SCIENCE TEACHING 305 



of nature -i^ -^^ -!' and not merely what has been said about them; a knowledge 

 of the laws of nature seen in special experiments and observed before they 

 were conceived in general terms * * * by such study of one or more depart- 

 ments of inductive knowledge the mind may escape from the thralldom 

 and illusion which reigns in the world of mere words," 



What then should form the basis and material of an educational sj^stem ? 

 ''Utility," "the demands of the Age," "The claims of the Past," "The 

 wants of the Future," have each been proposed. It is not a little interest- 

 ing to trace the growth of the view that the nature of the mind itself should 

 form such a basis, in the champion efforts of Comenius, Bacon, Eousseau, 

 Schopenhauer, Lankoster and Rosenkranz, down to our own Pestalozzi and 

 Froebel, It should be remembered that our theories of education and the 

 science of education are not necessarily synonymous terms. To this fact 

 theories must give room — the essential character of all knowledge is experi- 

 ential. The strength of this position is in part illustrated by the fact that 

 he who has never experienced bitterness, transjDarency or an electric shock, 

 for instance, can never receive from others more than their empty names. 

 This knowledge is absolutely incommunicable, and it is thus with all 

 knowledge, which an analj'sis of the character of knowledge abundantly 

 proves. We may point the way by which the pupil may acquire it, but to 

 communicate new truth is utterly impossible. "Hov/ then," says one, " are 

 we able to tell a person what he did not know?" We can not. He who is 

 able to understand or receive the proffered information must do so by mar- 

 shaling his past psychical experiences in the order mentioned by the in- 

 formant. Should it contain a single item or element that has not been ex- 

 periential with the learner, he is in the fog, and, no matter how great his 

 anxiety, utterly incapacitated to accept (understand) it. More important 

 than all other facts and stranger than any fiction does the bearing of this 

 truth have upon our educational system. The illustration and proof of 

 this position would lead us to consider the nature, office and certainty of 

 symbolic knowledge, which our time will not allow, but it may be satisfac- 

 torily wrought out by each individual teacher. Our conclusion, then, is 

 that the advancing knowledge of the pupil depends wholly upon psy- 

 chological experiences, and these in turn result only from physiological 

 ones. Beside the deep, safe and buoyant sea of presentation we lie strand- 

 ed, half wrecked upon the shoals of a so-called representative knowledge. 

 If science teaching should be made practical, where is the time for the 

 work? The time when a man can compass the whole field of human 

 knowledge is past, for there is scarcely a single department of study that 

 can be mastered by one individual. In the language of a great man (Ag.), 

 " We must bo contented to know little, but to know that little well." How- 

 ever, when we shall have lopped off that great mass of uselet-s stuff, the ac- 

 quirement of which neither brings discipline nor intelligence, we shall 

 have time to accomplish much. The most of our mental arithmetic drill 

 might very sensibly step down and out to make room for the elements of 



4 



