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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 
 
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 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 
 
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 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 IN 
 
 CLASSICAL STUDY. 
 
 BY 
 
 WILLIAM GAEDISTEK HALE, 
 
 50] 
 
 4.t 
 
 Professor op the Latin Language and Literature in 
 Cornell University. 
 
 
 -oo><2KjOo- 
 
 y^^'i OF COa 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 PUBLISHED BY GINN & COMPANY. 
 
 1888. 
 

 Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1887, by 
 
 WILLIAM GARDNER HALE, 
 in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 
 
 J. S. CusniNQ & Co., Pbinteks, Boston. 
 
I DEDICATE THIS ADDRESS 
 TO MY FRIEND 
 
 PROFESSOE E. P. MORRIS 
 
 WHOM I -VVOULD FAIN 
 PERSUADE. 
 
Oninis hie sermo noster non solum enumerationeni oratorum, 
 verufn etia?n pr accept a quaedam desidcrat : 93. 319. 
 
AIMS AND METHODS IN CLASSICAL 
 
 STUDY. 
 
 An Address delivered at the Meeting of the Massa- 
 chusetts Classical and High School Teachers' 
 Association, Boston, 1887. 
 
 I HAD planned to speak to you to-day of the various 
 phases of the classical education, — the study of the 
 Greek and Latin literatures as bodies of thought, the 
 study of the forms and constructions of the languages, 
 the study of the history of the peoples, the study of 
 public and private life, the study of art. I had planned 
 to discuss the relation of these studies to one another, 
 and to speak with some detail of the methods by which 
 certain of them might best be pursued. But at the 
 very outset I find a difficulty in my path. Six months 
 ago one would have thought oneself safe in assuming a 
 common opinion in regard to the aim of all this. One 
 would then have said that, while either the classics or 
 the natural and physical sciences, properly dealt with, 
 would teach young students that indispensable and rare 
 accomplishment, the art of thinking, yet they greatly 
 differed as regards the things brought before the mind ; 
 and that in the power of the great literary men of 
 Greece and Rome to stimulate thought, to teach a 
 severe taste, to form those qualities of mind and char- 
 
6 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 acter which come with a largei\outlook on human life 
 and a broader sympathy, lay their special value in 
 a system of liberal education. But since that time a 
 pamphlet has appeared, in an important series of mono- 
 graphs on education, in which the view has been upheld 
 that this common agreement of the past was an error. 
 It is there maintained that the humanistic conception 
 of classical study has passed away, and that, under 
 the mighty impulse of modern science, the scientific 
 conception has taken its place, so that the great aim 
 of classical study (as regards the schools, at least, this 
 is clearly said) should be, and is inevitably coming to 
 be, to teach scientific procedure, — namely, observation, 
 generalization, and proof. And in this paper, after an 
 admirable sketch of the currents that have prevailed 
 from time to time in classical study, the view just 
 stated is urged Avith such vigor and weightiness that 
 one must certainly set oneself to debating very carefully 
 in his own mind whether it is or is not just, and must 
 have his whole manner of looking at classical education 
 largely determined by the decision to which he is 
 brought. Such a debate I have held with myself, and 
 have not come to share the opinion of the writer. I do 
 not know your convictions. But at any rate, until there 
 shall again be a clear consensus of opinion on this 
 fundamental point, no one can properly speak of the 
 study of Greek and Latin without raising the ques- 
 tion. What is the aim of it all? That is, then, of 
 necessity, our first inquiry to-day. By a singular 
 irony of fortune, the writer of that p)amphlet is the 
 gentleman in whose company I have the honor — a 
 twofold honor, therefore — to address you, — Professor 
 Morris, of Williams College. The irony has, however, 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 7 
 
 a kindly side ; for, as we appear together before you, 
 with opportunities assured us for discussion after our 
 papers have been read, we may hope to reach, in 
 amicable controversy, a common ground, and possibl}'' 
 even a common settlement of the important point at 
 issue. 
 
 At once we are involved in perplexity. The gen- 
 eral tone of Professor Morris's preface is not in harmony 
 with the tone of the address which forms the body 
 of his pamphlet. Both preface and address must there- 
 fore be considered. 
 
 I quote from the former: — 
 
 The classical work of the college, at least in the first two 
 years, should undoubtedly deal mainly with the literature and 
 history, with the contents of the writings, not with the form of the 
 language. The arguments, therefore, which would naturally be 
 used in support of the study of Latin in these years are those 
 which are drawn from the excellence of the literature, from the 
 political and social history of the Eoman race, and especially from 
 the fact that the most important elements of modern civilization 
 have come from or through Rome. Taking the whole curriculum 
 together, from preparatory school to university, these are beyond 
 a doubt the chief aspects of the question, and it would be a matter 
 of regret to the writer should their omission here be understood to 
 indicate any doubt on his part of their weight as arguments, or of 
 their supreme importance in contributing to culture. The reason 
 for passing them over is a twofold one : first, because they have 
 been often and fully presented ; and, second, because any discus- 
 sion of the college work brings in at once the question of elective 
 studies, '^r a question upon which the writer had no warrant for 
 entering. 
 
 To this statement I heartily assent. It is true, it is 
 admirable. Than the phrase " their supreme impor- 
 tance in contributing to culture " nothing could be 
 more satisfactory. And even if, noting the words, " the 
 
8 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 classical work of the college, at least in the first two 
 years," and the title of the monograph, " The Study 
 of Latin in the Preparatory Course," one suspected a 
 certain exclusion which augured ill for the schools, 
 yet one would hope that Professor Morris's perception 
 of the supreme value of the aspects he has spoken of 
 would keep him, when he comes to speak of the philo- 
 logical side of classical study, from claiming for that 
 side more than its just — its great but not supreme — 
 importance. 
 
 At the beginning of the address, the writer says, 
 " If any of the views which follow shall seem partisan 
 in spirit, I can only remind jqm of the extreme diffi- 
 culty of looking with entire impartiality at one's favor- 
 ite study, and beg you to make such allowance for 
 professional prejudice as you may think best." Let 
 me, similarly, say that my own special field of investi- 
 gation is precisely what I judge Professor Morris's to 
 be, namely, comparative syntax. Li any case, we start 
 together, in that our special personal interest is on the 
 scientific side, rather than the humanistic. If, then, the 
 discussion of the question which Professor Morris has 
 raised should lead me to the opposite conclusion, it will 
 not be in consequence of natural bias. 
 
 The keynote of the address is struck in the prelimi- 
 nary statement on page 1. 
 
 Those who deshe to see the classics retaining their place must 
 face the fact that the literary spirit of fifty years ago has passed 
 out of sight, and that the scientific spirit has taken its place. I 
 disclaim, therefore, at the outset, any share in an attempt to recon- 
 stitute the college curriculum upon the basis of a mainly literary 
 training, — an attempt which would result, in my opinion, simply 
 in a prolonged struggle, disastrous to our higher scholarship, and 
 certain to eud in defeat. 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. \) 
 
 Professor Morris then proceeds to show that classical 
 scholarship has passed through four stages since the 
 Reuaissance, and that the phrase, "the study of Latin," 
 has correspondingly four senses. It may mean "lin- 
 guistics," learning to read the language, as it did in 
 its first stage ; it may mean history and literature, as it 
 did in its prevailing spirit in its second stage ; it may 
 mean rhetoric and composition, the acquisition of the 
 ability to write Latin as an elegant accomplishment; it 
 may mean scientific study. " It is now," says Professor 
 Morris, " in the fourth stage. It means, and is to mean, 
 the science of Latin philology." That this is the drift 
 of the times is shown, he argues, in several ways. First, 
 the great majority of the books on classical subjects 
 now produced in Germany are of a scientific character. 
 Secondly, students are said (I question the statement) 
 not to read so much Greek at Harvard College to-day 
 as they did at Marietta College, for example, forty 
 years ago; and even in Germany, as a German professor 
 laments, students who have spent twelve or fifteen years 
 upon Latin cannot read it after all. " The reason," says 
 Professor Morris, " is that teachers of Latin in oiir col- 
 leges are teaching philology, not linguistics." Further 
 (and here we get the gist of Professor Morris's view) : — 
 
 The most conclusive proof that philology has taken the place of 
 linguistics is to be had from a consideration of what actually occurs 
 in the preparation and recitation of a Latin lesson. 
 
 A chapter in the preparatory lesson-book deals, let us say, with 
 the genitive. It begins by referring the student to certain places 
 in the grammar where the laws of the genitive are given ; for in- 
 stance, that a noun in the genitive <lepends upon another noun. 
 Having mastered this law, the student goes on to the exercise, 
 where he finds sentences from wdiich he must select the genitives 
 according to their previously learned terminations, just as he might 
 
10 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 select the bits of quartz from a pile of pebbles by the quality of 
 hardness. This is scientific observation, the selection of individ- 
 ual objects according to a known characteristic. 
 
