FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[1]One illustration of the indifference of the authorities of our University Presses to the interest of Literature is so scandalous that it must be specified. Fourteen years ago a series of lectures was delivered by the then Clarke Lecturer in the Hall of Trinity College, Cambridge. They were afterwards published under the title ofFrom Shakespeare to Pope, and reviewed in theQuarterly Reviewfor October, 1886. The lectures, as the Review showed, absolutely swarmed with blunders, many of them so gross as to be almost incredible. Ever since then the volume has been circulated by the Press, absolutely unrevised, indeed without a single correction, and is now in circulation.[2]Cf. what Milton says in prescribing the study of masterpieces in criticism: "This would make them (students) soon perceive what despicable creatures our common rimers and play-writers be, and show them what religious, what glorious and magnificent use might be made of poetry, both in Divine and human things. From hence, and not till now, will be the right season of forming them to be able writers and composers in every excellent matter, when they shall be thus fraught with an universal insight into things."—Tractate on Education.

[1]One illustration of the indifference of the authorities of our University Presses to the interest of Literature is so scandalous that it must be specified. Fourteen years ago a series of lectures was delivered by the then Clarke Lecturer in the Hall of Trinity College, Cambridge. They were afterwards published under the title ofFrom Shakespeare to Pope, and reviewed in theQuarterly Reviewfor October, 1886. The lectures, as the Review showed, absolutely swarmed with blunders, many of them so gross as to be almost incredible. Ever since then the volume has been circulated by the Press, absolutely unrevised, indeed without a single correction, and is now in circulation.

[2]Cf. what Milton says in prescribing the study of masterpieces in criticism: "This would make them (students) soon perceive what despicable creatures our common rimers and play-writers be, and show them what religious, what glorious and magnificent use might be made of poetry, both in Divine and human things. From hence, and not till now, will be the right season of forming them to be able writers and composers in every excellent matter, when they shall be thus fraught with an universal insight into things."—Tractate on Education.

To say that the anarchy which has resulted from confusing the distinction between the study and interpretation of Literature as the expression of art and genius, and its study and interpretation as a mere monument of language, has had a most disastrous effect on education generally, would be to state very imperfectly the truth of the case. It has led to inadequate and even false conceptions of what constitutes Literature. It has led to all that is of essential importance in literary study being ignored, and all that is of secondary or accidental interest being preposterously magnified; to the substitution of grammatical and verbal commentary for the relation of a literary masterpiece to history, to philosophy, to æsthetics; to the mechanical inculcation of all that can be imparted, as it has been acquired, by cramming, for the intelligent application of principles to expression. Ithas led to the severance of our Literature from all that constitutes its vitality and virtue as an active power, and from all that renders its development and peculiarities intelligible as a subject of historical study. In a word, it has led to a total misconception of the ends at which literary instruction should aim, as well as of its most appropriate instruments and methods. All this is illustrated nowhere more strikingly than in the publications of the two great University Presses. It would be easy to point to editions of English classics, and to works on English Literature, bearing theimprimaturof Oxford and Cambridge, in which all that is worst in the opposite extremes of pedantry and dilettantism finds ludicrous expression.

