162 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXVI. No. 658 



ley car. This very modern invention is 

 commonly referred for its beginnings to 

 the electric railway first operated at Rich- 

 mond, Virginia, in 1888. But it appears 

 that that undertaking had a forerunner, 

 and that forerunner in its turn had a pro- 

 totype, and the successful American in- 

 ventor is found to be only the topmost fig- 

 ure of a human pyramid, made up of no 

 one knows how many experimenters in this 

 particular field. The Patent Office has dif- 

 ficulty enough in distinguishing each new 

 invention from its patented predecessors. 

 But when we go aside from the series of 

 formal patents and look to the succession 

 and mingling of motives and ideas, the 

 tangle passes our ability to unravel. We 

 can only see how inextricably the stroke 

 of individual initiative is enmeshed in the 

 movements of a whole people, and that 

 very complication we find it a delight to 

 contemplate. 



Now, this social character of all inven- 

 tion appears in a peculiarly vital way in 

 any original work in education. For edu- 

 cation in a special sense not only springs 

 from the people, but in turn -creates the 

 people from which it springs. Education 

 is its own father. An over-emphasis on 

 individuality in education would quickly 

 carry us away from the line of direct suc- 

 cession. It would give us isolation and 

 sterility instead of recreating the spiritual 

 life of the race. 



One can not add too quickly that in the 

 nature of things the danger of a dead lack 

 of individuality is usually a more threaten- 

 ing danger. But let us at once get down 

 to our examples. To begin with, we may 

 take the kindergarten. There has hardly 

 been a more distinct and conspicuous inven- 

 tion in the whole history of schools. It is 

 a thoroughly conscious and modern work 

 of art, in which the personal agency of the 

 inventor comes to the fore. That is the 



very weakness of the invention. To this 

 day it has not been assimilated. In our 

 educational concert it is a voice that sweet- 

 ly sings in tune but that refuses to blend 

 with other voices of the chorus. There 

 may be different explanations of this 

 lack of accord. It may be that the indi- 

 vidual note is permanently at variance 

 with anything that can be made universal. 

 Or it may be that the kindergarten is mere- 

 ly in advance of the age and will bring the 

 rest of education round into adjustment 

 with itself. It seems pretty clear that both 

 explanations are in part correct. The 

 kindergarten, with certain other forces that 

 have worked toward similar ends, has 

 brought our elementary education a long 

 way toward its type of faith and practise. 

 Yet the emphasis on what is distinctively 

 Froebelian still keeps it a thing apart, and 

 seems likely to set a permanent limit to its 

 ascendency. 



It will appear from this reference to the 

 work of Froebel that we are not now con- 

 cerned simply or chiefly with those inven- 

 tions which bear the sharp stamp of one 

 man's individuality. It is a minor con- 

 sideration that the invention should be 

 known at all as the work of a single in- 

 ventor. Some of the most marked of im- 

 mediate successes and ultimate failures 

 have had that distinctive imprint. Such, 

 for example, was the monitorial system, in 

 the forms given to it by Joseph Lancaster 

 and Doctor Bell. Such a system may have 

 a large usefulness of its own in the course 

 of educational progress, but it is as scaf- 

 folding rather than as part of the perma- 

 nent structure. Its very insistence upon 

 that which is one man's makes it less fit to 

 serve the great needs of Everyman. 



So in varjdng degrees the educational in- 

 ventions of the ages combine the distinct 

 contribution of this or that inventor with 

 the broad tendencies of an inventive 



