Science in National Education 



between national ideals, have thrown themselves 

 with all their energy into the work of educational 

 reconstruction. The result of their efforts may 

 not be wholly to our taste, but we cannot disregard 

 them, because they are changing the emotional 

 and intellectual conditions of the world-struggle 

 in which we are compelled for sheer existence to 

 bear our part. It is well, therefore, to consider 

 whether the scientific movement, with its intel- 

 lectual and practical implications, has so far shifted 

 the centre of educational need as to open up a free 

 course for united progress in English education, 

 aside from the embarrassing controversies which 

 have for so long hampered our advance. 



May it not prove to have done so by making 

 two changes of far-reaching importance in our 

 point of view ? In the first place it has thrown 

 an entirely new emphasis upon the physical side 

 of education. We realise far more vividly than 

 heretofore the interdependence of mind on body, 

 the dangers of mal-nutrition in infancy, in child- 

 hood and in adolescence, and the vital importance 

 to the nation of securing the healthy physical 

 development of the young. Not long ago it was 

 possible for the elementary education question 

 to be discussed as if it were concerned only with 

 instruction and rudimentary mental discipline, with 

 manners thrown in. Now, through the influence 

 of scientific habits of thought, the physical aspect 

 of the problem is beginning to stand out in 

 strong relief. The evils of overcrowded homes, 

 of wrongly fed and underfed school children, and 



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