§ 11. No doubt it will make a vast difference whether we consider the learning mainly as employment, as a means of taking up time and preventing “sauntering,” as Locke boldly calls it, or whether we are chiefly anxious to secure some special results. The knowledge of the Latin and Greek languages and the Latin and Greek authors was a result so highly prized by the Renascence scholars that they insisted on a prodigious quantity of learning, not as employment, but simply as the means of acquiring this knowledge. As the knowledge got to be less esteemed the pressure was by degrees relaxed. In our public schools fifty or sixty years ago the learning was to some extent retained as employment, but there certainly was no pressure, and the majority of the boys never learnt the ancient languages. So the masters of that time had given up the Renascence enthusiasm for the classics, and on the negative side of his teaching had come to an agreement with Montaigne. Any one inclined to sarcasm might say that on the positive side they were still totally opposed to him, for _he_ thought virtue and judgment were the main things to be cared for, and _they_ did not care for these things at all. But this is not a fair statement. The one thing gained, or supposed to be gained, in the public schools was the art of living, and this art, though it does not demand heroic virtue, requires at least prudence and self-control. Montaigne’s system was a revolt against the _bookishness_ of the Renascence. “In our studies,” says he, “whatever presents itself before us is book enough; a roguish trick of a page, a blunder of a servant, a jest at table, are so many new subjects.” So the education _out of school_ was in his eyes of more value than the education in school. And this was acknowledged also in our public schools: “It is not the Latin and Greek they learn or don’t learn that we consider so important,” the masters used to say, “but it is the tone of the school and the discipline of the games.” But of late years this virtual agreement with Montaigne has been broken up. School work is no longer mere employment, but it is done under pressure, and with penalties if the tale of brick turned out does not pass the inspector. § 12. What has produced this great change? It is due mainly to two causes: 1. The pressure put on the young to attain classical knowledge was relaxed when it was thought that they could get through life very well without this knowledge. But in these days new knowledge has awakened a new enthusiasm. The knowledge of science promises such great advantages that the latest reformers, headed by Mr. Herbert Spencer, seem to make the well-being of the grown person depend mainly on the amount of scientific knowledge he stored up in his youth. This is the first cause of educational pressure.