 the mind, grows and is maintained according to the same 
 method of nutrition as every other part of the body ; it is 
 supplied by the same blood ; and through the blood, like every 
 other part, may be affected for good or ill by the various 
 physical influences to which it is exposed. But I will not dwell 
 on this more than to assert, as safely deducible from physiology, 
 that no scheme of instruction, or of legislation, can avail for 
 the improvement of the human mind, which does not provide 
 with equal care for the well-being of the human body. Deprive 
 men of fresh air, and pure water, of the light of heaven, and of 
 sufficient food and rest, and as surely as their bodies will 
 become dwarfish, and pallid, and diseased, so surely will their 
 minds degenerate in intellectual and moral power. 
 
 But let me suppose that these needs of the body may be 
 happily within men's reach ; and then I may speak of the 
 advantages that would accrue from the general study of 
 physiology, in the mental culture it would provide. 
 
 I again remind myself that the cases to be kept in view are 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY 155 
 
 not only those of men who are to be chiefly occupied with 
 science, but those of persons who are to pursue the various 
 common businesses of life ; and upon whose minds we cannot 
 expect that those studies of their school-time, which would be 
 widely different from the occupations of their later life, will do 
 more than leave general impressions, and impart an habitual 
 method and tone of thought. To such persons I believe that 
 the study of physiology would be useful, first, on the general 
 ground that they who can, with most force, apply themselves 
 to any business in life (be it what it may) are those whose minds 
 are disciplined and informed in all their parts, so as to be not 
 only full and strong, but pliant, liberal, and adaptive. 
 
 Now, there are some characters in physiology by means of 
 which its study might affect the mind, or certain parts of it, 
 differently from any portions of even that enlarged education 
 which it is the object of this whole course of lectures to recom- 
 mend. 
 
 One of these is, that it is occupied with things of admitted 
 incompleteness and uncertainty. In other, and especially in 
 the physical, sciences, I think it is only the master, or the 
 advanced student, who is impressed with their uncertainty. In 
 them, speaking generally, that which is taught admits of clear 
 proof ; and imperfection is not spoken of, except, as it were, at 
 the distant boundaries of a vast body of truth. But, in physio- 
 logy, the teacher would need everywhere to mark the imperfec- 
 tions of his knowledge ; in the very rudiments, he must speak 
 of things as only, in various degrees, probable. 
 
 Some of my predecessors in this course have shown how 
 much the value of the physical sciences lies in the possibility 
 of proving what is held in them, and in the precision of the 
 mental exercises which they thus demand and cultivate ; and 
 no one can be more conscious than I am that, on this account, 
 they are indispensable elements of sound education. But I 
 believe, also, that it would be right to mingle with this study 
 that of a much more incomplete and uncertain science. I think 
 it would be good, at least for some minds, to know in early life 
 how much has yet to be done in science ; so that some through 
 ambition of discovery, some through love of enterprise, some 
 through mere curiosity, might be excited to work among the 
 stores of unexplored knowledge that would be pointed out to 
 
156 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 them. It is strange how early, and how strong in early life, 
 these ambitions of discovery and invention arise ; and I 
 suppose that, in all later life, there are no enjoyments more 
 keen, or more invigorating to the mind, than those felt in 
 boyhood, when such an ambition is gratified ; — whether by the 
 finding of some plant unknown before in the home-district, or 
 by the invention of some new appliance to a toy, imitating 
 what men deal with, or — it matters not by how trivial a thing. 
 I would not venture to say how large a part such ambition 
 should be allowed to have among the motives to study, but I 
 think it should not be quite suppressed, or starved, as it is by 
 teaching only such things as are already proved, or decided by 
 authority. 
 
 And, perhaps, yet another advantage would flow from the 
 teaching of physiology, honestly and expressly, as a very 
 incomplete and uncertain science. It is a great hindrance to 
 the progress of truth that some men will hold, with equal 
 tenacity, things that are, and things that are not, proved ; and 
 even things that, from their very nature, do not admit of 
 proof. They seem to think (and ordinary education might be 
 pleaded as justifying the thought) that a plain " yes " or " no " 
 can be answered to every question that can be plainly asked ; 
 and that everything thus answered is a settled thing, and to be 
 maintained as a point of conscience. I need not adduce 
 instances of this error, while its mischiefs are manifest every- 
 where in the wrongs done by premature and tenacious judg- 
 ments. 
 
 I am aware that these are faults of the temper, not less than 
 of the judgment ; but we know how much the temper is 
 influenced by the character of our studies ; and I think if 
 any one were to be free from this over-zeal of opinion, it should 
 be one who is early instructed in an uncertain science, such as 
 physiology. He might receive, with reverent submission, all 
 revealed truth ; he might bend unquestioning to the declara- 
 tions of teachers authorized to promulgate positive command- 
 ments ; but his habit of thinking how soon all inquiries con- 
 cerning living things end in uncertainty, his experience of the 
 exceeding difficulty of settling for ever even a small matter, 
 would make him very scrupulous in accepting as completely 
 proved, very slow in making a point of conscience of, anything 
 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY 157 
 
 that may be made a matter of reasonable discussion or of 
 further study. 
 
 Let me repeat that I do not hold that it is beneficial to study 
 only or chiefly such a science as this, whose principles scarcely 
 admit of full proof. I know too well the danger of resting 
 satisfied with error, when truth cannot be quite attained. But 
 I lecture only as one of many, advocating the importance of as 
 many different branches of study ; and I think that the early 
 study of uncertainties might well be mingled with that of things 
 which may be proved beyond all doubt. 
 
 But I have yet to speak of that through which, I believe, the 
 general teaching of physiology would exercise the greatest 
 influence upon the mind ; namely, its being, essentially, a 
 science of designs and final causes. In this (if we regard it in 
 its full meaning, as the science concerning living things) it is 
 chiefly in contrast with the physical sciences, and, so far as I 
 know, with nearly all the other studies of even the widest 
 scheme of education. 
 
 I do not say that it is only in living things that we can 
 discern the evidences of design. Doubtless, things that are 
 dead — things that we call inorganic, when we would distinguish 
 them from living organisms — are yet purposive, and mutually 
 adapted to co-operate in the fulfilment of design. We cannot 
 doubt, for example, that all the parts of this dead earth, and 
 all the members of our planetary system, are adapted to one 
 another with mutual influence ; balanced and laid out in 
 appropriate weight and measure ; fitted each to do its part, 
 and serve its purpose, in some vast design. And thus the whole 
 universe might be called an organism ; constructed in parts 
 and systems, almost infinite in number and variety, but 
 adjusted with an all-pervading purpose. Still, there is a 
 striking difference between dead and living things, in the degree 
 and manner in which their laws and their designs are manifest 
 to us. In the inorganic world, in the studies of the physical 
 sciences, we seem to come nearer to the efficient, than to the 
 final, causes of events : we discern, it may be, both the most 
 general laws and the most minute details of the events ; but 
 these rarely shadow forth their purpose or design ; or, if they 
 do, it is a design in adaptation to organic life, as where we may 
 trace the fitness of the earth and air for their living occupants. 
 
158 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 But, in the inorganic world, the reverse is true : purpose, 
 design, and mutual fitness are manifest wherever we can 
 discern the structure or the actions of a part ; utility and 
 mutual dependence are implied in all the language, and sought 
 in all the studies, of physiology. The efficient causes and the 
 general laws of the vital actions may Be hidden from the keenest 
 search ; but their final causes are often nearly certain. In the 
 sciences of the inorganic world, we can learn how changes are 
 accomplished, but we can rarely tell why they are : in those of 
 the organic world, the question " why " can be often answered, 
 the question " how " is generally an enigma that we cannot 
 solve. 
 
 Now, were there no other argument for the general teaching 
 of physiology, I would be content with this : that an education 
 which does not include the teaching of some science of natural 
 designs does not provide for the instruction of one of the best 
 powers and aspirations of the mind. 
 
 The askings of children seem to indicate a natural desire after 
 the knowledge of the purposes fulfilled in nature. " Why ? " 
 and " Of what use ? " are the ends of half their untutored 
 questions ; and we may be sure they have not the wish for 
 such knowledge without the power of attaining it, if the needful 
 help be given them. And yet, in the usual subjects of educa- 
 tion, nothing addresses itself to this desire, and so there is not 
 only a neglect of the teaching of the peculiar modes of reasoning 
 required, or admitted, in physiological research ; but the natural 
 love and capacity for studying design are left to spend them- 
 selves, untrained, upon unworthy objects ; and so they fade or 
 degenerate — degenerate, perhaps, into some such baseness as 
 an impertinent curiosity about other men's matters. 
 
 I would therefore have physiology taught to all, as a study of 
 God's designs and purposes achieved ; as a science for which 
 our natural desire after the knowledge of final causes seems to 
 have been destined ; a science in which that desire, though it 
 were infinite, might be satisfied ; and in which, as with perfect 
 models of beneficence and wisdom, our own faculties of design 
 may be instructed. I would not have its teaching limited to a 
 bare declaration of the use and exact fitness of each part or 
 organ of the body. This, indeed, should not be omitted ; for 
 there are noble truths in the simplest demonstrations of the 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY 159 
 
 fitness of parts for their simplest purposes, and no study has 
 been made more attractive than this by the ingenuity, the 
 acuteness, and eloquence of its teachers. But I would go 
 beyond this, and striving, as I said before, to teach general 
 truths as well as the details of science, I would try to lead the 
 mind to the contemplation of those general designs from which 
 it might gather the best lessons for its own guidance. 
 
 If I may presume to speak as I would to boys or girls, I would 
 say let us learn frugality from some of the designs that we can 
 study in the living body ; and surely the lesson may be the 
 more impressive if we remember that we are studying the 
 frugality of One whose power and materials are infinite. 
 
 Observe, for example, what happens during active exercise ; 
 how the heart beats quicker and harder than it did before, and 
 the skin grows warmer and ruddier, and the blood moves faster, 
 and the breathing is quicker. The main design of this seems 
 to be that the active muscles may be the more abundantly 
 supplied with blood. But the beginning in the series of changes 
 is an instance of that designed frugality of which I have been 
 speaking. Veins, carrying blood to the heart, lie, as you see, 
 branching and communicating under the skin ; and there are 
 others like them deeper set among the muscles of both the 
 limbs and the trunk. Now, muscles, when they act, shorten 
 and swell up : and in so doing (as in active exercise) they 
 compress the veins that lie between them, or upon them under- 
 neath the skin. The effect of such compression must be to 
 press the blood in every vein, equally in both directions — both 
 onwards towards the heart, and backwards from it. All that 
 part of this pressure which is effective in propelling the blood 
 towards the heart is so much added to the forces of the circula- 
 tion ; it is so much direct gain of force. But it may seem as if 
 this gain were balanced by an equal loss, through the influence 
 of the same pressure driving other portions of the blood back- 
 wards. And so it would be, but for the arrangement of valves 
 in the veins, which are the instruments of this saving of force. 
 Wherever there are muscles that in their action can compress 
 the veins, there, also, the veins have valves ; and a diagram 
 or a model would show that these are little pocket-shaped 
 membranes, which project into the canals of the veins in such 
 a manner that they will allow the streams of blood to pass 
 
160 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 onwards to the heart, but will close at once and hinder any 
 stream that would flow backwards. Thus, therefore, the effect 
 of muscular pressure on the veins is (let us say), with a certain 
 force, to propel some blood towards the heart, and with the 
 same force to press back other blood upon the valves and close 
 them. You will say, then, here is still the same hindrance : if 
 the valves be closed, the stream behind them must be stopped, 
 and there is as much loss as gain. It would be so if there were ' 
 not this other provision : that wherever there can be muscular 
 pressure upon veins, those veins not only have valves, but have ; 
 abundant channels of communication with one another. The 
 back-pressure of the blood, and the closure of the valves, is 
 therefore no hindrance to the circulation ; for the blood that 
 might be stopped in one vein makes its way at once into 
 another by some communicating branch. The general result, 
 therefore, is, that all muscular pressure upon veins is an almost 
 unalloyed advantage to the circulation. And now mark the 
 frugality of the design. Veins must lie in or near these places. ' 
 and the muscles must act (suppose for some design of our own) ; ; 
 and if they are to be in very active exercise, they will need 
 swifter streams of blood than will suffice in their repose. The 
 streams could be made swifter by a greater force of the heart ; 
 but heart-force is a thing to be economized ; and the muscles 
 themselves may, without harm, contribute to accelerate the 
 blood ; for in the fulfilment of their primary purpose, of moving 
 and sustaining the limbs and trunk, they must swell up, and 
 compress the veins that are about them ; and this compression 
 can be made effective for the circulation of the blood by the 
 mechanism of valves. So then, in the necessary fulfilment of 
 their primary use, and without the least hindrance or damage 
 to it, the muscles are made to serve this secondary purpose ; 
 and all that they do herein is so much saved to the forces of the 
 heart. 
 
