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 THE ELEM 
 
 ^V^, 
 
 
 ENERAL Method 
 
 BASED ON THE PRINCIPLES OF HERBART. 
 
 Charles A. McMl'RRV. Ph.D. 
 
 SECOND EDITION. 
 
 I'll!I,I<-SC IIOOI. ITHIJ^n^lW CO.. IMlll.ISIIKIiS. 
 HI.(>(),\l\P^N, n.I.INHls. 
 
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 V
 
 Copyright, 1893. 
 By C. a. McMuRnv, Normal, Ii.i. 
 
 Press of 
 J'aiifograph Printing end UtaHoneri/ Co. 
 Bloomington, Illinois.
 
 U3 
 PREFACE. 
 
 THE Herbart School of Pedagogy has created much 
 stir in Germany in the last thirty years. It has 
 developed a large number of vigorous writers on 
 all phases of education and psychology, and numbers a 
 thousand or more positive disciples among the energetic 
 teachers of Germany. 
 
 Those American teachers and students who have come 
 In contact with the ideas of this school have been greatly 
 stimulated. 
 
 In such a miscellaneous and many-sided thing as prac- 
 tical education, it is deeply gratifying to find a clear and 
 definite leading purpose that prevails throughout and a 
 set of mutually related and supporting principles which 
 in practice contribute to the realization of this purpose. 
 
 The following chapters cannot be regarded as a full, 
 exact, and painfully scientific account of Herbartian 
 ideas, but as a simple explanation of their leading prin- 
 ciples in their relations to each other and in their appli- 
 cation to our own school problems. 
 
 In the second edition the last chapter of the first edi- 
 tion has been omitted, while the other chapters have been 
 much modified and enlarged. The chapter on the Formal 
 Steps is reserved for enlargement and publication in a 
 separate form. 
 
 Normal, III., November 4, 1893.
 
 TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER 1. 
 Tlio T'liii^f Aim of Education . .' . 5-14 
 
 CHAPTER li. 
 Ivolativo Valuo of Studies .... 15-60 
 
 CHAPTER 111. 
 jN'aUirc of Interest ..... 61-S5 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 Concentration ..... 86-127 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 Induct ion ...... 128-156 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 Aplierception ..... 1.57-184 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 Tlie Will ...... 185-193 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 lleibait and His Disciples . 194-200 
 
 Ifooks of Reference - . . . . 200-201
 
 CHAPTER 1. 
 
 THE CHIEF Al.W OF EDUCATION. 
 
 What is the central pm-pose of education? If we 
 include under this term all the things commonly assigned 
 to it, its many phases as represented by the great variety 
 of teachers and pupils, the many branches of knowledge 
 and the various and even conflicting methods in bringing 
 up children, it is difficult to find a definition sufficiently 
 broad and definite to compass its meaning. In fact we 
 shall not attempt in the beginning to make a definition. 
 We are in search not so much of a comprehensive defini- 
 tion as of a central truth, a key to the situation, an aim 
 that will simplify and brighten all the work of teachers. 
 Keeping in view the end from the beginning, we need a 
 central organizing principle which shall dictate for teacher 
 and pupil the highway over which they shall travel to- 
 gether. 
 
 , We will assume at least that education mean.^ the 
 whole bringing up of a child from infancy to matuiity, 
 not simply his school training. The reason for thi.s 
 assumption is thathome, school, companions, environment, 
 and natural endowment, working through a series if 
 years, produce a character which is a unit as the result- 
 ant of these different influences and growths. Again, we 
 are compelled to assume that this aim, whatever it is, is 
 the same for all.
 
 o GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 Now what will the average man, picked up at random, 
 say to our question: What is the chief end in the edu- 
 cation of your son? A farmer wishes his boy to read, 
 write, and cipher, so as to meet successfully the needs of 
 a farmer's life. The merchant desires that his boy get 
 a wider reach of knowledge and experience so as to sue" 
 ceed in a livelier sort of business competition. A uni- 
 versity professor would lay out a liberal course of train* 
 ing for his son so as to prepare him for intellectual pur- 
 suits among scholars and people of culture. This utili- 
 tarian view, which points to success in life in the ordinary 
 sense, is the prevailing one. We could probably sum up 
 the wishes of a great majority of the common people by 
 saying, "They desire to give their children, through 
 education, a better chance in life than they themselves 
 have had." Yet even these people, if pressed to give 
 reasons, would admit that the purely utilitarian view is 
 a low one aud that there is something better for every 
 boy and girl than the mere ability to make a successful 
 living. 
 
 Turn for a moment to the great si/ste)7is of education 
 which have held their own for centuries and examine 
 their aims. The Jesuits, the Humanists, and the Natural 
 Scientists all claimed to be liberal, culture-giving, 
 and pi'eparatory to great things; yet we only need to 
 quote from the histories of education to show their nar- 
 rowness and incompleteness. The training of the Jesuits 
 was linguistic and rhetorical, and almost entirely apart 
 from our present notion of human development. The 
 Humanists or Classicists who for so many centuries con- 
 stituted the educational elite, belonged to the past with 
 its glories rather than to the age in which they really 
 lived. Though standing in a modern age, they were
 
 THE CHIEF AIM. 7 
 
 almost blind to the great problems and opportunities it 
 offered. They stood in bold contrast to the growth of 
 the modern spirit in history, literature, and natural sci- 
 ence. But in spite of their predominating influence over 
 education for centuries, there has never been the shadow 
 of a chance for making the classics of antiquity the 
 basis of common, popular education. The modern school 
 of Natural Scientists is just as one-sided as the Human- 
 ists in supposing that human nature is narrow enough to 
 be compressed within the bounds of natural science 
 studies, however broad their field may be. 
 
 But the systems of education in vogue have always 
 lagged behind the clear views of educational reformers. 
 Two hundred fifty years ago Comenius projected a plan 
 of education for every boy and girl of the common peo- 
 ple. His aim was to teach all men all things from the 
 highest truths of religion to the commonest things of 
 daily experience. Being a man of simple and profound 
 religious faith, religion and morality were at the 
 foundation of his system. But even the principles 
 of intellectual training so clearly advocated by Comen- 
 ius have not yet found a ready hearing among teach- 
 teachers, to say nothing of his great moral-religious pur- 
 pose. Among later writers, Locke, Rousseau, and Pesta- 
 lozzi have set up ideals of education that have had much 
 influence. But Locke's " gentleman ' can never be the 
 ideal of all because it is intrinsically aristocratic and 
 education has become with us broadly democratic. After 
 all, Locke's " gentleman" is a noble ideal and should 
 powerfully impress teachers. The perfect human animal 
 that Rousseau dreamed of in the Emile, is best illustrated 
 in the noble savage, but we are not in danger in America
 
 8 GENERAL MKTlioi). 
 
 of adopting this ideal. In spite of lii.s merits the noblest 
 savage falls short in several ways. Yet it is innportant in 
 education to perfect the physical powers and the animal 
 development in every child. Pestalozzi touched the 
 hearts of even the weakest and morally frailest children, 
 and tried to make ini]>roved physical conditions and intel- 
 lectual culture contribute to heart cultui'e, or rather to 
 combine the two in strong moral character. He came 
 close upon the highest aim of education and was able to 
 illustrate his doctrine in practice. The educational 
 reformers have gone far ahead of the schoolmasters in 
 setting up a high aim in education. 
 
 Let us examine a few well-known definitions of edu- 
 cation by great thinkers, and try to discover a central 
 idea. 
 
 " The purpose of education is to give to the body and 
 to the soul all the beautv and all the perfection of which 
 they are capable." — Plato. 
 
 "Education includes w^hatever we do for ourselves 
 and whatever is done for us by others for the express 
 purpose of bringing us nearer to the perfection of our 
 nature." — Jo/i/i >Stuart Mill. 
 
 ''Education is the preparation for complete living." — 
 Herbert Spencer. 
 
 "Education is the harmonious and equable evolution 
 of the human faculties by a method based upon the 
 nature of the mind for developing all the faculties of the 
 soul, for stirring up and nourishing all the principles of 
 life, while shunning all one-sided culture and taking 
 account of the sentiments upon which the strength and 
 worth of men depend." — Stein. 
 
 ■'Education is the sum of the reflective efforts by 
 which we aid nature in the development of the physical,
 
 THE CHIEF AIM. 9 
 
 intellectual, and moral faculties of man in view of his per- 
 fection, his happiness, and his social destination." — toin- 
 payre. 
 
 These attempts to bring the task of education into 
 a comprehensive, scientific formula are interesting and 
 yet disappointing. They agree in giving great breadth 
 to education. But in the attempt to be comprehensive, 
 to omit nothing, they fail to specify that wherein the 
 true icorth of man consists; they fail to bring out into 
 relief the highest aim as an organizing idea in the compli- 
 cated work of education and its relation to secondary 
 aims. 
 
 We desire therefore to approach nearer to this prob- 
 lem: What is the highest aim of education? 
 
 We will do so by an inquiry into the aims and tenden- 
 cies of our public schools. To an outward observer the 
 schools of today confine their attention almost exclu- 
 sively to the acquisition of certain forms of knowledge 
 and to intellectual training, to the mental discipline and 
 power that come from a varied and vigorous exercise of 
 the faculties. The great majority of good schoolmasters 
 stand squarely upon this platform, knowledge and mental 
 discipline. But they are none the less deeply conscious that 
 this is not the highest aim of education. We scarcely need 
 to be told that a person may be fully equipped with the best 
 that this style of education can give, and still remain a 
 criminal. A good and wise parent will inevitably seek 
 for a better result in his child than mere knowledge, in- 
 tellectual ability, and power. All good schoolmasters 
 know that behind school studies and cares is the still 
 greater task of developing manly and womanly character. 
 Perhaps, however, this is too high and sacred a thing to 
 formulate. Perhaps in the attempt to reduce it to a scien-
 
 10 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 tific form we should lose its spirit. Admitting that 
 strong moral character is the noblest result of right 
 training, is it not still incidental to the regular school 
 work? Perhaps it lies in the teacher and in his manner 
 of teaching subjects, and not in the subject-matter itself 
 nor in any course of study. 
 
 This is exactly the point at which we wish to apply 
 the lever and to lift into prominence the tnoral character- 
 buildinfj aim as the central, one in education. This aim 
 should be like a loadstone, attracting and subordinating- 
 all other purposes to itself. It should dominate in the 
 choice, arrangement, and method of studies. 
 
 Let us examine more carefully the convictions upon 
 which the moral aim rests. Every wise and benevolent 
 parent knows that the first and last question to ask and 
 answer regarding a child is "What are his moral quality 
 and strength?" ISTow, who is better able to judge of the 
 true aim than thoughtful and so\\c\io\xs parents? In the 
 second place, it is inconceivable that a conscientious 
 teacher should close his eyes to all except the intellectual 
 training of his pupils. It is as natural for him to touch 
 and awaken the moral qualities as it is for birds to sing 
 Again, the state is more concerned to see the growth q\ 
 just and virtuous citizens than in seeing the prosperity? 
 of scholars, inventors, and merchants. It is also con. 
 cerned with the success of the latter, but chiefly when 
 their knowledge, skill, and wealth are equaled by their 
 virtues. Our country may have vast resources and grea< 
 opportunities, but everything in the end depends upon 
 the moral quality of its men and women. Undermine 
 and corrupt this and we all know that there is nothing 
 to hope for. The uncorrupted stock of true patriots in 
 our land is firmly rooted in this conviction, which is
 
 THE CHIEF AIM. II 
 
 worth more to the country than corn-fields and iron 
 raines. The perpetual enticement and blandishment of 
 worldly success so universal in our time can not move us 
 if we found one theory and practice upon the central doc- 
 trine of moral education. Education, therefore, in its 
 popular, untrammeled, moral sense, is the greatest con- 
 cern of society. 
 
 In projecting a general plan of popular education we 
 are beholden to the prejudices of no man nor class of 
 men. Not even the traditional prejudices of the great 
 body of teachers should stand in the way of setting up 
 the noblest ideal of education. Educat^ional thinkers are 
 in duty bound to free themselves from utilitarian notions 
 and narrowness, and to adopt the best platform that 
 children by natural birthright can stand upon. They are 
 called upon to find the best and to apply it to as many as 
 possible. Let it be remembered that each child has a 
 complete growth before him. His own possibilities and 
 not the ^tainments of his parents and elders are the 
 things to consider. 
 
 Shall we seek to avoid responsibility for the moral 
 aim by throwing it upon the family and the church? 
 But the more we probe into educational problems the 
 more we shall find the essential unity of all educational 
 forces. The citadel of a child's life is his moral charac- 
 ter, whether the home, the school, or the church build 
 and strengthen its walls. If asked to define the relation 
 of the school to the home we shall quickly see that they 
 are one in spirit and leading purpose, that instead of 
 being separated they should be brought closer together. 
 
 In conclusion, therefore, shall we make moral charac- 
 ^«r the clear and conscious aim of school education, and 
 then subordinate school studies and discipline, mental
 
 1-3 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 trainiiif^ and conduct, to this aim? It will be a great 
 stimulus to thousands of teachers to discover that this is 
 the real- purposf! of school work, and that there are 
 abundant means not yet used of realizing it. Having 
 once firmly grasped this idea, they will find that there is 
 no other having half its potency. It will put a substan- 
 tial foundation under educational labors, both theoretical 
 and practical, which will make them the noblest of enter- 
 prises. Can we expect the public school to drop into 
 such a purely subordinate function as that of intellectual 
 training; to limit its influence to an almost mechanical 
 action, the sharpening of the mental tools? Stated in this 
 form, it becomes an absurdity. 
 
 Is it reasonable lo suppose that the rank and file of 
 our teachers will realize the importance of this aim in 
 teaching so long as it has no recognition in our public 
 system of instruction? The moral element is largely 
 present among educators as an instinct, but it ought to 
 be evolved into a cleaj' pu7'pose with definite means of 
 accomplishment. It is an open secret in fact, that while 
 our public instruction is ostensibly secular, havicg noth- 
 ing to do directly with religion or morals, there is noth- 
 ing about which good teachers are more thoughtful and 
 anxious than about the means of moral influence. Occa- 
 sionally some one from the outside attacks our public 
 schools as without morals and godless, but there is no 
 lack of staunch defenders on moral grounds. Theoretic- 
 ally and even practically, to a considerable extent, we 
 are all agreed upon the great value of moral education. 
 But there is a striking inconsistency in our whole posi- 
 tion on the school problem. While the supreme value of 
 the moral aim will be generally admitted, it has no open 
 recognition in our school course, either as a principal or
 
 THE CHIEF AIM. 13 
 
 as a subordinate aim of instruction. Moral education is 
 not germane to the avowed purposes of the public school. 
 If it gets In at all it is by the back door. It is incidental, 
 not primary. The importance of making the leading aim 
 of education clear and conscious to teachers, is great. If 
 their conviction on this j^oint is not clear they will cer- 
 tainly not concentrate their attention and efforts upon its 
 realization. Again, in a business like education, where 
 there are so many important and necessary results to be 
 reached, it is very easy and common to put forward a 
 subordinate aim, and to lift it into undue prominence, even 
 allowing it to swallow up all the energies of teacher and 
 pupils. Owing to this diversity of opinion among teach- 
 ers as to the results to be reached, our public schools 
 exhibit a chaos of conflicting theory and practice, and a 
 numberless brood of hobby-riders. 
 
 How to establish the moral aim in, the center of the 
 school course, how to subordinate and realize the other 
 educational aims while keeping this chiefly in view, how 
 to make instruction and school discipline contribute 
 unitedly to the formation of vigorous moral character, 
 and how to unite home, school, and other life experiences 
 of a child in perfecting the one great aim of education — 
 these are some of the problems whose solution will be 
 sought in the following chapters. 
 
 It will be especially our purpose to show how school 
 instrnction can be brought into the direct service of char- 
 acter-buiir.ing. This is th(> point upon which most teach- 
 ers are skeptical. Not much effort has been made of late 
 to put the best moral materials into the school course. 
 In one whole set of school studies, and that the m )st im- 
 portant (reading, literature, and history), there is oppor- 
 tunity through all the grades for a vivid and direct cul-
 
 ]^ GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 tivation of moral ideas and convictions. The second great 
 series of studies, the natural sciences, come in to support 
 the moral aims, while tlie personal example and influence 
 of tiie teacher, and the common experiences and incidents 
 of school life and conduct, give abundant occasion to ap- 
 ply and enforce moral ideas. 
 
 That the other justifiable aims of education, such as 
 physical training, mental discipline, orderly habits, gen- 
 tlemanly conduct, practical utility of knowledge, liberal 
 culture, and the free development of individuality will 
 not be weakened by placing the moral aim in the fore- 
 front of educational motives, we are convinced. To 
 some extent these questions will be discussed in the fol- 
 lowing pages.
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 15 
 
 CHAPTER 11. 
 
 RELATIVE VALUE OF STUDIES. 
 
 Being convinced that the controlling aim of education 
 should be moral, we shall now inquire into the relative 
 value of different studies and their fitness to reach and 
 satisfy this aim. As measured upon this cardinal pur- 
 pose, what is the intrinsic value of each school study? 
 The branches of knowledge furnish the materials upon 
 which a child's mind works. Before entering upon such 
 a long and up-hill task as education, with its weighty re- 
 sults, it is prudent to estimate not only the end in view, 
 but the best means of reaching it. Many means are 
 offered, some trivial, others valuable. A careful measure- 
 ment, with some reliable standard, of the materials fur- 
 nished by the common school, is our first task. To what 
 extent does history contribute to our purpose? What 
 importance have geography and arithmetic? How do 
 reading and natural science aid a child to grow into the 
 full stature of a man or woman? 
 
 These questions are not new, but the answer to them 
 has t)een long delayed. Since the time of Comenius, to 
 say the least, they have seriously disturbed educators. 
 But few have had the courage, industry, and breadth of 
 mind of a Comenius, to sound the educational waters and 
 to lay out a profitable chart. In spite of Comenius' 
 labors, however, and those of other educational reform- 
 ers be they never so energetic, practical progress 
 toward a final answer, as registered in school courses, 
 has been extremely slow.
 
 16 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 Herbert Spencer says: "If there needs any further 
 evidence of the rude, undeveloped character of our edu- 
 cation, we have it in the fact that the comparative 
 worths of tlio different kinds of knowledge have been 
 as yet scarcely even discussed, much less discussed in a 
 methodic way with definite results. Not only is it that 
 no standard of relative values has yet been agreed upon, 
 but the existence of any such standard has not been con- 
 ceived in any clear manner. And not only is it that the 
 existence of such a standard has not been clearly con- 
 ceived, but the need of it seems to have been scarcely 
 even felt. Men i-ead books on this topic and attend lect- 
 ures upon that, decide that their children shall be in- 
 structed in these branches and not in those; and all 
 under the guidance of mere custom, or liking, or prejudice, 
 without ever considering the enormous importance of 
 determining in some rational way what things are really 
 most worth learning. * * ^ * * jyj^^ dress their 
 children's minds as they do their bodies, in the prevail- 
 ing fashion." Spencer, Education^ p. 26. 
 
 Spencer sees clearly the importance of this problem 
 and gives it a vigorous discussion in his first chapter, 
 " What knowledge is of most worth?" But the question 
 is a broad and fundamental one and in his p7'eference 
 for the natural sciences he seems to us not to have main- 
 tained a just balance of educational forces in preparing 
 a child for "complete living." His theory needs also to 
 be worked out into greater detail and applied to school 
 conditions before it can be of much value to teachers. It 
 can scarcely be said that any other En glishman or A merican 
 has seriously grappled with this problem. Great changes 
 and reforms indeed have been started, especially within the 
 last fifty years, but they hare been undertaken under the
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 17 
 
 pressure of general popular demands and have resulted in 
 compromises between traditional forces and urgent pop- 
 ular needs. An adequate philosophical inquiry into the 
 relative merit of studies and their adaptability to nurture 
 mental, moral, and physical qualities has not been made. 
 
 The Germans have worked to a better purpose. Quite 
 a number of able thinkers among them have given their 
 best years to the study of this problem of relative educa- 
 tional values and to a working out of its results. Her- 
 bart, Ziller, Stoy, and Rein have been deeply interested 
 in philosophy and psychology as life-long teachers of 
 these subjects at the university, but in their practice 
 schools in the same place they also stood daily face to 
 face with the primary difficulties of ordinary teaching. 
 At the outset, and before laying out a course of study, 
 they were compelled to meet and settle the aim of educa- 
 tion and the problem of relative values. Having an- 
 swered these questions to their own satisfaction, they 
 proceeded to work out in detail a common school course. 
 The Herbart school of teacliers has presumed to call its 
 interpretation of educational ideas "scientific pedagogy," 
 a somewhat pretentious name in view of the fact that 
 many leading educators in Germany, England, and else- 
 where, deny the existence of such a science. But if not a 
 science, it is at least a serious attempt at one. The ex- 
 position of principles that follow is chiefly derived from 
 them. 
 
 With us the present time is favorable to a rational 
 inquiry into relative educational values and to a thor- 
 ough-going application of the results to school courses 
 and methods. 
 
 In the first place the old classical monopoly is finally 
 and completely broken, at least so far as the common
 
 18 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 school is concerned. It ruled education for several centu- 
 ries, but now even its methods of discipline are losing 
 their antique hold. The natural sciences, modern his- 
 tory, and literature have assumed an equal place with 
 the old classical studies in college courses. Freed from 
 old traditions and prejudice, our common school is now 
 grounded in the vernacular, in the national history and 
 literature, and in home geography and natural science. 
 Its roots go deep into native soil. Secondly, the door of 
 the- common school has been thrown open to the new 
 studies and they have entered in a troop. History, 
 drawing, natural science, modern literature, and physical 
 culture have been added to the old reading, writing, and 
 arithn^^tic. The common school was never so untram- 
 meled. It is free to absorb into its course the select 
 materials of the best studies. Teachers really enjoy 
 more freedom in selecting and arranging subjects and in 
 introducing new things than they know how to make 
 use of. There is no one in high authority to check the 
 reform spirit and even local boards are often among the 
 advocates of change. In the third place, by multiplying 
 studies, the common school course has grown more com- 
 plex and heterogeneous. The old reading, writing, 'arith- 
 metic, and grammar could not be shelved for the sake of 
 the new studies and the same amount of time must be 
 divided now among many branches. It is not to be won- 
 dered at if all the studies are treated in a shallow and 
 fragmentary way. Some of the new studies, especially, 
 are not well taught. There is less of unity in higher 
 education now than there was before the classical studies 
 and "the three R's" lost their supremacy. Our common 
 school course has become a batch of miscellanies. We 
 are in danger of overloading pupils, as well as of making
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 19 
 
 a superficial hodge-podge of all branches. There is im- 
 perative need for sifting the studies according to their 
 value, as well as for bringing them into right connection 
 and dependence upon one another. FoKrthly, there is 
 a large body of thoughtful and inquiring teachers and 
 principals who are working at a revision of tho school 
 course. They seek something tangible, a working plan, 
 which will help them in their present perplexities and 
 show them a wise use of drawing, natural science, and 
 literature, in harmony with the other studies. Fivally, 
 since we are in the midst of such a breaking-up period, 
 we need to take our bearings. In order to avoid mis- 
 takes and excesses there is a call for deep, impartial, and 
 many-sided thinking on educational problems. Suppos- 
 ing thit we know what the controling aim of education 
 is, we are next led to inquire about and to determine the 
 relative value of studies as tributary to this aim. 
 
 It is not however our purpose to give an original 
 solution to this problem and to those which follow it. 
 We must decline to attempt a philosophical inquiry into 
 fundamental principles and their origin. Ours is the 
 humbler task of explaining and applying principles al- 
 ready worked out by others; that is, to give the results 
 of Herbartian pedagogy as applied to our schools. 
 
 Instead of discussing the many branches of study 
 one after another, it will be well to make a broad divi- 
 sioii of them into three classes and observe the marked 
 features and value of each. First, history, including the 
 subject matter of biography, history, story, and other parts 
 of literature. Second, the 7iataral sciences. Third, the 
 formal studies, grammar, writing, much of arithmetic, 
 and the symbols used in reading.
 
 20 GENERAL MliTIlOl). 
 
 The. first two open up the great fields of real knowl- 
 edge and experience, the world of man and of external 
 nature, the two great reservoirs of interesting facts. 
 We will first examine these two fields and consider their 
 value as constituent parts of the school course. 
 
 Ilistori/, in our present sense, includes what we usu- 
 ally understand by it, as U. S. history, modern and an- 
 cient history, also biography, tradition, fiction as express- 
 ing human life and the novel or romance, and historical 
 and literary masterpieces of all sorts, as the drama and 
 the epic poem, so far as they delineate man's experience 
 and character. In a still broader sense, history includes 
 language as the expression of men's thoughts and feei- 
 .ings. But this is the formal side of history with which 
 we are not at present concerned. History deals with 
 men's motives and actions as individuals or in societyj 
 with their dispositions, habits, and institutions, and | 
 with the monuments and literature they have left. 
 
 The relations of persons to each other in society give 
 rise to morals. How? The act of a person — as when a 
 fireman rescues a child from a burning building — shows a 
 disposition in the actor. We praise or condemn this dis- 
 position as the deed is good or bad. But each moral 
 judgment, rightly given, leaves us stronger. To appre- 
 ciate and judge fairly the life and acts of a woman like 
 Mary Lyon, or of a man such as Samuel Armstrong, is 
 to awaken something of their spirit and moral temper in 
 ourselves. Whether in the life of David or of Shylock, or 
 of the people whom they represent, the study of men is 
 primarily a study of morals, of conduct. It is in the per- 
 sonal hardships, struggles, and mutual contact of men 
 that motives and moral impulses are observed and 
 weighed. In such men as John Banyan, William the Si-
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 21 
 
 ient, and John Quincy Adams, we are much interested to 
 know what qualities of mind and heart they possessed, 
 and especially what human sympathies and antipathies 
 they felt. Livingstone embodied in his African life cer- 
 tain Christian virtues which we love and honor the more 
 because they were so severely and successfully tested. 
 Although the history of men and of society has many 
 uses, its best influence is in illustrating and inculcating 
 moral ideas. It is teaching niorals by example. Even 
 living companions often exert less influence upon children 
 than the characters impressed upon their minds from 
 reading. The deliberate plan of teachers and parents 
 might make this influence more salutary and effective. 
 
 It will strike most teachers as a surprise to say that 
 the chief use of history study is to form moral notions in 
 children. Their experience with this branch of school 
 work has been quite different. They have not so re- 
 garded nor used history. It has been generally looked 
 upon as a body of useful information that intelligent per- 
 sons must possess. Our history texts also have been con- 
 structed for another purpose, namely, to summarize and 
 present important facts in as brief space as possible, not 
 to reveal personal actions and character as a formative 
 moral influence in the education of the young. Even as 
 sources of valuable information, Spencer shows that our 
 histories have been extremely deficient; but for moral 
 purposes they are almost worthless. 
 
 No.v, moral dispositions are a better fruitage and test 
 of worth in men than any intellectual acquirements. 
 History is already a recognized study of admitted value 
 in the schools. It is a shame to strip it of that content 
 and of that influence which are its chief merit. To study 
 the conduct of persons as illustrating right actions is, in
 
 23 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 quality, the highest form of instruction. Other very im- 
 portant things are also involved in a right study of his- 
 tory. There are economic, political, and social institu- 
 tions evolved out of previous history ; there are present 
 intricate problems to be approached and understood. 
 But all these questions rest to a large extent upon moral 
 principles. But while these political, social, and eco- 
 nomic interests are beyond the present reach of children, 
 biography, individual life and action in their simple forms, 
 are plain to their understanding. They not only make 
 moral conduct real and impressive, but they gradually 
 lead up to an appreciation of history in its social and in- 
 stitutional forms. 
 
 Some of the best historical materials (from biography, 
 tradition, and fiction) should be absorbed by children in 
 each grade as an essential part of the substratum 
 of moral ideas. This implies more than a collection of 
 historical stories in a supplementary reader for inter- 
 mediate grades. It means that history in the broad 
 sense is to be an important study in every grade, and 
 that it shall become a center and reservoir from which 
 reading books and language lessons draw their supplies 
 These biographies, stories, and historical episodes must 
 be the best which our history and classic literature can 
 furnish, and whatever is of like virtue in the life of other 
 kindred peoples, of England, Germany, Greece, etc. 
 
 If history in this sense can be made a strong auxiliary 
 to moral education in common schools, the whole body of 
 earnest teachers will be gratified. For there is no theme 
 among them of such perennial interest and depth of 
 meaning as moral culture in schools. It is useless to talk 
 of confining our teachers to the intellectual exercises out- 
 lined in text books. They are conscious of dealing with
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 2S 
 
 children of moral susceptibility. In our meetings, dis- 
 cussions on the means of moral influence are more fre- 
 quent and earnest than on any other topic; and in their 
 daily work hundreds of our teachers are aiming at moral 
 character in childi*en more than at anything else. As 
 they free themselves from mechanical requirements and 
 begin to recognize their true function, they dicover the 
 transcendent importance of moral education, that it under- 
 lies and gives meaning to all the other work of the 
 teacher. 
 
 But teachers heretofore have taken a narrow view of 
 the moral influences at their disposal. Their ever-recur- 
 ring emphatic refrain has been 'Hhe example of the 
 teacher]'' and, to tell the truth, there is no better means 
 of^ instilling moral ideas than the presence and inspira- 
 tion of a high-toned teacher. We know, however, that 
 teachers need moral stimulus and encouragement as much 
 as anybody. It will not do to suppose that they have 
 reached the pinnacle of moral excellence and can stand as 
 all-sufficient exemplars to children. The teacher himself 
 must have food as well as the children. He must partake of 
 the loaf he distributes to them. The clergyman also should 
 be an example of Christian virtue, but he preaches 
 the gospel as illustrated in the life of Christ, of St. Paul, 
 and of others. In pressing home moral and religious 
 truths his appeal is to great sources of inspiration which 
 lie outside of himself. Why should the teacher rely upon 
 his own unaided example more than the preacher? No 
 teacher can feel that he embodies in himself, except in an 
 imperfect way, the strong moral ideas that have made 
 the history of good men worth reading. No matter what 
 resources he may have in his own character, the teacher 
 needs to employ moral forces that lie outside of himself,
 
 24 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 ideals toward which he struggles and towards which he 
 inspires and leads others. The very fact that he appre- 
 ciates and adnnires a man like Longfellow or Peter Cooper 
 will stir the children with like feelings. In this sense it is a 
 mistake to center all attention upon the conduct of the 
 teacher. He is but a guide, or, like Goldsmith's preacher, 
 he allures to brighter worlds and leads the way. It is better 
 for pupil and teacher to enter into the companionship of 
 common aims and ideals. For them to study together and 
 admire the conduct of Roger Williams is to bring them into 
 closer sympathy, and what do teachers need more than to 
 get into personal sympathy with their children? Let them 
 climb the hill together, and enjoy the views together, and 
 grow so intimate in their aims and sympathies that after- 
 life cannot break the bond. When the inspirations and 
 aims thus gained have gi'adually changed into tendencies 
 and habits, the child is morally full-fledged. It is high 
 ground upon which to land youth, or aid in landing him, 
 but it is clearly in view. 
 
 It is only gradually that moral ideas gain an ascend- 
 ency, first over the thoughts and feelings of a child and 
 later still over his conduct. Many good impressions at 
 first seem to bear no fruit in action. But examples and 
 experience reiterate the truth till it finds a firm lodgment 
 and begins to act as a check upon natural impulses. 
 Many a child reads the stories in the Youth's Companion 
 with absorbing interest but in the home circle fails no- 
 ticeably to imitate the conduct he admires. But moral 
 ideas must grow a little before they can yield fruit. The 
 seed of example must drop into the soil of the mind under 
 favorable conditions; it must germinate and send up its 
 shoots to some height before its presence and nature 
 can be clearly seen. The application of moral ideas to
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 25 
 
 conduct is very important even in childhood, out patience 
 and care are necessary in most cases. There must be 
 timely sowing of the seed and judicious cultivation, if 
 good fruits are to be gathered later on. There is indeed 
 much anxiety and painful uncertainty on the part of 
 those who charge themselves with the moral training of 
 children. Labor and birth pains are antecedent to the 
 delivery of a moral being. Then again a child must de- 
 velop according to what is in him, his nature and pecu- 
 liar disposition. The processes of growth are within 
 him and the best you can do is to give them scope. He 
 \sfree and you are bound to minister to his best freedom. 
 The common school age is the formative period. At six 
 a child is morally immature; at fifteen the die has been 
 stamped. This youthful wilderness must be crossed. 
 We can't turn back. There is no other way of reaching 
 the promised land. But there are rebellions and haltings 
 and disorderly scenes. 
 
