210 INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF EDUCATION. 
that in early years the parents of boys or girls should decide what course they should 
take. I think that is to forget that boys and girls are all of the same kind for fourteen 
or fifteen years of their life. It is not a question of what they shall be developed to ; it 
is a question of what is the girl and what is the boy to have. When a boy or girl is 
fourteen or fifteen, it is time to think of specialization. Until that time, 1 think, 
‘hey ought to be educated almost in the same way. 
Then I come to the question that has been discussed to-day. There is the question 
about the subjects that ought to be taught in the secondary schools. Now, I have 
some difficulty to express my opinion in this respect, because we have no secondary 
schools in the same meaning that you have. It seems to be rather a conflicting system 
that you have when you divide the instruction into primary schools and grammar 
schools, and then you put in the high-schocl, and then the college, and thereafter the 
iniversity. 1 think you might include in the secondary school two or three years of 
what you take in colleges. Thereafter I would recommend the destruction of all 
solleges, and begin university life. 
What should be taught in secondary schools ? I say, first of all you should teach young 
boys and girls to know their surroundings ; that is, the sciences. They should know the 
life of personality. They should study history ; they should study the languages. Of 
sourse, mathematics must be included. The study of language should ke a very impor- 
‘ant part of the curriculum; and not language, but languages. 1 think the importance 
of a full study of the mother tongue cannot be exaggerated. It should be a study of 
‘he literature, so that the boys and girls, when they once leave the school, know their 
>wn tongue, and know their own literature, and feel it is a pleasure in their literature 
to know the great authors, and know the great characters of literature. They should be 
sducated in good penmanship. If you give the boys and girls these you will give them 
something that will be of the most intrinsic value in their lives. You should not lay 
too much stress on teaching many languages. If you have learned one language, and 
by that been able to learn the great thoughts of great men, why should you learn them 
ver again for year after year? It is necessary, of course, for us to know at any rate one 
5f the foreign languages, so that we can communicate with other persons. 1t may not 
be so necessary for you Englishmen and Americans, whose language will become the 
.anguage of all mankind. (Applause.) But, anyhow, it may be necessary even to you, 
tn order to be able to study your own language the better, to study one language, at any 
rate, of a foreign country. What foreign language should that be ? If it is a question 
5f what language should be taught in the school, I should certainly say not Latin and 
not Greek, but a modern language. We in our country are divided into two great 
sarties, those who advocate Latin and Greek, and those who advocate the modern 
anguages, I think of those who advocate Latin and Greek, the number has decreased. 
[n fact, Greek is almost excluded from our schools, and Latin is beginning to retreat 
more and more. And sonow I think there isa commission, in Sweden, to discuss whether 
Latin ought not to be delayed to the fifteenth or sixteenth year, so that only four years 
'n our school should be given to the study of Latin. It has been a very hard contest 
between these parties in Sweden, and I do not wish now to go into the details of that 
zontest. 
I am sure that it will not hurt, but it will advance, the progress in our schools if we 
do not study too much of languages. I think that we should do well if we deferred the 
study of Latin and Greek to the later stages. But in the universities a great many 
say, Can you expect the university to teach the rudiments of Latin and Greek ? 
And I say, yes; and I know there are some who have been successful. I think the same 
>xperiment has been made in England. I heard that Miss Ramsey had obtained the 
greatest honors in the university course, and she had actually not taken her study of 
Latin and Greek before ber seventeenth year, if I remember rightly. Now I think that 
we, in Sweden, arc following the right course when we more and more delay the 
study of Latin and Greek, and defer them to the universities. By doing that, the 
study of Latin and Greek can be a really scientific study. But are you not, cutting off 
the historical continuity ? one might ask me. That is preserved by studying history. 
And when you study history you ought to study history of the old nations, and the 
aistory of their institutions. 
Now I think the people who recommend the study of Latin and Greek have invented 
several reasons. First, that Latin and Greek are more proper to develop logic. Don’t 
you think that the sciences and mathematics are more able to develop logic ? I think 
‘hat the reasons that have been invented afterwards are to be compared with the 
rortification that the general makes when he is ready to surrender. He binds the 
‘ortifications around kim, and he ‘cannot come out from them without surrendering 
:he place. 
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