 The genitives thus collected are, then, in the process of trans- 
 lation, tested according to the new law ; the student examines the 
 sentence in which each is found to discover the noun upon which it 
 depends. He will perhaps find that in some cases the form has 
 misled him, and, in the absence of a noun to which they may be 
 referred, some genitives must be rejected as locatives or dativer, as 
 among his pieces of quartz the test of the acid might reveal bits of 
 some other hard mineral. This process, repeated with every genitive 
 in the exercise, is a drill in scientific generalization, differing from 
 the same process in actual scientific investigation, only by the fact 
 that the law to be discovered is pointed out at the beginning. It 
 is at the same time scientific proof, since it is the testing of the 
 law under conditions constantly varied. 
 
 Still more like the actual work of the investigator is the prepa- 
 ration of a chapter in Caesar, since here there is no artificial ar- 
 rangement of sentences, but nouns of all forms, and sentences of 
 different structure follow each other in confusion, as the botanist 
 finds by the roadside here a clover, there a fern. 
 
 Now all this has nothing to do with reading Latin. 
 
 " We no longer study Latin in our schools [page 14] 
 in order to learn Latin ; we study it, and teach it, with 
 primary reference to the science of philology."^ We are 
 giving our students drill in scientific observation, scien- 
 tific generalization, scientific proof. And '' all this has 
 nothing to do with reading Latin." 
 
 We see clearly now the field of our amicable, and, I 
 
 1 The phrase science of philology is used by Professor Morris here 
 and in most places in the sense of scientific procedure in dealing with 
 the language, not in its common sense of comparative phonology or 
 comparative syntax. For my own part, I wish that we might come in 
 this country, as the Germans have come, to use the phrase classical 
 philology as covering the whole field of classical study, — language, 
 literature, history, institutions, archeology. 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 11 
 
 hope, helpful controversy. But before entering upon 
 it, I am disposed to tiike breath a moment, and to admit 
 that, so far as the facts claimed are concerned, something 
 of what Professor Morris says would appear to be sadly 
 true. I should gladly be relieved of a fear that far too 
 much work in the preparatory school has, I will not say 
 nothing to do with reading Latin, but quite inadequate 
 relations to that matter. To this we shall return. 
 
 Let us now, having seen Professor Morris's position, 
 approach the subject afresh, but from essentially the 
 same point of view. 
 
 The spirit of the age demands scientific method in all 
 intellectual activity that comes within the domain of 
 science. The scientific habit of mind is a tool of which 
 each one of us, no matter in what field he is to work, must 
 become the possessor. We must all learn to observe, to 
 generalize, and to prove. We shall so learn, if we are 
 under the guidance of a wise instructor, himself possessed 
 of the power and the confirmed habit of observing, of 
 generalizing, and of proving, and engaged in teaching 
 us things the dealing with which calls for the exercise 
 of those operations. Things the dealing with which did 
 not call for the considerable exercise of these operations, 
 even though they might have in themselves an indis- 
 pensable importance (the case of French and German^ 
 as is excellently shown by Professor Morris, is in point), 
 would fail to give us entire satisfaction as material for 
 education. The ideal subjects for education, then, would 
 be such as should combine interest and importance of 
 results with the considerable exercise of observation, 
 generalization, and proof, in arriving at those results. 
 
 So far, we probably agree. We must all, at any cost, 
 learn to observe accurately, and to reason accurately 
 
12 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 from the facts observed. We must also learn the 
 thmgs that are of interest and importance, even if we 
 have to go elsewhere for training in accurate observa- 
 tion and correct inference. The ideal subjects for 
 education would be those that come under both heads, 
 those that are of interest and importance, and that, 
 at the same time, require to be dealt with by processes 
 that will form the scientific habit of mind. Professor 
 Morris has admirably shown the great value of classical 
 studies on the latter score, a value equal, in the early 
 stage of education, to that of what we may briefly call 
 the physical studies, — and, for the present, at least, 
 even superior, on account of the availability of the 
 apparatus, namely, books, and the poverty of the 
 schools in laboratories. But to possess this value is 
 not enough. For if the physical sciences, even if they 
 should prove to be less suited at the beginning, or even 
 finally, to teach young minds habits of true observation 
 and right inference, yet are of more interest, of greater 
 importance, — in a word, are more practical, — then we 
 ought to reorganize the work of our preparatory schools 
 and colleges by substituting the physical sciences in place 
 of the classics. Up to this point, also, I hope we have 
 advanced in company. 
 
 So, then, we have come to the question. What is in 
 the best sense practical? what is of interest and impor- 
 tance in the average human life ? This is a very old 
 question, because it is fundamental. But, old as it is, 
 and easy as in truth it is, no settlement has yet been 
 reached. It is thought by many that the current of 
 opinion is setting in the direction of a belief that the 
 things which are of interest and importance to the 
 average man are the constitution and behavior of 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 13 
 
 chemical agents, of fluids, of the undulations that pro- 
 duce in us visual and acoustic results, of plants, of 
 animals, of the heavenly bodies. For some men, indeed, 
 these are certainly the practical things ; and we can, 
 therefore, at once concede a part of the debatable ground. 
 To the man who is to devote his life to the building of 
 railroads and bridges, the most important thing is 
 the knowledge how to build an excellent road and an 
 excellent bridge. To the man who has a genius for in- 
 venting improved machinery, the most important thing 
 is to understand what has been done, and to have his 
 powers developed that he may do still better. But we 
 are not discussing the education of the civil or mechani- 
 cal engineer, the electrician, the practical chemist, the 
 inventor. It is a pity if there is not time to educate 
 them first as if they were to be average untechnical 
 men, and then to add thereto their education as special 
 workers. But let that go. We are speaking of the 
 needs of men of the untechnical classes, lawyers, doc- 
 tors, journalists, ministers, business men, men of leisure. 
 The truism will be granted us that man is a creature of 
 varied and wide-reaching capacities. To educate him 
 is to arouse these capacities and set them into action, to 
 make him alive to all. that touches most vitally the life 
 of his race, — that is to say, to all that is of supreme 
 interest and importance. What, then, are the matters 
 which to the average untechnical man are of supreme 
 interest and importance? On this question I shall call 
 both a man of science and a man of letters to help me ; 
 quoting first from the address on the Mission of Science, 
 delivered before the American Association for the Ad- 
 vancement of Science, at the .meeting in Philadelphia 
 in 1884, by Professor Thurston : — 
 
14 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 What is the object of dn-ectiiig this enormous array of intellec- 
 tual power into the field of scientific inquiry? Having settled 
 upon the form of the system, and the details of the mechanism by 
 which this development of science is to be secured with greatest 
 ease, accuracy, and rapidity, to what purpose is this great scheme 
 to be applied? AVhat is the use, and what is the object, of sys- 
 tematically gathering knowledge and of constructing a great, an 
 elaborate, system having the promotion of science as its sole end 
 and aim? What is " The Mission of Science"? 
 
 The iDission of science is the promotion of the welfare, material 
 and spiritual, physical and intellectual, of the human race. It has 
 for its purpose and its object the improvement, in every imaginable 
 way, directly and indirectly, of the mind and the body, the heart 
 and the soul, of every human being. It is charged with the duty 
 of seeking the cause of every ill to which mankind is subject; of 
 finding a remedy for every misfortune to which the race is now lia- 
 ble; of ameliorating every misery known to sage or savage; of 
 seeking ways of giving to all every comfort and all healthful luxu- 
 ries ; of reducing the hours of toil, and offering to the relieved la- 
 borer intellectual occupations that shall at once take from him all 
 temptation to waste his life in indolence and dissipation, and give 
 him aid in his feeble efforts to climb upward into a higher life ; of 
 enlightening the world intellectually; of giving it leisure to per- 
 fect itself ethically, and to gain those elements of character that 
 are so sadly crushed out by the terrible pressure of our incomplete 
 civilization, sentiments of honor and justice, feelings of love and 
 sympathy, and a spirit of devotion that can only be found highly 
 developed in either the simple child of nature, or in the soul that 
 has time, in the midst of a driving world, to reflect, to aspire, and 
 to grow. The true mission of science is one that extends far be- 
 yond the workshop of its servants ; it extends far beyond our ken, 
 and beyond the range of our mental grasp and farthest view. The 
 great fact that material prosperity is the fruit of science, and that 
 other great truth, that as mankind is given opportunity for medi- 
 tation and for culture, the higher attributes of human character 
 are given development, are the best indications of the nature of the 
 real mission of science, and of the correctness of the conclusion 
 that the use and the aim of' scientific inquiry are to be sought in 
 the region beyond and above the material world to which those 
 studies are confined. 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 15 
 
 This is the position taken on the question, what is of 
 supreme interest and importance, by a scientific man 
 of great success, himself professionally engaged in di- 
 recting the training of mechanical engineers. " The use 
 and the aim of scientific inquiry are to be sought in the 
 region beyond and above the material world to which 
 those studies are confined." We can agree to that. 
 
