CHAPTER II

WHY GEOMETRY IS STUDIED

With geometry, as with other subjects, it is easier to set forth what are not the reasons for studying it than to proceed positively and enumerate the advantages. Although such a negative course is not satisfying to the mind as a finality, it possesses definite advantages in the beginning of such a discussion as this. Whenever false prophets arise, and with an attitude of pained superiority proclaim unworthy aims in human life, it is well to show the fallacy of their position before proceeding to a constructive philosophy. Taking for a moment this negative course, let us inquire as to what are not the reasons for studying geometry, or, to be more emphatic, as to what are not the worthy reasons.

In view of a periodic activity in favor of the utilities of geometry, it is well to understand, in the first place, that geometry is not studied, and never has been studied, because of its positive utility in commercial life or even in the workshop. In America we commonly allow at least a year to plane geometry and a half year to solid geometry; but all of the facts that a skilled mechanic or an engineer would ever need could be taught in a few lessons. All the rest is either obvious or is commercially and technically useless. We prove, for example, that the angles opposite the equal sides of a triangle are equal, a fact that is probably quite as obvious as the postulate that but one line can be drawn through a given point parallel to a given line. We then prove, sometimes by the unsatisfactory process of _reductio ad absurdum_, the converse of this proposition,--a fact that is as obvious as most other facts that come to our consciousness, at least after the preceding proposition has been proved. And these two theorems are perfectly fair types of upwards of one hundred sixty or seventy propositions comprising Euclid's books on plane geometry. They are generally not useful in daily life, and they were never intended to be so. There is an oft-repeated but not well-authenticated story of Euclid that illustrates the feeling of the founders of geometry as well as of its most worthy teachers. A Greek writer, Stobæus, relates the story in these words:

Some one who had begun to read geometry with Euclid, when he had learned the first theorem, asked, "But what shall I get by learning these things?" Euclid called his slave and said, "Give him three obols, since he must make gain out of what he learns."

Whether true or not, the story expresses the sentiment that runs through Euclid's work, and not improbably we have here a bit of real biography,--practically all of the personal Euclid that has come down to us from the world's first great textbook maker. It is well that we read the story occasionally, and also such words as the following, recently uttered[4] by Sir Conan Doyle,--words bearing the same lesson, although upon a different theme:

In the present utilitarian age one frequently hears the question asked, "What is the use of it all?" as if every noble deed was not its own justification. As if every action which makes for self-denial, for hardihood, and for endurance was not in itself a most precious lesson to mankind. That people can be found to ask such a question shows how far materialism has gone, and how needful it is that we insist upon the value of all that is nobler and higher in life.

An American statesman and jurist, speaking upon a similar occasion[5], gave utterance to the same sentiments in these words:

When the time comes that knowledge will not be sought for its own sake, and men will not press forward simply in a desire of achievement, without hope of gain, to extend the limits of human knowledge and information, then, indeed, will the race enter upon its decadence.

There have not been wanting, however, in every age, those whose zeal is in inverse proportion to their experience, who were possessed with the idea that it is the duty of the schools to make geometry practical. We have them to-day, and the world had them yesterday, and the future shall see them as active as ever.

These people do good to the world, and their labors should always be welcome, for out of the myriad of suggestions that they make a few have value, and these are helpful both to the mathematician and the artisan. Not infrequently they have contributed material that serves to make geometry somewhat more interesting, but it must be confessed that most of their work is merely the threshing of old straw, like the work of those who follow the will-o'-the-wisp of the circle squarers. The medieval astrologers wished to make geometry more practical, and so they carried to a considerable length the study of the star polygon, a figure that they could use in their profession. The cathedral builders, as their art progressed, found that architectural drawings were more exact if made with a single opening of the compasses, and it is probable that their influence led to the development of this phase of geometry in the Middle Ages as a practical application of the science. Later, and about the beginning of the sixteenth century, the revival of art, and particularly the great development of painting, led to the practical application of geometry to the study of perspective and of those curves[6] that occur most frequently in the graphic arts. The sixteenth and seventeenth centuries witnessed the publication of a large number of treatises on practical geometry, usually relating to the measuring of distances and partly answering the purposes of our present trigonometry. Such were the well-known treatises of Belli (1569), Cataneo (1567), and Bartoli (1589).[7]

The period of two centuries from about 1600 to about 1800 was quite as much given to experiments in the creation of a practical geometry as is the present time, and it was no doubt as much by way of protest against this false idea of the subject as a desire to improve upon Euclid that led the great French mathematician, Legendre, to publish his geometry in 1794,--a work that soon replaced Euclid in the schools of America.

