Essays on Education and Kindred Subjects | Page 7

fragment of clothing on, would not dare to commit such a
breach of decorum as to go out unpainted. Voyagers find that coloured
beads and trinkets are much more prized by wild tribes than are
calicoes or broadcloths. And the anecdotes we have of the ways in
which, when shirts and coats are given, savages turn them to some
ludicrous display, show how completely the idea of ornament
predominates over that of use. Nay, there are still more extreme
illustrations: witness the fact narrated by Capt. Speke of his African
attendants, who strutted about in their goat-skin mantles when the
weather was fine, but when it was wet, took them off, folded them up,
and went about naked, shivering in the rain! Indeed, the facts of
aboriginal life seem to indicate that dress is developed out of
decorations. And when we remember that even among ourselves most
think more about the fineness of the fabric than its warmth, and more
about the cut than the convenience--when we see that the function is
still in great measure subordinated to the appearance--we have further
reason for inferring such an origin.
It is curious that the like relations hold with the mind. Among mental as
among bodily acquisitions, the ornamental comes before the useful.
Not only in times past, but almost as much in our own era, that
knowledge which conduces to personal well-being has been postponed
to that which brings applause. In the Greek schools, music, poetry,
rhetoric, and a philosophy which, until Socrates taught, had but little

bearing upon action, were the dominant subjects; while knowledge
aiding the arts of life had a very subordinate place. And in our own
universities and schools at the present moment, the like antithesis holds.
We are guilty of something like a platitude when we say that
throughout his after-career, a boy, in nine cases out of ten, applies his
Latin and Greek to no practical purposes. The remark is trite that in his
shop, or his office, in managing his estate or his family, in playing his
part as director of a bank or a railway, he is very little aided by this
knowledge he took so many years to acquire--so little, that generally
the greater part of it drops out of his memory; and if he occasionally
vents a Latin quotation, or alludes to some Greek myth, it is less to
throw light on the topic in hand than for the sake of effect. If we inquire
what is the real motive for giving boys a classical education, we find it
to be simply conformity to public opinion. Men dress their children's
minds as they do their bodies, in the prevailing fashion. As the Orinoco
Indian puts on paint before leaving his hut, not with a view to any
direct benefit, but because he would be ashamed to be seen without it;
so, a boy's drilling in Latin and Greek is insisted on, not because of
their intrinsic value, but that he may not be disgraced by being found
ignorant of them--that he may have "the education of a gentleman"--the
badge marking a certain social position, and bringing a consequent
respect.
This parallel is still more clearly displayed in the case of the other sex.
In the treatment of both mind and body, the decorative element has
continued to predominate in a greater degree among women than
among men. Originally, personal adornment occupied the attention of
both sexes equally. In these latter days of civilisation, however, we see
that in the dress of men the regard for appearance has in a considerable
degree yielded to the regard for comfort; while in their education the
useful has of late been trenching on the ornamental. In neither direction
has this change gone so far with women. The wearing of earrings,
finger-rings, bracelets; the elaborate dressings of the hair; the still
occasional use of paint; the immense labour bestowed in making
habiliments sufficiently attractive; and the great discomfort that will be
submitted to for the sake of conformity; show how greatly, in the
attiring of women, the desire of approbation overrides the desire for

warmth and convenience. And similarly in their education, the
immense preponderance of "accomplishments" proves how here, too,
use is subordinated to display. Dancing, deportment, the piano, singing,
drawing--what a large space do these occupy! If you ask why Italian
and German are learnt, you will find that, under all the sham reasons
given, the real reason is, that a knowledge of those tongues is thought
ladylike. It is not that the books written in them may be utilised, which
they scarcely ever are; but that Italian and German songs may be sung,
and that the extent of attainment may bring whispered admiration. The
births, deaths, and marriages of kings, and other like historic trivialities,