 And now for the answer of a man of letters, Dr. John- 
 son, given in his Life of Milton : — 
 
 But the truth is, that the knowledge of external nature, and the 
 sciences which that knowledge requires or includes, are not the 
 great or the frequent business of the human mind. Whether we 
 provide for action or conversation, whether we wish to be useful 
 or pleasing, the first requisite is the religious and moral knowledge 
 of right and wrong; the next is an acquaintance with the history 
 of mankind, and with those examples which may be said to embody 
 truth, and prove by events the reasonableness of opinions. Pru- 
 dence and justice are virtues and excellences of all times and of all 
 places. We are perpetually morahsts ; but we are geometricians 
 only by chance. Our intercourse with intellectual nature is neces- 
 sary ; our speculations upon matter are voluntary and at leisure. 
 Physiological learning is of such rare emergence that one may 
 know another half his life without being able to estimate his skill 
 in hydrostatics or astronomy ; but his moral and prudential char- 
 acter immediately aj^pears. 
 
 Those authors, therefore, are to be read at schools, that supply 
 most axioms of prudence, most principles of moral truth, and most 
 materials for conversation ; and those purposes are best served by 
 poets, orators, and historians. 
 
 Let me not be censured for this digression as pedantic or para- 
 doxical ; for, if I have Milton against me, I have Socrates on my 
 side. It was his labor to turn philosophy from the study of nature 
 to speculations upon life ; but the innovators whom I oppose are 
 turning of£ attention from life to nature. They seem to think that 
 we are placed here to watch the growth of plants, or the motions of 
 the stars. Socrates was rather of the opinion that what we had to 
 learn was how to do good and avoid evil. 
 
16 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 Dr. Johnson twice needs supplementing here. We 
 all at times suspect him of imperfect susceptibilit}^ to 
 the highest qualities of imaginative literature ; and it is 
 in precisely these qualities that literature reaches the 
 expression of that which is highest in the human mind. 
 Secondly, we more than suspect him of imperfect sym- 
 pathy with that instinct of human nature which, as 
 Professor Morris has told us, has come to play so mighty 
 a part in all our thinking, the imperious desire to know 
 the causes of things, — in a word, the scientific spirit. 
 We are all scientific nowadays. The human mind has 
 taken all knowledge to be its province. We all desire 
 to know the whole of the universe, and the place and 
 part of man in it. 
 
 But we cannot know well both the record of nature 
 and the record of man. We must choose, for our main 
 occupation, the one to which our bent inclines, and 
 thenceforth depend, for our acquaintance with the other, 
 upon the saving friction of our necessary intercourse 
 with the great thinking and writing world. We shall 
 do right to follow our tastes, whatever they may be. 
 So much is assured us, and rightly assured us, at some 
 point or other, in the new education. But if our tastes 
 lead us to the knowledge of that which is the great and 
 frequent business of the human mind, we shall choose, 
 with Dr. Johnson, to understand man himself, as he has 
 shown himself in history, and above all, as he has shown 
 himself in that more intimate history which is called 
 literature. 
 
 We are dealing here with a point upon w^hich a strange 
 misconception exists. It appears to be constantly as- 
 sumed that, " discipline " apart, the study of mathemat- 
 ics, of mechanics, of chemistry, of electricity, supplies 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 17 
 
 not only to the technical worker, but equally to tlie 
 average man, something which he will be constantly 
 putting into use, while the study of the classical litera- 
 tures and cognate subjects supplies the student with 
 idle things, mere accomplishmeuts, out of all touch with 
 daily life. The misconception arises from the fact that 
 the so-called scientific studies lead to those marvel- 
 lous triumphs over our natural lot which have added 
 so much to the comfort and pleasure of living, and to 
 the interchange of thought. But from this fact nothing 
 rightly follows except that the technical worker, and 
 especially the man of inventive genius, must have the 
 scientific training. As for the rest, the blessings of the 
 steam-engine, the telegraph, the electric light, fall alike 
 on the scientific and the unscientific. I am a devout 
 believer in the importance of giving to every student 
 mathematical training — an absolute indispensable in 
 the best liberal education — and a training in some 
 two or three of the natural sciences, — such as botany, 
 physics, and chemistry, — sufficient to afford him some 
 understanding of the way in which scientific work is 
 carried on, and a clear conception of that regular recur- 
 rence of like phenomena under like conditions which 
 we call law.i But I am an equally devout believer in 
 
 ^ I do not believe that, in a well-planned education, the study of 
 the classics could wholly replace the study of the physical and natural 
 sciences. For myself, my first heartfelt conviction that in this world 
 like phenomena recur under like conditions was got, not from the study 
 of the development of the classical tongues, but from work in ento- 
 mology, outside of the college curriculum, carried on, in successive sea- 
 sons, under the direction of a classmate who is now a special worker in 
 that field. The development of a language is equally under wliat we 
 call law; but the phenomena are too difiicult, and the tests too little 
 obviuus, to serve the purposes of a young student. 
 
18 AIMS AND IMETHODS 
 
 the importance of giving to every student of possible 
 humanistic tastes some knowledge of those great litera- 
 tures, ancient and modern, which, with the great works 
 of art, constitute the most precious — because wholly 
 unreplaceable — achievements of the human race. I 
 de]3recate the apparent tendency of our times, which 
 threatens to carry us on to a point at which education 
 will split sharply into two parts : the serious student of 
 literature knowing nothing of natural science, and the 
 serious student of natural science having no catholic 
 introduction to literature, or respect for it. It is the 
 most crying need of education to-day that workers in 
 the classics and workers in the sciences should hold 
 together and insist that education consists of a fairly 
 broad basis of knowledge and sympathies, together with 
 a thorough mastery of one's own powers, obtained by 
 an exclusive devotion, during the latter part of a college 
 course, to a few things — be they classics, or modern lan- 
 guages, or mathematics, or natural science — to which 
 the student's individual turn of mind leads him, in a 
 system of absolute freedom. But, so long as they do 
 not hold together, I must express my conviction not 
 only tljat it is the very bane of mathematical and sci- 
 entific studies in a liberal education to maintain that 
 their value lies in their practical applications, but 
 also that it involves an absolute untruth. The uses of 
 mathematics which the average untechnical man makes 
 in his daity life are the operations of addition, subtrac- 
 tion, multiplication, and division, applied to calculations 
 of which the reckoning of interest is probably the most 
 complicated; and these matters he learned, not in col- 
 lege, nor in the higli or corresponding private school, 
 but in the grammar school. As for geometry, the aver- 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 19 
 
 age man uses very little of it, while algebra commonly 
 drops wholly out of his life, as clean forgotten as our 
 friends the objectors to the classics tell us Greek and 
 Latin are. And precisely the same thing is true of any 
 practical application, in the life of the average untech- 
 nical man, of acoustics, optics, and the like, and pretty 
 nearly true of the forgetting of them. And so Dr. John- 
 son is practically right. " Physiological learning is of such 
 rare emergence that one may know another half his life 
 without being able to estimate his skill in hydrostatics 
 or astronomy ; but his moral and prudential character 
 immediately appears." The things that are of supreme 
 interest and importance to the average man, and even 
 to the technical worker, so far as he can give himself 
 that leisure to perfect himself ethically which Professor 
 Thurston says it is the mission of science to provide 
 some day, in some measure, for the whole human family, 
 are, not the things of external nature, but, to use a 
 phrase that has grown familiar, the things of the mind. 
 
 We have, then, so far as strong natural bent does not 
 intervene, two requirements to meet in choosing the 
 studies which shall constitute that ideal and indis- 
 pensable part of education for which we have been 
 inquiring on behalf of the boy who is to be one of the 
 great multitude of untechnical workers. They must 
 deal with the things of the mind, and they must beget 
 a right habit of mental procedure. 
 
 Now the study of Greek and Latin, properly pursued, 
 satisfies the second requirement, so far as the preparatory 
 school is concerned, as well as the study of science can 
 satisfy it, and, on account of- the availability of the ap- 
 paratus, even better ; whereas, as regards the things of 
 the mind, kinematics, acoustics, electricity, and the rest 
 
20 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 do not deal with them at all, — while the Greek and 
 Roman literatures deal with them in an unsurpassed 
 degree, beside being a large and important part of the 
 record of the intellectual ancestry of the life which we 
 now live. 
 