And in thus speaking we are saying nothing more than is notorious, nothing more than is admitted, and admitted unreservedly, in the Universities themselves, or at least at Oxford. But different sections of Academic society regard the matter in different lights. The majority of the classical professors and teachers, deprecating any attempt on the part of the University to meddle with "Literature," treat the whole thing as a joke, and, so far from supposing that the reputation of the University is concerned, find infinite amusement in the constant exposures which are being made in the reviews and newspapers of the absurdities of the "English Literature party." They regard the "studyof Literature" precisely as they regard the University Extension Movement—the one as a contemptible excrescence on our Academic system, the other as a contemptible excrescence on Academic curricula. Another section takes a very different view. Recognising the reasonableness of the appeals which have, during the last twelve years, been made to Oxford to place the study of Literature on the same sound footing as she has placed that of other subjects included in her courses, and discerning clearly that what is required cannot be obtained as long as the interests of Philology and those of Literature continue to collide, this party, unhappily a small minority, has pleaded for the establishment of a School of Literature. They have very properly laid stress on four points: First, that, as the chief justification for the establishment of such a School is the fact that the University is undertaking by innumerable agencies, its Press, its oral teachers both at home and abroad, to disseminate liberal instruction through the medium of English Literature, the principal object of the School should be the education of these agencies. Secondly, they have insisted that, if the interpretation of Literature is to effect what it is of power to effect, if, as an instrument of political instruction, it is to warn, to admonish, to guide, if, as an instrument of moral and æsthetic instruction, it is to exercise that influence on taste, on tone, on sentiment, on opinion, oncharacter—on all, in short, which is susceptible of educational impression—it must both be properly defined and liberally studied; and they contend that, if it is to be so defined and so studied outside the Universities, it must first be so defined and so studied within. Thirdly, they insist that the study of our own Literature should be associated with that of ancient classical literature, for two indisputable reasons: first, because the basis of all liberal literary culture, of a high standard, must necessarily rest on competent classical attainments, and because, historically speaking, the development and characteristics of the greater part of what is most valuable in our Literature would be as unintelligible, without reference to the Greek and Roman classics, as the Literature of Rome would be without reference to that of Greece. Fourthly, they point out that, as our Literature is, in various intimate ways, associated with the Literatures of Italy, France, and Germany, and that, as an acquaintance with the classics of those countries must form an essential element in a literary education, the comparative study of those Literatures and our own ought, by all means, to be encouraged and provided for. And, fifthly, they show that what is demanded is perfectly feasible. There already exists in the University, they contend, every facility for organizing such a course of Literature as is required. All that is needed is co-ordination. In the Classical Moderations and intheLiteræ HumanioresHonour Schools a liberal literary education on the classical side is already provided; two-thirds in fact of the discipline, culture, and attainments desiderated in a literary teacher it is the aim of those Schools to impart. The Taylorian Institute provides instruction in the languages and literatures of the Continent; and, if its professors could be roused into a little more activity, a youth might, in two years, if he pleased,—and that side by side with his severer studies—acquire something more than a superficial acquaintance with the language and writings of Dante and Machiavelli, of Montaigne and Molière, of Lessing and Goethe. What he could not obtain would be instruction and guidance in the study of our own Literature. In a word, all that is required to secure what this party plead for is simply the establishment of a School of English Literature, in the proper acceptation of the term, and the co-ordination of studies which are at present pursued independently. It was proposed that it should take the form of a Post-graduate Honour School, standing in the same relation to the other schools in the University as the old Law and History School used to stand to the oldLiteræ HumanioresSchool, and as the examination for the Bachelorship in Civil Law now stands to the ordinary Law School. Thus a youth who had graduated in honours in Moderations and in the Final Classical School, who had studied modern literatures at theTaylorian and our own Literature under its professor, or even by himself, would have an opportunity of displaying his qualifications for an honour diploma in Literature. But the appeals and arguments of this party have been of no avail.

Next come the philologists. They are in possession of the field. All the revenues supporting the Chairs of Language and Literature are their monopoly. They have steadily resisted all attempts on the part of what may be denominated the Liberal party to encroach on their dominions. In their eyes the Universities are simply nurseries for esoteric specialists, and to talk of bringing them into touch with national life is, in their estimation, mere cant. Their attitude towards Literature, generally, is precisely that of the classical party towards our own Literature; they regard it simply as the concern of men of letters, journalists, dilettants, and Extension lecturers. They defeated sixteen years ago an attempt to establish a Chair of English Literature by transforming it into a Chair of Language and securing it for themselves. They attempted, subsequently, to supplement what they had done by the establishment of a School of Language on the model of the Mediæval and Modern Languages Tripos at Cambridge. They were defeated by a coalition of the classical party, the Liberals, of whom we have just spoken, and a third party which insisted on acompromise between Philology and Literature. Reviving the scheme, they have, by accepting the modifications of the compromisers, just succeeded in getting it accepted. The new School of English Language and Literature is the result of that compromise.

