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 SHOULD LATIN AND GREEK BE REQUIRED 
 
 FOE THE 
 
 DEGREE OF BACHELOR OF ARTS. 
 
 By 
 
 Professor John J. Stevenson. 
 
 Beprinted from Science, N. S., Vol. XL, No. $82, Pages 801-807 
 May 25, 1900. 
 

 i 
 
 By transfer 
 NOV 1 1905 
 
 to- 2. 
 
 k^,^£^^/\^^ 
 
iBeprinted from SCIENCE, N. S., Vol. XL, No. 28^, 
 Pages 801-807, May 25, 1900.'] 
 
 SHOULD LATLN AND GREEK BE EEQULBED 
 
 FOB IHE DEGREE OF BACHELOR 
 
 OF ABTSf 
 
 The removal of Latin from the curricu- 
 lum required for A. B. by another promi- 
 nent university has re-opened discussion 
 respecting the relative worth of classical 
 and other studies. The discussion is con- 
 ducted much in the same manner as of old 
 and disputants on both sides frequently 
 show irritation when the opposing opinion 
 is expressed. They seem to regard the 
 matter as so thoroughly settled that all 
 doubts can be disposed of by a wave of the 
 hand. But the matters involved deserve 
 very different treatment from this. There 
 must be something worth considering on 
 both sides, otherwise intelligent men would 
 not be ranged in opposing., camps. The 
 writer will endeaver to present one side of 
 the case. ^ ' • • * . 
 
 One point should be noted at the outset. 
 It must be evident to those who have fol- 
 lowed the discussion during late years that 
 the contestants are not equally competent 
 to render judgment. Most of those who re- 
 sist encroachment upon territory, held so 
 long by the older system, and who deny 
 that inductive sciences can be Xitilized as 
 culture studies are unfamiliar with science 
 and cannot distinguish between pure and 
 applied science. Their reading has been 
 determined by their college training, or 
 their studies have been confined within 
 somewhat narrow limits by professional 
 surroundings. Their knowledge of chem- 
 
istry and physics is bounded by the curric- 
 ulum of thirty or more years ago in the 
 larger colleges or by that of some of the 
 younger institutions with limited resources; 
 while their knowledge of biology, geology 
 and modern psychology has been derived 
 from magazine articles, popular summaries 
 or from controversial works of not wholly 
 friendly character. 
 
 American workers in pure science, who 
 have passed middle age were trained, with 
 few exceptions, in the studies of the old 
 curriculum, so that they understand thor- 
 oughly its nature and its advantages. But 
 the exigencies of their work have compelled 
 them to recognize the deficiencies also. The 
 great majority of those laboring in pure 
 science have a working knowledge of 
 French, German, and Italian and many add 
 Spanish and Russian ; some require in ad- 
 dition a good knowledge of the oriental 
 languages as well as of numerous dialects 
 — in every case a knowledge much more 
 exact than the knowledge of Greek and 
 Latin possessed by the ordinary college 
 graduate ; and all of this merely as prepa- 
 ration for their work. Such study neces- 
 sarily brings men into touch with a great 
 range of knowledge, so that, especially 
 among naturalists, many are well read in 
 various branches of philosophy and almost 
 all have a broad acquaintance with litera- 
 ture. These are the men who assert delib- 
 erately that the older system of education 
 is a survival of conditions which men have 
 outgrown and that it is no longer fitted to 
 our needs. 
 
 In one sense, education, as training, is an 
 end in itself, being a course in mental gym- 
 nastics ; but in the true sense it is far more, 
 
embracing not merely mental training but 
 also the imparting of knowledge. 
 
