Education as a Factor in Civilization. 253 



work. If it be true that the tree is known by its fruit, 

 we may well believe that the leaves of this tree are for 

 the healing of the nations whose people are cast upon our 

 shores by every breaking wave of the Atlantic. 



In every age education has been the outgrowth of the 

 social conditions of the time, and educational ideals are 

 always in accordance with the beliefs and principles by 

 which nations are controlled. Civilization is but a contin- 

 ual series of shifting conditions in need of constant organ- 

 ization and re-adjustment. It would be strange if this fact 

 did not impose upon us the necessity for frequent examina- 

 tions of our standards and re-arrangement in our methods 

 of reaching them. But we are not to assume that the old 

 methods were wholly wrong, or that new ones must neces- 

 sarily be altogether right. The truth of Plato and of Paul 

 is no less true than is that of Darwin and of Spencer. We 

 are to prove all things, holding fast only that which is good, 

 and rejecting even that when clearer light or broader out- 

 look discloses something better still. Man is studying the 

 alphabet of science and of ethics, and has not even begun 

 to spell the first syllable of the sentences in which here- 

 after he may write out a little of their glory and their 

 grandeur. He has exultingly seized upon Jove's own 

 thunderbolts, a triumph which brings need of yet further 

 knowledge lest they compass his own destruction. But to 

 the evolutionist, though he does not thereby justify himself 

 in any relaxation of individual influence or effort, no im- 

 patience or discouragement is possible. He will judge not 

 absolutely but relatively, and be in no danger of hurrying 

 to lame and impotent conclusions from overlooking the pro- 

 portions of things or the relation of causes to effects ; 

 realizing that the present is the outcome of the past and 

 that the present alone can make or mar the future, he will 

 study that past to learn what plans and methods have been 

 failures, and Avhy ; what others have proved successful and 

 the reasons for the success ; reading history not merely as 

 a record of past events, but as the crystallization of the 

 longings and endeavors of the race for a higher condition, 

 and with the profoundest faith that what man has become 

 is but an earnest of the better man he is to be. 