Now it will not be disputed that if the Universities ought, in the interests of liberal culture, to provide adequately for instruction in Literature, they ought also, in the interests of science, to provide adequately for instruction in Philology. It is a branch of learning of immense importance. It is, and ought to be, the peculiar care of Universities, and nothing could be more derogatory to a University than deficiency in such a study. But it is a study in itself. As a science it has no connection with Literature. Indeed the instincts and faculties which separate the temperament of the mathematician from the temperament of the poet are not more radical and essential than the instincts and faculties which separate the sympathetic student of Philology from the sympathetic student of Literature. But no science resolves itself more easily into a pseudo-science, and it is in this degenerate form that it has become linked with Literature and been, in all ages, the butt of wits and men of letters. Nothing but anarchy can result till this mutually degrading alliance be dissolved. It has been forced on the philologists by the compromise to which reference has beenmade. Let them be free to rescind it. Let the "pia vota" of Professor Max Müller be fulfilled and Oxford have her School of Philology. That such a School should be established is desirable for three reasons. In the first place, it would define what is at present vague and indeterminate, the scope and functions of Philology. Secondly, it would place that study on its proper footing, and, by placing it on its proper footing, it would not only demonstrate its relation to other studies, but it would enable it to effect fully what it is competent to effect. Thirdly, it might, and probably would, do something to relieve Oxford of the opprobrium of being behind the rest of the learned world in this branch of science. The School would probably not attract many students, for Philology, unlike Literature, can never appeal to more than a small minority. If, therefore, the choice lay between the institution of a School of Philology and that of a School of Literature, there can be no doubt which should have precedence. But no such choice is offered. If the philologists were not strong enough to refuse to compromise, they are strong enough to crush any attempt to forestall them.

Let us now turn to the constitution of the School which has been the result of this arrangement, and which will authorize the University to confer, not, be it remembered, an ordinary, but an honour, degree in English Language andLiterature. The following are the Regulations. The subjects for examination are four. 1. Portions of English authors. 2. The History of the English Language. 3. The History of English Literature. 4. In the case of those candidates who aim at a place in the first or second class, a Special Subject of language or literature. The portions of the authors specified are these.Beowulf, the texts printed in Sweet'sAnglo-Saxon Reader,King Horn,Havelok; Laurence Minot,Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Of Chaucer'sCanterbury Tales, thePrologue,The Knight's Tale,The Man of Law's,The Prioress's,Sir Thopas,The Monk's,The Nun Priest's,The Pardoner's,The Clerk's,The Squire's,The Second Nun's,The Canon Yeoman's. Next come thePrologueand the first sevenpassus(text B) ofPiers Ploughman. Then come select plays of Shakespeare, chosen apparently at haphazard,Love's Labour's Lost,Romeo and Juliet,Richard the Second,Twelfth Night,Julius Cæsar,Winter's Tale,King Lear. Then we have the following extraordinary farrago:—

Bacon'sEssays.

Milton, with a special study ofParadise Lostand theAreopagitica.

Dryden'sEssay on Epic(sic).

Pope'sSatires and Epistles.

Johnson'sLives of the Poets—the Lives of Eighteenth-Century Poets.

Goldsmith'sCitizen of the World.

Burke'sThoughts on the Present Discontents.

Lyrical Ballads (Wordsworth and Coleridge), Shelley'sAdonais.[3]

The second part of the examination will be on the History of the English Language. "Candidates will be examined in Gothic (the Gospel of St. Mark), and in translation from Old English and Middle English authors not specially offered."

This is to be followed by the History of English Literature, to which portion of the Regulations the following odd clause is appended: "the examination will include the History of Criticism and of style in prose and verse." Last come the special subjects designed for "those who aim at a place in the First or Second Class." Six of these consist of certain prescribed periods of English Literature. The other subjects are as follows:—

(1) Old English Language and Literature down to 1150A.D.

(2) Middle English Language and Literature, 1150-1400A.D.

(3) Old French Philology with special reference to Anglo-Norman French, together with aspecial study of the following texts:—Computus of Phillippe de Thaun,Voyage of St. Brandan,The Song of Dermot and the Earl,Les Contes moralisés de Nicole Bozon.

(4) Scandinavian Philology, with special reference to Icelandic, together with a special study of the following texts:—Gylfaginning,Laxdæla Saga,Gunnlaugssaga Ormstungu.

(5) French Literature down to 1400A.D.in its bearing on English Literature.

(6) Italian Literature as influencing English down to the death of Milton.

(7) German Literature from 1500A.D.to the death of Goethe in its bearing on English Literature.

