The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 1, July, 1862

We were right glad when morning came, and after a mug of thick coffee, a bit of bread, and a handful of figs, we bid farewell to Krevatá with no regrets. A short ride brought us to the brow of the range on which we were traveling, and there lay the valley of Sparta at our feet, and beyond it the Taygetus, if not the highest, the boldest and sharpest mountain-range in Greece. Its white and jagged crest was still tipped with clouds, and it appeared to rise from the valley of Sparta in an almost unbroken ascent to its hight of seven thousand feet. This was the finest single prospect of our journey; but we gladly left it, after a short pause, to push on to the warmth and sunshine of the valley below. The precipitous descent was soon accomplished; we forded the Eurotas, a broad, clear, shallow stream, the only real river we saw in Greece, and stood in Sparta, its site marked by a group of low hills and a few unimportant ruins. The ground is good, and was then green with young wheat; the valley was sheltered from the winds which had persecuted us on the highlands, and for a few hours in the middle of the day, the clouds were scattered, and we basked in the sun's rays. It seemed an Elysium. A small and thrifty village has recently sprung up south of this group of hills, still within the limits of the ancient city, and here we dined in a café (kapheterion) kept by one Lycurgus, not on black broth, but on roast lamb, omelette, figs, oranges, and wine. Truly, if national character depended wholly on physical geography, we should be inclined to look in the valley of the Eurotas for the rich and luxurious Athens, and seek its stern and simple rival among the bleak hills and sterile plains of Attica. We had a short ride that afternoon up the valley of the Eurotas, with a keen north wind in our faces, and were not sorry to reach Kalyvia at an early hour.

Dhemetri had sent the pack-horse with our baggage across by a shorter path, and now announced that we were to sleep to-night in a house instead of a khan, that the mayor (demarchos) of Kalyvia had consented to receive us. Great was our exultation at the prospect of spending a night in this aristocratic mansion, and in truth we found the accommodations here much the most comfortable—nay, we reckoned them luxurious—which we had on our journey. We were first shown into a small room with one glass window, with tight walls, and a chimney. A fire was burning cheerfully on the hearth—that is to say, a stone platform slightly elevated above the floor. The floor around the fire was spread with mats, and in one corner the lady of the house was—what shall I say?—squatted upon the floor, engaged in domestic work. Her daughter, a pretty, blue-eyed maiden, of some fourteen years, named Athena, (Γλαυκώπις ‘Αθήνα,) was working by her side, and the demarch himself, with his stalwart son, were similarly seated on the opposite side of the hearth. Three rough, unpainted stools, an extra luxury for guests, were brought in for us, and we at once plunged into conversation.

'Εενυ κριό!' said we.

'Μάλιστα, μάλιστα, εενυ κριό!' was the prompt reply.

Stimulated by our success, we made another attempt, and were overwhelmed by a flood of Romaic, to which we could only nod our heads gratefully, with 'Málista, málista, charí, charí,' (certainly, certainly, thank you, thank you.) When we retired to our room, we found our beds laid on a sort of shelf along the wall, instead of on the floor, and our supper was served on a table instead of in our laps, as we were used. The family shook hands with us cordially when we took leave, in the morning, placing their hands on their hearts.

This day we rode through a rolling country, quite well watered and wooded, separating the waters of the Eurotas from those of the Alpheus, Laconia from Arcadia. As we reached the highest point, and were about to descend, Dhemetri pointed out a village, distinguished by a single tall, slender cypress, with the words; 'There is Megalopolis.' This is the city founded by Epaminondas, almost the only statesman of antiquity who seems to have had a dim conception of the modern policy of the balance of power, as a point of union for the jealous and disunited States of Arcadia, and as a sentinel stationed at a chief entrance to Laconia. The whole of his great project was not realized, and Megalopolis, instead of becoming 'the great city' of Arcadia, was only a mate to Tegea and Mantinea. Even thus, the work was by no means lost; a Spartan army, to reach Messenia, whose independence was to be secured, must pass through the territory of Megalopolis, and even a second-rate city would answer as a guard. But not even Epaminondas could make of Arcadia a first-class power, and a sufficient counterpoise to Sparta. Megalopolis is now wholly deserted, and represented only by the little village of Sinanu, half a mile distant, where we stopped at a khan kept by an old soldier of Colocotroni, and ran, while dinner was preparing, to examine the scanty ruins of the great city—interesting only from their association with a great name.

