304 SCIENCE TEACHING. 



thino- defined should precede the definition ; that a knowledge of the relation 

 of facts should antedate their form of presentation ; and that conceptions, 

 standing out in clear relief, should precede an opinion. Not long hence will 

 our text books be founded upon the fact that education is the development 

 of faculties by use, rather than upon the theory that the mind is an elastic 

 receptacle that will indefinitely expand according to the quantity of finished 

 knowledge poured into it. The best that instruction can afford, and the 

 aim with which it should be given, is, first of all, to cultivate the powers of 

 observation, analysis, comparison and judgment ; second, method of investi- 

 gation • third, knowledge. Such a course of teaching impels the student to 

 examine an object before him, instead of what some authority saj^s about it ; 

 to consult his own good sense and experience, and to rely upon his powers 



the same powers which he will daily use through life — instead of consign- 



ino- them to the purleius fear and distrust. 



Knowledge ! knowledge ! is the cry upon all hands, and teachers every- 

 where are more diligent in imparting it than in developing the "muscle and 

 brain" with which the pupil may acquire it for himself. So wild and great 

 is the rush for knowledge, that we have overlooked the psychological con- 

 ditions of its acquirement, and now find ourselves buried in the exclusive 

 study of books and drawing pictures, dignifying the work by such express- 

 ions as "teaching botany," "teaching zoology." The great want of educa- 

 tional system is method and not knowledge. The old adage that "knowl- 

 edge is power" has rightly been called false, for it is perfectly true that only 

 so much of knowledge, that has been gained by the' natural processes of 

 acquisition, involving the use of faculties, is power. Teaching for the 

 sake of knowledge is the work of the crammer, i.nd it is too common that 

 solid acquirements are measured, not by the capacity to comprehend, apply, 

 and originate, but to recite by the yard. Cram has been very aptl}^ defined 

 by an English lexicographer, as a species of intellectual feeding which is 

 neither preceded by aj)petite nor followed by digestion. The work of the 

 boy who wrote upon the board, "Bacon wrote the 'Novum organura' and 

 the ' Instrationara Magna,' " is daily equaled at the cramming feasts where 

 are served up such dishes as abridgement, appositive, future perfect, aux- 

 iliary, recurrence, definitive, trochaic, intransitive and subsequent. The 

 time is fast approaching when the common school will teach the use of the 

 Eno-lish language, leaving its technical details and abstract philosophy to- 

 the maturer minds in the higher schools of the States. 



In support of the above views, let me read from the pen of Dr. Whewell, 

 "The most obvious method of affecting this discipline of mind =i= >i^ >i« is the 

 exact and solid study of some portion of inductive knowledge as botany, 

 geology, comparative anatomy and chemistry. But I say the exact and solid 

 knowledge ; not a mere verbal knowledge, but a knowledge that is real in 

 its character though it may be elementary and limited in its extent. The 

 knowledge of which I speak must be a knowledge of things and not merely 

 the names of things; an acquaintance with the operations and productionSv 



