Post-Prandial Philosophy by Grant Allen

It is admitted on all hands by this time, I suppose, that the best way of learning is by eye, not by ear. Therefore the authorities that prescribe for us our education among all classes have decided that we shall learn by ear, not by eye. Which is just what one might expect from a vested interest.

Of course this superiority of sight over hearing is pre-eminently true of natural science -- that is to say, of nine-tenths among the subjects worth learning by humanity. The only real way to learn geology, for example, is not to mug it up in a printed text-book, but to go into the field with a geologist's hammer. The only real way to learn zoology and botany is not by reading a volume of natural history, but by collecting, dissecting, observing, preserving, and comparing specimens. Therefore, of course, natural science has never been a favourite study in the eyes of school-masters, who prefer those subjects which can be taught in a room to a row of boys on a bench, and who care a great deal less than nothing for any subject which isn't "good to examine in. " Educational value and importance in after life have been sacrificed to the teacher's ease and convenience, or to the readiness with which the pupil's progress can be tested on paper.