Professor Emerton's Lectures.

The popularity of Professor Emerton's lectures was well attested yesterday afternoon by the large number present at the first of his series of four lectures on the Study and Teaching of History. He said: The lectures to which I invite your attention are a part of the new pedagogic scheme. Personally, however, I have little faith in the science of pedagogy. Teaching is the practice of an art, not the demonstration of a science, and art, I think, has to be learned by trial and failure. The true teacher is born, not made, and the most pedagogy can hope to do is to give hints. The most successful adapt themselves to the state of mind of those they teach. I purpose to offer suggestions along the line of history, large and broad, but brief and general, which each will have to apply for himself. When we come where specializations are necessary, on the whole the person who knows his subject best will teach it best. Get then a comprehensive grasp of the subject you would teach. Right here lies the danger of pedagogic systems; they may tend to give the impression that one can teach without thoroughly knowing one's subject, and that teaching is a science apart from the subject one would teach. Lay out limitations to your subject, and remember the value of detailed work depends on knowledge that sinks in and stays, not what may be easily learned and forgotten.

Is history a science; if not it will always be in danger of being confounded with some branch of science. I would define science a branch of learning that has a body of material, a peculiar process of its own, and certain definite results, and such I regard history.

History comes from a root that means to see, then to know by seeing, and finally to tell what is known. Such is the Greek, Latin, Italian and English idea. The German word, geschickte or das geschehen expresses a somewhat different idea, that which has happened, and German writers lay more stress on facts. Indeed there may be said to be no literary history in Germany. We have regarded history as a literary art, and often literary men that can hardly be said to have been historical scholars have taught in the large universities of England. A definition of history should include both these elements, that which has happened, and a preception and presentation.

The material for history is the record of the life of man expressing himself as a social being. This is an arbitrary definition, but important as helping to distinguish our science from others.

History begins whenever there is a record that tends to explain man in the relations I've indicated. An Indian spear head may be a record if used to explain man's social relations. Prehistoric is generally understood to refer to something before written record, but according to my definition it would refer to a time before any record.

History mast deal with man conditioned by his environment, yet the historian should not intrude his individual views on his historical conclusion. The historian should be the intelligent annalist.

History cares for the individual only as he represents the family or state. History ought not to be made use of to defend a cause, and we should bear in mind that there are no real breaks in history. The historian first should be a gleaner of facts, and second, should have the power to combine facts so as to bring them out in their full significance.