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X
PREFACE
cicnt free play of opinion ;
each individual, however, basing
his share in the discussion upon a thorough written analysis
of the whole selection. In the case of immature students
these analyses would afterward be subject to the instructor's
private supervision. At the next meeting
let each member
of the class be prepared with a paper also accompanied by
an outline expanding some special topic in that selection,
or elaborating some point raised in the discussion.
When one
has read, the others should feel encouraged to question and
comment.
The instructor may or may not pass final judgment
on a paper. He is a moderator, whose function is to
stimulate his class to mental self-activity, and quietly to mould
it into a living, intelligent, social unit. This function he can
best perform with groups of not more than fifteen pupils -
preferably of ten or twelve; and, if he has tact, with much
younger minds than are usually drilled in anything approaching
a " seminary" course. Each student should preserve
his own papers, properly revised, for special conference from
time to time with the instructor. The net amount of writing
expected of an underclassman per week should be far less
than is
customary in some of the "theme" courses at our
American universities ;
the amount of time spent in the preparation
and revision of any one theme, far greater. The student
who cannot be sufficiently interested in his English to
plan a composition twice, and to rewrite it thrice, should not,
under ordinary circumstances, hope to master even the rudiments
of plain exposition.
Save for the introductory translation from Wackernagel,
the order of the selections is
roughly chronological; but it
need not be followed.
The excerpt from Aristotle might be
read before that from Plato. Lewes or Thoreau might be
kept until the close of the term. Manifestly, Wackernagel,
Aristotle, Plato, and Longinus are inserted as standards by