66 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XVI. No. 393. 



theoretical grouping so far as is established to 

 date, and they want this information in the 

 most easily assimilable form. They care not 

 a rap for the mind-training value of a text- 

 book. For their use it is a positive detriment 

 and hindrance. They require first a complete 

 if only a bare outline of the subject so that 

 they may know the extent of the ground 

 covered to date. Secondly, they want the 

 subject classified and carried as far in detail 

 as may be in one volume of convenient size. 

 Thirdly, they want full bibliographical notes 

 and a good index so that they may know 

 where to look for fuller details if needed for 

 their particular purposes. 



Such is the 'fact-book' needed by two large 

 classes in the community; the business man 

 who if ' successful ' has very little time (and 

 if unsuccessful still less), yet must keep as 

 far as possible abreast of scientific and 

 other progress, and, secondly, the work- 

 ing artisan who aims to improve his 

 present condition by learning facts, the 

 knowledge of which will enable him 

 at once to command better pay through added 

 ability to more intelligently apply the hand- 

 skill for which his wages are paid. 



A demand for this class of book is entirely 

 aside from and in addition to the school or 

 college text. Neither does the demand for it 

 cast any reflection on the need and value of 

 mind-training. Both the business man and 

 the arti"san need and would benefit by it if 

 they could secure it. The business man to- 

 day, more generally than ever before, has had 

 a collegiate training, but that fact does not 

 lessen his need of books from which to keep 

 up to date as to facts and discoveries with the 

 minimum of mental eilort. So too the work- 

 man would benefit vastly more if he could 

 have the mental training so that he might 

 have 'mind-skill' to sell, but as he cannot 

 secure the latter he has all the more need of 

 information of the kind he can use and that 

 presented in the simplest form. 



The college of to-day makes no pretense to 

 teach in the sense of imparting working in- 

 formation in any branch of study. In fact, 



while professing to train the mind it some- 

 times almost boasts that it does not furnish 

 the detailed information needed for money 

 winning. And widely as this fact is pro- 

 claimed, yet many, particularly poor boys, 

 fail t6 appreciate existing conditions, and 

 while their point of view may be wrong and 

 utterly unjust to their alma mater, they some- 

 times, after graduation, feel that they have 

 not received what they thought they were 

 paying for. 



A step in the evolution of education soon 

 to be taken, if not already begun in our tech- 

 nical schools, will be that of presenting the 

 known facts to the pupil with the minimum 

 of mental effort, and then training his mind 

 by a drill in applying the information to 

 practical problems in the shape these are pre- 

 sented in commercial life. When this course 

 shall be pursued in our colleges the gradu- 

 ate will have, in addition to a trained mind, 

 a fund of information of money-value to him 

 immediately on graduation. 



An attempt to supply the existing demand 

 for what we have called 'fact-books,' as 

 opposed to 'text-books,' is illustrated by 

 the series of books published by the 

 International Correspondence School of 

 Scranton, Pa., which, starting as a purely 

 commercial venture, now has an enrollment 

 of half a million scholars — mostly poor boys 

 and working men. Its books may not be the 

 ideal along the line suggested, neither are 

 they as, yet for sale except to their own stu- 

 dents, but the enoi-mous success of the school 

 and the books which it has had prepared seem 

 to indicate a 'want' and one attempt to meet 

 it. 



Another attempt might be considered as 

 that made by certain publishing houses, as in 

 Appleton's 'International Scientific Series' 

 and Putnam's 'The Science Series'; yet 

 valuable as are these books, they have not 

 been prepared to meet the exact requirements 

 to which attention has just been drawn. 



J. Stanford Brown. 



New York, N. Y., 

 April 5, 1902. 