 This is a tortuous road ! Isn't there a quicker and 
 easier way? The most speedily constructed road across 
 this region is a short treatise on morals for teacher and 
 pupil. In this way it is possible to have all the virtues 
 and faults tabulated, labeled, and transferred in brief 
 space to the minds of the children (if the discipline is rig- 
 orous enough). Swallow a catechism, reduced to a verbal 
 memory product. Pack away the essence of morals in a 
 few general laws and rules and have the children learn 
 them. Some day they may understand. What astound- 
 ing faith in memory cram and dry forms ! We can pave 
 such a road through the fields of moral science, but when 
 a child has traveled it is he a whit the better ? No such 
 paved road is good for anything. It isn't even comfortable. 
 It has been tried a dozen times in much less important
 
 26 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 fields of knowledge than morals. Moral ideas spring up 
 out of experience with persons either in real life or in the 
 books we read. Examples of moral action drawn from 
 life are the only thing that can give meaning to moral 
 precepts. If we see a harsh man beating his horse, we 
 get an ineffaceable impression of harshness. By 
 reading the story of the Black Beauty we acquire a 
 lively sympathy for animals. Then the maxim *' A 
 merciful man is merciful to his beast " will be a good 
 summary of the impressions received. Moral ideas al- 
 ways have a concrete basis or origin. Some companion 
 with whose feelings and actions you are in close personal 
 contact, or some character from history or fiction by 
 whose personality you have been strongly attracted, gives 
 you your keenest impressions of moral qualities. To be- 
 gin with abstract moral teaching, or to put faith in it, is 
 to misunderstand children. In morals as in other forms 
 of knowledge, children are overwhelmingly interested in 
 personal and individual examples, things which have 
 form, color, action. The attempt to sum up the import- 
 ant truths of a subject and present them as abstractions 
 to children is almost certain to be a failure, pedagogically 
 considered. It has been demonstrated again and again, 
 even in high schools, that botany, chemistry, physics, 
 and zoology can not be taught by such brief scientific 
 compendia of rules and principles — " Words, words, 
 words," as Hamlet said. We can not learn geography 
 from definitions and map questions, nor morals from 
 catechisms. And just as in natural science we are re- 
 sorting perforce to plants, animals, and natural phe- 
 nomena, so in morals we turn to the deeds and lives of 
 men. Columbus in his varying fortunes leaves vivid im- 
 pressions of the moral strength and weakness of himself
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. -'7 
 
 and of others. John Winthrop gives frequent examples of 
 generous and unselfish good-will to the settlers about Bos- 
 ton. Little Lord Fauntleroy is a better treatise on morals 
 for children than any of our sermonizers have written. We 
 must get at morals without moralizing and drink in moral 
 convictions without resorting to moral platitudes. Edu- 
 cators are losing faith in words, definitions, and classifi- 
 cations. It is a truism that we can't learn chemistry 
 or zoology from books alone, nor can moral judgments be 
 rendered except from individual action^. 
 
 A little reflection will show that we are only demand- 
 ing object lessons in the field of moral education, exten- 
 sive, systematic object lessons; choice experiences and 
 episodes from human life, simple and clear, painted in 
 natural colors, as shown by our best history and litera- 
 ture. To appreciate the virtues and vices, to sympathize 
 with better impulses, we must travel beyond words and 
 definitions till we come in contact with the personal deeds 
 that first give rise to them. The life of Martin Luther, 
 with its faults and merits honestly represented, is a power- 
 frl moral tonic to the reader; the autobiography of 
 Franklin brings out a great variety of homely truths in 
 the form of interesting episodes in his career. Adam 
 Bede and Romola impress us more powerfully and perma- 
 nently than the best sermons, because the individual 
 realism in them leads to a vividness of moral judgment of 
 their acts unequalled. King Lear teaches us tlie folly of 
 a rash judgment with overwhelming force. Evangeline 
 awakens our sympathies as no moralist ever dreamed of 
 doing. Uncle Tom in Mrs. Stowe's story was a stronger 
 preacher than Wendell Phillips. William Tell in Schil- 
 ler's play kindles our love for heroic deeds into an 
 enthusiasm. The best myths, historical biographies,
 
 28 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 novels, and dramas, are the richest sources of moral 
 stimulus because they lead us into the immediate presence 
 of those men and women whose deeds stir up our moral 
 natures. In the representations of the masters we are 
 in the presence of moral ideas clothed in flesh and blood, 
 real and yet idealized. Generosity is not a name but the 
 act of a person which wins our interest and favor. To 
 get the impress of kindness we must see an act of kind- 
 ness and feel the glow it produces. When Sir Philip 
 Sidney, wounded on the battlefield and suffering with 
 thirst, reached out his hand for a cup of water that was 
 brought, his glance fell upon a dying soldier who viewed 
 the cup with great desire; Sidney handed him the water 
 with the words, "Thy necessity is greater than mine." 
 No one can refuse his approval for this act. After tell- 
 ing the story of the man who went down to Jericho and 
 fell among thieves, and then of the priest, the Levite, 
 and the Samaritan who passed that way, Jesus put the 
 question to his critic, "Who was neighbor to him that 
 fell among thieves?" And the answer came even from 
 unwilling lips, " He that showed mercy.' When Nathan 
 Hale on the scafi'old regretted that he had but one life to 
 lose for his country, we realize better what patriotism is. 
 On the other hand it is natural to condemn icrong deeds 
 when presented clearly and objectively in the action of 
 another. Nero caused Christians to be falsely accused 
 and then to be condemned to the claws of wild beasts in 
 the arena. When such cruelty is practiced against the 
 innocent and helpless, we condemn the act. When Co- 
 lum.bus was thrown into chains instead of being rewarded, 
 w^ condemn the Spaniards. In the same way the real 
 world of persons about us, the acts of parents, compan- 
 ions, and teachers are powerful in giving a good or bad
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 29 
 
 tone to our sentiments, because, as living object lessons, 
 their impress is directly and constantly upon us. 
 
 In such cases' taken from daily experience and from 
 illustrations of personal conduct in books, it is possible to 
 observe how moral Jndr/rnents originate and by repetition 
 grow into convictions. They spring up naturally and 
 surely when we understand well the circumstances under 
 which an act was performed. The interest and sympathy 
 felt for the persons lends great vividness to the judg- 
 ments expressed. Each individual act stands out clearly 
 and calls forth a prompt and unerring approval or disap 
 proval. (But later the judgment must react upon our 
 own conduct.) The examples are simple and objective, 
 free from selfish interest on the child's part, so that 
 good and bad acts are recognized in their true quality. 
 These simple moral judgments are only a beginning, only 
 a sowing of the seed. But harvests will not grow and 
 ripen unless seed has been laid in the ground. It is a 
 long road to travel before these early moral impressions 
 develop into firm convictions which rule the conduct of 
 an adult. But education is necessarily a slow process, 
 and it is likely to be a perverted one unless the founda- 
 tion is carefully laid in early years. The fitting way 
 then to cultivate moral judgments, that is, to start just 
 :dca? of right and wrong, of virtues and vices, is by a 
 ft n-ular and systematic presentation of persons illustrat- 
 iiir noble and ignoble acts. A preference for the right 
 and an aversion for the wrong will be the sure result of 
 careful teaching. Habits of judging will be formed and 
 strong moral convictions established which may be grad- 
 ually brought to influence and control action. 
 
 A good share of the influences that are thrown around 
 an ordinary child need to be counteracted. It can be
 
 30 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 done to a considerable extent by instruction. Many of 
 the interesting characters of history are better company 
 for us and for children than our neighbors and contempo- 
 raries. For the purposes of moral example and inspira- 
 tion we may select as companions for them the best per- 
 sons in history, provided we know how to select for our- 
 selves and others. Their acts are personal, biographical, 
 and interesting, and appeal at once to children as well as 
 to their elders. There is no good reason why a much 
 greater number of our school children should not be 
 brought under the influence of the best books suited to 
 their age. Here is a source of educational influence of 
 high quality which is left too much to accident and to 
 the natural, unaided instinct of children. A few get the 
 benefit but many more are capable of receiving it. How 
 much better the school choice and treatment of such books 
 may be than the loose and miscellaneous reading of chil- 
 dren, is discussed in Special Method. A fit introduction 
 of children to this class of literature should be in the 
 hands of teachers, and all the later reading of pupils will 
 feel the salutary effect. 
 
 If this is the proper origin and culture of moral ideas, 
 we desire to know how to utilize it in the common school 
 course. It can only be done by an extensive use of his- 
 torical and literary materials in all grades with the con- 
 scious piirjyose of shaping moral ideas and character. 
 That the school has such influence at its disposal can not 
 be reasonably denied by any one who believes that the 
 family or the church can affect the moral character of 
 their children. It may be objected that the school thus 
 takes up the proper work of the home, when it ought to 
 be occupied with other things.. Would that the homes 
 were all good! But even if they were the teacher could
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 31 
 
 not fold his arms over a responsibility removed. As soon 
 as a boy enters school, if not sooner, he begins, in some 
 sense, to outgrow the home. New influences and inter- 
 ests find a lodgment in his affections. Companions, the 
 wider range of his acquaintances, studies, and ambitions, 
 share now with the home. John Locke objected radi- 
 cally to English public schools on this account. But 
 even if we desired, we could not resort to private tutors 
 as Locke did. The child is growing and changing. Who 
 shall organize unity out of this maze of thoughts, inter- 
 ests, and influences, casting out the useless and bad, com- 
 bining and strengthening the good? The more service 
 the home renders the better. The child's range of thought 
 and ambition is expanding. Who has the best survey of 
 the field? In many cases at least, the teacher, especially 
 where parents lack the culture and the children need a 
 guide. Who spends six hours a day directing these cur- 
 rents of thought and interest? We are not disposed to 
 underestimate the magnitude of the task here laid upon 
 the teacher. The rights and duties of the home are not 
 put in question. Indeed the spirit of this kind of teach- 
 ing is best illustrated in a good home. A teacher who 
 has a father's anxiety in the real welfare of children will 
 not forget his duty in watching their moral growth. 
 The moral atmosphere of a good home will remain the 
 ideal for the school. In fact, Herbart's plan of education 
 originated not in a school-room, but in an excellent 
 home in Switzerland, where he spent three years in the 
 private instruction of three boys. The conscientious zeal 
 with which he devoted himself to the moral and mental 
 growth of these children is a model for teachers. The 
 shaping of three characters was, according to his view, 
 entrusted to him. The common notion of intellectual
 
 32 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 growth and strength which rules in such cases was at 
 once subordinated to character development in the moral 
 sense. Not that the two ideas are at all antagonistic, 
 but one is more important than the other. The selection 
 of reading matter, of studies, and of em^>!oyments, was 
 adapted to each boy with a view to influencing conduct 
 and moral action. 
 
 The Herbart school adheres to this view of education, 
 and has transferred its spirit and method to the schools. 
 TheHerbartians have the hardihood, in this age. of moral 
 skeptics, to believe not only in moral example but also in 
 moral teaching. (By moral skeptics we mean those who 
 believe in morals but not in moral instruction.) They 
 seek first of all historical materials of the richest moral 
 content, in vivid personification, upon which to nourish 
 the moral spirit of children. If properly treated, this 
 subject matter will soon win the children by its power 
 over feeling and judgment. With Crusoe the child goes 
 through every hardship and success; with !?^braham he 
 lives in tents, seeks pastures for his flocks, and gener- 
 ously marches out to the rescue of his kijiismen. He 
 should not read Caesar with a slow and , toilsome drag 
 (parsing and construing) that would rend^r/a bright boy 
 stupid. If he goes with Caesar at all, he-Ynust build an 
 agger, fight battles, construct bridges, and approve or 
 condemn Caesar's acts. But we doubt the moral value of 
 Caisar's Gallic wars. By reading Plutarch we may see 
 that the Latins and Greeks, before the days of their 
 degeneracy, nourished their rising youth upon the tra- 
 ditions of their ancestry. The education produced a 
 tough and sinewy brood of moral qualities. Their great 
 men were great characters, largely because of the mother- 
 milk of national tradition and family training. In Scotch,
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 33 
 
 English, and German history we are familiar with Alfred, 
 Bruce, Siegfried, and many other heroes of similar value 
 in the training of youth. 
 
 It will be well for us to look into our own history and 
 see what sort of a moral heritage of educative materials 
 it has left us. What noble examples does it furnish of 
 right thought and action? Have we any home-bred food 
 like this for the nourishment of our growing youth? Our 
 native American history is indeed nobler in tone and more 
 abundant. For moral educative purposes in the training 
 of the young the history of America, from the early ex- 
 plorations and settlements along the Atlantic coast to 
 the present, has scarcely a parallel in history. It was a 
 race of moral heroes that led the first colonies to many of 
 the early settlements. Winthrop, Penn, "Williams', Ogle- 
 thorpe, Raleigh, and Columbus were great and simple 
 characters, deeply moral and practical. For culture pur- 
 poses, where can their equals be found? And where was 
 given a better opportunity for the display of personal 
 virtues than by the leaders of these little danger-encir- 
 cled communities? Theleaven of purity, piety, andmanly 
 independence which they brought with them and illus- 
 trated, has never ceased to work powerfully among our 
 people. Why not bring the children into direct contact 
 with these characters in the intermediate grades, not by 
 short and sketchy stories, but by full life pictures of these 
 men and their surroundings? We have not been wholly 
 lacking in literary artists who have worked up a part of 
 these materials into a more durable and acceptable form 
 for our schools. We need to make an abundant use of 
 this and other history for our boys and girls, not by 
 devoting a year in the upper grades to a barren outline 
 of American annals, but by a proper distribution of these
 
 34 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 and other similar rich treasures throughout the grades of 
 the common school. 
 
 Tradition and fiction are scarcely less valuable than 
 biography and history because of their vivid portrayal of 
 strong and typical characters. Our own literature, and 
 the world's literature at large, are a store-house well- 
 stocked with moral educative materials, properly suited 
 to children at different ages, if only sorted, selected, and 
 arranged. But this requires broad knowledge of our best 
 literature and clear insight into child character at dif- 
 ferent ages. This problem will not be solved in a day, 
 nor in a life-time. 
 
 In making a progressive series of our best historical 
 and literary products, it is necessary to select those 
 materials which are better adapted than anything else to 
 interest, influence, and mould the character of children at 
 each time of life. It is now generally agreed by the best 
 teachers that these, selections shall be classical master- 
 pieces, not in fragments but as wholes. They should be 
 those classical materials that bear the stamp of genuine 
 nobility. Goethe says ^'■The best is good enough for chil- 
 dren. " For some years past in our grammar grades we 
 have been usinc; some of the best selections of Whittier, 
 Longfellow, Bryant, and others, and we are not even 
 frightened by the length of such productions as Evan- 
 geline, The Lady of the Lake, or Julius Caesar. A simple, 
 adapted version of Robinson Crusoe is used in some 
 schools as a second reader. From time immemorial choice 
 selections of prose and verse have formed the staple of 
 our readei's above the third. But generally these selec- 
 tions are scrappy or fragmentary. Few of the great 
 masterpieces have been used because most of them are 
 supposed to be too long. Broken fragments of our choice
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 35 
 
 literary products have been served up, but the best liter- 
 ary works as wholes have never been given to the chil- 
 dren in the schools. The Greek youth were better served 
 with the Iliad and Odyssey, and some of our grandfathers 
 with the tales of the Old Testament. We now go still 
 further back in the child-life and make use of fairy tales 
 in the first grade. But many are not yet able to realize 
 that select fairy stories are genuinely classical, that they 
 are as well adapted to stimulate the minds of children as 
 Hamlet the minds of adults. (See Special Method.) 
 
 The chief aim of our schools all along has not been 
 an appreciation of literary masterpieces either in their 
 moral or art value, but to acquire skill in reading, flu- 
 ency, and naturalness, of expression. Our schools have 
 been almost completely absorbed in the purely formal 
 use of our literary materials, learning to read in the ear- 
 lier j^rades and learning to read with rhetorical expres- 
 sion and confidence in the later ones. In the present 
 argument our chief concern is not with the formal use of 
 literary materials for practice in reading, but with the 
 moral culture, conviction, and habit of life they may fos- 
 ter. Nor have we chiefly in view the art side of our best 
 literary pieces. Appreciation of beauty in poetry and 
 of strength in prose, admirable as tliey may be, are quite 
 secondary to the main purpose. Coming in direct and 
 vivid contact with manly deeds or with unselfish acts as 
 personified in choice biography, history, fiction, and real 
 life, will inspire children with thoughts that make life 
 worth living. Neither formal skill in reading nor aj)pre- 
 elation of literary art can atone for the lack of direct 
 moral incentive which historical studies should give. All 
 three ends should be reached.
 
 36 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 Many teachers are now calling for a change in the 
 spirit with which the best biography and literature are 
 used. They call for an improvement in the quality and 
 an increase in the quantity of complete historical epi- 
 sodes and of literary masterpieces. An appreciative 
 reading of Ivanhoe revives the spirit of that age. The 
 life of Samuel Adams is an epic that gives the youth a 
 chance to live amid the stirring scenes of Boston in a 
 notable time. Children are to live in thought and inter- 
 est the lives of many men of other generations, as of 
 Tell, Columbus, Livingstone, Lincoln, Penn, Franklin, 
 Fulton. They are to partake of the experiences of the best 
 typical men in the story of our own and of other countries. 
 
 The use of the best historical and literary works as a 
 means of strengthening moral motives and principles 
 with children whose minds and characters are develop- 
 ing, is a high aim in itself. And it will add interest and 
 life to the formal studies, such as reading, spelling, 
 grammar, and composition, which spring out of this valu- 
 able subject-matter. 
 
 History, in the broad sense, should be the chief con- 
 stituent of a child's education. That subject-matter 
 which contains the essence of moral culture in generative 
 form deserves to constitute the chief mental food of 
 young people. The conviction of the high moral value 
 of historic subjects and of their peculiar adaptability to 
 children at different ages, brings us to a positive judg- 
 ment as to their relative value among studies. The first 
 question, preliminary to all others in the common school 
 course, "What is the most important study?" is an- 
 swered by putting history at the head of the list. 
 
 Nat^iral science takes the second place. In many 
 respects it is co-ordinate with history. The object-world,
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 37 
 
 which is so interesting, so informing, and so intimately 
 interwoven with the needs, labors, and progress of men, 
 furnishes the second great constituent of education for 
 all children. Botany, zoology, and the other natural sci- 
 ences, taken as a unit, constitute the field of nature 
 apart from man. They furnish us an understanding of 
 the varied objects and complex phenomena of nature. It 
 is one of the imperative needs of all human minds that 
 have retained their childlike thoughtfulness and spirit of 
 inquiry, to desire to understand nature, to classify the 
 variety of objects and appearances, to trace the chain of 
 causes, and to search out the simple laws of nature's 
 operations. The command early came to men to subdue 
 the earth, and we understand better than primitive man 
 that it is subdued through investigation and study. All 
 the forces and bounties of nature are to be made service- 
 able to us and it can only be done by understanding her 
 facts and laws. The road to mastery leads through 
 patient observation, experiment, and study. 
 
 But we are concerned with the educatio7ial value of 
 the natural sciences. Waitzsays: " A correct philosophy 
 of the world and of life is possible to a person only on 
 the basis of a knowledge of one's self and of one's rela- 
 tion to surrounding nature." Diesterweg says: "No 
 one can atTord to neglect a knowledge of nature who 
 desires to get a comprehension of the world and of God 
 according to human possibility, or who desires to find his 
 proper relation to Him and to real things. He who 
 knows nothing of human history is an ignoramus, like- 
 wise he who knows nothing of natural science. To know 
 nothing of either is a pure shame. Ignorance of nature 
 is an unpardonable perversion." Kraepelin speaks as 
 follows: "Instruction should open up to a pupil an under-
 
 38 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 standing of the present, and thereby furnish a ba^s for 
 a frank and many-sided philosophy of life, resting upon 
 reality. But to the present belongs the world outside of 
 us. Of this present there can be no such thing as an 
 understanding unless it relates not only to inter-human 
 relations but also to relations of man to animal, of ani- 
 mal to plant, and of organic life to inorganic life. The 
 necessity of assuming a relation to our environment is 
 unavoidable and this can only be done by acquainting 
 ourselves with the surrounding world in every direction. 
 This requirement would remain in force though man, 
 like a god, were set above nature and her laws. But 
 man lives, acts, and dies not outside of, but within the 
 circle of nature's laws. This maxim is axiomatic and 
 contains the final judgment against those who claim that 
 a comprehensive but unified philosophy of life is possible 
 without a knowledge of nature." Herbart says: -'Here 
 ('i-n nature) lies the abode of real truth, which does not 
 retreat before tests into an inaccessible past (as does his- 
 tory). This genuinely empirical character distinguishes 
 the natural sciences and makes their loss irretrievable. 
 It is here (in nature) that the object disentangles itself 
 from all fancies and opinions and constantly stimulates 
 the spirit of observation. Here then is found an obstruc- 
 tion to extravagant thinking such as the sciences them 
 selves could not better devise." Ziller says: "The 
 natural sciences are necessary in education because from 
 the province of nature (as well as from history) are 
 derived those means and resources which are necessary 
 to accomplish the purposes of the will in action. Means 
 and forces are the natural conditions for the realization 
 of aims Without knowledge of and intelligent power 
 over nature, it is difficult to realize that certain aims are
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 39 
 
 possible; action cannot be successful; will effort, based 
 upon the firm conviction of ability, that is, judicious ex- 
 ercise of will, is impossible." We quote also from Pro- 
 fessor Rein: '-Let us observe in passing that in the 
 great industrial contest between civilized nations, that 
 people will suffer defeat which falls behind in the culture 
 of natural science, and for this reason the motive of self- 
 protection would deniand natural science instruction. In 
 favor of this teaching, the claim is further made that no 
 science is so well adapted to train the mind to inductive 
 thought processes as that which rests entirely upon in- 
 duction, and that natural science study is in a position to 
 resist more easily and successfully than all other studies, 
 the deeply-rooted tendency in all branches to substitute 
 words for ideas." 
 
 Rein (das vierte Schuljahr) explains further the lead- 
 ing Ideas and standpoints which have appeared in his- 
 torical order among science teachers in the common 
 school. From the first crude ideas there has been marked 
 progress toward higher aims in science teaching. 
 
 1. Natural history stories for eyitertainmeyU. Many 
 curious and entertaining facts in connection with animal 
 life were searched out, more especially unusual and spicy 
 anecdotes of shrewdness and intelligence. Some of the 
 old readers, and even of the recent ones, are en- 
 riched with such marvels. 
 
 2. Utility, or the study of things in nature that are 
 directly useful or hurtful to man. Whatever fruits or 
 animals or herbs are of plain service to man. as well as 
 things poisonous or dangerous, were studied because such 
 information would be of future service. It was a purely 
 practical aim, at first very narrow, but in an enlarged 
 and liberal sense of much importance.
 
 40 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 3. Training of the senses and of the observing power. 
 By a study and description of natural objects, sense per- 
 ception was to be sharpened and a habit of close obser- 
 vation formed. Among science teachers today no aim is 
 more emphasized than this. It also stores away a body 
 of useful ideas of great future value. This is an intel- 
 lectual aim that accords better with the purpose of the 
 school than the preceding. 
 
 4. Analysis and determination of specimens. To ex- 
 amine and trace a plant, mineral, or insect, to its true 
 classification and name, has occupied much of the time of 
 students. It requires nice discrimination, a comprehen- 
 sive grasp of relations, and a power to seize and hold 
 common characteristics. Many of our text-books and 
 courses of study are based chiefly upon this idea. 
 
 5. System,-makiny, or the reduction of all things in 
 nature to a systematic whole, with a place for everything. 
 Some of the greatest scientists, Linnaeus, for example, 
 looked upon scientific classification as the chief aim of 
 nature study. It has had a great influence upon schools 
 and teachers. The attempt to compress everything into 
 a system has led to many text-books which are but brief 
 summaries of sciences like zoology, botany, and physics. 
 Scientific classification is very important, but the attempt 
 to make it a leading aim in teaching children is a mistake. 
 
 We may add that nature study is felt by all to offer 
 abundant scope to the exercise of the esthetic faculty. 
 There is great variety of beauty and gracefulness in nat- 
 uraljorms in plant and animal; the rich or delicate col- 
 oring of the clouds, of birds, of insects, and of plants, 
 gives constant pleasure. Then there are grand and im- 
 pressive scenery and phenomena in nature, and melody 
 and harm©Hy in nature's voices.
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 41 
 
 These various aims of science study are valuable to 
 the teacher as showing him the scope of his work. But 
 a higher and more comprehensive standpoint has been 
 reached. We now realize that the great purpose of this 
 study is insight into nature, into this whole physical en- 
 vironment, with a view to a better appreciation of her 
 objects, forces, and laws, and of their bearing on human 
 life and progress. 
 
 All these purposes thus far developed in schools 
 are to oe considered as valuable subsidiary aims, 
 leading up to the central purpose of the study of 
 natural sciences, which is, "An understanding of life and 
 of the powers and of the unity which express themselves 
 in nature;" or, as Kraepelin says: "Nature should not 
 appear to man as an inextricable chaos, but as a well- 
 ordered mechanism, the parts fitting exactly to each 
 other, controlled by unchanging laws, and in perpetual 
 action and production." Humboldt is further quoted: 
 "Nature to the mature mind is unity in variety, unity of 
 the manifold in form and combination, the content or 
 sum total of natural things and natural forces as a living 
 whole The weightiest result, therefore, of deep phys- 
 ical study is, by beginning with the individual, to grasp 
 all that the discoveries of recent times reveal to us, to 
 separate single things critically and yet not be overcome 
 by the mass of details, mindful of the high destiny of 
 man, to comprehend the mind of nature, which lies con- 
 cealed under the mantle of phenomena." This sounds 
 visionary and impracticable for children of the common 
 school, especially when we know that much lower aims 
 have not been successfully reached. In fact it cannot be 
 said that the natural sciences have any recognized stand- 
 ing in the common school course. But it is worth the
 
 42 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 while to inquire whether natural sciences will ever be 
 taught as they should be until the best attainable aims 
 become the dominant principles for guiding teachers. 
 Stripped of its rhetoric, the above mentioned aim, "an 
 understanding of life and of the unity in nature," may 
 prove a practical and inspiring guide to the teacher. 
 
 If we look upon nature as a field of observation and 
 study which can be grasped as a whole both as a work 
 of creation and as contributing in multiplied ways to 
 man's needs, its proper study gives a many-sided culture 
 to the mind. This leading purpose will bring into rela- 
 tion and unity all the subordinate aims of science teach- 
 ing, such as information, utility, training of the senses 
 and judgment, and of the power to compare and classify. 
 
 For the accomplishment of this great purpose of gain- 
 ing insight into nature's many-sided activities, there are 
 several simple means not yet mentioned. Running 
 through nature are great principles and laws which can 
 be studied upon concrete examples, plain and interesting 
 to a child. The study of the squirrel in its home, hab- 
 its, organs, and natural activities in the woods, will show 
 how strangely adapted it is to its surroundings. But 
 an observation of birds in the air and of fishes in water 
 reveals the same curious fitness to surrounding nature. 
 The study of plants and animals in their adaptation 
 to environment, of the relation between organ and func- 
 tion; between organs, mode of life, and environment, 
 leads up to a general law which applies to all plants and 
 animals. The law of growth and development from the 
 simple germ to the mature life form can be seen in the 
 butterfly, the frog, and the sunflower. These laws and 
 others in biology, if developed on concrete specimens, 
 give much insight into the whole realm of nature, more
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 43 
 
 stimulating by far than that based on scientific classifica- 
 tions, as orders, families and species. The great and 
 simple outlines of nature's work begin to appear out of 
 such laws. 
 
 Again the study of the whole life history of a plant or 
 animal, in its relations to the inorganic world and to 
 other plants and animals, is always a cross-section in the 
 sciences and shows how all the natural sciences are knit 
 together into a causal unity. Take the life history of a 
 hickory tree. As it germinates and grows from the seed 
 how it draws from the earth and air; the effect of storms, 
 seasons, and lightning upon it; how it later furnishes 
 nuts to the squirrels and boys; its branches may be the 
 nesting place for birds and its bark for insects. Finally, 
 the uses of its tough wood for man are seen. The life of 
 a squirrel or of a honey-bee furnishes also a cross-section 
 through all the sciences from the inorganic world up to 
 man. 
 
 If in tracing life histories we take care to select typi- 
 cal subjects which exemplify perhaps thousands of simi- 
 lar cases, we shall materially shorten the road leading 
 toward insight into nature. These types are concrete 
 and have all the interest and attractiveness of individual 
 life, but they also bring out characteristics which explain 
 myriads of similar phenomena. A careful and detailed 
 study of a single tree like the maple, with the circulation 
 of the sap and the function of roots, bark, leaves, and 
 woody fiber, will give an insight into the processes of 
 growth upon which the life of the tree depends and these 
 processes will easily appear to be true of all tree ^nd 
 plant forms. 
 
 In nature as it shows itself in the woods or in the 
 pond, there is such a miixgling and interdependence of
 
 44 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 the natural sciences upon each other that the book of 
 nature seems totally different from books of botany, 
 physics, and zoology as made by men. In the forest we 
 find close together trees of many kinds, shrubs, flower- 
 ing plants, vines, mosses, and ferns; grasses, beetles, 
 worms, and birds; ^ squirrels, owls and sunshine; rocks, 
 soil, and springs; summer and winter; storms, frost, and 
 drouth. Plants depend upon the soil and upon each 
 other. The birds and squirrels find their home and food 
 among the trees and plants. The trees seem to grow 
 together as if they needed each other's companionship. 
 All the plants and animals depend upon the soil, air, and 
 climate, and the whole wood changes. its garb and partly 
 Its guests with the seasons. A forest is a life society^ 
 consisting of mutually dependent parts. How nature dis- 
 regards our conventional distinctions between the natural 
 sciences ! We need no better proof than this that they 
 should not be taught chiefly from books. A child might 
 learn a myriad of things in the woods and gain much 
 insight into nature's ways without making any clear dis- 
 tinction between botany, zoology, and geology. Herein 
 is also the proof that text-books are needed as' a guide in 
 nature's labyrinth. If the frequency and intimacy of 
 mutual relations are any proof of unity, the natural sci- 
 ences are a unit and have a right to be called by one 
 name, nature stud)/. 
 
 In the study of laws, life histories, and life groups, 
 the causal relations in nature are found to be wonderfully 
 stimulating to those who have begun to trace them out. 
 The child as well as the mature scientist finds in these 
 causal connections materials of absorbing interest. 
 
 It is plain, therefore, that the lines tending toward 
 unity in nature study are numerous and strong; such as
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 4S 
 
 the scientific classificatioas of our text-books, the work- 
 ing out of general laws whether in biology or physics, 
 the study of life histories in vegetable and animal, and 
 the observation of life societies in the close mutual rela- 
 tions of the different parts or individuals. 
 
 If a course of nature studies is begun in the first grade 
 and carried systematically through all the years up to the 
 eighth grade, is it not reasonable to suppose that real 
 insight into nature, based on observation taken at first 
 hand, may be reached? It will involve a study of living 
 plants and animals, minerals, physical apparatus and 
 devices, chemical experiments, the making of collections, 
 regular excursions for the observation of the neighboring 
 fields, forests, and streams, and the working over of these 
 and other concrete experiences from all sources through 
 skillful class teaching. 
 
 The first great result to a child of such a series of 
 studies is an intelligent and rational understanding of his 
 home, the world, his natural environment. He will have 
 a seeing eye and an appreciative mind for the thousand 
 things surrounding his daily life where the ignorant toiler 
 sees and understands nothing. 
 
 A second advantage which we can only hint at, while 
 incidental is almost equally important. We have been 
 considering nature chiefly as a realm by itself, apart 
 from man. But the utilities of natural science in indi. 
 vidual life and in society are so manifold that we accept 
 many of the finest products of skill and art as if they 
 were natural products — as if gold coins, silk dresses, and 
 fine pictures grew on the bushes and only waited to be 
 picked. The thousand-fold applications of natural science 
 to human industry and comfort deserve to be perceived 
 as the result oj^ labor and inventive skill. Our much-
 
 4« GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 lauded steam engines, telegraph microscopes, sewing 
 machines, reapers, iron ships, and printing presses, are 
 not examples of a few, but of myriads of things that 
 natural science has secured. But how many children on 
 leaving the common school understand the principle in- 
 volved in any one of the machines mentioned, subjects of 
 common talk as they are? As children leave the schools 
 at fourteen or fifteen they should know and appreciate 
 many such things, wherein man, by his wit and ingenious 
 use of natures forces, has triumphed over difficulties. 
 How are glass and soap made? What has a knowledge of 
 natural science to do with the construction of stoves, 
 furnaces, and lamps? How are iron, silver, and copper 
 ore mined and reduced? How is sugar obtained from 
 maple trees, cane, and beet root? How does a suction 
 pump work and why? Without a knowledge of such 
 applications of natural science we should be thrown back 
 into barbarism. These things also, since they form such 
 an important part of every child's environment, should 
 be understood, but not for direct utility. 
 
 Historically considered, the study of natural science 
 is the study of man's long continued struggle with nature 
 and of his gradual triumph. It ends with insight into 
 nature and into those contrivances of men by which her 
 laws and forces are utilized. The whole subject of nature, 
 her laws and powers, must not remain a sealed book to 
 the masses of the people. Scientists, inventors, and 
 scholars may lead the way, but they are only pioneers. 
 The thousands of the children of the people are treading 
 at their heels and must be initiated into the mysteries. 
 
 Our knowledge of these principles and appliances con- 
 stitute in fact a good share of the foundation upon which 
 our whole culture status rests. Without natural science
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 47 
 
 we should understand neither nature nor society. Spen- 
 cer shows the wide-reaching value of science knowledge 
 in our modern life: "For leaving out only some very 
 small classes, what are all men employed in? They are 
 employed in the production, preparation, and distribu- 
 tion of commodities. And on what does efficiency in the 
 production, preparation, and distribution of commodities 
 depend? It depends on the use of methods fitted to the 
 respective nature of these commodities, it depends on an 
 adequate knowledge of their physical, chemical, or vital 
 properties, as the case may be; that is, it depends on 
 science. This order of knowledge which is in great part 
 ignored in our school courses, is the order of knowledge 
 underlying the right performance of all those processes 
 by which civilized life is made possible. Undeniable as 
 is this truth, and thrust upon us as it is at every turn, 
 there seems to be no living consciousness of it. Its very 
 familiarity makes it unregarded. To give due weight to 
 our argument, we must therefore realize. this truth to the 
 reader by a rapid review of the facts." He then illus- 
 trates, in interesting detail, the varied applications of 
 mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, and social sci- 
 ence to the industries and economies of real life, and con- 
 cludes as follows: "That which our school courses leave 
 almost entirely out, we thus find to be that which most 
 nearly concerns the business of life. All our industries 
 would cease were it not for that information which men 
 begin to acquire as they best may after their education 
 is said to be finished. And were it not for this informa- 
 tion that has been from age to age accumulated and 
 spread by unofficial means, these industries would never 
 have existed. Had there been no teaching but such as 
 is given in our public schools, England would now be
 
 48 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 what it was in feudal times. That increasing acquaint- 
 ance with the laws of nature which has through succes- 
 sive ages enabled us to subjugate nature to our needs, 
 and in these days gives to the common laborer comforts 
 which a few centuries ago kings could not purchase, is 
 scarcely in any degree owed to the appointed means of 
 instructing our youth. The vital knowledge — that by 
 which we have grown as a nation to what we are, and 
 which now underlies our whole existence — is a knowledge 
 that has got itself taught in nooks and corners, while the 
 ordained agencies for teaching have been mumbling little 
 else but dead formulas." Spencer, Education, pp. 44, 54. 
 
