Practical Knowledge.

Pelorus Guardian and Miners' Advocate., Volume 1, Issue 58, 15 August 1890, Page 3

Practical Knowledge.

At thp annual meeting of the Melbourne Trinity College Dialetic Society the other evening the Governor (Lord Hopetoun) administered somewhat of a shock to the company of dons. The prelector in his address had urged Unimportance of classics in education, and evidently imagined that the Governor, as an old Eton boy. would be with him hand and glove, and so did ail the other speakers. But his Excellency had his own opinions and was not afraid to give them. ‘He said : “I have listered with the greatest attention and interest to the lecture which has been delivered by the prelector. I have had what may be called the teacher’s point of view—the professor’s point of view—placed before me. How, ladies and gentlemen, I never believe in pretending to he what I am not. If I came before you pretending to be a high authority on education, I should make myself ridiculous. But I should just like to look at this subject from a boy’s point of view, because J have not yet reached the age at which it has been said a person may consider hims -lf a rising young man. I am afraid lam rather a Philistine on the subject of classical education. 1 think that a certain amount of classical education is an excellent thing, and a necessary part of a gentleman’s education, but when I look back at ray school days I confess that I should net regret the long lovely afternoons 1 spent in the classroom if I had learned & little more modern languages, a little more history, a little more science, instead of so much Latin and Greek.—(Cheers.)— l believe that Latin and Greek are an excellent training for the mind, but I don’t believe in taking up the whole <>f a hoy’s youth in nr r< ly training his mind to receive something else afterwards. I don’t think it would be a good plan if we wanted to grow potatoes to cultivate the field with wheat until just before the time for putting the potatoes in. This may be a very crude view, but it is my view all the same, and I believe that as time goes on people will see that it is necessary to teach in our schools the things which are to- be useful to us in life.”