that the education was a bad one, I only say that it made no provision for a work-a-day world,-whose ideal was summed up in the time-honoured phrase "a scholar and a gentleman". But the world outside the schools was widening. Science was already knocking at their doors. Commerce and industry, travel and geography, the inclusion in the public school system of the middle classes, the increase of population, the reform of the public services, competitive examinations, the Napoleonic wars, the writings of Goethe and Schiller, a German Prince Consort, international exhibitions, international trade, the struggle for existence and survival of the fittest, these and all that they implied combined to raise the study of modern languages from the status of an accomplishment, or a commercial art, on a level let us say with book-keeping, to rank as an integral portion of a liberal education. Those who had to devise examinations for the public services could not but consider the matter from the utilitarian stand-point, though deference to tradition-and especially to the tradition of fashion, that worst of all traditions, in as much as it substitutes servility for veneration-largely interfered with their work. Still we can see that at the basis of our competitive examinations is the one principle which can never lead us astray; that education means the training of a man to bear himself worthily, and to perform ably his share of the world's work; and that while much of education will therefore be common to all, just as the qualities which make up the worthy and able man in whatever capacity are largely the same, yet a considerable portion of the training of the man must depend upon the nature of the post he is intended to occupy. And it is one not the least of the honours of Cambridge that it has recognised that whatever

study the world needs a University should teach in all its breadth and fulness.

All studies are good for man, some more some less, some for this man some for that, and the more widely and more deeply a study is pursued, the better for the world; this it is that our Alma Mater has proclaimed aloud by her new Triposes, and nothing less than this is the true conception of a Universitas Studiorum. There is some trace still of the old mistrust, I fear I must say of the old contempt. The living languages, we have been told, are too trivial to be scholarly, too easy to be learned, too useful to be dignified. There is no language like a dead one I suppose, all else is dialect. And on the principle that to rail is not only easier than to reason, but far more attractive and persuasive to those whose interests are feeble, and who love to have their opinions formed for them, a Modern Languages Tripos was dubbed a "Courier" Tripos, the Antiquarians triumphed, and what Cambridge possesses at the present moment would more properly be styled the Mediaeval and Modern Languages Tripos. Now there is everything to be said for a Mediaeval Languages Tripos in itself, though the arguments for it are not of precisely the same kind as those which make for the Modern Languages; but I venture to think that there is very little to be said for and very much to be said against this linking of the two, and in the interests of literature in general I hope that they may soon be dissociated. But I will come back to my immediate topic.

We teach Modern Languages, firstly because they are so supremely useful. If I spend a few moments in stating fully in what various ways they are so, it is because each use they serve bears upon the methods of their study.

I.

Consider how a knowledge of French and German doubles and trebles, and more, the library whence knowledge may be drawn. How much of history and philosophy, of geography and travel is written in French; how much of history, of philosophy, of science, of mathematics, of geography in German! Nor can we accept the reply that all that is worth reading either has been or can be translated, for not only will translations not pay for much that is most deserving of perusal, but also translations cannot keep pace with the ever increasing mass of literature; and even if it I could, it is a wasteful process, wasting in sheer superfluity the capital and labour of translator and publisher. And even so again we need a large army of translators, and these must be well trained.

2. They are useful and indispensable to the passing traveller, that is to everyone now-a-days.

3. All Europe and the coasts of the Mediterranean are no longer strange places, but a home to the resident abroad who is armed with one or both of these languages.

4.

Commerce needs them at home. What proportion of corresponding clerks in our City houses are English at this present moment? How gladly and profitably would nine-tenths of our middle classes exchange their little Latin and less Greek for a passable knowledge of even one Modern Language! How laboriously do they acquire them in later life after business hours, with jaded minds and at a belated age!

5. French is still the language of diplomacy. We have all read in a recent book at what disadvantage the late Earl Russell found himself for want of an adequate knowledge of it. Some of us know that the proficiency even now of the

clerks of the Foreign Office leaves much to be desired-but I need not continue.

Secondly, we teach Modern Languages because they are, by comparison, so easy that our teaching does not run to

waste.

2. Be

We teach boys Greek, and we have so far advanced in honesty, or frankness, that we own that nine-tenths of them learn little, forget that little soon, and never touch a Greek book when once they leave school. We defend the practice by saying that we have been "training faculty". If we told the real truth we should say that we do it for three reasons. 1. Because we know some Greek and can teach it. cause fashion demands it. 3. Because we really do want to teach it to one-tenth of our boys who will do some good with it. Now so soon as we adopt a reasonable practice and take for all boys Latin, if possible, and one or more living languages for that linguistic training which I believe we are all agreed is an essential part of a complete education (besides being the cheapest and for most boys the most human and exhilarating and stimulating), then and not till then we shall find that we are training faculty in reality in the nine-tenths as well as the one-tenth; and also that whatever portion our pupils have grasped of vocabulary, grammar, and literature is a possession of which they will really make use, which they will really extend, which they do really appreciate, which will bear real fruit. In other words we shall have emerged from darkness to light, from the cloudland of fancy to the terra firma of fact. Surely it is not too much to say that before we teach any subject merely to "train faculty" we ought at least to have made the circuit of all other possible subjects of study to see if we cannot find

one, in which we may combine some actual knowledge with the bare power to know.

Thirdly, we teach Modern Languages for the sake of the culture which they afford.

Having put first the bread and cheese principle of real material utility, we need not nevertheless fear to claim for living tongues a potency in kindling the imagination, ennobling thought, inspiring right feeling and worthy action, charming the ear by beauty of sound and rhythm, and the reason by force or grace, or stateliness of expression, enlivening by the brilliancy of wit and the glow of humour. We need not care to dispute as to their place and precedence in these respects; I will only venture just to express my own conviction, that while I should place Greek far above French or German, I should place Latin below either. That is not the point. If the "Humanities" are contained in French and German, then there are so many other reasons for seeking our training in the "Humanities" from them that we shall be right in so doing for the majority of the young.

It often seems to me strange, when the "Classics" in the narrow sense of the word are placed educationally so far above Modern Languages, that no offset is made for the very important fact that while the masterpieces of ancient literature are essentially pagan, modern literature is, not indeed essentially, but in colour and setting, Christian. I know that it may be said that the very greatest names in Literature, old or new, are neither Pagan nor Christian, but purely human, and that for the poets Great Pan did not die as Thamus was bidden to proclaim. I know that there is nothing nobler in any literature than much of Aeschylus,