238 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



"We ought to recognise that the real struggle in which this war 

 is only an episode, is not merely between our own country and any- 

 thing so unstable and transitory as modern Germany, but between 

 permanent and irreconcilable claimants for the soul of man, and 

 that what makes the German spirit dangerous is not that it is alien, 

 but that it is horribly congenial to almost the whole modern world. 

 For the spirit of German Imperialism is too often the spirit of English 

 and American industrialism, with all its cult of power as an end in itself, 

 its coarse material standards, its subordination of personality to 

 mechanism, its worship of an elaborate and soul-destroying organisa- 

 tion And if we feel that the absolute claim of personality, 



the preservation and development of spiritual freedom, are worth 

 any sacrifice in time of war, we ought equally to feel that they are 

 worth any sacrifice in time of peace." The first step towards educa- 

 tional reform is, he believes, to recognise that our attitude towards 

 education was wrong, that we are not to commend it because it is 

 commercially profitable, or leads to commercial success or will be 

 "our principal w^eapon in the coming commercial war." 



Yet the view which this officer repudiates is perilously likely 

 to be the result of the work of the "many educators (who) are per- 

 suaded that the real objects of education, primary, secondary and 

 higher, are first cultivation of the powers of observation through the 

 senses, secondly training in receiving correctly the accurate observa- 

 tions made, both on paper and on the retentive memory, and thirdly 

 training in reasoning partly from the premises thus secured and from 

 cognate facts held in the memory or found in print." {Atlantic 

 Monthly March, 1917). If this were to cover all the aims of education 

 there is no guarantee that the next generation would not be simply 

 super-efficient in the most deadly meaning of that term. Not a 

 word is said there as to the ability of the person to choose for himself 

 worthy ideals in life, nor of the necessity of a disciplined character 

 with which to follow the ideals of one's choice. But that the definition 

 is not complete is proved by this later remark, "The highest human 

 interests are concerned with religion, government and the means of 

 supporting and improving a family." This carries us forward to a 

 really "practical" education. We must consider the complete man- 

 hood of our citizens. How are we to raise our standards and get them 

 adopted by ever widening circles ? How are we to create a more 

 intelligent democracy ? Average men and women, who have displayed 

 such heroism and endurance and who have laboured so unselfishly 

 to save the commonwealth, will be deemed worthy of better things 

 from the State, science will be called in to ameliorate their lot, educa- 

 tion will widen its scope and open up new realms for them so that they 