 Scarcely a lesson in physiology could be given but it might 
 illustrate some such design as this. Everywhere we see 
 examples of parts thus made to serve by-purposes while 
 fulfilling their primary designs. 
 
 I will mention but one more. All know that the air we' have 
 once breathed is less fit for breathing than it was before, and 
 that if we breathe the same air often it becomes poisonous 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY 161 
 
 through the mixture of the carbonic acid and other exhalations 
 from the lungs. We must breathe out the air, therefore, as so 
 much refuse ; and ample provision is made that we may do 
 so ; and it might seem design enough fulfilled when we are 
 thus freed from our own poison. But is it not an admirable 
 secondary design, an admirable frugality, a true wisdom by the 
 way, that, with this same air, we speak ; that this, which we 
 I must cast out lest it destroy us, should be used for one of the 
 noblest powers of man ? Surely, one might have supposed, for 
 j so great a purpose as the communion of human thoughts, and 
 for all that speech and vocal melody can achieve, there would 
 be contrived some matchless instrument, some rare material. 
 But no : the instruments of human speech are scarcely more 
 complex organs than those which dumb creatures have to 
 breathe and feed with ; and the material for human speech 
 carries out the refuse of the blood ; the very dross of the body 
 is used for the coinage of the mind. 
 
 Such might be some lessons in that Divine frugality which is 
 ever " gathering up the fragments that remain, that nothing be 
 lost." The moral of such lessons is very plain. 
 
 Not less significant are those which may be studied in the 
 designs of the body during its development. All these are 
 instances of present things having their true purpose in some 
 future state. 
 
 Let me endeavour to illustrate some of them. 
 I have here models of the changes that the chick undergoes 
 in its development ; and what they show might suffice for 
 teaching the development of higher creatures. Now, nearly 
 all we see here is the working out of a design, which cannot 
 have its full end till some future time. These wings and legs — 
 of what avail are they to the prisoner in the shell ? Their 
 purpose is not yet fulfilled ; they are for the future. But if 
 these be too plain to be impressive, let us look at more particular 
 things. 
 
 Observe the changes through which the heart passes, from its 
 first appearance as a little pulsating bag, to its being nearly fit 
 for the time when the hatched bird will breathe in the open air. 
 The changes are not merely a growth from a little heart to a 
 big one ; but are a series of acquirements of more complex 
 shapes ; so that the heart, which at first is a simple bag, then 
 
162 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 becomes very curved, and then divides into two, and then into 
 three and four, cavities. Now, doubtless, in each of these 
 conditions, the heart is exactly appropriate to the contemporary 
 state of the other organs, and the circumstances of the time of 
 life ; but each of them is, besides, a necessary stage of transition 
 towards that more perfect state, that fitness for more complex 
 duties, which the heart attains when the bird is born to breathe 
 with lungs in the open air. 
 
 But I would descend yet lower, and, magnifying the wonders 
 of these plans for the future, by diminishing (as it may seem 
 to some) the importance of the objects in which they are dis- 
 played, would trace the development of a single blood-cell in a 
 tadpole — i.e. in the young fish-like embryo of a frog, such as 
 nearly every pool would supply in the spring-time, and such as 
 magnified sketches would fully illustrate. 
 
 By a blood-cell I mean one of those microscopic particles by 
 which the blood is coloured red : particles so minute that, in 
 our own blood, about ten millions might lie on a square inch of 
 surface. 
 
 In the earliest period of active life of these tadpoles, the 
 little black and fish-like body is composed almost wholly of 
 minute cells, among which you can trace, with even powerful 
 microscopes, scarce any difference. You could not tell the 
 future destiny of any of them by their present characters ; they 
 look all alike. But presently, as they increase in number, a 
 differencing begins among them, and a sorting of them ; and 
 some arrange themselves for a spinal column, and some for 
 muscles ; and some are seen to be placed where the first streams 
 of blood are to run ; and some are clustered where the heart 
 will be. At first, those that are to be blood-cells are round, 
 and darkly shaded, and contain yellowish particles, many of 
 which are like four-sided crystals of some fatty substance. Butj 
 in a day or two, the cells begin to move and circulate in th& 
 channels in which they were arranged ; and then, as we watch 
 them day by day, they gradually change. The particles within 
 them become smaller and less numerous, and collect near tfi 
 their borders ; while their centres, clearing up, show an enclosed 
 smaller body or nucleus. Moreover, as these changes proceed, 
 the cells which were before colourless acquire gradually a 
 deeper and deeper blood- tint, and exchange their round for an 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY 163 
 
 oval shape ; till, by the time that all the particles they first 
 contained are cleared away, as if by solution, they have become 
 perfect blood-cells, nearly like those which colour the blood of 
 the completely developed frog. 
 
 The time required for these changes depends much on the 
 temperature and degree of light to which the creature is exposed. 
 It may vary from one to three or more weeks ; and we can 
 thus deliberately watch the development of a blood-cell, day 
 by day, until it reaches that which we may call its perfection. 
 In this state the cells abide for a time, unchanging ; and then 
 decline and give place to another set of blood-cells, each of 
 which is developed through a series of changes different, indeed, 
 from those that I have described, but not less numerous or 
 complex. 
 
 Now, such is the life, up to the period of perfection, of every 
 blood-cell in this trivial creature. And so it is in ourselves. Of 
 the millions of those cells that colour our blood, not one reaches 
 its perfection but through changes as numerous and great as 
 these. 
 
 Perhaps the wonder is augmented if we think that, in the 
 embryo, the changes proceed, with equal steps, in all the cells 
 at once : there is exact concert among them ; if I may so speak, 
 they all keep time. Nor is the harmony limited to them : for 
 their development is exactly adjusted to that of every other 
 part ; successive changes are exactly concurrent in every part 
 at once ; so that, though all are continually changing, they 
 never lose their mutual fitness. 
 
 I might cite more instances of these plans for futurity ; but 
 they are nearly infinite ; for in truth (and what a moral there 
 is in such a truth !) in the living world, nothing is made at once 
 fit for the highest purposes of which it may be capable. In all 
 the countless crowds of living beings — in all the countless 
 particles of each — there is not one but in the history of its life 
 we may read a gradual attainment of its highest destiny : not 
 one but has a time in which its true purpose is yet future, its 
 true design yet unfulfilled ; and, although, even in its rudiment, 
 it is not useless, yet there will be a time when, with higher 
 powers, it will take part in the designs of some more perfect 
 state. So wide is that law, which has its highest instance in 
 the history and future destiny of man himself. 
 
164 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 But the evidence of the design of living bodies for conditions 
 that are yet future, seems to culminate in the proofs of their 
 capacity to repair injuries, and to recover from diseases. 
 
 It is surely only because it is so familiar that we think lightly, 
 if at all, of the fact that living bodies are capable of repairing 
 most of the injuries they may sustain ; and that, in this capacity, 
 they show that provision has been made in them, for events of 
 which it is not certain whether they will ever occur to them or 
 not. When we contemplate the perfect living body — the exact 
 fitness of every part for its office, not as an independent agent, 
 but as one whose work must be done in due proportion with 
 that of many others, is a very marvellous thing ; but it seems 
 much more marvellous that, in the embryo, each of these parts 
 was made fit for offices and relations that were then future ; 
 but surely more marvellous than all it is that each of these, 
 when perfect, should still have capacity for right action in 
 events that are not only future, but unlikely ; that are indeed 
 possible, but are in only so low a degree probable, that if ever 
 they happen they will be called accidents — as things not to be 
 expected or provided for. 
 
 Let me describe a process of repair, and describe it so simply, 
 as it might be to schoolboys. 
 
 All know, or can feel, their Achilles-tendons behind their 
 ankles, and that these, strong as they are, are sometimes 
 broken by a violent contraction of their muscles. I know not 
 how small — how almost infinitely small — the chance is that any 
 given man, or quadruped, would ever break this or any other 
 part ; but small as the chance may be, ample provision is made 
 for its repair. How this is accomplished may be again 
 illustrated by diagrams. 
 
 When the tendon in such an animal as a rabbit is divided, its 
 pieces separate to nearly an inch apart, the upper piece being 
 drawn up by the unrestricted action of its muscles. The 
 muscles, no longer fastened by the tendon to the heel-bone, are 
 thus rendered useless ; and the object of the reparative process 
 must be to form a bond of connexion between the separated 
 pieces of -the tendon. 
 
 In the two days following such an injury, all the structures 
 between and around the ends of the divided tendon appear 
 soaked with a half-liquid substance, the product of inflamma- 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY 165 
 
 tion. And thus far we see no plan for uniting the separated 
 pieces ; there is no more of this new substance in the line 
 between them than there is around them ; and all the new 
 substance appears alike. But in the course of two days more, 
 we find that fresh material is deposited between the separated 
 pieces of the tendons, and that it is firmer than that around, 
 and has firm hold on the ends of the separated pieces, and 
 connects them, though as yet (if I may so say) only clumsily. 
 After this, however, each day finds the connecting substance 
 becoming firmer, tougher, and more like the texture of the 
 tendon itself. Each day, too, it becomes more defined from 
 the surrounding parts ; and this it does, not only because itself 
 becomes more exactly shaped, but because they regain their 
 natural texture. And observe the distinct design which is 
 shown in this contrast. At first, all the parts at and about the 
 seat of injury were soaked with a similar material ; but now,, 
 that portion of this material, which lay in the place for the 
 formation of the connecting bond, has remained and contributed 
 to the repair ; but that portion of it which was more remote, 
 and could serve no Useful purpose, has been cleared away. 
 
 At the end of a week, in the rabbit, a complete cord-like bond 
 of union is formed, and the muscles can act again. By this 
 time, too, the bond has gained nearly the perfect texture and 
 the toughness of the original tendon. I once tried the strength 
 of such a bond of connexion, which had been forming for ten 
 days after the division of the Achilles-tendon of a young rabbit. 
 Having removed it from the dead body, I suspended weights 
 upon it, and, after bearing weights of twenty, thirty, forty, and 
 fifty pounds, it was at length broken by a weight of fifty-six 
 pounds. But surely the strength it showed was very wonderful, 
 if we remember that it was not more than the sixth of an inch 
 in its greatest thickness, and that it was wholly formed in ten 
 days, in the leg of a rabbit scarcely more than a pound in 
 weight. 
 
 I might illustrate the process of repair by instances as perfect 
 as these, observed after injuries of many, almost of any, parts. 
 And I might, as in the instance of development, magnify its 
 excellence by showing it in what we are apt to call trivial 
 creatures, or even by showing that, in general, those lower 
 species of animals, that have least means of escape or defence 
 
166 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 from mutilation, appear to be endowed with the most ample 
 powers of repair. But time will not permit this, nor yet that 
 I should show how many lessons of practical utility might be 
 engrafted on the teaching of a process such as this, or how the 
 main principles of the surgery of injuries are based on the 
 recognition of the natural power of recovery. Nearly its whole 
 practice consists in the prevention of any interference with that 
 to which there is, in the very nature of the body, as great a 
 tendency as there is for the embryo to be developed into the 
 perfect creature. Using the facts of the reparative process only 
 for the present purpose of showing how physiology might be 
 taught as the chief science of designs, I would say that the 
 arguments of design, which are here displayed, are such as 
 cannot be impugned by the suspicion^ that the events among 
 which each living thing is cast have determined its adaptation 
 to them ; because the adaptations here noted prove capacities 
 for things that are future, and only not impossible. 
 
 I will mention but one more instance of general design, which 
 I think should not be omitted in the teaching of physiology to 
 whatever class of students : that, namely, of the adaptation 
 of animals in their decay ; how, as they do not live, so neither 
 do they decay nor die, for themselves alone, but ministering to 
 others' good. 
 
