124 CREATIVE INVOLUTION 



lacks observation, sees things as a whole and is blind 

 to distinctions. They become nervous and " fall 

 down " in examinations because they have learned to 

 do team-thinking. In later life they make syco- 

 phants and demagogues, inasmuch as they are but 

 fitted to take what place they may in the great com- 

 munity. The class-mind is likewise accountable for 

 the fact that the " best students " usually amount to 

 little in after life they are the ones most plastic 

 to suggestion and consequently leave school with 

 correspondingly diminished individuality. Unless a 

 place is made for them in the world of affairs, they 

 rarely secure one. 



That this evil has fallen upon our day and coun- 

 try is not ascribable to teacher or parent, or above 

 all to the children. A more conscientious, able body 

 of people than the teachers of our public schools 

 does not exist ; instruction has never been better than 

 to-day. The young people are innately as earnest 

 and anxious to meet life efficiently as their parents 

 or grandparents were. With the scientific advance- 

 ment in all lines, the influences making for mental 

 quickening have greatly increased. Parents are 

 taking a more vital, because a more intelligent, in- 

 terest in the education of their children than did 

 their ancestors. The spiritual and ethical influ- 

 ences are more potent for the upbuilding of char- 

 acter than in former times, notwithstanding the 

 crumbling of old beliefs. Search as we may else- 