 Not only the specialists in natural science, whose 
 interest and enthusiasm are largely absorbed in these 
 studies, but many other energetic teachers are persuaded 
 that thFlBulture value of nature studies is on a par with 
 that of historical studies. But on account of the present 
 lack of system and of clear purpose in natural science 
 teachers, the first great problem in this field of common 
 school effort is to select the material and perfect the 
 method of studying nature with children. 
 
 Our estimate of the value of natural science for cult- 
 ure and for discipline is confirmed by the opinion of edu- 
 cational reformers and by the changes and progress in 
 schools. An inquiry into the history of education in 
 Europe and in America since the Reformation will show 
 that the movement towards nature study has been accu- 
 mulating momentum for more than three hundred years. 
 Tn spite of the failure of such men as Comeuius, Ratich, 
 Basedow, and Rousseau to secure the introduction of 
 these studies in a liberal degree, in spite of the enormous 
 influence of custom and prejudice in favor of Latin and 
 other traditional studies, the natural srciences have made
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 49 
 
 recently such surprising advances and have so penetrated 
 and transformed our modern life that we are simply com- 
 pelled, even in the common school, to take heed of these 
 great, living educational forces already at work. 
 
 The universities of England and of the United States 
 have been largely transformed within the last forty years 
 by the introduction, on a grand scale, of modern studies, 
 particularly of the natural sciences. The fitting schools, 
 academies, and high schools have had no choice but to fol- 
 low this lead. Since the forces that produced this result 
 in higher education sprang up largely outside of our in- 
 stitutions of learning, the movement is not likely to 
 cease till the common school has been changed in the 
 same way. The educational question of the future is not 
 whether historical or natural science or formal studies 
 are to monopolize the school course, but rather how these 
 three indispensable elements of every child's education 
 may be best harmonized and wrought into a unit. 
 / But the question that confronts us at every turn is, 
 What is the disciplinary value of nature study?' We 
 know, say the opponents, what a vigorous training in 
 ancient languages and mathematics can do for a student. 
 What results in this direction can the natural sciences 
 tabulate? The champions of natural science point with 
 pride to the great men who have been trained and devel- 
 oped in such studies. For inductive thinking the natural 
 sciences otTer the best materials. To cultivate self-reli- 
 ance there is nothing like turning a student loose in 
 nature under a skilled instructor. The spirit of investi- 
 gation and of accurate thinking is claimed as a peculiar 
 product of nature study. It is called, par excellence, 
 "the scientific spirit." The undue reverence for au- 
 thority produced by literary studies is not a weakness of
 
 50 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 natural science pursuits. But intense interest and devo- 
 tion are combined with scientific accuracy and fidelity to 
 nature and her laws. 
 
 We do not feel called upon to attempt a settlement of 
 this dispute. We have already assumed that history in 
 the broad sense (including languages) and natural science 
 (or nature study) are the two great staples of the com- 
 mon school course, and that so far as discipline is con- 
 cerned one is as important as the other. But we tfelieve 
 that those educators whose first, middle, and last question 
 in education is, "What is the disciplinary value of a 
 study?" have mistaken the primary problem of educa- 
 tion. Just as in the proper training of the body, the 
 strength and skill of a professional athlete are, in no 
 sense, the true aim, but physical soundness, health, and 
 vigor; so in mind culture, not extraordinary skill in men- 
 tal gymnastics of the severest sort, is the essential aim, 
 but mental soundness, integrity, and motive. The under- 
 lying question in education is not. How strong or incisive 
 is his .mind? (This depends largely upon heredity and na- 
 tive endowment) but, What is its quality and its temper? 
 If might is right, then mental strength is to be gained 
 at all hazards. But if right is higher than might, then 
 mental skill and power are only secondary aims. So 
 long as we are dealing with fundamental aims in such a 
 serious business as education, why stop short of that 
 ideal which is manifestly the best? We have no contro- 
 versy with the highest mental discipline and strength 
 that are consistent with all-round mental soundness. 
 Our better teachers are not lacking in appreciation for 
 the value of what is called formal mental discipline, but 
 they do generally lack faith in the innate power of the 
 best studies to arouse interest and mental life. They
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 51 
 
 emphasize the drill more than the co)itent and the iuspira- 
 tion of the author. Both in theory and in practice they 
 are greatly lacking in the intellectual sympathy and 
 moral power which result from bringing the minds of 
 students into direct contact with the noblest products of 
 God's work in history and in the object world. Here we 
 can put our finger on the radical weakness of our school 
 work. 
 
 The really soul-inspiring teachers have not been 
 formalists nor drill-masters alone. Friedrich August 
 Wolf, for example, the great German philologist, was 
 probably the most inspiring teacher of classical lan- 
 guages that Germany has had. But to what was his 
 remarkable infliuence as a teacher of young men due? 
 .We usually think of a philologist as one who digs among 
 the roots of dead languages, who worships the forms of 
 speech and the laws of grammar. Doubtless he and his 
 pupils were much taken up with these things, but they 
 were not the prime source of his and their interest. 
 Wolf defined philology as "the knowledge of human na- 
 ture as exhibited in antiquity." He studied with great 
 avidity everything that could throw light upon the lives, 
 character, and language of the ancients. Their biogra- 
 phies, histories, geography, climate, dress, implements, 
 their sculpture, monuments, buildings, tombs. Ap- 
 proaching the literature and language of the Greeks with 
 this abundant knowledge of their real surroundings and 
 conditions of life, he saw the deeper, fuller significance 
 of every classical author and the great literary master- 
 pieces were perceived as the expression of the national 
 life. He appreciated language as the wonderful medium 
 through which the more wonderful life of the versatile 
 Greek expressed itself. The reason he was such a great
 
 r.2 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 j)hilologist was because he was so great a realist, a raan 
 who was intensely interested in the Greek people, their 
 history and life. Words alone had little charm for him. 
 No great teacher has been simply a word-monger. 
 
 For the present we leave the question of discipline 
 unanswered, though we are disposed to think that those 
 studies which introduce children to the two great fields 
 of real knowledge, and which arouse a strong desire to 
 solve the problems found there, will also furnish the most 
 valuable discipline. 
 
 Tho/i>7-m(d studies such as reading, spelling, writing, 
 language, and much of arithmetic, have thus far appro- 
 priated the best share of school time. They are the tools 
 for acquiring and formulating knowledge rather than 
 knowledge itself. They are so indispensable in life that 
 people have acquired a sort of superstitious respect for 
 them. They are generally considered as of primary im- 
 portance while other things are taken as secondary. By 
 virtue of this excessive estimation the formal studies 
 have become so strongly intrenched in the practice of the 
 schools that they are really a heavy obstacle to educa- 
 tional progress. They have been so long regarded as 
 the only gateway to knowledge that anyone who tries to 
 climb in some other way is regarded as a thief and rob- 
 ber. We forget that Homer's great poems were com- 
 posed and preserved for centuries before letters were in- 
 vented. As more thought is expended on studies and 
 methods of learning, the more the thinkers are inclined 
 to exactly reverse the educational machinery. They say: 
 ••Thought studies must precede form studies." We 
 should everywhere begin with valuable and interesting 
 thought materials in history and natural science and let 
 language, reading, spelling, and drawing follow. It is a
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 53 
 
 thing much more easily said than done, but many active 
 teachers are really doing it, and many others are wonder- 
 ing how it may be done. The advantage of putting the 
 concrete realities of thought before children at first 
 is that they give a powerful impetus to mental life, while 
 pure formal studies in most cases have a deadening effect 
 and gradually put a child to sleep. One of the great 
 problems of school work is how to get more interest and 
 instructive thought into school exercises. 
 
 We are now in a position to give a concluding esti- 
 mate upon the relative value of these three elements in 
 school education. History contributes the materials 
 from which motives and moral impulses spring. It culti- 
 vates and strengthens moral convictions by the use of 
 inspiring examples. The character of each child should 
 be drawn into harmony with the highest impulses that 
 men have felt. A desire to be the author of good to 
 others should be developed into a practical ruling motive. 
 Natural science on the other hand supplies a knowledge 
 of the ordinary means and appliances by which the pur- 
 poses of life are realized. It gives us proper insight 
 into the conditions of life and puts us into intelligent 
 relation to our envii'onment. Not only must a child be 
 supplied with the necessaries of life but he must appreci- 
 ate the needs of health and understand the economies of 
 society, such as the necessity of mental and manual 
 labor, the right use of the products and forces of nature, 
 and the advantage of men's inventions and devices. In 
 a plan of popular education these two culture elements 
 should mingle (history and natural science). In the 
 case of all sorts of people in society the ability to exe- 
 cute high moral purposes depends largely upon a ready, 
 practical insight into natural conditions. We are ncl
 
 54 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 thinking of the bread-and-butter phase of life and of the 
 aid afforded by the sciences in making a living, but of 
 the all-round, practical utility of natural science as a 
 necessary supplenaent to moral training. 
 
 One of the best tests of a system of education is the 
 preparation it gives for life in a liberal sense. When a 
 child, leaving school behind, develops into a citizen, 
 what tests are applied to him? The questions submitted 
 to his judgment in his relations to the family and to 
 society call for a quick and varied knowledge of men, 
 insight into character, and for a large amount of prac- 
 tical information of natural science. He is asked to vote 
 intelligently on social, political, sanitary, and economic 
 questions; to judge of men's motives, opinions, and char- 
 acter; to vote upon or perhaps to direct the management 
 of poor houses, asylums, and penitentiaries; in towns to 
 decide questions of drainage, police, water supply, public 
 health, and school administration; to make contracts for 
 public buildings, and bridges; to grant licenses and fran- 
 chises; to serve on juries or as representatives of the 
 people. These are not professional matters alone; they 
 are the common duties of all citizens of a sound mind. 
 These things each person should know how to judge^ 
 whether he be a blacksmith, a merchant, or a house 
 keeper. In all such matters he must be not only a 
 judge of others but an actor under the guidance of right 
 motives and information. Again, in the bringing up of 
 children, in the domestic arrangements of every home 
 and in a proper care for the minds and bodies of both 
 parents and children, a multitude of practical problems 
 from each of the great fields of real knowledge must be 
 met and solved. 
 
 A medical missionary illustrates this combination of
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. . 55 
 
 historical and natural science elements. His life purpose 
 is drawn from history, from the life of Christ, and from 
 the traditional incentives of the church. The means by 
 which he is to make himself practically felt are obtained 
 from his study of medicine and from the sciences upon 
 which it depends. These elements form the basis of his 
 influence. This illustration however savors of profes- 
 sional rather than of general education, and we are con- 
 cerned only with the latter. But the education of every 
 child is analogous to that of the medical missionary in its 
 two constituent elements. 
 
 As a matter of fact neither history nor natural science 
 occupies any such prominence in the school course as we 
 have judged fitting. Much thoughtful study, experience 
 in teaching, and pioneer labor in partially new fields will 
 be necessary in order to bring into existence such a course 
 of study based upon the best materials. Many teachers 
 already recognize the necessity for it and see before them 
 a land of plenty as compared with the half-desert barren- 
 ness revealed in our present school course. 
 
 Two powerful convictions in the minds of those re- 
 sponsible for education have contributed to produce this 
 desert-like condition in children's school employments, 
 and this brings us to a discussion of the overestimation 
 in which ipure\y formal studies are held. The first article 
 of faith rests upon the unshaken belief in the practical 
 sticdiex, reading, writing, and arithmetic. They are still 
 looked upon as a barrier that must be scaled before the 
 real work of education can begin. Learn to read, write, 
 and figure and then the world of knowledge as well as of 
 business is at your command. But many children find 
 the bari-ier so difficult to scale that they really never get 
 into the fields of knowledge. Many of our most thorough-
 
 56 . GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 going educators still firmly believe that a child can not 
 learn anything worth mentioning till he has first learned 
 to read. But however deeply rooted this confidence in 
 the purely formal work of the early school years may be, 
 it must break down as soon as means are deviled for 
 putting the realities of interesting knowledge before and 
 underneath all the forms of expression. Let the neces- 
 sity for expression spring from the real objects of study. 
 Those children to whom the memorizing and drill upon 
 forms of expression becomes tedious deserve our sym- 
 pathy. There is a kind of knowledge adapted to arouse 
 these dull ones to their full capacity of interest. '-Or 
 what man is there of you whom if his son ask bread will 
 he give him a stone ?" With many a child the first reader, 
 the arithmetic, or the grammar becomes a veritable stone. 
 There is no good reason why the sole burden of work in 
 early school grades should rest upon the learning of the 
 pure formalities of knowledge. Children's minds are not 
 adapted to an exclusive diet of this kind. The fact that 
 children have good memories is no reason why their 
 minds should be gorged with the dryest memory mate- 
 rials. They have a healthy interest in people, whether in 
 life or in story, and in the objects in nature around them. 
 What is thus pre-eminently true of the primary grades is 
 true to a large extent throughout all the grades of the 
 common school. It seems almost curious that the more 
 tender the plants the more barren and inhospitable the 
 soil upon which they are expected to grow. Fortunately 
 these little ones have such an exuberance of life that it is 
 not easily quenched. Formal knowledge stands first in 
 our common school course and real studies are allowed to 
 pick up such crumbs of comfort as may chance to fall. 
 We believe in formal studies and in their complete mastery
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 37 
 
 in the common school, but they should stand in the place 
 of service to real studies. How powerful the tendency 
 has been and still is toward pure formal drill and word 
 memory is apparent from the fact that even geography 
 and history, which are not at all formal studies, but full 
 to overflowing with interesting facts and laws, have been 
 reduced to a dry memorizing of words, phrases, and ster- 
 eotyped sentences. 
 
 It is not difficult to understand why the numerous body 
 of teachers, who easily drift into mechanical methods, has 
 a preference for formal studies. They are comparatively 
 easy and humdrum and keep pupils busy. Real studies, 
 if taught with any sort of fitness, require energy, interest, 
 and versatility, besides much outside work in preparing 
 materials. 
 
 The second article of faith is a still stronger one. The 
 better class of energetic teachers would never have been 
 won over to formal studies on purely utilitarian grounds. 
 A second conviction weighs heavily in their minds. "T/ie 
 ((iscipline of the mental facAdties'' is a talisman of unusual 
 potency with them. They prize arithmetic and grammar 
 more for this than for any direct practical value. The 
 idea of mental discipline, of training the faculties, is so 
 ingrained into all 'our educational thinking that it crops 
 out in a hundred ways and holds our courses of study iu 
 the beaten track of formal training with a steadiness that 
 is astonishing. These friends believe that we are taking 
 the back-bone out of education by making it interesting. 
 The culmination of this educational doctrine is reached 
 when it is said that the most valuable thing learned in 
 school or out of it is to do and do vigorously that which 
 is most disagreeable. The training of the will to meet 
 difficulties unflinchingly is their aim, and we can not gain- 
 
 1'
 
 58 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 say it. These stalwart apostles of educational hardship 
 and difficulty are in constant fear lest we shall, make 
 studies interesting and attractive and thus undermine 
 the energy of the will. But the question at once arises: 
 Does not the will always act from motives of some sort? 
 And is there any motive or incentive so stimulating to 
 the will as a steady and constantly increasing wterest in 
 studies? It is able to surmount great difficulties. 
 
 We wish to assure our stalwart friends that we still 
 adhere to the good old doctrine that "there is no royal 
 road to learning." There is no way of putting aside the 
 real difficulties that are found in every study, no way of 
 grading up the valleys and tunneling through the hills so 
 as to get the even monotony of a railroad track through 
 the rough or mountainous part of education. Every 
 child must meet and master the difficulties of learning 
 for himself. There are no palace cars with reclining chairs 
 to carry him to the summit of real difficulties. The char- 
 acter-developing j)oiper that lies in the mastery of hard 
 tasks constitutes one of their chief merits. Accepting 
 this as a fundamental truth in education, the problem 
 for our solution is, how to stimulate children to encounter 
 difficulties. Many children have little inclination to sac- 
 rifice their ease to the cause of learning, and our dull 
 methods of teaching confirm them in their indifference 
 to educational incentives. Any child, who. like Hugh 
 Miller or Abraham Lincoln, already possesses an insati- 
 able thirst for knowledge, will allow no difficulties or 
 hardships to stand in the way of progress. This original 
 appetite and thirst for knowledge which the select few 
 have often manifested in childhood is more valuable than 
 anything the schools can give. With the majority of 
 children we can certainly do nothing better than to nur-
 
 THE RELATIVE VALUE. 59 
 
 ture such a taste for knowledge into vigorous life. It 
 will not do to assume that the average of children have 
 any such original energy or momentum to lead them to 
 scale the heights of even ordinary knowledge. Nor will 
 it do to rely too much upon divorcing process, that is, by 
 means of threats, severity, and discipline, to carry chil- 
 dren against their will toward the educational goal. 
 
 •'Be not like dumb driven cattle, 
 Be a hero in the strife" 
 
 is sound educational doctrine. 
 
 The thing for teachers to do is to cultivate in children 
 all healthy appetites for knowledge, to set up interesting 
 aims and desires at every step, to lead the approach to 
 different fields of knowledge in the spirit of conquest. 
 
 In the business world and in professional life men and 
 women work with abundant energy and will because they 
 have desirable ends in view. The hireling knows no such 
 generous stimulus. Bu.siness life is full of irksome and 
 difficult tasks but the aim in view carries people through 
 them. We shall not eliminate the disagreeable and irk- 
 some from school tasks, but try to create in children such 
 a spirit and ambition as will lead to greater exertions. 
 To implant vigorous aims and incentives in children is the 
 great privilege of the teacher. We shall some day learn 
 that when a boy cracks a nut he does so because there 
 may be a kernel in it, not because the shell is hard. 
 
 In concluding the discussion of relative values we will 
 summarize the results. 
 
 History, in the liberal sense, surveys the field of hu- 
 man life in its typical forms and furnishes the best illus- 
 trative moral materials. Nature study opens the door 
 to the real world in all its beauty, variety, and law. The 
 formal Hudiea constitute an indispensable part of useful
 
 60 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 and disciplinary knowledge, but they should occupy a 
 secondary place in courses of study because they deal 
 with the Jorm rather than with the content of the sci- 
 ences. It is a fundamental error to place formal studies 
 in the center of the school course and to subordinate 
 everything to their mastery. History and natural sci- 
 ence, on the contrary, having the richest knowledge con- 
 tent, constitute a natural center for all educative efforts. 
 They make possible a strong development of will-energy 
 because their interesting materials furnish strong and 
 legitimate incentives to mental activity and an enlarged 
 field and opportunity to voluntary effort in pursuit of 
 clear and attractive aims. 
 
 "''^l^^.^noo. 
 
 A/. 
 
 ^-
 
 NATURE OF I^'TEREST. 61 
 
 CHAPTER HI. 
 
 NATURE OF INTEREST. 
 
 By interest we mean the natural bent or inclinatiou 
 of the mind to find satisfaction in a subject when it is 
 properly presented. It is the natural attractiveness of 
 the subject that draws and holds the attention. Inter- 
 est belongs to the feelings but differs from the other feel- 
 ings, such as desire or longing for an object, since it is 
 satisfied with the simple contemplation without asking 
 for possession. The degree of interest with which differ- 
 ent kinds of knowledge are received, varies greatly. 
 Indeed, it is possible to acquire knowledge in such a man. 
 ner as to produce dislike and disgust. A proper interest 
 in a subject leads to a quiet, steady absorption of the 
 mind with it, but does not imply an impetuous, passion- 
 ate, and one-sided devotion to one thing. Interest keeps 
 the mind active and alert without undue excitement or 
 partiality. 
 
 It would be well if every study and every lesson could 
 be sustained by such an interest as this. It would be in 
 many cases like lubricating oil poured upon dry and 
 creaking axles. Knowledge might then have a flavor to 
 it and would be more than a consumption of certain facts 
 and formulas coldly turned over to the memory machine. 
 The child's own personality must become entangled in 
 the facts and ideas acquired. There should be a sort of 
 affinity established between the child's soul and the in- 
 formation hfi gains. At every step the sympathy and
 
 62 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 life experiences from without the school should be inter- 
 twined with school acquisitions. " All would be woven to- 
 gether and permeated by feeling. We forget that the 
 feelings or sensibilities awakened by knowledge are what 
 give it personal significance to us. 
 
 The interest we have in mmdis, intrinsic, native to 
 the subject, and springs up naturally when the mind is 
 brought face to face with something attractive. The 
 things of sense in nature and the people whom we see 
 and read about, have a perennial and inexhaustible attrac- 
 tion for us all. It is among these objects that poets 
 and artists find their materials and their inspiration. 
 For the same reason the pictures drawn by the artist 
 or poet have a charm which does not pass away. They 
 select something concrete and individual; they clothe it 
 with beauty and attractiveness; they give it some in- 
 herent quality that appeals to our admiration and love. 
 It must call forth some esthetic or moral judgment by 
 virtue of its natural quality. Like luscious grapes the 
 objects presented to the thought of the children should 
 have an unquestionable quality that is desirable. 
 
 We just spoke of interest, not as fluctuating and 
 variable, but steady and persistent. It contains also the 
 elements of ease, pleasure, and needed employment; that 
 is, in learning something that has a proper interest, 
 there is greater ease and pleasure in the acquisition, 
 and occupation with the object satisfies an inner need. 
 "When interest has been fully developed, it must always 
 combine pleasure, facility, and the satisfaction of a 
 need. We see again that in all exertions, power and 
 pleasure are secured to interest. It does not feel the 
 burden of difficulties but often seems to sport with 
 them. "— Zt7/er.
 
 NATURE OF INTEREST. 63 
 
 A natural interest is also awakened by what is 
 strange, mysterious, and even frightful, but these kinds 
 of interest concern us from a speculative rather than 
 a pedagogical point of view. We are seeking for those 
 interests which contribute to a normal and permanent 
 mental action. 
 
 Severe effort and exertion are a necessary part of in- 
 struction, but a proper interest in the subject will lead 
 children to exert themselves with greater energy even 
 when encountering disagreeable tasks. There are places 
 in every subject when work is felt as a burden rather 
 than as a pleasure, but the interest and energy aroused 
 in the more attractive parts will carry a child through 
 the swamps and mires at a speedier rate. It is not at all 
 desirable to conceal difficulties under the guise of amuse- 
 ment. But by means of a natural interest it is possible 
 to bring the mind into the most favorable state for ac- 
 tion. In opposition to a lively and humane treatment of 
 subjects, a dry and dull routine has often been praised 
 as the proper discipline of the raicd and will. "It was a 
 mistake," says Ziller, "to find in the simple pressure of 
 difficulties a. source of culture, for it is the opposite of 
 culture. It was a mistake to call the pressure of effort, 
 the feeling of burden and pain, a source of proper train- 
 ing, simply because will power and firmness of character 
 are thus secured and preserved to youth. Pedagogical 
 efforts looking towards a lightening and enlivening of in- 
 struction should not have been answered by an appeal to 
 severe methods, to strict, dry, and dull learning, that 
 made no attempt to adapt itself to the natural movement 
 of the child's mind." (Ziller, Lehre vom E. U., p. 355.) 
 Not those studies which are driest, dullest, and most 
 disagreeable should be selected upon which to awaken
 
 64 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 the mental forces of a child, but those which naturally 
 arouse his interest and prompt him to a lively exercise 
 of his powers. For children of the third and fourth^rade 
 to narrate the story of the Golden Fleece is a more suit- 
 able exercise than to memorize the CXIXth Psalm, or 
 a catechism. 
 
 A proper interest aims, finally, at the highest form of 
 quiet, sustained loill exertion. The succession of steps 
 leading up to will energy, is interest, desire, and will. 
 Before attempting to realize the higher forms of will 
 effort, we must look to the fountains and sources out 
 of which it springs. If a young man has laid up abundant 
 and interesting stores of knowledge of architecture, he 
 only needs an opportunity, and there is likely to be great 
 will-energy in the work of planning and constructing 
 buildings. But without this interest and knowledge 
 there will be no effort along this line. In like manner 
 children cannot be expected to show their best effort un- 
 less the subject is made strongly interesting from the 
 start, or unless interest-awakening knowledge has al- 
 ready been stored in the mind. To make great demands 
 upon the will power in early school years, is like asking 
 for ripe fruits before they have had time to mature. 
 Knowledge, feelings, and will-incentives of every sort 
 must be first planted in the mind, before a proper will- 
 energy can be expected. In teaching, we should aim to 
 develop will power, not to take it for granted as a ready 
 product. As the will should ultimately control all the 
 mental powers, its proper maturity is a later outcome of 
 education. Even supposing that the will has consid- 
 erable original native power, it is a power that is likely 
 to lie dormant or be used in some ill-direction, unless 
 proper incentives are brought to bear upon it. The will
 
 NATURE OF INTEREST. 65 
 
 is so constituted that it is open to appeal, and in all the 
 affairs of school and life, incentives of all sorts are con- 
 stantly brought to bear upon it. Why not make an effort 
 to bring to bear the incentives that spring out of inter- 
 -est, that steady force, which is able to give abiding ten- 
 dency and direction to the efforts? Why not cultivate 
 those nobler incentives that spring out of culture-bring- 
 ing-knowledge? There are, therefore, important prelim- 
 inaries to full will energy, which are secured by the cul- 
 tivation of knowledge, the sensibilities, and desires. 
 
 There is a common belief that any subject can be made 
 interesting if only the teacher knows the secret of the 
 how; if only he has proper skill. But it is hard even for 
 a skillful workman "to make bricks without straw," to 
 awaken mental effort where interest in the subject is en- 
 tirely lucking. It is often claimed that if there is dull- 
 ness and disgust with a study it is the fault of the teacher. 
 As Mr. Quick says, '-I would go so far as to lay it down 
 as a rule, that whenever children are inattentive and ap- 
 parently take no interest in a lesson, the teacher should 
 always look first to himself for the reason. There are 
 perhaps no circumstances in which a lack of interest 
 does not originate in the mode of instruction adopted by 
 the teacher." This statement assumes that all knowledge 
 is about equally interesting to pupils, and everything 
 depends upon the tnanner in which the teacher deals with 
 it. But different kinds of knowledge differ widely in 
 their power to awaken interest in childr^ft.- . The true 
 idea of interest demands that the subject matter be ^ 
 itselj interesting, adapted to appeal to a child, and to se- 
 cure his participation. If the interest awakened by 
 bringing the mind in contact with the subject is not 
 spontaneous, it is not genuine and helpful in the best
 
 r,« (lENERAL METHOD. 
 
 sense. One of the first and greatest evils of all school 
 courses has been a failure to select those subjects, which 
 in themselves are adapted to excite the interest of chil- 
 dren at each age of progress. If we could assume that 
 lessons had been so arranged, we might then with Mr. 
 Quick justly demand of a teacher a manner of teaching 
 that must make the subjects interesting, or in other 
 words a manner of treatment that would be appropriate 
 to an interesting subject. 
 
 There are two kinds of interest that need to be 
 clearly distinguished: direct interest, which is felt for the 
 thing itself, for its own sake, and indirect interest which 
 points to something else as the real sourde. A miser 
 loves gold coins for their own sake, but most people love 
 them only because of the things for which they may be 
 exchanged. The poet loves the beauty and fragrance of 
 flowers, the florist adds to this a mercenary interest. A 
 snow-shovel may have no interest for us ordinarily, but 
 just when it is needed, on a winter morning, it is an 
 object of considerable interest. It is simply a means to 
 an end. The kind of interest which we think is so valu- 
 able for instruction is direct and intrinsic. The life of 
 Benjamin Franklin calls out a strong direct interest in 
 the man and his fortunes. A humming bird attracts 
 and appeals to us for its own &ake. Indirect interest, 
 so called, has more of the character of desire. A desire 
 to restore one's health will produce great interest in a 
 certain health resort, like the Hot Springs, or in some 
 method of treatment, as the uge of Koch's lymph. The 
 desire for wealth and business success will lead a mer- 
 chant in the fur trade to take interest in seals and seal- 
 fishing, and in beavers, trapping, etc. The wish to gain 
 a prize will cause a child to take deep interest in a lesson.
 
 NATURE OF INTEREST. 07 
 
 But in all these cases desire precedes interest. Interest, 
 indeed, in the thing itself for its own sake, is frequently 
 not present. It is true in many cases that indirect in- 
 terest is not interest at all. It is a dangerous thing in 
 education to substitute indirect for direct or true interest. 
 The former often means the cultivation, primarily, of 
 certain inordinate desires or feelings, such as rivalry, 
 pride, jealousy, ambition, reputation, love of self. By 
 appealing to the selfish pride of children in getting les- 
 sons, hateful moral qualities are sometimes started into 
 active growth in the very effort to secure the highest in- 
 tellectual results and discipline. Giving a prize for su- 
 periority often produces jealousy, unkindness, and deep- 
 seated ill-will where the cultivation of a proper natural 
 interest would lead to more kindly and sympathetic rela- 
 tions between the children. The cultivation of direct in- 
 terest in all valuable kinds of knowledge, on the other 
 hand, leads also to the cultivation of desires, but the de- 
 sires thus generated are pure and generous, the desire 
 for further knowledge of botany or history, the desire to 
 imitate what is admirable in human actions and to shun 
 what is mean. The desires which spring out of direct 
 interest are elevating, while the desires which are asso- 
 ciated with indirect interest are in many cases egotistic 
 and selfish. 
 
 We often say that it is necessary to make a subject 
 interesting so that it may be more p<ilat<(ble, more easily 
 learned. 'J'his is the commonly accepted idea. It is a 
 means of helping us to swallow a distasteful medicine. 
 If the main purpose were to get knowledge into the mind, 
 and interest only a means to this end, the cultivation of 
 such indirect interests would be all right. But interest 
 is one of the qualities which we wish to see permanently
 
 68 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 associated with knowledge even after it is safely stored 
 in the mind. If interest is there, future energy and ac- 
 tivity will spring spontaneously out of the acquirements. 
 Indirect interest indeed is often necessary and may 
 be a sign of tact in teaching. But it is negative and 
 weak in after results. So far as it produces motives at 
 all they may be dangerous. It cannot build up and 
 strengthen character but threatens to undermine it by 
 cultivating wrong motives. There is no assurance that 
 knowledge thus acquired can affect the will and bear 
 fruit in action, even though it be the right kind of knowl- 
 edge, because it is not the knowledge in this case that 
 furnishes the incentives. The interest that is awakened 
 in a subject because of its innate attractiveness, leaves 
 incentives which may ripen sooner or later into action. 
 The higher kind of interest is direct, intrinsic, not 
 simply receptive, but active and progressive. In the 
 knowledge acquired it finds only incentives to further ac- 
 quisition. It is life giving and is prompted by the ob- 
 jects themselves, just as the interest of boys is awakened 
 by deeds of adventure and daring or by a journey into 
 the woods. The interest in an object that springs from 
 some other source than the thing itself, is indirect, as 
 the desire to master a lesson so as to excel others, or 
 gain a prize, or make a money profit out of it. In speak- 
 ing of interest in school studies, teachers quite commonly 
 have only the indirect in mind; i. e., the kind that leads 
 children to take hold of and master their lessons more 
 readily. Interest is thus chiefly a means of overcoming 
 distasteful tasks. It is the merit of a direct or genuine 
 interest that it aids in mastering difficulties and in addi- 
 tion to this gives a permanent pleasure in studies. One 
 of the high aims of instruction is to implant a strong
 
 NATURE OF INTEREST. 69 
 
 permanent interest in studies that will last through 
 school days and after they are over. 
 
 A live interest springs most easily out of knowl- 
 edge subjects like history and natural science. Formal 
 studies like grammar and arithmetic awaken it less 
 easily. Herbart has classified the chief kinds and sources 
 of interest as follows: Interest in nature apart fiom man, 
 and interest in man, society, etc. In nature and natural 
 objects as illustrated in the natural sciences there are 
 three chief kinds of interest. Empirical, which is stirred 
 by the variety and novelty of things seen. There is an 
 attractiveness in the many faces and moods of nature. 
 Between the years of childhood and old age there is 
 scarcely a person who does not enjoy a walk or a ride in 
 the open air, where the variety of plant, bird, animal, 
 and landscape makes a pleasing panorama. Speculative 
 interest goes deeper and inquires into the relations and 
 causal connections of phenomena. It traces out similar- 
 ities and sequences, and detects law and unity in nature. 
 It is not satisfied with the simple play of variety, but 
 seeks for the cause and genesis of things. Even a child 
 is anxious to know how a squirrel climbs a tree or cracks 
 a nut; where it stores its winter food, its nest and man- 
 ner of \\ie in winter. Why is it that a mole can burrow 
 and live under ground? How is it possible for a fish to 
 breathe in water? Esthetic interest is awakened by 
 what is beautiful, grand, and harmonious in nature or 
 art. The first glance at great overhanging masses of 
 rock, oppresses us with a feeling of awe. The wings of 
 an insect, with their delicate tracery and bright hues, 
 are attractive, and stir us with pleasure. The graceful 
 ferns beside the brooks and moss-stained rocks suggest 
 fairy-land.
 