It thus appears that the effort to make geometry practical is by no means new. Euclid knew of it, the Middle Ages contributed to it, that period vaguely styled the Renaissance joined in the movement, and the first three centuries of printing contributed a large literature to the subject. Out of all this effort some genuine good remains, but relatively not very much.[8] And so it will be with the present movement; it will serve its greatest purpose in making teachers think and read, and in adding to their interest and enthusiasm and to the interest of their pupils; but it will not greatly change geometry, because no serious person ever believed that geometry was taught chiefly for practical purposes, or was made more interesting or valuable through such a pretense. Changes in sequence, in definitions, and in proofs will come little by little; but that there will be any such radical change in these matters in the immediate future, as some writers have anticipated, is not probable.[9]

A recent writer of much acumen[10] has summed up this thought in these words:

Not one tenth of the graduates of our high schools ever enter professions in which their algebra and geometry are applied to concrete realities; not one day in three hundred sixty-five is a high school graduate called upon to "apply," as it is called, an algebraic or a geometrical proposition.... Why, then, do we teach these subjects, if this alone is the sense of the word "practical"!... To me the solution of this paradox consists in boldly confronting the dilemma, and in saying that our conception of the practical utility of those studies must be readjusted, and that we have frankly to face the truth that the "practical" ends we seek are in a sense _ideal_ practical ends, yet such as have, after all, an eminently utilitarian value in the intellectual sphere.

He quotes from C. S. Jackson, a progressive contemporary teacher of mechanics in England, who speaks of pupils confusing millimeters and centimeters in some simple computation, and who adds:

There is the enemy! The real enemy we have to fight against, whatever we teach, is carelessness, inaccuracy, forgetfulness, and slovenliness. That battle has been fought and won with diverse weapons. It has, for instance, been fought with Latin grammar before now, and won. I say that because we must be very careful to guard against the notion that there is any one panacea for this sort of thing. It borders on quackery to say that elementary physics will cure everything.

And of course the same thing may be said for mathematics. Nevertheless it is doubtful if we have any other subject that does so much to bring to the front this danger of carelessness, of slovenly reasoning, of inaccuracy, and of forgetfulness as this science of geometry, which has been so polished and perfected as the centuries have gone on.

There have been those who did not proclaim the utilitarian value of geometry, but who fell into as serious an error, namely, the advocating of geometry as a means of training the memory. In times not so very far past, and to some extent to-day, the memorizing of proofs has been justified on this ground. This error has, however, been fully exposed by our modern psychologists. They have shown that the person who memorizes the propositions of Euclid by number is no more capable of memorizing other facts than he was before, and that the learning of proofs verbatim is of no assistance whatever in retaining matter that is helpful in other lines of work. Geometry, therefore, as a training of the memory is of no more value than any other subject in the curriculum.

If geometry is not studied chiefly because it is practical, or because it trains the memory, what reasons can be adduced for its presence in the courses of study of every civilized country? Is it not, after all, a mere fetish, and are not those virulent writers correct who see nothing good in the subject save only its utilities?[11] Of this type one of the most entertaining is William J. Locke,[12] whose words upon the subject are well worth reading:

... I earned my living at school slavery, teaching to children the most useless, the most disastrous, the most soul-cramping branch of knowledge wherewith pedagogues in their insensate folly have crippled the minds and blasted the lives of thousands of their fellow creatures--elementary mathematics. There is no more reason for any human being on God's earth to be acquainted with the binomial theorem or the solution of triangles, unless he is a professional scientist,--when he can begin to specialize in mathematics at the same age as the lawyer begins to specialize in law or the surgeon in anatomy,--than for him to be expert in Choctaw, the Cabala, or the Book of Mormon. I look back with feelings of shame and degradation to the days when, for a crust of bread, I prostituted my intelligence to wasting the precious hours of impressionable childhood, which could have been filled with so many beautiful and meaningful things, over this utterly futile and inhuman subject. It trains the mind,--it teaches boys to think, they say. It doesn't. In reality it is a cut-and-dried subject, easy to fit into a school curriculum. Its sacrosanctity saves educationalists an enormous amount of trouble, and its chief use is to enable mindless young men from the universities to make a dishonest living by teaching it to others, who in their turn may teach it to a future generation.

