Many of our predecessors in the academic world, touched by the quality of their education, have devised plans for educating the young. One of these plans sets forth a curriculum that has been called impractical, idealistic, even impossible. And perhaps it is—and that may be a good reason for reviewing it. Despite its impracticalities, it is a reminder of the ideals of education held by the Renaissance and by the Enlightenment as well. A review of it should be an encouragement to use what we have learned in the best and most benevolent way. For this curriculum illustrates a noble attempt to bring about the attainment of a liberal education—an education that had two goals, one Hebraic, one Greek: first, "to repair the ruins of our first parents by regaining to know God aright" and thus restoring us to a close relationship with Him; and second, to fit "a man to perform justly, skillfully, and magnanimously, all the offices, both private and public, of peace and of war." According to John Milton, the great intellect among our poets, to secure these goals would constitute "a complete and generous education," one that joins the ideals of private conduct and public service.