development proceeds, there becomes possible the conception of a related system of cause and effect, of reason and consequence. When a pupil has reached the age of twelve or thirteen his powers of reasoning have developed sufficiently to enable him to comprehend relations of cause and effect, and the adaptation of means to an end, in a simple system. This indicates to the teacher that the study of structure in literature should not be begun before that age; and it affords to him a firm ground for believing that after that age the study of structure should form an essential part of the literary course. The movement of the intellect is instinctively onward towards coherence and system; and the study of structure in literature is one of the means by which that instinct may be satisfied and its development secured. If our teaching is to satisfy the nature of our pupils, from this time onwards we must offer a more systematic treatment of the subjects of study: we must emphazise wherever we can the relations of cause and effect, and the systematic adaptation of means to ends. In the later stages of the literature course, then, whatever be the particular class of literature that for the time being may constitute the object of study, be it poem or play, biography or essay or novel, the pupils should be required at suitable times to direct their attention to its structure, from the point of view of adaptation of means to ends: so that, after having read and considered it, they may be able to perceive it as a whole made up of parts skilfully arranged in such a manner as to produce the general effect at which the writer has aimed.

The circumstance that the essence of the form of

literature when regarded on the side of diction, no less than when regarded on the side of architectural design, is the adaptation of means to an end, a fine harmony between the reality that is expressed and the manner of its expression, indicates to us again that the formal study of literary diction should not be attempted in the junior classes. Speaking generally, the less verbal criticism there is in the earlier stages of literature teaching, the better and more effective will the teaching be; and at all stages of the teaching, whenever the details of language are considered, the teacher must consider these not in themselves, as isolated features, but in their relation to the matter that is expressed, or as producing a certain mental effect aimed at by the writer. All the details in a work of literary art are selected with a view to the attainment of an artistic end, and they should be studied in relation to that end. In a letter written to Mr R. H. Hutton with reference to her novel of Romola, George Eliot bears striking testimony to this fact. "Perhaps," she remarks, " even a judge so discerning as yourself could not infer from the artistic result how strict a self-control and selection were exercised in the presentation of details. I believe there is scarcely a phrase, an incident, an allusion, that did not gather its value to me from its supposed subservience to my main artistic objects."

It is frequently doubted whether pupils of school age are able to appreciate rightly the effect of imaginative atmosphere in literature. Even if a favourable view of the possibilities of literary study in schools be taken, and it be admitted that the pupil may be taught

to perceive the "intellectual" qualities of literature— for instance, the logical qualities of coherence and continuity in a poem or treatise or essay-yet, it is said, he can by no means be trained to appreciate its "imaginative" or "aesthetic" qualities-its appeal to the imagination and its beauty of expression or of feeling. From this point of view, while it is admitted that the pupil may be taught to perceive some of the more prosaic qualities of literature, it is urged that he can have no vision of it in its higher, more poetic aspects.

In opposition to these opinions, it may be maintained that through the study of literature not only the pupil's intellect, but also his imagination and feelings-his whole human nature-may be trained and developed; and that there is in the curriculum no other subject so well fitted to achieve this particular result.

When it is said that possibly the harder and more logical qualities of a literary work may be utilized in teaching, but that its imaginative and aesthetic qualities cannot; when it is said that the study of literature in schools may possibly be a means of training a boy's intellect but cannot cultivate his imagination—to say this is to commit the serious psychological error of making an abstract separation of "mental faculties" where no real separation exists. There is no concrete state of mind that consists merely of reasoning or merely of imagination or merely of feeling: though we may distinguish between different aspects of consciousness, yet they do not operate apart from one another-the mind is a unity. And in a work of literary art the intellectual, the imaginative, and the emotional elements

of human nature work in particularly close association and harmony: the artist puts himself into his work, himself considered not as a congeries of distinct faculties," but as a whole-souled being, as compact of conception, of imagination, of feeling—each of his "faculties" being related to the other, and all blended and harmonized in the finished product of his art. No other subject included in the school curriculum presents the pupil with material that is so "rammed with life"-so penetrated and inspired by the united action of all our faculties; and it is just this close association in it of intellect, imagination, and feeling that constitutes the special value of literature as a school study.

Remembering this connexion, and the fact that our faculties do not operate apart from one another, we may feel sure that, if we succeed in conveying to a pupil a sense of the intellectual qualities of literature, of the coherence and order and restraint that characterise a work of art, at the same time we shall have succeeded in conveying to him a sense of its imaginative qualities and its aesthetic value.

In other words, in the teaching of literature the imagination and the aesthetic nature may be cultivated through the intellect.

It is impossible to describe briefly what the distinctive function of imagination in literature is; but perhaps the best description in general terms would be to say that its function is to inspire atmosphere-an appropriate medium in which the creations of the artist may live and move. Atmosphere, it may be said, is the very life-breath of all literature (and of all art), just as

it is of our material existence, and it may be admitted that only in so far as a pupil is inspired with the atmosphere of a book is the teaching of literature quite successful. If it be said that the imagination refuses to be coerced, and that therefore it is impossible to compel a pupil to breathe the atmosphere of literature, the reply may be made that in reality there exists no necessity for such compulsion; that just as, in the material world, given the necessary bodily organs, we cannot but breathe the atmosphere of the place in which we are, so, too, in the world of literature, given intellectual comprehension of the book that we are reading, we simply cannot help breathing its imaginative atmosphere.

It is the more special function of the intellect, in creative literature, to impart suitable form and design to a work, so that the exposition of its subject-matter may be marked by continuity, coherence, and unity. If a pupil shall have been led to perceive this unity of thought and structure in an imaginative work, he will have been brought a considerable way towards feeling the correspondent harmony of atmosphere.

Suppose, for instance, that a class is reading one of Shakespeare's plays, in all of which there appears the greatest complexity, while at the same time amid the diversity there is an underlying unity which serves as link of connexion throughout. This unity of thought a pupil should be brought to see in each of the details that it governs; it will be seen often in those details that apparently are most irrelevant to the main issue. Thus, in As You Like It, the lyrics with which the speeches are interspersed would seem, on a first view, to be quite unrelated to the main idea of the piece. Yet