To be fair we must face just such attacks, and we must recognize that they set forth the feelings of many honest people. One is tempted to inquire if Mr. Locke could have written in such an incisive style if he had not, as was the case, graduated with honors in mathematics at one of the great universities. But he might reply that if his mind had not been warped by mathematics, he would have written more temperately, so the honors in the argument would be even. Much more to the point is the fact that Mr. Locke taught mathematics in the schools of England, and that these schools do not seem to the rest of the world to furnish a good type of the teaching of elementary mathematics. No country goes to England for its model in this particular branch of education, although the work is rapidly changing there, and Mr. Locke pictures a local condition in teaching rather than a general condition in mathematics. Few visitors to the schools of England would care to teach mathematics as they see it taught there, in spite of their recognition of the thoroughness of the work and the earnestness of many of the teachers. It is also of interest to note that the greatest protests against formal mathematics have come from England, as witness the utterances of such men as Sir William Hamilton and Professors Perry, Minchin, Henrici, and Alfred Lodge. It may therefore be questioned whether these scholars are not unconsciously protesting against the English methods and curriculum rather than against the subject itself. When Professor Minchin says that he had been through the six books of Euclid without really understanding an angle, it is Euclid's text and his own teacher that are at fault, and not geometry.

Before considering directly the question as to why geometry should be taught, let us turn for a moment to the other subjects in the secondary curriculum. Why, for example, do we study literature? "It does not lower the price of bread," as Malherbe remarked in speaking of the commentary of Bachet on the great work of Diophantus. Is it for the purpose of making authors? Not one person out of ten thousand who study literature ever writes for publication. And why do we allow pupils to waste their time in physical education? It uses valuable hours, it wastes money, and it is dangerous to life and limb. Would it not be better to set pupils at sawing wood? And why do we study music? To give pleasure by our performances? How many who attempt to play the piano or to sing give much pleasure to any but themselves, and possibly their parents? The study of grammar does not make an accurate writer, nor the study of rhetoric an orator, nor the study of meter a poet, nor the study of pedagogy a teacher. The study of geography in the school does not make travel particularly easier, nor does the study of biology tend to populate the earth. So we might pass in review the various subjects that we study and ought to study, and in no case would we find utility the moving cause, and in every case would we find it difficult to state the one great reason for the pursuit of the subject in question,--and so it is with geometry.

What positive reasons can now be adduced for the study of a subject that occupies upwards of a year in the school course, and that is, perhaps unwisely, required of all pupils? Probably the primary reason, if we do not attempt to deceive ourselves, is pleasure. We study music because music gives us pleasure, not necessarily our own music, but good music, whether ours, or, as is more probable, that of others. We study literature because we derive pleasure from books; the better the book the more subtle and lasting the pleasure. We study art because we receive pleasure from the great works of the masters, and probably we appreciate them the more because we have dabbled a little in pigments or in clay. We do not expect to be composers, or poets, or sculptors, but we wish to appreciate music and letters and the fine arts, and to derive pleasure from them and to be uplifted by them. At any rate, these are the nobler reasons for their study.

So it is with geometry. We study it because we derive pleasure from contact with a great and an ancient body of learning that has occupied the attention of master minds during the thousands of years in which it has been perfected, and we are uplifted by it. To deny that our pupils derive this pleasure from the study is to confess ourselves poor teachers, for most pupils do have positive enjoyment in the pursuit of geometry, in spite of the tradition that leads them to proclaim a general dislike for all study. This enjoyment is partly that of the game,--the playing of a game that can always be won, but that cannot be won too easily. It is partly that of the æsthetic, the pleasure of symmetry of form, the delight of fitting things together. But probably it lies chiefly in the mental uplift that geometry brings, the contact with absolute truth, and the approach that one makes to the Infinite. We are not quite sure of any one thing in biology; our knowledge of geology is relatively very slight, and the economic laws of society are uncertain to every one except some individual who attempts to set them forth; but before the world was fashioned the square on the hypotenuse was equal to the sum of the squares on the other two sides of a right triangle, and it will be so after this world is dead; and the inhabitant of Mars, if he exists, probably knows its truth as we know it. The uplift of this contact with absolute truth, with truth eternal, gives pleasure to humanity to a greater or less degree, depending upon the mental equipment of the particular individual; but it probably gives an appreciable amount of pleasure to every student of geometry who has a teacher worthy of the name. First, then, and foremost as a reason for studying geometry has always stood, and will always stand, the pleasure and the mental uplift that comes from contact with such a great body of human learning, and particularly with the exact truth that it contains. The teacher who is imbued with this feeling is on the road to success, whatever method of presentation he may use; the one who is not imbued with it is on the road to failure, however logical his presentation or however large his supply of practical applications.

