Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 77.djvu/567

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HEN we consider that in all the high schools and colleges of Christendom, with few exceptions, the pupils are required to study one or more foreign languages, we can not but admit that the subject is one of the utmost importance. And more than this: in the public schools of many of our large cities thousands of children are engaged in the study of English, which is to them a foreign language. Since in the latter case the end in view is solely and directly practical, we need not consider this phase of the problem further in this connection. It is only within the memory of many men now living that the value of such studies has been called in question; or more especially, the relative value of the ancient and modern languages. A few decades ago the latter had either no place or a very subordinate one in the educational curriculum. Every young man who entered college was required to have some knowledge of Greek and Latin. In a few institutions he might pursue a modern language, or perhaps two, but this part of the course was perfunctorily gone over because regarded as subordinate. After a score or less of recitations from the grammar the student was put to reading. Then a few master-pieces were in whole or in part rapidly gone over and that was the end of the program. So far as the principles of language-structure were concerned the student was supposed to have learned them along with his Latin and Greek. Gradually, however, the modern languages received an increasing share of attention, until at the present time in many of our largest universities not five per cent. of the students take Greek, while neither Greek nor Latin is required for graduation. In most high schools the former is not taught, and in all it no longer occupies the post of honor. In this country the contest between the progressives and the conservatives was carried on without much bitterness; but in Germany the latter contested every inch of ground and the discussions of the relative value of ancient and modern languages often gave rise to acrimonious debates. It was in fact a contest between the ins and the outs; between the college professors and what may be called the enlightened public; between the traditional views of education and the practical, not to say imperious, demands of the age. Under the old régime an education was supposed to serve a sentimental rather than a practical end. It was not necessary for either law, medicine, or theology, since