 70 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 But stronger even than these interests which attach 
 us to the things of nature, are the interests of humanity. 
 The concern felt for others in joy or sorrow is based upon 
 our interest in them individually, and is sympathetic. In 
 this lies the charm of biography and the novel. Take 
 away the personal interest we have in Ivanhoe, Quenten 
 Durward, etc., and Scott's glory would quickly depart. 
 What empty and spiritless annals would the life of Fred- 
 eric the Great and Patrick Henry furnish! Social inter- 
 est is the regard for the good or evil fortune of societies 
 and nations. Upon this depends our concern for the pro- 
 gress of liberty and the struggle for free institutions in 
 Eno-land and other countries. On a smaller scale clubs, 
 fraternities, and local societies of all kinds are based on 
 the social interest. Religious interest finally reveals our 
 consciousness of man's littleness and weakness, and of 
 God's providence. As Pestalozzi says, "God is the near- 
 est resource of humanity.'" As individuals or nations 
 pass away their fate lies in His hand. 
 
 The sources of interest therefore are varied and pro- 
 ductive. Any one of the six is unlimited in extei^t and 
 variety. Together they constitute a boundless field for a 
 l)roper cultivation of the emotional as well as int^dctual 
 nature of man. A study of these sources of genuine in- 
 terest and a partial view of their breadth and depth, 
 reveals to teachers what our ^. ^sent school courses tend 
 strongly to mak^^ them for-^et, namely, that the right 
 kind of knowle*. ^ conf^^'^^s in itself the stimulus and the 
 germs- to great mental eAt-*tion. The dull drill upon gram- 
 mar, arithmetic, reading, spelling, and writing, which 
 are regarded as so important as to exclude almost every- 
 thing else, has convinced many a child that school is 
 veritably a dull place. And many a teacher is just as
 
 NATURE OF INTEREST. 71 
 
 strongly couvinced that keeping school is a dull and 
 sleepy business. And yet the sources of interest are 
 abundant to overflowing for him who has eyes to see. 
 That these sources and materials of knowledge, arousing 
 deep and lasting interests, are above other things adapted 
 to children and to the school room, is a truth worthy of 
 all emphasis. 
 
 Interest is a good test of the adaptability of knowl- 
 edge. When any subject is brought to the attention at 
 the right age and in the proper manner, it awakens in 
 children a natural and lively feeling. It is evident that 
 certain kinds of knowledge are not adapted to a boy at 
 the age of ten. He cares nothing about political science, 
 or medicine, or statesmanship, or the history of literature. 
 These things may be profoundly interesting to a person 
 two or three times as old, but not to him. Other things, 
 however, the story of Ulysses, travel, animals, geogra- 
 phy, and history, even arithmetic, may be very attractive 
 to a boy of ten. It becomes a matter of importance to 
 select those studies and parts of studies for children at 
 their cjj^ngiug periods of growth, which are adapted to 
 awaken lyid stimulate their minds. We shall be saved 
 then fr^-n doing what the best of educators have so fre- 
 (juently condemned, namely, when the child asks for 
 bread give him a stone, or when he asks for fish give him 
 a serpent. 
 
 The neglect to take propier cognizance of this princi- 
 ple of interest in laying out cour«'^'= of stucjy and in the 
 manner of presenting subject certainly one of the 
 
 gravest charges that ever can be brought against the 
 schools. It is a sure sign that teachers do not know 
 what it means "to put yourself in his place," to sympa- 
 thize with children and feel their needs. The educational
 
 72 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 reformers who have had deepest insight into child-life, 
 have given us clear and profound warnings. Rousseau 
 says: "Study children, for be sure you do not under- 
 stand them. Let childhood ripen in children. The 
 wisest apply themselves to what it is important to men 
 to know, without considering what children are in a con- 
 dition to learn. They are always seeking the man in the 
 child, without reflecting what he is before he can be a 
 man." It is well for us to take these words home and 
 act upon them. 
 
 It is worth the trouble to inquire whether it is possi- 
 ble to select subjects for school study which will prove 
 essentially attractive and interesting from the age of six 
 on. Are there materials for school study which are 
 adapted fully to interest first grade children? We know 
 that fairy stories appeal directly to them, and they love 
 to reproduce them. Reading and spelling in connection 
 with these tales are also stirring studies. Reading a 
 familiar story is certainly a much more interesting 
 employment than working at the almost meaningless sen- 
 tences of a chart or first reader. Number work when 
 based upon objects can be made to hold the attention of 
 little ones, at least in the last half of the first grade. 
 They love also to see and describe flowers, rocks, plants, 
 and pictures. It probably requires more skillful teach- 
 ing to awaken and hold the interest in the first grade 
 than in the second or any higher grade, unless older chil- 
 dren have been dulled by bad instruction. On what prin- 
 ciple is it possible to select both interesting and valuable 
 materials for the successive grades? We will venture to 
 answer this difficult question. 
 
 The main interest of children must be attracted by 
 what we may call real knoxoledge subjects; that is, those
 
 NATURE OF INTEREST. 73 
 
 treating of people (history stories, etc. ,) and those treat- 
 ing o"f plants, animals, and other natural objects (natural 
 science topics). Grammar, arithmetic, and spelling are 
 chiefly form studies and have less native attraction for 
 children. Secondly, it may be laid down as a fact of 
 experience that children will be more touched and stimu- 
 lated by particular persons and objects in nature than by 
 any general propositions, or laws, or classifications. 
 They prefer seeing a particular palm tree to hearing a 
 general description of palms. A narrative of some 
 special deed of kindness moves them more than a dis- 
 course on kindness. They feel a natural drawing toward 
 real, definite persons and things, and an indifference or 
 repulsion toward generalities. They prefer the story to 
 the moral. Children are little materialists. They dwell 
 in the sense-world, or in the world of imagination with 
 very clear and definite pictures. 
 
 But while dealing with things of sense and with par- 
 ticulars, it is necessary in teaching children to keep an 
 eye directed toward general classes and toward those 
 laws and principles that will be fully appreciated later. 
 In geography, arithmetic, language lessons, and natural 
 science, we must collect more materials in the lower 
 grades; more simple, concrete illustrations. They are 
 the basis upon which we can soon begin to generalize and 
 classify. The more attractive the illustrative materials 
 we select, the stronger the appeal to the child's own 
 liking, the more effective will be the instruction. A way 
 has been discovered to make the study of the concrete 
 and individual lead up w^th certainty to the grasp of 
 general notions and even of scientific laws as fast as the 
 children are ready for them. If the concrete object or 
 individual is carefully selected it will be a tgpe, that is,
 
 74 (iENERAL METHOD. 
 
 it illustrates a whole class of similar objects. Such a 
 typical concrete object really combines the particular and 
 the general. It has all the advantage of object-teaching, 
 the powerful attraction of real things, but its comparison 
 with other objects will also show that it illustrates a gen- 
 eral law or principle of wide-reaching scientific import- 
 ance. In both these steps natural interest is provided 
 for in the best way. A full and itemized examination of 
 some attractive object produces as strong an interest as 
 a child is capable of. Then to find out that this object 
 is a sort of key to the right interpretation of other ob- 
 jects, more or less familiar to him, has all the charm ol' 
 discovery. The sunflower, for example, is a large and at- 
 tractive object for itemized study. If the examination 
 leads a step further to a comparison with other composite 
 flowers, there will be an interesting discovery of kinship 
 with dandelions, asters, thistles, etc. This principle of 
 the type, as illustrating both the particular and general, 
 is true also of geographical topics that lead a child far 
 from home and call for the construction of mental pic- 
 tures. The study of Pike'K Peak and vicinity is very in- 
 teresting and instructive for fourth grade children. The 
 valleys, springs at Manitou. Garden of the Gods, Chey- 
 enne Canon and Falls, the Cave of the Winds, the ascent 
 of the peak by trail or by railroad, the views of distant 
 mountains, the summit house on the barren and rugged 
 top, the snow fields even in summer, the drifting mists 
 that shut off the view, the stories of hardship and early 
 history — these things take a firm hold on a child's interest 
 and desire for knowledge. When this whole picture is 
 reasonably complete a brief comparison of Pike's Peak 
 with Mt. Washington, Mt. Marcy. Mt. Shasta, and Mt. 
 Rainier, will bring forth points of contrast and similarity
 
 NATURE OF INTEREST. 75 
 
 that will surprise and instruct a child. In every branch 
 of study there are certain underlying principles and forms 
 of thought whose thorough mastery in the lower grades 
 is necessary to successful progress. They are the im- 
 portant and central ideas of the subject. It was a marked 
 quality of Pestalozzi to sift out these simple fundamen- 
 tals and to master them. It is for us to make these sim- 
 ple elements intelligible and interesting by the use of 
 concrete types and illustrations drawn from nature and 
 from human life. If we speak of history and nature as 
 the two chief subjects of study, the simple, fundamental 
 relations of persons to each other in society, and the 
 simple, typical objects, forces, and laws of nature con 
 stitute the basis of all knowledge. These elements we 
 desire to master. But to make them attractive to chil- 
 dren, they should not be presented in bald and sterile 
 outlines, but in typical forms. All actions and human 
 relations must appear in ^.ttvTici'we personifcatiou. 
 
 Persons speak and act and virtues shine foi'th in 
 them. We do not study nature's laws at first, but the 
 beautiful, typical life forms in nature, the lily, the oak, 
 Cinderella, and William Tell. For children, then, the 
 underlying ideas and principles of every study, in order 
 to start the interest, must be revealed in the most beau- 
 tiful illustrative forms which can be furnished by nature, 
 poetry, and art. The story of William Tell, although it 
 comes all the way from the Alps and from the distant 
 traditional history of the Swiss, is one of the best things 
 with which to illustrate and impress manliness and patri- 
 otism. The fairy stories for still younger children, are 
 the best means for teaching kindness or unselfishness, 
 because they arc so chaste, and beautiful, and graceful, 
 even to the child's thought. The most attraetive type-
 
 76 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 forms and life-porsonifications of fundamental ideas in 
 history and nature are the really interesting objects of 
 study for children. To put it in a simple, practical form 
 — objects and human actions, if well selected, are tho 
 best means in the world to excite curiosity and the strong 
 spirit of inquiry. While dwelling upon this thought of 
 the attractiveness of type-forms as personified in things 
 or persons, we catch a glimpse of a far-reaching truth in 
 education. 
 
 The idea of culture epochs, as typical of the steps of 
 progress in the race, and also of the periods of growth in 
 the child, offers a deep perspective into educational prob- 
 lems. In the progress of mankind from a primitive state 
 of barbarism to the present state of culture in Europe 
 and in the United States, there has been a succession of 
 not very clearly defined stages. In point of government, 
 for example, there has been the savage, nomad, patri- 
 arch, kingdom, constitutional monarchy, democracy, re- 
 public, federal republic. There have been great epochs 
 of politital convulsion in the conflicts with external powers 
 and in civil struggles and revolutions. In the growth of 
 handicrafts, arts, manufactures, and inventions, there 
 has been a series of advances from the time when men 
 first began to cultivate the ground, to reduce the metals, 
 and to bring the forces of nature into service. In the 
 development of human society, therefore, and in the 
 progress of arts and human knowledge, there are certain 
 typical stages whose proper use may help us to solve 
 some of the difficult problems in educating the young. 
 All nations have passed through some of these important 
 epochs. The United States, for example, since the first 
 settlements upon the east coast, have gone rapidly through 
 many of the characteristic epochs of the world's history,
 
 NATURE OF INTEREST. 77 
 
 in politics, commerce, and industry; in social life, educa- 
 tion, and religion. 
 
 The importance of the culture epochs for schools lies 
 in the theory, accepted by many great writers, that chil- 
 dren in their growth from infancy to maturity, pass 
 through a series of steps which correspond broadly to 
 the historical epochs of mankind. A child's life up to 
 the age of twenty, is a. sort of epitome of the world's 
 history. Our present state of culture is a result of 
 growth, and if a child is to appreciate society as it now 
 is, he must grow into it out of the past, by having trav- 
 eled through the same stages it has traced. But this is 
 only a very superficial way of viewing the relation be- 
 tween child and world history. The periods of child life 
 are so similar to the epochs of history, that a child finds 
 its proper mental food in the study of the materials fur- 
 nished by these epochs. Let us test this. A child eight 
 years old cares nothing about reciprocity or free silver, 
 or university extension. Robinson Crusoe, however, 
 who typifies mankind's early struggle with the forces 
 of nature, claims his undivided attention. A boy of ten 
 will take more delight in the story of King Alfred or 
 William Tell than in twenty Gladstones or Bismarcks. 
 Not that Gladstone's work is less important or interest- 
 ing to the right, person, but the boy does not live and 
 have his being in the Gladstonian age. Not all parts 
 of history, indeed, are adapted to please and instruct 
 some period of youth. Whole ages have been destitute 
 of such materials, barren as deserts for educational pur- 
 poses. But those epochs which have been typical of 
 great experiences, landmarks of progress, have also 
 found poets and historians to describe them. The great 
 works of poets and historians contain also the great
 
 7ft (JKNERAL METHOD. 
 
 object lessons upon which to cultivate the minds of chil- 
 dren. Some of the leading characters of fiction and hi> 
 tory are the best personifications of the steps of progrt 
 in the history of the race; Crusoe, Abraham, Ulysst.-. 
 Alfred, Tell, David, Charlemagne, Moses, Columbus 
 Washington. These men, cast in a large and heron 
 mold, represent great human strivings and are adapteci 
 to teach the chief lessons of history, if properly select( ■ 
 and arranged. These typical individual characters illu- 
 trate the fundamental ideas that will give insight and 
 appreciation for later social forms. They contain, hid- 
 den as it were, the essential part of great historical and 
 social truths of far-reaching importance. The culture 
 epochs will be seen later to be important in solving the 
 problem of the con centra tio7i of instruction along certain 
 lines, but in the present discussion their value is chiefly 
 seen in their adaptability to arouse the interest of chil- 
 dren, by supplying peculiarly congenial materials of 
 instruction in the changing phases of child progress. 
 
 The interest most worth awakening in pupils is not 
 only direct but permanent. Hawthorne's Golden Touch 
 embodies a simple classic truth in such transparent 
 form that its reperusal is always a pleasure. In the 
 same way, to observe the autumn woods and flowers, the 
 birds and insects, with sympathy and delight, leaves a 
 lasting pleasure in the memory. The best kind of 
 knowledge is that which lays a permanent hold upon the 
 affections. The best method of learning is that which 
 opens up any field of study with a growing interest. To 
 awaken a child's permanent interest in any branch cf 
 knowledge is to accomplish much for his character and 
 usefulness. An enduring interest in American history, 
 for example, is valuable in the best sense, no matter
 
 NATURE OF INTEREST. 79 
 
 what the method of instruction. Any companion or book 
 that teaches us to observe the birds with growing interest 
 and pleasure has done what a teacher could scarcely do 
 better. This kind of knowledge becomes a living, gen- 
 erative culture influence. Knowledge which contains no 
 springs of interest is like faith divorced from works. 
 Information and discipline may be gained in education 
 without any lasting interest, but the one who uses such 
 knowledge and discipline is only a machine. A Cambridge, 
 student who had taken the best prizes and scholarships 
 said at the end of his university career: "I am at a loss 
 to know what to do. I have already gained the best dis- 
 tinctions, and I can see but little to work for in the 
 future." The child of four years, who opens his eyes 
 with unfeigned interest and surprised inquiry into the 
 big world around him, has a better spirit than such a 
 dead product of university training. Rut happily this 
 is not the spirit of our universities now. The remarkable 
 and characteristic idea in university life today is the 
 spirit of investigation and scientific inquiry which it con- 
 stantly awakens. We happen to live in a time when 
 university teachers are trying to enlarge the bounds of 
 human knowledge in every direction, to solve problems 
 that have not been solved before. No matter what the 
 subject, the real student soon becomes an explorer, an 
 investigator in fields of absorbing-interest. The common 
 school can scarcely do better than to receive this gen- 
 erous impulse into its work. Can our common studies be 
 approached in this inquisitive spirit? Can growth in 
 knowledge be made a progressive investigation? A true 
 interest takes pleasure in acquired knowledge, and stand- 
 ing upon this vantage looks with inquiring purpose into 
 new worlds. Children in our schools are sometimes made
 
 80 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 so dyspeptic that no knowledge has any relish. But the 
 soul should grow strong, and .healthy, and elastic, upon 
 the food it takes. If the teaching is such that the appe- 
 tite becomes stronger, the mental digestion better, and 
 if the spirit of interest and inquiry grows into a steady 
 force, the best results may be expected. 
 
 The cultivation of a many-sided interest is desirable in 
 order to avoid narrowness, and to open up the various 
 sources of mental activity, i. e., to stimulate mental 
 vigor along many lines. We believe that most children 
 are capable of taking interest in many kinds of study. 
 The preference which some children show for certain 
 branches and the dislike for others may be due to pecu- 
 liar early surroundings, and is often the result of good or 
 poor teaching as much as to natural gifts. As every 
 child has sympathies for companions and people, so every 
 child may take a real interest in story, biography, and 
 history, if these subjects are rightly approached. So also 
 the indifference to plant and animal life shown by many 
 persons is due to lack of culture and suitable suggestion 
 at the impressionable age. Unquestionably the lives of 
 most people run in too narrow a channel. They fail to 
 appreciate and enjoy many of the common things about 
 them, to which their eyes have not been properly opened. 
 The particular trade or business so engrosses most peo- 
 ple's time that their sympathies are narrowed and their 
 appreciation of the duties and responsibilities of life is 
 stunted. The common school, more than all other insti- 
 tutions, should lay broad foundations and awaken many- 
 sided sympathies. The trade school and the university 
 can afford to specialize, to prepare for a vocation. The 
 common school, on the contrary, is preparing all children 
 for general citizenship. The narrowing idea of a trade
 
 NATURE OF INTEREST. 81 
 
 or calling should be kept away from the public school, 
 and as far as possible varied interests in knowledge 
 should be awakened in every child. 
 
 But this variety of interests may lead to scattering 
 and sicperficial knowledge. And in its results many- 
 sided interest would seem to point naturally to many- 
 sided activity; that is, to multiplicity of employments, to 
 that character which in Yankee phrase is designated as 
 ".Jack of all trades and master of none." If instead of 
 being allowed to spread out so much, the educational 
 stream is confined between narrow banks, it will show a 
 deep and full current. If allowed to spread over the 
 marshes and plains, it becomes sluggish and brackish. 
 Our course of study for the common schools in recent 
 years, has been largely added to and has been extended 
 over the whole field of knowledge. History, geography, 
 natural science lessons and drawing have been added to 
 the old reading, writing, arithmetic, and grammar. 
 There may appear to be more variety, but less strength. 
 When in addition to this greater variety of studies, 
 enthusiastic teachers desire to increase the quantity of 
 knowledge in each branch and to present as many inter- 
 esting facts as possible, at every point, we have the over- 
 loading of the school course. This effect will be noticed 
 in a later chapter in its bearing upon concentration. 
 Children have too much to learn. They become pack- 
 horses, instead of free spirits walking in the fields of 
 knowledge. Mental vigor, after all, is worth more than a 
 mind grown corpulent and lazy with an excess of pabu- 
 lum, overfed. The cultivation therefore of a many-sided 
 interest ceases to be a blessing as soon as encyclopedic 
 knowledge becomes its aim. In fact the desire on the 
 part of teachers to make the knowledge of any subject
 
 82 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 complete and encyclopedic destroys all true interest. 
 The solution of this great problem does not consist in 
 identifying many-sided interest with encyclopedic knowl- 
 edge, but in such a detailed study of typical forms in 
 each case as will give insight into that branch without 
 any pretension to exhaustive knowledge. Certainly a 
 true interest in plants does not require that we become 
 acquainted with all the species of all the genera. But a 
 proper study of a few typical forms in a few of the fami- 
 lies and genera might produce a much deeper interest in 
 nature and in her laws. 
 
 The culture of a many-sided interest is essential to a 
 full development and perfection of the mental activities. 
 It is easy to see that interest in any subject gives all 
 thought upon it a greater vigor and intensity. Mental 
 action in all directions is strengthened and vivified by a 
 direct interest. On the other hand mental life diminishes 
 with the loss of interest, and even in fields of knowledge 
 in which a man has displayed unusual mastery, a loss of 
 interest is followed by a loss of energy. Excluding in- 
 terest is like cutting -^ff the circulation from a limb. 
 Perfect vigor of thought which we aim at in educa- 
 tion, is marked by strength along three lines, the vigor 
 of the individual ideas, the extent and variety of ideas 
 under control, and the connection and harmony of ideas. 
 It is the highest general aim of intellectual education to 
 strengthen mental vigor in these three directions. Many- 
 sided interest is conducive to all three. Every thought 
 that finds lodgment in the mind is toned up and strength- 
 ened by interest. It is also easier to retain and repro- 
 duce some idea that has once been grasped with full 
 feeling of interest. An interest that has been developed 
 along all leading lines of study has a proper breadth and
 
 NATI'RE OF INTEREST. 83 
 
 comprehensiveness and cannot be hampered and clogged 
 by narrow restraints and prejudice. We admire a per- 
 son not simply because he has a few clear ideas, but also 
 for the extent and variety of this sort of information. 
 Our admiration ceases when he shows ignorance or preju- 
 dice or lack of sympathy with important branches of study. 
 Finally, the unity and harmony of the varied kinds of 
 knowledge are a great source of interest. The tracing of 
 connections between different studies and the insight 
 that comes from proper associations, are among the high- 
 est delights of learning. The connection and harmony of 
 ideas will be discussed under concentration. 
 
 The six interests above mentioned are to be devel- 
 oped along parallel lines. They are to be kept in proper 
 equipoise. It is not designed that any one shall be devel- 
 oped to the overshadowing of the others. They are like 
 six pillars upon which the structure of a liberal educa- 
 tion is rested. A cultivation of any one, exclusively, 
 may be in place when the work of general education is 
 complete and a profession or life labor has been chosen. 
 
 It is also true that a proper interest is a protection 
 against the desires, disorderly impulses, and passions. 
 One of the chief ends of education is to bring the inclina- 
 tions and importunate desires under mastery, to estab- 
 lish a counterpoise to them by the steady and persistent 
 forces of education. A many-sided interest cultivated 
 along the chief paths of knowledge, implies such mental 
 vigor and such preoccupation with worthy subjects as 
 naturally to discourage unworthy desires. 
 
 Locke says, self-restraint, the mastery over one's 
 inclinations, is the foundation of virtue. "He that has 
 found a way how to keep a child's spirit easy, active, and 
 free, and yet at the same time to restrain him from
 
 84 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 many things he has u, mind to, and to draw him to things 
 that are uneasy to him; he, I say, that knows how to 
 reconcile these seeming contradictions, has, in my opin- 
 ion, got the true secret of education." But it is a secret 
 still; the central question remains unanswered. How is 
 the teacher to approach and influence the will of the 
 child ? Is it by supposing that the child has a will al- 
 ready developed and strong enough to be relied upon on 
 all occasions? , On the contrary, must not the teacher 
 put incentives in the path of the pupil, ideas and feelings 
 that prompt him to self-denial? 
 
 Interest as a source of will-stimulus has peculiar ad- 
 vantages. It is not desired that the inclinations and 
 feelings shall get the mastery of the mind, certainly not 
 the disorderly and momentary desires. Higher desires, 
 indeed, should properly influence the will, as the desire 
 of the approval of conscience, the desire to attain excel- 
 lence, to gain strength and mastery, to serve others, etc. 
 But the importance of awakening interest as a basis of 
 will cultivation is found in the favorable mental state in- 
 duced by interest as a preliminary to will action along 
 the best lines. Interest is not an impetuous force like 
 the desires, prompting to instant action, but a quiet, per- 
 manent undertone, which brings everything into readi- 
 ness for action, clears the deck, and begins the attack. 
 It would be a vast help to many boys and girls if the 
 irksomeness of study in arithmetic or grammar, which is 
 so fatal to will energy, could give way to the spur of in- 
 terest, and when the wheels are once set in motion, pro- 
 gress would not only begin but be sustained by interest. 
 
 It is pretty generally agreed to by thoughtful edu- 
 cators, that in giving a child the broad foundations of 
 education, we should aim not so much at knowledge as at
 
 NATURE OF INTEREST. 85 
 
 capacity and appreciation for it. A universal recep- 
 tivity, such as Rosseau requires of Emile, is a desidera- 
 tum. Scarcely a better dowry can be bestowed upon a 
 child by education, than a desire for knowledge and an 
 intelligent interest in all important branches of study. 
 Herbart's many-sided interest is to strengthen and branch 
 out from year to year during school life, and become a 
 permanent tendency or force in later years. No school 
 can give even an ap])roach to full and encyclopedic knowl- 
 edge, but no school is so humble that it may not. throw 
 open the doors and present many a pleasing prospect 
 into the fields of learning. 
 
 With Herbart, therefore, a many-sided, harmonious 
 interest promotes will-enerffy through all the efforts of 
 learning from childhood up, and when the work of gen- 
 eral education has been completed, the youth is ready to 
 launch out into the world with a strong, healthy appetite 
 for information in mauv directions. The best fruitasre 
 of such a course will follow in the years that succeed 
 school life. Interest is a very practical thing. It is that 
 which gives force and momentum to ideas. It is not 
 knowledge itself, but, like the invisible principle of life, 
 it converts dead matter into living energy. In our 
 schools thus far we have had too much faith in the me- 
 chanics of education. Too much virtue has been imputed 
 to facts, to knowledge, to sharp tools. We have now to 
 learn that incentive is a more important thing in educa- 
 tion; that is, a direct, permanent, many-sided interest.
 
 86 GENERAL MKTHOD 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 CONCENTRATION. 
 
 By concentration is meant such a connection between 
 the parts of each study and such a spinning of relations 
 and connecting linlcs between different sciences that, 
 unity may spring out of the variety of knowledge. His- 
 tory, for example, is a series and collocation of facts 
 explainable on the basis of cause and effect, a develop- 
 ment. On the other hand, history is intimately related 
 to geography, language, natural science, literature, and 
 mathematics. It would be impossible to draw real his- 
 tory out by the roots without drawing all other studies 
 out bodily with it. Is there then any reason why school 
 history should ignore its blood relationships to other 
 branches of knowledge? 
 
 Concentration is so bound up with the idea of char- 
 acter-forming that it includes more than school studies. 
 It lays hold of home influences and all the experiences of 
 life outside of school' and brings them into the daily ser- 
 vice of school studies. It is just as important to bind up 
 home experience with arithmetic, language, and other 
 studies as it is to see the connection between geography 
 and history. In the end, all the knowledge and expe- 
 rience gained by a person at home, at school, and else- 
 where should be classified and related, each part brought 
 into its right associations with other parts. 
 
 Nor is it simply a question of throwing the varied 
 sorts of k)ioioledge into a net-work of crossing and inter- 
 woven series so that the person may have ready access 
 along various lines to all his knowledge stores. Concen-
 
 CONCENTRATION. 87 
 
 tration draws the feelings and the will equally into its 
 circle of operations. To imagine a character without 
 feeling and will would be like thinking a watch without a 
 mainspring. All knowledge properly taught generates 
 feeling. The will is steadily laying out, during the form- 
 ative period of education, the highways of its future 
 ambitions and activities. Habits of willing are formed 
 along the lines of associated thought and feeling. The 
 more feeling and will are enlisted through all the avenues 
 of study and experience, the more permanent will be their 
 influence upon character. 
 
 In attempting to solve the problem of concentration 
 the question has been raised whether a single studg, the 
 most important, of course, should constitute a concen- 
 trating nucleus, like the hub in a wheel, or whether fdl 
 studies and experience are to be brought into an organic 
 whole of related parts. It is evident that history and 
 natural science at least hold a leading place among 
 studies and determine to some e.xtent the selection of 
 materials in reading and language lessons. 
 
 The center for concentrating efforts in education is 
 not so much the knowledge given in any school course as 
 the child's mind itself. We do not desire to find in the 
 school studies a new center for a child's life so much as 
 the means for fortifying that original stronghold of char- 
 acter which rests upon native mental characteristics and 
 early home influences. We have in mind not the objec. 
 tivn unity of different studies considered as complete and 
 related sciences, nor any general model to which each 
 mind is to be conformed, but the practical union of all the 
 experiences and knowledge that find entrance into a par- 
 ticular mind.
 
 88 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 The wiity of the personality as gradually developed in 
 a child by wise education is essential to strength of char- 
 acter. Ackerman says on this point, ("Ueber Concentra- 
 tion," p. 20.) " In behalf of character development, which 
 is the ultimate aim of all educative effort, pedagogy re- 
 quires uf instruction that it aid in forming the unity of 
 the personality, the most primitive basis of character. 
 In requiring that the unity of the personality be formed 
 it is presupposed that this unity is not some original 
 quality, but something to be first developed. It remains 
 for psychology to prove this and to indicate in what man- 
 ner the unity of the personality originates. Now, psy- 
 chology teaches that the personality, the ego, is not 
 something original, but something that must be first de- 
 veloped and is also changeable and variable. The ego is 
 nothing else than a psychological phenomenon, namely, 
 the consciousness of an interchange between the parts of 
 an extensive complex of ideas, or the reference of all our 
 ideas and of the other psychical states springing out of 
 them to each other. P]xperience teaches this. In infancy 
 the ego, the personality, is consciously realized in one 
 person sooner, in another later. In the different ages of 
 life, also, the personality possesses a different content. 
 The deeper cause for the mutual reference of all our man- 
 ifold ideas to each other and for their union in a single 
 point, as it were, may be found in the simplicity of the 
 soul, which constrains into unity all things that are not 
 dissociated by hindrance or contradiction. The soul, 
 therefore, in the face of the varied influences produced 
 by contact with nature and society, is active in concen- 
 trating its ideas, so that with mental soundness as a 
 basis, the ego, once formed, in spite of all the transitions 
 through which it may pass, still remains the same."
 
 CONCENTRATION. 89 
 
 There is then a natural tendency of the mind to unijy 
 all its ideas, feelings, incentives. On the other hand the 
 knowledge and experiences of life are so varied and seem- 
 ingly contradictory that a young person, if left to him- 
 self or if subjected to a wrong schooling, will seldom 
 work his way to harmony and unity. In spite of the fact 
 that the soul is a simple unit and tends naturally to unify 
 all its contents, the common experience of life discovers 
 in it unconnected and even antagonistic thought and 
 knowledge-centers. People are sometimes painfully sur- 
 prised to see how the same mind may be lifted by exalted 
 sentiments and depressed by the opposite. The frequent 
 examples that come to notice of men of superiority and 
 virtue along certain lines, who give way to weakness and 
 wrong in other directions, are sufficient evidence that 
 good and evil may be systematically cultivated in the 
 same character, and that instead of unity and harmony 
 education may collect in the soul heterogeneous and war- 
 ring elements which make it a battle ground for life. All 
 such disharmony and contradiction lend inconsistency 
 and weakness to character. Not only can incompatible 
 lines of thought and of moral action become established 
 in the same person, but even those studies which could 
 be properly harmonized and unified by education may 
 lie in the mind so disjointed and unrelated as to render 
 the person awkward and helpless in spite of much knowl- 
 edge. In unifying the various parts of school education, 
 and in bringing them into close connection with children's 
 other experiences, the school life fulfills one of its chief 
 duties. 
 
 Among other things tending toward consistency of 
 character there must be harmony between the school ami 
 hoyne life of a child. At home or among companions,
 
 90 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 perhaps unknown to the teacher, a boy or girl may be 
 forming an habitual tendency and desire, more powerful 
 than any other force in his life, and yet at variance with 
 the best influence of the school. If possible the teacher 
 should draw the home and school into a closer bond so as 
 to get a better grasp of the situation and of its remedy. 
 The school will fail to leave an effective impress upon such 
 a child unless it can get a closer hold upon the sympa- 
 thies and thus neutralize an evil tendency. It must 
 league itself with better home influences so as to implant 
 its own impulses in home life. How to unify home and 
 school influences is one of those true and abiding prob- 
 lems of education that appeals strongly and sympathetic- 
 ally to parents and teachers. 
 
 Concentration evidently involves a solution of the 
 question as to the relative value of studies. All the 
 light that the discussion of relative values can furnish 
 will be needed in selecting the different lines of appro- 
 priate study and in properly adjusting them to one 
 another. The theory of interest will also aid us in this 
 field of investigation. 
 
 Accepting therefore the results of the two preceding 
 chapters, that history (in the broad sense) is the study 
 which best cultivates moral dispositions; secondly, that 
 natural science furnishes the indispensable insight into 
 the external world, man's physical environment; and, 
 thirdly, that language, mathematics, and drawing are but 
 the formal side and expression of the two realms of real 
 knowledge, we have the broad outlines of any true course 
 of education. In more definitely laying out the parts of 
 this course the natural interests and capacities of children 
 in their successive periods of growth must be taken into 
 the reckoning. When a course of study has been laid out
 
 CONCENTRATION. . 91 
 
 on this basis, bringing the three great threads or cables 
 of human knowledge into proper juxtaposition at the va- 
 rious points, we shall be ready to speak of the manner of 
 really executing the plan of concentration. 
 
 Even after the general plan is complete and the studies 
 arranged, the real work of concentration consists in fixhuj 
 the relations as the facts are learned. Concentration takes 
 for granted that the facts of knowledge will be acquired. 
 It is but half the problem to learn the facts. The other 
 half consists in understanding the facts by fixing the re- 
 lations. Most teachers will admit that each lesson should 
 be a collection of connected facts and that every science 
 should consist of a series of derivative and mutually de- 
 pendent lessons. And yet the study and mastery of 
 arithmetic as a connection of closely related principles is 
 not generally appreciated. With proper reflection it is 
 not difficult to see that the facts of a single study like 
 grammar or botany should stand in close serial or causal 
 relation. If they are seen and fixed with a clear insight 
 into these connections, by touching the chain of associa- 
 tions at any point one may easily bring the whole matter 
 to remembrance. 
 