Reluctantly, we now turned our backs upon Messene, with its renowned fortress of Ithome, the sacred Olympia, and the beautiful temple of Phigalia, and began our homeward journey. Passing over a mountain from which we had a wide and beautiful view, we rode through a barren and uninteresting plain to the lonely khan of Frankovrysi, and early the next day arrived at Tripolitza. We had had a clear sky at Megalopolis and Frankovrysi, but here, in the high table-land of Arcadia, we found the self-same leaden sky and bleak winds we left three days before. This valley or table-land stretches from north to south, nearly divided in two by the approach of the mountains from east and west. Thus the valley takes the shape rudely of the figure eight; the southern part, through one corner of which we had passed before, being occupied by Tegea, the northern by Mantinea. Tripolitza, to the northwest of Tegea, represents the ancient Pallantium, the birthplace of Evander. Here Dhemetri brought us bad news. We had intended to go to Mantinea, thence north through Orchomenus, Stymphalus, and Sicyon, to Corinth; but the passes, we learned, were impracticable for the snow, and we must recross Mount Parthenion, and revisit Achladhokamvo and Argos. First, however, we took a rapid ride to Mantinea, about eight miles through a level, tolerably well-cultivated country. At the narrow passage between the mountains, there stood in ancient times a grove of cork-trees, called 'Pelagus,' the sea. Epaminondas, warned by an oracle to beware of the 'Pelagus,' had carefully avoided the sea. But it was just in this spot that he drew up his troops for the great battle which cost him his life. When mortally wounded, he was carried to a high place called 'Skope'—identified with the sharp spur of Mount Mænalus, which projects just here into the plain, and from this he watched the battle, and here he died, like Wolfe, at the moment of victory. The well-built walls of Mantinea still stand in nearly their entire circuit, built in the fourth century before Christ, after Agesipolis of Sparta had captured the city, by washing away its walls of sun-burnt brick, and had dispersed the inhabitants among the neighboring villages. The restoration of the city was a part of the great system of humbling Sparta, set on foot by Epaminondas after the battle of Leuctra.

After spending the night at Achladhokamvo, where we visited the ruins of Hysiæ close by, we went next day through Argos, passing within sight of Mycenæ, to Nemea, where, in a beautiful little valley, three Doric columns, still standing, testify to the former sanctity of the spot. Then to Kurtissa, the ancient Cleonæ, to pass the night. When Dhemetri pointed it out to us from the hill above, it looked like a New-England farm-house, a neat white cottage peeping out from among the trees, and we rejoiced at the prospect. But lo! the neat white cottage was a guardhouse, and our khan was the rude, unpainted, windowless barn. It was, nevertheless, very comfortable. There was a ceiling to the room, and the board windows were tight. The floor, to be sure, gaped in wide cracks; but as there was a blazing fire in the room beneath, the cracks let in no cold air, nothing but smoke, a sort of compensation, as it seemed, for our having a chimney, lest we should be puffed up with pride and luxury. For we not only had a chimney, but a table and two stools, one sitting on an inverted barrel spread with a horse-blanket. Here Dhemetri concocted for our supper an Hellenic soup, of royal flavor, the recollection of which is still grateful to my palate. And here a youth, named Agamemnon, son of George, came and displayed to us his school-books, a geography, beginning with Greece and ending with America, where Βοσθονια as put down as capital of Μασσαχοντια. Longing to hear a Greek war-song, we requested him to sing, at which he warbled Δεντε παιδες τον Ελλενον to a tune which we strongly suspected he composed for the occasion, following it up with others, with such delight that we were fain at last to plead sleepiness and let him depart.

