ESSAYS 



SCIENCE IN EDUCATION (Prof. E. H. Starling, C.M.G., F.R.S.) 



Educational Shortcomings 



From a broad standpoint the present war is a struggle for existence between two 

 types of organised society. One, the autocratic, is based on the dominance of a 

 military caste ; in the other, the democratic, the chief power is represented by 

 public opinion. Comparing only Germany and England, some might say that the 

 struggle is really between two kinds of oligarchies, the one military and the other 

 aristocrat-capitalist : but it cannot be denied that while the success of the former 

 type would lead to a tightening of the bonds which hold the rest of the population 

 in check, a complete victory of England would preserve and enhance its power 

 of self-evolution, and would ensure the continuance of the process by which the 

 ultimate political power is transferred to the maximum number of the people. 

 In the one case we should see a strengthening of aristocratic rule, in the other 

 case a progressive democratisation of the system and form of government. 



In the struggle for existence, whether by peaceful commerce or by the methods 

 of war, an ever-increasing perfection of organisation is a necessary condition for 

 the survival of states as of animal types. There are some who believe that there 

 is an inherent disability in a democracy to secure the perfection of organisation, 

 the competence of the chiefs of public departments, the discipline and fitness of 

 all its members which are necessary to secure the efficiency of any state either in 

 peace or war. Germany's success during the first four years of the war might be 

 taken as a proof of superiority in her form of government, especially when her 

 material disadvantages and the relative weakness of her population are taken 

 into account. Even if she were able to secure a peace negotiated on equal terms 

 with her enemies, she would have gained much by the war. By her very existence 

 as a military state she would continue to impose a military form of government 

 on the democracies by which she is surrounded, and the main efforts of these 

 democracies for years to come would be directed to securing national safety by 

 continuing the competition in armaments and in military preparations which their 

 people found so heavy a burden before the war. 



But even if Germany had attained the peace which she desired — a peace which 

 would be victory for her and defeat for the Allies — the abstract question as to the 

 most efficient form of government would not be decided. The vast and ruthless 

 experiment which Fate has been enacting before our eyes is not what Scientific men 

 would call a " clean experiment," since the course of the struggle and the varying 

 fortunes of the two sides have not been determined by the nature of the govern- 

 ments involved. The Allies, including autocratic Russia, democratic England, 

 and republican France, had, as nations, neglected science and misconceived or 

 despised education ; while against them they had a state which, since the 

 time of Napoleon, has been imbued with the idea that education is the most 

 effective means of enhancing its power and prosperity. As a result we find that, 



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