O THE FOOD CRISIS AND AMERICANISM 



question. Gustave LeBon, one of the most profound 

 of French thinkers, in discussing the French school 

 system, among other things, says : " Nobody has ever 

 maintained that well-directed instruction may not give 

 very useful practical results." ..." The acquisition 

 of knowledge for which no use can be found is a sure 

 method of driving a man to revolt." Continuing, he 

 says : " In a recent work, a distinguished magistrate, 

 Adolphe Guillot, made the observation that at present 

 three thousand educated criminals are met with for 

 every one thousand illiterate delinquents, and that in 

 fifty years the criminal percentage of the population 

 has passed from two hundred twenty-seven to five hun- 

 dred fifty- two for every one hundred thousand inhab- 

 itants, an increase of 133 per cent. He also noted in 

 common with his colleagues that criminality is par- 

 ticularly on the increase among young persons, for 

 whom, as is known, gratuitous and obligatory school- 

 ing has in France replaced apprenticeship." He 

 then cites similar experience in China, as well as edu- 

 cation in India, under English rule. LeBon further 

 says : " It is evidently too late to retrace our steps. 

 Experience alone, that supreme educator of peoples, 

 will be at pains to show us our mistake. It alone will 

 be powerful enough to prove the necessity of replacing 

 our odious text-books and our pitiable examinations 

 by industrial instruction capable of inducing our young 

 men to return to the fields, to the workshop, . . , 

 which they avoid to-day at all costs." 



If in France, with but one language, one nationality, 

 all inheriting the same history, traditions, habits of 

 thrift and industry, with no influx of foreigners, they 



