GENERAL PRINCIPLES 



There are two, and only two, methods of education 

 in the world — the scientific method and the literary 

 method. All variations are easily classified in one or 

 the other of these two methods. The basis of the 

 scientific method, often called the new education, is 

 all nature and all art. The basis of the literary 

 method is books. Books constitute a very important 

 branch of art ; hence books are included for all they 

 are worth, in the scientific method. But wherever 

 books are made the basis of education, civilization 

 remains nearly stationary. This has been the condi- 

 tion of China for centuries, and of South America 

 from the earliest European settlements. Books can 

 never yield that kind of knowledge which has trans- 

 formed European and American civilization during 

 the last two hundred years. 



How did this broad wave of mental force which has 

 given us all modern civilization, originate ? What 

 are the principles on which it depends, and what are 

 the laws of its progress ? 



The men who accomplished this work prepared 

 themselves for it by reading a volume ever open to 

 us all, a book in which the letters are suns and 

 worlds, the forces which build the elements into living 

 forms, and all the varied phenomena of nature. They 



