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pursuits are rewarded by prizes in honor or money, and they will be
strongly tempted to select them. Therefore, unless the Government has
exercised extraordinary wisdom, men will learn what they do not really
care for and may never practically want, merely in order to win some
academical grade. So soon as this object has been attained, they will
immediately abandon the studies by which they attained it.

Can it be said that in these cases the purposes of the Government were
fulfilled? Clearly not, if it desired to form a permanent taste for
learning. But it may have done worse than fail in this merely negative
way; it may have diverted its youth from pursuits to which Nature called
them, and in which they might have effectually aided the advancement and
the prosperity of the State.

Let us suppose that a Government were to have a pet study, and offer
great artificial inducements for success in it. Suppose that the pet
study were entomology. All the most promising youth of the country would
spend ten years in emulating Messrs. Kirby and Spence, and take their
degrees as entomological bachelors. But might it not easily happen that
to a majority of the young gentlemen this pursuit would have acted
positively as a hindrance by keeping them from other pursuits more
likely to help them in their professions? It would not only cost a great
deal of valuable time, it would absorb a quantity of youthful energy
which the country can ill afford to lose. The Government would probably
affirm that entomology, if not always practically useful in itself, was
an invaluable intellectual training; but what if this training used up
the early vigor which might be needed for other pursuits, and of which
every human being has only a limited supply? We should be told, no
doubt, that this powerful encouragement was necessary to the advancement
of science, and it is true that under such a system the rudiments of
entomology would be more generally known. But the vulgarization of
rudiments is not the advancement of knowledge. Entomology has gone quite
as far in discovery, though pursued simply for its own sake, as it would
have gone if it had been made necessary to a bachelor's degree.

You will ask whether I would go so far as to abolish degrees of all
kinds, Certainly not; that is not my project. But I believe that no
Government is competent to make a selection amongst intellectual
pursuits and say, "This or that pursuit shall be encouraged by