We were up betimes the following morning, for we had a long day's work before us. We were approaching Corinth, and knew that from the Acrocorinthus, a very high and steep hill over-hanging it, a prospect was to be had inferior to none in Greece. The morning, though not actually unpleasant, was chill and hazy, and Dhemetri tried to dissuade us from wasting the time. But we were determined to see what there was to be seen, and after a ride of two or three hours over a rough country, we entered the fortifications of this chief citadel of Greece. It is now guarded by a handful of soldiers, two or three neglected cannons thrust their muzzles idly over the rampart, and shepherds with their flocks roam at will within. A sharp wind was sweeping over the summit, and the mountains and islands—Parnassus, Cyllene, Helicon, Pentclicon, Salamis, Ægina—were veiled with a dull, opaque haze. While Basil, with stiff fingers, was sketching the view from the top, I wandered about with my other companion, picking spring flowers, reading the descriptions of Pausanias, and studying the distant landscape. There is a thriving town at the bottom of the hill, and hither we descended, asking for the inn (Xenodhekeon) where Dhemetri had told us to meet him. But alas! modern Corinth can not sustain an inn; and we were obliged to eat our dinner in a grocery, stared at by all the youth of Corinth. Half a dozen Doric columns, belonging to a very old temple, are the only considerable relics of ancient Corinth. And as we had a long afternoon's work before us, we set off before twelve. We galloped at good speed across the Isthmus, about an hour's ride; Dhemetri, who understood the management of Greek horses, driving us before him like a flock of sheep. We paused a moment at the Isthmic sanctuary of Poseidon, passed through the village of Kalamáki, whence steamers run to Athens, then continued along the shore between Mount Geroneia and the sea, through a low, uneven country, well grown with pine, heather, arbute, gorse in the full splendor of its yellow blossoms, and sweet-smelling thyme. The afternoon was warm and bright. Here and there were flocks of long-haired sheep and sturdy black goats, cropping the grass and the shrubs, and it was well in keeping with the scene when we passed a shepherd, with his cloak thrown carelessly aside, leaning on his crook, and playing a few simple notes—not a tune—on his flageolet to while away the time. We delayed half an hour at the miserable hamlet of Kineta, to rest one of the horses, exhausted with our fast riding, then began the ascent of our last mountain-pass. A spur of Mount Geroneia runs boldly into the sea, forming a wall between the territories of Corinth and Megara. It is called 'Kake-Scala,' 'Bad Ladder,' an odd mixture of Greek and Italian. Here, as the ancients fabled, dwelt the robber Skiron, plundering and mutilating all wayfarers, and throwing them into the sea; but Theseus subdued him and subjected him to a like treatment, and thereafter traveling was secure. No doubt Theseus crowned his labors by building a road, as we know one existed here in antiquity, but it has long since disappeared, and King Otho was then imitating him, as we found, presently, to our cost. The sun had already set, when the road became impassable, and shouts from two men some distance above, informed us that the building of the new road had rendered the old bridle-path impracticable. We had to urge our horses down a steep, narrow path to the water's edge, then as the beach was blocked up with huge rocks, to ride a rod or two through the water, then climb up the steep rocks on the other side, where one horse slipped and came near tumbling with his rider into the sea below. Ten minutes later, and we must have returned to Kineta, or waited an hour or two for the moon, for as soon as we were over this dangerous spot it became quite dark; but the path was now safe and easy to find. The full moon was up when we reached the top of the cliff, and the valley of Megara, the mountains, the bay, and the islands of Ægina and Salamis lay distinctly before us. We made all speed to Megara, cheered by the fame of its khan as one of the best in Greece, and by the certainty that there was now a good road all the way to Athens.

It was suggested that we should take a carriage the rest of the way, but as our horses were hired to Athens, we decided not to incur the extra expense. Soon after arriving, however, while Dhemetri was making us a soup, and Diomedes was taking care of our horses, and Epaminondas was roasting us a joint of lamb, while we were squatting half-asleep on bolsters on the floor, hugging our knees, looking dreamily at the fire, and longing for supper and bed, the driver of the carriage came in, and addressed us in recommendation of his establishment in his choicest Frank, "Carrozza-very good-ye-e-e-s!' then squatted down on the hearth beside us, hugged his knees, and looked at the fire with infinite self-satisfaction. Whether it was his eloquence that prevailed on our attendants, I know not, but it was determined to provide us with a carriage the next day, at no extra expense. The day was perfect, and the luxury of an easy drive of four hours was very grateful to us after our uncomfortable ride in the Peloponnesus. We dined at Eleusis, and reached Athens early in the afternoon.

ADONIUM

 
Far dimly back in distant days of eld,
    There lived a pretty boy, as parchments tell,
    As formed for love and life in lonely dell,
With mien as fair as never eyes beheld;
Because who saw, to love him was compelled
    Straightway, so wizardly he wielded Beauty's spell.
 
 
His name Adonis—sad of memory!
    Whose life, though fair, his death was fairer still,
    In dying for a cause, or good or ill;
For he heart-crazed the daughter of the sea,
Who loved him well, though wisely loved not she:
    True hearts are never wise, as worldlings selfish will.
 