(8) History of Scottish Poetry.

Such is the scheme which will, in conjunction with the similar scheme at Cambridge, supply England and the colonies with their literary professors. Let us examine it in detail. The first thing which strikes us is the contrast between the competence and judgment displayed in the organization of the philological part of the course and the confusion, inadequacy, and flimsiness so conspicuous in the literary part. Nothing could be more satisfactory than the provisions made for the study of Language. They are obviously the work of legislators who knew what they were about, and who, but for the thwarting requirements of the provisions for Literature,would have proceeded to a superstructure worthy of the foundation. A student who, in addition to having mastered the prescribed works in Gothic, Anglo-Saxon, and Middle English, is competent to translate and comment on unprepared passages from those dialects, has certainly laid the foundation of sound scholarship in an important department of Philology. In the fact that what properly belongs to his study has been relegated to the subjects out of which he has only the option of choosing one, we have a lamentable illustration of the effects of the compromise forced on the philologists. If, for the literary portion of the curriculum, a candidate could substitute the first four of the special subjects, he would have completed a thoroughly satisfactory course of Philology, so far at least as relates to the Teutonic and Romance languages.

But to pass from what concerns Philology to what concerns Literature. Now in considering this point it is necessary to remember that we are not dealing with the regulations of any subordinate institution or curriculum, with provincial Universities and seminaries, or with schemes of study in which Literature is only one out of many subjects. We are dealing with a Final Honour School at Oxford, with regulations which will inevitably form a precedent and model wherever the study of English literature shall be organized in Great Britain. We are dealing with a school which is to educate those who areto educate the country. Nothing, therefore, could be more disastrous than unsoundness and deficiency in the provisions of such an institution, nothing more deplorable than its giving countenance and authority to error and inadequacy. It is not too much to say that, if this scheme had been designed with the express object of degrading the standard of literary teaching, and of perpetuating all that is worst in present systems, it could hardly have been better adapted for its purpose. Not to dwell upon subordinate defects, it completely severs the study of our own literature from that of the ancient classical literatures. It necessitates no knowledge of any of the Continental literatures. It ignores absolutely the higher criticism. Contracting Literature within the narrowest bounds, its selection of books for special study is worthy of an Army Examination. In the wretched jumble in which Goldsmith'sCitizen of the Worldjostles Shelley'sAdonaisand Burke'sThoughts on the Present DiscontentsWordsworth's and Coleridge'sLyrical Ballads, no attempt is made to discriminate between compositions which are representative, either critically of the work of particular authors, or historically of particular epochs, and works which have no such significance, while many of the most important departments of our prose Literature are unrepresented. Nor is this all. It affords every facility for cramming. It is adapted to test nothing butwhat may be mechanically acquired and mechanically imparted, what may be poured out from lectures into notebooks, and from notebooks into examination papers. Proceeding on the assumption that a literary education is merely the acquisition of positive knowledge, it neither requires nor encourages, as the prescription of an essay or thesis, or even "taste-paper," might have done, any of the finer qualities of literary culture, such, for example, as a sense of style, sound judgment, good taste, the touch of the scholar. We can assure these legislators, and we speak from knowledge, that, setting aside the philological portion of this curriculum, which is, so far as it goes, solid enough, an experienced crammer, would, in about three months furnish an astute youth with all that is requisite for graduating in this school.

But to proceed to details. Conceive the qualifications of an interpreter and critic of English Literature, a graduate in Honours in his subject, whose education has proceeded on the hypothesis that he need have no acquaintance with the classics of Greece and Rome. Would any competent scholar deny that the history of English Literature, in its mature expression, is little less than the history of the modifications of native genius and characteristics by classical influence, that the development and peculiarities of our epic, dramatic, elegiac, didactic, pastoral, much of our lyric, of our satire and of other species ofour poetry is, historically speaking, unintelligible without reference to ancient classical literature? That what is true of our poetry is true of our criticism, of our oratory, sacred and secular, of our dialectic and epistolary Literature, of our historical composition, of the greater part, in short, of our national masterpieces in prose? What, indeed, the Literature of Greece was to that of Rome, the Literatures of Greece and Rome have been to ours.[4]