 And here, even if some of my hearers do not now 
 go with me, I am sure that Professor Morris and I 
 are still together. Yet a difference of emphasis — an 
 important matter in educational affairs — begins to 
 appear. He has disclaimed, at the outset, any share in 
 an attempt to reconstitute the college curriculum upon 
 the basis of a training mainly literary, while I, for rea- 
 sons already given, should gladly see it reconstituted 
 upon such a basis, — taking the word literary (though 
 I should prefer the word humanistic) in the sense in 
 which he ' himself has used it on page 6 (toward the 
 bottom) as standing for " the study of the form and con- 
 tents of the Latin writers, the gradual discovery of the 
 facts, and then of the meaning, of Roman history, the 
 investigation of archseological problems, the apprecia- 
 tion of poetic style, the comprehension of ancient ethics 
 and philosophy, the knowledge of Roman daily life and 
 private character." But I pass at once to the most seri- 
 ous divergence. I have spoken of a difference of tone 
 between the preface and the body of the monograph. 
 With the utmost desire to find a reconciliation which 
 shall leave to the latter the spirit of the former, I am 
 forced to understand Professor Morris's view as follows: 
 that, though the classical work of the college, at least in 
 the first two years, should undoubtedly deal mainly with 
 the literature and history, yet " in our lower schools we 
 no longer study Latin in order to learn Latin ; we study 
 it and teach it with j^rimary reference to the science of 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 21 
 
 philology" ; or, to put tlie matter more explicitly, as lie 
 elsewhere does, with primary reference to the forming 
 of the scientific spirit, through training, mainly in the 
 field of syntax, in observation, generalization, and proof. 
 This is very clear language, and, whatever may be said 
 in the preface, it is in exact keeping with the under- 
 standing with which readers rise from the pamphlet. 
 And even if Professor Morris has only been temporarily 
 led into a disproportionate statement through that clear 
 conception of the value of training in the fundamental 
 scientific processes which enabled him to state so well 
 the power of properly conducted classical study to give 
 this training, yet the view which he has enunciated has 
 undoubtedly gained some vogue, and his monograph is 
 cited in support of it. In the opinion, therefore, of many 
 people, among them professional workers in the classics, 
 themselves actively engaged on the scientific side, the 
 fallacy of the monograph needs to be pointed out. 
 
 The fundamental error in Professor Morris's view, 
 then, is this : he exalts a habit of mental procedure into 
 the position of the acquisitions gained by that xDrocedure. 
 What the naturalist demands of the student is that he 
 shall use scientific x^rocedure to attain results ; namely, 
 a knowledge of the things that specially belong to the 
 province of natural history. The student of nature is 
 not forming the scientific spirit at one time, and getting 
 results at another : he is building up the scientific spirit 
 in the very act of seeking for results. Just as im- 
 peratively, our classical student must get his results in 
 the very activity wdiich, rightly guided by the teacher, 
 develops in him the scientific habit of thinking. These 
 results, as wo have seen, are, in their highest distinctive 
 aim, an acquaintance with, and love of, the things that 
 
22 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 belong especially to literature, — the things of the mind. 
 But the literatures in question are hidden in unknown 
 tongues. Then the great aim of the preparatory schools 
 should be to teach students, by the best means that the 
 teacher's art can devise, to read those unknown tongues, 
 and to teach them to read them in such a way as to 
 leave as slight a barrier as possible between the reader 
 and his author. The main duty of the schools is, in a 
 word, to apply the operations of observation, generaliza- 
 tion, and proof to the acquisition of the powder to read 
 Greek and Latin. All the benefits of grammatical study 
 on which Professor Morris bases the claims of the study 
 of Latin are conserved by the larger theory which I 
 advocate. For the efforts which have been made of late 
 to dispense largely with grammar in teaching students 
 to read Greek and Latin are futile. The workman 
 must know the use of his tools ; and the ^vorkman who 
 wastes the most time in getting this knowledge is 
 the one who longest postpones getting it.^ It can be 
 shown with certainty that not one iota of rigorous think- 
 ing is sacrificed by a true method of studying Greek 
 and Latin with primary reference to learning to read 
 them. But the teacher's responsibility does not stop 
 with teaching his students to read. A boy is born into 
 the world with tastes and aptitudes in embryo. It is 
 the great privilege of the teachers of Greek and Latin 
 in the preparatory schools to hate the opportunity of 
 developing at once the scientific habit and whatsoever 
 
 1 Pessime de pueris merentur praeceptores qui aut regulas nullas 
 tradunt aut certe statim abiciunt, et magnifice promittunt fore ut usu 
 loqueudi discantur constructiones, . . . Omnino cnim danda est 
 opera, ut tarn diu in arte detineantur adolescentes, donee perfect! 
 grammatici, donee arcliitecti sermonis et absoluti artifices evaserint- — 
 Melaxciitiion. » 
 
IE CLASSICAL STUDY. 23 
 
 of aptitude there may be for the things represented by 
 the word literature, — to give the student his first hirge 
 outlook into human life, outside of the country farm 
 and the city street. So, then, the young student of 
 Greek or Latin should be made to feel from the outset 
 that his study of the mechanism through which the 
 Greeks or the Romans expressed thought is to the end 
 that he may be able to read and enjoy a great literature, 
 and that, through every page of that literature actually 
 read, he is preparing himself to read with more and 
 more understanding and enjoyment in the field that re- 
 mains. All this time, we quite agree with Professor Mor- 
 ris, we must be forming in our young pupil, by incessant 
 watchfulness, the habit of exact observation and sound 
 reasoning. That is one of our interesting and very 
 solemn duties — one of the indispensables. But there 
 are twt) indispensables. What can we conceive to be 
 gained, even for Professor Morris's aim, by throwing 
 aside or even obscuring one of them, except that very 
 inability to read Latin, and that indisposition to read 
 it, which we all deplore ? Why impoverish the young 
 spirit, up to the time of his leaving the school for the 
 university, by feeding him on method without results, 
 on form without substance? Is it because the human- 
 istic spirit is so rife in our nineteenth century that 
 he cannot fail to catch it, so in the air that he draws 
 it in with every breath, while the scientific habit is 
 so foreign to the feeling of the times that everything else 
 must be thrown aside to further the birth of it in the 
 young mind? I had supposed the opposite. But at 
 any rate, if we wish to prepare for the universities a 
 student who shall feel that Latin and Greek are indeed 
 dead, that they have nothing to do with human life in 
 
24 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 the nineteenth century, and who, as early as tlie elec- 
 tive system of his college allows him, shall shift his sci- 
 entific activity into a field contiguous to the life of to- 
 day, then let us draw a division liue between the 
 school and the college, and let the latter attempt to 
 beget a literary feeling, a humanistic spirit, in students 
 who have thus far been primarily dwelling in cases, 
 modes, and tenses, and in these things, furthermore, 
 not as passports to the literature, but rather as a daily 
 drill in the fundamental scientific processes. 
 
 We have now agreed, I hope, upon a statement of the 
 twofold aim for the classical work of the preparatory 
 school, — to teach the student, by methods of exact 
 observation and inference, the art of reading Greek and 
 Latin, to the end that he may be able easily to acquaint 
 himself later with those great commentaries on human 
 life, the Greek and the Roman literatures; and at 
 the same time to deal sympathetically with such parts 
 of these literatures — some of them of the highest 
 importance — as come within the curriculum of the 
 schools. 
 
 What, then, shall be the method by which we shall 
 teach this on which all the rest is largely dependent, — 
 the art of reading Greek and Latin ? 
 
 We are all too much enlisted in the same cause to 
 allow me to fear that I shall give offence when I say 
 that we, preparatory teachers and college teachers alike, 
 fail to give our students a reading power in Greek and 
 Latin. What they get is not the power to read Latin, — ■ 
 to confine what I have to say to that language, — but 
 the confirmed habit of attempting to "dig out" the 
 meaning by a slow, painful, and dangerous process. We 
 set our students to work at learning to read Latin by 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 25 
 
 a method founded on unreason, a method very similar, 
 except in its lack of the element of pleasurable 
 success, to that by which Jack Horner, in the nurs- 
 ery rhyme, got the treasures of the pudding-dish into 
 his mouth, — a method which refuses to think the 
 thought as the Roman thought it, and substitutes 
 instead a process of hunting up one thing, wherever 
 it may be in the length and breadth of the sentence, 
 and then another, perhaps far removed, and then an- 
 other, to be patched upon the first, and then another to 
 go with the second, and then another, and another, and 
 so on, with the blessing of Heaven on the result, or not, 
 as the case may be. 
 
 This is — I speak with a very near approach to exact- 
 ness — the process regularly taught in the books that 
 teach anything at all upon the subject in starting a stu- 
 dent upon his career in Latin. ^ This is the best method 
 that the study of thousands of teachers in this shrewd 
 age has succeeded in establishing for the understanding 
 of the meaning of a Roman sentence. But it is not 
 the method of the Roman forum and the Roman dinner- 
 table. The Roman orator spoke his sentence straight 
 through, from beginning to end, one word at a time, 
 giving his hearers no opportunity to begin with his 
 main sentence, unless he himself began with it, never 
 turning upon his tracks to enable them, after discover- 
 ing his verb, to go back and hunt up the modifiers of 
 his subject, and then to go back again and collect, from 
 beginning to end, the modifiers of his predicate. The 
 Roman diner-out told his anecdote one word at a time, 
 
 1 I am indebted to Dr. Bacon, the editor of the Academy, for per- 
 mission to use again a portion of an article contributed by me to that 
 journal (February, 1887). 
 
