partments proportionate to the importance of the subject.
We fail to see the confusion alleged by the writer. There is a definite proposition which he explicitly denies. Educational reformers complain that the higher institutions in which the classical languages predominate give to our professional and business men an education that is not "practical," and they accordingly insist upon the retrenchment of these studies and the substitution of the sciences, that the higher education may become more truly "practical." This is certainly clear enough, and the antagonistic proposition of the writer is equally clear—that for the education of professional and business men the natural sciences are no more "practical" than Greek and Latin. The issue is thus sharply presented. Yet the ground taken by the writer has been long ago, and even ostentatiously, given up by the staunchest defenders of the classics. To the popular indictment that classical studies are not "practical" they have pleaded guilty, but have claimed that this alleged vice is in reality a virtue. The whole literature of that side of the question has been pervaded by a scorn of utility, and a contempt for the "practical." The dead languages have been advocated, not for their ulterior uses, but as mental gymnastics in which discipline of the faculties is the object to be obtained. It has not been denied that the sciences were "practical," but practical ends have themselves been repudiated as low, sordid, and unworthy.
Perhaps, however, the writer in the Union may not care what ground has been formerly taken. Is it true, then, that for the higher education of professional and business men the natural sciences are no more practical than Greek and Latin? By "practical" in this connection we understand that which bears upon practice, which fits for action. All are agreed that education is a calling out of human powers in preparation for something; and the term "practical," as employed by the friends of reform, is used to designate what the general character of this preparation should be. They maintain that it should have reference to the circumstances, duties, and work of life. Will it be claimed that the knowledge of two languages spoken by nations that have been extinct for many centuries, which were dead long before modern knowledge came into existence, and which have been emptied of their valuable thought over and over again by translation, confers an equal preparation for the responsibilities of practical life with that living knowledge of present things—that acquaintance with the forces and laws of the surrounding world which it is the office of science to impart? Even if the writer gives to the term "practical" as applied to education its narrowest meaning, that of a bare and specific preparation for professional and business pursuits (which is not the meaning given to it by educational reformers), his proposition is baseless, for there is not a profession or a business which does not involve scientific principles that must be known if they are to be "practised" intelligently. Merchant, manufacturer, agriculturist, and engineer; physician, lawyer, and clergyman—all deal with phenomena that are regulated by natural laws, and are intimately dependent upon them; and are we still to be told that a knowledge of these laws is of no more practical benefit than to be able to read a couple of antiquated languages?
With such an estimate of the educational value of scientific knowledge, it is not surprising that the writer in the Union throws no light upon its proper claim and place in the higher education. He admits that there are studies of the highest practical utility which have been greatly neglected—those, namely, which relate to political and social science—and is pleased that