 The chief evidence of this is in the provision that the decaying 
 parts of animals yield the materials from which the vegetable 
 kingdom derives its chief supply of food. In the ordinary 
 decomposition of the dead body, many of the products are the 
 very materials from which, as they are mingled with the earth 
 and atmosphere, each plant takes its food. But it is not alone 
 through this decay in death that animals restore to the 
 vegetable world the materials which they have, for their own 
 food, derived from it. The same rule is fulfilled in the decay 
 of life ; i.e. in those changes which occur when the particles of 
 the animal body, having served their purpose, or lived their 
 full time in it, are then to be cast out as refuse. For in all these 
 changes, which are a part of that constant mutation of particles 
 through which the body remains, through all the time of 
 vigorous life, the same, though continually changing — in all 
 these, the material which is passing out, as refuse, gradually 
 approximates, in its transition, to the inorganic state of matter. 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY 167 
 
 It is so with the carbonic acid and other exhalations from the 
 lungs and skin, and with all the class of substances excreted. 
 And thus, every form of degeneration or decay, whether in life 
 or after death, may be described as a series of changes, through 
 which the elements of organic bodies, instead of being on a 
 sudden and with violence dispersed, are gradually collected into 
 those lower combinations in which they may best rejoin the 
 inorganic world ; they are such changes that every creature 
 may be said to decay and die and cast out its refuse in the form 
 which may best fit it to discharge its share in the economy of 
 the world — either by supplying nutriment to other organisms, 
 or by taking its right part in the adjustment of the balance held 
 between the organic and inorganic masses. 
 
 I have thus endeavoured to fulfil my office, and to show how 
 the general teaching of physiology might do good among its 
 students. I think its advantages are such as might be appre- 
 hended by students of all classes in society. I suppose, too, 
 that for all that part of it which can be applied in the main- 
 tenance of health the merit of utility would be admitted ; and 
 that, in general terms, it would be allowed that the study of 
 designs and final causes should be mingled with other studies 
 in any scheme of education by which it is proposed that the 
 whole mind should be disciplined, and all modes of reasoning 
 should be taught. 
 
 But still, the question may be asked, is it possible that 
 knowledge such as this, of the methods of design, will rest, with 
 any influence, in a mind that must be engrossed in urgent 
 business, or in household cares ; harassed, perhaps, in struggles 
 against poverty, or dissipated in the luxuries of wealth ? It 
 may be very well (some will say) to teach these things to the 
 young, but men and women have other works and other 
 pleasures to pursue. 
 
 I know all this ; and I have overshot my mark if I have 
 Urged any teaching of which the effects would interfere with 
 devotion to the necessary works of later life. But I suppose 
 that, if any one will watch his thoughts for a few days, or even 
 la, few hours, he will find that, however engrossing may be his 
 Icares or his pleasures, however earnest his attention to what 
 seems his most urgent need, there are yet intermingling trains 
 
168 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 of thought quite alien from these : trains into which the mind 
 falls, it knows not how, but in which it will wander as if resolute 
 to refresh itself. Now these must be provided for ; and so it 
 must be an object of all education to supply, in early life, those 
 studies from which, in later years, may arise reflections that 
 may mingle happily with the business thoughts of common 
 days ; that may suggest to the reason, or even to the imagina- 
 tion, some hidden meaning, some future purpose, some noble 
 end, in the things about us. Reflections such as these, being 
 interwoven with our common thoughts, may often bring to our 
 life a tone of joy, which its general aspect would not wear ; like 
 brilliant threads shot through the texture of some sombre 
 fabric, giving lustre to its darkness. 
 
 But besides this happy influence of the general impressions 
 that might remain in the mind from the early teaching of 
 physiology, I claim for it the hope that its principles might 
 read to some minds lessons of the truest wisdom. 
 
 The student of Nature's purposes should surely be averse 
 from leading a purposeless existence. Watching design in 
 everything around him, he could not fail, one would think, to 
 reflect often on the purpose of his own existence. And doing 
 so, if his mind were imbued with the knowledge of the mutual 
 fitness in which all the members of his body, and all the parts 
 of the whole organic world, subsist and minister to each other's 
 good, he could not conclude that he exists for his own sake 
 alone, or that happiness would be found separate from the 
 offices of mutual help and of universal good-will. One who is 
 conversant with things that have a purpose in the future, 
 higher than that which they have yet fulfilled, would nevejj 
 think that his own highest destiny is yet achieved. Though 
 his place among men might be only like that of a single particle 
 • — like that of a single blood-cell of the body — yet would h( 
 strive to concur, and take his share, in all progressive good 
 Nor would he count that, with his life ended, his purpose woulc 
 be attained ; but by teaching, or by record, or by some othaj 
 of those means through which, in the history of our race, thing! J 
 that in their rudiments seemed trivial have been developed int(| 
 great results, he would strive to " achieve at least some useful 
 work, the fruit whereof might abide." Conscious of an immorta 
 nature, and of desires and capacities for knowledge, whicl 
 
THE STUDY OF PHYSIOLOGY 169 
 
 cannot be satisfied in this world, he would be sure that the 
 great law of progress, from a lower to a higher state, would not 
 be abrogated in the Divine government of that part of him 
 which cannot perish, and is not yet perfect. In him, even the 
 understanding would be assured that, " as we have borne the 
 image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the 
 heavenly " ; for that is the true lesson of development. 
 
 And because it abounds in lessons such as these, I claim for 
 physiology the pre-eminence among all sciences, for the clear 
 and full analogies which it displays between truths natural and 
 revealed : and I would teach it everywhere ; looking to its 
 help, by these analogies, to prove the concord between know- 
 ledge and belief, and to mediate in the ever-pending conflict of 
 intellect and faith. 
 
ON THE IMPORTANCE OF THE STUDY OF 
 
 ECONOMIC SCIENCE AS A BRANCH OF 
 
 EDUCATION FOR ALL CLASSES 
 
 A LECTURE DELIVERED AT THE ROYAL INSTITUTION OF 
 GREAT BRITAIN 
 
 By W. B. HODGSON, LL.D. 
 
 " Ignorance does not simply deprive us of advantages ; it leads us 
 to work our own misery ; it is not merely a vacuum, void of know- 
 ledge, but a plenum of positive errors, continually productive of 
 unhappiness. This remark was never more apposite than in the case 
 of Political Economy."— Samuel Bailey's Discourses, etc., p. 121. 
 1852. 
 
 " If a man begins to forget that he is a social being, a member of 
 a body, and that the only truths which can avail him anything, the 
 only truths which are worthy objects of his philosophical search, are 
 those which are equally true for every man, which will equally avail 
 every man, which he must proclaim, as far as he can, to every man, 
 from the proudest sage to the meanest outcast, he enters, I believe, 
 into a lie, and helps forward the dissolution of that society of which 
 he is a member." — Rev. C. Kingsley's Alexandria and her Schools, 
 L. ii, p. 66. 1854. 
 
 " A man will never be just to others who is not just to himself, 
 and the first requisite of that justice is that he should look every 
 obligation, every engagement, every duty in the face. This applies 
 as much to money as to more serious affairs, and as much to nations 
 as to men." — Times, June 6, 1854. 
 
 It was truly said in this room, some weeks ago, by one whose 
 departure from London we must all regret — Professor Edward 
 Forbes — that " It is the nature of the human mind to desire and\ 
 seek a law." The higher desires of man have not been left, any 
 more than his lower, without their object and their fulfilment, 
 and just as the bodily appetite desires food, while the earth i 
 yields stores of nourishment- — as the imagination craves for I 
 beauty, and beauty is on every .side, so, responding to man's J 
 desire for law, does all Nature bear the impress of law. Not to I 
 the ignorant or careless eye, however, does law anywhere I 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 171 
 
 reveal itself. The discovery of its traces is the student's rich 
 and ever fresh reward. To men in general, the outward sense 
 reports only a number of detached phenomena ; their relations 
 become gradually apparent to him only whose mental vision is 
 acute enough, and whose gaze is steady enough, to behold 
 them. Science, therefore, consists not in the accumulation of 
 heterogeneous facts — any more than the random up-piling of 
 stones is architecture — but in the detection of the principles 
 which correlate facts even the most dissimilar and anomalous, 
 and of the order which binds the parts into a whole. Science 
 is, in brief, the pursuit of law ; and the history of science is 
 the record of the steps by which man in this pursuit rises 
 through classifications, of which the last is ever more compre- 
 hensive than its predecessors, from the complexity of countless 
 individuals to the simplicity of the groups, and from the 
 diversity of the many, at least towards the oneness of the 
 universal. 
 
 The discoveries, however, which it needed a Newton or a 
 Cuvier to make, may be rendered intelligible in their results, if 
 not always in their processes, to ordinary understandings ; and 
 whether our knowledge be superficial or profound, the belief 
 in the omnipresence of law, in at least the physical world, has 
 long ago taken its place in the convictions of the least instructed 
 man. Let any one, then, who can realize mentally the difference 
 between the aspect which the starry heavens bear to the quite 
 ignorant beholder, and that which those same heavens present 
 to the man most slightly acquainted with the discoveries of 
 astronomy, or between the appearances of the vegetable world 
 before and after some acquaintance with Vegetable Physiology : 
 but who has never thoughtfully considered the phenomena of 
 industrial life — let such a one station himself, say, on London 
 Bridge, at high tide, and in the busy hour of day ; let him watch 
 the ever-flowing streams of human beings, each bound on his 
 several errand, — the seemingly endless succession of vehicles, 
 with their freight, animate and inanimate ; let him look down 
 the river, and observe the number and variety of shipping, 
 coming and departing from and to all parts of the world, 
 remote or near ; let him observe, as he strolls onwards, the 
 shops, and warehouses, and wharves, and arsenals, and docks, 
 with their overflowing stores, the almost interminable lines of 
 
172 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 streets with houses of every size and kind, each tenanted by its 
 respective occupants ; • the railway stations from which and to 
 which go and come, hourly, thousands of human beings, and 
 the produce of the industry of millions of human beings ; the 
 electric telegraph, transmitting from town to town — nay, from 
 land to land — the outward symbols of thought, with almost the 
 proverbial speed of the inward thought itself ; let him consider 
 that within the range of a few miles of ground that produces, 
 directly, none of the necessaries of life,* are gathered together 
 more than 2,000,000 of men, women, and children, at the rate, 
 in some parts, of 186,000 to the square mile ; let him ponder 
 how it is that all these people are daily fed, and clothed, and 
 lodged, — how it is that all these things have been produced 
 and are maintained ; let him further consider that this stupen- 
 dous spectacle is but a sample of what is going on, with great 
 varieties, in so many other regions of the world ; that people 
 separated by thousands of miles of land and sea, who never 
 saw each other, who, it may be, scarcely know of each other's 
 existence, are busily providing for each other's wants, and each 
 procuring his own sustenance by ministering to others' neces- 
 sities or desires ; — and then let him, without at all losing sight 
 of the too obvious evil mixed up with all this, seriously ask 
 himself, is this vast field of contemplation the theatre also of 
 law, which binds the several parts together ; or is it a mere 
 giddy and fortuitous dance of discordant and jostling atoms — 
 in a word, a huge weltering chaos, waiting the fiat of some 
 Monsieur Cabet or Baboeuf to reduce it to order, and convert 
 it into a cosmos, by persuading or compelling the several 
 atoms to adopt some cunningly devised principle of so-called 
 " organization of labour " ? To this question Economic Science 
 professes, at least, to supply the answer ; and if science be the 
 pursuit of law, and deserve the title in proportion to its success 
 in that pursuit, the claims of Economic Science must be tested 
 by the nature of the reply it gives. 
 
 * " Moyhanger, a New-Zealander, who was brought to England, was struck 
 with especial wonder, in his visit to London, at the mystery, as it appeared to 
 him, how such an immense population could be fed ; as he saw neither cattle 
 nor crops. Many of the Londoners, who would perhaps have laughed at the 
 savage's admiration, would probably have been found never to have even 
 thought of the mechanism which is here at work." — Archbishop Whately, 
 Introd. Lect. to Polit. Econ.,L.iv, p. 97. Second Edition. 1832. 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 173 
 
 It may occur to some who hear me that the term law is not 
 applicable in the same sense or way to the various classes of 
 phenomena which I have casually indicated. In the first — 
 the region of astronomy — law suggests the idea of some 
 mighty force which irresistibly compels motions on the grandest 
 scale ; in the second — the vegetable world — it suggests rather 
 a mere principle of arrangement, according to which certain 
 unresisting bodies are distributed ; while in the third — the 
 Economic World of Man — a vast difference appears between it 
 and the other two, inasmuch as we have here a multitude of 
 independent intelligences and wills, acting consciously and 
 voluntarily from within, in every variety of direction, and often 
 in seeming opposition to each other. This difficulty merits a 
 consideration, serious if brief. Between the first and second 
 the difference is not real, but only apparent. The growth of a 
 plant is as wonderful — as grand an exercise of power as the 
 revolution of a planet ; and gravitation, as we call it, no more 
 than growth, is in itself a power ; both are alike expressions 
 and results of that will which is in the universe the only real 
 power — the only true cause. Our very word order has a 
 double sense — arrangement and command : so natural is it for 
 us to identify the one with the other, and to believe that 
 arrangement or system exists only by command or law. And, 
 in truth, throughout all things, however diverse the special 
 phenomena, whether it be the sweep of a comet, or the budding 
 of a flower, we can recognize still only a principle or method of 
 arrangement as the result of will ; and it is because these are 
 so closely and invariably connected in our minds that we are 
 so apt to use the word law sometimes for the one, and some- 
 times for the other, personifying Law, just as we do Providence 
 in ordinary speech. 
 
