AN ESSAY ON THE EDUCATION OF THE EYE BY JOHN BURNET, F. R. S. N A country so largely connected with manufactures as this is, we cannot but wonder why the education of the eye has not been more generally cultivated; observing, as is also the case with the ear, that its education in after-life rarely gives the possessor those advantages which result from a proper direction having been given in youth; nor do I see why drawing should not accompany the elements of reading and writing, the complicated forms of the letters in many languages presenting a more serious obstacle than what is required in the rudiments of drawing; and I have no doubt but that a very short time would be sufficient to enable a scholar to draw objects with tolerable correctness. Without this education, not only are the most valuable advantages often lost,' but the mind is deprived of one of its chief sources of correct information, and the hand remains in a manner paralyzed and unable to record what the eye takes cognizance of; whereas, when they advance in mutual contact through a course of early instruction, this difficulty is overcome. This ready execution of the hand is to be acquired 1 Locke, whose attention was turned to this branch of education, says, "when he can write well and quick, I think it may be convenient not only to continue the exercise of his hand in writing, but also to improve the use of it further in drawing, a thing very useful to gentlemen on several occasions, but especially if he travels, as that which helps a man often to express in a few lines well put together what a whole sheet of paper in writing would not be able to represent and make intelligible. How many buildings may a man see, how many machines and habits meet with, the ideas whereof would be easily retained and communicated by a little skill in drawing, which being committed to words are in danger of being lost, or at best but ill retained in the most exact descriptions? I do |