Although many details may be classified under each of these heads,
yet there is one of pre-eminent importance on which we should
insist.
The one feature of the scientific spirit which outweighs all
others in importance is the love of knowledge for its own sake. If
by our system of education we can inculcate this sentiment we
shall do what is, from a public point of view, worth more than any
amount of technical knowledge, because we shall lay the foundation
of all knowledge. So long as men study only what they think is
going to be useful their knowledge will be partial and
insufficient. I think it is to the constant inculcation of this
fact by experience, rather than to any reasoning, that is due the
continued appreciation of a liberal education. Every business-man
knows that a business-college training is of very little account
in enabling one to fight the battle of life, and that college-bred
men have a great advantage even in fields where mere education is
a secondary matter. We are accustomed to seeing ridicule thrown
upon the questions sometimes asked of candidates for the civil
service because the questions refer to subjects of which a
knowledge is not essential. The reply to all criticisms of this
kind is that there is no one quality which more certainly assures
a man's usefulness to society than the propensity to acquire
useless knowledge.
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