Word: farrars
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Dates: during 1883-1883
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EDITORS HERALD-CRIMSON :-Dear Sirs : Having read to-day your article of the 28th, in which you cite Canon Farrar's views in regard to the (socalled) English system of classical education, I trust that, with your usual courtesy and fairness and desire to furnish your readers correct information on the subjects discussed in your paper, you will permit me to offer a few brief remarks, that may tend to modify largely the conclusions that might be drawn from the extract you have given...
...will carefully examine Canon Farrar's remarks as a whole you will see that they are not directed against "classical education" in a broad and liberal point of view, but against the special system, with which he was familiar as an assistant master at Harrow from 1855 to (I think) 1871, chiefly under the mastership of Dr. Vaughan. That system, though much improved by Dr. Vaughan, still preserved and preserves the old traditions and arrangements of the school which made a very full and finished classical education the one great object, to which all other branches were made subordinate...
...from me to say anything derogatory to Canon Farrar who early proved himself a brilliant and accomplished classical scholar, winning fourth place in the first class of the classical tripos in 1854, and a Trinity fellowship in 1856, besides many of the highest prizes in Greek and Latin verse composition. But his studies and experience have hardly been such as to render him a sound judge of university education, and he has shown in his remarks an ignorance of the broad and liberal system that has been doing such good work in England, outside of the small circle of Harrow...
...that both sides of the question as to the utility of a classical education have been so ably set forth by President Porter and Charles Francis Adams, it is both interesting and important to note the opinions of a leading English scholar, Rev. Frederick W. Farrar, on the same point. Especially is this so since it has been claimed that the 'American standard of classical Knowledge is low and that we must go where the system has been more faithfully tried for the highest evidence of its advantages.' There could be no better field from which to gain this evidence...
...much for the English system, which has been held by President Porter to be better than our own in several respects. As to the result of the system Canon Farrar goes on to say : "This is the sort of 'kelp and brick dust' used to polish the cogs of their mental machinery ! And when, for a good decade of human life, and those its most invaluable years, a boy has stumbled on this dreadful mill-round, without progressing a single step, and is plucked at his matriculation for Latin prose, we flatter ourselves, forsooth, that we have been giving...