Page:Calcutta University and Science.djvu/4

Rh those obstacles which yet bar human progress to its unknown bourne in the future.

We place these lectures at the head of the list of works referred to in this article, inasmuch as they appear to us to give the best exposition within a brief compass, of the objects to be fulfilled by a Scientific, as distinguished from a literary system of Education, and by the study of Inductive as contrasted with purely Deductive or Abstract Science. Admitting fully the important influence of each of these kinds of study on the training of the mind, we would draw attention to the fact, clearly enunciated in these lectures, that each class of studies exercises an influence mainly its own, and that the system until lately pursued at the great English Universities, and which practically ignored Inductive or Phenomenal Science, left untrained and uncultivated one at least of the most important faculties of the human mind. Were we dealing with English Education in these remarks, we might well be content to leave the matter in those abler hands which have already to some extent treated it; but as in medical science, the idiosyncracy of the patient modifies the action of the drugs and should influence the treatment of the physician, so in dealing with a phase of intellect kindred to, but not identical with our own, we must take note of the especial requirements of the Oriental mind, and adapt our system to our patient.

The present moment is well fitted for the discussion of the topic we have selected. The University of Calcutta has from the time of its foundation recognised the claims of Natural and Physical Science to form part of the University course in Arts, that is,—of the general cultivation of the mind, independently of special professional aims ; but the means which, in a measure unavoidably, have been adopted to carry out its views, are such as have only tended to perpetuate the very evils, the mental narrowness and dogmatism, which a well-devised system should correct. During the past two years, the question of how to provide proper means of instruction in Physical and Natural Science for the under-graduates of the Calcutta University has been frequently discussed in the Senate, but beyond making a selection from this class of studies optional, a very important reform so far as it goes, nothing has been effected to improve the actual system. The chief difficulty encountered by the University appears to be, strange to say, to find men fitted for the task of teaching, and to provide such means of illustration as are indispensible to useful instruction. These difficulties are however, we believe, less than they appear to be, and there are other causes at work which we shall presently discuss, and which have operated to some extent at least, in retarding the general introduction of an