208 INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF EDUCATION. 
she five orations of Cicero, and Virgil. We take part of his Bucolics, and we take 
Solon. We take up in our first year the Iliad. It is read in the secondary schools now, 
where it wasn’t read in the colleges ten years ago. Now, if there is asked a little 
retrenchment, it should come from the time which does not belong to the classical 
work. Principal Bancroft, in his paper, said that scientific work could be picked up 
afterward. Any teacher of science that has done anything in the sciences knows 
shat this is a fallacy. A man may take up a smattering of the sciences, so that he may 
zo out and expatiate on the beauties of nature ; but he will never get any accurate 
scientific knowledge himself unless he is an exceedingly scientific man. It is not the 
science we are trying to ingraft in the present schools, but it is simply the old text- 
oooks that somebody has discovered for you already. 
There is no doubt but the elective system in our colleges: has come to stay. It is 
oeing placed in all our colleges ; while a few years ago it was only in the larger colleges, 
to-day it is in the smaller colleges as well. Now take a boy from the secondary school 
who goes to college without ever having known anything about the sciences. He has 
no idea whether he has any capabilities for them or not. He knows he has passed the 
requirements in Greek and mathematics and Latin, and there he will continue, thinking 
he can carry them on, or else he will branch out for science, not knowing why he wants 
it. We call cur school a preparatory school; yet we don't give them any preparation 
at all to judge of what they are best capable of doing. If young men are going to 
higher institutions, and choose those things in the institutions which wiil be the best 
adapted for them, they must have some preparation before. 
I had an experience along this very line, and you will pardon me for this personal 
eference, because it applies to this point. A young man came to me who had graduated 
‘rom a classical department, standing very high ; who had taken both chemistry and 
ohysics. He was placed in the chemical laboratory, and given something to examine. 
He got along while the experiments were described, but when he was put on qualitative 
work he totally failed. For the first six or eight years he did hardly anything. It 
wasn’t a memory subject; it was simply a subject he must absolutely observe. He 
sould not do it. Suppose that boy had gone into college; he would have taken a high 
-ank along one line, and an exceedingly low rank along another. Now, wasn’t it far 
setter that he should know what he would want, than to waste the time in his college 
sourse 7 We must prepare for those things we are going to choose just before we go 
nto college. 
Our time is wasting. Our boys enter college late enough; they graduate late enough; 
‘hey enter life late enough ; if they are to choose rightly before they enter college they 
nust know something before they enter college. It is not going to be a complete waste 
of time if physics and languages are taught right. For instance, take English, a sub- 
ject that is usually much talked of ; and we ought to know something about our own 
.anguage. I contend that English can be better taken in a course of experimental 
physics than in any other way. The boy says, I have nothing to talk about; therefore 
[ cannot write. In a course of chemistry and physics the boy describes the experiment 
:n his note-book ; and if he has done that he has written a composition, and he has told 
something he knows about, and expressed it rightly. He has not been verbose about it, 
and he has got some fine training in English. He is taught to observe ; he is taught 
;0 note ; he is taught to reason ; what more will he be taught by other subjects? We 
shall not lose much even if we take time for this from Latin and Greek. It cannot be 
;aken from mathematics. A boy must have mathematics in order to take up these 
sciences. It is utterly impossible for him to do the work of algebra and geometry without 
them. This little time we add in can be given to us by slightly shortening these courses. 
sven if it cannot be inerafted. 
R. BE. CurLER, of the Northwest Division High School, Chicago: Mr. President and 
Fellow-Teachers—There has been one aspect of this subject that I was very anxious 
0 see brought before this assembly; and, as the discussion seems to be passing with- 
out its being presented, I feel called upon to say a word. We have in most of our 
high-schools two courses—that is, in the larger high-schools. We have the college 
preparatory course, and the general course. Those high-schools that are not large 
enough to have the two courses usually have the general course, and dispense with the 
preparatory course. I want to say a word for the general course. It is an experience 
that comes to me every year of my life, having charge of the fourth high-school of this 
civy. The students come to me for advice in regard to what they shall do without going 
to college after they have finished the high-school. Now, theorize as we may, the fact 
is before us that the ordinary student, before he enters the high-school, has not any 
idea whether he is going to college or not: and usually it is the student who decides 
this qu 
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