Los Angeles daily herald., 1873-11-11
Eos Anselss Nerala.
MENTAL DlETETiCS.
A Lecture Delivered Thursday Evening, No.
vember 6, 1873, before the Teachers As
sociation, by J. N. Quinn.
[COnclu,led.l

lCOncuded.l
Nor was it much better in Latin.
Cicero would have sworn bigger oaths
than he ever hurled at a Cataline, and
Horace have drank himself drunker
upon old Talerien, could they have
heard us making their good Latin into
bad English. Even Socrates, the
"childlike and bland" would have
been provoked to profanity, (and every
classical student knows that he cou ld
not swear, could he have heard our
version of his famous set to with the
beauties of the classics depends very
much who renders them into English.
POpe's translation of the Illiad bears
about as much resemblance to the
translatiOns made by the average col
legc student, as one of HOOka Jim's
speeches does to Governor Booths.
There are no doubt many beautiful
passages both in the prose and poetry
of the classic authors, but they derive
ut least half their charms from the
consideration of the time and circum-
stances in which they were produced.
The author of our day who should
produce poem of equal merit to the
very best of these ancient productions,
would neither make fame nor fortune
out Of it.
The poetry of the ancients deals
almost wholly with external and ma
terial subjects. There is no delving
into the caverns of the soul; no roam
ing on the shOreless sea of spiritual
life. HOmer's Illiad, the best of all
ancient poetry, is inferior to Milton's
Paradise Lost, or LOngfellOw's Evan
geline. The dramas of Eschylus and
SOphOcles, fall immeasurebly below
the tragedies of Shakespeare and the
comedies of Molere.
1t is claimed that this long course of
training in classical studies, is neces-
sary to give us command of language,
and facility in expressing our ideas.
What the student needs above all
other things in the scholastic period,
is training in the formation of the
habits of thouyht, and methods OF
study that he can carry with him
when he leaves his college halls, and
enters that great school of life the busy
world.
A course Of training in the ancient
classics, as we have seen, gives him
but meager food for thought, and the
methods of study that it fosters are
worthless, when applied to the acqui-
sitiOn off knowledge in other forms.
The gar. ering up of words in memory
is of little value, and it is immaterial
il what way they are coupled togeth-
er, if they are empty OF thought.
Words are the vehicles in which we
carry our thoughts to market, when
we have any to carry.
What would be thought of that ag-
riculturist who would charter long
train of freight cars to carry to mar
ket the products of fifty-acre garden
patch? Yet this is very similar to
what this traditional system actually
does. 1t invests six years out OF seven
i'm preparing vehicles to carry the
Thoughts evolved in the remaining
year. The prevailing error of all sys-
TENS of education is the training OF
the student to ring changes upon the
thoughts of others instead of teaching
him to evolve thoughts of his own.
There is a wonderful prOclivity in the
present age to accept the sign of an
idea" for the idea itself, and to mis-
take the symbols of thought for the
thing signitied. Words, as l have
said, are the vehicles of thought; but
in this golden age of talk there seems
to be a growing propensity to run
empty trains of these vehicles over
our central railroads simply to make q
showing of business and hereby run
up the price of our mental stocks.
Sesuuipidalian derivitives are as
plentiful as i'm the days of Horace, and
NAV be had for the asking, from Web
sters or WOrcester's verbal arsenals.
But for all that, it is exceedingly
doubtful whether shot from these
long range rifles of the dictionaries,
will wing an error or bring down a
usory SO expeditiously and SO effectu-
ally, as slug from Saxon blunder-
buSS.
Penury of thought and poverty OF
power derive no more efficacy from
words that run than from words that
creep. The modern novel and the
modern newspaper have done much
toward hurrying the soul out OF our
many syllabled Latin derivatlOns.
Fitz Charles Augustus, the lackadais-
cal hero of latter day fiction, never
discloses the love that Is playing, the
mischief with his be-scented and be-
dizened anatomy in blunt Saxon, but
drowls it out in melliffluOus pOlysyl-
Liable derivatiOns, and the modern edi-
tor fires whole volleys OF lW-pound
Parrott shells of invective, to bring
down some buzzing musquitO OF an
opponent, or he emplOysthe vocabulary
OF all it's high-sOunding lachrymose
expressions in mourning over the
death of liberty and the downfall Of
the republic, because fOrsOOth, his IA
yorite candidate for town constable
has met an inglorious defeat ut the
hands of q corrupt populace.
:. Earnestness, whetherin love or hate,
never seeks expression in smoothly
flowing derivatives, but always bursts
out i'm plain Saxon primitives. !
doubt whether we gain very much
either i'm ethics or philology by this
habit of aesthetical word piling, that
calls a lie deliberate dereliction from
the undertaking paths of moral recti-
tude, that modifies theft into q heredi-
tarv propensity to peculatiOn and
mildly stigmatizes shameful fraud as
an undue earnestness for illegitimate
speculation, believe that 1t would
he safer for our morals, if not for our
heads. to call q lie q lie, fraud, fraud,
and theft, theft. But to escape irom
this dangerous ground. Undoubtedly
SO much of the study OF language,
and i'm such forms as are necessary 10
its intelligent use, is demanded In edll,
cation; but I confidently believe that
one years careful study under a COM
petent teacher of the best English