 The real difficulty, however, lies in the third case, that is, the 
 subject immediately before us. Having seen the prima facie 
 and analogical improbability of the notion that the economic 
 world is lawless, the question arises — in what way does law 
 operate amid so many seemingly independent and conflicting 
 individualities ? I have no desire, and there is happily no- 
 need, for long or subtle disquisition. I would merely submit a 
 consideration in itself quite simple, but fraught, if I mistake not, 
 with the most important practical results. In the purely 
 
174 * LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 inorganic world, law operates irresistibly, and command and 
 obedience are strictly coincident, co-extensive, and identical. 
 In the motions of the heavenly bodies, for example, there is no 
 eccentricity in the popular sense of the term ; even the orbit of 
 a comet, between whose successive reappearances many decades 
 of years and whole generations of men pass away, is absolutely 
 known — eclipses with the longest intervals are certainly fore- 
 told. The same fact holds in the organized but inanimate 
 world, as in the world both inanimate and unorganized. As we 
 ascend in the scale, and enter on the animate creation, we find 
 a like fixity and uniformity provided for to a very large extent by 
 that most marvellous faculty — Instinct, which guides almost 
 infallibly the lower orders of animals, which maintains an 
 almost precise sameness among the most distant generations, 
 and conducts all surely and unconsciously to the end of their 
 being. But Man is a being vastly more complex in his nature ; 
 he, too, has instincts, but these form a much smaller proportion 
 of his whole faculty ; * with all that the lower orders of being 
 have, he has much more besides — moral faculties, reason, and 
 will, both the latter differing vastly in degree, if not in kind, 
 from those of any other creature. The part which he has to 
 play in creation is proportionally complex ; and here it is that 
 perplexity, and discord, and confusion begin to appear, or at 
 least chiefly manifest themselves. It is this surface confusion 
 which hides from us the central and pervading Law, and makes 
 it difficult to trace its operation. The laws or conditions, 
 however, which determine human well-being are really as fixed 
 and absolute as are the laws of planetary motion ; but man, 
 though so constituted as to desire and seek his well-being, has 
 not an infallible perception of that in which it consists, or of 
 the means by which this end is to be attained. We find 
 throughout, this distinction between man and the lower 
 animals. Thus other animals are gifted by nature with the 
 clothing suitable to their condition, and it even varies in colour 
 and thickness according to the seasons. Man alone has with 
 effort to construct what clothing he requires ; so, more or less, 
 
 * " It would seem that it is in the proportion which their instincts an<; 
 intelligence bear to each other that the difference between the mind of man anc 
 that of other animals chiefly consists. Reasoning is not peculiar to the former 
 nor is instinct peculiar to the latter. — Psychological Inquiries, by B. C. B, 
 p. 186. London. 1854. 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 175 
 
 is it with food ; so is it with shelter. Is this an inferiority on 
 the part of man ? Surely not ; for it is by this very discipline 
 that his higher faculties are called into play, and enlarged, and 
 strengthened. What appears a penalty is, in reality, a blessing. 
 Nature's very provision for the comfort of bird or beast seems, 
 at the same time, the sentence of incapacity for improvement. 
 Man, however (I speak now of the individual), is progressive, 
 being capable of improvement ; and he is stimulated to improve- 
 ment because his wants are not supplied for him, but he is 
 compelled to supply them for himself, and his desires ever grow 
 with the means of their gratification. The whole universe is 
 thus, in truth, a great educational organization — a great school, 
 — for the calling out and the direction of what powers are in 
 man latent. But his progress is not a smooth advance from 
 good to better ; his way lies through evils of many kinds — -evils 
 attendant inseparably on defective knowledge and ill-regulated 
 desires. Law, which in the physical universe operates uni- 
 formly, here operates, so to speak, Bi-formly ; the law wears, 
 Janus-like, two faces ; but it is one law nevertheless. It 
 assumes, however, a twofold sanction, reward for obedience, 
 punishment for disobedience, each being but the complement 
 and corollary of the other. Thus the pallid face and irritable 
 nerves of the sedentary student, the ruddy cheek and iron 
 muscles of the ploughman — the trembling hand and bloodshot 
 eyes of the drunkard, the steady pulse and clear open counte- 
 nance of the temperate man — are the results not of two 
 antagonistic laws, but of one law, vindicating its majestic 
 universality in the one case not less than in the other. So is it 
 with the stagnant and pestilential swamp as contrasted with 
 the cultivated plain ; the ruined village with the thriving town ; 
 the land of inhabitants few but poor with the land of inhabitants 
 many and rich. It is this difference, accordingly, which in the 
 human sphere translates Law into Duty, and the Must of the 
 Physical World into the Ought of the Moral. Wordsworth, the 
 most philosophical of poets, has not failed to detect their 
 kinship, however, when, in his noble " Ode to Duty," he says : 
 
 Flowers laugh before thee on their beds, 
 And fragrance in thv footing treads : 
 Thou dost preserve the stars from wrong, 
 And the most ancient heavens through Thee are fresh and strong. 
 
176 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 Good, then, being the great end of all the established condi- 
 tions of our life, evil is, and must ever be, the result of their 
 violation. As Paley has said that no nerve has ever been 
 discovered whose function lies in the giving of pain, so, in all 
 things, pain or evil follows the breach, not the observance, of a 
 law. But this very pain or evil is not in its end vindictive, or 
 simply punitive ; its aim is reformation for the future, not 
 merely punishment for the past. The child burns its finger in 
 the candle flame, cuts its hand with a knife, makes a false step 
 and falls, and profits all its life through by the lessons it has 
 gained. And so the exhaustion of mind or body from over- 
 exertion, the headache from intemperance, are Nature's solemn 
 warnings, tending powerfully to prevent future transgression. 
 Man's successes and his failures are both, in different ways, 
 instructive ; both help him in his career. 
 
 But Man is progressive not only as an individual, but as a 
 race. Here, still more, is his superiority to all other animals 
 apparent. He is, in some measure, the heir of the discoveries, 
 the inventions, the thoughts, and the labours, of all foregoing 
 time ; and each man has, in some measure, for his helper, the 
 results of the accumulated knowledge of the world. But the 
 transmission of experience and knowledge from generation to 
 generation is the fundamental condition of progress throughout 
 the successive ages of the life of mankind. To a large extent, 
 of course, we cannot but profit from the labour of our prede- 
 cessors ; all those products, and instruments, and agencies, 
 which we style " civilization," our roads, our railways, our 
 canals, our courts of law, our houses of legislature, and a 
 thousand other embodiments of the combined and successive 
 efforts of many generations, are our inheritance by birth ; but 
 the very guidance and employment of these for their improve- 
 ment, or even for their maintenance, require ever increased 
 knowledge and intelligence. The higher the civilization that a 
 community has attained, the more, not the less, necessary is it 
 that its members, as one race succeeds another, should be 
 enlightened and informed. No inheritance of industrial pro- 
 gress can dispense with individual intelligence and judgment 
 any more than the accumulation of books can save from the 
 need of learning to read and write. But thousands of human 
 beings, born ignorant, are left to repeat unguided the same 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 177 
 
 experiments, and to incur the same failures and penalties as" 
 their parents — as their ancestors. Where these stumbled, or 
 slipped, and fell, they too stumble, or slip, and fall, rising again 
 perhaps, but not uninjured by the fall. Nature teaches, it is 
 true, by penalty as well as by reward ; but it is surely wise, as 
 far as may be, to anticipate in each case this rough teaching, to 
 aid it by rational explanation, and to confine it within safe 
 bounds. The world, doubtless, advances in spite of all.* That 
 industrial progress is what it is proves that the amount of 
 observance of law is, on the whole, largely in excess of its 
 violation ; were it otherwise, society would retrograde, and 
 humanity would perish. This predominance of good results 
 from the very constitution of human nature and of the world, 
 by which the individual, working even unconsciously and for 
 his own ends, and learning even by failure, achieves a good 
 wider than that he contemplates, and by which progress, in 
 spite of delay and fluctuation, is maintained alike in the 
 individual and the race. But how shall the evil which yet mars 
 and deforms our civilization be abated, if not removed, while 
 progress is made more rapid, and sure, and equable ? Both 
 depend alike on increased observance of law ; and it is by 
 diffusing knowledge of its existence and operation that obser- 
 vance of law is rendered more general and less precarious. If, 
 then, we would convert not only disobedience into obedience, 
 but obedience blind, unconscious, and precarious, into obedience 
 conscious, intelligent, and habitual, we must teach all to under- 
 stand the nature of the laws on which the universal well-being 
 depends, and train all in those habits which facilitate and 
 secure the observance of those laws.f 
 
 Assuming, then, that in the industrial or economic sphere 
 the laws of human well-being are as fixed as in any other, and 
 that what measure of well-being we anywhere behold is the 
 result of obedience, conscious or unconscious, to those laws, we 
 ought next to inquire what those laws are. As a preliminary, 
 let us take a hasty survey of the steps by which any people 
 ascends from barbarism to civilization, from destitution to 
 
 * " There is this difference between the body politic and the physical frame. 
 Life is ' a harp of thousand strings, that dies if one be gone ' ; but the life of 
 society is still living and tuneful, though many strings be broken." — Times, 
 June 8, 1854. 
 
 f Vide Appendix, p. 200. 
 
178 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 comfort, from poverty to wealth. From the review alike of 
 good and of evil, we shall be able to extract the principles which 
 run throughout, and which both good and evil concur to attest. 
 In barbarous countries we find men scattered in small numbers 
 over wide extent of territory, living by hunting or fishing, or 
 both combined ; every man supplies his own wants directly ; 
 he makes his own bow and arrows ; he kills a buffalo for 
 himself ; with hides stripped and dressed by himself, he con- 
 structs his own robe or tent ; he lives from hand to mouth, 
 feasting voraciously to-day, then starving till another supply 
 of food can be obtained ; ever on the verge of famine, and 
 eking out a precarious subsistence by robbery and murder, 
 which he calls war. All but the strong perish in early years, 
 and the average duration of life is low. If we contemplate the 
 pastoral life instead of that of hunting and fishing, still we find 
 that large tracts of country are needed for the maintenance of 
 few people. If the earth be at all cultivated, it is with the 
 rudest implements, and the produce is proportionally scanty. 
 So long as each man is entirely occupied in providing for his 
 own wants, progress is impossible. So soon, however, as by 
 the gradual and slow introduction of better implements, and 
 the acquirement of greater skill, agriculture becomes more 
 productive, and the labour of one man becomes sufficient for 
 the support of more than one, of some, of many ; the first 
 condition of progress is realized, and the labour of some or 
 many is now set free for other occupations. Food and clothing, 
 fuel and shelter, are the first necessaries of life. But instead of 
 every man preparing all these for himself directly, instead of 
 every man making for himself all that he requires, gradually 
 one man begins to construct one article, or set of articles only, 
 while another devotes himself to another, with a consequent 
 great increase of productiveness in each case, from increased 
 skill and economy of time ; in other words, the division of i 
 labour is begun. But so soon as the industry of the community 
 is thus divided, and that of each thus restricted, as each still 
 requires all the articles which before he constructed for himself, 
 he can obtain them only from those who employ themselves in 
 their production ; and this he can do only by giving some of 
 his own product as an equivalent, in other words, by exchange. 
 This transaction gives meaning to the term value, which 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 179 
 
 denotes simply the amount of commodities that can be procured 
 in exchange for any other commodity. Division of labour and 
 exchange are thus simultaneous in their origin. From the 
 introduction of exchange, industrial progress gains a fresh life. 
 Industry having been thus rendered more productive than 
 before, subsistence is now provided for a larger number of 
 persons than before. The reward of industry increasing with 
 its productiveness, ingenuity is stimulated to the invention of 
 improved methods, and of improved instruments called tools, 
 or, as they become more complicated and powerful, machines, 
 though a machine is in principle only a tool ; and the very 
 argument which is good, if good at all, against a steam-plough 
 is good against the common plough, or a hoe, or a spade, or a 
 stake hardened in the fire. 
 
