Preface
The method of teaching
herein advocated started, many years ago, from a desire to know Latin literature,
and an impatience with the actual amount of reading power attained by a
college course. At the outset there existed a conviction that the
modern mind could not be so degenerate as to be incapable of reading Latin
as the Romans read it, that is to say, in the Roman order, in the Roman
medium, and at a rate of speed which would not be intolerably slow in the
reading of a modern tongue. The nature of the aim dictated the method
to be employed; and the employment of the method proved the soundness
of the original conviction.
The writer has for some years intended to publish an account of this
method, as it has shaped itself in practical experience with successive
classes. First, however, he desired to present it orally before a
number of gatherings of teachers. As a beginning, accordingly, the
address with which the pamphlet opens was read before the Holiday Conference
of the Associated Academic Principals of the State of New York, held in
Syracuse in December last. The interest with which the paper was
received was so kindly, and the requests that it be published without further
delay were so pressing, that it seemed best not to hold to the former intention.
The pamphlet has not the form which was first intended, namely, that
of plain exposition; for in spite of the iteration of the personal
pronoun, the form of direct appeal and explanation natural to an address
proved to have its advantages. It has been necessary, however, to
add to the address a considerable supplement.
Though no explicit suggestions will be found in regard to the teaching
of Greek, the substance of the method of course applies alike to either
language.
I am under a debt to many of my students of recent years, whose support
of the method, though it was taken up by them under the sore necessity
of an entire revolution of confirmed mental habits, has supplied me with
the confidence that comes from concrete results. But I am under especial
obligations to my sister, Miss Gertrude Elisabeth Hale, both for suggestions
made earlier as a result of her own experience (the device mentioned on
page 13 originated, so far as my own case goes, with her) and for a searching
criticism of the proof of the present pamphlet, from the point of view
of a preparatory teacher.