 
Him Venus loved—Love's cherished creatures they!
    And Venus wooed with perseverance sore,
    Till weary was the lad, the wooing o'er;
And while he, hiding in the forest lay,
O'ershaded from the sun's unfriendly ray,
    Ah me! there came to kill a maddened, foaming boar!
 
 
Oh! see! from limbs too fair for touch of earth,
    As tusk and tusk is savage through them drove,
    While rain their dainty power 'fending strove,
The pure red liquid life all wasting forth!
All wasted, lost? Nay! thence, thence took its birth
    Adonium, eternal bloom of martyred Love!
 
 
Love's martyr is a-bleeding now again;
    Sweet Liberty, beloved of earth, doth bleed:
    The maddened, foaming boar hath come indeed,
And tears our life on many a gory plain;
But we—as bled the boy—bleed not in vain:
    Our blood-drops—our sons—will be Adonium seed!
 
 
Who die for Liberty—they never die!
    Adonis, dead for Love, doth live anew!
    They bloom blood-flowers in the tearful dew,
Forever falling on their memory!
In veins that are and veins that are not to be,
    They ever coursing live, the right, the good, the true!
 
 
Where sinks the martyr's blood within the sod,
    A spirit-plant of universal root,
    Divinely radiant, doth upward shoot,
Appealing from a wicked world to God!
And seen for once, down drops the tyrant's rod;
    For men at last have tasted of a heavenly fruit.
 
 
All good and beautiful of soul thus sprung
    From blood, e'en as the Adonium I sing;
    And where the blood is purest, thence doth spring
Such flowers as by heavenly bards are sung;
For since from Christ the fierce blood-sweat was wrung,
    Have growths of nobler fruit on earth been ripening!
 

POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTES

There is positively no class of writers entitled to higher praise, or actuated by nobler motives, than those who are now distinguishing themselves by their labors for Education. They have laid their hands on what is to be the great social motive power of the future—the great subject of the politics of days to come—and are working bravely in the sacred cause.

Yet it can hardly be denied that amid the vast mass of every practical observation and suggestion contained in the educational works with which we are familiar, or even among the really scientific contributors to it, there is very little founded on the great social wants and tendencies of the age. Education is, at present, merely an art; it has a right, in common with every conceivable department of knowledge, to be raised to the rank of a science. This can only be done by putting it on a progressive basis, and placing it in such a position as to aid in supplying some great demand of the age.

The great fact of the time is, the advance from mere art upward to science, from the blossom to the fruit. Practical wants, 'the greatest good for the greatest number,' the fullest development of free labor, the increase of capital, the diminution of suffering, the harmony of interests between capital and labor—all of these are the children of Science and Facts. During the feudal age, nearly all the resources of genius—all the capital of the day—was devoted to mere Art, for the sake of setting off social position and 'idealisms.' As with the nobility and royalty of England at the present day, society enormously overpaid what is, or was, really the police—whose mission it was to keep it in order. But from Friar Bacon to Lord Bacon, a movement was silently progressing, which the present century has just begun to realize. This movement was that of the development of all human ability and natural resources, guided by science. It was a tendency toward the practical, the positive, which is destined in time to bring forth its own new art and literature, is breaking away from the trammels of the old literary or imaginative sway.

At the present day, up to the present hour, Education—especially the higher education, destined to fit men for leading positions—is still under the old literary regime. We laugh when we read of the two first years of medical study at the school of Salerno being devoted to dry logic, yet the four years' course at nearly all our modern Universities, or, in fact, the course of almost any 'high-school,' is as little adapted to the real wants of the practical leading men of this age as a study of the Schoolmen would be. The 'literature' of the past still rules the practical wants of the present. It is not that the study of the thought of the past is not noble, nay, essential, to the highly cultivated man; but it should be pursued on a large, scientific scale. The study of Greek and Latin, as languages, is not so disciplining nor so valuable as that of the science of language, as taught by Max Müller; and if these languages must be learned, (and we do not deny that they should,) they can better be studied in their relations to all languages than simply by themselves. And as if to make bad worse, the genial and strictly scientific use of literal translations, advocated by Milton and Locke, and generally employed at the Revival of Letters, and during the days when Europe boasted its greatest classic scholars, is prohibited. 'A college education' suggests the employment of the best years of life in studies of little practical use in themselves, and seldom revived, save for pleasure, after graduation. And even where such studies are exceptionally practical; nay, where science and a free choice of languages and literature are left to the somewhat advanced student, we still find the shadow of the past—of the old, formal, and rapidly growing obsolete literature—overawing the more enlightened effort. Deny it as we may, the University is still a feudal institution. Within the memory of man, there existed in England positively no school where the would-be engineer or manufacturer could be fitted for his career and at the same time be 'well educated.' George Stephenson was obliged to send his son to an 'University,' where some scraps of practical science—scanty scraps they were—most insufficiently repaid the expense of education.

