TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION L. 361 



These points are met in what is known as ' Scouting,' a training which has 

 evolved itself from the child's point of view rather than that of the tea.cher. 



Woodcraft with Nature-lore is its key-activity. 



The training is adapted to the psychological stages of the adolescent life in 

 the Wolf Cubs, Scouts, and Rovers. 



Individuality is developed and then harnessed for the betterment of the 

 community. 



'2. Discussion upon Fundamentoil Principles in Education, opened by 

 Professor A. N. Whitehead, F.R.S. : — 



All education is the development of genius. Genius is the divine instinct 

 for creation, incident throughout life, a certain quality of first-handedness 

 accompanying and directing activity. An education mainly devoted to the 

 development of genius is the best education for eliciting common sense. The 

 three factoi's of genius are the habit of action, the vivid imagination, and 

 the discipline of judgment. Criticism is the antagonist of genius, though it 

 is essential for the discipline of judgment. The function of criticism is the 

 education of genius by the aid of knowledge. 



The acquisition of knowledge is the ultimate substratum of education. Know- 

 ledge and genius are the twin factors of effective personality, and the true 

 ultimate problem before the educator is liow to impart knowledge so as to 

 stimulate genius. 



A curriculum should start with obvious relevancy, and should progressively 

 widen as the field of relevancy expands — the subject-matter of early education 

 should issue quickly in securing some definite acquirement. The stimulus of 

 success is essential for any broad effectiveness of culture. 



Literary education is of overwhelming importance. Language is essential. 

 The study of language has importance, relevancy, and the certainty of a large 

 measure of success. You can only spoil its effect by one procedure — namely, 

 by teaching a language which the pupils can never acquire, will never want 

 to use, and which is the vehicle of a literature whose relevancy is only imme- 

 diately obvious to a mature mind. You must not go on to a dead language 

 until a modern languao;e has gripped the imagination. Classical learning is 

 the superstructure of a literary education, not the foundation. Classical learning 

 has had its chance with the well-to-do class, and has failed — failed to impress 

 on them that learning should mould life, a failure which originates in a lack 

 of relevancy in the subject-matter of education. The technical triumphs of 

 science in war and in industry have startled English thought back into 

 sanity, for it is sanity to believe in the importance of knowledge. Learning 

 is not advocated for the sake of mere utility, but utility for the sake of learning. 

 Knowledge should proceed from the concrete to the abstract. General educa- 

 tion, the basis of culture, should be compact of material which will enter into 

 the habitual lives of its recipients, a doctrine which applies alike to language, 

 literature, history, natural science, and to mathematics. Beyond this general 

 education every educated person should push on to a specialism dominated by 

 finer theory and by subtler ideas — for one it may be Greek, another scientific 

 theory, for another mathematics. There can be no complete education without 

 specialism, but classical specialism is not general culture. 



It is the demand of genius that it lives its own life in its own way. It is 

 the function of education to supply criticism and knowledge. 



The one fundamental principle of education — that the pupils are alive, and 

 not mere portmanteaus to be neatly packed. 



Fundamental Principles of 'Education; The Literary Aspect of the 

 Question. By P. S. Peeston, MA. 



The word ' humanistic ' is purposely avoided as being applicable to any subject 

 studied for its own sake. The object of a general education is not merely to 

 acquire knowledge, nor to provide a man with a commercial asset, still less to 

 beetow the label ' qualified ' as the result of an examination test, but to produce 



