Concerning another book on the course, a critic says:
“As a close student of the classics for years past, I must say that I think there is very little scholarship displayed or employed in Prof. Wilkinson’s work on Greek literature.… Further, the arrangement is senseless, even harmful. Literature is a growth, and largely the reflex of the people’s life and thought. It must then be treated historically, and not in the topsy-turvy fashion of Prof. Wilkinson.”
The same writer proposed another series of works on ancient Greek literature, as a substitute for the two volumes of Prof. Wilkinson. The series he proposed, however, contained an amount of matter which would prove utterly discouraging to our readers and which would cost ten times as much as the more condensed work of Dr. Wilkinson. Besides all this, the work of Dr. Wilkinson meets the object of the C. L. S. C.
When one gets into the world of criticism, he finds himself among “doctors” who “disagree.” I have quoted one view of Dr. Wilkinson’s text-books, presented by our unknown critic. Now for another. Dr. Howard Crosby, of New York, a most finished scholar and close critic, and a judge of both English and Greek literature, says: “Dr. Wilkinson’s Greek course is clear, attractive, judicious in its treatment of the subject, and fills a valuable place in literature.” Of the second volume, the same scholar says: “The new volume is thoroughly attractive. It is fully up to the high standard of the other.” Such commendation as this sustained our earliest judgment of the works in question. Prof. Frieze, of the Latin Department of the University of Michigan, says: “I have not yet seen the ‘Preparatory Latin Course in English,’ though I was favored with a copy of the Greek. I have only to say that if the Latin equals the Greek it can not fail to be a contribution to classical culture both for classical and English scholars, of very great value. I have been delighted with a perusal of Prof. Wilkinson’s critical notices, his own translations, and his selections of the translations of others, and I sincerely congratulate him on the admirable style in which he has presented the matter, as well as the character of the matter itself, and the plan of the whole work.”
Prof. A. C. Kendrick, D.D., head of the Department of Greek in the University of Rochester, says:
“The plan of the work is quite unique, yet certainly adapted to the wants of a large and increasing class of young persons in our country. Its execution seems to me very felicitous; it is marked by the taste and scholarship which were to be expected from its accomplished author.”
Dr. Alvah Hovey, President of the Theological Institution, writes to Dr. Wilkinson:
“In these latter days I do not often read a volume through from beginning to end without omitting a chapter, paragraph, or sentence. But I have read in this way your ‘Preparatory Greek Course,’ simply because it is so instructive and captivating a volume that I could not persuade myself to pass over any word of it unread.”
The Rev. A. P. Peabody, D.D., LL.D., late of Harvard University, writes:
“I have looked through Mr. Wilkinson’s ‘Preparatory Greek Course in English,’ and am prepared to give it my warmest commendation. It supplies a need which is more and more felt from year to year, for two reasons, one for which I rejoice, the higher standard of culture that prevails in society at large; the other, inevitable, yet to me a subject of regret, the diminishing disposition on the part of well-educated people to study the classical languages.”