22 NATURE STUDY AND LIFE 



about it more often detracts from its best appreciation 

 and enjoyment. 



You send for me to talk to you of art; and I have obeyed you 

 in coming. But the main thing I have to tell you is, — that art must 

 not be talked about. . . . Does a bird need to theorize about building 

 its nest, or boast of it when built? Ruskin, Sesa7ne and Lilies, 

 p. 216. 



Educational. — On the side of educational values in build- 

 ing up sound brain tissue and mental power, the school 

 should yield to Nature, "the Old Nurse," so far as pos- 

 sible, the position she has held in the education of the 

 race. Clearly, this relation is that of active response in 

 direct, first-hand contact with nature. Doing something 

 with nature has ever formed a large factor in education, of 

 which nothing can take the place. This alone, as Froebel 

 says, can prevent education from becoming hollow and 

 empty, artificial, and a wholly secondhand affair. 



We do not feel the meaning of what we say, for our speech 

 is made up of memorized ideas, based neither on perception nor 

 on productive effort. Therefore, it does not lead to perception, 

 production, life ; it has not proceeded, it does not proceed from 

 life. Froebel, Education of Man, p. 88. 



With a distrust in " book larnin " that has become 

 proverbial, it is strange that it has been allowed to domi- 

 nate the school curriculum so completely. This danger is 

 now so widely recognized that it is unnecessary to dwell 

 upon it, and, while some of our best plans of elemen- 

 tary science teaching aim to bring nature and the child 

 into direct contact, much remains to be done by way 

 of deciding what to bring to the child and what sort of 



