168 D. S. MAKGOLIOCTH, D.LITT., F.B.A., ON THE FUTURE OF 



to have urged that the process should be an agreeable one ; and 

 this principle is now brought into relation with the fundamental 

 principles of democracy. The conventional type of educatimi^ 

 we are told,* ivhich trains children to docility and obedience, to the 

 carefid performance of imposed tasJcs because they are imposed, 

 regardless of where they lead, is suited to an autocratic society. 

 These are the traits needed in a state where there is one head to plan 

 and care for the lives and institutions of the people. If we train 

 our children to take orders, to do things simply because they are told 

 to, and fail to give them confidence to act and think for themselves, 

 ice are putting an ahnost insurmountable obstacle in the way of 

 overcoming the present defects of our system, and of establishing the 

 truth of democratic idecds. The experiments described by these 

 authors are mainly attempts to teach through industry, and it is 

 claimed that where the children are getting their knowledge by 

 doing things, it is presented to them through all their senses, the 

 pupil sees the value of his work and his own progress, is not 

 discouraged by his mistakes, has no motive for doing dishonest 

 acts, since the result shows whether he has or has not done the 

 work, and needs no artificial inducement. In a somewhat milder 

 strain a Scottish writerf urges that the child should be led to 

 see more clearly than is the case at present the usefulness of the 

 training which he is receiving at school ; and a highly interesting 

 illustration of what is meant is given by Mr. Branford in his 

 Memoir of Alasdair Geddes :{ At a secondary school Alasdair 

 was set to learn trigonometry. He totcdly failed to get any grasp 

 of it, a).d doubtless was rated by the teacher as a born truithematical 

 dunce. But the boy was given another chance. He was sent for 

 a few special lessons to one of those nautical coaches ivho instruct 

 budding mariners in the use of the sextant. This practical teacher 

 took his pupil on the flat roof of his coaching establishment, and by 

 ocular demonstration showed him hoiv with the aid of trigonometrical 

 formidcB the captain of -a vessel can determine by midday observa- 

 tion of the sun the precise location of his ship on the broad ocean. 

 After the second lesson Alasdair returned home so full of the wor ders 

 of trigonometry that nothing could deter him from iyderruptirg a 

 musical party to tell his mother of the great news.^ In the same 



* Schools of To-morrow, p. 303. 



t Morgan, Education and Social Progress, p. 47. 



X Town-planning Review, March, 1918, p. 167. 



§ K. Richmond, Education for Liberty, tells a similar story, p. 76 ; he 

 required no such inducement himself to study trigonometry, p. 11. 



