8o THE THIRD YEARBOOK 



tion. This lesson is taught as plainly and forcefully by the grass- 

 hopper, the mosquito, and the roadside weed as by the life of man. 

 This is the ground of the new morality, which, supported by modern 

 science, will furnish the ethical code for the twentieth century. 



The supreme test for the value of nature-study is now at hand. 

 For years teachers all over this country have bravely struggled to 

 get the children in touch with nature. Books have been written 

 by the score suggesting endless ways by which this may be done, 

 and detailing devices to make the study interesting and pleasant ; 

 and substantial ground has been gained. During this time many 

 burdens have been lifted from the pupils, and the teacher's work 

 has been greatly improved. But the period of diversion is approach- 

 ing an end. Not that the study of nature is to be less pleasant and 

 interesting, but its purpose is to be more serious, more definite, more 

 manifest. 



The task now set for the friends of nature-study is great. It is 

 not without deep-seated result that for centuries mankind has been 

 taught that the world and the flesh have been the joint partners of 

 the evil one. That nature-study can be a positive stimulus to the 

 moral nature of man is a proposition resisted by the prejudices deep- 

 rooted in the ignorance and bigotry of two thousand years. From 

 the standpoint of moral development, man at first feared nature as 

 something that was bent upon his eternal ruin ; then he despised 

 nature as a stifling incubus upon his spiritual life. Today he 

 regards nature as neutral and her teachings as irrelevant. This 

 false view has given rise to an equally false and utterly misleading 

 classification of studies in our curriculum, namely, the humanistic 

 and scientific. We may study man and the tree; but we must study 

 man. This partial view must always give undue precedence to the 

 so-called humanistic, to the corresponding detriment of the so-called 

 scientific ; whereas in the not distant future we shall find through 

 the study of nature a proper evaluation of the so-called humanistic 

 studies. It will be according to new standards of morality set up 

 by a study of nature, that the true worth of all studies will be 

 determined. When this is done, all studies will be humanistic. As 

 long as the ancient, but now almost obsolete, dualistic conception 

 of man's nature prevailed ; as long as man the spiritual being was 

 set over against man the carnal being, so long has the house been 

 divided against itself. But through the study of nature — of life, 