26 ATMS AND METHODS 
 
 in the order in which we now find it. And in some 
 way or other, hy indications somehow strown along the 
 sentence^ the mass-meeting in the forum and the host 
 at the dinner-table nevertheless understood ! That was 
 the ancient method. What, then, shall we say of the 
 modern method? Simply that it is the method of de- 
 spair. It assumes from the outset that the mind of 
 to-day is not competent to detect, while the Roman 
 sentence moves steadily on, those indications of mean- 
 ing which sufficed for the better-endowed Roman mind, 
 and it accordingly substitutes for the Roman way slow 
 and painful processes which could find no possible 
 defence except upon a theory that they are the best of 
 which an inferior age is capable. 
 
 My own teaching for years has proceeded upon a 
 very different plan. I have believed that the modern 
 mind could be brought to understand Latin suited to its 
 particular stage of advancement in a graded process pre- 
 cisely as the Roman mind understood it. The method 
 employed under this spirit of hope may be succinctly 
 stated in the general directions to the teacher : Being for 
 a time content to move sloAvly, in tlie certainty of great 
 speed by and by in the event of success, select a short 
 Latin sentence and put it upon the board, one word at 
 a time, asking your students, as each new word is written, 
 what the Roman found in the position, the inflection, and 
 the signification of that word to convey to him meaning 
 
 — what light it threw backward upon so much of the 
 sentence as was already past, what light it threw for- 
 ward upon that part of the sentence which still remained 
 
 — what indication of the speaker's thought, in short, 
 the Roman found in one word and another, while the 
 sentence moved steadily on, so entirely sufficient that, 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 27 
 
 when the last word was spoken, the full idea of the 
 speaker had been communicated to the hearer's mind. 
 Guide the student through this wherever he needs 
 guidance. Unhappily, he will for some time need it in 
 large measure, for the absolutely reversed process by 
 which, after the sentence is all over and its meaning 
 has been " dug out," we deal with syntax in the exer- 
 cise of belated parsing, leaves the pupil's mind very 
 helpless when he is suddenly asked to apply his knowl- 
 edge to the interpretation of syntactical indications 
 in situ. Avail yourself of the resources of the whole 
 class, drawing out one point after another as you ques- 
 tion listeners whose interest and attention are sure to 
 be entire. Next put a piece of paper into the hands of 
 each of them, and, taking up a new sentence, and 
 writing one word at a time upon the board as before, 
 set at each word a formal question or succession of 
 questions to be answered formally, but succinctly and 
 rapidly, upon the student's paper. Let the substance 
 of these questions be. What indications of meaning are 
 there here for the word itself? what light does it throw 
 backward upon the words already past, the bearing of 
 which was left in momentary suspense by the Roman 
 way of thinking? what possibilities are there of con- 
 structions to follow, if the word is one that requires 
 something else to complete its meaning, and that some- 
 thing else has not preceded it? and is there among 
 these possible completing constructions any one that 
 you may fairly regard as probable? 
 
 Then tell him to study his next lesson by himself in 
 the same way, guarding himself at every point from 
 looking ahead in the sentence by keeping the remainder 
 always covered from sight as he moves on (a sheet of 
 
28 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 common note-paper can easily be cut to insure this), and 
 to be prepared at the next meeting of the class to tell, 
 rapidly and precisely, how he did it. Let this go on for 
 some time. Frequently repeat the exercise with which 
 you began, of putting a sentence upon the board, one 
 word at a time, with formal questions for terse written 
 answers. After a few weeks, cease to write the sen- 
 tence yourself, but have the student write it as you pro- 
 nounce it. Give one Avord at a time, asking questions 
 for written answers, as before. Direct that the answers 
 be placed below, while the Latin sentence constantly 
 grows at the top of the paper. After a few weeks, let 
 there be no more writing of the Latin words ; but in all 
 other respects conduct the exercise as before, — with the 
 exception that, as certain kinds of indications of mean- 
 ing in the individual word and in frequently recurring 
 types of combination become familiar to your students, 
 you will cease to ask questions on these points, and will 
 devote yourself to new ones introduced in the sentences 
 chosen. In no very long time, you will have made your 
 class familiar, from an entirely practical point of view, 
 with all the commonly recurring constructions and types 
 of combination. And you will find that, throughout this 
 time, the method you have been using will have been 
 doing as much as lies within the power of human art to 
 break up that sad inaccuracy of observation and inconse- 
 quence of inference which, in school and college, lead 
 the teacher in his gloomier hours to doubt the power of 
 education. You will discover that an active or a passive 
 ending, a mode or a tense sign, the mark of a dative or 
 an ablative, produces a discernible effect upon the mind 
 of the student who, in the exercises described above, 
 has been required to tell for every word when reached^ 
 
IN" CLASSICAL STUDY. 29 
 
 and hefore advancing a step farther, the precise signifi- 
 cance of each of these indications of meaning. And — 
 what is more, and, indeed, the soul of the whole pro- 
 cedure — you will find that these graspings of indications 
 of meaning, at first so slow and painfully conscious, will 
 become unconscious and rapid, so that, as you read aloud 
 to your class longer and longer selections, the meaning 
 of longer and longer passages will be carried straight 
 to their minds (as once to the Roman mind) without 
 the need of any questioning from you, and with no 
 translation into English on their part. And you will 
 feel the great satisfaction of knowing that your class is 
 on the direct road, and the only possible direct road, 
 to the reading of the Latin language as the people 
 who wrote it read it, — straight on without returning 
 upon a word, with speed, and with pleasure. 
 
 I should gladly treat this matter in detail, if time 
 permitted, for I believe it to be of an importance diffi- 
 cult to exaggerate ; but I have found by actual trial 
 that to do this alone requires all the time that can pos- 
 sibly be given to an address in these days of short 
 sermons. I must therefore ask you, if I have suc- 
 ceeded in making it seem desirable that there should be 
 an examination of the method of teaching Latin and 
 Greek, to take the trouble to look at a pamphlet,^ from 
 the press of sMessrs. Ginn & Co., in which I have set 
 forth in detail the method here sketched, and have 
 added a special discussion of its application from the 
 beginning of the preparatory course. 
 
 One word, however, I must add now to what I have 
 to-day said on the subject. We have agreed that the 
 
 1 The Art of Heading Latin : How to Teach it. 
 
30 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 student must, for every reason, constantly be held to 
 exact thinking. But it is a grievous error, permit me 
 to say, to let him into your confidence by giving 
 him to understand that what he is in pursuit of is 
 mental discipline. , Mental discipline is not a good that 
 appeals very powerfully to the young mind, with its 
 fresh outlook on this new world. I do not think a nat- 
 uralist would talk in this way to a young fellow who 
 was about to take up the study of botany. He would 
 rather tell him that it was very interesting to know that 
 which botany has to teach, — the life and growth of 
 plants. So we classicists had better tell our pupils that 
 what they are to find in Latin is the life and growth of 
 the human mind, seen at a great period, the results 
 of which still abide ; and that in order to get at this, 
 they must learn how the Romans made people under- 
 stand what was in their minds. Cases, modes, tenses, 
 then, are to he studied and treated in the preparatory 
 school as heys to the literature, as direct conveyers of 
 thought from mind to mind. In sa3dng this, I am not 
 saying that the best way to learn how the Romans ex- 
 pressed their thoughts by cases, modes, and tenses, is to 
 study syntax unscientifically, or that an unscientific 
 grammar is as good a tool, in what Professor Morris 
 calls linguistic work, as a scientific grammar. I do not 
 agree with him that the Andrews and Stoddard of our 
 boyhood is as good a book of its kind as we ever had in 
 our schools, or that, as he seems to hold, Goodwin's 
 Grammar is superior only from the scientific point of 
 view. Every gain in syntactical science is a gain for 
 pedagogy; for it consists in a better understanding of 
 the force of constructions, and a. truer knowledge of 
 their actual historical relations. Bat this means that 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 31 
 
 the exposition from which the young student is to 
 learn these constructions can be at once sounder, and 
 easier to apprehend and retain. 
 
 We may safely say — and any of you will agree 
 with me, who, like myself, were prepared for college on 
 Crosby's Greek Grammar, and then put into Goodwin's 
 Moods and Tenses on arriving there — that scientific 
 clearness assists and inspires as much as it illumines. In 
 my own experience, as a teacher of preparatory studies, 
 and as a teacher in college, I have found that a mechan- 
 ical and unscientific understanding of the Latin modes 
 and tenses is a greater block to the rapid comprehension 
 of a Latin writer, a more frequent cause of absolute 
 inapprehension of his meaning, than any other cause 
 except the wicked liberties taken with the structure of 
 the Latin sentence by the modern method. 
 
