702 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Again, schools and education, technically so called, are not the 

 antecedent but the consequent of progress. The men who have been 

 most successful in penetrating the secrets of Nature and solving the 

 problems of society have been in advance of any school. The educa- 

 tion of these men has not been for mental discipline ; they have studied 

 to find the truth, and an incident of that study has been discipline. 

 Whence came that discipline which rendered schools possible ? Not 

 from disciplinary studies, certainly. It came in the study of sur- 

 rounding conditions, with the view to bring those conditions into 

 conformity with what was deemed personal or social well-being. Men- 

 tal discipline had then the same relation to human activity that it 

 has now. Until schools were created, all study was in the direction 

 of real or apparent utility ; all study outside of the schools is at pres- 

 ent for knowledge or utility. 



That is, the law of education has been and is now, that mental 

 discipline is the incident and not the end of study. Hence the con- 

 clusion, study what is most useful, and the resulting discipline will 

 be most valuable. 



We see the same truth in another aspect when we observe that the 

 highest mental and physical power is attained in efibrts to discover, 

 measure, and control the forces around us. A language is never so 

 easily or so well learned as when our personal comfort depends upon 

 its use. The hand and eye of the hunter are never so thoroughly dis- 

 ciplined as when he knows that at any moment his life may depend 

 on the accuracy of his aim. The mathematics have been invented to 

 measure the relations of things in common life, or to investigate the 

 less apparent relations. 



I cannot forbear here to point out, further, that the truth in regard 

 to mental discipline appears to be a universal truth or law of human 

 activity, perhaps of all activity. Discipline is an incidental result of 

 right exercise. In accordance with this truth are developed and dis- 

 ciplined the religious, intellecti;al, physical, social indeed, every fac- 

 ulty and capacity within us. This law recognized, and science and 

 philosophy will force us to accept the best truths of religion those 

 truths which take man out of himself, make him forgetful of himself, 

 and teach him that he does most for himself who does most for others. 

 Upon such a general truth appears to rest the proposition that we 

 should study for utility for utility in its widest and best sense and 

 not for discipline. In the light of this truth we recognize the dead 

 languages all languages the mathematics, as but the means, the 

 machinery of an education. Resting on experience, they direct us to 

 new experience. These are the glass through which we may see 

 something of ourselves and the universe. Why waste half our lives 

 in studying the glass under pretense of disciplining our eyes, when 

 our eyes would be better disciplined by studying Nature beyond ? 

 Better still to break through all barriers, and study things them- 