 In another place, the writer likened the 
 college course to emery used in polishing 
 metal and held that, as one has no concern 
 for the emery after the metal has been pol- 
 ished, so, if the youth be developed, it mat- 
 ters little whether or not his college studies 
 disappear from memory. But this is a 
 narrow view, regarding mere training as 
 the single end, not considering that this 
 strengthening, developing process consumes 
 the years when the power of acquiring and 
 that of retention are most ef&cient. Those 
 years ought not to be expended in training 
 to the exclusion of learning. Youth in 
 America is shorter now than formerly ; 
 manhood's responsibilities come earlier and 
 are heavier; one cannot ignore the utili- 
 tarian side of education — utilitarian, not in 
 the sense of dollars and cents but in that of 
 preparing the man for usefulness. There 
 should be more than mere robustness to 
 show for the labor of the early years, some 
 capital should be accumulated with which 
 to utilize the robustness. 
 
 Study of classical tongues retained its very 
 prominent place in college curricula long 
 after necessity for it disappeared. Until 
 little more than one hundred years ago, 
 classical languages were studied for use — 
 the study was as purely utilitarian in pur- 
 pose as is that of the Calculus to-day- 
 Latin, as the language of the mediaeval 
 church, was the language of educated men 
 until the latter part of the eighteenth cen- 
 tury ; university lectures were delivered in 
 Latin ; scientific, theological and philo- 
 sophical works were written in it. At the 
 revival of learning, the sources of knowledge 
 
were classical and early Christian writers : 
 to reach them, acquaintance with Greek and 
 Latin was essential ; those tongues were 
 learned by students at that time as anatomy 
 is learned by the medical student of our 
 time and for the same reason. There were 
 but two learned professions, Law and The- 
 ology, with Medicine as a coming third. 
 Education was for the few, to enable them 
 to enter a profession, not to develop them, 
 not to render them useful. Educated men 
 could not touch commerce — that was degra- 
 dation. But education now is for all, for 
 the poor as for the rich, for the merchant as 
 for the professional man ; we recognize that 
 the professional man ranks no higher intel- 
 lectually than does the financier, whether 
 the latter deal in money or in goods. This 
 absolute reversal of conditions cannot be 
 ignored in the discussion. 
 
 When men threw off the bonds of the 
 mediaeval church, the study of things re- 
 placed that of words ; men discovered 
 themselves and the great world about them. 
 As knowledge increased, respect for the 
 dicta of ancient writers decreased ; Latin 
 and Greek fell into disuse and at length 
 necessity for acquaintance with them dis- 
 appeared. But the curricula had become 
 hoary with age ; change meant revolution ; 
 the universities were controlled by men 
 who knew no other training and the promi- 
 nent instructors in almost all branches be- 
 longed to the clerical profession. Those 
 investigating material things were spoken 
 of disdainfully ; even those studying the 
 physical portion of man received little 
 respect from those who studied his mental 
 and spiritual portion — their work was re- 
 ferred to patronizingly as requiring less 
 
intellectual power than that of their critics 
 — a reflection not wholly unknown in our 
 time, for there are still those who appear 
 to think that familiarity with material 
 things unfits a man for taking the higher 
 flights of philosophical reasoning. Th-ere 
 may be something in this reflection, for a 
 knowledge of facts cannot fail to fetter the 
 wings of a philosopher of the old type. 
 
 When classical study ceased to be neces- 
 sary from the utilitarian standpoint, those 
 entrusted with educational work discovered 
 that it was still necessary from an educa- 
 tional standpoint. Verily necessity is the 
 mother of invention. Necessity increased 
 with years and for the last half century 
 men have been seeking excuses for reten- 
 tion of compulsory classical study. They 
 have succeeded in convincing those who 
 know little about either classics or science 
 that without such a smattering of the clas- 
 sics as the college man usually receives, no 
 one can be regarded as educated. 
 
