54 
readily to good teaching. This peculiarity 
arises from the inherent human interest of 
the material it deals with, and by virtue of 
which it is easily possible to arouse the stu- 
dent to voluntary effort. The more I see 
of practical teaching the more I am con- 
vinced of the great influence that can be ex- 
erted by a teacher in this matter of stimu- 
lating the interest of students in his subject. 
Interest in one’s work is like a brilliant 
light ; it brings out numerous details that 
would be overlooked in the obscurer illu- 
mination that comes from an effort under 
compulsion or from a mere sense of duty, 
and by the same token the mental impres- 
sions produced under its influence are of a 
more enduring character. Real interest in 
one’s work leads to voluntary exertion and 
to a concentration of attention, both of 
which factors produce excellent results, as 
regards the subject under study as well as 
in the matter of exercising and developing 
the potential capacities of the brain. I 
should be willing to defend this thesis purely 
on physiological grounds, although it is 
scarcely necessary, perhaps, since it seems 
to be fully appreciated in modern methods 
of teaching, particularly in the instruction 
of the young. 
I am sure that those of us who are watch- 
ing the education of our children must be 
struck with this fact. In former times the 
teacher, from the beginning, was often a 
task master, driving us to unwelcome labor, 
and when interest on the part of the pupil 
flagged he stirred up the circulation in the 
organs of thought by external applications 
of the rod. Learning and the rod, to use 
an often-quoted simile, were nail and ham- 
mer. The method was effective; tempo- 
rarily, at least, it served as a means of con- 
centrating the mind on the work in hand, 
but from the physiological standpoint the 
rod is a crude instrument, ill-adapted to 
mental culture. In these happier days the 
teacher is more frequently a friend endeay- 
SCIENCE. 
(N.S. Vou. XIII. No. 315. 
oring by gentler means to arouse in his 
pupils a vivid personal interest in the sub- 
jects studied, and successful in his work in 
proportion to his ability to effect this result. 
In fact, I am inclined to believe that the 
power to interest his students in their work 
is the test of a good teacher. It makes no 
difference how well a teacher may know his 
subject, nor how skilled he may be in the 
technical side of his calling, if he has not 
sufficient enthusiasm and ingenuity to put 
life and attractiveness into his instruction 
he is not doing justice to his opportunities. 
No student is getting the full measure of 
information or mental discipline out of his 
course unless by the interest he takes in the 
subject, or by some other means, he has 
been led to exert himself voluntarily. I 
feel that this consideration is quite as im- 
portant in university instruction as in kin- 
dergarten teaching. I am convinced that 
every teacher should exert himself to devise 
legitimate means of arousing the interest of 
his student, upon the theory that they will 
thereby be led to think and meditate for 
themselves. It is for this reason, mainly, 
that in the natural sciences we make such 
extensive use of ocular demonstrations. It 
is not often that these demonstrations are 
really necessary to the comprehension of 
facts; their value, so it seems to me at 
least, lies mainly in this, that they stir the 
sluggish mind, they bring the brain into a 
condition of receptivity and activity in 
which it is at its best as a physiological 
mechanism. 
That this last statement is a matter of 
fact and not a mere figure of speech is in- 
dicated pretty clearly by laboratory experi- 
ments. It is well known to physiologists 
that mental exertion is accompanied by a 
greater flow of blood through the brain, and 
that, roughly speaking, the effectiveness and 
intensity of the brain work is proportional 
to the increase in the flow of blood. We 
have instruments in the laboratories by 