 Population having meantime increased, the land available 
 for production becomes more and more fully appropriated ; and 
 as one portion is more fertile, or more advantageously situated 
 than another, it becomes more advantageous to pay a portion 
 of the produce for the right to cultivate a more productive soil, 
 than to cultivate an inferior soil even for nothing ; e.g. to pay 
 ten measures of grain for a soil which produces fifty measures, 
 than nothing for a soil which produces, say, thirty or thirty-five ; 
 and hence arises what we call rent. But, meantime also, the 
 productiveness of industry having become ever greater in pro- 
 portion to the consumption of its produce, the process of 
 accumulation goes on, and the unconsumed results of previous 
 labour, which, however various their kinds, we term wealth, 
 swell to larger proportions. But this wealth is not equally 
 possessed by all ; one man, from superior skill, or intelligence, 
 or economy, or other causes, coming to possess more than 
 others, while some, it may be, possess none at all. Mere labour, 
 however, without the results of foregone labour, embodied in 
 some form, can accomplish little ; while the results of foregone 
 labour, in whatever form embodied, need fresh labour in order 
 to become still more productive. Thus, e.g. a spade is a result 
 of past labour ; without it the labourer could accomplish little ; 
 and, on the other hand, the spade, without a labourer to wield 
 it, would be unproductive. Now, the spade here represents 
 that portion of wealth which is devoted to further production, 
 and which is called capital. Capital and labour are thus 
 
180 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 indispensable to each other. They may exist in different hands, 
 or in the same ; but they must co-exist, and co-operate. Thus 
 — if we suppose them to be in different hands — the owner of 
 the spade, whom we may call the capitalist, may undertake to 
 give the labourer a fixed compensation for his labour aided by 
 the spade (an amount which will more or less exceed, and can 
 in no case fall below, what the labourer without the spade can 
 earn), reserving for himself any surplus that may arise after 
 that labour is paid. In this case the labourer's reward is called 
 wages ; the capitalist's reward is called profit. Or the 
 capitalist may lend the spade to the labourer for a fixed return 
 (which will be somewhat less than, and which cannot exceed, 
 the difference in the labourer's productiveness, caused by the 
 spade), the labourer claiming as his own all that he can realize 
 over and above what he pays. In this case the labourer's 
 return, whatever it may be called, is partly wages and partly 
 profit, while the capitalist's return is termed interest, or much 
 better, usance, an obsolete English word, for it is really what is 
 paid for the use of capital in any form. If the capital and 
 labour be in the same hands, e.g. if the labourer own the spade 
 he uses, the joint return ever consists of the two items here 
 discriminated. 
 
 As industry extends and wealth increases, it is early found 
 necessary to provide for the security of property ; for the 
 suppression of violence and fraud ; and for the settlement of 
 disputes that will here and there arise, even without evil 
 intention on either side. Hence all the machinery of courts of 
 justice, and of government, from its highest to its lowest 
 functionary. As these, though not in themselves directly 
 producers, are indispensable to production, and exist for the 
 welfare of all, they must be maintained at the expense of all ; 
 hence comes taxation of various kinds, which it is the business 
 of the legislature to impose justly, and in the way least likely 
 to fetter industry, and prevent increase of wealth. 
 
 So far as we have hitherto seen, exchanges have as yet been 
 effected by direct giving and taking of commodity for com- 
 modity, or, as it is termed, barter ; but great and serious 
 difficulties attend this system, difficulties ever more deeply felt 
 as exchanges multiply and become more various ; the baker 
 may not want the shoemaker's shoes, if the latter want hi 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 181 
 
 bread ; but the latter may not want as much bread as equals 
 the value of a pair of shoes ; and payment by a half or a third 
 of a pair of shoes is impossible. A medium of exchange, 
 accordingly, is introduced ; usually the 'precious metals, as they 
 are called, the very word implying one of their fitnesses for the 
 task — viz. that in a small bulk they contain great value. The 
 non-liability to decay ; capability of division without loss ; 
 comparative exemption from fluctuations of supply ; and 
 facility of recognition, are among their other claims. Exchange, 
 thus facilitated by the adoption of a medium which all are 
 ready to receive, and by which most minute proportions of 
 value may be easily represented, proceeds with vastly increased 
 rapidity ; and value being thus measured habitually in money, 
 we have the new element of price. Though money in itself is 
 but a very small portion of the capital, and still less of the total 
 wealth, of a nation, it so habitually represents every kind of 
 capital and wealth that it conveniently becomes a synonym 
 for both, not, however, without some risk of mental confusion 
 and error as the result. 
 
 Exchanges becoming thus continually more frequent and 
 complicated, it is found convenient and advantageous, on the 
 principle of the division of labour, that a class of men should 
 devote themselves to conduct the business of exchange solely, 
 the work of production being left to others. By the introduc- 
 tion of merchants, who do not themselves produce, a greater 
 amount of production is attained, on the whole, than would be 
 possible if all both produced and exchanged without their 
 intervention. 
 
 But, for facility and frequency of exchange, even at home, 
 rapidity, and ease, and safety of communication are indis- 
 pensable ; good roads, swift conveyances, canals, and ulti- 
 mately railways arise, with their adjuncts of carriers and 
 couriers, and post-establishments, and telegraphs of ever 
 greater ingenuity and efficiency. 
 
 Exchange, which was at first confined within the limits of 
 :>ne country, soon extends to other countries, with an immense 
 advantage to all, for all are thus made partakers in the produc- 
 tions of each, which are more and more diverse according to 
 :heir diversity of climate. Foreign commerce, with all that it 
 nvolves of ships, and docks, and warehouses, is the most 
 
 M 
 
182 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 powerful stimulus to home industry. But exchange, whether 
 at home or abroad, is, in all cases, when analysed, simply each 
 man's giving something that he wants less, for something else 
 that he wants more. 
 
 As geographical knowledge and means of transit are increased, 
 numbers pass from one country to another ; from countries 
 densely to those less densely peopled ; from countries where 
 land is all appropriated to those where it is still unclaimed ; 
 from countries where capital and labour are comparatively 
 unproductive to those where both are more amply rewarded ; 
 new fields being thus perpetually opened up for human industry, 
 and increased enjoyment provided by fresh and ever augmented 
 interchange, both for those who go and for those who stay. 
 
 But long ere this, as yet the highest, stage of progress has! 
 been reached, the precious metals themselves have been found 
 incompetent to discharge the full duty of exchange ; and paper 
 money, or duly vouched promises to pay money, is introduced 
 with an ever more complicated machinery of bank-notes and 
 bills of exchange, for the management of which class of transac-| 
 tions a still further division of labour is introduced by meajnsj 
 of bankers, bill-brokers, and the other agents by whom what' 
 we call comprehensively credit is carried on. 
 
 But life and property are subject to contingencies which 
 involve serious loss, and which it is impossible always to 
 prevent. It is discovered that the evil results to individuals, 
 which would be ruinous to one, may, by combination, be distri- 
 buted over many. Hence insurances against fire, against death, 
 against disaster at sea, against hail-storms and diseases among 
 cattle, against railway accidents, and even against fraud on the 
 part of clerks or other assistants, all of which are based on 
 calculation of averages, this again being based on the conviction 
 that a certain regularity prevails among events even the most 
 anomalous and irregular. 
 
 And thus, step by step, by a strictly natural course, does thd 
 work of industrial progress go on, till we witness its gigantic 
 results in our own time and our own land — results of which thl 
 great Crystal Palace (the opening of which was not inaptly! 
 coincident with the day fixed for this exposition of the principles | 
 whose triumph it exemplifies) may be justly regarded as the 
 crowning and most, various illustration — raised, as it has been, 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 183 
 
 by voluntary combination, on strictly economic grounds, and 
 embracing within itself, in one vast space, examples of the 
 productions of the labour, the ingenuity, the fancy, the skill, 
 the science of all ages and of every land. 
 
 In this inevitably brief and incomplete sketch of the industrial 
 progress of the world, not only has much been omitted, but it 
 is to be observed that the steps do not always follow each other 
 in precisely the same order, and that much that is here recorded, 
 perforce, successively, takes place simultaneously. It is not 
 possible here or now to extract from even this most hasty 
 sketch the merely theoretic principles which it involves. This 
 is the business of a long course of lectures, and it is not, besides, 
 my purpose to expound Economic Science itself, any further 
 than may be indispensable to show its importance as a branch 
 of general instruction. Let us rather look at some of the great 
 practical lessons that may be deduced from it for the guidance 
 of individual conduct. 
 
 Everything, then, that we or others possess, is more or less 
 the result of human, that is, of individual, industry. It is 
 observable that not where nature itself is most prolific is human 
 labour the most productive ; so true is it that necessity is the 
 mother of invention and of industry as well. Truly has 
 Rousseau remarked, " In the south, men consume little " (he 
 might have said produce little) " on a grateful soil ; in the 
 north, men consume much " (and of course produce much) " on 
 a soil ungrateful." * Where man has most done for him, he 
 often does least for himself ; and though his labours must be 
 seconded by the productiveness of Nature, the latter is really 
 more dependent on the former than the former on the latter. 
 Now this law holds true of the future as well as of the present 
 or the past. Every human being must subsist on the produce 
 of his own industry, or on that of some one else. Industry, 
 then, is the first duty of him who would be honourably 
 independent. 
 
 But it is not by present labour, any more than by future, 
 that any man is really sustained. While the crop is growing, 
 for example, the labourer is fed by the grain of former harvests. 
 Now, if the produce of labour were consumed as fast as it is 
 produced, not only would progress be impossible, but life itself 
 * Emile, Liv. I. 
 
184 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 would be endangered, and would ere long cease. Hence the 
 duty of what is called, in its narrower sense, economy, or the 
 frugal and prudent consumption of what has been produced. 
 Disasters, too, will arise, which no human wisdom can prevent, 
 but against whose consequences it may provide. The very 
 progress of industry involves displacement of labour, though it 
 is not true that labour is so superseded, as the phrase is. The 
 invention of printing threw amanuenses out of their old employ- 
 ment, though it soon employed a thousand men instead of one. 
 During all such transitions, it is only by previous savings that 
 those thus affected can be maintained till they can adapt 
 themselves to the change. Again, the early years of every 
 human being are incapable of industrial effort, and the child 
 must be maintained by the previous labour of others. Upon 
 whom this duty fairly falls, whether on some abstraction that 
 we call the State, or society, or on the parents of the child to 
 whom his being is due, is a question which needs less to be 
 asked than merely to be suggested here. Again, the years of 
 labour are limited ; the evening of that night approaches in 
 which no man can work, and here is another call on the proceeds 
 of past industry. The very old, as well as the very young, must 
 be supported alike by foregone labour ; in the case of the young, 
 it must be by the labour of others ; in the case of the old, it 
 must be either by their own previous labour, or by that of their 
 children now grown up, or by that of society at large — which 
 way is best is surely not doubtful. During the years of active 
 life itself, sickness will sometimes invade, throwing men often 
 for long periods on the resources of the past. Hence the 
 necessity of forethought as regards equally the future of others 
 whom affection and duty alike commend to our care and our 
 own, when the days of decay and weakness shall arrive. Now, 
 forethought involves judgment, and diligence, and self-denial. 
 ( 1 ) As to j udgment. Earnings may be saved, but if injudiciously 
 invested, they may be lost. To take a simple case — hoarded 
 potatoes are a more precarious economy than hoarded grain ; 
 and so throughout where savings are invested through banks, 
 or building societies, or railway shares, or in any other way. 
 The division of labour itself calls for ever fresh exercise of 
 judgment. So long as each man produces all that he wants for 
 himself, he knows precisely what he wants, and how much ; 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 185 
 
 but so soon as labour is divided, each man produces not what 
 he wants himself, but what others want, or are supposed to 
 want. If, then, any one produce by mistake articles which 
 others do not want, or of a quality or to an extent at variance 
 with the demand, he suffers serious loss, it may be ruin. (2) As 
 to diligence. Without this, labour is little different from 
 idleness. But mere labour, however diligent, can accomplish 
 little unless guided by intelligence, for which, as the demands 
 of society increase, there is an ever louder call. Knowledge, 
 then, is indispensable to the attainment of any beyond the 
 lowest results of industry. The more we know of the nature 
 of that on which, and by which, and in which, and for which, 
 we work, the more likely, nay certain, is our work to turn to 
 good account. This knowledge, when embodied in practice 
 and confirmed by it, becomes skill. The very tools and 
 machines which some fancy supersede human labour and skill 
 are the results of both, and they render the former infinitely 
 more productive, and call for ever more of the latter for their 
 improvement, if not for their actual guidance. (3) As regards 
 self-denial. One of its most important forms is temperance, 
 without which labour, especially of the higher kinds, is pre- 
 carious, it may be impossible. As society advances, the 
 relations of man to his fellows become more and more numerous 
 and complex. Credit, as it is well called, holds a larger and 
 larger place, and reliance on each other's faith becomes more 
 and more important. Honesty, accordingly, whether in its 
 lower forms, such as punctuality, or in its higher, to which we 
 give the name integrity, is thus an indispensable condition of 
 human progress. Were the exceptions to this condition to 
 become much more frequent, the bonds of human society would 
 be proportionally loosened, and civilization would go backward. 
 In scarcely a subordinate degree are civility, courtesy, mutual 
 forbearance, and willingness to oblige, necessary to oil the 
 wheels of the social machine, which, without these, would move 
 but slowly and creakingly along. These things we all need in 
 our own case ; and to be received they must be given. 
 
