The person who first seeks to acquire a general survey of a science,
and then gradually to descend to details, will never attain to sound
and exact knowledge, but will for ever dissipate his energies, and,
knowing many things, will yet know nothing. In his lectures on the
Method of Academical Study, Schelling remarks with great justice that,
in history, to begin with a survey of the entire past is in the highest
degree useless and injurious, since it gives one mere compartments for
knowledge, without anything to fill them. In history, his advice is,
first study one period in detail, and from this broaden out in all
directions. For the study of language and literature (which corresponds
with history in its most general sense) a similar procedure is the only
right one. Everything in science is related; although science itself is
endless, yet the whole system is pervaded with sympathies and
correspondences. Let the student place himself where he will--so long
as he selects something significant and worth while,--and he will be
compelled to broaden out from this point of departure in every
direction in order to reach a complete understanding of his subject.
From each and every detail one is driven to consider the whole; the
only thing that matters is that one go to work in the right way, with
strength, intelligence, and avidity. Let one choose several different
points of departure, working through from each of them to the whole,
and one will grasp the whole all the more surely, and comprehend the
wealth of detail all the more fully. Accordingly, by sinking deep into
the particular, one most easily avoids the danger of becoming narrow.


PASSAGES FOR COMPARISON

FROM THE SYMPOSIUM OF PLATO