 We have at last, with much patience or impatience 
 on your part, got our assumed boy into college, hav- 
 ing equipped him, I hope, with a considerable power 
 of reading easy Latin, together with a dawning love 
 for that exact expression of thought touched with 
 emotion or imagination which we call literature, — ^a 
 larger perception of, and sympathy with, all that has 
 been best in the human family, an awakened and grow- 
 ing sense for the things of the mind. What now are 
 his college instructors to do for him, to carry on worthily 
 the work which you have begun in the preparatory 
 school? 
 
 They will still hold fast the two aims which you have 
 held ; but they will also add, not too early in the curri- 
 culum, one aim more, — the very one which I haA^e urged 
 should not be introduced into the school. They will 
 
32 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 make provision for the scientific side of philological 
 study, — philological study pursued, not as a training 
 for science, but in the love of the results to be achieved 
 through it. 
 
 For the schools, then, to recapitulate, the two joint 
 aims should be : — 
 
 1. To prepare the student to read Greek and Latin 
 with ease and speed. 
 
 2. To rouse in him an interest in and love for the 
 things which give Greece and Rome their power and 
 place in the history of mankind. 
 
 For the universities, to summarize in advance, the 
 four aims should be : — 
 
 1. To continue the work of training the student to 
 read Greek and Latin with ease and speed. 
 
 2. To read with him as much Greek and Latin as 
 possible. 
 
 3. To display to him as many aspects as possible of 
 those civilizations which have given Greece and Rome 
 their permanent place and power. 
 
 4. To conduct him, if he has the bent for philological 
 or archaeological science, into the field of research. 
 
 To my mind each of the first two aims which the 
 university teacher should set himself demands, in ad- 
 vanced work, a method of procedure the general adop- 
 tion of which I do not expect to see in the immediate 
 future. 
 
 Our students who elect Greek and Latin throughout 
 their university course (and it is mainly of such students 
 that we are now speaking) are occupied about eight 
 years with these languages. I have urged that they 
 sliould at the very beginning of their preparatory course 
 be set upon a path that leads to the ability to understand 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 33 
 
 Greek and Latin without translating, — as a student 
 who has spent some paltry months in Germany expects 
 as a matter of course to understand German. To my 
 full conviction, the classical education is in one im- 
 portant part a failure, if this ability is not attained to a 
 considerable degree in season to allow at least the last 
 two years of the university course to be devoted in 
 part to a true reading of classical literature under the 
 teacher's supervision. This means that, from as early 
 as the beginning of the Junior year, students who 
 have been well trained to this end (I speak only of 
 such) should have opportunities to study without 
 daily translation. The advantages are fourfold. First, 
 the student, by constantly dealing with the Roman 
 page, for example, without the intervention of English, 
 gains much more rapidly in familiarity with the structure 
 of the Roman sentence, and consequently in swiftness 
 of comprehension of the Roman thought.^ Secondly, 
 the acquaintance of much more of the literature can be 
 made in this way, — about twice as much, I should infer 
 from my own experiments. Thirdly, the student sub- 
 stitutes a direct contemplation of the pictures presented 
 
 1 The case is much less urgent, I concede, with Greek than with 
 Latin, The order of the Greek sentence is not so different from that 
 of the English that one cannot translate a long Greek period cur- 
 rently as it stands, and in the very process be making advances in the 
 power to read and understand without translating. The Roman classi- 
 cal style, on the other hand, differs so entirely from the English style 
 in its unfolding of the thought that the Latin sentence should always 
 be read to the end before it is translated. But, except for an occa- 
 sional stumbling-block, this preliminary reading of the Latin sentence 
 in itself conveys the author's meaning to the rightly trained advanced 
 student; and the remaining steps should naturally be to proceed to the 
 next Latin sentence, and the next, — unless, indeed, one's aim is prac- 
 tice in English composition, and not the study of Roman literature. 
 
34 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 by his author, in place of the contemplation of imperfect 
 and slowly manufactured copies of his own making. 
 Fourthly, this way of reading gives great pleasure. 
 The more familiar one becomes with a foreign language, 
 after the first feeling of mastery has arrived, the more 
 his original delights him, and translation irks him. 
 
 Of this matter, as I say in the pamphlet alluded to 
 before, I wish that Professor Greenough would give a 
 full discussion. It had long been my habit to read on 
 with my classes each day, after finishing the set lesson, 
 without translating, but with such grammatical and 
 other comments as should ~make the meaning clear, 
 and I had intended to break eventually with translation 
 in the class-room in the work of advanced students, 
 confining it to occasional brief written examinations 
 during the term, and the final examination at the end 
 of it ; but I should not yet have taken the step had it 
 not been for Professor Greenough 's assurances that the 
 plan had succeeded measurably in his own experience. 
 As his method remains undescribed, let me state, as a 
 possibly useful suggestion, the arrangement which I have 
 reached, through an experience of nearly two years. 
 
 A lesson is assigned for the whole class, varying in 
 length according to the difficulty of the author, and 
 increasing with the amount read. Of a difficult author, 
 like Juvenal, the whole must be read aloud and com- 
 mented upon in the class-room. In Pliny the younger, 
 who will serve for a specimen of the treatment of an 
 easier author, the maximum lesson reached (which was 
 held for a good part of the term) was six pages. Each 
 student, reading the whole lesson carefully in his study, 
 marks every passage which he does not feel sure that he 
 understands. In addition, he selects a passage, not ex- 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 35 
 
 ceecling half a page in length, and prepares himself with 
 pains to read it aload at the recitation, treating it as he 
 would a piece of English literature. During this read- 
 ing the rest of the class are advised to follow the reader, 
 if possible, rather than the text; and the teacher, in 
 particular, relies wholly upon him. Failures properly 
 to express the meaning by correct grouping, by the bal- 
 ancing of corresponding or antithetical members, by due 
 emphasis, etc., etc., are corrected, as any other failures 
 would be. Absolute failures to comprehend the author 
 are very sure — even if a relation of mutual trust did 
 not exist between teacher and student — to betray 
 themselves in the delivery,^ and it is generally easy to 
 detect precisely where and how the student went astray. 
 Explanations are rarely given b}^ translating, but, in 
 preference, others in the class are asked to explain the 
 misinterpreted constructions, to point out the unnoticed 
 correspondences or antitheses, to correct the false group- 
 ing or false emphasis. Where, as seldom happens with 
 advanced students, the difficulty lies in the mere mean- 
 ing of a phrase or word, it seems to me to be generally 
 better to paraphrase in Latin rather than in English, — 
 yet under no iron rnle against the admission of that 
 tongue. As we pass over the parts of the lesson 
 which no one has prepared to read aloud, questions 
 are asked by the class; or I myself, in the light of 
 
 1 About this time Elmwood the Quaker, being recommended to him 
 as one who would read Latin to him for the advantage of his conver- 
 sation, attended liim every afternoon except Sundays. . . . Elm- 
 wood complied with the directions, and improved himself by his attend- 
 ance ; for he relates that Milton, having a curious ear, knew by his voice 
 ichen he read ivhat he did not understand, and would stop him, and open the 
 most difficult passages. — Johnson's Life of Hilton. 
 
36 ATMS AND METHODS 
 
 the experience of former years, point out and meet 
 difficulties. Let me illustrate. In the famous te con- 
 sule passage in Juvenal (11, 33), I should ask the con- 
 struction of te. If I were told that it was ablative 
 absolute (we have Mayor's example for the confession 
 that such calamities occur), I should ask for a different 
 opinion, and should be pretty sure to find some one who 
 had recognized consnle to be the imperative. That is 
 as comprehensible an explanation as a translation would 
 have been. Undoubtedly it takes more time. But, on 
 the other hand, large parts of each lesson will require 
 no explanation. And everywhere the student is brought 
 into direct contact with his author, endeavoring to 
 understand his thought as he wrote it, and to convey 
 it directly, in all its confessedly untranslatable qualities, 
 to me and the rest of the class. And only at intervals 
 (in addition to the final examination at the end of the 
 term) is an exercise in written translation conducted, — 
 an exercise naturally aiming, when it does occur, at a 
 more exacting standard of literary expression than expe- 
 rience leads a teacher to hope for in daily oral work. 
 
 With negligent students such a system would work 
 ruin. But in the case of those who have conceived a 
 fondness for the language, and have gained a command 
 of it sufficient to lead them to elect it in the last two 
 years of their course, the system produces a rapid gain 
 in the power of understanding, and gives a sense of 
 success which is sure to beget zest. As for my own 
 share as teacher, I feel a far keener pleasure in an ex- 
 cellent reading of an elegy of Catullus or an excellent 
 declamation of a passage from Juvenal than in the best 
 class-room translation I have known. And when (for 
 repetition is pardonable in so important a matter), — - 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 37 
 
 when shall we hope to have a true reading of Greek 
 and Latm, if we cannot bring our students to this? if 
 they can never get the flavor of a Homer or a Horace, 
 but only of a compound of their own, made of the prod- 
 ucts of a different soil and a different climate ? If no 
 translation of Horace yet made is Horace, ought not the 
 young men who are the choicest product of our classical 
 training to be brought, in eight years, to a point at 
 which they can read the real Horace? Incontroverti- 
 bly "Yes," if it be possible. But possible it is. The 
 way lies in plain sight. And by taking that way, and 
 only so, can we have any considerable hope that our 
 students will continue to love and read their Homer 
 and their Horace and their Aristophanes and their 
 Juvenal, when they come to give all but their stolen 
 moments to their patients, their clients, their parish- 
 ioners, their silks and cottons. 
 
