THE AFTER-SCHOOL SERIES. BY WILLIAM CLEAVER WILKINSON. PREPARATORY CREEK COURSE IN ENCLISH. PREPARATORY LATIN COURSE IN ENGLISH. COLLEGE CREEK COURSE IN ENGLISH. COLLEGE LATIN COURSE IN ENGLISH. BY THE SAME AUTHOR. A FREE LANCE. (A VOLUME OF ESSAYS.) THE DANCE OF MODERN SOCIETY. EDWIN ARNOLD AS POETIZER AND AS PAGANIZER. FOR SALE BY THE CHAUTAUQUA PRESS, 805 BROADWAY, NEW YORK. COLLEGE LATIN COURSE IN ENGLISH. BY WILLIAM CLEAVER WILKINSON. FIFTEENTH THOUSAND. NEW YORK: C. L. S. C. Department. The required books of the C. L. S. C. are recommended by a Council of six. It must, however, be understood that recommendation does not involve an approval by the Council, or by any member of it, of every principle or doctrine contained in the book recommended. HENRY MORSE STEPHENS Copyright 1885, by PHILLIPS & HUNT, 805 Broadway, New York. PREFACE. PA 6004 WITH the present volume we bring to its completion a series of four books, projected for the purpose of making accessible to English readers, in their own tongue, the treasures of Greek and Latin letters, as these treasures are disclosed to the average American student in the ordinary course of school and college education. The preparation of this series of books has happened to coincide in time with vivid public discussion, experiencing its irregularly periodic revival among us, of the question whether after all classical culture ought not to be regarded now as a thing that has had its day. The fact of such discussion, rife anew at just this moment, may well awaken in the present writer's mind a somewhat serious consideration. Has he perhaps been doing work for the past rather than for the future? Is modern interest in ancient classic literature doomed presently to be extinguished? What, as to this point, are the signs of the times? There is no disguising the fact that Greek and Latin are yielding some ground that once was theirs in the schools and the colleges. At Harvard, for example, it has been proposed that Greek shall no longer be made a study indispensable for admission to full standing in the classes. This change established, a Harvard student might perhaps at 511005 graduation know nothing whatever of Greek. The precedent -should the example be set, and should it become a precedent-would no doubt commence an important innovation. The influence, however, to depress Greek culture, would not be so great as might at first be imagined. The chief difference would be only that those students would freely neglect Greek, who, under the system of compulsion, would learn it reluctantly. Such learners, probably, would never under any circumstances become good Greek scholars. They would grow up to hate Greek study, and to talk against it. Meantime, students that really wish to learn Greek would do so as under the old plan. It is out of the ranks of these students that good Greek scholars will come, in the future, as has been the case in the past. There would then be this positive gain to the cause of Greek culture, that there would be nobody to speak ill of it—nobody, that is, having the authority of ostensible qualification to do so. Sound Greek scholarship, enlightened interest in Greek literature, will thus lose little, and they will certainly stand a chance of gaining something, by the change of Greek from a compulsory to an elective study whether in school or college. It will simply mark a new importation of good common sense into the business of liberal education-a place in which, always, that not too abundant quality is as much needed as anywhere else in the world. Wise friends of Greek learning find, therefore, small occasion of fear in the prevalent tendency to leave Greek open to election or rejection at the will of the student. There is, however, in this tendency a reason why earnest efforts should be put forth to make the choice of students judicious. The present series of books will, it is hoped, contribute something to dif |