feasible to advance for some time to come. But then I see no reason,
why, in secondary schools, and in the Science Classes which are under
the control of the Science and Art Department--and which I may say, in
passing, have in my judgment, done so very much for the diffusion of a
knowledge of science over the country--we should not hope to see
instruction in the elements of Biology carried out, not perhaps to the
same extent, but still upon somewhat the same principle as here. There
is no difficulty, when you have to deal with students of the ages of
fifteen or sixteen, in practising a little dissection and in getting a
notion of, at any rate, the four or five great modifications of the
animal form; and the like is true in regard to the higher anatomy of
plants.

While, lastly, to all those who are studying biological science with
a view to their own edification merely, or with the intention of
becoming zoologists or botanists; to all those who intend to pursue
physiology--and especially to those who propose to employ the working
years of their lives in the practice of medicine--I say that there is
no training so fitted, or which may be of such important service to
them, as the discipline in practical biological work which I have
sketched out as being pursued in the laboratory hard by.

* * * * *

I may add that, beyond all these different classes of persons who may
profit by the study of Biology, there is yet one other. I remember, a
number of years ago, that a gentleman who was a vehement opponent of
Mr. Darwin's views and had written some terrible articles against them,
applied to me to know what was the best way in which he could acquaint
himself with the strongest arguments in favour of evolution. I wrote