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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



sodden in ignorance, and living lives 

 of children or savages amid the light 

 of a scientific age. 



THE USES OF EDUCATION. 



We fear that, with all the alleged 

 improvements that are being intro- 

 duced into the methods of education, 

 the true end of education is being 

 more and more lost sight of. The 

 idea that education is essentially a 

 preparation for money-making is, it 

 seems to us, gradually taking com- 

 plete possession of the popular con- 

 sciousness. It is needless to say 

 that this was not the ancient ideal. 

 To-day we look upon arithmetic as 

 indispensable for the earning of a 

 living. Plato, as Oscar Browning 

 remarks in his little book on Edu- 

 cational Theories, considered it " as 

 the best spur to a sleepy and unin- 

 structed spirit." Admitting that the 

 modern view must be recognized, 

 why should not the more elevated 

 ancient view be recognized as well ? 

 But what child is made aware to-day 

 that in studying arithmetic he is 

 doing more than acquiring an instru- 

 ment by which afterward money 

 may be made ? There is just as 

 much need to rouse sleepy spirits 

 now as there ever was ; and there 

 are more sleepy spirits than ever to 

 be roused. We fear the arithmetic 

 of the public schools is not doing as 

 much to rouse them as might be de- 

 sired, and the reason may partly be 

 that the higher intellectual and 

 moral uses of the study are not kept 

 sufficiently in view. 



In the Greek scheme of education 

 "reading" (we quote from Mr. Brown- 

 ing) " was taught with the greatest 

 pains ; the utmost care was taken 

 with the intonation of the voice and 

 the articulation of the throat." If 

 anything of the kind were proposed 

 to-day, objection would at once be 

 raised that such training of the ear 



and vocal organs might be very use- 

 ful, and pecuniarily profitable, to a 

 youth who was going to be a pro- 

 fessional elocutionist, but that for 

 others it would be a waste of time. 

 So with the study of modern lan- 

 guages : their utility is recognized in 

 so far as they may be required for 

 business purposes, and perhaps for 

 actual use in foreign travel. That 

 they may become a source of re- 

 fined intellectual pleasure by extend- 

 ing one's survey of the development 

 and differentiation of thought is, to 

 say the least, not an everyday con- 

 ception. Geography is, of course, 

 regarded as an essentially commer- 

 cial study, not as one that ought to 

 liberalize the mind by removing ig- 

 norance in regard to foreign coun- 

 tries, and creating a sense of the kin- 

 ship of the whole human race. 



Even in our higher seats of learn- 

 ing the ultra-practical or technical 

 view of the use of education more or 

 less prevails. In an excellent article 

 by Mr. Irving Babbit, in a recent 

 number of the Atlantic Monthly, we 

 read that " one of the first things 

 that struck M. Brunetiere on coming 

 into contact with our university life 

 was the predominance of purely ana- 

 lytical scholarship — a predominance 

 which he attributes to an excessive 

 imitation of German models. He 

 even agreed with the opinion ex- 

 pressed by one of the Harvard pro- 

 fessors, that several of our great 

 universities are in danger of degen- 

 erating into mere technical schools 

 as a result of losing hold on the old 

 humanistic ideal." 



The humanistic ideal is founded 

 on the old truth which, in a manner, 

 we still profess to believe, that " the 

 life is more than meat, and the body 

 than raiment." According to that 

 ideal, the business of education is to 

 enable a human being to enter on 

 full possession of all his faculties, 

 in order that, so far as possible, he 