It was the influence of Æschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Menander, Diphilus, which transformed theLudi Sceniciand the Atellan farces into the tragedies of Ennius and Pacuvius andthe comedies of Plautus and Terence. It was the influence of the Roman drama and of a drama modelled on the Roman which transformed, so far at least as structure and style are concerned, our similarly rude native experiments into the tragedies and comedies of Shakespeare. On the epics of Greece were modelled the epics of Rome, and on the epics of Greece and Rome are modelled our own great epics. Of our elegiac poetry, to employ the term in its conventional sense, one portion is largely indebted to Theocritus, Moschus, and Virgil, and another to Catullus and Ovid. Almost all our didactic poetry is modelled on the didactic poetry of Rome. Theocritus and Virgil have furnished the archetypes for our eclogues and pastorals. One important branch of our lyric poetry springs directly from Pindar, another important branch directly from Horace, another directly from the choral odes of the Attic dramatists and of Seneca. Our heroic satire, from Hall to Lord Lytton, is simply the counterpart—often, indeed, a mere imitation—of Roman satire. And if this is true of our satire, it is equally true of our best ethical poetry. The Epistles, which fill so large a space in the poetical literature of the seventeenth and eighteenth century, derive their origin from those of Horace. To theHeroidesof Ovid we owe a whole series of important poems from Drayton to Cawthorn. The Greek anthology and Martial have furnishedthe archetypes of our epigrams and of our epitaphs. It is the same with our prose. The history of English eloquence begins from the moment when the Roman classics moulded and coloured our style, when periodic prose was modelled on Cicero and Livy, when analytic prose was modelled on Sallust, Seneca, and Tacitus. With the exception of fiction, there is no important branch of our prose composition, the development and characteristics of which are historically intelligible without reference to the ancients. How radically inadequate must any study of the principles of criticism be, which has no reference to the critical works of the Greek and Roman writers, is obvious. But it is not merely in tracing the development and explaining the peculiarities generally of our prose and of our poetry that competent classical scholarship is indispensable. Is it not notorious that in each generation, from Spenser to Tennyson, from More to Froude, our leading poets and prose writers have been, with very few exceptions, men nourished on classical literature and saturated with its influence? Many entire masterpieces, much, and in some cases the greater portion, of other masterpieces, particularly in our poetry, are simply unintelligible—we are speaking, of course, of serious critical students—except to classical scholars. Take, for example, theFaerie Queen, and theHymnsof Spenser, Milton'sParadise Lost,Comus,Lycidas,andSamson Agonistes, Pope's satires, the two great odes of Gray, Collins's odes toFearand thePassions, Wordsworth's greatOdeand hisLaodamia, Shelley'sAdonaisandPrometheus Unbound, Landor'sHellenics, much of the poetry of Tennyson, Browning, and Matthew Arnold. Indeed it would be as preposterous to attempt any critical study of our Literature, without reference to the ancients, as it would be for a man to set up as an interpreter in Roman Literature without reference to the Greek.

And the effect of this severance of the study of the ancient classics from the study of our own is written large throughout the whole domain of education, in the instruction given in schools and institutes, in the monographs, manuals, and "editions" which pour from scholastic presses. In one of the most popular manuals now in circulation, the writer gravely tells us that "the pastoral name ofLycidaswas chosen by Milton to signify purity of character," adding "in Theocritus a goat was so calledλευκιταςfor its whiteness," that Comus "the drinker of human blood" revelled in the palace of Agamemnon.[5]Another writer confounds the "choruses" in Shakespeare with the choruses of the Greek plays. Another, commenting on the symbolism of ivy in the wreathof a poet, tells us that it indicates "constancy."[6]Nothing is more common than to find elaborate critical comments on theFaerie Queenwithout the smallest reference to its connection with Aristotle'sEthics, and on Wordsworth's greatOdewithout any reference to Plato. But such is the confidence reposed in Professor Earle and his theory, and so determined are the legislators for the new School to exclude all connection with classical literature, that it is not admitted even as a special subject. A candidate has, as we have seen, the option of studying the influence exercised on old English literature by French, and on later literature by Italian and German; but the one thing which he has not the option of studying is the influence exercised on it by the literatures of Greece and Rome. Some of our readers may remember that a few years ago a public appeal was made for an expression of opinion on the question of associating the study of our own classics and that of the ancients. Opinions were elicited from many of the most distinguished men in England. They were all but unanimous, not merely in supporting the association, but in deprecating the severance. So wrote Mr. Gladstone, Cardinal Manning, Professor Jowett, Matthew Arnold, Lord Lytton, Mr. John Morley, Walter Pater,Addington Symonds; sowrote the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of London, the Rector of Lincoln, the President of Magdalen, the Warden of All Souls, and many others. We may add, also—for we are now at liberty to state it publicly—that this was emphatically the opinion of Robert Browning. We cannot, of course, quote these opinionsin extenso,[7]and that of the late Professor Jowett and a portion of that of Mr. John Morley must suffice.