 Concentration, however, is chiefly concerned with the 
 relation of different studies to each other. In this larger 
 sense of an intimate binding together of all studies and 
 experience into a close network of interwoven parts, con- 
 centration is now generally ignored by the schools. In 
 fact it would almost seem as if the purpose of teachers 
 were to make a clear separation of the ditferent studies 
 from one another and to seal up each one in a separate bot- 
 tle, as it were. The problem appears in two phases: 1. 
 Taking the school studies as they now are, is it desirable 
 to pay more attention to the natural connections between
 
 92 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 such studies as reading, geography, history, and Ian- j 
 guage, to open up frequent communicating avenues be-' 
 tween the various branches of educational worlc ? 2. Or ' 
 if concentration is regarded as still more important, shall 
 the subject matter of school studies be rearranged and 
 the lessons in different branches so adjusted to each other 
 that the number of close relations between them may be 
 greatly increased ? Then with the intentional increase 
 of such connecting links would follow a more particular 
 care in fixing them. We have assumed the latter posi- 
 tion, and claim that the whole construction of the school 
 course and the whole method of teaching should contrib- 
 ute powerfully to the unification of all the knowledge 
 and experience in each child's mind. 
 
 Without laying any undue stress upon simple 
 knowledge, we believe that a small amount of well 
 articulated knowledge is more valuable than a large 
 amount of loose and fragmentary information. A small, 
 disciplined police force is able to cope with a large, unor- 
 ganized mob. "The very important principle here in- 
 volved is that the value of knowledge depends not only 
 upon the distinctness and accuracy of the ideas, but also 
 upon the closeness and extent of the relations into which 
 they enter. This is a fundamental principle of educa- 
 tion. It was Hei'bart who said, * Only those thoughts 
 come easily and frequently to the mind which have at 
 some time made a strong impression and which possess 
 numerous connections with other thoughts.' And psy- 
 chology teaches that those ideas which take an isolated 
 station in the mind are usually weak in the impression 
 they make, and are easily forgotten. A fact, however 
 important in itself, if learned without reference to other 
 facts, is quite likely to fade quickly from the memory.
 
 CONCENTRATION. 93 
 
 It is for this reason that the witticisms, sayings, and 
 scattered pieces of information, which we pick up here 
 and there, are so soon forgotten. There is no way of 
 bringing about their frequent reproduction when they 
 are so disconnected, for the reproduction of ideas is 
 largely governed by the law of association. One idea 
 reminds us of another closely related to it; this of 
 another, etc., till a long series is produced. They are 
 bound together like the links of a chain, and one draws 
 another along with it just as one link of a chain drags an- 
 other after it. A mental image that is not one of such a 
 series cannot hope to come often to consciousness; it 
 must as a rule sink into oblivion, because the usual means 
 of calling it forth are wanting." (F. McMurry, "Relation 
 of natural science to other studies.") 
 
 We are not conscious of the constant dependence of 
 our thinkiiig and conversation upon the laio of associa- 
 tion. It may be frequently observed in the familiar con- 
 versation of several persons in a company. The simple 
 mention of a topic will often suggest half a dozen things 
 that different ones are prompted to say about it, and 
 may even give direction to the conversation for a whole 
 evening. Now if it is true that ideas are more easily re- 
 membered and used if associated, let us increase the associa- 
 tions. Why not bind all the studies and ideas of a child 
 as closely together as possible by natural lines of asso- 
 ciation? Why not select for reading lessons those ma- 
 terials which will throw added light upon contempo- 
 raneous lessons in history, botany, and geography? Then 
 if the reading lesson presents in detail the battle of 
 King's Mou?itain, take the pains • to refer to this part of 
 ^he history and put this lesson into connection with his- 
 torical facts elsewhere learned. If a reading lesson gives
 
 94 GENERAL METHOD. | 
 
 a full description of tiie palm tree, its growth and use, 
 what better setting could this knowledge find than in 
 the geography of Northern Africa and the West Indies?'^ 
 
 The numerous associations into which ideas enter, 
 without producing confusion make them more serviceable 
 for every kind of use. "It is only by associating thoughts 
 closely that a person comes to possess^them securely and 
 have command over them. One's reproduction of ideas 
 is then rapid enough to enable him to comprehend a 
 situation quickly, and form a judgment with some safety; 
 his knowledge is all present and ready for use; while on 
 the other hand, one whose related thoughts have never 
 been firmly welded together reproduces slowly, and in 
 consequence is wavering and undecided. His knowledge 
 is not at his command and he is therefore weak." (F. 
 McMurry.) The greater then the number of clear mental 
 relations of a fact to other facts in the same and in other 
 studies the more likely it is to render instant obedience 
 to the will when it is needed. Such ready mastery of 
 one's past experiences and accumulations promotes con- 
 fidence and power in action. Concentration is manifestly 
 designed to give strength and decision to character. 
 But a careless education by neglecting this principle, by 
 scattering the mind's forces over broad fields and by neg- 
 lecting the connecting roads and paths that should bind 
 together the separate fields, can actually undermine force y 
 and decision of character. 
 
 In later years when we consider the results of school 
 methods upon our own character we can see the weakness 
 of a system of education which lacks concentration, a 
 weakness which shows itself in a lack of retentiveness and 
 of ability to use acquired knowledge. We are only too 
 frequently reminded of the loose and scrappy state of our
 
 CONCENTRATION. 95 
 
 acquired knowledge by the ease with which it eludes the 
 memory when it is needed. To escape from this dis- 
 agreeable consciousness in after years, we begin to spy 
 out a few of the mountain peaks of memory which still 
 give evidence of submerged continents. Around these 
 islands we begin to collect the wreckage of the past and 
 the accretions of later study and experience. A thought- 
 ful person naturally falls into the habit of collecting ideas 
 around a few centers, and of holding them in place by 
 links of association. In American history, for instance, 
 it is inevitable that our knowledge becomes congested in 
 certain important epochs, or around the character and 
 life of a few typical persons. The same seems to be true 
 also of other studies, as geography and even geometry. 
 The failure to acquire proper habits of thinkirig is also 
 exposed by the experience of practical life. In life we 
 are compelled to see and respect the causal relations be- 
 tween events. We must calculate the influences of the 
 stubborn forces and facts around us. But in school we 
 often have so many things to learn that we have no time 
 to think. At least half the meaning of things lies 
 not in themselves, but in their relations and effects. 
 Therefore, to get ideas without getting their significant 
 relations, is to encumber the mind with ill-digested ma- 
 terial. A sensible man of the world has little respect for 
 this kind of learning. 
 
 One reason why knowledge is so poorly understood 
 and remembered is because its real application to other 
 branches of knowledge, whether near or remote, is so 
 little observed and fixed. Looking back upon our 
 school studies we often wonder what botany, geometry, 
 and drawing have to do with each other and with our 
 present needs. Each subject was so compactly stowed
 
 90 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 away on a shelf by itself that it is always thought of 
 in that isolation, — like Hammerfest or the Falkland 
 Islands in geography, — out of the way places. Are 
 the various sciences so distinct and so widely separated 
 in nature and in real life as they are in school? An 
 observant boy in the woods will notice important rela- 
 tions between animals and plants, between plants, soil, | 
 and seasons that are not referred to in the text-books. 
 In a carpenter shop he will observe relations of differ- 
 ent kinds of wood, metals, and tools to each other that 
 will surprise and* instruct him. In the real life of the 
 country or town the objects and materials of knowledge, 
 representing the sciences of nature and the arts of life, 
 are closely jumbled together and intimately dependent 
 upon each other. The very closeness of causal and local 
 connections and the lack of orderly arrangement shown 
 by things in life make it necessary in schools to classify 
 and arrange into sciences. But it is a vital mistake to 
 suppose that the knowledge is complete when classified 
 and learned in this scientific form. Classification and 
 books are but a faulty means of getting a clear insight 
 into nature and human life or society. Knowledge should 
 not only be mastered in its scientific classifications but 
 also constantly referred back to things as seen in prac- 
 tical life and closely traced out and fixed in those con- 
 nections. The vital connections of different studies with 
 each other are best known and 'realized by the study of 
 nature and society. 
 
 In later life we are convinced at every turn of the 
 need of being able to recognize and use knowledge out- 
 side of its scietitific connectio7is. A lawyer finds many 
 subjects closely mingled and causally related in his daily 
 business which were never mentioned together in text-
 
 CONCENTRATION. 97 
 
 books. The ordinary run of cases will iead him through 
 a kaleidoscope of natural science, human life, commerce, 
 history, mathematics, literature, and law, not to speak of 
 less agreeable things. But the same is true of a physi- 
 cian, merchant, or farmer, in different ways. Shall we 
 answer to all this that schools were never designed to 
 teach such things? They belong to professions or to the 
 school of life, etc. 
 
 But it is not simply in professions and trades that we 
 find this close mingling and dependence of the most di- 
 vergent sorts of knowledge, this unscientific mixing of 
 the sciences. Everywhere knowledge, however well 
 classified, is one-sided and misleading, which does not 
 conform to the conditions of real life. A wise mother in 
 her household has a variety of problems to meet. From 
 cellar to garret, from kitchen to library, from nursery to 
 drawing-room, her good sense must adapt all sorts of 
 knowledge to real conditions. In bringing up her chil- 
 dren she must understand physical and mental orders 
 and disorders. She must judge of foods and cooking, of 
 clothing, as to taste, comfort, and durability; of the exer- 
 cises and employments of children, etc. Whether she is 
 conscious of it or not, she must mingle a knowledge of 
 chemistry, psychology, physiology, medicine, sanitation, 
 the physics of light and air, with the traditional house- 
 hold virtues in a sort of universal solvent from which she 
 can bring forth all good things in their proper time and 
 place. As Spencer says, education should be a prepara- 
 tion for complete living; or, according to the old Latin 
 maxim, we learn non scholae sed vitae. The fi-ual test of 
 a true mastery and concentration of knowledge in the 
 mind is the ability to use it readily in the varied and 
 tangled relations of actual experience.
 
 98 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 We are accustomed to take refuge behind the so-called 
 "mental discipline" that results from studies, whether or 
 not anything is remembered that bears upon the relations 
 of life. There are doubtless certain formal habits of mind 
 that result from study even though, like Latin, it is cast 
 aside as an old garment at the end of school days. Trans- 
 ferring our argument then to this ground, is there any 
 "habit of thinking" more valuable than that bent of mind 
 which is not satisfied with the mere memorizing of a fact 
 but seeks to interpret its value by judging of its influ- 
 ence upon other facts and their influence upon it? No 
 subject is understood by itself nor even by its relation to 
 other facts in the same science, but by its relation to the 
 whole field of knowledge and experience. Unless it can 
 be proven that the study of relations is above the chool- 
 boy capacity, it is doubtful if there is any mental habit 
 so valuable at the close of school studies as the disposi- 
 tion to ihitik and ponder, to trace relations. The rela- 
 tions which are of interest and vital importance are those 
 which in daily life bind all the realms of science into a 
 network of causally connected parts. 
 
 The multiplication of studies in the common school in 
 recent years will soon compel us to pay more attention 
 to concentration or the mutual relation of knowledges. 
 There is a resistless tendency to convert the course of 
 studies into an encyclopedia of knowledge. To perceive 
 this it is only necessary to note the new studies incorpo- 
 rated into the public school within a generation. Draw- 
 ing, natural science, gymnastics, and manual training are 
 entirely neV, while language lessons, history, and music 
 have been expanded to include much that is new for lower 
 grades. Still other studies are even now seeking admis- 
 sion, as modern languages, geometrv. and sewing. In
 
 CONCENTRATION. 00 
 
 spite of all that has been said by educational reformers 
 against making the acquisition of knowledge the basis of 
 education, the range and variety of studies has been 
 greatly extended and chiefly through the influence of the 
 reformers. This expansive movement appears in schools 
 of all grades. The secondary and fitting schools and the 
 universities have spread their branches likewise over a 
 much wider area of studies. We are in the full sweep of 
 this movement along the whole line and it has not yet 
 reached its flood. 
 
 T?he simplicity of the old course both in the common 
 school and in higher institutions is in marked contrast to 
 the present multiplicity. It was a narrow current in 
 which education used to run, but it was deep and strong. 
 In higher institutions the mastery of Latin and of Latin 
 authors was the siyie qua non. In the common school 
 arithmetic was held in almost equal honor. Strong char- 
 acters have often been developed by a narrow and rigid 
 training along a single line of duty as is shown in the 
 case of the Jesuits, the Humanists, and the more recent 
 devotees of natural science. 
 
 As contrasted with this, the most striking feature of 
 our public schools now is their shallow and superficial 
 work. It is probable that the teaching in lower grades 
 is better than ever before, but as the tasks accumulate in 
 the higher grades there is a great amount of smattering. 
 The prospect is, however, that this disease will grow worse 
 before a remedy can be applied. The first attempt to 
 cultivate broader and more varied fields of knowledge in 
 the common school must necessarily exhibit a shallow re- 
 sult. Teachers are not familiar with the new subjects, 
 methods are not developed, and the'proper adjustments of 
 the studies to each other are neeclocted. No one who is
 
 100 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 at all familiar with our present status will claim that 
 drawing, natural science, geography, and language are 
 yet properly adjusted to each other. The task is a difiB- 
 cult one, but it is being grappled with by many earnest 
 teachers. 
 
 It is obvious that the first serious effort to remedy 
 this shallowness will be made by deepening and intensi- 
 fying the culture of the new fields. The knowledge of 
 each subject must be made as complete and detailed as 
 possible. Well-qualified teachers and specialists will of 
 course accomplish the most. They will zealously try to 
 teach all the important things in each branch of study. 
 But where is the limit ? The capacity of children ! And 
 it will not be long before philanthropists, physicians, 
 reformers, and all the friends of mankind will call a 
 decisive halt. Children w^ere not born simply to be 
 stuffed with knowledge, like turkeys for a Christmas din- 
 ner. 
 
 It appears, therefore, that we must steer between 
 Scylla and Charybdis. or that we are in a first-class edu- 
 cational dilemma. This conviction is strengthened by 
 the reflection that there is no escape from fairly facing 
 the situation. Having once put our hand to the plow we 
 can not look back. The common school course has greatly 
 expanded in recent years and there is no probability that 
 it will ever contract. It has expanded in response to 
 proper universal educational demands. For we may 
 fairly believe that most of the studies recently incorpo- 
 rated into the school course are essential elements in the 
 education of every child that is to grow up and take a 
 due share in our society. It is too late to sound the 
 retreat. The educational reformers have battled stoutly 
 for three hundred years for just the course of study that
 
 CONCENTRATION. 101 
 
 we are now beginning to accept. The edict can not be 
 revoked, that every child is entitled to an harmonious and 
 equable development of all its human powers, or as Her- 
 bart calls it, a harmonious culture of many-sided interests. 
 The nature of every child imperatively demands such broad 
 and liberal culture, and the varied duties and responsi- 
 bilities of the citizen m,ake it a practical necessity. No 
 narrow, one-sided culture will ever equip a child to act a 
 just part in the complex social, political, and industrial 
 society of our time. But the demand for depth of knowl- 
 edge is just as imperative as that for comprehensiveness. 
 
 It is clear that two serious dangers threaten the 
 quality of our education: First, loose and shallow knowl- 
 edge; second, overloading with encyclopedic knowledge. 
 What can concentration do to remedy the one and check 
 the other? The cure for these two evils will be found in 
 so adjusting the studies to each other, in so building 
 them into each other, as to secure a mutual support. 
 The study of a topic not only as it is affected by others 
 in the same subject, but also by facts and principles in 
 other studies, as an antidote against superficial learning. 
 In tracing these causal relations, in observing the resem- 
 blances and analogies, the interdependence of studies, as 
 geography, history, and natural science, a thoughtfulness 
 and clearness of insight are engendered quite contrary to 
 loose and shallow study. 
 
 Secondly, concentration at once discards the idea of 
 encyclopedic knt)\vledge as an aim of school education. 
 It puts a higher estimate upon related ideas and a lower 
 one upon that of complete or encyclopedic information. 
 All the cardinal branches of education indeed shall be 
 taught in the school, but only the essential, the ty2)ical, 
 will be selected and an exhaustive knowledge of any sub-
 
 102 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 ject is out of the question. Concentration will put a con- 
 stant check upon over-accumulation of facts, and will 
 rather seek to strengthen an idea by association with 
 familiar things than to add a new fact to it. No matter 
 how thorough and enthusiastic a specialist one may be, 
 he is called upon to curtail the quantity of his subject 
 and bring it into proper dependence upon other studies. 
 Historicalh/ considered the principle of concentration 
 has been advocated and emphasized by many writers and 
 teachers. The most striking and decided attempt to ap- 
 ply it was made by Jacotot in the first quarter of this 
 century, and had great success in France. Mr. Joseph 
 Payne, in interpreting Jacotot (Lectures on the Science 
 and Art of Ed. p. 339), lays down as his main precept, 
 '■'■Learn sometfmig thoroughly and refer everything else to 
 it." He emphasized above everything else clearness of 
 insight and connection between the parts of knowledge. 
 It was principally applied to the study of languages and 
 called for perfect memorizing by incessant repetition and 
 rigid questioning by the teacher to insure perfect under- 
 standing, in the first instance, of new facts acquired; and 
 secondly, firm association with all previous knowledge. 
 Jacotot and his disciples reached notable results by an 
 heroic and consistent application of this principle and 
 some of our present methods in language are based upon 
 it. But on the whole th5 principle was only partially 
 and mechanically applied. Its aim was primarily intel- 
 lectual, even linguistic, not moral. There was no philo- 
 sophical effort made to determine the relative value of 
 studies and thus find out what study or series of studies 
 best deserved to take the leading place in the school 
 course. The importance of interest, as a means of rous- 
 ng mental vigor and as a criterion for selecting concen-
 
 CONCENTRATION. 103 
 
 trating materials suited to children at different ages, was 
 overlooked. 
 
 A kind of concentration has long been practiced in 
 Germany and to a considerable extent in our own schools 
 which is known as the concentric circles. 
 
 In our schools it is illustrated by the treatment of 
 geography, grammar, and history. In beginning the 
 study of geography in the third or fourth grade it has 
 been customary to outline the whole science in the first 
 primary book. The earth as a whole and its daily and 
 yearly motion, the chief continents and oceans, the gen- 
 eral geographical notions, mountain, lake, river, etc., are 
 briefly treated by definition and illustration. Having 
 comjileted this general framework of geographical 
 knowledge during the first year, the second year, or at 
 least the second book, takes up the scone round of topics 
 again and enters into a somewhat fuller treatment of 
 continents, countries, states, and political divisions. 
 The last two years of the common school may be spent 
 upon a large, complete geography; which, with larger, 
 fuller maps and more names, gives also a more detailed 
 account of cities, products, climate, political divisions, 
 and commerce. Finally, physical geography is permitted 
 to spread over much the same ground from a natural- 
 science standpoint, giving many additional and interest- 
 ing facts and laws concerning zones, volcanoes, ocean- 
 beds and currents, atmospheric phenomena, geologic his- 
 tory, etc. The same earth, the same lands and oceans, 
 furnish the outline in each case, and we travel over the 
 same ground three or four times successively, each time 
 adding new facts to the original nucleus. There is an 
 old proverb that "repetition is the mother of studies," 
 and here we have a systematic plan for repetition, ex-
 
 10 
 
 104 R (iENERAL METHOD. 
 
 tending through the school course, with the advantage of 
 new and interesting facts to add to the grist each, time 
 it is sent through the mill. It is an attractive plan at 
 first sight, but if we appeal to experience, are we not 
 reminded rather that it was dull repetition of names, 
 boundaries, map questions, location of places, etc., and 
 after all not much detailed knowledge was gained even 
 in the higher grades? Again, is it not contrary to reason 
 to begin with definitions and general notions in the lower 
 grades and end up with the interesting and concrete in 
 the higher? 
 
 In language lessons and grammar it has been cus- 
 tomary to learn the kinds of sentence and the parts of 
 speech in a simple form in the third and fourth grades 
 and in each succeeding year to review these topics, grad- 
 ually enlarging and expanding the definitions, inflections, 
 and constructions into a fuller etymology and syntax. 
 In United States history we are beginning to adopt a 
 similar plan of repetitions, and the frequent reviews in 
 arithmetic are designed to make good the lack of thor- 
 oughness and mastery which should characterize each 
 successive grade of work. The course of religious in- 
 struction given in European schools is based upon the 
 same reiteration year by year of essential religious ideas. 
 The whole plan, as illustrated by different studies, is 
 based upon a successive enlargement of a subject in con- 
 centric circles with the implied constant repetition and 
 strengthening of leading ideas. A framework of import- 
 ant notions in each branch is kept before the mind year 
 after year, repeated, explained, enlarged, with faith in a 
 constantly increasing depth of meaning. There is no 
 doubt that under good teaching the principle of the con- 
 centric circles produces some excellent fruits, a mastery
 
 CONCENTRATION. 105 
 
 of the subject, and a concentration of ideas within the / 
 limits of a single study. a^ ^ 
 
 The disciples of Herbart, while admitting the merits ' n., 
 of the concentric circles, have subjected the plan to a 
 severe criticism. They say it begins with general and 
 abstract notions and puts off the interesting details to 
 the later years, while any correct method with children 
 will take the interesting particulars first, will collect 
 abundant concrete materials, and by a gradual process of 
 comparison and induction reach the general principles 
 and concepts at the close. It inevitably leads to a dull 
 and mechanical repetition instead of cultivating an inter- 
 esting comparison of new and old and a thoughtful retro- 
 spect. It is a clumsy and distorted application of the 
 principle of apperception, of going from the known to 
 the unknown. Instead of marching forward into new 
 fields of knov/ledge with a proper basis of supplies in con- 
 quered fields, it gleans again and again in fields already 
 harvested. For this reason it destroys a proper interest 
 by hashing up the same old ideas year after year. Finally 
 the concentric circles are not even designed to bring the 
 different school studies into relation to each other. At 
 best they contribute to a more thorough mastery of each 
 study. They leave the separate branches of the course 
 isolated and unconnected, an aggregation of unrelated 
 thought complexes. True concentration should leave 
 them an organic whole of intimate knowledge-relations, 
 conducing to strength and unity of character. 
 
 There is a growing conviction among teachers that 
 we need a closer articulation of studies with one another. 
 The expansion of the school course over new fields of 
 knowledge and the multiplication of studies already dis- 
 cussed compels us to seek for a simplification of the
 
 lOG GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 course. A hundred years ago, yes, even fifty years ago, 
 it was thought that the extension of our territory and 
 government to the present limits would be impossible. 
 It was plainly stated that one government could never 
 hold together people so widely separated. Mr. Fiske says: 
 (The Critical Period of Am. Hist., p. 60) "Even with 
 all other conditions favorable, it is doubtful if the Ameri- 
 can Union could have been preserved to the present time 
 without the railroad. Railroads and telegraphs have made 
 our vast country, both for political and for social pur- 
 poses, more snug and compact than little Switzerland was 
 in the middle ages or New England a century ago." The 
 analogy between the realm of government and of knowl- 
 edge is not at all complete but it suggests at least the 
 change which is imperatively called for in education. In 
 education as well as in commerce there must be trunk 
 lines of thought which bring the will as monarch of the 
 mind into close communication with all the resources of 
 knowledge and experience. Indeed in the mind of a child 
 or of an adult there is much stronger necessity for central- 
 ization than in the government and commerce of a coun- 
 try. The will should be an undisputed monarch of the 
 whole mental life. It is the one center where all lines of 
 communication meet. London is not so perfect a center 
 for the commerce and finance of England as is the con- 
 scious ego (smaller than a needle's point} for all its forms 
 of experience. 
 
 Besides the central trunk lines of knowledge in his- 
 tory and natural science there are branches of study 
 which are tributary to them, which serve also as con- 
 necting chains between more important subjects. Read- 
 ing, for instance, is largely a relative study. Not only is 
 the art of reading merely a preparation for a better ap-
 
 CONCENTRATION. 107 
 
 preciation of history, geography, arithmetic, etc., but 
 even the subject-matter of reading lessons is now made 
 largely tributary to other studies. The supplementary 
 readers consist exclusively of interesting matter bearing 
 upon geography, history, and natural science. It is a 
 fact that reading is becoming more and more a relative 
 study, and selections are regularly made to bear on other 
 school work. Geography especially serves to establish a 
 network of connections between other kinds of knowledge. 
 It is a very important supplement to history. In fact 
 history cannot dispense with its help. Geography lessons 
 are full of natural science, as with plants, animals, rocks, 
 climate, inventions, machines, and races. Indeed there 
 are few if any school studies which should not be brought 
 into close and important relations to geography. Again 
 the more important historical and scientific branches not 
 only receive valuable aid from the tributary studies but 
 they abundantly supply such aid in return. Language 
 lessons should receive all their subject-matter from his- 
 tory and natural science. While the language lessons are 
 working up such rich and interesting materials for pur- 
 poses of oral and written language, the more important 
 branches are also illustrated and enriched by the new 
 historical and scientific subjects thus incidentally treated. 
 An examination of these mutual relations and courte- 
 sies between studies may discover to us the fact that we i- 
 are now unconsciously or thoughtlessly duplicatiny the 
 work of education to a surprising extent. For example, 
 by isolating language lessons and cutting them oflf from 
 communication with history, geography, and natural sci- 
 ence, we make a double or triple series of lessons neces- 
 sary where a single series would answer the purpose. 
 Moreover, by excluding an interesting subject-matter de-
 
 108 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 rived from other studies, the interest and mental life 
 awakened by language lessons are reduced to a minimum. 
 Interest is not only awakened by well selected matter 
 taken from other branches but the relationships themselves 
 between studies, whether of cause and effect as between 
 history and geography, or of resemblance as between the 
 classifications in botany and grammar — the relations 
 themselves are matters of unusual interest to children. 
 
 Many teachers have begun to realize in some degree 
 the value of these relations, their effect in enlivening 
 studies, and the better articulation of all kinds of knowl- 
 edge in the mind. But as yet all attempts among us to, 
 properly relate studies are but weak and ineffective ap- 
 proaches toward the solution of the great problem of con- 
 centration. The links that now bind studies together in 
 our work are largely accidental and no great stress has 
 been laid upon their value, but if concentration is grap- 
 pled with in earnest it involves relatiojis at every step. 
 Not only are the principal and tributary branches of 
 knowledge brought into proper conjunction, but there is 
 constant forethought and afterthought to bring each new 
 topic into the company of its kindred, near and remote. 
 The mastery of any topic or subject is not clear and sat- 
 isfactory till the grappling hooks that bind it to the other 
 kinds of knowledge are securely fastened. 
 
 Concentration on a large scale and with consistent 
 thoroughness has been attempted in recent years by the 
 scholars and teachers of the Herbart school. It is based 
 upon moral character as the highest aim, and upon a cor- 
 relation of studies which attributes a high moral value to 
 historical knowledge and consequently places a series of 
 historical materials in the center of the school course. 
 The ability of the school to affect moral character is not
 
 CONCENTRATION. lOfi 
 
 limited to the personal influence of the teacher and to 
 the discipline and daily conduct of the children; but ia- 
 struction itself, by illustrating and implanting moral 
 ideas, and by closely 'relating all other kinds of knowl- 
 edge to the historical series, can powerfully affect moral 
 tendency and strength. If historical matter of the most 
 interesting and valuable kind be selected for the central 
 series, and the natural sciences and formal studies be 
 closely associated with it, there will be harmony and 
 union between the culture elements of the school course. 
 
 The Culture Epochs. 
 
 The problem that confronts us at the outset, when 
 preparing a plan of concentration, is hoio to select the 
 best historical (moral educative) materials, which are to 
 serve as the central series of the course. The atlture 
 epochs (cultur-historische Stufen) are, according to the 
 •Herbartians, the key to the situation. (This subject was 
 briefly discussed under Interest.) 
 
 According to the theory of the culture epochs, the 
 child, in its growth from infancy to maturity, is an epi- 
 tome of the world's history and growth in a profoundly 
 significant sense for the purpose of education. From the 
 earliest history of society and of arts, from the first 
 simple family and tribal relations, and from the time of 
 the primitive industries, there has been a series of up- 
 ward steps toward our present state of culture (social, 
 political, and economic life). Some of the periods of pro- 
 gress have been typical for different nations or for the 
 whole race; for example, the stone age, the age of bar- 
 barism, the age of primitive industries, the age of no- 
 mads, the heroic age, the age of chivalry, the age of des-
 
 no GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 potism, the age of conquest, wars of freedom, the age of 
 revolution, the commercial age, the age of democracy, the 
 age of discovery, etc. What relation the leading epochs 
 of progress in the race bear to the steps of change 
 and growth in children, has become a matter of great in- 
 terest in education. The assumption of \A\q culture epochs 
 is that the growth of moral and secular ideas in the race, 
 represented at its best, is similar to their growth in chil- 
 dren, and that children may find in the representative 
 historical periods select materials for moral and intellec- 
 tual nurture and a natural access to an understanding of 
 our present condition of society. / The culture epochs are 
 those representative periods in nistory which are sup- 
 posed to embody the elements of culture suited to train 
 the young upon in their successive periods of growth. 
 Goethe says, "Childhood must always begin again at the 
 first and pass through the epochs of the world's culture." 
 Herbart says, "The whole of the past survives in each of 
 US;" and again, "The receptivity (of the child) changes 
 continually with progress in years. It is the function of 
 the teacher to see to it that these modifications advance 
 steadily in agreement with these changes (in the world's 
 history)." Ziller has attempted more fully to "justify 
 this culture-historical course of instruction on the ground 
 of a certain predisposition of the child's mental growth 
 for this course." Again, "We are- to let children pass 
 through the culture development of mankind with accel- 
 erated speed." Herbart says, "The treasure of advice 
 and warning, of precept and principle, of transmitted 
 laws and institutions, which earlier generations have pre- 
 pared and handed down to the latter, belongs to the 
 strongest of psychological forces." That is, choice his- 
 torical illustrations produce a weighty effect upon the
 
 CONCENTRATION. Ill 
 
 minds of children, if selected from those epochs which 
 correspond to a child's own periods of growth. 
 
 The culture epochs imply an intimate union between 
 history and natural science, the two main branches of 
 knowledge, at every step. The isolation between these 
 studies, which has often appeared and is still strong, is 
 unnatural and does violence to the unity of education 
 historically considered. Men at all times have had phys- 
 ical nature in and around them. Every child is an inti- 
 mate blending of historical and physical (natural science) 
 elements. The culture epochs illustrate a constant change 
 and expansion of history and Jiatural science together and 
 in harmony (despite the conflict between them). As men 
 have progressed historically and socially from age to age 
 their interpretation of nature has been modified with 
 growing discovery, insight, invention, and utilization of 
 her reso'arces. Children also pass through a series of 
 metamorphoses which are both physical and psycholog- 
 ical, changing temper and mental tendency as the body 
 increases in vigor and strength. 
 
 The culture epochs, by beginning well back in history, 
 with those early epochs which correspond to a child's 
 early years and tracing up the steps of progress in their 
 origin and growth, pave the way for a clear Insight into 
 our present state of culture, which is a comple.x of his- 
 torical and natural science elements. It is comparatively 
 easy for us to see that to understand the present politi- 
 cal, economic, and social conditions of the United States 
 we are compelled to go back to the early settlements 
 with their simple surroundings and slowly trace up the 
 growth and increasing complexity of government, re- 
 ligion, commerce, manufactures, and social life. The 
 theory of the culture epochs implies that the child began
 
 112 (GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 where primitive man began, feels as he felt, and ad- 
 vances us he advanced, only with more rapid strides; 
 that as his physique is the hereditary outcome of thou- 
 sands of years of history, and his physical growth the 
 epitome of that development, so his mental progress is 
 related to the mind progress of his ancestry. They go 
 still further and assume that the subject-matter of the 
 leading epochs is so well adapted to the changing phases 
 and impulses of child life that there is a strong predis- 
 position in children in favor of this course, and that the 
 series of historical object lessons stirs the strongest in- 
 tellectual and moral interests into life. 
 
 As a theory the culture epochs may seem too loose 
 and unsubstantial to serve as the basis for such a serious 
 undertaking as the education of children to moral charac- 
 ter. There is probably no exact agreement as to what 
 the leading epochs of the world's history are, nor of the 
 true order of succession even of those epochs which can 
 be clearly seen. The value of this theory is rather in its 
 suggestiveness to teachers in their efforts to select suit- 
 able historical materials for children not in any exact 
 order but approximately. So far as we are informed no 
 one has yet tried to prove, in logical form, the necessary 
 correspondence between the epochs of history and the 
 periods of growth in children. It is rather an instinct 
 which has been felt and expressed by many great writers. 
 The real test of the value of this theory is not so much in 
 a positive argument as in a general survey of the educa- 
 tional materials furnished by the historical epochs, and 
 an experimental use of them in schools to see whether 
 they are suited to the periods of child growth. 
 
 There are, however, certain limits to the theory of 
 race progress that need to be drawn at once. It is easy 
 
 I
 
 CUNCENTIIA riON. 113 
 
 to perceive that not all races have left such epochs be- 
 hind them, because some are still in barbarism; others 
 liave advanced to a considerable height and then retro- 
 graded. Of those which have advanced with more or 
 less steadiness for two thousand years, like England, 
 France, and Germany, not every period of their history 
 contains valuable culture elements. The great epochs 
 are not clearly distinguishable in their origin and ending. 
 Again, only those periods whose deeds, spirit, and ten- 
 dency have been well preserved by history or, still bet- 
 ter, have found expression in the work of some great 
 poet or literary artist, can supply for children the best 
 educative material. 
 
 The culture epochs of history can be of no service to us 
 in schools except as they have been suitably described by 
 able writers. In history and literature, as handed down 
 to us by the great literary artists, many of the culture 
 t^pochs have been portrayed by a master hand. In the 
 Iliad, Homer gives us vivid and delightfully attractive 
 scenes from life in the heroic age. The historical 
 parts of the Old Testament furnish clear and classic ex- 
 pression to great typical historical scenes as illustrated 
 in the lives of Abraham, Joseph, Moses, Joshua, David, 
 and Solomon. The chief poets have expended a full meas- 
 ure of their art i.i presenting to posterity attractive 
 events from striking epochs of the world's history. Homer, 
 Virgil, Dante, Tennyson, and Longfellow have left for us 
 such historical paintings as the Iliad, Odyssey, the yEneid, 
 the Divine Comedy, Idyls of a King, Miles Standish, etc. 
 Some of the best historians also have described such 
 epochs of history in scarcely less attractive form. Xeno- 
 phon's Anabasis, Livy's Punic Wars, Plutarch's Lives, 
 Caesar's Gallic Wars, the best biographies of Charlemagne
 
 114 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 Columbus, Luther, Cromwell, Washinc^ton, are designed 
 to give us a clear view of some of the great typical charac- 
 ters and events of history. Some of the leading novel- 
 ists and imaginative writers in prose have performed a 
 like sorvico. Hypatia, I van hoe. Last Days of Pompeii, 
 Ilomola, Uarda, and Robinson Crusoe are examples. 
 The story of Siegfried, of King Arthur, of Bayard, of 
 Tell, of Bruce, of Alfred, and the heroic myths of 
 Greece, all bring out representative figures of the myth- 
 ical age. 
 
