642 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



factors in the upward world-movement which saves us from 

 the stagnation of the relentless law of habit. 



But habits, like systems, have their good side. They enable 

 us to do a vast number of actions with the minimum of attention 

 and the least expenditure of nervous energy. Education consists 

 largely, as has been said, in making habitual as many good ac- 

 tions as possible. The training of domestic animals is purely the 

 formation of good habits ; the training of children is largely so. 

 Every time we form a good association and send it down into the 

 region of the unconscious, we practice mental economy. Habits, 

 therefore, are at the same time our salvation and our damnation. 

 This is the great dilemma in education. Extremists like Rous- 

 seau, impressed with the danger of habits, condemned them all 

 outright. Perhaps we may say that it is the abuse of habits, the 

 falling into fatal ruts, that constitutes our prevailing sin. 



The laws of prejudice that we have examined naturally sug- 

 gest one or two questions. Is there any escape from this narrow- 

 ing of mind that accompanies the hardening of the brain ? If not, 

 are there any pedagogical principles the application of which in 

 educational systems may retard the involution and hasten the 

 evolution movement ? It is not my purpose to attempt to answer 

 these questions here ; but, if the first one must be answered in the 

 negative, the latter may certainly be answered in the affirmative. 

 Our psychological principles have already shown us the direction 

 in which the solution of this problem must be sought. There 

 must be persistent emphasis of the objective factor of knowledge. 

 The senses, the primal source of all our. knowledge, must be kept 

 open and alert. This is vastly more difficult than at first appears. 

 The man prejudiced by his interests has his eyes and ears open, 

 and yet, being open, they are shut. More than twenty centuries 

 ago an old Greek philosopher said, " Eyes and ears are bad wit- 

 nesses to men having rude souls." To escape mental bias, we 

 must not only have our senses open to the outer world, but we 

 must apperceive this world as it is, not as warped by our receptive 

 faculties. But, however excellent this advice, it is as impossible 

 for us with minds already formed to follow it as to see the ultra 

 red or violet colors with our eyes constituted as they are. The 

 remedy is to be found in education, especially of the young. For- 

 tunately, we live in an epoch of objective education. The training 

 of the senses, thanks to the labors of Rousseau, Pestalozzi, Froebel, 

 and their disciples, and thanks to the retroactive influence of 

 the physical sciences, is now the great central thought in peda- 

 gogical systems. Unfortunately, it is still too largely theory and 

 too little practice. In our primary as well as in our secondary 

 schools we slip back too easily into the lazy scholastic, deductive 

 methods. The tendency, however, is the other way. 