I am as strongly of opinion that in an Honour School of English Literature or Modern Literature the subject should not be separated from classical literature, as I am of opinion that English literature should have a place in our curriculum.

So writes Professor Jowett.

It seems to me to be as impossible effectively to study English literature, except in close association with the classics, as it would be to grasp the significance of mediæval or modern institutions without reference to the political creations of Greece and Rome. I should be very sorry to see the study of Greek and Latin writers displaced, or cut off from the study of our own.

So writes Mr. John Morley.

But the Professor of Anglo-Saxon and his friends, as we have seen, think otherwise, and have, unhappily for the interests of letters and education, persuaded Oxford to think otherwise too. We say advisedly the interests of letters andeducation. For the precedent of excluding from a School of "Literature," and that at the chief centre and nursery of liberal culture, the Literatures of Greece and Rome cannot but be detrimental to the vitality and influence of the ancient classics; and, as Froude truly observed, both the national taste and the tone of the national intellect would suffer serious decline, if they lost their authority. The reaction against philological study which has set in during the last ten years has given them a new lease of life. But the spirit of the age is against them; they have rivals in languages far easier to acquire; they are not, and never can be, in touch with the many. Let them become disassociated from our curriculums of Literature, and they will cease to be influential, They will cease to be studied seriously, to be studied even in the original, except by mere scholars.

Another absurdity, not less monstrous, in these regulations, is the absence of all provision for instruction in the principles of criticism. There is indeed an unmeaning clause about the history of criticism, and of style in verse and prose, being included in the examination; but as nothing is specified, and as no work on criticism, with the exception of Dryden'sDiscourse on Epic Poetry, and Johnson'sLives(of eighteenth-century poets),[8]is included in the booksprescribed for special study, it is plain that this important subject has no place. Why it should not have occurred to these legislators to substitute, say, for Goldsmith'sCitizen of the Worldand Burke'sThoughts on the Present Discontents, some work which would at least have opened the eyes of the literary professors of the future to the existence of philosophical criticism, is certainly odd. Had they prescribed select essays from Hume; and Shaftesbury'sAdvice to an Author, or Campbell'sPhilosophy of Rhetoric, or Burke'sTreatise on the Sublime and Beautiful, or even the critical portions of Coleridge'sBiographia Literaria, with the two essays of Wordsworth, it would have been something. But the truth is that, as they have excluded, except from the optional subjects, all literatures but the English, one absurdity has involved them in another. The course for the literary education of our future professors, proceeding on the principle that they need know no language but Gothic and Anglo-Saxon, has necessitated the elimination of all the greatmasterpieces of critical literature. As they are assumed to know no Greek, they can have no serious instruction in such works as Aristotle'sPoeticandRhetoric, and in theTreatise on the Sublime. As they are assumed to know no Latin, they can have no instruction in Roman criticism. On the same principle such works as Lessing'sLaocoonandHamburgische Dramaturgie, Schiller's Æsthetical Letters and Essays, Villemain's Lectures, and Sainte-Beuve's Essays, can find no place in their curriculum of study. And so it comes to pass that Dryden'sDiscourse on Epic Poetryand Johnson'sLivesof the eighteenth-century poets, represent—proh pudor!—the course in Criticism.

Now it is not too much to say that, for a University like Oxford to confer an honour degree in English Literature on a student who need never have read a line of the works to which we have referred, is to authorize not simply superficiality, but sheer imposture. How can a teacher deal adequately even with the subject which these regulations profess to include—the history of criticism—who need have no acquaintance with thePoeticandRhetoric, theTreatise on the Sublime, and theInstitutes of Oratory? How could a teacher possibly be a competent exponent and critic of the masterpieces of our literature, who had not received a proper critical training, and how could he have any pretension to such a training when all that is best incriticism had been expressly excluded from his education?