 The typical epochs of the world's struggle and pro- 
 gress are reflected, therefore, in the literary masterpieces 
 of great writers, whether poets, historians, biographers, 
 or novelists. The simplest and choicest of these literary 
 and historical materials, selected, arranged, and adapted 
 for children, have been regarded by some thinkers as the 
 strongest and best meat that can be supplied to chilcireti 
 during their periods of growth. The history of each nation 
 that has had a progressive civilization contains some such 
 elements and masterpieces. It would be fortunate for 
 each nation if it could find first in its own history all such 
 leading epochs and corresponding materials. Then it 
 could draw upon the historical and literary resources of 
 other countries to complete and round out the horizon of 
 thought. 
 
 Since the best materials selected from history are 
 calculated to build a strong foundation of moral ideas 
 and sentiments, this carefully selected historical series 
 of studies has been chosen as the basis for a concentra- 
 tion of all the studies of the school course. Ziller, as a 
 disciple of Herbart, was the first to lay out a course of 
 study for the common school with history materials as a 
 central series, based upon the idea of the cultui-e epochs.
 
 CONCENTRATION. iHS 
 
 Since religious instruction drawn from the Old and New 
 Testament has always been an important study in Ger- 
 man schools, he established a double historical series. 
 The first was scriptural, representing the chief epochs of 
 Jewish and Christian history from the time of Abraham 
 to the Reformation; the second was national Oorman his- 
 tory from the early traditional stories of Thuringia and 
 the Saxon kings down to the Napoleonic wars and the 
 entry of Emperor William into Paris in 1871. It should 
 be remarked that in the first and second grade re- 
 ligious instruction does not appear in regular form, but 
 in devotional exercises, Christmas stories, etc. Fairy 
 stories and Robinson Crusoe are the chief materials 
 used in the first and second grades, so that the regular 
 historical series begin in the third. 
 
 The two lines of religious and secular history are de- 
 signed to illustrate for each grade corresponding epochs 
 of national history, both Jewish and German. The 
 parallel series stand as follows: 
 
 Reltgioxis. Secular. 
 
 1st Grade. Fairytales. 
 
 2nd Grade. Robinson Crusoe. 
 
 3d Grade. The patriarchs, Abra- Stories of Thuringia. 
 ham, Joseph, Moses. 
 
 4th Grade. Judges and Kintrs. Tiie Nibelungen Song, Sieg- 
 Saniuel, Saul, David, Solomon. fried. 
 
 5th Grade. Life of Christ. * Henry I., Charlemagne, Bon- 
 
 iface, Armenius. 
 
 till; Grade. Life of Christ. Teutonic migrations. Cru- 
 
 sades, Attila, Harbarossa, 
 Rudolph. 
 
 7th Grade. Life of Taul. Discovery of America, Ref- 
 
 ormation, Thirty Years' 
 War. 
 
 8th Grade. Life of Luther. Frederick the Great, Wars 
 
 against Napoleon, Wil- 
 liam L
 
 116 GENERAL METIIOn. 
 
 The above outline is Ziller's plan, modified by Pro- 
 fessor Rein. 
 
 In eacii grade is selected a body of classical or choice 
 historical materials, representing a great period of Ger- 
 man as well as of Jewish or Christian life, and especially 
 suited to interest and instruct children, while illustrat- 
 ing moral ideas and deepening moral convictions. The 
 body of historical narrative selected for any one grade is 
 calculated to form a center or nucleus for concentrating 
 all the studies of that year. Reading, language, geog- 
 raphy, drawing, music, and arithmetic largely spring out 
 of and dej)end upon this historical center, while they are 
 also bound to ea<'h other by many links of connection. 
 A full course for the eight grades of the common school, 
 with this double historical series as a nucleus, has been 
 carefully worked out and applied by Professor Rein and 
 his associates. It has been applied also with consider- 
 .ible success in a number of German schools. 
 
 This great undertaking has had to run the gauntlet of 
 a severe criticisni. Its fundamental principles, as well as 
 its details of execution, have been sharply questioned. But 
 a long-continued elTort. extending through many years, 
 by able and thoroughly-equipped teachers, to solve one of 
 the greatest problems of education, deserves careful 
 attention. The general theory of concentration, the 
 selection and value of the materials, the previous history 
 of method, and the best present method of treating each 
 subject, with detailed illustrations, are all worked out 
 with great care and ability. 
 
 The Jewish and German historical materials, which 
 are made the moral-educative basis of the common school 
 course by the Herbartians, can be of no service to us 
 except by way of example. Neither sacred nor German
 
 CONCENTRATION. 117 
 
 history can form any important part of an American 
 course of study. Religious instruction has been rele- 
 gated to the church, and German history touches us 
 indirectly-if at all. The epochs of history from which 
 American schools must draw are chiefly those of the 
 United states and Great Britain. France, Germany. 
 Italy, and Greece may furnish some collateral matter, as 
 the story of Tell, of Siegfried, of Alaric, and of Ulysses; 
 but some of the leading epochs must be those of our own 
 national history. 
 
 Has the English-speakinff race in North America 
 passed through a series of historical epochs which, on 
 account of their moral-educative worth, deserve to stand 
 in the center of a common school course? Is this history 
 adapted to cultivate the highest moral and intellectual 
 qualities of children as they advance from year to year? 
 There are few, if any, single nations whose history could 
 furnish a favorable answer to this question. The English 
 in America began their career so late in the world's his- 
 torj' and with such advantages of previous European cul- 
 ture that several of the earlier historical epochs are not 
 represented in our country. But perhaps Great Britain 
 and Europe will furnish the earlier links of a chain whose 
 later links were firmly welded in America. 
 
 The hhtory of our country since the first settlements 
 less than three hundred years ago is by far the best epi- 
 tome of the world's progress in its later phases that the 
 life of any nation presents. On reaching the new world 
 the settlers began a hand-to hand, tooth-and-nail conflict 
 with hard conditions of climate, soil, and savage. Tlu^ 
 simple basis of physical existence had to be fought for on 
 the hardest terms. The fact that everything had to be 
 built up anew from small beginnings on a virgin soil gave
 
 118 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 an opportunity to trace the rise of institutions from their 
 infancy in a Puritan dwelling or in a town meeting till 
 they sjircad and consolidated over a continent. In this 
 short time the people have grown from little scattered 
 settlements to a nation, have experienced an undreamed- 
 of material expansion; have passed through a rapid suc- 
 cession of great political struggles, and have had an 
 unrivaled evolution of agriculture, commerce, manufac- 
 tures, inventions, education, and social life. All the 
 elements of sopiety, material, religious, political, and 
 .social have started with the day of small things and have 
 grown up together. 
 
 There is little in our history to appeal to children be- 
 low the fourth grade, that is, below ten years; but from 
 the beginning of the fourth grade on, American history 
 is rich in moral-educative materials of the best quality 
 and suited to children. We are able to distinguish four 
 principal epochs: 1. The age of pioneers, the ocean nav- 
 igators, like Columbus, Drake, and Magellan, and the ex- 
 plorers of the continent like Smith, Champlain, LaSalle, 
 and Fremont. 2. The period of settlements, of col'^nial 
 history, and of French and Indian wars. 3. The Revolu- 
 tion and life under the Articles of Confederation till the 
 adoption of the Constitution. 4. Self-government under 
 Ihe Union and the growth and strengthening of the fed- 
 eral idea. While drawing largely upon general history 
 for a full and detailed treatment of a few important top- 
 ics in each of these epochs, we should make a still more 
 abundant use of the biographical and literary materials 
 furnished by each. The concentration of school studies, 
 with a historical series suggested by the culture e}X)chs 
 as a basis, would utilize our American history, biogra- 
 phy, and literature in a manner scarcely dreamed of here- 
 tofore.
 
 CO: fCENTRATION. 119 
 
 We shall attempt o illustrate briefly this concentra- 
 tion of studies about /materials selected from on(^ of the 
 culture epochs. Talgb, for example, the age of pioiteerg 
 from which to selec/ historical subject-matter for chil- 
 dren of the fourth afnd tifth grades. It comprehends the 
 biographies of eminent navigators and explorers, pioneers 
 on land and sea. / It describes the important undertak- 
 ings of Columbug, Magellan. Cobot, Raleigh. Drake, and 
 others, who werq daring leaders at the great period of 
 maritime discovery. The pioneer explorers of New Eng- 
 land and the other colonies .bring out strongly marked 
 characters in the preparatory stage of our earliest his- 
 tory. Smith, Champlain, Winthrop, Penn. Oglethorpe, 
 Stuyvesant, and Washington are examples. In the Mis- 
 sissippi valley De Soto, La Salle, Boone, Lincoln, and 
 Robertson, are types. Still farther west Lewis and 
 Clarke, and the pioneers of California complete this his- 
 torical epoch in a series of great enterprises. Most of 
 them are pioneers into new regions beset with dangers 
 of wild beasts, savages, and sickness. A few are 
 settlers, the first to build cabins and take possession of 
 land that was still claimed by red men and still covered 
 with forests. The men named were leaders of small 
 bands sent out to explore rivers and forests or to drive 
 out hostile claimants at the point of the sword. 
 
 Any one who has tried the effect of these stories upon 
 children of the fourlli gi-ade will grant that they touch a 
 deep native interest. liut this must be a ;^rnuineand per- 
 manent interest to he of educative value. Tin uiorul quality 
 'n this interest is its virtue. Standish, Boone, TjaSalle.and 
 the rest were stalwart men, whose courage was keenly 
 and powerfully tempered. They were leaders of men by 
 virtue of moral strength and superiority. Their deeds
 
 120 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 have the stamp of heroism and in ai)proving them the 
 moral judfrments of children are exercised upon noble 
 material. These nien and stories constitute an epoch in 
 civilization because they represent that stage which just 
 precedes the first form of settled society. Tn fact .some 
 of the stories fall in the transition stage, where men 
 followed the plow and wielded the woodman's axe, or 
 turned to the war-path as occasion required. In every 
 part of the United States there has been such a period, 
 and something corresponding to it in other countries. 
 We are prepared to assume,, therefore, that these histor- 
 ical materials arouse a strong interest, implant moral 
 ideas, and illustrate a typical epoch. They are also very 
 real. These men, especially the land pioneers, were our 
 own predecessors, traversing the same rivers, forests, and 
 prairies where we now live and enjoy the fruits of their 
 hardihood and labor. 
 
 Let us suppose that such a historical series of stories 
 has its due share of time on the school program and that 
 the stories are properly presented by the teacher and 
 orally reproduced by the pupils. Into what relations shall 
 the other studies of the school enter to these historical 
 materials ? How shall language, reading, geography, 
 natural science, and arithmetic be brought into the close 
 relation to history required by the idea of concentration. 
 
 The oral reproduction of the stories by the children is 
 the best possible oral language drill, while their. partial 
 written review is the basis of much of the regular com- 
 position work. Language lessons on isolated and uncon- 
 nected topics can thus be entirely omitted. The element 
 of interest will be added to oral and written language 
 lessons by the use of such lively stories. 
 
 Reading is chiefly tributary to the historical series.
 
 CONCENTRATION. 121 
 
 Such selections should be made (or reading lessons as will 
 throw additional light upon pioneer history and its re- 
 lated geography. Descriptions of natural scenery and 
 choice selections from our best historians, as Irving and 
 Bancroft, describing events or men of this period, should 
 be used for reading lessons. Especially the best literary 
 selections are to be utilized, as the Landing of the Pil- 
 grims, Webster's and Everett's orations at Plymouth, 
 Evangeline and Hiawatha, Indian legends and life. Miles 
 Standish, The Knickerbocker History, and some of the 
 original papers and letters of the early settlers. What- 
 ever poems or prose selections from our best literature 
 are found to bear directly or indirectly upou pioneer 
 events, will add much interest and beauty to the whole 
 subject. A second series of reading materials for these 
 grades would be those masterpieces and traditions of 
 European literature, which are drawn from a correspond- 
 ing pioneer epoch in those countries; for example, Sieg" 
 fried in Germany, Alaric in Italy, and Ulysses in Greece. 
 A selection of reading material along these lines would 
 exhibit much variety of prose and poetry, history, and 
 geography. Unity would be given to it by the spirit and 
 labors of a typical age and an intimate relation to history 
 at all points established. 
 
 Geography has an equally close relation to history 
 stories. For these grades geography and history cover 
 the same geographical regions. Instead of being totally 
 isolated from each other they should be purposely laid out 
 on parallel lines with interlacing topics. North America 
 and the Atlantic ocean are the tield of action in both 
 cases. These maritime explorers opened up the geogra- 
 phy of this hemisphere at its most interesting stage. No 
 part of the Atlantic ocean or of its North American
 
 122 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 coasts was overlooked by the navigators. The climate, 
 vegetation and people upon its islands and coasts were 
 curious objects to European adventurers. The first 
 pioneers surveyed the eastern coast and the adjacent 
 interior of a new continent, with its bays, rivers, forests, 
 and mountains. The stories themselves are not intelligible 
 without full geographical explanations, and the personal 
 interest in the narratives throws a peculiar charm upon 
 the geography. 
 
 The Mississippi valley is a great field for both 
 history and geography. It is one of the striking phys- 
 ical features of North America and the best of stories 
 find their setting in this environment. Not a great 
 river of this region but is the scene of one of the sto- 
 ries. The lakes and streams were the natural highways 
 of the explorers and settlers. The mountains obstructed 
 their way, presenting obstacles but not limits to their 
 enterprise. The great forests housed their game, con- 
 cealed their enemies, and had to be cut down to make 
 space for their homes and cornfields. The prairies farther 
 west were a camping ground for them as well as for the 
 deer and buffalo. There are no important physical fea- 
 tures of the great valley that are not touched more or 
 less in detail by the stories. It is the work of .the geog- 
 raphy of this year to enlarge and complete the pictures 
 suggested by the stories, to multiply details, to compare 
 and arrange and to associate with these the facts of our 
 present political and commercial geography. 
 
 The relation between history and geogi'aphy is so in- 
 timate that it requires some pedagogical skill to deter- 
 mine which of the two should take the lead. But we 
 have already adjudged the history to be by far the more 
 important of the two. Its subject-matter is of greater
 
 CONCENTRATION. l>» 
 
 intrinsic interest to children, and as it already stands in 
 the commanding center of the school course, we are dis- 
 posed to bring the geography lessons into close depend- 
 ence upon it. 
 
 In these grades natural science or nature study form 
 a necessary complement to the circle of historical and 
 geographical topics treated. Many interesting natural- 
 science subjects, suggested by history and geography, can 
 not be dealt with satisfactorily in those studies; for ex- 
 ample, the tobacco plant, the cactus, the deer, the hot 
 springs, the squirrel, the mariner's compass. Natural 
 science studies begin naturally with the home neighbor- 
 hood, with its plants, trees, animals, rocks, inventions. 
 and products. But having surveyed and learned many 
 of these things at home in his earlier years, the child is 
 prepared, when geography and history begin, to extend 
 his natural-science information to the larger geographical 
 rogions. 
 
 The history stories and geography suggest a large 
 number of natural-science topics, so that there is abun- 
 dant choice of materials while remaining in close con- 
 nection with those studies. The vegetable and animal 
 life and products of the sea, suggested by the voyages, are 
 fishes, dolphins, whales, sea-birds, shells, Other topics 
 are the construction of ships, the mariner's compass, and 
 astronomy. The stories of the land pioneers open up a still 
 richer field of natural science study for the common schools. 
 Among animals are the beaver, otter, squirrel, coon, 
 bear, fox, wildcat, deer, buffalo, domestic animals, wild 
 turkeys, ducks, pigeons, eagle, hawk, wild bees, cat-fish, 
 sword-fish, turtle, alligator, and many more. Among na- 
 tive products and fruits are mentioned corn, pumpkins, 
 beans, huckleberries, grapes, strawberries, cranberries.
 
 134 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 tobacco, pawpaw, mulberry, haw, plum, apple, and per- 
 simmon. Of trees are oak, hickory, walnut, cypress, 
 pine, birch, beech, and others. Tools, instruments, and 
 inventions are mentioned, with their uses, as guns, Indian 
 weapons, compass, thermometer, barometer, boats, car- 
 penter's tools; also, the uses of iron, lead, leather, and 
 many of the simple arts and economies of life, such as 
 weaving, tempering of metals, tanning, and cooking. 
 The natural wonders of the country, such as falls, caves, 
 hot-springs, canons, salt licks, plains, interior deserts, 
 and salt lakes, kinds of rocks, soils, forests and other 
 vegetation, the phenomena of the weather and differences 
 in climate, are referred to. All these and other topics 
 from the broad realm of nature are suggested, any of 
 which may serve as the starting point for a series of sci- 
 ence lessons. 
 
 How far the natural science lessons can heed the 
 suggestions of history and geography and still follow out 
 and develop important science principles, is one of the 
 great problems for solution. It would seem that the 
 large number of natural-science topics touched upon by 
 the history, when increased by the variety of home ob- 
 jects in nature and by still others called up by the geog- 
 raphy work of .these years, w-ould give sufficient variety to 
 the natural science work of the same period. By omitting 
 some of these topics and enlarging upon others, develop- 
 ing the notions of classes and principles so far as is desir- 
 able, the natural-science lessons may be made sufficiently 
 scientific without losing the close relation to the central 
 subject-matter for the year. There is no doubt but the 
 science-lessons will add greatly to many topics suggested 
 by the stories and will bring the whole realm of nature 
 into close relation to history and geography.
 
 CONCENTRATION. 125 
 
 The subjects thus far discussed, that may be brought 
 into close relation to the central stories, are oral and 
 written language, reading and literature, geography, and 
 the natural sciences. The connection between these 
 branches are numerous and strong at every step. Drawing 
 has a very intimate and important relation to the objects 
 described in history, natural science, arithmetic, and 
 geography; while the songs learned should express in 
 those poetic and rhythmic forms which appeal so strongly 
 to the feelings, many of the noblest ideas suggested by 
 travel, scenery, history, and the experiences of home life. 
 
 Arithinetic, finally, seems to stand like an odd sheep 
 among the studies. It is certainly the least social of the 
 tommon school branches. While avoiding all forced con- 
 nection between arithmetic and other studies, we shall 
 find some points where the relations are simple and clear. 
 Children in the first grade should see numbers in the 
 leaver-, flowers, trees, and animals they study. At the 
 beginning of the first grade this would be a good in- 
 formal way of beginning numbers. The value of objects 
 in first and second grade number is so great that it is 
 only a question as to how far the objects suggested by 
 other lessons may be used. 
 
 But we are speaking of concentration in the fourth 
 and fifth grades. In the stories and in geography "'e 
 deal with journeys up great rivers, with the height of 
 mountains, with the extent of valleys and lakes, with 
 regular forts, mounds, and enclosures, with comjianies 
 and bodies of men, with railroads, cities, and agricultural 
 products, and with many other topics which suggest ex- 
 cellent practical problems in arithmetic for these grades. 
 All such careful arithmetical computations add clearness 
 and definiteness to historical and geographical ideas.
 
 12r, GENEUAL METHOD. 
 
 The natural sciences have been so little systematically 
 tauf^ht in our common schools, that we are scarcely able 
 to realize what connection may be made between them 
 and arithmetic. We know that in the advanced study 
 and applications of some of the natural sciences, mathe- 
 matics is an essential part. 
 
 A brief retrospect will make it appear that the history 
 stories, natural sciences, and geography, with the more 
 formal studies, such as reading, language, and arithmetic, 
 may be brought into a close organic harmony. Each of 
 them depends upon and throws light upon the other; and 
 while the connections are natural, not forced, there is a 
 concentration upon the central historical and literary 
 matter that makes moral character the highest aim of 
 teaching. 
 
 Since real concentration is practically a new educa- 
 tional undertaking, it involves a number of unsolved 
 subordinate problems; for instance, how far shall science 
 lessons, grammar, and geography follow their own princi- 
 ])les of selection, based on the nature and scientific ar- 
 rangement of their materials, while keeping up the de- 
 pendence upon and connections with the central subject. 
 But if concentration is a true principle of education, it is 
 evident that none of these problems can be solved until 
 concentration has been agreed upon and made funda- 
 mental. In this case those teachers who are trying to 
 lay out courses of study in geography, natural science, 
 or history, without regard to the relation of studies to 
 each other, will have most of their work to do over 
 again. 
 
 A little reflection will convince us, perhaps, that a 
 years work thus concentrated will produce a much more 
 powerful and lasting impression upon children than the
 
 CONCENTRATION. 127 
 
 loose aggregation of facts which is usually collected dur- 
 ing a year's work. Not only will the moral effect be in- 
 tensified, but the close dependence of each study upon 
 the others will be perceptibly felt as valuable and stimu- 
 lating to the children. 
 
 If now we can conceive of the eight grades of the 
 common school as eight stages passing naturally from 
 one to another, each a unit composed of a net-work of 
 well I'elated facts, but the epochs closely related to each 
 other in a rising series, from childhood almost to matur- 
 ity, or from the beginning of history up to the present 
 state of culture, we shall be able also to think of educa- 
 tion as a succession of powerful culture influences, that 
 will bring the child to our present standpoint fully con- 
 scious of his duties and surroundings. 
 
 Note. — A careful criticism of the theory of the culture 
 epochs is found in Laoge's Apperception translated by the Her- 
 bart club, published by D. C. Heath, p. 110, etc.
 
 ■^ 
 
 r.'s (JENERAL METHOD. 
 
 
 -h^ 
 
 ..^' 
 
 fi 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 \x^^ 
 
 i >} 
 
 INDUCTION. 
 
 We are now prepared to inquire into the minds 
 method of approacli to any and all subjects. We have 
 considered the aim of education, the value of diflFerent 
 subjects as helping toward that aim. the natural interests 
 which give zest to studies, and finally the general plan 
 of combining and relating topics so as to bring about 
 wnity of purpose and unity of matter in the mind. As a 
 child enters upon the work of acquisition are there any 
 regulatives to guide the process of learning? 
 r~ Induction, or the concept-bearing process, shows the 
 tendency of our minds to advance fi-om the inspection of 
 particular objects and actions to the understanding of 
 general notions or concepts. The study and analysis 
 of this process casts us forthwith into the mi^t of psychol- 
 ogy, and calls for a knowledge of that succession and 
 net-work of mental activities discussed in all the psychol- 
 ogies; sensation, discrimination, perception, analysis 
 and synthesis, comparison, judgment, generalization or 
 concept, reasoning. An inquiry into these mental activ- 
 ities, which are among the most important in psychology,. 
 is necessary as a basis of induction and of general method. 
 But even the more profound study of psychology does 
 not necessarily give insight into correct methods of 
 teaching. Many great psychologists have had little 
 or no interest in teaching. Even eminent specialists in
 
 INDUCTION. V2'J 
 
 electricity and chemistry have not often been those to 
 draw the immediate practical benefit from their studies. 
 The application of psychology to the work of instruction 
 constitutes a distinct field of inquiry and experiment. 
 The output of the best experimental thinking in this di- 
 rection may be called pedagogy. 
 
 The process of induction or concept- building leads the 
 mind, as above indicated, through a series of different 
 acts. We may first observe how far the mind is naturally 
 inclined to follow this process, and whether it is a mark 
 of healthy mental action in children and in adults. Later 
 we may examine more closely the successive stages in the 
 process itself. 
 
 To get at the natural process it is well to observe first 
 the action of a chilcVs mind. By analyzing a simple case 
 of a farmer's child we ma}^ trace the mental steps in 
 forming a general notion. So long as it has seen no barn 
 except that on its father's farm, the word barn means to 
 it only that particular object. But when it discovers 
 that one of the neighbors has a similar building called a 
 barn, it learns to put these different objects under one 
 head, and the general notion barn as a building for 
 horses, cattle, and feed, gradually rises in the mind. 
 Long before the child is six years old (school age) it may 
 have seen enough of such barns for the general notion to 
 be distinctly formed. By observing different objects, by 
 comparing and grouping similar things together, it has 
 formed a general notion in a regular process of induction, 
 and that without any help from teachers. 
 
 At two and three years of age, or as soon as a child 
 begins to recognize and name new objects (because of 
 their resemblance to things previously seen) this tendency 
 to concept-building is manifest. Another illustration:
 
 130 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 The child has seen the family horse spv. 
 word horse becomes associated with tha- ^.^^^..^ai. rv mm 
 out walking it sees another horse, and pointing its finger 
 says "horse." The memory of the first hoise and the 
 similarity calls forth the natural conclusion that this is a 
 horse, though it may not be able to formulate the sen- 
 tence. More horses are seen and compared till the word 
 becomes the name of a whole class of animals. By a 
 gradual process of observation, comparison, and judg- 
 ment the word horse comes to stand for a large group of 
 objects in nature. 
 
 A child's mind is naturally very active in detecting 
 resemblances and in grouping similar objects together. 
 It notices that there are certain people called women, 
 others called men; that certain animals are called sheep, 
 others cattle. One class of objects receives the name 
 book, another stove, etc. The work of observing, com- 
 paring, and classifying is a perpetual operation in the 
 child's active moods. In this way, what may appear at 
 first as an interminable confusion or blur of objects in 
 nature begins to fall into groups and classes with ap- 
 propriate names. It is the child's own way of bringing 
 order out of the apparent chaos of his surroundings. All 
 this process of classification is natural and nearly uncon- 
 scious, and results in a better understanding and inter- 
 pretation of the things around him. 
 
 Observe next the work of an educated adult, and how 
 he increases and arranges his knowledge. If he is an in- 
 cipient dry-goods merchant he learns by sight and touch 
 to detect the quality of goods. He compares and classi- 
 fies his experiences and becomes in time an expert in 
 judging textile fabrics. On the other hand he becomes 
 acquainted by personal contact with various customers
 
 INDUCTION. 131 
 
 and learns how to classify and judge thena-both as buy- 
 ers and as debtors. 
 
 If a botanist finds a new plant he examines its stem, 
 leaves, root, flower, seed, and environment. While enter- 
 ing into these details he is also comparing it with fa- 
 miliar classes of plants. Finally, he is not satisfied till 
 he can definitely locate it in his previous system. With 
 every new plant that he discovers he travels over the 
 whole road from the individual particulars to the general 
 classes of his whole system. The merchant and the sci- 
 entist follow out with painstaking care and industry the 
 same course which was involuntarily taken by the child; 
 namely, observjition of particiulars, comparing an^d^group- 
 ing into classes. The same habit of mind may be ob- 
 served in all people who are growing knowledgewards and 
 who possess any thoughtful instincts. In building uj) 
 concepts, especially with the adult, induction is con- 
 stantly mingled with deduction. As fast as general 
 notions are formed they are used to interpret new objects. 
 As the amount of this organized and classified knowledge 
 increases, we reason more and more deductively. 
 
 In acquiring knowledge along the line of induction, we 
 are on the road to the solution of the puzzle that nature 
 puts to every child. To every infant, indeed, the world is 
 an enormous riddle or puzzle, whose parts lie in fragments 
 about him, waiting the operation of his curious and in- 
 ventive mind toward the reconstruction of the whole. 
 Endless variety and complexity confront us all in the 
 beginning. There is indeed an order and classification of 
 things in nature, but it does not appear on the surface, 
 and for centuries men remained ignorant of the underly- 
 ing harmony. Nature is full of valuable secrets, but they 
 lie concealed from the careless eye. They are to be de-
 
 132 (iENERAL METHOD. 
 
 tected by prying deeper into individual facts, Dy putting 
 a thing here and a thing there together, by pondering 
 on the relationship of things to each other in their nature, 
 appearance, and cause. It is a remarl<able fact that we 
 not only increase knowledge best by analyzing, compar- 
 ing, and classifying objects, experience, and phenomena 
 — even into old age — but that the deeper we penetrate 
 into the individual qualities and inner nature of objects, 
 the more we extend and classify our information, the 
 simpler all the operations of nature become to our under- 
 standing. The surprising simplicity and unity of nature 
 in her varied phenomena is one of the mature products of 
 scientific study. The most scientific thinker, then, is only 
 trying to reduce to a simple explanation the same puzzle 
 which confronted the infant in its cradle. The problem is 
 the same and the method similar. 
 
 It is plain that the process of classifying objects and 
 phenomena in nature and in society is the beginning of 
 scientific knowledge. A child begins to learn as soon as 
 it notices the resemblances in things and arranges them 
 into groups. It will appear later that the mind does not 
 follow a strictly logical method in gaining its groups, that 
 it falls into natural errors and misconceptions; but in 
 spite of these eccentric movements, the general trend is 
 toward classifications and toward the language symbols 
 that express them. In this poA^er to associate, classify, 
 and symbolize the products of experience in words is 
 seen the marked difference between man and the animals. 
 The latter have little power to compare and generalize, 
 that is, to think. On a still higher plane, the difference 
 between a careless, loose observer and a well-trained 
 scientific thinker is largely a difference in accuracy, in 
 inductive and deductive processes.
 
 INDUCTION. 133 
 
 The important thing for the teacher to determine is 
 whether this inductive or concept-building tendency fur- 
 nishes any solid ground tq^on which to base the work of in- 
 struction. Admitting that it is a natural process, com- 
 mon to both old and young in acquiring knowledge, per- 
 haps it can be neglected because it will take care of 
 itself. If it is self-active, needing no artificial stimulus, 
 let it alone. On the contrary, if in a healthy pursuit of 
 knowledge it brings the varied mental powers into 
 a natural sequence where they will strengthen and sup- 
 port one another, it should be studied and used by 
 teachers. It would be very commonplace to say that 
 each of the faculties or activities involved in the induc- 
 tive process should be disciplined and strengthened by 
 school studies. There is but little difference of .opinion 
 on this subject, though some would lay more stress upon 
 sense training, some on memory, some on reasoning. 
 The ground for this general conviction is the notorious 
 fact that with children every one of these acts, is per- 
 formed in z, faulty and stiperficial manner. The observa- 
 tions of children are very careless and unreliable. Even 
 adults are extremely negligent and inaccurate in their 
 observations of natural objects, persons, and phenomena. 
 But the mental powers brought to bear in observation 
 are simple and elementary. Tlie exercise of higher men- 
 tal powers, such as analysis, comparison, judgment, and 
 reasoning, is prone to be still more accidental and erro- 
 neous. 
 
 Acknowledging then the necessity for training all 
 these powers, how can it best be done ? Not by delegat- 
 ing to each study the cultivation of one kind or set of 
 mental activities, but by observing that the same general 
 process underlies the acquisition of knowledge in each
 
 134 GENERAL METHOD. ^ 
 
 .subject, and that all the kinds of mental life are brought 
 into action in nearly every study. In short, the inductive 
 process is a natural highway of human thought in every 
 line of study, bringing all the mental forces into an 
 orderly, successive, healthful activity. We may yet dis- 
 cover that the inductive process not only gives the key to 
 an interesting method of mastering different branches of 
 knowledge, but in developing mental activity it brings 
 the various mental powers into a strong natural sequence. 
 
 One of the great ends of intellectual culture is gradually 
 to transform this careless, unconscious, inductive tendency 
 in children into the painstaking ayid exact scrutiny of the 
 student, and later of the specialist. 
 
 Although the inductive process is a common highway 
 of thought in all stages of intellectual growth from child- 
 hood to maturity, certain parts of the road are much 
 more frequently traveled in childhood, and still others in 
 youth and maturity. It is the work of pedagogy to 
 adapt its materials to these changing phases of soul life 
 in children. In the analysis of the inductive and de- 
 ductive processes we desire to come at the solution of 
 this problem. 
 
 Considered as a whole, there is a simple phase of the 
 inductive process which is best explained by the terms 
 absorption and reflection.' It appears in the study of 
 simple as well as of complex objects, and indicates clearly 
 the fundamental rhythm of the mind in acquiring and 
 elaborating its knowledge. This action of the mind is a 
 shuttle-like movement, a constant running back and 
 forth between two extremes, absorption and reflection, 
 We will test this statement upon examples. When we 
 are in the mood for learning let some new object, a saio- 
 mili attract the attention. A quick general glance at
 
 INDUCTION. 13-, 
 
 the place and its surroundings tells us what it is. Now 
 trace the operation of the mill as it draws up the logs 
 singly from the rafts lying on the margin of the river 
 and converts them into lumber. You observe first how 
 the logs are carried up an inclined slide by means of an 
 endless chain with hooks, into the mill. You examine 
 this first piece of machinery and notice its mode of 
 action. As the logs enter the upper story of the mill, 
 they are thrown by heavy levers to either side and roll 
 down toward the saws. Here is another piece of ma- 
 chinery in its proper place. Having been stripped of the 
 loose pieces of bark, the logs are grasped by another set 
 of iron hands, lifted firmly to the carriage and passed to 
 the circular or band-saw, which takes off the side slabs 
 and squares them for the gang-saw. The squared logs 
 are then carried along over rollers and collected before 
 the gang-saws. From two to four of them are clasped 
 firmly together and then forced up against the teeth of 
 the parallel group of saws, issuing from them as a batch 
 of lumber. The boards are then passed on to a set of 
 men at small circular saws, by whom they are sorted and 
 the edges trimmed, while still others with trucks carry 
 them to the yard for stacking. 
 
