The Express.
London, England, 1868-03-04 00:00:00

IFTIAND.

Tni F.vrtann, OLD SALT. Ileatn Lowy. Belford,* James:
Miss :lolly Moore —FARM. OIL VIVA lAMPKIERK Mews.
Jlllloeg, Thorne, Robson, and Fenton: Mesdames Awanbocooth.
Harland, Johnstone. Holt, to.—And COAL AND COKL

BRITANNIA.

Tms Ennio. THI TPAliiiff nF TTOLEWOOD FOREST.
News. Itepw3lo4, Chiultoe. Leslie. & Norwood : Mesdames Cosa
emu, Comm,. & Hooth.—Mos Kate Ulnas ; Mrs. J. Y. &Wm;
J W Liskard —And TH K DARK HOUSE

MGR WATIE AT LONDON BRITIGIL
nue DAM —Manilas. Olt. 7m.. ....Afternoon, Oh. r.27n.
Tu-MORROW-41icesias, 1011 3: mu ..Attereuoo, 11A. 20m.

ROTICLiOt DrATHA, are received
soldi It o'clock *or hisertiou ante evening. rice, Sa. 114.

LONDON,WEDNESDAY ,MARCH 4.

THE PUZZLE FOR EXULTS!' PARENTS.

Fe!a mix with growing sons may well be in a
curious dilemma. However willing they may feel to
give their boys a liberal education, however ready
they may be to stint themselves in order that this
groat end may at any cost be achieved, they know
it is possible, some will say probable, that their
money may be expended, and their sons' time 00.
copied in vain, It is a sore bewilderment to a
man if he is unfortunate enough to fall into
the hands of three or four doctors, each of whom
makes a different diagnosis and recommends
differeilt ouursoof treatment. In that case, however,

be may he led to leave all the remedies alone, and
trust to the restorative power of nature. But
the let alone system, often the best in medicine,
will nut do in education. Some course must be
clwseu ; and slime just now every course is pro-
nounced by some great authority to be bad, since
the liberal education of yesterday may be a
limited one to-day, and may be scarcely tolerated
to morrow, how is a man to know amidst the din
of discordant voices the one that carries moat
weight, and to which he will do wisely to give
bend A few years ago it was thought that
the education of a boy at one of the great
public schools, and of a young man at
either of our two most venerable uni-
versities, left nothing to be desired. We are
now told that the whole curriculum is little better
than a delusion and a sham. Professor FARRAR
comes forward at the Royal Institution and
declares that the educational value of Latin and
Greek has been extravagantly overrated ; that we
lave taught enemies empirically ; that an average
buy does not even gain from them what they are
auppund to yield, while on all other subjects he is
grossly ignorant ; that athleticism is preferred to
study at our schools and universities—and no
wonder either, since the present system of teach-
ing is " utterly degrading to all but the most
" mechanical masters, and utterly wearisome
" to all but the most sluggish-minded boy."
Professor Sir J. SIMPSON utters the same
complaint, and satirically suggests that it might be
desirable to get rid of the entire race of pre-
sent schoolmasters. Professor Ilext.zi- says that
the general result of a elastics' education is
that after a dozen years of toil the sufferer
loathes the sight of a Greek or Latin book,
and he arrives at the conclusion that " the
" best of our schools and the most complete of
" our university trainings give but a narrow, one-
" sided and essentially illiberal education, while
" the worst give what is really next to no educe-
" ton at all." Professor THOMPSON writes in
the like strain, and he is specially severe upon the
ten le.irned head masters who have lately issued
an elementary grammar fell of terms to be
learnt by boys which he finds it diffi-
cult to interpret himself. Moreover, the
Commissioners, in their report recently
published, testify to the same deficiencies,
and from them we learn that our public school
education is unsatisfactory and that the majority
of private schools are bad. On the other hand
men are not rare, who, like Mr. GLADSTONZ,
defend the present system of classical education
as " the complement of Christianity in the culture
"of the human being," and scores of learned
pundits may be found, ani this too is proved by
the Commissioners' report, who adhere with
vigorous pertinacity to the present system, and
defend with eloquence and zeal the time-honoured
usages of our public schools. Meanwhile our boys
must be taught, and who shall decide bow ? One
thing alone seems to us certain, that no education
which does not comprehend science and English
literature—the grandest literature the world has
yet seen—is entitled to be called liberal, and
that Latin and Greek are of little, if any, service
unless they are properly taught and intelligently
acquired. The boy who has spent his school-
days upon the classics and knows nothing about
them after all, and lees than nothing about any-
thing else, inuat caanytodtr sop Irimeunati
ill-
educated. Yet this is the predicament of the
vast number of buys with average intelligence who

The demolition of the Universal Exhibitioa in
the Champ do Ken I. aew remedias far mere lordly
than Were, sad it la alealated that by the malt d
Kay not • vestige of the rest warld'a fair will be ltd r
• farmer* of its fare aad parer.