It may be urged that he would himself supply these deficiencies, that the study of our own Literature would naturally lead him to the study of other Literatures, that intelligent curiosity, ambition, or a sense of shame would induce him to supplement voluntarily, and by his own efforts, what he needed in his profession. In some instances this would undoubtedly be the case. In the great majority of instances such a supposition would be against all analogy. As a general rule, a high honour degree in any subject represented at the Universities is final. It winds a man up for life. It determines, fixes, and colours his methods, his views, his tone, in all that relates to the subject in which he has graduated. If he chooses teaching as a profession, he has no inducement to correct, to modify, or even materially add to what has been imparted to him, for his scholastic reputation has been made, and a comfortable independence is assured. To very many men, indeed, who go up to the Universities with the intention of following teaching as a profession, a high degree is a mere investment, the one instinct in them which is not quite banausic being the conscientious thoroughness with which they impart what they have been taught. Nothing, therefore, is of more importance to education than the sound constitution of theHonour Schools of Oxford and Cambridge, and nothing could be more disastrous than the toleration in those Schools of inadequate standards, and of palpably erroneous theories of study.

But to return to the Regulations. The ridiculous disproportion between the ground covered and the work involved in the different "special subjects" open to the option of candidates, would seem to indicate, either that the regulators are very inadequately informed on those subjects, or that divided counsels have resulted in the settlement of very different standards of requirement. Compare, for instance, what is involved respectively in such subjects as "English Literature between 1700 and 1745," and "The History of Scottish Poetry." Why, a competent knowledge of the history of Scotch poetry in the fifteenth century alone would be more than an equivalent to the first subject. Not less absurd is the prescription of "English Literature between 1745 and 1797" as an alternative for "English Literature between 1558 and 1637." The prescription of such "special subjects" as the influence exercised on our Literature by the Literatures of Italy, Germany, and France, is one of the few steps in a wise direction discernible in these regulations; but, as no student is free to take more than one of them, or required to take any of them at all, their inclusion in no way affects the constitution of the School. Acompetent literary education is not very much furthered by a student being invited to study how our Literature has been affected by one out of the five Literatures which have influenced it. As, moreover, the integrity of a chain depends on its weakest link, so the efficiency of examinational tests, in their application to purely optional subjects, depends on that subject in the list which involves least labour. A candidate who can "get a first" out of "English Literature between 1700 and 1745," or between 1745 and 1797, will be much too wise to attempt to "get a first" out of subjects which will require treble the time and labour to master. Is it likely that candidates, anxious, naturally, from less lofty motives than the love of Literature for its own sake, to obtain an honour degree, will, after laboriously acquiring Anglo-Saxon and Middle English, which are compulsory, voluntarily specialize in a subject requiring a knowledge of Italian and German, when it is open to them to choose, as their special subject, "Old English Language and Literature down to 1150"?

The statute authorizing the foundation of this School recites that in its curriculum and examinations "equal weight" is, "as far as possible, to be given to Language and Literature, provided always that candidates who offer special subjects shall be at liberty to choose subjects connected either with Language or Literature, orwith both." It would be interesting to know what this means. If by "equal weight" be meant equality in the proportions of what is prescribed for the study of Literature, and what is prescribed for the study of Language, the provision is stultified by the very constitution of the course. To suppose that the history of English Literature, and the special study of a few particular works like Shelley'sAdonais, Burke'sPresent Discontents, and theLyrical Ballads, is equivalent to the History of the English language, the Gospel of St. Mark in Gothic, theBeowulf, and a volume of extracts in Anglo-Saxon,King Horn,Havelok,Sir Gawain, and the prologue and sevenpassusofPiers Ploughmanin Middle English, is palpably absurd. If by "equal weight" be meant that an examiner is to assign equal marks to candidates who distinguish themselves in Literature, and to candidates who distinguish themselves in Language, it involves gross injustice. For while the latter have every opportunity for displaying knowledge and competence, the former have not. If a student has literary tastes and sympathies, if he is conversant with the Classics, if, attracted by what is best not merely in our own but in other modern Literatures, he has indulged himself in their study, if he has made himself a good critic and acquired a good style, what chance has he of doing his attainments and accomplishments justice? But if it be meant that "equal weight" will be given,not to literary merit regarded as Sainte-Beuve and Matthew Arnold would regard it, but regarded in relation to the standard indicated by the regulations of the School, then the philologists would have just reason to complain.