Subordinate to these reasons for studying geometry are many others, exactly as with all other subjects of the curriculum. Geometry, for example, offers the best developed application of logic that we have, or are likely to have, in the school course. This does not mean that it always exemplifies perfect logic, for it does not; but to the pupil who is not ready for logic, per se, it offers an example of close reasoning such as his other subjects do not offer. We may say, and possibly with truth, that one who studies geometry will not reason more clearly on a financial proposition than one who does not; but in spite of the results of the very meager experiments of the psychologists, it is probable that the man who has had some drill in syllogisms, and who has learned to select the essentials and to neglect the nonessentials in reaching his conclusions, has acquired habits in reasoning that will help him in every line of work. As part of this equipment there is also a terseness of statement and a clearness in arrangement of points in an argument that has been the subject of comment by many writers.

Upon this same topic an English writer, in one of the sanest of recent monographs upon the subject,[13] has expressed his views in the following words:

The statement that a given individual has received a sound geometrical training implies that he has segregated from the whole of his sense impressions a certain set of these impressions, that he has then eliminated from their consideration all irrelevant impressions (in other words, acquired a subjective command of these impressions), that he has developed on the basis of these impressions an ordered and continuous system of logical deduction, and finally that he is capable of expressing the nature of these impressions and his deductions therefrom in terms simple and free from ambiguity. Now the slightest consideration will convince any one not already conversant with the idea, that the same sequence of mental processes underlies the whole career of any individual in any walk of life if only he is not concerned entirely with manual labor; consequently a full training in the performance of such sequences must be regarded as forming an essential part of any education worthy of the name. Moreover, the full appreciation of such processes has a higher value than is contained in the mental training involved, great though this be, for it induces an appreciation of intellectual unity and beauty which plays for the mind that part which the appreciation of schemes of shape and color plays for the artistic faculties; or, again, that part which the appreciation of a body of religious doctrine plays for the ethical aspirations. Now geometry is not the sole possible basis for inculcating this appreciation. Logic is an alternative for adults, provided that the individual is possessed of sufficient wide, though rough, experience on which to base his reasoning. Geometry is, however, highly desirable in that the objective bases are so simple and precise that they can be grasped at an early age, that the amount of training for the imagination is very large, that the deductive processes are not beyond the scope of ordinary boys, and finally that it affords a better basis for exercise in the art of simple and exact expression than any other possible subject of a school course.

Are these results really secured by teachers, however, or are they merely imagined by the pedagogue as a justification for his existence? Do teachers have any such appreciation of geometry as has been suggested, and even if they have it, do they impart it to their pupils? In reply it may be said, probably with perfect safety, that teachers of geometry appreciate their subject and lead their pupils to appreciate it to quite as great a degree as obtains in any other branch of education. What teacher appreciates fully the beauties of "In Memoriam," or of "Hamlet," or of "Paradise Lost," and what one inspires his pupils with all the nobility of these world classics? What teacher sees in biology all the grandeur of the evolution of the race, or imparts to his pupils the noble lessons of life that the study of this subject should suggest? What teacher of Latin brings his pupils to read the ancient letters with full appreciation of the dignity of style and the nobility of thought that they contain? And what teacher of French succeeds in bringing a pupil to carry on a conversation, to read a French magazine, to see the history imbedded in the words that are used, to realize the charm and power of the language, or to appreciate to the full a single classic? In other words, none of us fully appreciates his subject, and none of us can hope to bring his pupils to the ideal attitude toward any part of it. But it is probable that the teacher of geometry succeeds relatively better than the teacher of other subjects, because the science has reached a relatively higher state of perfection. The body of truth in geometry has been more clearly marked out, it has been more successfully fitted together, its lesson is more patent, and the experience of centuries has brought it into a shape that is more usable in the school. While, therefore, we have all kinds of teaching in all kinds of subjects, the very nature of the case leads to the belief that the class in geometry receives quite as much from the teacher and the subject as the class in any other branch in the school curriculum.