 The change in purpose brought about a 
 change in the teaching, so that classical in- 
 struction, as commonly conducted in secon- 
 dary schools, leads a youth along an in- 
 vestigation of grammatical principles. The 
 great majority of young men, who enter 
 college after four to six years of prepara- 
 tion, find themselves so burdened by lexi- 
 con work that too many of them seek relief 
 in the convenient ' Bohn.' Acquisition of 
 the vocabulary seems to be less important 
 than mastery of nice points in syntax. An 
 eminent instructor in Latin told the writer 
 that in marking students he laid little 
 stress on translation, as a '■ Bohn ' is always 
 available ; his grading was based on pro- 
 ficiency in prose and quantity which had 
 
to be studied. That a large proportion of 
 Bachelors, after ten years of study, cannot 
 read their diplomas without resort to a 
 lexicon causes no surprise to them or to 
 their instructors. They had not been at- 
 tempting to acquire either Latin or Greek, 
 but they had been utilizing classical words 
 and idioms in studying the principles of 
 grammar. True it is, that this statement 
 is not of universal application ; there are 
 exceptions among both instructors and stu- 
 dents and, owing to the demand that there 
 be something tangible to show for the labor 
 of years, the number is increasing ; but the 
 fact remains that the conditions as described 
 are those which prevail ; and they have 
 much to do with the notion that the study 
 of classical languages is much more diffi- 
 cult than that of other languages. 
 
 But one asks, suppose that the young 
 man has acquired an accurate knowledge 
 of, let us say, Latin, that he can read, write 
 and speak it, has he gained nothing? He 
 has gained much, he has learned accuracy 
 in expression; a certain discrimination in 
 the use of terms ; he has cultivated his 
 memory ; he has become acquainted with 
 the tongue in which men of Eome expressed 
 their thoughts ; in which many theologians 
 of the early centuries expressed their con- 
 ceptions of what Cliristianity ought to be ; 
 in which theologians of later centuries ex- 
 pressed their conceptions and misconcep- 
 tions of what the Fathers wrote ; the lan- 
 guage of educated men until a little more 
 than one hundred years ago. Thus he has 
 acquired, first, a sharpening of certain fac- 
 ulties and, secondly, the means which give 
 direct access to a great literature represent- 
 ing in time more than two milleniums pre- 
 ceding our century. 
 
This much he has acquired and it cer- 
 tainly is a great deal. Those who defend 
 the necessity for classical training assert 
 that he has acquired much more if he be an 
 English-speaking student. It is said that 
 one has a better understanding of his own 
 tongue if he have a good knowledge of the 
 classics, since so much of our language is 
 derived from the Greek and Latin. Shakes- 
 peare, we are told, enriched our vocabulary 
 by the addition of not less than three thous- 
 and words. 
 
 Much is made of this, but one may doubt 
 the importance of the reasoning. Words 
 are available when they become identified 
 with things either material or abstract, so 
 that one's ability to use them with precision 
 depends upon the exactness of the identifi- 
 cation. The question of their origin does 
 not enter into the matter. Indeed, one too 
 fully imbued with the signification of par- 
 ent-words may employ derived words in 
 senses at variance with accepted significa- 
 tions. If there be any force in the argu- 
 ment, it would apply rather to a course in 
 Anglo-Saxon or in the language of the Au- 
 thorized Version, if the object be to culti- 
 vate a direct style. That Shakespeare's 
 works enriched the English vocabulary ad- 
 mits of no doubt ; but if Shakespeare wrote 
 his plays, the argument gains little strength 
 by reference to him, for, according to Ben 
 Jonson, he knew 'little Latin and less 
 Greek.' In any event, however, this is a 
 matter of no importance. The suggestion 
 that our language is in urgent need of fur- 
 ther enrichment can hardly commend itself 
 as wise in view of the fact that the lexi- 
 cons already boast of approximately three 
 hundred thousand words, while the vocab- 
 
alary of the metropolitan newspaper does 
 not exceed three thousand and that of great 
 writers rarely equals ten thousand. 
 