As the constitution of this School is still open to amendment, it is devoutly to be hoped that Oxford will see its way to reconsidering a matter so seriously affecting the interests of education and culture. It is neither too late to remedy what has been done, nor to devise a remedy. Let it be remembered that there is an essential distinction between what should constitute an Honour School and what should constitute a Pass School, between what is to educate those who are to educate others, and what guarantees nothing more than a smattering. The present institution could be reformed in two ways. By reducing the philological part of its provisions to the level of the literary part, it could, with a little further simplification, be made into an excellent Pass School, which would supply a real want. By eliminating the literary part, and adding proportionately to the philological, it could be transformed into a perfectly satisfactory Honour School of Modern Languages. But no modification could make it into an Honour School of English Literature correspondingly adequate, for the simple reason that the study of English Literature cannot be isolated from the study of those literatures with which it isinseparably linked. The absurdity of assuming that the student of Philology could separate a single language or dialect from the group to which it belongs, that he could isolate Anglo-Saxon from Gothic, or Middle English from Anglo-Saxon, the Celtic of the Cymbry from the Celtic of the Gaels, is not greater than to assume that the study of our Literature can be severed from the study of those literatures which stand in precisely the same relation to it as one of those dialects stands to the others in the same group.

If the legislators of this School decline to reform it, then it is the duty of Oxford—a duty which she owes alike to education and to her own honour—to counteract the mischief which this institution must, by degrading throughout England and the colonies the whole level of liberal instruction and study on its most important side, inevitably do. To the herd of imperfectly and erroneously disciplined teachers which this institution will turn loose on education, let her oppose, at least, a minority which shall worthily represent her. Let her establish a proper degree or diploma in Literature. There exist, as we have already said, scattered throughout the various institutions of the University, nearly all the facilities for a complete course in this subject, and nothing more is needed than to encourage and render possible their co-ordination. Let it be open to a man who has obtaineda high class in Moderations and in the Final Classical Schools, who has availed himself of the opportunities offered for the study of Modern Languages and Literatures in the Taylorian Institute, and who has studied what he would at present have to study for himself, our own Literature—let it be open to him to present himself for examination in these subjects, and to obtain, as the result of such an examination, a degree analogous to the Bachelorship of Civil Law. It would no doubt not be possible for these studies to be pursued, systematically, side by side with the work required for a high class in Moderations andLiteræ Humaniores. Nor is it necessary. There need be no limit assigned to the time at which a candidate would be free to qualify himself for obtaining this diploma. As a general rule it would probably be about six months, possibly a year, after the attainment of the present degree in Arts. And, considering the high prizes open to teachers in Literature, it would be well worth a student's while to spend this additional time in preparing himself for the examination. If a post-graduate scholarship, analogous to the Craven or the Derby scholarships, could be founded for the encouragement of a comparative study of Classical and Modern Literature, an important step would, at any rate, be taken in a right direction; something would be done for the competent equipment of future Professors of Literature.

Thus would a precedent, disastrous beyond expression to the interests of liberal instruction and culture, as well as to the reputation of the University—we mean the severance of the study of Classical Literature from that of our own—be at least deprived of its authority. Thus would the mass at any rate be leavened, and such institutions in the provinces and elsewhere as have, unlike Oxford and Cambridge, had the wisdom to separate their Chairs of Language and Literature, know where to go for those who should fill them; and thus, finally, would there be some chance of the literary curriculum in Oxford ceasing to be a by-word in the Universities of the Continent and America.

Since the first edition of these essays appeared the liberality of Mr. John Passmore Edwards has supplied the scholarship here desiderated, and Oxford has instituted a University scholarship, bearing the donor's name, "for the encouragement and promotion of the study of English Literature in connection with the Classical Literatures of Greece and Rome."

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