and it

In these early schools, you thus, as it were, stand by the cradle of European learning and education: the Latin literature you find meagre ; there is scarcely any Greek; the school-books and dictionaries are wretched. At the same time, there is great mental energy in the Master, vigour in his method, earnestness in his purpose, and love of knowledge in his pupils.

which learning is probably indebted to vium; and that, whatever the quality, the Christian Church. The ancient the quantity of learning at least was Grammarians of Rome seemed to have not deficient :-" In the Church of followed a diffuse rhetorical mode of Padderborn, public studies flourishedteaching, little adapted to exercise and where were musicians and dialecticians train the minds of their pupils. The -where rhetoricians strove, and distinexamination of catchumens in the guished grammarians-where Masters Christian Church led almost neces- of Arts practised on the Trivium, and sarily to a close, sifting, cateche-there were those whose whole study was tical method. We find this in the about the Quadrivium-where mathe early schools of Alexandria, and it maticians and astronomers ́expounded pervades the teaching of the Middle-where there were students of physics Ages, at least in grammatical art. It is and geometry-where Horace flou thus that Alcuin's instructions are im- rished, and the great Virgil, and Crisparted, often, with considerable acutepus Salustius, and Urbanus Statius. ness, and occasionally, as in a disputa- And it was sport to sweat in all kinds tion with Pepin his pupil, with those of verse, in witty sayings, and joyous quiet strokes of humour with which, our songs.' early personal recollections of a Grammar School remind us, a good natural Scholasticus sometimes uses to enliven the dulness of grammar. We can thus early trace the tutorial method, the value of which, in bringing the mind of master and pupil into lively contact, no educationist will deny. Whether we give to it the high place which Dr. Whewell and Dr. Pusey contend for, it is unquestionably the best method in our higher schools. We believe that the admitted reason why many of the Continental Gymnasia, as in Belgium, do not realise all that their equipment in learned teachers might lead us to expect, is that there is not that active sympathy between master and pupil, and that enlivening system of sifting examination, which distinguishes the great English Schools, is a conspicuous feature in our Scottish Academies, and is carefully attempted, I am happy to learn, in our higher Indian Schools. I shall not fatigue my hearers with a detailed history of the Gymnasia in the centuries that followed Alcuin's day. The study of the purer classics extended, better Latinity was taught, and altogether the Literature of the Trivium, both as regards grammar and rhetoric, slowly improved. I shall translate here, as giving you an idea of a well-equipped school of these ages, a passage quoted by Mr. Maitland in his interesting work on the dark ages, Now, we may say we find a paralleł giving a very lively account of the to this in this second era of education. School of Padderborn. You will see The cause of this great mental movethat this school ranged over all the ment was the introduction, by Arabic seven arts of the Trivium and Quadri-channels, of Aristotle to the West.

II.-I now come to a second period. I have already remarked that the progress of knowledge exercised an immense influence over Education in its methods and arrangements. Dr. Whe well has shown, for instance, that the school of Plato was based on geometrical science. Plato's age was Plato's age was one of important geometrical discoveries, and Plato was himself an eminent geometer. It was thence he derived his conviction that there was "a certain and solid truth" a knowledge which was not mere opinion, and "science which was more than seeming." It was on this that he would build up his School-not founded, as with the Sophists, on baseless opinion, but resting upon clear and certain convictions, which he believed might be ascertained as well regarding right and wrong, as about straight lines and curves. Hence he writes on the gates of the gardens of the academy, "Let no one enter who is destitute of geometry."

transition, nineteen or twenty, appears to me somewhat too late. At the same time, I have no hesitation in stating that our Scottish plan, of ushering a boy prematurely on University life, at thirteen or fourteen, is open to the greatest objection. And yet, if you examine the history of Medieval Uni

The science of logic, thus re-discovered, exercised a prodigious influence on the schools. The art of grammar came to be regarded as quite a subordinate thing, and divine philosophy attracted all ardent aspiring minds. What a battle-field logic was-what great names it educed-Abelard, Scotus, Aquinas, Ockham! No knight-versities, you will find that the period errant of those ages was more eager for joust and tournament than were the learned for discussion. Nor did the Crusaders venture greater perils than many a poor scholar risked, in those hazardous days for travel, on his journey to Oxford or Paris. Debating societies in our day are generally regarded as dull affairs-then they were a passion ; the learned receiving and accepting challenges to discuss, and, amid hearers as eager as them-at selves, grappling brain with brain in the theatre of the schools.

The consequence of this movement was a re-organisation of Educational Institutions. Now began that distinction between the studies of the Higher School, and of the University, which so universally exists in our day, and is really so important to the interests of learning. It is a great disadvantage for a boy to be too early introduced to the higher mental stimulus and more scientific methods of the University; while it would be most injurious to the man to be subjected to the syntactic drill or physical discipline of the School. Hence arose a division, the Ars Grammatica and the Ars Rhetorica being handed over to the Higher School, while the Ars Dialectica, with its philosophical developments, was reserved for the University.

