EDITOR'S TABLE. 



555 



The great trouble is, says President 

 Eliot, that our popular education is not 

 really conducted in such a way as to 

 develop intelligence. It teaches children 

 to read (after a fashion), to spell, to 

 write, and to cipher ; it also imparts a 

 little knowledge of geography ; but none 

 of these things, as commonly taught, 

 calls into activity in any adequate man- 

 ner those powers on the due exercise of 

 which the growth of intelligence de- 

 pends — the power of observing facts, 

 the power of accurately and faithfully 

 recording facts, the power of reasoning 

 correctly in regard to facts. Nor is any 

 sufficient practice given in the impor- 

 tant art of composition or correct ex- 

 pression in writing. To give a proper 

 training in the observation of facts some 

 brancli of natural science or some kind 

 of handicraft should be taught. At pres- 

 ent whatever quickness of observation 

 children acquire is acquired in connec- 

 tion with their sports ; and their school 

 studies lack vitality and effect simply 

 because the element of original observa- 

 tion has no part in them. To make an 

 observation of one's own in regard to 

 any matter is to gain at once an inter- 

 est in that matter, and in all probability 

 to prepare the way for other observa- 

 tions. While we agree with President 

 Eliot that some branch of natural sci- 

 ence or some " well-conducted work 

 with tools or machines " furnishes the 

 best means of developing the observing 

 faculty, we also agree with him in holding 

 that almost any line of study may, in the 

 hands of a competent teacher, be turned 

 to good account for the same purpose. 

 As he rightly observes, one teacher will 

 get better results out of one subject and 

 another out of another. Geography, 

 which, "as commonly taught, means 

 committing to memory a mass of curi- 

 ously uninteresting and unimportant 

 facts," may, under proper treatment, 

 become a most stimulating study ; but, 

 in order that this may be the case, a 

 teacher is required who has a vivid ap- 

 prehension of the relation of geograph- 



ical facts to one another, and a clear 

 conception of the general relation of 

 physical to political geography. So with 

 language : it may be made a mere thing 

 of arbitrary rules or it may be exhibited 

 in its vital connection with thought, and 

 its structure and etymology made to 

 yield abundant exercise both for the ob- 

 serving and the analytical faculties. 



In the recording of facts opportunity 

 is given both for the cultivation of accu- 

 racy of statement and for the acquisition 

 of correct modes of expression. We do 

 not, indeed, see how first lessons in com- 

 position could be given with greater ad- 

 vantage than in connection with the 

 statement of facts observed by the pu- 

 pil. Every fact is observed under some 

 conditions of place, time, etc., and, in 

 the due setting forth of these, various 

 adverbial and other elements of a well- 

 developed sentence come into requisi- 

 tion. There is no point at which the 

 inefficiency of our higher schools has 

 been more apparent, or has given rise 

 to severer criticism, than in the matter 

 of composition ; and the reproach will 

 remain until the problem of its removal 

 is approached in a scientific spirit and 

 by scientific methods. Language is the 

 garb of thought, not a substitute for 

 thought, nor a thing to be acquired 

 and possessed independently of thought. 

 He alone can use language with free- 

 dom, certainty, and accuracy who is 

 conscicuis of needing for the expres- 

 sion of his thought all the words and 

 phrases that he employs. First catch 

 your thought and then array it suitably. 

 A lesson in language should therefore 

 always be a lesson in thinking; and 

 words, instead of appearing, as they so 

 often do in language lessons, as mean- 

 ingless superfluities, should be exhibit- 

 ed as essential for that communication 

 of our thoughts on which the whole 

 of our rational and social life depends. 

 Language lessons in the earlier stages 

 should always turn upon such words, 

 phrases, and narratives as actually relate 

 to the daily life of the child. Thought 