 But conceding all that has been conceded 
 30 willingly because true, the query persist- 
 ently comes : Is the profit in due propor- 
 tion to the expenditure in time and labor ? 
 Might not the mental discipline be acquired 
 equally well by the use of other languages, 
 which would open a wider field of knowl- 
 edge and render the man more useful to 
 himself and to his fellows? 
 
 The modernized courses pay too little at- 
 tention to instruction in the use of lan- 
 guage. The literary courses are better 
 than the older types in that they do not ex- 
 clude the English language and proper 
 training in that direction is not far awaj' ; 
 but the defect is still too conspicuous, espe- 
 cially in the scientific courses. Laboratory 
 work leads to exactness in method ; field- 
 work gives precision in observation and 
 comparison ; scientific training, in general, 
 strengthens the logical powers and gives 
 precision in thinking; but none of them 
 gives precision in expression. As in theo- 
 logical seminaries, too often, preparation 
 for preaching is neglected on the principle 
 that if a man has anything to say he will 
 find no difficulty in saying it, so the study 
 of language as a means of expressing one's 
 thoughts has been neglected in scientific 
 training. Nevertheless, one cannot fail to 
 recognize that the writings of scientific 
 men compare, at least, favorablj' with the 
 writings of those who have had the great 
 advantage of classical training, that is to 
 say, of the average clergymen and lawyer, 
 those who plead so urgently for retention 
 of the system from which they have re- 
 
9 
 
 ceived sucli abundant profit. Brilliant 
 rhetoricians cannot be taken as examples 
 of wbat the training can do— in the intel- 
 lectual as in the vegetable world, the aver- 
 age of the fruitage, not the choicest selec- 
 tions, must be taken as type of the product. 
 And one must not forget that the soil in 
 which seed is planted has much to do with 
 the crop. 
 
 But the remedy for this defect in modern 
 training is very simple, and its application 
 involves no material change in plan. 
 
 The advantages derived from education 
 according to the old system do not come 
 from the study of Latin and Greek any 
 more than they would come from the study 
 of French, Hebrew or any other language. 
 The results are due to the method, not in 
 any sense to the particular language em- 
 ployed. One may say, better, that the re- 
 sult is due rather to skill in applying the 
 method, for classical teaching is very dif- 
 ferent to-day from that of the older day, 
 when pupils were plunged in medias res 
 at the outset. The Arnoldian method is 
 not so far removed from the Ollendorfian 
 as a casual observer might imagine. Why 
 then do we hear the constant claim for the 
 advantage of classical teaching ? 
 
 The reason is found in conditions still 
 existing in our secondary schools. There, 
 the ablest teachers have always been those 
 in classics, though increasing requirements 
 for college entrance have led in many 
 instances to the selection of strong men 
 for mathematics. Until very recently, the 
 study of English has been perfunctory, 
 while, for the most part, French and Ger- 
 man have been taught by ' natives ' be- 
 cause they alone can give the ' proper 
 
10 
 
 pronunciation.' But those excellent men, 
 though efficient teachers for pupils willing 
 to learn, too often fail as disciplinarians 
 and have to pay more attention to quieting 
 disorder than to imparting knowledge. 
 Here must be made the change needed to 
 remedy the defect in our modern system. 
 Men must be employed, who can teach the 
 modern languages as Latin and Greek were 
 taught seventy-five years ago, when the 
 pupil acquired not merely a fairly accurate 
 knowledge of grammatical principles, but 
 also the language itself. Our colleges must 
 demand more thorough preparation in 
 modern languages — in other words, the 
 transformation which college courses have 
 undergone must reach into the secondary 
 schools. Able men occupy modern language 
 chairs in colleges ; able teachers must be 
 found to prepare students. 
 
 But some may feel that while a modern 
 language course may be as useful mental 
 training as is a classical course, still there 
 may be room for doubt whether or not he 
 has gained equal preparation for his life's 
 work. 
 