But is this not mere conjecture? What are the results of scientific investigation of the teaching of geometry? Unfortunately there is little hope from the results of such an inquiry, either here or in other fields. We cannot first weigh a pupil in an intellectual or moral balance, then feed him geometry, and then weigh him again, and then set back his clock of time and begin all over again with the same individual. There is no "before taking" and "after taking" of a subject that extends over a year or two of a pupil's life. We can weigh utilities roughly, we can estimate the pleasure of a subject relatively, but we cannot say that geometry is worth so many dollars, and history so many, and so on through the curriculum. The best we can do is to ask ourselves what the various subjects, with teachers of fairly equal merit, have done for us, and to inquire what has been the experience of other persons. Such an investigation results in showing that, with few exceptions, people who have studied geometry received as much of pleasure, of inspiration, of satisfaction, of what they call training from geometry as from any other subject of study,--given teachers of equal merit,--and that they would not willingly give up the something which geometry brought to them. If this were not the feeling, and if humanity believed that geometry is what Mr. Locke's words would seem to indicate, it would long ago have banished it from the schools, since upon this ground rather than upon the ground of utility the subject has always stood.

These seem to be the great reasons for the study of geometry, and to search for others would tend to weaken the argument. At first sight they may not seem to justify the expenditure of time that geometry demands, and they may seem unduly to neglect the argument that geometry is a stepping-stone to higher mathematics. Each of these points, however, has been neglected purposely. A pupil has a number of school years at his disposal; to what shall they be devoted? To literature? What claim has letters that is such as to justify the exclusion of geometry? To music, or natural science, or language? These are all valuable, and all should be studied by one seeking a liberal education; but for the same reason geometry should have its place. What subject, in fine, can supply exactly what geometry does? And if none, then how can the pupil's time be better expended than in the study of this science?[14] As to the second point, that a claim should be set forth that geometry is a _sine qua non_ to higher mathematics, this belief is considerably exaggerated because there are relatively few who proceed from geometry to a higher branch of mathematics. This argument would justify its status as an elective rather than as a required subject.

Let us then stand upon the ground already marked out, holding that the pleasure, the culture, the mental poise, the habits of exact reasoning that geometry brings, and the general experience of mankind upon the subject are sufficient to justify us in demanding for it a reasonable amount of time in the framing of a curriculum. Let us be fair in our appreciation of all other branches, but let us urge that every student may have an opportunity to know of real geometry, say for a single year, thereafter pursuing it or not, according as we succeed in making its value apparent, or fail in our attempt to present worthily an ancient and noble science to the mind confided to our instruction.

The shortsightedness of a narrow education, of an education that teaches only machines to a prospective mechanic, and agriculture to a prospective farmer, and cooking and dressmaking to the girl, and that would exclude all mathematics that is not utilitarian in the narrow sense, cannot endure.

The community has found out that such schemes may be well fitted to give the children a good time in school, but lead them to a bad time afterward. Life is hard work, and if they have never learned in school to give their concentrated attention to that which does not appeal to them and which does not interest them immediately, they have missed the most valuable lesson of their school years. The little practical information they could have learned at any time; the energy of attention and concentration can no longer be learned if the early years are wasted. However narrow and commercial the standpoint which is chosen may be, it can always be found that it is the general education which pays best, and the more the period of cultural work can be expanded the more efficient will be the services of the school for the practical services of the nation.[15]

Of course no one should construe these remarks as opposing in the slightest degree the laudable efforts that are constantly being put forth to make geometry more interesting and to vitalize it by establishing as strong motives as possible for its study. Let the home, the workshop, physics, art, play,--all contribute their quota of motive to geometry as to all mathematics and all other branches. But let us never forget that geometry has a _raison d'être_ beyond all this, and that these applications are sought primarily for the sake of geometry, and that geometry is not taught primarily for the sake of these applications.

When we consider how often geometry is attacked by those who profess to be its friends, and how teachers who have been trained in mathematics occasionally seem to make of the subject little besides a mongrel course in drawing and measuring, all the time insisting that they are progressive while the champions of real geometry are reactionary, it is well to read some of the opinions of the masters. The following quotations may be given occasionally in geometry classes as showing the esteem in which the subject has been held in various ages, and at any rate they should serve to inspire the teacher to greater love for his subject.

