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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



healthy development of ideas. All edu- 

 cators acknowledge this, just as men in 

 general acknowledge the moral law ; but 

 how many of them live up to it ? How 

 many of them are willing to leave in 

 their pupils' minds liberal tracts of ig- 

 norance, acknowledged as such tracts 

 which might be cultivated, but which 

 are left fallow simply in order that the 

 mental powers may not be overtaxed 

 nor imagination unduly restrained ? We 

 venture to say that the cases are rare 

 in which an effort is not being made to 

 cultivate, as it were, every square inch 

 of mental territory, and call all the 

 strength of the intellect into exercise. 

 Each school or academy must teach so 

 many "branches"; it would never do 

 for one to omit what another has in 

 its curriculum ; and every pupil, if not 

 compelled, is urged to take up just as 

 many subjects as he or she can possibly 

 grapple with. The general, at least the 

 frequent, consequence is congestion, 

 confusion, enfeebled memory, impaired 

 judgment, lowered intellectual vitality. 

 Better far, in many cases, would it have 

 been if the child, with no education be- 

 yond reading and writing, had lived in 

 a concrete world and picked up, gradu- 

 ally, verifiable notions about real things. 

 There is nothing fortuitous in the fact 

 that so many men, eminent in various 

 departments of life, have had but the 

 most meager " educational advantages" 

 in their youth. It would seem as if the 

 one great " educational advantage " they 

 had was in getting free from so-called 

 education at a very early period and be- 

 taking themselves to the school of act- 

 ive life a school that leads up to ab- 

 stract truths only through multiplied 

 concrete examples; that leaves ample 

 space in the mind for useful ignorance, 

 and consequently makes all the better 

 provision for useful knowledge. 



There is much sound philosophy in 

 regard to education abroad in the world 

 to-day. What is needed is, that edu- 

 cators should be as wise in practice as 

 they are in theory. The labor of the 



gardener, every one knows, consists, to 

 a large extent, in "thinning out" his 

 crops. If a similar process could be 

 practiced on the minds of the young, 

 and if it were practiced, the evils of too 

 copious sowing would not be so great; 

 but, as the method is hardly applicable 

 to intellectual growths, teachers should 

 educate themselves up to the point of 

 sowing sparingly in order that they may 

 reap abundantly. The evil of too thick 

 sowing attains, we believe, greater pro- 

 portions in academies for young ladies 

 than anywhere else. There, nearly ev- 

 erything that is taught to boys enters 

 into the course of instruction, while 

 music and other " accomplishments," 

 together with an extra language or two, 

 are generally superadded. As if this 

 were not enough, a special acquaint- 

 ance with the literature, history, and 

 institutions of the ancient Jews, un- 

 tinged, however, by any touch of " mod- 

 eru criticism," is frequently also insisted 

 on. The effect of all this may be easily 

 imagined a spindly growth of rootless 

 ideas, habits of intellectual indifference, 

 a medley of incongruous notions in re- 

 gard to ill- apprehended facts; in a word, 

 a seriously injured, if not a fatally 

 ruined, intelligence. 



The intellectual signs of the times, 

 it should be remembered, are not all 

 favorable. We have such an educational 

 apparatus, for extent and scope at least, 

 as the world never saw before ; but the 

 results it is not easy to be enthusiastic 

 over the results. Where is the quick- 

 ened sense for evidence that we might 

 have expected to see ? Where the se- 

 riousness of intellectual aim? Where 

 the refinement of popular taste? Cant 

 seems to stalk abroad through the world 

 as potent an enslaver as ever of the 

 minds of men. Credulity is wide-spread. 

 Superstition still occupies its strong- 

 holds and rules over vast multitudes. 

 Faction controls our politics and legis- 

 lation is made a plaything. We have, 

 perhaps, expected too much of educa- 

 tion in the past ; but at least, if we un- 