The great want of the age is the Polytechnic School, or more correctly speaking, of the Technological Institute, in which the labors of the Society of Arts, aided by the Museum and Library, may serve the two-fold object of informing the public on all matters of science and industry and of aiding the School of Industrial Science. Developed on its largest scale, such an institute should be devoted to the acquisition and dissemination of all knowledge, but under strictly scientific guidance and influences. Literature should there be taught historically, in close connection with mental philosophy, a system which, it may be observed, results in interesting the pupil more in details than the old plan devoted to a few mere details ever did. Art should there be taught, not in rhapsodies over Raphael, Turner, and the favorite fancies of an individual, but according to its unfoldings in human culture, based on architecture as an illustrative medium. 'The lines of connection' between these and the exact sciences should be ever kept in sight, so that the student may never forget 'the countless connecting threads woven into one indissoluble texture, forming that ever-enlarging web which is the blended product of the world's scientific and industrial activity.'

The great aim of such an institute should be the aiding of industrial progress, and the application of generous, intelligent culture to practical pursuits—the whole to be based on exact science. When we look into this community, and see the vast demand for talent in its manufactures, and see how many thousands there are who would gladly be 'liberally educated' men, if the education could only be allied to practically useful knowledge, we at once feel that the time has come for the establishment of such institutes. The demand exists on every side; the supply must come, and that speedily. England, France, and Germany are rapidly improving their manufactures by scientifically educating their master-workmen—the Conservatoire des Arts, and Ecole Centrale, of Paris, the art-schools of the British capital and provinces, the many museums devoted to scientic collection, are all keeping up their factories—shall we be behind them? Let Capital consult its interests, and answer.

We have been induced to put the query, from a perusal of two pamphlets, both directly bearing on this subject. The first is the Ninth Annual Announcement of the Polytechnic College of the State of Pennsylvania, Session 1861-1862, and Catalogue of the Officers and Students; while the second sets forth the Objects and Plan of an Institute of Technology, including a Society of Arts, a Museum of Arts, and a School of Industrial Science, proposed to be established in Boston.'³ This latter, it may be added, was prepared by direction of the Committee of Associated Institutions of Science and Arts, and is addressed to 'manufacturers, merchants, agriculturists, and other friends of enlightened industry in the commonwealth.'

The Polytechnic College of Philadelphia, now in its ninth year, is a truly excellent institution, the practical results of which are shown in the fact that its students, immediately on graduating, have generally received appointments as civil and mechanical engineers, or otherwise stepped at once into active and remunerative employment. Its object, as we are told, is to afford to the young civil, mining, or mechanical engineer, chemist, architect, metallurgist, or student of applied science, every facility whereby he may perfect himself in his destined calling. It is, in fact, a collection of technical schools, or schools of instruction in the several departments of learned industry. It comprises the school of mines, for professional training in mine-engineering, in the best methods of determining the value of mineral lands and of analyzing and manufacturing mine products. Also the schools of civil engineering, of practical chemistry, of mechanical engineering, architecture, general science, and agriculture. To these is added a military department, now under superintendence of a former instructor in West-Point, with the use of the State armory near the college, generously granted by the State, with a supply of arms. We are glad to say that in all these schools the instruction is thorough, not only in theory but in actual practice. The course of the school of chemistry, for instance, comprehends the principles of the science and their actual application to agriculture, to the arts, and to analysis; to the examination and smelting of ores; to the alloying, refining, and working of metals; to the arts of dyeing and pottery; to the starch, lime, and glass manufacture; to the preparation and durability of mortars and cements; to means of disinfecting, ventilating, heating, and lighting. Its students are also practiced in manipulations, testing in the arts qualitative and quantitative; in analysis of minerals and soils, and in many other important practical matters.

