THE SPIRIT OF NATURE STUDY 69 



The honest desire for truth not only seeks to free it from 

 a fog bank of imagination, but also compels honest work. 

 Work that is part observation and part guess does not 

 satisfy. Of course if interest does not prompt, there is no 

 desire for the truth in reference to any particular exercise, 

 but, given enthusiasm, the real facts are discovered if they 

 are attainable. The same desire not only prompts to 

 honest work, but mounts over all sorts of obstacles to 

 secure it. It is not necessary to make things easy, but 

 only to assure that they are really there. A boy became 

 interested in the length of time a certain bird sat on its nest 

 to hatch eggs. He might have asked some one who knew, 

 or possibly he might have found the information in some 

 book, but he wanted the truth, and thought he was able to 

 discover it for himself. That involved daily trips to the 

 nest until the truth was discovered. Some would say 

 that the boy's time and energy might have been better 

 employed, but that is very doubtful. That particular fact 

 at that particular time was the most important thing for 

 that boy, and he labored to discover the truth in a perfectly 

 scientific way. The illustration is an extreme one, for the 

 boy was exceptional, but it illustrates the compelling 

 power of the desire for truth. 



There is reason to believe that such definite problems 

 can be used to great advantage at certain stages. This 

 does not mean problems in the university sense, but in the 

 school sense. It means the suggestion of a truth that may 

 be discovered by using a reasonable amount of time, effort, 

 and initiative. Children who have given symptoms of an 

 ability of this sort may well have problems of this kind 

 on hand, to be followed up on their own initiative. It is 



