TECHNICAL EDUCATION XVI 



such education may be a deadly mischief to the 

 workman, and lead to the rapid ruin of the indus- 

 tries it is intended to serve. 



I know that I am expressing the opinion of 

 some of the largest as well as the most enlightened 

 employers of labour, when I say that there is a real 

 danger that, from the extreme of no education, we 

 may run to the other extreme of over-education of 

 handicraftsmen. And I apprehend that what is 

 true for the ordinary hand-worker is true for the 

 foreman. Activity, probity, knowledge of men, 

 ready mother-wit, supplemented by a good know- 

 ledge of the general principles involved in his 

 business, are the making of a good foreman. If he 

 possess these qualities, no amount of learning will 

 fit him better for his position ; while the course of 

 life and the habit of mind required for the at- 

 tainment of such learning may, in various direct 

 and indirect ways, act as direct disqualifications 

 for it. 



Keeping in mind, then, that the two things to 

 be avoided are, the delay of the entrance of boys 

 into practical life, and the substitution of exhausted 

 bookworms for shrewd, handy men, in our works 

 and factories, let us consider what may be wisely 

 and safely attempted in the way of improving the 

 education of the handicraftsman. 



First, I look to the elementary schools now 

 happily established all over the country. I am not 

 going to criticise or find fault with them ; on the 