 If the end to be attained by classical 
 study, beyond mere discipline, is the ability 
 to read the works of those who wrote in 
 classical languages, surely the labor has 
 been that of supererogation, for practically 
 all that is good in the ancient languages, 
 whether theological or legal or literary, has 
 been done into English after a fashion many 
 times better than that of the amateur — and 
 the reading in English will be vastly more 
 profita,ble than that in the original, for 
 one's contemplation of lofty sentiments or 
 useful matter is not likely to be interrupt- 
 ed by struggles with difficult construction. 
 
11 
 
 This argument is treated with such con- 
 tempt by advocates of elaborate classical 
 study that one is inclined to regard it as 
 unanswerable. It is said, however, that 
 the true meaning of an author cannot be 
 ascertained from a translation, the work 
 must be read in the original — which is 
 equivalent to saying that, to most of us, 
 works in a foreign language, especially 
 those in a dead language, must remain 
 sealed books. No man can acquire a 
 knowledge of a dead language, so exact as 
 to enable him to think in it, without ex- 
 pending so much labor as to leave time for 
 little else, so that to most of us a concep- 
 tion of what the writers meant must come 
 through translation. 
 
 But we may dismiss this last argument, 
 for it is purely academic and has no refer- 
 ence to the actual condition. It is not pre- 
 tended that the ordinary college graduate 
 knows enough to make the reading of Latin 
 or Greek authors a delight in hours of re- 
 laxation from the burdens of everyday life. 
 Long ago, Latin text-books were abandoned 
 in theological seminaries, not so much be- 
 cause the theology was antiquated as be- 
 cause the students were so burdened by 
 translation that neither time nor energy 
 remained for study of the matter. 
 
 But granting all that is claimed, the 
 question still recurs, is the game worth the 
 candle? Is access to classical authors in 
 the original or even in translation a matter 
 of such importance to the average man as 
 to justify the expenditure of the most im- 
 portant years of his life? One cannot 
 avoid expressing some doubts respecting 
 this. Unquestionably, the men of classical 
 Greece and Rome were, in some instances, 
 
12 
 
 men of towering intellect ; those who wor- 
 ship at the classical shrine demand that we 
 point out in modern times the equals of 
 Aristotle, Homer, Thucydides, Plato, Sen- 
 eca, Vergil, Tacitus, Horace, Quintilian 
 and half a score of others. Where in mod- 
 ern literature, we are asked, can one find 
 such elevating sentiments, such ennobling 
 philosophy, such brilliant rhetoric? One 
 may reply that perspective has much to do 
 with this type of ancestor worship, that a 
 score or even two scores of names gathered 
 from more than a millenium of antiquity 
 could easily be matched by a score of names 
 gathered from the five centuries preceding 
 our own. Even our nineteenth century, 
 whose materialism grieves so many hearts, 
 does not pale in comparison with the golden 
 period of either Greece or Rome. Men do 
 not stand out pre-eminently now as they 
 did centuries ago, for the field of knowledge 
 is so wide and the laborers so numerous 
 that one may gain eminence only with great 
 difficulty in even a very contracted portion. 
 Pre-eminent in his own area, he may be 
 utterly unknown to workers elsewhere. 
 It is probable that the ablest astronomer 
 in America cannot name the most eminent 
 ten chemists in the world and, in like man- 
 ner, that the ablest chemist cannot name 
 the most eminent ten astronomers. It is 
 equally probable that no eminent philoso- 
 pher or historian in this country can name 
 the ten Americans who have been pre- 
 eminent in the several branches of science 
 during the last fifty years. If Aristotle 
 were living now, he would be an eminent 
 professor of philosophy in some university, 
 much respected by philosophers elsewhere, 
 but unknown outside of his immediate cir- 
 
13 
 
 cle, unless, like Herbert Spencer, lie should 
 undertake problems of broad type, in wbicb 
 case, no doubt, he would be as little read 
 and as much misrepresented as Spencer 
 himself. 
 
