THE PROBLEM OF EDUCATION in 



the institutions where our teachers learn their trade 

 as far as possible " training " colleges as their 

 name indicates and not centres of education places 

 for the acquirement of book-learning rather than for 

 the development of character and the deepening of 

 spiritual insight emphasises the trend of national 

 development. Many of the students who issue 

 thence are only fitted to give the training in mental 

 gymnastics which they themselves have received ; they 

 are not capable, either by nature or by upbringing, 

 especially at the immature age when they have to 

 undertake these important functions, of exercising any 

 true educational influence on the children who pass 

 under their care. Nor does the life of arduous labour, 

 both as regards wearing physical stress and incessant 

 mental exertion, in a cramped atmosphere of super- 

 regulated discipline and official supervision, tend to 

 foster their subsequent mental growth, or make it 

 easy for them to appreciate and overcome the limita- 

 tions of their situation. 



It is the fault of the system far more than of the 

 teachers that so much of our English education fails to 

 accomplish its purpose ; and, until some radical alteration 

 can be effected in the aims and methods of instruction, 

 any increase of the time spent in school is likely to 

 accentuate the state of affairs we deplore. Be that as 

 it may, to students of sociology, the spinster influence, 

 divorced from the fuller knowledge, the riper ex- 

 perience that comes from personal contact with the 

 deepest mysteries and emotions of life, is a disquieting 

 feature of Western civilization, and seems j at present 