The enemies of geometry, those who know it only imperfectly, look upon the theoretical problems, which constitute the most difficult part of the subject, as mental games which consume time and energy that might better be employed in other ways. Such a belief is false, and it would block the progress of science if it were credible. But aside from the fact that the speculative problems, which at first sight seem barren, can often be applied to useful purposes, they always stand as among the best means to develop and to express all the forces of the human intelligence.--ABBÉ BOSSUT.

The sailor whom an exact observation of longitude saves from shipwreck owes his life to a theory developed two thousand years ago by men who had in mind merely the speculations of abstract geometry.--CONDORCET.

If mathematical heights are hard to climb, the fundamental principles lie at every threshold, and this fact allows them to be comprehended by that common sense which Descartes declared was "apportioned equally among all men."--COLLET.

It may seem strange that geometry is unable to define the terms which it uses most frequently, since it defines neither movement, nor number, nor space,---the three things with which it is chiefly concerned. But we shall not be surprised if we stop to consider that this admirable science concerns only the most simple things, and the very quality that renders these things worthy of study renders them incapable of being defined. Thus the very lack of definition is rather an evidence of perfection than a defect, since it comes not from the obscurity of the terms, but from the fact that they are so very well known.--PASCAL.

God eternally geometrizes.--PLATO.

God is a circle of which the center is everywhere and the circumference nowhere.--RABELAIS.

Without mathematics no one can fathom the depths of philosophy. Without philosophy no one can fathom the depths of mathematics. Without the two no one can fathom the depths of anything.--BORDAS-DEMOULIN.

We may look upon geometry as a practical logic, for the truths which it studies, being the most simple and most clearly understood of all truths, are on this account the most susceptible of ready application in reasoning.--D'ALEMBERT.

The advance and the perfecting of mathematics are closely joined to the prosperity of the nation.--NAPOLEON.

Hold nothing as certain save what can be demonstrated.--NEWTON.

To measure is to know.--KEPLER.

The method of making no mistake is sought by every one. The logicians profess to show the way, but the geometers alone ever reach it, and aside from their science there is no genuine demonstration.--PASCAL.

The taste for exactness, the impossibility of contenting one's self with vague notions or of leaning upon mere hypotheses, the necessity for perceiving clearly the connection between certain propositions and the object in view,--these are the most precious fruits of the study of mathematics.--LACROIX.

=Bibliography.= Smith, The Teaching of Elementary Mathematics, p. 234, New York, 1900; Henrici, Presidential Address before the British Association, _Nature_, Vol. XXVIII, p. 497; Hill, Educational Value of Mathematics, _Educational Review_, Vol. IX, p. 349; Young, The Teaching of Mathematics, p. 9, New York, 1907. The closing quotations are from Rebière, Mathématiques et Mathématiciens, Paris, 1893.

FOOTNOTES:

[4] In an address in London, June 15, 1909, at a dinner to Sir Ernest Shackelton.

[5] Governor Hughes, now Justice Hughes, of New York, at the Peary testimonial on February 8, 1910, at New York City.

[6] The first work upon this subject, and indeed the first printed treatise on curves in general, was written by the famous artist of Nürnberg, Albrecht Dürer.

[7] Several of these writers are mentioned in Chapter IV.

[8] If any reader chances upon George Birkbeck's English translation of Charles Dupin's "Mathematics Practically Applied," Halifax, 1854, he will find that Dupin gave more good applications of geometry than all of our American advocates of practical geometry combined.

[9] See, for example, Henrici's "Congruent Figures," London, 1879, and the review of Borel's "Elements of Mathematics," by Professor Sisam in the _Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society_, July, 1910, a matter discussed later in this work.

[10] T. J. McCormack, "Why do we study Mathematics: a Philosophical and Historical Retrospect," p. 9, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 1910.

[11] Of the fair and candid arguments against the culture value of mathematics, one of the best of the recent ones is that by G. F. Swain, in the _Atti del IV Congresso Internazionale dei Matematici_, Rome, 1909, Vol. III, p. 361. The literature of this school is quite extensive, but Perry's "England's Neglect of Science," London, 1900, and "Discussion on the Teaching of Mathematics," London, 1901, are typical.

[12] In his novel, "The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne."

[13] G. W. L. Carson, "The Functions of Geometry as a Subject of Education," p. 3, Tonbridge, 1910.

[14] It may well be, however, that the growing curriculum may justify some reduction in the time formerly assigned to geometry, and any reasonable proposition of this nature should be fairly met by teachers of mathematics.

[15] Professor Münsterberg, in the _Metropolitan Magazine_ for July, 1910.