Page:On the education of the people of India (IA oneducationofpeo00trevrich).pdf/77

Rh the contrast was very striking between the rubbish which these young men were learning in a government establishment and the rudiments of real knowledge which those whom I had visited the day before had acquired, in the very same city, and under circumstances far less favourable. I was informed that it had been frequently proposed to introduce an English and mathematical class, and to teach the Newtonian and Copernican system of astronomy; but that the late superintendent of the establishment was strongly opposed to any innovation, partly on the plea that it would draw the boys off from their Sanskrit studies, and partly lest it should interfere with the religious prejudices of the professors. The first of these arguments is pretty much like what was urged at Oxford (substituting Greek for Sanskrit) against the new examinations, by which, however, Greek has lost nothing. The second is plainly absurd, since the Ptolemaic system, which is now taught, is itself an innovation, and an improvement on the old faith of eight worlds and seven oceans, arranged like a nest of foxesboxes [sic].”

My readers may be surprised to hear that this college had been “completely re-organized ” four