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corrupted in judgment, as with much ado, or never at all, they be brought to the right frame again.

"Yet all men covet to have their children speak Latin, and so do 1 very earnestly too. We both have one purpose, we agree in desire, we wish one end; but we differ somewhat in order, and way, that leadeth rightly to that end."

This passage is from the First Book of "The Schoolmaster; or, a plain and perfect Way of teaching Children to understand, write, and speak the Latin Tongue, by Roger Ascham, Esquire, Preceptor to her Majesty Queen Elizabeth. Now corrected and revis'd, with an addition of explanatory Notes, by the Reverend Mr. James Upton, A.M., Rector of Brimpton, in Somersetshire; and late fellow of King's College, Cambridge." (London, 1711.) This passage from Ascham and another which follows have been printed because the book is not very well known, and it seemed best to let Ascham explain his method in his own language. The parts which I have printed are sufficient to show what his method is.

It would be thought a great thing if a teacher could accomplish what Ascham promises; and what, according to his own account, he performed. At present, it cannot be said that children generally do learn either to understand or write the Latin tongue, much less to speak it. The writing and speaking of Latin are indeed not much used, but a great deal of time is spent over trying to understand the Latin tongue and also to write it; and it is generally agreed that few out of many learn to read a Latin author with ease and profit, and fewer still, to write Latin well. To read the Latin authors with profit, it is necessary to know the language, and to understand the matter. The language may be learned by boys to a certain extent, though the perfect knowledge of any language requires the study of mature years. While a boy is learning the Latin language, he may learn something of the matter which his author treats of. In reading Caesar's Commentaries he will learn something of the geography of Gaul, Italy, and Britain, something of Roman history and Roman institutions; and in reading Cicero's Letters and Orations he will learn something more of Roman matters, though there will be many things which he will not comprehend fully, until he is of riper years. It is plain

that as the matter of an author creates a difficulty, a boy must be first instructed in those authors or parts of authors, which present the fewest difficulties for the matter, and are written in an easy and simple style.

If teachers of Latin knew that language as well as a good teacher of French or of any other modern tongue knows his own language, the teaching of Latin would be comparatively easy. And yet the usual methods of teaching a modern language are bad, and the amount that is learned is often small for the time and labour; and this, mainly because teachers of foreign languages follow nearly the same methods that are followed in teaching Latin, many of which are bad. A man may wish to learn a foreign language in order to be able to write it and speak it; but if he follow no other method than reading, he will never accomplish his object. If he will first acquire the power of writing and speaking a language, he can easily learn to read it. The power of reading or translating a foreign language does not give the power of writing or speaking it, not even in the smallest degree, as all who have tried know by experience. A man may have even a very exact knowledge of a foreign tongue for the purpose of reading and understanding, and yet may be unable to construct a single sentence or to utter a single phrase in conversation; which proves that to learn to express a foreign language in our own tongue is only learning it under one aspect; and that to express our own language or our own ideas in another tongue is quite a different thing. Indeed so different are the two things, that a person may learn by ear to speak a modern language fluently, and yet he may have only a slight knowledge of it; for the language of common conversation is very limited. If he has learned to write the language so as to express himself with ease on the ordinary matters of life, as in a letter or the like, he will have a greater command of the language; but even then, his knowledge will be superficial without a careful study of the best writers.

It is true that the writing of exercises is one of the means now employed for the teaching of modern languages, but the writing of exercises may be an impediment to learning a language. The method of the exercises may be as bad and as ill adapted to the object, as it would be for a man to learn a foreign tongue

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by habitual converse with persons who spoke it ill. By such converse a man may certainly learn to speak fluently and ill, as many do. A boy also by writing exercises may learn to write Latin with some facility, and ill; for ease in doing a thing, well or ill, requires practice. Now the "making of Latines" which leads to such a result is one of the ill consequences of teaching, of which Ascham complains in his day; and the same complaint may be made now. Budaeus lamented the ill consequences of the use of speaking Latin unadvisedly; and we may complain of the ill consequences of writing it unadvisedly; for the bad choice of words and the bad order of a boy's early exercises make a deeper impression than the corrections of the master, even if we suppose the exercises to be always corrected as they ought to be and to suppose this would be very extravagant indeed.