The students of geology and mining, of machinery and metallurgy, make, with their professors, frequent visits to the many interesting localities in Pennsylvania or New-Jersey, to the many large machine-shops with which Philadelphia abounds, visit mines and furnaces, and are in every way practically familiarized with their future callings. Instruction in languages and literature, in drawing and in the elements of practical law is, we believe, given in common to all. It is the first, we may say, unavoidable, characteristic of a scientific school, that its work is always well done. Other schools may or may not be specious contrivances, well or ill managed; but the very nature of science is to clear itself in whatever it touches, and be honest and practical. Its tendency is to classify and select, to cast away the obsolete and test and adopt the new and true. Such is by no means an exaggerated statement of the real condition of the excellent college to which we refer, which testifies, by its success, to the excellence of its plan and the competency of its teachers, especially to the administrative ability of its worthy President, Dr. Alfred L. Kennedy.

It can not be denied, that for many years, radicals have inveighed against 'Greek and Universities,' but it has been in a narrow, vulgar, and simply destructive manner, with no provision to substitute any thing better in their place. The growth of science, of the knowledge of history, of culture in every branch, has, however, of late, so vastly increased, that the proposition to reform the old system of study is really one not to tear it down, but to build it up, to extend it and develop it on a grand scale. Since, for example, the influence of science has been felt in philology, how inconsiderable do the Bruncks and Porsons of the old school, appear before the Bopps, Schlegels, Burnoufs, and Müllers of the new! For as yet, even where here and there in colleges a liberal and enlightened method is partially attempted, still the old monkish spirit appears, driving away with something like a 'mystery' or 'guild' feeling the merely practical man, and interposing a mass of 'dead vocables,' which must be learned by years of labor, between him and the realization of an education. The young man who is to be a miner, a cotton-spinner, an architect, or a merchant, may possibly find here and there, at this or that college, lectures and instruction which may aid him directly in his future career, but he soon realizes that the general tendency and tone of the college is entirely in favor of abstract studies quite useless out in the world, and apart from preparation for one of 'the three professions.' He himself is as a 'marine' among the regular sailors, a surgeon among 'regular doctors,' or as a dentist among surgeons. And this in an age when we may say that what is not to be studied scientifically is not worth studying. As our principal object in writing these remarks has been to assert that the Polytechnic Institute, in its either partial or entire form, should exist entirely independent of all other influences, we might be held excused from any mention of such scientific schools as are attached to our Universities. That of Cambridge, Massachusetts, would, however, deserve special mention, from the celebrity of its teachers. In this institute, which has between seventy and eighty students, we have a single school divided into the following departments: that of Chemistry, under supervision of Professor Horseford, in which instruction is both theoretical and practical; that of Zoölogy and Geology, in which the teaching consists alternately of a course of lectures by Professor Agassiz, on Zoology, embracing the fundamental principles of the classification of animals as founded upon structure and embryonic development, and illustrating their natural affinities, habits, distribution, and the relations which exist between the living and extinct races, and a course of geology, both theoretical and practical. To this are added the departments of Engineering under Professor Eustis, that of Botany, under Professor Gray, that of Comparative Anatomy and Physiology, under Professor J. Wyman, that of Mathematics, under Professor Peirce, and that of Mineralogy, under Professor Cooke. It is needless to speak in praise of a school boasting men of such world-wide names as teachers, or to commend it as affording facilities for bestowing a sound education. We do it no injustice, however, in asserting that its tendency is to develop students of abstract science and teachers, while the aim of the Polytechnic school proper is, in addition to this, to supply the manufactures of the country with working men, and the country at large, including those already engaged in labor, with technological information of every kind. It should be a vast reservoir of practical knowledge, where the man of the 'print-works,' in search of a certain dye or of a new form of machinery, may apply, certain that all the latest discoveries will be found registered there. It should be a place where capitalists may go as to an intelligence-office, confident of finding there the assistants which they may need. It should be, in fact, in every respect, an institute simply and solely for the people, and for the development of manufacturing industry. If, as we have urged, it should embrace eventually thorough instruction in every branch of knowledge, this should be because experience shows that the most commonplace branches require the stimulus of genius, which can only be fairly developed by universal facilities. No young man, however practical, could have his Thätigkeit or 'available energy' other than stimulated by even an extensive familiarity with every detail of philosophy, literature, and art, provided that these were properly scienced, or taught strictly according to their historical development.