248 Education through Nature 



freighted with ideas that can be had by gathering 

 words. The word centrosome can give no idea of 

 what the centrosome really is. A word means nothing 

 to us unless we are able to put an idea into it. To 

 the biological investigator, the following combination 

 of articulate sounds or symbols means a great deal, 

 because he has gained through experience the ideas 

 for which the words stand: "The equal splitting of 

 the chromosomes in caryokinesis, and the position of 

 the centrosome of the aster at the end of the spindle, 

 in the maturation of the ovum of Ascaris megalocephala, 

 point to the latter as dynamic centers whereby the 

 hereditary qualities are equally distributed." To a 

 child, this means nothing. Ideas do not come from 

 language, but language grows out of ideas. Hence 

 the idea before the word. 



The Use of Language. In using language, as in 

 conversation or as in reading a book, do we actually 

 gain new ideas or do we merely put into language the 

 thoughts derived from our own experience? The 

 popular conception is that, by reading a book or re- 

 peating the words and committing them to memory, 

 the idea for which the word stands, and hence the 

 thought of the book, must be ours also. The common 

 politician, who wishes to really reach his audience so 

 as to influence them in his behalf, does not proceed 

 on that assumption. He deals with images, figures, 

 ideas, and language that are common to the experience 

 of all. To tell people what they know already is to 

 be popular. To express new ideas in new terms is 

 to be unpopular. Ruskin once lamented before his 

 audience that instead of receiving what the speaker 

 had to say, his audience were only trying to discover 

 in what respects he was right and in what wrong. He 

 should have known that it was not only a proper but 

 the natural thing to do; for they were merely reading 

 into his words the ideas they already had, and judging 