 It is only in so far as all these qualities of diligence, and 
 economy, and skill, and forethought, and intelligence, and 
 temperance, and integrity, and courtesy, have been manifested 
 that wealth has been created, and that society in any age or 
 
186 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 country has advanced. It is just in so far as these have been 
 neglected that poverty, and misery, and evil, of every kind, 
 abound. Such are some of the chief practical lessons of 
 Economic Science when rightly studied. 
 
 And will any one ask, " Are these mere truisms the boasted 
 results of economic teaching ? " In reply, much may be said. 
 What is a truism to one mind, say to all here, may be really 
 unknown to thousands beyond these walls. In such subjects, 
 again, the profoundest truth is ever the simplest. It is its very 
 simplicity that blinds us to its value and comprehensiveness. 
 Further, we are so easily familiarized with the mere names of 
 duties, and so accustomed to assent with the lips to their 
 obligation, that we neglect to consider either their basis or their 
 practical working. We go on daily assenting to truths we daily 
 violate ; it is not uncommon to lecture on ventilation in rooms 
 whose atmosphere is stifling ; to eulogize economy in the midst 
 of reckless expenditure ; and health is sometimes injured by 
 very diligence in the study of its laws. What men all want is 
 not merely the discovery and promulgation of new truth, 
 however useful, but the freshening up of old truths long ago 
 admitted. The coins which we carry about with us, and which 
 pass continually from hand to hand, have had the sharpness of 
 their edges worn off, their legend all but effaced. We need to 
 have them cast anew into the mint of thought, and re-stamped 
 with their original " image and superscription." Rote-teaching 
 is pernicious in morals not less than in merely intellectual 
 matters. The explanation of a law, its demonstration, should 
 ever go hand in hand with its inculcation. For the sake of 
 those who may say, or at least think, " All this we knew long 
 ago," let me use an illustration from the quite parallel case of 
 Physiology. In my younger days I was accustomed to hear 
 much vague talk about air and exercise ; on all hands I heard 
 that nothing was so good as exercise and fresh air. Well, so 
 long as the restless activity of boyhood lasted, there was less 
 need for instruction on this head ; boys take fresh air and 
 exercise in blind obedience to a blessed law of their nature. 
 But when youth came on, and intellect became more mature, 
 and books began to push cricket from its throne, all the rumour 
 about air and exercise was quite inoperative to prevent long 
 days and late nights of sedentary position, of confinement in 
 
 
THF STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 187 
 
 close room , of hard work of the brain, while the circulation of 
 the blood /as impeded, the lungs laboured, the muscles ost 
 their energy, and the skin its freedom of transpiration and its 
 vigour to resist agencies from without. When, like most of 
 you, I listened in delight to the beautiful expositions of my 
 immediate predecessor, perhaps I was not alone in thinking 
 that, had we all been taught in early life the economy of the 
 lungs, and heart, and blood-vessels, and brain — had we been 
 shown that the blood which nourishes the body must be purified 
 by frequent contact with the outer air ; that for this purpose it 
 passes frequently through the lungs, receiving from the air fresh 
 life, while its impurities are thrown off ; that in the process of 
 breathing the air is rapidly deteriorated and rendered unfit to 
 sustain life, constant renovation being thus required ; that by 
 muscular compression consequent on exercise the circulation 
 is quickened, as well as the breathing, so that the blood is thus 
 more rapidly purified, the effete particles of matter are more 
 quickly removed, and our bodies in truth more frequently and 
 healthfully renewed — we should many of us have been spared 
 much suffering and much loss of power arising necessarily from 
 violation of the vital laws. And so with Economic Science. 
 It is of no avail to repeat by rote phrases about industry, and 
 temperance, and frugality, etc. The results of the observance 
 and of the violation of those duties, as exemplified in the actual 
 working of social life, must be clearly shown, and so enforced 
 that the knowledge shall be wrought into the very tissue and 
 substance of the mind, never to perish while life lasts, so that 
 all things shall be brought to the test of the principles thus 
 incorporated with the intellect itself. Further, in the case of 
 both sciences alike, mere teaching, or addressing of the intellect, 
 even if that be convinced, is not all, or enough. Training must 
 accompany teaching ; the formation of habits must go on with 
 the clearing of the intellectual vision. I speak not of schools 
 alone, or of homes alone ; in both must the embryo man be 
 accustomed, as well as told, to do what is right. He who has 
 once learned by habit the delight and the advantage of daily 
 ablution of the -whole body, or of daily exercise in all weathers, 
 in the open air, will not easily abandon or interrupt either of 
 these habits. And so with industry and the rest. Every fresh 
 act of obedience is no longer, as it were, the effort of a distinct 
 
188 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 volition, but an almost automatic repetition of an act first 
 commanded by reason. This conversion of the voluntary into 
 the spontaneous is the true guarantee for perseverance in any 
 line of conduct, the excellence of which has been already 
 recognized by the understanding. 
 
 The analogy between the Physiological and the Economic 
 Sciences, both in their nature and in their present position, 
 seems to me to hold throughout. Thus ignorance does not in 
 either confer any exemption from the evils attending the breach 
 of any law, however it may be admitted in extenuation at the 
 bar of human justice. The child who takes arsenic for sugar, 
 dies as surely as the wilful suicide. The youth launched on this 
 busy world without any of the knowledge here indicated, finds 
 Greek iambics, and even conic sections, of no guidance in its 
 industrial relations, and he suffers and fails accordingly. What 
 is the inference ? That ignorance should be removed, and 
 evil prevented, by early teaching, rather than left to the bitter 
 regimen of experience. Coleridge has finely compared experi- 
 ence to the stern lights of a Vessel, which illuminate only the 
 track over which it has passed. It is for us rather to fix the 
 light of knowledge on the prow, to illumine the course which 
 the ship has yet to take. It would surely be a great gain were 
 all offences against economic law reduced to the category of 
 wilful disobedience, in spite of knowledge ; for such, I firmly 
 believe, are, especially at the outset, vastly the minority. 
 
 Again : Health, much as it depends on individual observance 
 of its laws, is greatly dependent on their observance by others 
 also. The profligate parent transmits a feeble and sickly 
 organization to his child ; just as opposite conduct tends to 
 the opposite result. The pestilence which foulness in one part 
 of a city has bred, extends to other parts ; and the consequences 
 of the offence spread far beyond the original offender. So, 
 economically, does each man suffer for others' transgressions 
 besides his own. The idleness, and wastefulness, and intem- 
 perance of parents entail hunger, and raggedness, and every 
 form of misery on the unhappy children. The industrious, 
 and provident, and honest members of the community are 
 stinted in their means for the support of the idle, and improvi- 
 dent, and dishonest, and for their own protection against the 
 depredations of those who seek to live by others' labour rather 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 189 
 
 than their own. No law of our existence is more sure than 
 this. It is idle to cavil or complain. Let us rather see how the 
 recognition of this law should affect us. What is the practical 
 inference ? It is that the interests of humanity are one ; that 
 throughout mankind there is, in French phrase, a solidarity, 
 which renders each responsible, in some measure, for the rest. 
 The policy of selfish isolation is, therefore, vain, as well as 
 sinful. We suffer from our neglect of the well-being of our 
 fellow-men. The gaol fever, which the gross negligence of 
 prison authorities produced in former days, slew the juryman 
 in the box, and even the judge upon the bench. And it is not 
 . in purse alone, or even chiefly, that we suffer from the existence 
 of the destitute or the depraved. The great mountain of 
 human evil throws its dark, cold shadow on every one of us ; in 
 such an atmosphere our own moral nature droops and pines ; 
 and just proportioned to the mental elasticity which attends 
 every successful effort to spread good around us is the numbing 
 and hardening pressure of that great mass of vice and misery 
 which we feel ourselves impotent to relieve. 
 
 One more analogy I would briefly note. We know how 
 common quack medicines are. Why is this ? Because, through 
 ignorance of physiological laws, people are silly enough to 
 believe that any nostrum can exist potent to repair, as by a 
 magic 'spell or incantation, the evil results of their own neglect 
 of health and its conditions. To such people, talk about air 
 and exercise, and washing, and regular diet, and early hours, 
 and temperance, and alternation of labour and rest, is very 
 uninteresting and commonplace. To a similar class of persons 
 discourse on diligence and economy, and forethought and 
 integrity, is very dull. " What is the use of all your chemistry," 
 said the old lady, " if you cannot take the stain out of my silk 
 gown ? " And by tests not less narrow and erroneous are the 
 teachings of science, whether economical or physiological, often 
 tried. But a change is coming over the public estimate of the 
 latter, at least in this respect. Prevention is being ever more 
 thought of than cure ; or, in technical phrase, the 'prophylactic 
 claims, and now receives, more attention than the therapeutic 
 portion of the physician's art. Pure water, and fresh air and 
 light are now, almost for the first time, really recognized as the 
 fundamental and indispensable conditions of health ; and baths, 
 
190 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 and drains, and ventilators, and wash-houses, are fast encroach- 
 ing on the domain of the blister and the lancet, the pill and the 
 black draught. Now, what systems of the treatment of disease 
 are to Sanitary Physiology, Poor-laws and Charitable Institu- 
 tions and Criminal Legislation are to Economic Science. It 
 aims at preventing the evils which those seek to deal with as 
 they arise. The attempt may never quite succeed ; but its 
 success will be exactly proportioned to the vigour and unanimity 
 with which it is made. It seeks to treat the source of the 
 disease, rather than the mere symptoms. It is only as the 
 former is removed that the latter will disappear. By all means 
 let no palliative be neglected in the meantime, but let no cure 
 be expected therefrom. Efforts to perfect systems of poor-laws, 
 or criminal laws, however excellent or useful, must be abortive, 
 because the very existence of the evils which these address is 
 abnormal ; and it is for the removal of these wens and blotches 
 on the social system that we must strive, not for their mere 
 abatement by typical applications, or the rendering of them 
 symmetrical and trim. Wisdom and Benevolence here meet, 
 and are at one.* 
 
 Yet persons are not wanting who meet our desire that 
 Economic Science should be taught to all, and especially to the 
 young, by the cry that " it tends to make men selfish." In 
 reply, I will not content myself with saying, in the words of 
 Shakespeare, " Self-love is not so vile a sin as self-neglecting." 
 I go much further, and assert that this teaching, if properly 
 conducted, has precisely the opposite tendency. Its great 
 purpose is to show how the community is enriched by the 
 industry of the individual, and how the value of individual 
 industry is measured by its result in enriching the community. 
 It wholly disowns and condemns every mode of enriching the 
 individual at the general expense, or even without the general 
 advantage. Thus, the merchant who brings a commodity, say 
 tea, from a country where it is cheap to one where it is dear, 
 and gains a profit by the transaction, fulfils the conditions of 
 Economic Science. He serves at once the community in which 
 he lives by bringing an article from a place where it is less, to 
 a place where it is more, wanted ; and the community with 
 
 * In the text I have merely pointed out analogy. Here let me hint at depen- 
 dence. Is not the economic difficulty the main obstacle to sanitary arrangements ? 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 191 
 
 which he trades by giving them in exchange for the article they 
 sell something that they value more. But the man who 
 enriches himself at the gaming-table, or by other means more 
 or less resembling the picking of pockets, does injury, not service, 
 to the community. He is wholly out of the pale of Economic 
 Science ; he may be a chevalier ^Industrie, in the French sense, 
 but Economic Science disowns his industry, and condemns him 
 as a wasteful consumer of what others have produced. It 
 teaches every man to look on himself as a portion of society, 
 and widens, not narrows, his views of his own calling. 
 
