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REMARKS

ON THE USEFULNESS OF

CLASSICAL LEARNING.

teor.

Ego multos homines excellenti animo ac virtute fuiffe, et fine doctrina, naturæ ipfius habitu prope divino, per feipfos et moderatos, et graves, extitiffe faEtiam illud adjungo, fæpius ad laudem atque virtutem naturam fine doctrina, quam fine natura valuiffe doctrinam. Atque idem ego contendo, cum ad naturam eximiam atque illuftrem accefferit ratio qua dam conformatioque doctrine, tum illud nefcio quid præclarum ac fingulare folere exiftere.-Quod fi non bic tantus fructus oftenderetur, et fi ex his ftudiis delectatio fola peteretur; tamen, ut opinor, banc animi remiffionem humaniffimam ac liberatiffimam judicaretis.Hæc ftudia adolefcentiam alunt, fene&tutem oblectant, fecundas res ornant, adverfis perfugium ac folatium præbent, delectant domi, non impediunt foris, pernoctant nobifcum, peregrinantur, rufticantur.

Cicero pro Archia, cap. 7.

REMARKS

ON THE USEFULNESS OF

CLASSICAL LEARNING.

Written in the year 1769.

T

HE calumniators of the Greek and Ro

man Learning have not been few in these

latter times. Perrault, La Motte, and Teraffon, arraigned the taste of the ancients; and Des Cartes and Malebranche affected to despise their philofophy. Yet it seemed to be allowed in general, that the study of the Claffic Authors was a neceffary part of polite education. This, however, has of late been not only queftioned, but denied and it has been faid, that every thing worth preferving of ancient literature might be more easily transmitted, both to us and to pofterity, through the channel of the modern languages, than through that of the Greek and Latin. On this fubject, feveral flight effays have been written;

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the authors of which seem to think, that the human mind, being now arrived at maturity, may fafely be left to itself; and that the Claffic authors, thofe great instructors of former times, are become an incumbrance to the more sprightly genius of the present.

"For who, that is an adept in the philosophy "of Locke and Newton, can have any need of "Aristotle? What useful precept of the Socra

tic fchool has been overlooked by modern "moralifts? Is not Geometry as fairly, and as "fully displayed in the French and English "tongues, as in the unknown dialects of Archi"medes, Apollonius, and Euclid? Why have "recourse to Demoithenes and Cicero, for ex❝amples in an art, which Maffillon, Bourdaloue, "and the French academicians (to fay nothing "of the orators of our own country), have car"ried to perfection? Are we not taught by Vol"taire and his Editors, who, though ignorant of "Greek, are well read in Madam Dacier's tran"flations, that Taffo is a better poet than Homer; દ "and that the fixth and feventh cantoes of the "Henriade are alone more valuable than the "whole Iliad *? What Dramatic poet of anti

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quity is to be compared with the immortal

Shakespeare? What fatirift with Pope, who, to "the fire and elevation of Juvenal, joins the wit, "the tafe, and fententious morality of Horace? "As to criticifm: is there in Ariftotle, Diony

See Le Vicende della Literatura, p. 166.

7

<< fius,

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fius, Cicero, Quintilian, or Longinus, any thing that is not more philofophically explained, " and better illuftrated by examples, in the writ"ings of Dacier, Rollin, Fenelon, Dryden, and "Addifon?--And then, how debafing to an ingenuous mind is the drudgery and discipline " of our public schools! That the best days of "youth should be embittered by confinement, " amidst the gloom of folitude, or under the "fcourge of tyranny; and all for no purpose, "but that the memory may be loaded with the "words of two languages that have been dead up"wards of a thousand years :—is it not an absur❝dity too grofs to admit of exaggeration? To "fee a youth of spirit hanging over a mufty folio, his cheek pale with watching, his brow "furrowed with untimely wrinkles, his health gone, and every power of his foul enervated "with anxiety, and ftupified with poring upon

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trifles,-what blood boils not with indignation, "what heart melts not with forrow! And then "the pedant, juft broken loose from his cell,

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briftling all o'er with Greek, and puff'd with

pride," as Boileau fays; " his head fo full of "words, that no room is left for ideas; his ac"complishments fo highly prized by himself, as

to be intolerable to others; ignorant of the "hiftory, and untouched with the interefts, of "his native country;-what an useless, what an "odious animal! Who will fay that education is " on a right footing, while its tendency is, to Gg 4

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