Let me observe here, to guard against misapprehension, that the age at which the scholar passed from the Gymnasium to the Studium Generale or University was different, in Medieval times, from that which now prevails in England, in Germany, and throughout educated Europe. The only Educational Institutions which now present any parallel to the Medieval system are those of Scotland. I am not sure that the proper age for entrance on the University has yet been satisfactorily decided. I venture to say it, with deference, that the English and German period of

was still earlier. From the regulation of the University of Paris, quoted by Bulæus, that boys should not be admitted under twelve years of age, to study the Arts, we learn how early was the period at which the student began his course. The Bachelor of Arts in those days was often scarcely older than the student who in our day matriculates at Oxford, Cambridge, or Berlin.

And not only was the age early which the studies of the Universities began, Grammar Schools were also attached to them, where the elements of classical knowledge were imparted. Wood enumerates ten such Grammar Schools at Oxford, which, he says, were for the most part very ancient. Bulæus, too, informs us, that there were halls in the University of Paris set apart for such scholars..

It is only, indeed, when we take this wide extent of instruction given within the limits of the University into consideration, that we can account for the prodigious numbers who thronged to Paris and Oxford in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. At Paris, they exceeded the number of the citizens ; at Oxford, there were assembled, according to the authority of Richard of Armagh, before the Pope, at Avignon, at one period, 30,000 students. Historians have explained this by the zeal of learning which marked these ages; by the want of books, which made the student more dependent on oral teaching; by the number of dependants includedparchment-makers, illuminators, booksellers, surgeons, barbers, apothecaries, and the retainers of the young nobles but we must add to this, the comprehensiveness of the education afforded, and the variety of age represented. The Scottish colleges, with their motley groups of noisy juniors, ardent youths, grave-looking men, who, after a hard battle with fortune, have fought their way to the University, may give us

;

Politian spoke Latin as it had not been heard since the age of Boethius. Chrysoloras was the first great teacher of the Greek tongue. Boccaccio opened up the treasures of Greek. The first edition of Virgil was printed in 1472 A. D. "The spirit of literary research allied itself," says Lord Macaulay, "to that of commercial enterprise. Every

"Full of strong oaths, and bearded like the pard; Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in place to which the merchant princes of quarrel."

III.-I now advance to a third period. The equipment of the Gymnasium was yet very miserable. No Latin grammars of any value existed. The dictionaries, such as they were, made no distinction betwixt classical usage and later barbarisms. The study of classical idiom had made little progress, and many of the Latin classics were yet unknown. The Greek language was a dead letter. We now come to the age of the revival of learning, which at once so elevated the Grammar School, that as regards its literature, or, to speak technically, the verbalism of the Trivium, it is scarcely yet surpassed. In the Colloquies of Erasmus, and and the Latin Psalms of Buchanan, Latin is written with an elegance and force almost rivalling the ancients, and certainly unexcelled by any later compositions of the same order.

This impulse was imparted by Italy. Lord Macaulay has justly observed of Italian history, that "the night which descended upon her was the night of an Arctic summer. The dawn began to re-appear before the reflection of the preceding sunset had faded from the horizon." To the genius of the highly endowed and imaginative Italian, the subtleties of logic were never attractive. It was classical Italy indeed-and it deserves to be noted, and not reformed Europe, which first branded the scholastic period as the dark ages. Poggio, one of the earliest scholars of Italy, discovered a number of Cicero's Orations, a complete Quinctilian, and other authors. Gasparin of Bergamo found Cicero de Oratore. Petarch inspired his countrymen with his own passion for Virgil and Cicero. Laurentius Valla helped grammatical science, as he opened up with much learning the distinctions of Latin syntax and synony

Florence extended their gigantic traffic, from the bazaars of the Tigris to the monasteries of the Clyde, was ransacked for medals and manuscripts." In the beginning of the sixteenth century, so widely spread was classical literature in Italy, that there was scarcely a considerable city where public instruction was not furnished both in the Greek and Latin languages.

But, passing from Italy, we find the progress of literature gradually gaining triumphs in the schools of France and of Germany. The rise of humane studies in Germany was mainly owing to the Fratres Hieronymici, a school remarkable for religious earnestness and learning. The object of their institu tions may be expressed in the language of Langius, a distinguished pupil and teacher :- Ut tenebræ ex ecclesiis et scholis extirpentur et redeat puritas in ecclesias et mundicies Latini sermonis in scholas." Many a hard battle had to be fought by these worthy brethren against the school-men with their barbarous school-books and wretched classics. The progress which the Humanists made was the more honorable. Erasmus powerfully aided the cause, especially by his Colloquies, a work expressly written for Grammar scholars. Those familiar with the rise of human studies will recall how much indebted the Higher School is to Hegius, Buschius, Murmelius, Dringenberg, Platter, Simler, Agricola, and many others. Reuchlin was especially distinguished for his Latin oratory. He translated Thucydides with such accuracy and fidelity at Rome, that a distinguished Greek exclaimed, "Greece has overflown the Alps!" It may mark the progress of the rising Greek learning of the period, that at a time when Greek had scarcely found its way to England and Scotland, Reuchlin visited the German school of Simler, where he