 Of course, one risks much in venturing 
 to question the over-towering grandeur of 
 the ancient writers, for their names have 
 been enshrined so long that doubts respect- 
 ing their superiority appear as sacrilegious 
 as were Galileo's doubts respecting the 
 Ptolemaic system. But the fact remains, 
 that the commonly accepted verdict in 
 favor of the ancient writers is not that of 
 our day — it was pronounced at the revival 
 of learning amid the shadows of the reced- 
 ing dark ages and it has become a tradition 
 in seats of learning to be guarded carefully 
 as a pillar of the intellectual universe. 
 
 But the student, who has a thorough 
 knowledge of French and German as well 
 as of his own language, still has access 
 through translations to the thoughts of 
 antiquity, while he has vastly more. He 
 has access to the best thoughts of modern 
 times, to the works of authors in all 
 branches of knowledge during this, the age 
 not only of greatest intellectual activity 
 but also of the most accurate investigation. 
 If he be a professional man, he can keep 
 himself abreast with advance ; if he have 
 turned aside to commerce, he finds himself 
 equipped for the broader fields ; in any case 
 without early training in those languages, 
 he is crippled and is compelled to learn 
 them amid the pressure of other duties. 
 Those languages he must know — without 
 them, he cannot gain admission to graduate 
 schools of our stronger universities. They 
 are as essential as was Latin a century ago 
 
14 
 
 and for the same reason — they are, so ta 
 opeak the tools of trade. In philosophy, 
 law, theology and the various branches of 
 science, a man is at more than serious dis- 
 advantage without them. 
 
 In all this, there is no denial that a 
 knowledge of Greek and Latin is useful j 
 but that is whollj' aside from the issue, 
 which is, whether the gains from the study 
 of classical languages are such as to justify 
 the demand that it retain the very promi- 
 nent place in the curriculum. The utility 
 of some acquaintance with Latin and Greek 
 is beyond dispute ; naturalists employ terms 
 derived from those languages ; astronomers 
 and chemists make heavy drafts on mythol- 
 ogy, while relics of old practice in law and 
 medicine remain embalmed in Latin terms 
 and phrases. But the knowledge of Greek 
 and Latin necessary to the physician, 
 clergyman or lawyer is not great in quan- 
 tity ; if it were, most of the college graduates 
 who have taken up those professions would 
 feel themselves sadly handicapped. Indeed, 
 a ' smattering ' is all that very many en- 
 ergetic writers demand. 
 
 Elementary courses in Hebrew, Arabic, 
 Assj'rian, Italian and Spanish are given in 
 all of our larger institutions and, in manj', 
 the opportunity is still afforded for the be- 
 ginner in French and German. Similar 
 courses, as options, ought to be offered in 
 Latin and Greek, planned to give a good 
 knowledge of the vocabulary and to ac- 
 quaint the student with that something, 
 which we are accustomed to call the ' gen- 
 ius ' of the language. A faithful student, 
 with an object in view, should be able in 
 two years to read, with comparative ease, 
 any ordinary work in either of those Ian- 
 
15 
 
 •guages. Certainly, no one will assert that 
 Latin and Greek are more difi&cult than 
 German or that the idioms are more per- 
 plexing than those of Spanish. Scientific 
 men understand this, for there are doubt- 
 less few who have not been compelled to 
 acquire at short notice a working knowl- 
 edge of an additional language in order to 
 prosecute an investigation already begun. 
 
 When our college curricula shall have 
 been properly adjusted, the graduate will 
 have received the polish obtained by study 
 of language and literature, the logical mode 
 of thought obtained by study of mathe- 
 matics, the knowledge, strength and judi- 
 cial tendency obtained by study of the in- 
 ductive sciences ; while in addition, he will 
 have the means to utilize his gains in the 
 profession or calling which has been in 
 view during the later years of his college 
 life. 
 
 John J. Stevenson. 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
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