more general, reverts to the characteristically Greek problem of the nature and origin of things. It has more affinity with ancient ontological than with modern psychological metaphysics. It is nearer to the atomists and to Aristotle than to modern philosophers since Descartes. It is indeed repeating the very transition of Aristotle from physics to metaphysics. Hence a closer union with Greek philosophy would raise both natural science and metaphysics to a higher plane than they have ever occupied. This is the lesson of the present controversy in your columns.

By the perverse irony of fate, at the very moment when natural science, as it rises in generality, requires more Greek, a short-sighted agitation has arisen to sever one from the other, on the ground either that it is not necessary for students of natural science to learn Greek, or that it is not practicable to learn enough of it to be of use.

The first is the argument of the so-called expert, and of those who, like Professor Ray Lankester, write as if all science were natural science, and natural scientists can be kept from going beyond the limits of natural facts. It is true that within those limits much may be done from the data of observation and experiment without Greek, though better with it. But students of natural science are men, and men nowadays cannot be kept within these narrow limits. It is amusing to read Professor Ray Lankester's letter, first disclaiming all connexion of what he calls science' with the higher issue raised by Lord Kelvin, and then giving his own opinion on the intervention of Providence. He forgets that not all science is natural science, and that, as natural science becomes more general, a man ought to know the other sciences with which it is connected, in order that by combining the data of all these sciences he may speak scientifically both

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within the limits of natural science and beyond them; as speak he will. It is for this purpose that he should know Greek. This also is the reason why the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge should require Greek, not of every natural scientist in the land, but of those who coming to its two chief Universities aspire to the highest education, and therefore must be expected to form conclusions on the highest subjects. One thing is certain. If Oxford and Cambridge desert this duty, Greek will disappear out of English natural science. Are then the natural scientists of the future to speak about nature as adepts, and about things in general, about man, about the soul, about God, as mere amateurs? God forbid!

The second is the argument of the professional teacher who loves to divide learning into departments, to assign scholarships to each department, and to gather disciples into his own department, where he overteaches them in one direction; as if the object of education were to make pedants, not men of the world. This specialism has already produced disastrous effects. It has diffused a lamentable want of ambition in education, the mottoes of which ought to be Sursum corda and the Greek determination to learn as many things as possible throughout life. With the loss of ambition a listlessness and want of intellectual interest have come over the schools and Universities, and have encouraged the natural idleness of youth. The cure of these evils is to make boys feel how many things there are in the world to learn. It is true that not everybody has the necessary leisure; and, therefore, there is a place for technical schools and Universities. But for those who aspire to the highest education-for the few, that is, who can go to Oxford and Cambridgethere is surely time, if there were will, to combine natural science and Greek before the mature age at which nowadays such boys leave school. As for

the astonishingly pusillanimous objection that men straightway forget the Greek they learn, the answer is that this is their own fault. The point is that what they begin to learn they have the means to go on with, and they have the duty to learn and know as much Greek as possible, in order to discuss, as they certainly will, the universal problems of the world in which we live. But it is not necessary to labour a point which has so well been put by Lord Kelvin himself as follows: 'I think, for the sake of mathematicians and science students, Cambridge and Oxford should keep Greek, of which even a very moderate extent is of very great value.' (See The Times, October 28, 1891.)

THE ANARCHY OF EDUCATION

FROM The Times, JANUARY 27, 1903.

There are many signs at the Universities and schools, in Parliament and the Press, that we are on the eve of fundamental changes in the fabric of socalled secondary education, but without any due deliberation, without any definite idea of what we are driving at, without any clear distinction between different kinds of secondary education, without any comprehensive view of education as a whole. All sorts of isolated points are discussed-Greek, Natural Science, modern languages, athletics, idleness. But the revolutionists in education seem agreed about nothing except the negative determination to lessen the learning of the Classics-the Classics which have enabled us to express ourselves in concrete terms and grammatical forms, and to think correctly so far as correct thinking depends upon expression and upon logic; the Classics which are at the basis of our literature and history, of our pure and mixed mathematical science, and of our theology and religion; the Classics which have opened the secrets

of human nature and taught us what man is and ought to be as an intelligent and practical being. What a disaster would it be to this country if she were to sacrifice so tried a part of the highest education without having considered and approved what is to be put in its place! Under the name of organization-a question-begging name-we stand in danger of producing an anarchy in education.

The manner in which this great problem is being treated at Oxford is hardly worthy of the occasion. It savours of politics rather than of philosophy. The revolutionists, having a majority on the Hebdomadal Council, brought forward two connected resolutions: 'I. That candidates shall not be required to offer both Greek ' and Latin in Responsions.'

2. That all candidates shall be required to pass in two out ' of the four following languages:-Greek, Latin, French, and German, one of the two being either Greek or Latin.'

In an exceptionally well-attended Congregation last term the first resolution was rejected by 189 to 166 votes; and the second resolution fell with it. But heads we win, tails you lose is the revolutionists' motto; if they had won by one vote, they would have gone on; having lost by twenty-three, they refuse to stop. They are now preparing to resume their design in another form in which they think that the capture of a few votes may turn their minority into a majority. Even in the course of the debate, in expectation of defeat, some of them, and their chief spokesman himself, playing fast and loose with his own proposal, declared in favour of carrying the resolution and then limiting it to candidates for honours. This change of front got them votes, but not enough. Immediately afterwards some of them commenced an agitation for exemption from Greek in Responsions under certain conditions. How can the University be deceived by so flagrant an instance of the familiar attempt to carry a policy

piecemeal which would not deceive even the most short-sighted voter if he could see it as a whole? In this instance, moreover, the revolutionists have shown their hand. We have only to reverse their course of action to see what will happen, if they are not stopped at once. First, exemption from Greek will be allowed to men reading for honours in Mathematics and Natural Science; then to men reading for honours in other schools, such as Modern History and Jurisprudence, which have quite as good a claim; and finally to candidates generally in accordance with the resolutions quoted above. The revolutionists brought forward these general resolutions deliberately, and with full power to have limited them if they had chosen, so that they cannot be trusted hereafter to stop short till they have carried out their first intention. The lovers of Greek have only one chance: principiis obsta.

Next followed the conference of head-masters, who, in full knowledge that they were reopening the question of Greek at Oxford when it had just been decided, proceeded to pass a resolution, reported in your issue of December 24, requesting the ViceChancellors of Oxford and Cambridge to consult them as to the compulsory subjects for entrance into the Universities. This resolution arose out of a discussion on compulsory Greek which bore a remarkable resemblance to the whole discussion of the question at Oxford. In both there was an entire absence of any agreement about what is to be put in the place of Greek. Behind the attack on Greek lurks a struggle between Natural Science and modern languages. After the head-masters' conference the Rev. H. A. Dalton, head-master of Felsted, wrote a letter to The Times (December 30), in which he distinguished between those head-masters who would make Greek optional for boys of promise in Mathematics and Natural Science and those who