[22 INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF EDUCATION. 
swo schemes, however—though, as I have shown, they do in a number of 
places actually exist—seem to me to have no justification. Letters, phi- 
losophy, history, political economy, social science, and the like are all hu- 
manistic subjects ; and, even upon the narrowest view, the best preparation 
for them must always include some study of the literature of the people 
with whom the record of the intellectual life of Europe and America 
oegins. If, however, these courses are demanded by a public impatient 
of what some of us regard as wise thoroughness, then, in the institutions 
which are willing to meet this need, new degrees should be used for their 
graduates. 
It remains to notice briefly several arguments advanced by holders of 
the opposite view, and then to formulate two considerations—one of them 
already implied—which I regard as having weight on the side of the 
cetention of the requirement of Greek. 
(1) It is urged that changes have already taken place, through the addi- 
tion of the study of the modern languages, and the increased part which 
science has come to play in the curriculum, so that the meaning of the 
degree of Bachelor of Arts is already different from what it was. The 
answer is that the process has been one of inclusion, not of exclusion ; 
shat the course has been enriched, not impoverished. And a further 
answer, of great force, is that, though changes have indeed taken place, 
they have taken place by slow and gradual processes, which have at no 
rime made a transformation of the meaning of the degree. Not until the 
opening of the Johns Hopkins University did any institution lop off at a 
blow one whole side—even if it were not, as in this case, the side supposed 
10 be the most characteristic—of the significance of the degree. 
(R) It is urged that changes have already taken place, in that the elec- 
sive system has made encroachments upon the amount of Greek formerly 
required. The answer is that while Greek has gained in quantity at one 
time and lost in quantity at another, nevertheless a certain amount of it 
nas, until the rise of the present question, remained as the distinctive 
.eature of the degree. 
(3) It is urged that inasmuch as a man can even now enter many colleges 
with little Greek and then drop “it—as, for example, at Harvard—Greek 
forms no serious part of the curriculum, and should therefore not be 
cequired for the degree. But the same thing is true of Latin at Harvard, 
and of mathematics and French and German as well. In fact, there is no 
fixed requirement at Harvard for the continuance of a study taken before 
admission, except of courses in English running through three years, and 
of a course in chemistry, consisting of a single lecture a week for a half of 
the Freshman year. If, then, this third argument against Greek is sound, 
it follows that the only set requirement for the degree of A.B. should be 
English and a short course of lectures on chemistry. This brings one, 
excepting for the matter of the brief course in chemistry, to the exact 
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