Page:The Great Didactic of John Amos Comenius (1896).pdf/236



1. have already shown that every one ought to receive a universal education, and this at school. But do not, therefore, imagine that we demand from all men a knowledge (that is to say, an exact or deep knowledge) of all the arts and sciences. This would neither be useful of itself, nor, on account of the shortness of life, can it be attained by any man. For we see that each science is so vast and so complicated (as are physics, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, or even agriculture and arboriculture) that it would occupy the lifetime of even the strongest intellects if they wished to master it thoroughly by investigation and experiment. Thus did Pythagoras devote himself to arithmetic, Archimedes to mechanics, Agricola to metallurgy, and Longolius (who spent his whole life in endeavouring to acquire a perfect Ciceronian style) to rhetoric. It is the principles, the causes, and the uses of all the most important things in existence that we wish all men to learn; all, that is to say, who are sent into the world to be actors as well as spectators. For we must take strong and vigorous measures that no man, in his journey through life, may encounter anything so unknown to him that he cannot pass sound judgment upon it and turn it to its proper use without serious error.

2. We must, therefore, concentrate our energies on