 And here I cannot but express my deep regret that one to 
 whom we all owe, and to whom we all pay, so much gratitude, 
 and affection, and admiration, for all he has written and done 
 in the cause of good — I mean Mr. Charles Dickens — should have 
 lent his great genius and name to the discrediting of the subject 
 whose claims I now advocate. Much as I am grieved, however, 
 I am not much surprised, for men of purely literary culture, 
 with keen and kindly sympathies which range them on what 
 seems the side of the poor and weak against the rich and 
 strong, and, on the other hand, with refined tastes, which are 
 shocked by the insolence of success and the ostentation incident 
 to newly acquired wealth, are ever most apt to fall into the 
 mistaken estimate of this subject which marks most that has 
 yet appeared of his new tale, Hard Times. Of wilful misrepre- 
 sentation we know him to be incapable ; not the less is the 
 misrepresentation to be deplored. We have heard of a young 
 lady who compromised between her desire to have a portrait 
 of her lover, and her fear lest her parents should discover her 
 attachment, by having the portrait painted very unlike. What 
 love did in the case of this young lady, aversion has done in 
 the case of Mr. Dickens, who has made the portrait so unlike 
 that the best friends of the original cannot detect the resem- 
 blance. His descriptions are just as like to real Economic 
 Science as " statistics " are to " stutterings," two words which 
 he makes one of his characters not very naturally confound. 
 He who misrepresents what he ridicules, does, in truth, not 
 ridicule what he misrepresents. Of the lad Bitzer, he says, in 
 No. 218 of Household Words : 
 
 Having satisfied himself, on his father's death, that his mother had a right 
 of settlement in Coketown, this excellent young economist had asserted that 
 
192 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 right for her with such a steadfast adherence to the principle of the case, that 
 she had been shut up in the workhouse ever since. It must be admitted that 
 he allowed her half a pound of tea a year, which was weak in him : first, because 
 all gifts have an inevitable tendency to pauperize the recipient ; and, secondly, 
 because his only reasonable transaction in that commodity would have been to 
 buy it for as little as he could possibly give, and to sell it for as much as he could 
 possibly get ; it having been clearly ascertained by philosophers that in this 
 is comprised the whole duty of man— not a part of man's duty, but the whole. 
 —(p. 335.) 
 
 Here Economic Science, which so strongly enforces parental 
 duty, is given out as discouraging its moral if not economic 
 correlative — filial duty. But where do economists represent 
 this, maxim as the whole duty of man ? Their business is to 
 treat of man in his industrial capacity and relations ; they do 
 not presume to deal with his other capacities and relations, 
 except by showing what must be done in their sphere to enable 
 any duties whatever to be discharged. Thus it shows simply 
 that without the exercise of qualities that need not be here 
 named again, man cannot support those dependent on him, or 
 even himself. If it do not establish the obligation, it shows 
 how only the obligation can be fulfilled. 
 
 Let me once more recur to physiology for an illustration. 
 The duty of preserving one's own life and health will not be 
 gainsaid. Physiology enforces this duty by showing how it 
 must be fulfilled. But, if one's mother were to fall into the 
 sea, are we to be told that physiology forbids the son to leap 
 into the waves, and even peril his own health and life in the 
 effort to save her who gave him birth ? Physiology does not 
 command this, it is true ; this is not its sphere ; but this, at 
 least, it does : it teaches and trains to the fullest development 
 of strength and activity, that so they may be equal for every 
 exigency — even one so terrible as this ; and so precisely with 
 Economic Science. 
 
 Again, we are told it discourages marriage : 
 
 " Look at me, ma'am," says Mr. Bitzer. " I don't want a wife and family. 
 Why should they ? " 
 
 " Because they are improvident," said Mrs. Sparsit. 
 
 " Yes, ma'am, that's where it is. If they were more provident, and less 
 perverse, ma'am, what would they do ? They would say, ' While my hat covers 
 my family,' or ' While my bonnet covers my family,' as the case might be, 
 ma'am, ' I have only one to feed, and that's the person I most like to feed.' " 
 —{p. 336.) 
 
 Does this mean that men or women ought to rush blindly into 
 
 the position of parents, without thinking or caring whether 
 
 1 
 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 193 
 
 their children can be supported by their industry, or must be a 
 burden on that of society at large ? If not, on what ground is 
 prudent hesitation, in assuming the most solemn of all human 
 responsibilities, a subject for ridicule and censure ? Is the 
 condition of the people to be improved by greater or by less 
 laxity in this respect ? 
 
 But not merely are we told that this teaching (which, by the 
 way, scarcely exists in any but a very few schools), tends to 
 selfishness, and the merging of the community in the individual ; 
 it has, it seems, also, a quite opposite tendency to merge the 
 individual in the community, by accustoming the mind to dwell 
 wholly on averages. Thus, if in a city of a million of inhabitants 
 twenty-five are starved to death annually in the streets, or if 
 of 100,000 persons who go to sea 500 are drowned, or burned 
 to death, we are led to believe that Economic Science disregards 
 these miseries, because they are exceptional, and because the 
 average is so greatly the other way ! Now, though in com- 
 parison of two countries, or two periods, such averages are 
 indispensable, Economic Science practically teaches everywhere 
 to analyse the collective result into its constituent elements — 
 in a word, to individualize. It teaches, for example, that every 
 brick, and stone, and beam of this building, of this street, of 
 this city, has been laid by some individual pair of hands ; and 
 it urges every man to work for himself, and to render his own 
 industry ever more productive, surely not to rest in idle con- 
 templation of the average of industry throughout the land. It is 
 his duty to swell, not to reduce that average. So with prosperity. 
 I am quite unable to see what tendency the knowledge of that 
 average can have to discourage the effort to increase it. Besides, 
 it is a fundamental error to confound mere statistics with Economic 
 Science, which deals with facts only to establish their connexions 
 by way of cause and effect, and to interpret them by law. 
 
 But were it otherwise, with what justice can economic 
 instruction be charged with destroying imagination, by the 
 utilitarian teaching of " stubborn facts." Why should either 
 exclude the other ? I can see no incompatibility between the 
 two.* By all means let us have poetry, but first let us have 
 
 * On this score, I have personally no misgivings. Seventeen years ago, I 
 delivered and published a lecture, in which I urged the exercise of the imagina- 
 tion, or aesthetic culture, in the youthful training of all classes. My convictions 
 are at least as strong now as fchey were then. 
 
194 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 our daily bread, even though man is not fed by that alone. It 
 is the Poet Rogers who says, in a note to his poem on Italy, 
 " To judge at once of a nation, we have only to throw our eyes 
 on the markets and the fields. If the markets are well supplied, 
 and the fields well cultivated, all is right. If otherwise, we may 
 say, and say truly, these people are barbarous or oppressed." 
 Destitution must be removed for the very sake of the higher 
 culture. If we would have the tree fling its branches widely 
 and freely into the upper air, its roots must be fixed deeply 
 and firmly in the earth. But enough of this subject, on which 
 I have entered with pain, and only from a strong sense of duty. 
 The public mind, alas, is not enlightened enough to render 
 such writing harmless. 
 
 Hitherto I have spoken only of those great principles, and 
 the duties flowing therefrom, which pervade the whole subject. 
 But if these principles are the most comprehensive, there are 
 very many others which, in the practical affairs of life, it is 
 most important thoroughly to understand, and which it is the 
 peculiar business of Economic Science to expound. It is an 
 error to suppose that in matters touching men's " business and 
 bosoms," even though of daily and hourly recurrence, instruc- 
 tion is not needed, and that " common sense " is a sufficient 
 guide. Alas, common sense is widely different from proper 
 sense. It is precisely in these subjects that error most exten- 
 sively prevails, and that it is most pernicious where it does 
 prevail. In matters far removed from ordinary life and 
 experience, pure ignorance is possible, perhaps ; and, in 
 comparison, little mischievous. But in those which concern 
 us all and at all times, it is alike impossible to be purely ignorant 
 and to be ignorant with impunity. If the mind have not right 
 notions developed at first, it will certainly have wrong ones. 
 Hence we may say of knowledge what Sheridan Knowles says 
 of virtue : " Plant virtue early ! Give the flower the chance 
 you suffer to the weed ! " 
 
 The minds of most men are a congeries of maxims, and 
 notions, and opinions, and rules, and theories picked up here 
 and there, now and then, some sound, others unsound, each 
 often quite inconsistent with the rest, but which are to them 
 identified with the whole body of truth, and which are the 
 standard by which they try all things. This fact explains a 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 195 
 
 remark in a recent school report, that it is far easier to make 
 this science intelligible to children than to their parents ; — no 
 doubt, just as it is easier to build on an unoccupied ground 
 than on one overspread by ruins. And so, not only is it 
 possible to teach this subject to the young ; but it is to the 
 young that we must teach it, if we would have this teaching 
 most effective for good. For further evidence of the general 
 need for this kind of instruction it suffices to look around us, 
 and test some of the opinions prevalent lately or even now. 
 And here there is much of interest that might be said, did 
 time permit, of still prevailing errors regarding strikes, and 
 machinery, and wages, and population, and protection, and 
 taxation, and expenditure, and competition, and much more 
 besides. But into this field my limits forbid me even to enter. 
 Let me, however, refer you to a most admirable series of lessons 
 on The Phenomena of Industrial Life, and the Conditions of 
 Industrial Success,* which has recently appeared under the 
 editorship of that zealous educationist, the Dean of Hereford. 
 The appearance of this book, and the recognition of this subject 
 in the last Report of the National School Society, are cheering 
 signs that the omissions of past ages in our school systems on 
 this head are not destined much longer to continue. 
 
 The programme of this lecture speaks of the importance of 
 Economic Science to all classes. It would be a serious error to 
 suppose that its advantage is confined wholly, or even chiefly, 
 to those who depend on daily labour for daily bread. Even 
 were it so, in the midst of frequent and rapid changes of position, 
 the rich man becoming poor, as well as the poor man becoming 
 rich, this kind of teaching would still be important for all 
 classes. But the capitalist not less, it may be said even more, 
 than the labourer, needs instruction. He has been styled the 
 captain of industry ; it is for him to marshal, and equip, and 
 organize, and pay its forces, and to guide their march. Any 
 mistake on his part must be widely injurious. The wise 
 employment of capital is a most momentous question ; for it 
 determines the direction of the industry of millions, and affects 
 the prosperity of all coming time. From the class of the rich, 
 too, are our legislators chiefly chosen. To them this kind of 
 knowledge is important just in proportion as, in their case, 
 * Price 2s. Groombridge, Paternoster Row. 
 
196 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 ignorance or error is most pernicious. Of the aristocracy of 
 our day, were old Burton living now, he would scarcely say 
 what he said of those of his own time : " They are like our 
 modern Frenchmen, that had rather lose a pound of blood in a 
 single combat, than a drop of sweat in any honest labour." * 
 The contagion of industry has spread to them ; and idleness is 
 less than ever confounded with nobility. But there is ample 
 room for further progress. If wealth, even economically 
 considered, involve increased responsibility, it calls the more 
 loudly for enlightenment and guidance. 
 