There may be several methods of exercises in modern languages, by which a boy may learn to write correctly; but in principle good exercises cannot differ much. A method which has been tried with success, and is founded on a clear principle, is shown in the late Mr. Wittich's German Exercises, and his German Tales. The exercises begin with principal sentences, or simple propositions, a noun, the verb 'to be,' and an adjective or other predicate. The most necessary words are supplied at the foot of the page. All the forms of simple sentences in the German language are successively presented in the exercises, and by writing these exercises, in which scarcely any error can be made, the learner masters one part and the easiest part of the language, but yet the most important, as being the foundation of all his future knowledge. He then proceeds to the exercises in which subordinate or dependent sentences occur, and when he has written all these, and also the second part of the exercises, he has gone through nearly every form of expression which exists in the language. While he is writing the exercises, he may read the German tales, which are constructed on the same principle as the exercises. A learner who has gone through the

5 This is the judgment of one of the greatest masters in his art: "Vere enim etiam illud dicitur, perverse dicere homines perverse dicendo facillime consequi." Cic. De Orat. i. 33. What must be the consequence of the 'perverse scribendo?'

exercises and the tales in the manner which the author recom mends, is able to write and speak the German language, and to read an easy author. The method requires perseverance, regularity, and some time; but if it is followed as Mr. Wittich directs, any boy of ordinary capacity will have acquired that command over the German language which very few possess. I do not believe that any system of writing Latin exercises now in use would produce a similar result; and yet it is easier to learn to write Latin, as well as a modern can learn to write it, than to learn to write German ".

Latin might be learned in the same way, if a teacher had as great command over it, as a German has over his own language; but this is impossible, and some other way must be attempted. A teacher's knowledge of Latin is founded on a few Latin authors, and his own judgment is no authority; he must always appeal to his originals. It is therefore necessary that the Latin language must be learned from Latin authors, who furnish the matter of the language both for the teacher and the learner. The direct object is not to learn to write Latin; it is to be able to read the authors with ease; and the means of accomplishing this must be some method that shall attain the object, and at the same time be a good discipline for the learner. A good discipline has not only the advantage of being good as a discipline, but it will secure the object which we have in view. A bad discipline will generally fail altogether; and those who learn in spite of it, throw away much of their time and labour : they learn much which, as Ascham says, they will afterwards be glad to unlearn.

Ascham's method supposes a certain amount of knowledge, but he does not explain how this is to be acquired. A boy must in some way master the various forms of declension and conjugation. He may do it by committing them to memory and writing out examples on paper. This is a dull and tiresome task;

6 Mr. Wittich's new method of learning a modern language was first explained by himself in the Journal of Education, vol. iv. p. 209. His method is further explained in his "German for Beginners; or, Progressive Exercises in the German Language," third edition, London, 1845; and in his "German Tales," London, 1845. Mr. Wittich published a Key to his Exercises, and also a German Grammar.

but the memory of boys is the chief faculty to be used when they are young, and they will get through this labour in a reasonable time. It is however necessary that a teacher should avoid the common error of making boys decline nouns with what are called the signs of the cases; for if this is done, the boy will learn something that he will afterwards have to unlearn; and it is a good principle in teaching, that a child should have no error implanted in him, if we can help it. What is first fixed, whether right or wrong, is very difficult to eradicate. In learning the conjugations also the usual signs or translations should be avoided, as they lead to erroneous notions, particularly in the subjunctive mood. The method adopted in Professor Key's Grammar, is that of conjugating the verbs in connexion with some other Latin words, so as to form a short sentence, of which a translation is given. This method is free from all objection: the boy learns the meaning of the tenses in connexion with other words, and at the same time he begins to get a small vocabulary.

As to the eight parts of speech, as Ascham calls them, there is no use in telling a boy the names of a number of things before he sees them. He cannot comprehend what a preposition is till he sees it used. When he learns the forms of nouns, adjectives, and verbs, he will also learn their names, and he may defer learning the names of the other parts of speech till he meets with them.

The next thing to learn according to Ascham, is "the right joining together of substantives with adjectives, the noun with the verb, the relative with the antecedent," or the three concordances, as he calls them. There is only one way of learning this, which is by examples from Latin authors; and a teacher may find plenty of the simplest sentences in the best Latin authors which will serve this purpose7. I say, "in the best Latin authors;" for I would not have the master make them himself. He may select for this purpose as many as he shall think fit, which he must translate to the boy, and he must fully explain every word. He must also translate the sentences in

7 The first book of Livy will supply abundance of examples; or they may be selected from Cicero with little trouble

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