 But one definite test remains to be satisfied, in 
 order to guarantee this method against the name of fad, 
 — the test of translation of passages from the term's 
 work, and of translation at sight, at the end of the term. 
 And herein I find the best voucher for the system. For 
 my advanced classes have gained in power in these re- 
 spects since daily translation was abandoned.^ 
 
 So much for the palpable and easy part of my sug- 
 gestions. 
 
 ^ That wise predecessor of ours in the schoolmaster's art, Eoger 
 Ascham, says (Second Booke, Teachyng the ready Way to the Latin 
 Tonge), " After that your scholer, as I sayd before, shall come indeede, 
 first to a readie perfitness in translating, then to a ripe and skilful! 
 choice in marking out hys sixe pointes . . ., these books [Cicero, 
 Terence, Plautus, Caesar, Livy], I would have him read now a good 
 deale at every lecture [recitation] ; for he shall not now use dailie tranS' 
 lation, but only construe againe, and parse, where ye suspect is any nede." 
 
38 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 Of tlie other side, that which deals with the develop- 
 ing of the student's love of the intellectual life, it is dif- 
 ficult to speak in definite words, as it is difficult so to 
 speak on any other matter which touches things that do 
 not fall within the domain of science. A man's educa- 
 tion, to employ in part Walter Pater's phrase, becomes 
 complete in proportion as his susceptibility to impressions 
 conveyed by the best things in art, in literature, in life, 
 increases in depth and variety. To help him to develop 
 this power of receiving impressions from a great variety 
 of the best things, we must ourselves feel keenly such 
 of them as come within the range of Greek and Roman 
 literature and life. But I have said only half the truth 
 in saying that. We classicists are no more dependent 
 upon the classics for our whole professional outfit than 
 is our breakfast-table dependent for its supplies upon 
 the contiguous garden and pasture. We may import 
 our cheering cup from China ; and we ma}^ get a keen 
 stimulus for literary study from Shakespeare or the 
 more Roman Bacon, from Milton, from Wordsworth, 
 nay even from Herrick, and Lovelace, and Waller. And 
 if this be possible for us, so is it for those we teach. 
 I met recently a student of mine of many years ago, 
 who, speaking of his college course, thanked me for 
 two things : first, that I had required him to commit to 
 memory no small number of the Odes of Horace (which 
 acquisition, made against his will, he had come to value 
 and add to) ; second, that I had advised him to possess 
 himself of Palgrave's "Golden Treasury of English Songs 
 and Lyrics." The poorest teacher gets an occasional 
 compliment, and this was not strictly my first. But it 
 made me feel, more than anything else had done, that 
 my work in those days liad not been without results. 
 
 ] 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 39 
 
 And it is worth mentioning, since it points to an atti- 
 tude toward the intellectual life which, as it seems to 
 me, we who teach the classics are bound to take. We 
 should deal with the literatures of Greece and Rome, 
 not as a distinct and remote entity, but as a precious 
 part of the most precious of all heritages, bringing the 
 sense for literature to bear from whatever quarter. 
 
 But we must by no means stop with the literature 
 itself. For, as we have seen from the statement of the 
 third aim of the university course, we must in every way 
 develep the student's interest in, and broad sympathy 
 with, the great range of ancient life, and we must, to 
 that end, offer him not only courses in political history, 
 but courses in Greek and Roman private life, courses 
 at once scientifically and sympathetically arranged 
 and taught. Above everything else in this field, we 
 must offer him an opportunity to know one of the rare 
 treasures of the human race, the greatest of all in its 
 power of developing the true feeling for the best in art, 
 namely, Greek and Roman sculpture — which, of course, 
 practically means Greek sculpture. No one who does 
 not know something of Greek sculpture really knows 
 ancient life. The Greek mind shows itself as clearly in 
 the frieze and pediment of the Parthenon as in the 
 Antigone of Sophocles. No completely intelligent sur- 
 vey of the rise and decline of the Greek character can 
 be had without a study of the sculptures. You find cut 
 into visible form all those tendencies which you detect 
 in the literature and the history. The importance of 
 these things, even to one who has not known Greek 
 literature, may be seen in the attention which the great 
 reading public gives to such papers as Mrs. Mitchell's on 
 Greek sculpture, and Mr. Stillman's on Greek coinage. 
 
40 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 There are abundant signs that the world is coming to a 
 conception how large a range human life covers, and of 
 what interest Greece and Rome are to the modern world, 
 which is their intellectual child. Our students, then, must 
 have an opportunity to study Greek art. Of course, in 
 teaching it, or giving such an introduction to it as is in 
 our 230wer, we should proceed under scientific methods, 
 metlpds comparative and historical. We shall begin 
 with archaic sculpture, not with the Hermes of Praxi- 
 teles. But we shall not dwell upon scientific method 
 as we do so. As we come to the Hermes, we shaJl not 
 thank heaven that its discovery has added to the terri- 
 tory upon which scientific method may occupy itself, 
 but rather that a great Avork from the master's own 
 hand has been discovered, to be a delight to us, and a 
 fresh witness to the matchless artistic power of the 
 Greek mind. Yet at the same time, — let me say in 
 passing, — we shall gladly avail ourselves of the help 
 of modern science on the practical side, and employ the 
 lantern. I understand that there are those who have 
 not thought well of its use in studying ancient life and 
 art. Such a feeling, I am sure, must pass away. No one 
 objects to referring a student to engravings of works of 
 art, still less to photographs. But the lantern will ena- 
 ble your class to see, with great truthfulness, so far 
 as a single point of view at a time goes, a statue re- 
 moved from us by the width of ocean, and, further, will 
 enable you, instead of referring them to a cut or photo- 
 graph in a library which can be put before only one 
 man at a time, to talk to them all together in the mimic 
 presence of the object. What is desirable now is not 
 to discourage the use of the lantern, but to make slides 
 inexpensive and accessible. 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 41 
 
 That which I have said of the importance of courses 
 in Greek art is, of course, clearly true also for courses 
 in Greek and Roman life. The actual helpfulness of 
 such courses in quickening the interest of students and 
 contributing to the effectiveness of a department has 
 already been shown in our oldest college, through the 
 work of a professor, whose address on The Realia of 
 Greek Literature, delivered before the Massachusetts 
 Teachers' Association in 1882, some of you may have 
 had the pleasure of hearing. 
 
 How far these things have a bearing on the secondary 
 schools I am not positive. It is clear that the system- 
 atic study of archaeology and of ancient life should not 
 be attempted by them ; but I am sure that it would 
 add greatly to his sense of the reality of his subject and 
 to his interest in the literature and history which he 
 is studying, if a boy who was reading Csesar and Cicero 
 might see, from authentic portraits, how the man Caesar, 
 the man Pompey, the man Cicero, looked. I am sure 
 that when a boy comes to the Catiline of Sallust it will 
 add to the interest of the story if he sees, even in the 
 copy of a rude woodcut, how that prison to-day appears 
 in which the conspirators were strangled. As he reads 
 in Homer of gods and goddesses, it will help his com- 
 prehension and greatly increase his interest to see sculp- 
 tures that shall represent to him how the gods looked 
 to the Greek imagination. Some day I suspect these 
 aids will be used in the schools as irregular auxiliaries, 
 and even to-day they should be given, with all system, 
 in college instruction. Though few colleges are as yet 
 equipped with teachers specially trained in classical 
 archceology, yet I feel strongly that those professors 
 of Greek and Latin who feel the importance of these 
 
42 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 things should offer introductory courses in them, with 
 a proper sense of their own inadequacy, but a high 
 sense of the greatness of their subject, until, through 
 the interest which such courses are sure to arouse, they 
 shall make it evident to our larger colleges and univer- 
 sities that each of them should have a professor of clas- 
 sical archaeology, solely devoted to his specialty. 
 
