684 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



the essential principle of memory; and it is particularly apj)lica- 

 ble to the automatic memory, upon which, as already said in sub- 

 stance, the teaching of the symbolic subjects must depend. The 

 object is to have thought spontaneously suggested by symbols, 

 with no conscious attention upon the symbols themselves ; and, 

 of course, there is the co-ordinate purpose to acquire power to 

 use the means of expression automatically to convey thought. 

 Neither of these objects may be secured if the learning of forms 

 is divorced from their constant use in the ready acquisition and 

 clear conveyance of thought ; which, when applied to the work of 

 the schoolroom, means that the study of arithmetic, language, 

 grammar, or the mechanics of reading, writing, and drawing, 

 apart from their natural connections with the pursuit of the con- 

 tent subjects, history, literature, science, and geography is a mis- 

 take. Common sense maintains, in everyday life at least, that 

 the mechanism necessary to the performance of any art may be 

 most advantageously acquired through actual practice of the art ; 

 and one never learns the mechanics of bicycle-riding, baseball- 

 playing, typewriting, and similar arts before he begins to ride the 

 bicycle, play ball, or use the typewriter ; but he acquires skill in 

 doing these things by applying himself to their execution at the 

 outset. A child at its mother's knee learns to talk by talking, 

 and to walk by walking, rather than in either case to acquire 

 beforehand the theory and mechanics of each in the hope to ap- 

 ply them some time later in life. But common sense, which has 

 always been slow in carrying its philosophy of the activities of 

 daily life into the work of the schoolroom, is just now beginning 

 it seems to appreciate in a way that what is true concerning the 

 mastery of the mechanics of doing things in daily life applies also 

 to the formal subjects of education, in the sense that they may be 

 most serviceably acquired in an incidental manner, while using 

 them, continually to acquire and express thought aroused by the 

 study of real things. It is, no doubt, necessary to have much 

 drill upon these formal things to make their use automatic ; but 

 this drill must follow and depend upon the use of the symbolic 

 subjects in the study of the real subjects at any time rather than 

 to aim at mastering a body of forms which may be applied at 

 some future period. 



From the foregoing (and there are other arguments, such as 

 the greater interest which the pupil will have in the study of the 

 formal subjects when they are thus connected with the real sub- 

 jects, which can not be entered into here) it may be concluded 

 that the formal branches of instruction acquire a value from 

 their connection with the study of content subject-matter; and 

 taught by themselves they are, comparatively speaking, empty 

 and valueless. What has been said of the symbolic studies may 