 Take note of the operation of the mind as it passes 
 from one .part of the machinery to another. Each part 
 is first examined by itself to get its construction and 
 method. Then its relation to what precedes and what 
 follows is noted.. Finally, in review you survey the whole 
 process in its successive stages and understand each part 
 and its relation to the whole and to the purpose of the 
 mill. We might call this an analysis and synthesis of 
 the process of making lumber, or in other words absorp- 
 tion and reflection. In the observation of such a com-
 
 i:(r, GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 plex piece of machinery as a large mill the mind swings 
 back and forth many times between absorption in the 
 study of parts and reflection upon their relation to each 
 other. 
 
 Having examined the mill in detail and grasped its 
 parts as a connected whole, the next step is to observe 
 its relation to the river, to the rafts and rafting- boats, 
 and further back to the pineries and logging-camps up 
 the river. (Northern Minnesota and Wisconsin.) The 
 occupations and sights along the Upper Mississippi and 
 its head-waters, the pineries, and even the spring floods, 
 are intimately connected, causally, with the saw-mills and 
 lumber yards lower down. Or going in the opposite di- 
 rection from the saw-mill, we follow the lumber till it is 
 used in the various forms of construction. Some of it 
 enters the planing-mills and is converted into moldings, 
 finishing lumber, sashes, blinds, etc. In all forms it is 
 loaded upon the cars, and shipped westward to be used 
 in the construction of houses and bridges. 
 
 Before we get through with the line of thought en- 
 gendered by observing the saw-mill, we have canvassed 
 the whole lumber industry from the pineries to the plans 
 of architects and builders in the actual work of construc- 
 tion. Not only has there been this progress of the mind 
 from one object or machine to another of a series con- 
 nected by cause and effect, but there has been also a con- 
 stant tendency to pass from the individual machines of 
 which the series is composed to the classes of which these 
 objects are typical. A circular-saw or a gang-saw is 
 each typical of a class of saws. The same is true of 
 each part of the machinery, as well as of the saw-mill or 
 planing-mill considered as a whole. Each of these ob- 
 jects, whether simple or complex, suggests others similar
 
 INDUCTION. 137 
 
 which we have observed or seen represented in pictures. 
 Each part of the machinery in turn becomes the center 
 of a set of comparisons leading from the concrete object 
 in question to the general notion of the class to which it 
 belongs. For example, the steam engine in a mill is 
 typical of all stationary engines used for driving machin- 
 ery. But the parts of the engine are also typical of sim- 
 ilar parts in other engines and machines, as the drive- 
 wheel, cylinder, boiler, etc. 
 
 In all these cases we become absorbed in one thing for 
 a while, only to recover ourselves and to reflect upon the 
 thing in its wider relations, either tracing out connections 
 of cause and effect, as in a series of machines, or passing 
 from the single example to the class of which it is typical. 
 Absorption and reflection ! The mind swings back and 
 forth like a pendulum between these two operations. 
 Herbart, who closely defined this process, called it the 
 mental act of breathing, because of the constancy of its 
 movement. As regularly as the air is drawn into the 
 lungs and again expelled, so regularly does the mind lose 
 itself in its absorption with objects only to recover itself 
 and reflect upon them. 
 
 In the inspection of a large printimj })ress in one of 
 our newspaper publishing-houses we meet with a similar 
 experience. The attention becomes centered upon the 
 press for a close analysis and synthesis of its parts. The 
 cogs, wheels, rollers, inking-plate, the chases for the type, 
 the application of the power, the springs and levers, each 
 part receives a close inspection, and the secret of its con- 
 nection with other parts is sought for. There is a vigor- 
 ous effort not only to understand each part but also the 
 connection of the whole. The shuttle-like movement of 
 the mind back and forth between the parts, absorbed for
 
 138 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 a moment, reflecting for a moment, continues until the 
 complex mechanism is understood. When this process 
 has been satisfactorily completed, we are ready to turn ' 
 our minds again to the other objects and rooms of the 
 printing establishment. The work of the compositors, 
 setting up different kinds of type, the proof-reading, the 
 editorial work, the reporters, all come in for a share of 
 attention. The reporters lead us to the great world out- 
 side whose happenings are brought here for publication. 
 On the other hand, following the distribution of papers 
 as they issue from the press, we think of news-boys, 
 news-stands, mail-service, railroads, and postoffices. But 
 the inspection of a printing press also leads the thoughts 
 in other directions and suggests other presses, great and 
 small, in other times and places, other printing establish- 
 ments, until the whole business of printing and publish- 
 ing books and papers springs into the thought. 
 
 If we desire to understand clearly the business of pub- 
 lishing a newspaper, we must enter into an observation 
 of the parts of the process from the collection of its news 
 to its distribution by the mails and carriers. Besides 
 noting these parts we must observe their causal connec- 
 tion with each other and the role that each plays in the 
 economy of the whole. The causal series thus clearly 
 outlined produces insight into an occupation, while every 
 typical machine or appliance is one of a cross series in- 
 tercepting the original series. The acquisition and assim- 
 ilation of knowledge in different subjects will be found 
 to exhibit the mental states of absorption and reflection as 
 just illustrated. Observe the manner in which we study 
 a poem. It is first read and interpreted sentence by sen- 
 tence, glancing from verse to verse to get the connec- 
 tions. When the whole piece has been read and under-
 
 INDUCTION. 13!» 
 
 stood in its parts and connections, the suggested lines of 
 thought are taken up and followed out in their wider ap- 
 plications. Take for example the "Burial of Moses," 
 and in the proper analysis and study of the poem, such 
 a process of absorption and reflection is observable. In 
 tracing the biography of John Quincy Adams or of Alex- 
 ander Hamilton, the facts of personal experience and 
 action first absorb the attention from step to step in the 
 study of his life. But reflection on the bearings of these 
 personal events, upon contemporaries, and upon public 
 aff"airs is noticed all along. The same mental process is 
 observed in studying a battle in history, a sentence in 
 grammar, a squirrel in natural history, or a picture in art. 
 
 The effect of such mental absorption and reflection is 
 to build up concepts. Series of causally related parts 
 are also formed, but each series in the end becomes a more 
 complete complex concept; that is, a representative of 
 many similar series. The inspection of one printing es- 
 tablishment suggests others which are brought into com- 
 parison till the general notion, publishing-house, is more 
 clearly conceived. The same is true in the lumber trade. 
 The concept lumber-business is not confined to Minneap- 
 olis or Chicago, but is common to the great lake region, 
 Maine, Washington, Norway, and other countries. Con- 
 cepts become more varied and complex with the advance 
 of studies, and there is scarcely anything we learn by ob- 
 servation or reflection that docs not ultimately illustrate 
 and build up our concepts. The observation of even the 
 miscellaneous objects in a large city leads to a variety of 
 concepts, and in the end, by comparison, to the general 
 notion, city. 
 
 How strong the concept-creating tendency of all ex- 
 perience and thought is, can be seen in the words of Ian-
 
 HO GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 guage. The processes of thought become petrified in 
 language. All progress in knowledge and acquisition of 
 new ideas is reflected in language by an increase of 
 words. But an examination of words in common use 
 will show that they are nearly all the names of concepts. 
 Proper names are the principal exception. Every com- 
 mon noun, verb, adjective, adverb, and preposition is 
 the name of a concept; for example, horse, beauty, to 
 steal, running, over, early, yellow, grape, ocean, etc. 
 To understand these concepts there must be somewhere 
 a progress from the individual to the abstract, an induc- 
 tion from particulars to a general concept. 
 
 Abstract or general notions cannot be acquired at 
 first hand without specific illustrations. Even where the 
 deductive process is supposedly employed, a closer ex- 
 amination will uncover the concrete or individual illustra- 
 tions in the background, and until these are reached the 
 concept has no clear meaning. The concrete examples, 
 whether introduced sooner or later b}' way of explana- 
 tion, are the real basis of the understanding of the con- 
 cept. It is customary to invert the inductive process 
 and to drive it stern forwards through grammar, geogra- 
 phy, and other studies. Take, for example, the word 
 boomerang as it comes up in a geography or reading lesson. 
 Webster's dictionary, which is recommended to children 
 as a first resort in such difficulties, calls it "A remark- 
 able missile weapon used by the natives of Australia." 
 This gives a faint notion by using the familiar word 
 loeapon. The picture accompanying the word in the dic- 
 tionary gives a more accurate idea because nearer the 
 concrete. The best possible explanation would be a real 
 boomerang thrown by a native South-Sea Islander. In 
 the absence of these, a picture and a vivid description are
 
 INDUCTION. 141 
 
 the best means at our disposal. The common mistake is 
 in learning and reciting the definition while neglecting 
 the concrete basis. By way of further illustration, try to 
 explain to children, who have never heard of them before, 
 the egg-plant, palm-tree, cactus, etc. 
 
 It would be of interest to inquire into the process of 
 concept-building in each of the school sttidies, where it 
 appears under quite varying forms. The natural sciences 
 are perhaps the best examples of concept-building from 
 concrete materials, advancing regularly through a series 
 of concepts from the individuals and species to the most 
 general classes of plants, animals, etc. In chemistry 
 and physics the laws and general principles are based on 
 substances, experiments, and processes observable by the 
 senses. Grammar and language, when studied as a sci- 
 ence, advance from concept to concept through etymology 
 and syntax. In geography and history the concepts are 
 less definite and more difficult to formulate, and yet there 
 are many typical ideas which are to be developed and 
 illustrated in each of these studies; in history, for ex- 
 ample, colony, legislature, governor, general, revolution 
 institutions and customs, political party, laws of develop- 
 ment, causal relations, inventions, etc. ; in geography, 
 continents, oceans, forms of relief, kinds of climate and 
 causes, occupations, products, commerce, etc. The 
 fundamental truths and relations and rules of arithmetic 
 must be developed from objects and illustrations. Read- 
 ing, spelling, and writing are arts, not sciences, and are 
 more concerned with skill in execution than with the ac- 
 quisition of a body of scientific truths. And yet certain 
 general truths are emphasized and applied in these 
 studies. 
 
 Much needless confusion has been caused by raising
 
 142 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 the question where to begin in learning. Do we proceed 
 from the whole to the parts, or from the parts to the 
 whole? In making the acquaintance of sense-objects 
 it seems clear that we first perceive wholes (somewhat 
 vaguely and indefinitely). The second impulse is to 
 analyze this whole into its parts, then recombine them 
 (synthesis) into a whole which is more definitely and fully 
 grasped. A house, for example, is generally first perceived 
 as a whole; aud later it is examined more particularly as 
 to its materials, rooms, stairways, conveniences, furnish- 
 ings, etc. The same is true with a mountain, a butterfly, 
 a man. Thus far we have proceeded from the whole to 
 the parts and then back again; analysis and synthesis. 
 The next movement is from this whole or object to- 
 ward a group of similar objects, a class notion. ABy com- 
 paring one thing with others similar, a class notion is 
 formed which includes them all. Each individual is a 
 whole, but is also a type of the entire group. The gen- 
 eral mental movement is successively in two directions 
 from any particular object; first, from the whole to the 
 parts, then grasping this whole in a richer, fuller sense, the 
 mind seeks for relations which bind this object with 1 
 others similar into a group, a more complex product, a ! 
 concept. There may appear to be an exception to this 
 rule in the case of a city, a continent, a railroad, or any^ 
 concrete object so large and complex that it cannot be 
 grasped by a single effort of sense perception. But 
 even here it is usual with us first to represent the whole 
 object to our thought by means of a sketch, map, or fig- 
 ure of speech, so as first to get a quick survey of the 
 whole thing. In history, also, we first grasp at wholes, 
 then enter into a detailed account of an event, a campaign, 
 u voyage, a revolution, etc. There are many complex
 
 INDUCTION. 143 
 
 wholes in geography and history with which it is not 
 wise to begin, because it requires a long and painful effort 
 to get at the notion of the whole. The wholes we have 
 in mind are those which can be almost instantly grasped. 
 Not, for example, an outline of American history or of 
 the world's history. The choice of suitable wholes with 
 which to begin is based upon the child's interest and ap- 
 perceptive powers. 
 
 Having thus examined into the general nature of the 
 inductive process and the extent of its application to 
 school studies and to other forms of acquiring knowledge, 
 we are led to a closer practical discussion of each of the 
 two chief stages of induction: ¥\r si, observation or intui- 
 tion; that is, the direct perception through the senses or 
 through consciousness, of the realities of the external 
 world and of the mind. Second, association of ideas with 
 a view to generalizing and for7ninff concepts. 
 
 Intuition* implies object lessons in a wide sense. By 
 object lessons is usually meant things in nature perceived 
 through the senses. But it is necessary to extend the 
 idea of object lessons beyond the objects and phenomena 
 of the physical world, to which it has been usually lim- 
 ited. It includes perception of our own mental states. 
 These direct experiences of our own inner states are 
 the primary basis of our understanding of other peo- 
 ple's feelings, mental states, and actions. In short, an 
 understanding of the phenomena of individual life, (the 
 
 ^Intuition is popularly used in a sense different from the 
 above. We are in need of a word which has the same meaning 
 as the German word, Anachduiauj, for wiiich there is no popular 
 equivalent In English. Intuition, as defined by Webster, is nearly 
 the same: "direct apprehension, or cognition; Immediate knowl- 
 edge, as in perception or consciousness." 
 
 For a discussion of this term, see Quick's Educational Re- 
 formers, p. 361. Appleton's edition.
 
 144 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 acts of persons) of society, and of history, is based upon 
 a knowledge of our own feelings and mental acts, and 
 upon the accuracy with which we have observed and in- 
 terpreted similar things in other persons. We have al- 
 ready seen that a right appreciation of companions, bi- 
 ographies, social life, and history, is the strongest of 
 psychological forces in its formative influence upon char- 
 acter. For this reason, also, history includes the first 
 and most important body of school studies. But object 
 lessons drawn from physical nature do not measurably 
 qualify us for a better appreciation of individual and so- 
 cial life and action. The fundamental illustrative ma- 
 terials for history are drawn from another source, from 
 the depth of the heart and inner experience of each per- 
 son. Many words in our own school books can be illus- 
 trated and explained by objects and activities in physical 
 nature, but a large part of the words in common use in 
 our readers and school books can be explained by no ex- 
 ternal objects. They depend for their interpretation upon 
 the child's own feelings, desires, joys, griefs, etc., and 
 upon similar phenomena observed in others. 
 
 Object lessons in this liberal sense point to the direct 
 exercise of the senses and intuitions in the acquisition of 
 experience of all sorts. They include the objects, per- 
 sons, and events that we see around us and our own ex- 
 periences in ordinary life — the grass, plants, trees, and 
 soils; the animals, wild and tame, with their structure, 
 habits, and uses; the rocks, woods, hills, streams, seasons, 
 clouds, heat, and cold. There is also the observation of 
 devices and inventions; tools, machinery and their work- 
 ings, the different raw and manufactured products, with 
 their ways of growth and transformation. Besides these 
 are the various kinds and dispositions of men, different
 
 INDUCTION. 145 
 
 classes and races of people, with great variety of charac- 
 ter, occupation, and education. Their actions, modes of 
 dress, and customs are included. But we have many 
 other primary and indispensable lessons to learn from the 
 playground, the street, from home and church, from city 
 and country, from travel and sight seeing, from holidays 
 and work days, from sickness, and healthful excursions. 
 Even a child's own tempers, faults, and successes are of 
 the greatest value to himself and to the teacher in a 
 proper self-understanding and mastery. By object les- 
 sons, therefore, we mean all that a child becomes conscious 
 of through the direct action of his senses and of his mind 
 upon external nature or inner experience. It is desired 
 that a child's knowledge in all direct experience be sim- 
 ple, clear, and according to the facts. All words that he 
 uses become only signs of the realities of his experience. 
 Every word stands for a potent thought in his own life 
 history. Of course object lessons in this rich and real 
 sense can not be confined to such few objects — birds, 
 leaves, models, and straws — as can be brought into a 
 school room. All the world, especially the outside world, 
 becomes 
 
 •'A complex Chinese toy 
 Fasliioned for a barefoot boy." 
 
 Many of the most interesting objects and phenomena 
 in nature and of man's construction can not be observed 
 in the school room at all, for instance, the river, the 
 bridge, the forest, the flight of birds, the sunrise, the 
 storm, the stars, etc. Still they must know these very 
 things and know how to use them better in construct- 
 ing the mind's treasures than they are wont to do. In 
 reading, grammar, geography, arithmetic, and nature 
 study, we desire to ground school discussions daily upon
 
 146 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 the clear facts of experience, of personal observation. 
 We need to clear up all confused and faulty perceptions 
 and to stimulate children to make their future observa- 
 tions more reliable. 
 
 We have already seen the importance of object lessons 
 in this full and real sense to interest. Interest in every 
 study is awakened and constantly reenforced by an appeal, 
 not to books, but to life. Much of the dull work in arith- 
 metic, geography, and other studies is due to the neglect 
 of these real, illustrative materials. 
 
 Of the six great sources of interest, (Herbart's) three, 
 the empirical, the esthetic, and the sympathetic, deal 
 entirely with concrete objects or with individuals, while 
 even the speculative and social interests are often based 
 directly upon particular persons or phenomena. In ad- 
 dition to this it may be said that the interests of children 
 are overwhelmingly with the concrete and imaginative 
 phases of every subject, and only secondarily with general 
 truths and laws. The latter are of greater concern to 
 older children and adults. Object lessons therefore con- 
 tain a life-giving element that should enter into every 
 subject of study. 
 
 Nor should these interesting, illustrative object les- 
 sons be limited to the lower grades. They contain the 
 combustible material upon which an abiding interest in 
 any subject is to be kindled. There are indeed other 
 and perhaps higher sources of interest, but they are 
 largely dependent upon these original springs that flow 
 from the concrete beginnings. 
 
 In the second place, object lessons supply a stock of 
 prim,ary ideas which form the foundation of all later pro- 
 gress in knowledge. This is not a question of interest 
 merely, but of imderstayiding , of capacity to get at the
 
 INDUCTION. 147 
 
 meaning of an idea. Concepts are not the raw materials 
 with which the mind works, but they are elaborated out 
 of the ■ raw products furnished by the senses and other 
 forms of intuition. As cloth is manufactured out of the 
 raw cotton and wool produced on the farm or in southern 
 fields, so concepts are a manufactured article, into whose 
 texture materials previously gathered enter. Concepts 
 do not grow up directly from the soil of the mind any 
 more than ready-made clothing grows on bushes or on the 
 backs of the wearers. Concepts must be made out of 
 stuff that is already in the mind, as woolen blankets are 
 spun and woven out of fleeces. Our present contention 
 is that the mind shall be filled up with the best quality of 
 raw stuff, otherwise there will be defect and deficiency 
 in its later products. The stuff out of which concepts are 
 built is drawn from the varied experiences of life. On 
 account of this intimate relation between the realities of 
 life and school studies they cannot be separated. Every 
 branch, especially in elementary studies, must be treated 
 concretely and be built up out of sense materials. Every 
 study has its concrete side, its illustrative materials, its 
 colors of individual things taken from life. Every study 
 has likewise its more general scientific truths and classi- 
 fications. The prime mistake in nearly all teaching and 
 in the text-book method is in supposing that the great 
 truths are accessible in some other way than through the 
 concrete materials that lie properly at the entrance. The 
 text-books are full of the abstractions and general form- 
 ulae of the sciences; but they can, in the very nature of 
 the case, deal only in a meager way with the individual 
 objects and facts upon whidh knowledge in different sub- 
 jects is based. This necessary defect in a text-book 
 method must be made good by excursions, by personal
 
 148 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 observation, by a constant reference of lessons to daily 
 experience outside of school, by more direct study of our 
 surroundings, by the teacher perfecting himself in this 
 kind of knowledge and in its skillful use. 
 
 There was a current belief at one time that object 
 lessons should form a special study for a particular period 
 of school life, namely, the first years. It was thought 
 that sufficient sense-materials could be collected in two 
 or three years to supply the whole school curriculum. 
 But this thought is now abandoned. Children in the 
 earlier grades may properly spend more time in object 
 study than in later grades, but there is no time in school 
 life when we can afford to cut loose from the real world. 
 There is scarcely a lesson in any subject that can not be 
 clarified and strengthened by calling in the fresh experi- 
 ences of daily life. 
 
 The discussion of the concept and of the inductive pro- 
 cess has shown that coticepts cannot be /ound at firsthand. 
 There must be observation of different objects, compar- 
 ison, and grouping into a class. A person who has never 
 seen an elephant nor a picture of one, can form no ade- 
 quate notion of elephants in general. We can by no shift 
 dispense with the illustrations. The more the memory is 
 filled with vivid pictures of real things, the more easy and 
 rapid will be the progress to general truths. Not only 
 are general notions of classes of objects in nature, or of 
 personal actions built up out of particulars, but the general 
 la.ws and principles of nature and of human society must 
 be observed in real life to be understood. We should 
 have no faith in electricity if it were simply a scientific 
 theory, if it had not demonstrated its power through ma- 
 terial objects. The idea of cohesion would never have 
 been dreamed of, if it had not become necessary to explain
 
 INDUCTION. 149 
 
 certain physical facts. The spherical form of the earth 
 was not accepted by many even learned men until sailors 
 with ships had gone around it. Political ideas of popular 
 government which a few centuries ago were regarded as 
 purely Utopian are now accepted as facts because they 
 have become matters of common observation. The circu- 
 lation of the blood remained a secret for many centuries 
 because of the difficulties of bringing it home to the 
 knowledge of the senses. These examples will show how 
 difficult it is to go beyond the reach of sense experience. 
 Even those philosophers who have tried to construct 
 theories without the safe foundation of facts have labored 
 for naught. The more our thought is checked and guided 
 by nature's realities the less danger of inflation with pre- 
 tended knowledge. Bacon found that in this tendency 
 to theorize loosely upon a slender basis of facts was the 
 fundamental weakness of ancient philosophy. Nature if 
 observed will reiterate her truths till they become con- 
 vincing verities, while the study of words and books alone 
 produces a quasi-knowledge which often mistakes the 
 symbol for the thing. 
 
 Having this thought in mind, Comenius, more than two 
 and a half centuries ago, said, "It is certain that there is 
 nothing in the understanding which has not been previ- 
 ously in the senses, and consequently to exercise the 
 senses carefully in discriminating the differences of nat- 
 ural objects is to lay the foundation of all wisdom, all 
 eloquence, and of all good and prudent action. The 
 right instruction of youth does not consist in cramming 
 them with a mass of words, phrases, sentences, and 
 opinions collected from authors. In this way the youth 
 are taught, like iEsop's crow in the fable, to adorn them- 
 selves with strange feathers. Why should we not, instead
 
 ir>0 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 of dead books, open the living book of nature ? Not the 
 shadows of things, but the things themselves, which make 
 an impression upon the senses and imagination, are to be 
 brought before the youth." 
 
 There has always been a strong tendency in the schools 
 to teach words, definitions, arid rules without a sufficient 
 knowledge of the objects and experiences of life that put 
 meaning into these abstractions. The result is that all 
 the prominent educational reformers have pointedly con- 
 demned the practice of learning words, names, etc., with- 
 out a knowledge of the things signified. The difference 
 is like that between learning the names of a list of per- 
 sons at a reception, and being present to enter into 
 acquaintance and conversation with the guests. The oft- 
 quoted dictum of Kant is a laconic summary of this 
 argument. "General notions (concepts) without sense- 
 percepts are empty." The general definition of com- 
 posite flowers means little or nothing to a child; but after 
 a familiar acquaintance with the sunflower, dandelion, 
 thistle, etc. , such a general statement has a clear mean- 
 ing. Concepts without the content derived from objects 
 are like a frame without a picture, or a cistern without 
 water. The table is spread and the dishes placed, but no 
 refreshments are supplied. 
 
 Havingcompleted the discussion of intuition, including 
 object lessons, that is, the preparatory step to the in- 
 ductive process, we reach the second, reflection and sur- 
 vey. We are seeking for a general term that covers the 
 several steps in the latter part of the inductive process. 
 It includes comparison, classification, and abstraction. It 
 may be discussed from the standpoint of "association of 
 ideas," and contributes directly to concentration. 
 
 We have in mind, chiefly, that thoughtful habit which
 
 INDUCTION. 151 
 
 is not satisfied with simply acquiring a new fact or set of 
 ideas, but is impelled to trace them out along their vari- 
 ous connections. We have to do now not with the acquis- 
 ition but with the elaboration and assimilation of knowl- 
 edge. The acqnisilion of knowledge in the ordinary 
 sense is one thing; its elaboration in a full sense sets up a 
 standard of progress which will put life into all school 
 work and reach far beyond it, and in fact is limited 
 only by the individual capacity for thought. In 
 school, in reading and study, we have been largely 
 engaged in acquiring knowledge on the principle that 
 "knowledge is power. " But no practical man needs to 
 be told that much so-called school knowledge is not power. 
 Facts which have been simply stored in the memory are 
 often of little ready use. It is like wheat in the bin, 
 which must first pass through the mill and change its 
 entire form before it will perform its function. Facts, in 
 order to become the personal property of the owner, must 
 be worked over, sifted, sorted, classified, and connected. 
 The process of elaborating and assimilating knowledge is 
 so important that it requires more time and pains than 
 the first labor of acquisition. Philosophers will admit 
 this at once, but it is hard for us to break loose from the 
 traditions of the schoolmasters. The mind is not in all . 
 respects like a lumberyard. It is, to be sure, a place 
 for storing up knowledge, just as the yard is a deposit 
 for lumber. But there the analogy ceases and the mind 
 begins to resemble more the contractor and builder. 
 There is planing, sawing, and hammering; the materials 
 collected are prepared, fitted, and mortised together, and 
 a building fit for use begins to rise. Knowledge also is 
 for use, and not primarily for storage. That simple 
 acquisition and quantity of knowledge arc not enough is
 
 152 (JENERAL METHOD. 
 
 illustrated by the analogy of an army. Numbers do not 
 make an army, but a rabble. A general first enlists raw 
 recruits, drills and trains them through a long period, 
 and finally combines them into an effective army. Many 
 of our ideas when first received are like disorderly raw 
 recruits. They need to be disciplined into proper action 
 and to ready obedience. 
 
 In connection with assimilation the analogy between 
 the stomach and the mind is of still greater interest. 
 The food received into the stomach is taken up by the 
 organs of digestion, assimilated and converted into blood. 
 The process, however, takes its course without our con- 
 scious effort or co-operation. Knowledge likewise enters 
 the mind, but how far will assimilation go on without 
 conscious efifort? If kept in a healthy state the organs 
 of digestion are self active. Not so the mind. Ideas 
 entering the mind are not so easily assimilated as the 
 food materials that enter the stomach. A cow chews her 
 cud once, but the ideas that enter our minds may be 
 drawn from their receptacle in the memory and worked 
 over again and again. Ideas have to be put side by side, 
 separated, grouped, and arranged into connected series. 
 There is, no doubt, some tendency in the mind toward in- 
 voluntary assimilation, but it greatly needs culture and 
 training. Many people never reach the thinking stage, 
 never learn to survey and reflect. The tendency of the 
 mind to work over and digest knowledge should receive 
 ample culture in the schools. There is a mental inertia 
 produced by pure memory exercise that is unfavorable to 
 reflection. It requires an extra exertion to arrange and 
 organize facts even after they are acquired. But when 
 the habit of reflection has been inaugurated it adds much 
 interest and value to all mental acquisitions.
 
 INDUCTION. 153 
 
 There are also well-established principles which guide 
 the mind in elaborating its facts. The kncs of the asso- 
 ciation of ideas indicate clearly the natural trend of 
 mental elaboration. The association of things because 
 of contiguity in time and place is the simplest mode. 
 The classification of objects or activities on the basis of 
 resemblance, is the second form and that upon which the 
 inductive process is principally founded. In the third 
 case objects and series are easily retained in memory 
 when the relation of cause and effect is perceived be- 
 tween them. These natural highways of association, 
 especially the second and third, should be frequently 
 traveled in linking the facts of school study with each 
 other. Indeed the outcome of a rational survey of an 
 object or faot in its different relations is an association of 
 ideas which is one of the best results of study. Such 
 connections of resemblance and difference or of cause and 
 effect are abundant and interesting in the natural sci- 
 ences and physical geography, also in history and lan- 
 guages. 
 
 The Herbartians draw an important distinction be- 
 tween psychical and logical concepts or general notions. 
 The ^.syc//tc'«^ concept is worked but naturally by a child 
 or an adult as a result of the chance experiences of life. 
 It is usually a work of accident; is incomplete, faulty, 
 and often misleading. The logical concept, on the other 
 hand, is scientifically correct and complete. It includes 
 all the common characteristics of the group and excludes 
 all that are not essential. It is a product of accurate 
 and mature thinking. We all possess an abundance of 
 psychical concepts drawn from the miscellaneous experi- 
 ences of life. It is a large share of the school work, as 
 we have seen, to develop logical concepts out of these im-
 
 154 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 mature and faulty psychical concepts. A child is dis- 
 posed to call tadpoles Rshes; and later porpoises and 
 whales are faultily classed wiih the fishes in the same 
 way. Nearly all our psychical concepts are subject to 
 such loose and faulty judgments. Even where one is ac- 
 curate in his observations, the conclusions naturally 
 drawn are often wrong. For example, a child that has 
 seen none but red squirrels would naturally think all 
 squirrels red, and include the quality red in his general 
 notion. Most of our empirically deriv'ed general notions 
 are spotted with such defects. What relation have these 
 facts to induction? We claim that general notions should 
 be experimentally formed; that is, by a gradual collec- 
 tion of concrete or illustrative materials, and that the 
 logical concepts are the final outcome of cofnparison and 
 reasoning toward conclusions. In other words, we must 
 begin with, psychical concepts with all their faults; we 
 must make mistakes and correct them as our experience 
 enlarges, and gradually work out of psychical into log- 
 ical methods and results. Our text-books usually give 
 us the logical concept first, the rule, definition, principle, 
 in its most complete and accurate statement. This does 
 violence to the child's natural mental movement. 
 
 \ The final stage of induction is the /onnulation of the 
 general truths, the concepts, principles, and laws which 
 constitute the science of any branch of knowledge. These 
 truths should be well formulated in clear and expressive 
 language and mastered in this form. Moreover, the re- 
 sults reached, when reduced to the strict scientific form, 
 are the same in the inductive methods as in the deductive 
 or common text-book method. Not that the effect on 
 the mind of the learner is the same but the body of truth 
 is unaltered. The general truths of every subject can be
 
 INDUCTION. 155 
 
 easily found well arranged in text-books. But we are 
 more anxious to know how the youth may best approach 
 and appreciate these truths than simply to see them 
 stored in the mind in a well-classified form. 
 
 A rich man in leaving a fortune to his son would more 
 than double the value of the inheritance if he could teach 
 him properly to appreciate wealth and form in him the 
 disposition and ability to use it wisely. In the same way 
 the best part of knowledge is not simply its possession, 
 but an appreciation of its value. The method of reach- 
 ing scientific knowledge through the inductive process, 
 that is by the collection and comparison of data with a 
 view to positive insight, will give greater meaning to the 
 results. Interest is awakened and self-activity exercised 
 at every step in the progress toward general truths. By 
 the reflective habit these truths will be seen in their 
 origin and causal connection, and the -line of similarity, 
 contrast, causal relation, analogy and coincidence will 
 be thoughtfully traced. 
 
 Possibly the progress toward formulated knowledge 
 will be less rapid by induction, but it will be real pro- 
 gress with no backward steps. It may well be doubted 
 whether, with average minds, real scientific knowledge is 
 attainable except by a strong admixture of inductive pro- 
 cesses. Perfection in the form and structure of our con- 
 cepts is not to be attained by children nor by adults, 
 but the ideal of scientific accuracy in general notions is 
 to be kept constantly in view and approximated to the 
 extent of our ability. 
 
 After all, deduction performs a much more important 
 part in the work of building up concepts than the previ- 
 ous discussion would indicate. As fast as psychical con- 
 cepts are formed we clamber upon them and try to get a
 
 \M ^ GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 better view of the field around us. Like captured guns, 
 we turn them at once upon the enemy and make them 
 perform service in new fields of conquest. If a new case 
 or object appears we judgeof it inthelight of our acquired 
 concepts, no matter whether they are complete and ac- 
 curate or not. This is deduction. We are glad to gain 
 any vantage ground in judging the objects and phenom- 
 ena constantly presenting themselves. In fact, it is in- 
 evitable that inductive and deductive processes will be 
 constantly dovetailed into each other. The faulty con- 
 cepts arrived at are brought persistently into contact 
 with new individual cases. They are thus corrected, en- 
 larged, and more accurately grasped. This is the series 
 of mental stepping-stones that leads up gradually to log- 
 ical concepts. The inductive process is the fundamental 
 one and deduction comes in at every step to brace it up. 
 This is only another illustration that mental processes are 
 intimately interwoven, and, except in thought, not to be 
 separated. In the discussion of apperception in the fol- 
 lowing chapter we shall see that, in the process of gain- 
 ing knowledge, our acquired ideas and concepts play a 
 most important role. They are really the chief assim- 
 ilating agencies. But in spite of all this we shall 
 scarcely be led again to the standpoint that logical or 
 scientific concepts should be the starting point in the 
 study of any subject.
 
 APPERCEPTION. 157 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 APPERCEPTION. 
 
 We have now to deal with a principle of pedagogy 
 upon which all the leading ideas thus far discussed largely 
 depend for their realization. Interest, concentration, 
 and induction set up requirements relative to the matter, 
 spirit, and method of school studies. Apperception is a 
 practical principle, obedience to which will contribute 
 daily and hourly to making real in school exercises the 
 ideas of interest, concentration and induction. 
 