 Again, on the side of expenditure, or consumption, does this 
 subject especially concern the rich. As supply ever follows 
 demand, it is by this that production is mainly guided. Shall 
 it run in the direction of sensuality and self-indulgence, or shall 
 it flow in better and more useful channels ? Memorable are the 
 words of Lord Byron in his later days in Greece : 
 
 The mechanics and working classes who can maintain their families are, in 
 my opinion, the happiest body of men. Poverty is wretchedness ; but it is 
 perhaps to be preferred to the heartless, unmeaning dissipation of the higher 
 orders. I am thankful I am now entirely clear of this, and my resolution to 
 remain clear of it for the rest of my life is immutable. | 
 
 At this most suggestive topic I can barely hint. Much beside 
 I am forced wholly to omit. But I must not pass in total 
 silence the claims of this subject on the attention of the other 
 sex. Fortunately, little needs be said within this Institution, 
 of whose audience at lectures on every subject ladies form 
 perhaps not the smallest, and certainly not the least attentive 
 portion. Surely I shall not be told that a superficial sketch, 
 such as mine, is for them unobjectionable, but that the serious 
 study of the science is, in their case, to be discountenanced. If 
 any kind of knowledge can do harm to any living being, it is 
 just this very superficial knowledge. It is like the twilight 
 which, holding of day on the one hand, and of night on the 
 other, mocks the senses with distorted appearances which 
 thicker darkness would hide, but which a broader daylight 
 would dispel. In truth, women have a special interest in this 
 subject. The part they play in industrial pursuits depends 
 much on conventional circumstances, and varies in various 
 
 * Anatomy of Melancholy. 
 
 t Last Days of Lord Byron, by W. Paeey, p. 205. 1825. 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 197 
 
 countries ; but in all, their influence in the region of expenditure 
 is vastly great. Who shall say how deeply the welfare of 
 families and of society at large is involved in this ? Again, the 
 domain of charity is peculiarly feminine ; and the benevolent 
 impulse, ever so ready to spring up, needs to be guided to the 
 prevention, rather than to the relief, or what is too often, in 
 fitter phrase, the indirect increase of misery. Well does 
 Thomas Carlyle (no friend of the dismal science, as he loves to 
 call it), in his quaint, odd way, exclaim : 
 
 What a reflection it is that we cannot bestow on an unworthy man any 
 particle of our benevolence, our patronage, or whatever resource is ours — 
 without withdrawing it, and all that will grow of it, from one worthy, to whom 
 it of right belongs ! We cannot, I say ; impossible ; it is the eternal law of 
 things. Incompetent Duncan M'Pastehorn, the hapless incompetent mortal to 
 whom I give the cobbling of my boots — and cannot find in my heart to refuse 
 it, the poor drunken wretch having a wife and ten children ; he withdraws the 
 job from sober, plainly competent and meritorious Mr. Sparrowbill, generally 
 short of work, too ; discourages Sparrowbill ; teaches him that he, too, may as 
 well drink and loiter and bungle ; that this is not a scene for merit and demerit 
 at all, but for dupery, and whining flattery, and incompetent cobbling of every 
 description — clearly tending to the ruin of poor Sparrowbill ! What harm had 
 Sparrowbill done me that I should so help to ruin him ? And I couldn't save 
 the insalvable Mr. Pastehorn : I merely yielded him, for insufficient work, here 
 and there a half-crown, which he oftenest drank. And now Sparrowbill also 
 is drinking ! * 
 
 Between the Lady Bountiful of olden times, with her perio- 
 dical distributions of coals and blankets, and simples and 
 cowslip wine, who regarded the poor as her pets, her peculiar 
 luxury, of which, did they, cease to be mendicants, she would 
 be cruelly deprived — and the Mrs. Jellyby, whose long-ranged 
 benevolence shoots in a parabolic curve far over what is near, 
 to descend on what is remote, hurrying past and above St. Giles 
 or Whitechapel, and exploding on " Borrioboola Gha " ; be- 
 tween these widely distinct forms of what is called in both alike 
 Charity, there is room and there is need for women of judgment 
 as clear as their sympathy is earnest, who can think for them- 
 selves, as well as feel for others ; who shall not so do good that 
 evil may come, but rather help the feeble to self-help, and, 
 while they raise the fallen, look mainly to " forestalling " others 
 " ere they come to fall." 
 
 Up to this point I have spoken solely of one class of advan- 
 tages attending the teaching of Economic Science. But, as you 
 
 * Model Prisons, p. 24 ; Latter -Day Pamphlets, No. 2. 
 
198 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 have been told oftener than once during this course, the teaching 
 of every branch of knowledge has, in different degrees, two 
 sorts of advantage : (1) in increasing man's outward resources ; 
 (2) as a means of mental discipline and inward culture. Of 
 the second of these advantages I can now say but little. It is 
 wholly unimportant to discuss the comparative claims of 
 different subjects in this respect. The difference among them 
 is, perhaps, rather of kind than of degree. Mathematics 
 discipline one set of powers, metaphysics another ; or in so far 
 as both exercise the same powers, it is in different ways. I 
 claim no monopoly, I arrogate no superiority. I simply assert 
 the educational value of this subject, without prejudice to any 
 other, and all the more strongly, because it has been and is so 
 sadly neglected. Surely, those subjects which have the most 
 direct and powerful bearing on human well-being, and which 
 treat of some of the most important relations between man and 
 man, cannot be educationally less efficient than other studies 
 which concern man less closely and directly. And I leave it 
 to you who have heard even this most imperfect and hurried 
 exposition, to judge whether it can fail to be a most improving 
 mental exercise to sift such questions as the relations and laws 
 of price, of capital and labour, and wages and profits, and 
 interest and rent, and to trace to their origin, and follow to 
 their results, the fluctuations affecting all these in our own and 
 other countries, in our own and other times. As regards the 
 other sex, on this ground, at least, there can be no doubt, even 
 if the former admitted of hesitation. To women and to men, 
 this discipline is alike valuable : for women it is even more 
 necessary ; for men are inevitably brought more into contact 
 with the world and its affairs, and so have the defects of their 
 early teaching in part corrected. It is well, at the same time 
 that the understanding is exercised, to foster an interest in 
 human welfare by an enlarged comprehension of its conditions. 
 We hear little now of the policy or propriety of confining 
 woman's studies to superficial accomplishment. It were an 
 error, scarcely less serious, to confine them to inquiries which 
 leave the individual isolated from the race. 
 
 Let me not, in conclusion, be supposed to ignore, because I 
 would not invade, other, and (by common consent) the most 
 sacred grounds on which the moral aspects of this subject may 
 
THE STUDY OF ECONOMIC SCIENCE 199 
 
 be viewed. Let the duties on which human welfare, even 
 industrially considered, is dependent, be enforced elsewhere, by- 
 reasons too high for discussion here. But surely this ground, 
 at least, is in common to religious sects of every variety of 
 creed and name. Surely it is a solemn and cogent considera- 
 tion that the very fabric of our social being is held together by 
 moral laws, and that the man who violates them outlaws 
 himself, as it were, from the social domain, and rouses into 
 armed hostility a thousand agencies which might and would 
 otherwise fight upon his side. Not only the profligate, the 
 gambler, the swindler, and the drunkard, but the idle, the 
 reckless, the unpunctual, the procrastinating, find here a bitter 
 but wholesome condemnation ; and the very science which is 
 ignorantly charged with fostering selfishness, teaches every 
 man to estimate his labours by their tendency to promote the 
 general good. Nor is it unimpressive, as regards even what 
 Wordsworth so finely calls 
 
 The unreasoning progress of the world,* 
 
 to watch how the social plan is carried on by the composition 
 of so many volitional forces, each bent on its own aims. " The 
 first party of painted savages," it has been well said, " who 
 raised a few huts upon the Thames, did not dream of the 
 London they were creating, or know that in lighting the fire on 
 their hearth they were kindling one of the great foci of 
 Time." ..." All the grand agencies which the progress of 
 mankind evolves are formed in the same unconscious way. 
 They are the aggregate result of countless single wills, each of 
 which, thinking merely of its own end, and perhaps ' fully 
 gaining it, is at the same time enlisted by Providence in the 
 secret service of the world." f If law be indeed the expression 
 of an intelligent and benevolent will, reverence and obedience 
 towards the great Lawgiver must surely be fostered (mark, I 
 do not say created) by the study of His laws, and the contrasted 
 results of their observance and their violation. And, finally 
 as regards that practical religion whose testing fruit is effort for 
 the good of man — a study which shows so clearly that human 
 
 * " Ija the unreasoning progress of the world 
 
 A wiser spirit is at work for us, 
 
 A bettei eye than ours." — Wordsworth. 
 t James Martineau. 
 
200 LECTURES ON EDUCATION 
 
 welfare is involved in obedience to fixed laws, and that obedi- 
 ence, to be reliable, must be based on knowledge of their exis- 
 tence and authority, must surely stimulate the extension of this 
 needful knowledge among all classes of the people. In this 
 light, it is abundantly apparent that, sacred as is the duty of 
 acquiring knowledge, the duty of diffusing it is not less sacred ; 
 and that knowledge is no exception to the divine precept — " It 
 is more blessed to give than to receive." 
 
 APPENDIX TO p. 177 
 
 Political Economists, with but slight exception, have neglected to urge 
 universal Teaching and Training in the Economic laws as the condition indis- 
 pensable for the most beneficial working of those laws themselves. Misled by 
 physical analogies, e.g. between the relation of supply and demand, and the 
 rising and falling of water as it seeks its level, they have failed practically to 
 recognize that human motives and human will are ever the keystone in the arch 
 which bridges over the interval between economic cause and effect. To Mr. 
 Samuel Bailey belongs (so far as I know) the credit of having first clearly 
 established this truth — simple as it is — in his Essay on The Uniformity of Causa- 
 tion-, published in 1829. The same writer, in his Discourse on Political Economy 
 (1852, p. 109), thus writes : " The object of Political Economy is not to ascertain 
 all the laws by which wealth is produced and distributed, but only one class of 
 them, namely, the moral or mental laics, or in other words, those laivs of human 
 nature on which the economical condition of nations depends." It may be 
 doubted, however, whether even Mr. Bailey has sufficiently insisted on the great 
 practical inference from his own doctrine — the necessity, for all men — of in- 
 struction in the nature of those laws. Yet here lies the answer to those who 
 point to the manifold misery coincident with our civilization, whether they 
 content themselves (like Mr. Carlyle) with angry protests against " Laissez faire, 
 laissez aller," or go on, with the French and other Socialists to build up schemes 
 for the entire reconstruction of the Economic World — schemes which would 
 substitute centralized compulsion for individual agency, separate or combined, 
 with a tendency more of less direct, more or less avowed, to Communism (or the 
 abolition of property and of family), as their ultimate results. The ignorant 
 abuse of human freedom, however, is a reason why men should be instructed, 
 not why they should be enslaved. Let but enlightenment keep pace with liberty, 
 and it will be found that intelligence within will succeed where compulsion from 
 without must fail ; and that the free action of the instructed individual is the 
 true guarantee for the well-being of the community. To reduce this conviction 
 to practice no one has yet done so much as Mr. William Ellis— the munificent 
 patron of the Birkbeck Schools.* No one has laboured so zealously as he 
 
 " To render with these precepts less 
 The sum of human wretchedness, 
 And strengthen Man with his own mind." f 
 
 * See Education as a Means of Preventing Destitution, etc., by William 
 Ellis, Author of Outlines of Social Economy, etc. London : Smith and 
 Elder. 1851. f Byron's Prometheus. 
 
 PRINTED AT THE COMPLETE PltESS, WEST NORWOOD, LONDON, S.E. 
 
UNIFORM WITH THIS VOLUME. 
 
 Mutual Aid: of F e a vJ l °ution. 
 
 By PRINCE KROPOTKIN. 
 
 Popular Edition. Paper boards, 1\- net. 
 
 " Prince Kropotkin has written a most suggestive and stimulating 
 study, showing not only immense range of reading and observation, aiid 
 the power of marshalling facts in an ord^rfy manner, but also a most 
 attractive and generous personality, demonstrating unconquerable faitl 
 in the innate goodness of humanity and its golden future." — .rftkenaur, 
 
 The Nature of Man 
 
 By ELIE METCHNIKOFF 
 
 Edited by P. Chalmers Mitchell, F.R.S. 
 Popular Edition. Paper boards, 1\- net. 
 
 'More fascinating than the 'Arabian Nights' . . . the most 
 brilliant biological investigations. . . . Dr. Mitchell is not only to be 
 congratulated on his courage in translating this volume, but also on the 
 elegance and the refinement of the language by which he has enabled 
 Professor Metchnikoff to present his philosophic conceptions to the 
 English speaking people." — Lancet. 
 
 The Mind and Health 
 Series 
 
 Edited by H. ADDINGTON BRUCE, A. 
 
 Each vol. Crown 8vo. 5/- net. 
 
 HUMAN MOTIVES By James Jackson Putnam, M.D. 
 
 THE MEANING OF DREAMS By Isador H. Coriat,M.D. 
 
 SLEEP AND SLEEPLESSNESS By H. Addington 
 Bruce, A.M. 
 
 THE INFLUENCE OF JOY By George Van Ness 
 Dearborn. 
 
 LOlNDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN 
 

 
 
 * ^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 -*» 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 - 
 
 
 - 
 
 o o 
 
 
 > 
 
 

 V <£ 
 
 4> "V, 
 
 O- V 
 
 ■ . . 
 
 
 ^ v* 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 ,0° ■ 
 
 % ^'" 
 
 ^o- 
 
 
 
 ^ v 
 
 $"\ 
 
 <- 
 
 ■/■ 
 
 <&■• 
 
 £ ^ 
 
 c£- ' /- 
 
 
 
 * </ ^ 
 
 
 7 \T 
 
 s <\ O 
 
 
 f% y 
 
 • S V 
 
 
 *'-%. ^ 
 
 
 
 
 W 
 
 ^2^_ NOV 68 
 
 fir N.MANCHESTER, 
 
 \*>^ .*«0 X 
 
 " 3 N '• \* 
 
 81 ^ ^°" 
 
 ^ 
 
 V, » 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
 022 159 449 6 
 
 BH 
 
 H 
 
 
 w* 
 
 ■i 
 
 m 
 
 ■ 
 
 ■ 
 
 
 ■