 And now, under the head of our fourth aim, I come 
 to speak of a matter in which I count upon the 
 satisfaction of having Professor Morris wholly with 
 me : I mean the importance of the scientific study 
 of the forms and the syntax of the classical tongues. 
 For those studies we must expressly provide, on two 
 accounts. A true interest in classical literature, suffi- 
 cient to hold the student to his classical work, after 
 passing the line of liberty in that system of election 
 to which, in some degree, all the world is coming, will 
 be likely to beget in him a desire to know how these 
 things have come to be as they are -7- a spirit of scien- 
 tific curiosity. But besides this, — and it is a matter of 
 importance, — there is a certain danger, of which I have 
 not 5^et spoken, in the study of literature and art pur- 
 sued exclusively, — the danger of dilettanteism, of the 
 begetting of a spirit not robust, patient in investi- 
 gation, long-suffering. The dilettante spirit does not 
 thrive in the very pure and stimulating air of phonetic 
 and syntactic science. These sciences are, consequently 
 (though perhaps Dr. Johnson would no longer agree), 
 subjects of great importance to a man who has been 
 carried far enough along in literary studies to have 
 conceived a curiosity about them. For graduate work, 
 in particular, they are pre-eminently fitted, inasmuch 
 as they offer definite problems to be solved ; and this 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 43 
 
 is the reason why Germany is so prolific in them. 
 I cannot, therefore, but marvel that a public teacher 
 of literature of high authority should occasionally go 
 out of his own excellent way to censure the doing of 
 such work. I should rather endeavor to interest as 
 many students as possible in these subjects ; and, in 
 particular, I should urge them upon all who intend, 
 in turn, to be teachers, not in the least — Heaven 
 forbid ! — that they may give instruction upon them 
 in the preparatory schools, but rather that, having 
 satisfied their own curiosity by intimate acquaintance, 
 and having learned how difficult these things are, and 
 as yet largely 8uh iudice, they may be content to leave 
 instruction in phonetics, above all, very nearly out of 
 the curriculum of the preparatory school. A little 
 knowledge of Grimm's law is useful and serviceable as 
 adding to the interest of the young student. But I 
 greatly question whether the grammars themselves have 
 not gone too far in the matter of the science of forms, 
 and added to the subjects which the young mind is 
 necessarily to attack other subjects that have no bear- 
 ing whatever upon the matter of prime importance, 
 the reading of Latin and Greek,, and that are far better 
 treated in systematic courses after a large field of the 
 literatures has been traversed, and data of considera- 
 ble amount have been accumulated. At the risk of 
 being accounted a backslider from the sx3irit of the 
 age, I shall say frankly that it seems to me that the sci- 
 entific spirit has got altogether too strong a hold upon 
 elementary classical work, and is proceeding to offer to 
 babes and sucklings things that are almost hidden 
 from the wise and prudent. It would not be a bad limi- 
 tation to establish, that, while everything in the ele- 
 
44 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 ineiitary grammar should be true, so as never to need to 
 be unlearned, but only sometime to be more fully appre- 
 hended, yet there should be nothing in it that should 
 not have a direct bearing upon the primary aim, the 
 acquiring of the ability really to read the languages 
 studied. And, as a second corollary from what I have 
 said, I should add that the study of such books as 
 Sellar's Virgil, and Freeman's Methods of Historical 
 Study, and Trollope's Cicero (in spite of whatever de- 
 fects), books dealing with the literary and historical 
 side alone, would be of greater practical service to 
 the preparatory teacher than the reading of books 
 upon comparative philology; though it would be excel- 
 lent if he were to work in both fields. And yet I beg 
 that you will not forget that I said at the outset that 
 my own special interest is in precisely such things as I 
 would exclude from the ^preparatory school, and that, if 
 I am misled, it is by an error of judgment that does not 
 arise from natural prejudice. 
 
 But I cannot finally dismiss the subject of the work 
 of the preparatory school with a statement so one-sided 
 and depressing as this. The school and the university 
 have a common aim, and the gain of either brings a 
 change in the other. The improved methods of teach- 
 ing in the schools have already made it possible 
 to read larger quantities of the classics in the uni- 
 versities, and in a freer and juster temper. Results 
 still greater, though slower to realize, will in time flow 
 to the schools from the enlarging curriculum and the 
 enlarging spirit of the universities. More and more, 
 students who have chosen the profession of teaching 
 will find themselves interested in the active philological 
 or historical work of the day, and will return to the 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 45 
 
 universities as graduates, to undertake such research 
 themselves. And more and more they will carry away 
 into their subsequent lives such a spirit as will leave 
 no difference of aim between the leisure hours of the 
 high school teacher and the leisure hours of the univer- 
 sity teacher. The German gymnasien produce work of 
 the highest order. To say nothing of the monographs 
 which every year contributes to the progress of investi- 
 gation, the latest and most important summary of Latin 
 syntax, that of Schmalz, is by the director of what we 
 should call a high school ; the one great sketch of his- 
 torical Latin syntax, that of Drager, is by a director ; 
 and the most comprehensive treatment of Latin gram- 
 mar as a wdiole, that of Kiihner, is by an upper teacher. 
 Such men prepare their students for the universities, 
 and they prepare them well ; but, under the goad of the 
 love of science, they accomplish, in the scant leisure of 
 a laborious life, work which is the envy and the re- 
 proach of many an American university teacher. And, 
 whether it be cause or effect (it is not wholly either), 
 the true feeling exists in Germany, that the position of 
 the director of a high school is an honor not different in 
 kind from the position of a university professor. We in 
 this country have difficulties of all sorts to contend with 
 (among which not the least is the debasing of the pro- 
 fession of teaching by young men who do not intend to 
 pursue it), and, in view of the gains of the last twenty 
 years, we have far greater reason for cheer than for 
 gloom ; but in the day when our high schools and our 
 universities shall carry on the work of investigation side 
 by side, both will stand higher in the public eye, and 
 in both will life bring greater satisfactions. 
 
 And so the creed we have reached for the educa- 
 
46 AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 tiou of our classical students and for the life-work 
 of our classical teachers, includes, in due order and 
 proportion, both literature and philological investi- 
 gation. But let us not, in our love for the lat- 
 ter, for a moment think of undervaluing the former, 
 and defending it as only the hand-maiden of science. 
 To touch for the last time the main note of my 
 paper, let us render unto Csesar the things that aje 
 Caesar's, but let us keep for the study of Latin and 
 Greek the things that belong to them. We shall never 
 propitiate the Cerberus of modern education by assur- 
 ing him that we are, after all, not humanistic, but scien- 
 tific, at least in the four years .spent in the schools. 
 Cerberus will answer us that if all we claim to do is to 
 train men for scientific inquiry, then they had better 
 get their training in that field which contains the 
 things they wish to know about ; that if we have noth- 
 ing to offer which the natural sciences do not them- 
 selves offer, we had better begone. I think so myself. 
 But the fact is, if we will openly say it and stand to it, 
 that, as the scientific teacher has things to offer of 
 which classical study knows nothing, so we have things 
 to offer of which natural science knows nothing ; and, 
 furthermore, that these things come nearer home to the 
 heart and daily life, supposing one to be the average 
 man, not the worker in applied science, nor a man with 
 an inborn passion to fathom the secrets of comparative 
 philolog}^ or molecular attraction ; that they are vital ; 
 that they meet us at every turn, unless our lives are 
 solely occupied in getting bread ; and that, even in the 
 getting of that bread, they meet many a man far more 
 closely than does natural or mathematical science. Yet 
 we can compel no one to devote his whole education to 
 
IN CLASSICAL STUDY. 47 
 
 these tilings. On whatever system prepared for college, 
 men are at some point in their course to be free to de- 
 vote themselves to whatsoever attracts them. They 
 may perhaps choose the classics, they may perhaps 
 choose science ; but those who study science, if they 
 are not misled by the unthinking, will study it for its 
 ideal side, because it has an intellectual charm for them, 
 because it is one field of inquiry of the boundlessly 
 curious human mind, not from any mistaken notion that 
 it has more to do with the daily life of the average un- 
 technical man than humanistic study; while those who 
 study the classics, if they do so on any other ground than 
 established tradition, will do it because in the classics 
 we have the recorded experience of the human race at 
 a great period of intellectual achievement, a period of 
 unsurpassed power in putting that experience into words 
 good for all time ; in short, they will study these things 
 mainly in the old humanistic spirit. When Greek and 
 Latin cease to stand for theJiumanities, if ever this shall 
 happen, their day is over, until there shall come a new 
 Renaissance of the human spirit. An age of scholasti- 
 cism has been rescued by them. An age of materialism 
 may yet be rescued by them. But I do not believe it 
 will come to that. I recognize no such sign of the 
 times. On the contrary, I agree with Professor Morris, 
 — and it is a pleasure to me, in closing, to agree with 
 him, — who wrote to me recently, " It seems to me that 
 we are certainly going to see, in some form or other, a 
 classical revival in this country. " 
 
AIMS AND METHODS 
 
 IN 
 
 CLASSICAL STUDY, 
 
 BY 
 
 WILLIAM GARDNEE HALE, 
 
 PROFKSSOR OP THB LATIN LaNGUAGB AND LITERATURE IN 
 
 Cornell University. 
 
 ^>Kc 
 
 BOSTON: 
 PUBLISHED BY GINN & COMPANY. 
 
 1888. 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
 019 598 496 7