THE SPIRIT OF MANUAL TRAINING. 441 



come to the school deeply impressed concerning the objects of the 

 senses, the concrete. They are here persuaded of the greater 

 reality of the spirit ; and appreciation is asked for the abstract 

 and impersonal. So far these objects might be the objects of any 

 school of high principle. They represent the spirit of the new 

 education. But they belong peculiarly to manual training, since 

 it is a system willing not only to cherish these sentiments, but 

 also to work with complete singleness of purpose for their reali- 

 zation. It is a sincere and practical effort to do something better 

 than has yet been done in the name of education. 



The methods of manual training are too new to have been 

 encumbered with any traditions ; nor have they attained suffi- 

 cient fixedness to threaten growth. For the most part, they are 

 still tentative and experimental. This plasticity is very hopeful. 

 A question left open is a constant stimulus to renewed searching 

 after something still a little better. Each school that attempts to 

 carry out manual training soon develops a certain individuality. 

 Any teaching so intensively subjective as this is deeply influ- 

 enced by the personality of its faculty. The character of the men 

 who have it in charge is quick to find expression in the school. 

 The distinctive features in the institution at Philadelphia are, 

 perhaps, the predominance given to ethics and the unremitting 

 effort to preserve unity throughout the many-sided development 

 attempted. In defending our unity we are beset by difficulties. 

 The over-enthusiasm of our friends would plunge us into many 

 excesses. Manual training seems to them so good a thing that 

 they can not realize the possibility of having too much of it. We 

 who take the long view have often to counsel moderation, or the 

 new idea would quite run away with us. In the intense delight 

 which these good people feel in giving substance to ideas, they 

 would discard everything which is not capable of such expres- 

 sion. They apparently forget that imagination is absolutely 

 needful for perspective, and that of all useless, pitiable creatures 

 the unimaginative man is superlative. Yet this excessive amount 

 of representation would quite kill imagination. In careless 

 hands the effect of manual training would be to set bounds and 

 limits rather than to break them down. It is not a system that 

 can be indiscriminately recommended. Men are so prone to mis- 

 take the means for the end, that those who esteem manual train- 

 ing most highly are least willing to encourage its introduction, 

 unless they know the character of the men who are to have it in 

 charge. 



In its organization the manual training school differs little 

 from the customary high school. It is an institution of similar 

 grade, and covers about the same period of boy life. Its students 

 enter at from thirteen to fifteen years of age, and remain, if they 