 We observe in passing that the important principles 
 already discussed stand in close mutual relation and de- 
 pendence. Interest aids concentration by bringing all 
 kinds of knowledge into close touch with the feelings. In- 
 terest puts incentives into every kind of information so 
 as to arouse the will, which, in turn, unifies and controls 
 the mental actions. But concentration has a reflex in- 
 fluence upon interest, because unity and conscious mas- 
 tery give added pleasure to knowledge. The culture 
 epochs are expected to contribute powerfully to both con. 
 centration and interest; to the former bj' supplying a 
 series of rallying-points for educative effort, to the lat- 
 ter by furnishing matter suited to interest children. In- 
 duction is a natural method of acquiring and unifying 
 knowledge in an interesting way. Apperception, in turn, 
 is a principle '^f mental action which puts life and inter- 
 est into inductive and concentrating processes. Every 
 hour of school labor illustrates the value of apperception
 
 158 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 and teachers should find in it a constant antidote to faulty 
 methods. 
 
 Apperception may be roughly defined at first as the 
 process of acquiring neto ideas hy the aid of old ideas al- 
 ready in the mind. It makes the acquisition of new 
 knowledge easier and quicker. Not that there is any - 
 easy road to learning, but there is a natural process which 
 greatly accelerates the progress of acquisition, just as it is 
 better to follow a highway over a rough country than to 
 betake one's self to the stumps and brush. For example, 
 if one is familiar with peaches, apricots will be quickly 
 understood as a kindred kind of fruit, even though a little 
 strange. A person who is familiar with electrical ma- 
 chinery will easily interpret the meaning and purpose of 
 every part of a new electrical plant. One may perceive 
 a new object without understanding it, but to apperceive 
 it is to interpret its meaning by the aid of similar fa- 
 miliar notions. 
 
 If one examines a typewriter for the first time, it will 
 take some pains and effort to understand its construction 
 and use; but after examining a Remington, another kind 
 will be more easily understood, because the principle of 
 the first interprets that of the second. Suppose the 
 Steppes of Russia are mentioned for the first time to a 
 class. The word has little or no meaning or perhaps 
 suggests erroneously a succession of stairs. But we re- 
 mark that the steppes are like the prairies and plains to 
 the west of the Mississippi river, covered with grass and 
 fed on by herds. By awakening a familiar notion already 
 in the mind and bringing it distinctly to the front, the 
 new thing is easily understood. Again, a boy goes to 
 town and sees a banana for the first time, and asks, 
 "What is that? I never saw anything like that." He
 
 APPERCEPTION. 159 
 
 thinks he has no class of things to which it belongs, no 
 place to put it. His father answers that it is to eat like 
 an orange or a pear, and its significance is at once plain 
 by the reference to something familiar. 
 
 Again, two men, the one a machinist and the other an 
 observer unskilled in machines, visit the machinery hall 
 of an exposition. The machinist observes a new inven- 
 tion and finds in it a new application of an old principle. 
 As he passes along from one machine to another he is 
 much interested in noting new devices and novel appli- 
 ances and at the end of an hour he leaves the hall with a 
 mind enriched. The other observer sees the same ma- 
 chines and their parts, but does not detect the principle 
 of their construction. His previous knowledge of ma- 
 chines is not sufficient to give him the clue to their expla- 
 nation. After an hour of uninterested observation he 
 leaves the hall with a confused notion of shafts, wheels, 
 cogs, bands, etc., but with no greater insight into the 
 principles of machinery. Why has one man learned so 
 much and the other nothing? Because the machinist's 
 previous experience served as an interpreter and ex- 
 plained these new contrivances, while the other had no 
 suflftcient previous knowledge and so acquired nothing 
 new. "To him that hath shall be given." 
 
 In the act of apperception the old ideas dwelling in 
 the mind are not to be regarded as deatl treasures stored 
 away and only occasionally drawn out and used by a pur- 
 posed effort of the memory, but they are living Jorce* 
 which have the active power of seizing and appropriating 
 new ideas. Lazarus says they stand ''like well-armed 
 men in the inner stronghold of the mind ready to sally 
 forth and overcome or make serviceable whatever shows 
 itself at the portals of sense." It is then through the
 
 100 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 active aid of familiar ideas that new things find an intro- 
 duction to soul life. If old friends go out to meet the 
 strangers and welcome them, there will be ao easy en- 
 trance and a quick adoption into the new home. 
 
 But frequently these old friends who stand in the 
 background of our thoughts must be awakened and called 
 to the front. They must stand as it were on tiptoe 
 ready to welcome the stranger. For if they lie asleep in 
 the penetralia of the home the new comers may approach 
 and pass by for lack of a welcome. It is often necessary, 
 therefore, for the teacher to revive old impressions, to 
 call up previously acquired knowledge and to put it in 
 readiness to receive and welcome the new. The success 
 with which this is done is often the difference between 
 good and poor teaching. 
 
 We might suppose that when two persons look at the 
 same object they would get the same impression, but this 
 is not true at all. Where one person faints with fright or 
 emotion another sees nothing to be disturbed at. Two 
 travelers come in sight of an old homestead. To one it 
 is an object of absorbing interest as the home of his child- 
 hood; to the other it is much like any other old farm 
 house. What is the cause of this difference? Not the 
 house. It is the same in both cases. It is remarkable 
 how much color is given to every idea that enters into 
 the mind by the ideas already there. Some visitors at 
 the World's Fair can tell almost at a glance to what 
 states many of the buildings belong; other visitors must 
 study this out on the maps and notices. One who is fa- 
 miliar with the history, architecture, and products of the 
 different states is able to classify many of the buildings 
 with ease. His previous knowledge of these states in- 
 terprets their buildings. Mt. Vernon naturally belongs
 
 APPERCEPTION. 161 
 
 to Virginia, Independence Hall to Pennsylvania, John 
 Hancock's house to Massachusetts. In a still more strik- 
 ing manner, a knowledge of foreign countries enables the 
 observer to classify such buildings as the French, the 
 German, the Swedish, the Japanese, etc. Again, in view- 
 ing any exhibit our enjoyment and appreciation depend 
 almost entirely upon our previous knowledge, not upon 
 our eye-sight or our physical endurance. Many objects 
 of the greatest value we pass by with an indifferent 
 glance because our previous knowledge is not sufficient to 
 give us tlieir meaning. 
 
 If a dry goods merchant, a horse jockey, and an arch- 
 itect pass down a city street together, what will each ob- 
 serve? The merchant notices all the dry goods stores, their 
 displays, and their favorable or unfavorable location. The 
 jockey sees every horse and equipage; he forms a quiet 
 but quick judgment upon every passing animal. The 
 architect sees the buildings and style of construction. If 
 in the evening each is called upon to give his observations 
 for the day, the jockey talks of horses and describes some 
 of the best specimens in detail; the merchant speaks of 
 store-fronts and merchandise; the architect is full of ele- 
 vations of striking or curious buildings. The architect 
 and merchant remember nothing, perhaps, about the 
 horses; the jockey nothing of stores or buildings. Three 
 people may occupy the same pew in a church; the one 
 can tell you all about the music, the second the good 
 points in the sermon, and the third the style and becom- 
 ingness of the bonnets and dresses. Each one sees what 
 he has in his own mind. A teacher describes Yosemite 
 Valley to a geography class. Some of the children con- 
 struct a mental picture of a gorge with steep mountain 
 sides, but no two pictures are alike; some have mental pic-
 
 ir,:> GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 tures that resemble nothing in heaven above or earth be- 
 low; some have constructed nothing at all! only 
 
 the echo of a few spoken words. If the teacher, at the 
 close of her description, could have the mental state of 
 each child photographed on the blackboard of her school- 
 room she would be in mental distress. In presenting 
 such topics to children, much depends upon the previous 
 content of their minds, upon the colors out of which they 
 paint the pictures. 
 
 We are now prepared for a more accurate definition 
 of apperception. "The transformation of a newer (weaker) 
 concept by means of an older one surpassing the former 
 in power and inner organization bears the name of apper- 
 ception, in contrast to the unaltered reception of the 
 same perception." (Lindner's Psychol, p. 124, trans, by 
 De Garmo. ) Lindner remarks further, "Apperception is 
 the reaction of the old against the new — in it is revealed 
 the preponderance which the older, firmer, and more 
 self-contained concept groups have in contrast to the 
 concepts which have just entered consciousness." Again, 
 " It is a kind of jyrocess of condensation of thought and 
 brings into the mental life a certain stability and firm- 
 ness, in that it subordinates new to older impressions, 
 puts everything in its right place and in its right rela- 
 tion to the whole, and in this way works at that organic 
 formation of our consciousness which we call cidture.^' 
 (Lindner p 126.) "Apperception may be defined as that 
 interaction between two similar ideas or thought- 
 complexes in the course of which the weaker, unorgan- 
 ized, isolated idea or thought-complex is incorporated into 
 the richer, better digested, and more firmly compacted 
 one." (Lange, Apperception, p. 13.) 
 
 Oftentimes, therefore, older ideas or thought masses,
 
 APPERCEPTION. 163 
 
 being clear, strong, and well-digested receive a new 
 impression to modify and appropriate it. This is 
 especially true where opinions have been carefully formed 
 after thought and deliberation. A well-trained political 
 economist, for example, when approaching a new theory 
 or presentation of it by a George or Bellamy, meets it 
 with all the resources of a well-stored, thoughtful mind; 
 and admits it, if at all, in a modified form to his system 
 of thought. Sometimes, however, a new theory, which 
 strikes the mind with grtat clearness and vigor, is able 
 to make a powerful assault upon previous opinions, and 
 perhaps modify or overturn them. This is the more apt 
 to be the case if one's previous ideas have been weak and 
 undecided. In the interaction between the old and new 
 the latter then become the apperceiving forces. Upon 
 the untrained or poorly-equipped mind a strong argu- 
 ment has a more decisive effect than it may justly 
 deserve. As we noticed above, new ideas, especially 
 those coming directly through the senses, are often more 
 vivid and attractive than similar old ones. For this 
 reason they usually occupy greater attention and prom- 
 inence at first than later, when the old ideas have besrun 
 to revive and reassert themselves. Old ideas usually 
 have the advantage over the new in being better organ- 
 ized, more closely connected in series and groups; and 
 having been often repeated, they acquire a certain per- 
 manent ascendency in the thoughts. In this interaction 
 between similar notions, old and new, the differences at 
 first arrest attention, then gradually sink into the back- 
 ground, while the stronger points of resemblance begin 
 to monopolize the thought and bind the notions into a 
 unity. 
 
 The use of familiar notions in acquiring an insight
 
 104 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 into new things is a natural tendency or drift of the mind. 
 As soon as we see something new and desire to under- 
 stand it, at once we involuntarily begin to ransack our 
 old stock of ideas to discover anything in our previous 
 experience which corresponds to this or is like it. For 
 whatever is like it or has an analogy to it, or serves the 
 same uses, will explain this new thing, though the two 
 objects be in other points essentially different. We are, 
 in short, constantly falling back upon our old experi- 
 ences and classifications for the explanation of new 
 objects that appear to us. 
 
 So far is this true that the most ordinary things can 
 only be explained in the light of experience. When John 
 Smith wrote a note to his companions at Jamestown, and 
 thus communicated his desires to them, it was unintelli- 
 gible to the Indians. They had no knowledge of writing 
 and looked on the marks as magical. "When Colu7nbus' 
 ships first appeared on the cost of the new world, the 
 natives looked upon them as great birds. They had 
 never seen large sailing vessels. To vary the illustra- 
 tion, the art of reading, so easy to a student, is the ac- 
 cumulated result of a long collection of knowledge and 
 experience. There is an unconscious employment of ap- 
 perception in the practical affairs of life that is of interest. 
 We often see a person at a distance and by some slight 
 characteristic of motion, form, or dress, recognize him at 
 once. From this slight trace we picture to ourselves the 
 person in full and say we saw him in the street. Sitting 
 in my room at evening I hear the regular passenger train 
 come in. The noise alone suggests the engine, cars, con. 
 ductor, passengers, and all the train complete. As a 
 matter of fact I saw nothing at all but have before my 
 mind the whole picture. On Sunday morning I see some
 
 APPERCEPTION. 165 
 
 one enter a familiar church door, and going on my way 
 the whole picture of church, congregation, pastor, music 
 and sermon come distinctly to my mind. Only a passing 
 glance at one person entering suggests the whole scene. 
 In looking at a varied landscape we see many things 
 which the sensuous eye alone would not detect, distances, 
 perspective and relative size, position and nature of ob- 
 jects. This apperceptive power is of vast importance in 
 practical life as it leads to quick judgment and action, 
 when personal examinations into details would be impos- 
 sible. 
 
 In apperception we never pass from the known to 
 things which are entirely new. Absolutely new knowl- 
 edge is gained by perception or intuition. When an older 
 person meets with something totally new, he either does 
 not notice it or it staggers him. Apperception does not 
 take place. In many cases we are disturbed or frightened, 
 as children, by some new or sudden noise or object. But 
 most so-called new things bear sufficient resemblance to 
 things seen before to admit of explanation. Strange as 
 the sights of a Chinese city might appear, we should still 
 know that we were in a city. In most "new" objects of 
 observation or study, the familiar parts greatly prepon- 
 derate over the unfamiliar. In a new reading lesson, for 
 example, most of the words and ideas are well known, only 
 an occasional word requires explanation and that by using 
 familiar illustrations. The flood of our familiar and oft- 
 repeated ideas sweeps on like a great river, receiving here 
 and there from either side a tributary stream, that is 
 swallowed up in its waters without perceptible increase_ 
 
 So strong is the apperceiving force of familiar notions 
 that they drag far-distant scenes in geography and his- 
 tory into the home neighborhood and locate them there.
 
 IGC, tJENERAL METHOD. 
 
 The imagination works in conjunction with the apper- 
 ceiving faculty and constructs real pictures. Children 
 are otherwise inclined to substitute one thing for another 
 by imagination. With boys and girls, geographical ob- 
 jects about home are often converted by fancy into rep- 
 resentatives of distant places. It is related of Byron 
 that while reading in childhood the story of the Trojan 
 war, he localized all the places in the region of his home. 
 An old hill and castle looking toward the plain and the 
 sea were his Troy. The stream flowing through the plain 
 was the Simois. The places of famous conflicts between 
 the Trojans and Greeks were located. So vivid were the 
 pictures which these home scenes gave to the child, that 
 years later in visiting Asia Minor and the sight of the 
 real Troy, he was not so deeply impressed as in his boy- 
 hood. A German professor relates that he and his com- 
 panions, while reading the Indian stories of Cooper, lo- 
 cated the important scenes in the hills and valleys about 
 Eisenach in the Thuringian mountains. Many other 
 illustrations of the same imaginative tendency to substi- 
 tute home objects for foreign ones are given. But 
 whether or not this experience is true of us all, it is cer- 
 tain that we can form no idea of foreign places and events 
 except as we construct the pictures out of the fragments 
 of things that we have known. What we have seen of 
 rivers, lands, and cities must form the materials for pic- 
 turing to ourselves distant places. 
 
 Since the old ideas have so much to do with the proper 
 reception of the new, let us examine more closely the 
 interaction of the two. If a neto idea drops into the 
 mind, like a stone upon the surface of the water, it pro- 
 duces a commotion. It acts as a stimulus or wakener to 
 the old ideas sleeping beneath the surface. It draws
 
 APPERCEPTION. 1(17 
 
 them up above the surface-level; that is, into conscious- 
 ness. But what ideas are thus disturbed? There are 
 thousands of these latent ideas, embryonic thoughts, be- 
 neath the surface. Those which possess sufficient kinship 
 to this new-comer to hoar his call, respond. For in the 
 mind "birds of a feather flock together." Ideas and 
 thoughts which resemble the new one answer, the others 
 sleep on undisturbed, except a few who are so intimately 
 associated with these kinsmen as to be disturbed when 
 they are disturbed. Or, to state it differently, certain 
 thought-groups or complexes, which contain elements 
 kindred to the new notion, are agitated and raised into 
 conscious thought. They seem to respond to their 
 names. The new idea may continue for some time to 
 stimulate and agitate. There appears to be a sort of tele- 
 ;^raphic inquiry through the regions of the mind to find 
 out where the kindred dwell. The distant relatives and 
 strangers (the unrelated or unserviceable ideas) soon dis- 
 cover that they have responded to the wrong call and 
 drop back to sleep again. But the real kindred wake up 
 more and more. They come forward to inspect the new- 
 tomor and to examine his credentials. Soon he finds that 
 he is surrounded by inquisitive friends and relatives. 
 They threaten even to take possession of him. Up to 
 this point the new idea has taken the lead, he has been 
 the aggressor. Bat now is the time for the awakened 
 kindred ideas to assume control and load the stranger 
 captive, to bring hiin in among themselves and give him 
 his appropriate place and importance. The old body of 
 ideas, when once set in motion, is more powerful than 
 any single-handed stranger who happens to fall into their 
 company. The outcome is that the stranger, who at first 
 seemed to be producing such a sensation, now discovers
 
 168 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 that strong arms are about him and he is carried captive 
 by vigorous friends. New ideas when first entering the 
 mind are very strong, and, if they come through the 
 senses, are especially rich in the color and vigor of real 
 life. They therefore absorb the attention at first and 
 seem to monopolize the mental energies; but the older 
 thought masses, when fully aroused, are better organ- 
 ized, more firmly rooted in habit, and possess much 
 wider connections. They are almost certain, therefore, 
 to apperceive the new idea; that is, to conquer and sub- 
 due it, to make it tributary to their power. 
 
 Let us examine more closely the effect of the process 
 of apperception upon the new and old ideas that are 
 brought in contact. First, observe the effect upon the neio : 
 Many an idea which is not strong enough in itself to make 
 a lasting impression, upon the mind would quickly fade 
 out and be forgotten were it not that in this process the old 
 ideas throw it into a clear light, give it more meaning, 
 associate it closely with themselves, and thus save it. Two 
 persons look at the sword of Washington; one examines 
 it with deep interest, the other scarcely gives it a second 
 glance. The one remembers it for life, the other forgets 
 it in an hour. The sense perception was the same in 
 both persons at first, but the reception given to the idea 
 by one converts it into a lasting treasure. A little 
 lamp-black, rolled up between finger and thumb, suggested 
 to Edison his carbon points for the electric light. A 
 piece of lamp-black would produce no such effect in most 
 peoples minds. The difference is in the reception 
 accorded to an idea. The meaning and importance of an 
 idea or event depend upon the interpretation put upon it 
 by our previous experience. " Many a weak, obscure, 
 and fleeting perception would pass almost unnoticed into
 
 APPERCEPTION. 169 
 
 obscurity, did not the additional activity of apperception 
 hold it fast in consciousness. This sharpens the senses, 
 i. e., it gives to the organs of sense a greater degree of 
 energy, so that the watching eye how sees, and the 
 listening ear now hears, that which ordinarily would pass 
 unnoticed. The events of apperception give to the 
 senses a peculiar keenness, which underlies the skill of 
 the money-changer in detecting a counterfeit among a 
 thousand bank-notes, notwithstanding its deceptive sim- 
 ilarity; of the jeweler who marks the slightest, appar- 
 ently imperceptible, flaw in an ornament; of the physicist 
 who perceives distinctly the overtones of a vibrating 
 string. According to this we see and hear not only with 
 the eye and ear, but quite as much with the help of our 
 present knowledge, with the apperceiving content of the 
 mind." (Apperception, Lange, J)e Garmo, p. 21.) 
 
 Some even intelligent and sensible people can walk 
 through . Westminster Abbey and see nothing but a 
 curious old church with a few graves and monuments. 
 To a person well-versed in English history and literature 
 it is a shrine of poets, a temple of heroes, the common 
 resting-place of statesmen and kings. 
 
 Secondly, what is the effect on the old ideas/ Every 
 idea that newly enters the mind produces changes in the 
 older groups and series of thought. Any one new idea 
 may cause but slight changes, but the constant influx of 
 new experiences works steadily at a modification and re- 
 arrangement of our previous stores of thought. Faulty 
 and incomplete groups and concepts are corrected or 
 enlarged; that is, changed from psychical into logical 
 notions. Children are surprised to find little flowers on 
 the oaks, maples, walnuts, and other large forest trees. 
 On account of the small size of the blossoms, heretofore
 
 170 , GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 unnoticed, they had not thought of the great trees as 
 belonging to the flowering plants. Their notion of flow- 
 ering plants is, therefore, greatly enlarged by a few new 
 observations. The bats flying about in the twilight have 
 been regarded as birds; but a closer inspection shows 
 that they belong to another class, and the notion bird 
 must be limited. As already observed in the discussion 
 of induction, most of our psychical notions are thus faulty 
 and incomplete; e. //. , the ideas fruit, fish, star, insect, 
 mineral, shij), church, clock, dog, kitchen, library, 
 lawyer, city, etc. Our notions of these and of hundreds 
 of other such classes are at first both incomplete and 
 faulty. The inflow of new ideas constantly modifies 
 them, extending, limiting, explaining, and correcting 
 our previous concepts. 
 
 Sometimes, however, a single new thought may have 
 wide-reaching effects; it may even revolutionize one's 
 previous modes of thinking and reorganize one's activi- 
 ties about a new center.-"*With Luther, for instance, the 
 idea of justification by faith was such a new and potent 
 force, breaking up and rearranging his old forms of 
 thought. St. Paul's vision on the way to Damascus is a 
 still more striking illustration of the power of a new idea 
 or conviction. And yet, even in such cases, the old ideas 
 reassert themselves with great persistence and power. 
 Luther and St. Paul remained, even after these great 
 changes, in many respects the same kind of men as be- 
 fore. Their old habits of thinking were modified, not de- 
 stroyed; the direction of their lives was changed, but 
 many of their habits and characteristics remained almost 
 unaltered. 
 
 Apperception, however, is not limited to the effects 
 of external objects upon us, to the influence of ideas com-
 
 APPERCEPTION. 171 
 
 ing from without upon our old stores of knowledge. Old 
 ideas, long since stored in the mind, may be freshly 
 called up and brought into such contact with each other 
 that new results follow, new apperceptions take place. 
 In moments of reflection we are often surprised by con- 
 clusions that had not presented themselves to us before. 
 A new light dawns upon us and we .are surprised at not 
 having seen it before. In fact, it makes little difference 
 whether the idea suggested to the mind comes from 
 within or from without if, when it once enters fairly into 
 consciousness, it has power to stimulate other thoughts, \y 
 to wake up whole thought complexes and bring about a 
 process of action and reaction between itself and others. 
 The result is new associations, new conclusions, new 
 mental products — apperceptions. 
 
 This inner apperception^ as it has been sometimes 
 called, takes place constantly when we are occupied with 
 our own thoughts, rather than with external impressions. 
 With persons of deep, steady, reflective habits, it is the 
 chief means of organizing their mental stores. The feel- 
 ings and the will have much also to do with this process. 
 
 The laws of association draw the feelings as much as 
 the intellectual states into apperceptive acts. I hear of 
 a friend who has had disasters in business and has lost 
 his whole fortune. If I have never experienced such dif- 
 ficulties myself, the chances are that the news will not 
 make a deep impression upon me. But if I have once 
 gone through the despondency of such a crushing defeat, 
 sympathy for my friend will be awakened, and I may feel 
 his trouble almost as my own. The meaning of such an 
 item of news depends upon the response which it finds in 
 my own feelings. It is well known that those friends can 
 best sympathize with us in our trouble who have passed
 
 173 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 through the same troubles. Even enemies are not lack- 
 ing in sympathy with each other when an appeal is made 
 to deep feelings and experiences common to both. 
 
 The feeling of interest, which we have emphasized s^ 
 much, is chiefly, if not wholly, dependent upon appercep- 
 tive conditions. Select a lesson adapted to the age and 
 understanding of a child, present it in such a way as to 
 recall and make use of his previous experience, and inter- 
 est is certain to follow. The outcome of a successful act 
 of apperception is always a feeling of pleasure, or at 
 least of interest. When the principle of apperception is 
 fully applied in teaching, the progress from one point to 
 another is so gradual and clear that it gives pleasure. 
 The clearness and understanding with which we receive 
 knowledge adds greatly to our interest in it. On the 
 contrary, when apperception is violated, and new knowl- 
 edge is only half understood and assimilated there can be 
 but little feeling of satisfaction. "The overcoming of 
 certain difficulties, the accession of numerous ideas, the 
 success of the act of knowledge or recognition, the 
 greater cleai^ness that the ideas have gained, awaken a 
 feeling of pleasure. We become conscious of the growth 
 of our knowledge and power of understanding. The 
 significance of this new impression for our ego is now 
 more strongly felt than at the beginning or during the 
 course of the progress. To this pleasurable feeling is 
 easily added the effort, at favorable opportunity, to repro" 
 duce the product of the apperception, to supplement and 
 deepen it, to unite it to other ideas, and so further to ex- 
 tend certain chains of thought. The summit or sum of 
 these states of mind we happily express with the word 
 interest. For in reality the feeling of self appears be- 
 tween the various stages of the process of apperception
 
 APPERCEPTION. 173 
 
 {inter esse); with one's whole soul does one contemplate 
 the object of attention. If we regard the acquired knowl- 
 edge as the objective result of apperception, interest 
 must be regarded as the subjective side." (Lange, Ap- 
 perception, page 19.) 
 
 Finally, the will has much to do with conscious efforts 
 at apperception. It holds the thought to certain groups; 
 it excludes or pushes back irrelevant ideas that crowd in; 
 it holds to a steady comparison of ideas, even where per- 
 plexity and obscurity trouble the thinker. When the 
 process of reaching a conclusion takes much time, when 
 conflict or contradiction have to be removed or adjusted, 
 when reflection and reasoning are necessary, the will is of 
 great importance in giving coherency and steadiness to 
 the apperceptive effort. A conscious effort at apper- 
 ception, therefore, may include many elements, sense per- 
 ceptions, ideas recalled, feeling, will. 
 
 "Let us now sum up the essentials in the process of 
 apperception. First of all, an external or internal per- 
 ception, an idea, or idea-complex appears in consciousness, 
 finding more or less response in the mind; that is, giving 
 rise to greater or less stimulation to thought and feeling. 
 
 "In consequence of this, and in accordance with the 
 psychical mechanism or an impulse of the will, one or 
 more groups of thoughts arise, which enter into relation 
 to the perception. While the two masses are com. 
 pared with one another, they work upon one another with 
 more or less of a transforming power. New thought-com- 
 binations are formed, until, finally, the perception is ad- 
 justed to the stronger and older thought combination. 
 In this way all the factors concerned gain in value as to 
 knowledge and feeling; especially, however, does the new 
 idea gain a clearness and activity that it never would
 
 174 (^.ENERAL METHOD. 
 
 have gained for itself. Apperception is, therefore, that 
 psychical activity by lohich indiviihial perceptions, ideas, 
 or idea-complexes are brought into relation to our previous 
 intellectxial and emotional life, assimilated with it, and 
 thxis raised to greater clearness, activity, and significance.'' 
 (Lange, Apperception, page 41.) 
 
 Important conclusions drawn from a study of apper- 
 ception : 
 
 1. Value of previous knowledge. If knowledge once 
 acquired is so valuable we are first of all urged to make 
 the acquisition permanent. Thorough mastery and fre- 
 quent reviews. are necessary to make knowledge stick. 
 Careless and superficial study is injurious. It is some- 
 times carelessly remarked by those who are supposed to 
 be wise in educational matters that it makes no differ" 
 ence how much we forget if we only have proper drill 
 and training to study. That is, how we study is more 
 important than what we learn. But viewed in the light 
 of apperception, acquired knowledge should be retained 
 and used, for it unlocks the door to more knowledge. 
 Thorough mastery and rete?itio7i of the elements of knowl- 
 edge in the different branches is the only solid road to 
 progress. In this connection we can see the importance 
 of learning only what is loorth remembering, what will 
 prove a valuable treasure in future study. In the selec- 
 tion of material for school studies, therefore, we must 
 keep in mind knowledge which, as Comenius says^ is of 
 solid utility. Having once selected and acquired such 
 materials, we are next impelled to make constant use of 
 them. If the acquisition of new information depends so 
 much upon the right use of previous knowledge, we are 
 called upon to build constantly upon this foundation. 
 This is true whether the child's knowledge has been
 
 APPERCEPTION. 175 
 
 acquired at school or at home. In order to make things 
 clear and interesting to boys and girls we must refer 
 every day to what they have before learned in school and 
 out of school. 
 
 Again, if we accept the doctrine that old ideas are the 
 materials out of which we constantly build bridges across 
 into new fields of knowledge, we must kno%o the diUdren 
 better and what store of knowledge they have already 
 acquired. Just as an army marching into a new country 
 must know well the country through which it has passed 
 and must keep open the line of communication and the 
 base of supplies, so the student must always have a safe 
 retreat into his past, and a base of supplies to sustain 
 him in his onward movements. The tendency is very 
 strong for a grade teacher to think that she needs to 
 know nothing except the facts to be acquired in her own 
 grade. But she should remember that her grade is only 
 a station on the highway to learning and life. In teach- 
 ing we cannot by any shift dispense with the ideas chil- 
 dren have gained at home, at play, in the school and out- 
 side of it. This, in connection with what the child has 
 learned in the previous grades, constitutes a stock of 
 ideas, a capital, upon which the teacher should freely 
 draw in illustrating daily lessons. 
 
 2. The use of our acquired stock of ideas involves a 
 constant worA:m/7 over of old ideas, and this working-over 
 process not only reviews and strengthens past knowledge, 
 keeping it from forgetfulness, but it throws new light 
 upon it and exposes it to a many sided criticism. In the 
 first place familiar ideas should not be allowed to rest in 
 the mind unused. Like tools for service they must be 
 kept bright and sharp. One reason why so many of the 
 valuable ideas we have acquired have gradually disap-
 
 17f) GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 peared from the mind is because they remained so long 
 unused that they faded out of sight. The old saying 
 that " repetition is the mother of studies" needs to be 
 recalled and emphasized. By being put in contact, with 
 new ideas, old notions are seen and appreciated in new 
 relations. Facts that have long lain unexplained in the 
 mind, suddenly receive a new interpretation, a vivid and 
 rational meaning. Or the old meaning is intensified and 
 vivified by putting a new fact in conjunction with it. 
 
 Where the climate and products of the British Isles 
 have been studied in political geography, and later on, in 
 physical geography, the gulf stream is explained in its 
 bearings on the climate of western Europe, the whole 
 subject of the climate of England is viewed from a new 
 and interesting standpoint. In arithmetic, where the 
 sum of the squares of the two sides of a right-angled tri- 
 angle is illustrated by an example and later on in geom- 
 etry the same proposition is taken up in a different way 
 and proved as a universal theorem, new and interesting 
 light is thrown upon an old problem of arithmetic. In 
 United /States history, after the Revolution has been 
 studied, the biography of a man like Samuel Adams 
 throws much additional and vivid light upon the events 
 and actors in Boston and Massachusetts. The life of 
 John Adams would give a still different view of the same 
 great events; just as a city, as seen from different stand- 
 points, presents different aspects. 
 
 3. We have thus far shown that new ideas are more 
 easily understood and assimilated when they are brought 
 into close contact with what we already know; and sec- 
 ondly, that our old knowledge is often explained and 
 illuminated by new facts brought to bear upon it. 
 We may now observe the result of this double action —
 
 APPERCEPTION. 177 
 
 tJie welding of old and new into one piece, the close 
 mingling and association of all our knowledge, i. e., its 
 unity. Apperception, therefore, has the same final ten- 
 dency that was observed in the inductive process, the 
 unification of knowledge, the concentration of all experi- 
 ence by uniting its parts into groups and series. The 
 smith, in welding together two pieces of iron, heats both 
 and then hammers them together into one piece. The 
 teacher has something similar to do. He must revive 
 old ideas in the child's mind, then present the new facts 
 and bring the two things together while they are still 
 fresh, so as to cause them to coalesce. To prove this 
 observe how long division may be best taught. Call up 
 and review the method of short division, then proceed to 
 work a problem in long division calling attention to the 
 similar steps and processes in the two, and finally to the 
 difference between them. 
 
 The defect of much teaching in children's classes is 
 that the teacher does not properly provide for the weld- 
 ing together of the new and old. The important prac- 
 tical question after all is whether instructors see to it 
 that children recall their previous knowledge. It is nec- 
 essary to take special pains in this. Nothing is more 
 common than to find children forgetting the very thing 
 which, if remembered, would explain the difficult point 
 in the lesson. Teachers are often surprised that children 
 have forgotten things once learned. But, in an impor- 
 tant sense, we encourage children to forget b}'^ not calling 
 into use their acquisitions. Lessons are learned too 
 much, each by itself, without reference to what precedes 
 or what follows, or what effect this lesson of to-day may 
 have upon things learned a year ago. Putting it briefly, 
 children and teachers do not think enough, pondering
 
 178 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 things over in their minds, relating facts with each other, 
 and bringing all knowledge into unity, and into a clear 
 comprehension. The habit of thoughtfulness, engendered 
 by a proper combining of old and new, is one of the valu- 
 able results of a good education. It gives the mind a 
 disposition to glance backward or forward, to judge of 
 all old ideas from a broader, more intelligent standpoint. 
 Thinking everything over in the light of the best experi- 
 ence we can bring to bear upon it, prevents us from 
 jumping at conclusions. 
 
 The general p^cwi of all studies is based upon this 
 notion of acquiring knowledge by the assistance of accu- 
 mulated funds. In Arithmetic it would be folly to begin 
 with long division before the multiplication table is 
 learned. In Geo?netry, later propositions depend upon 
 eai'lier principles and demonstrations. In Latin, vocab- 
 ularies and inflections and syntactical relations must be 
 mastered before readiness in the use of language is 
 reached. And so it is to a large degree in the general 
 plan of all studies. In spite of this no principle is more 
 commonly violated in daily recitations than that of ap- 
 perception. Its value is self-evident as a principle for 
 the arrangement of topics in any branch of study, but it 
 is overlooked in daily lessons. Instead of this new knowl- 
 edge is acquired by a thoughtless memory drill. 
 
 In this welding process we desire to deterniine how 
 far an actual concentration may take place beticeen school 
 studies and the home and outside life of children. The 
 stock of ideas and feelings which a child from its infancy 
 has gathered from its peculiar history and home sur- 
 roundings is the primitive basis of its personality. Its 
 thought, feeling, and individuality are deeply interwoven 
 with home experience. No other set of ideas, later ac-
 
 APPERCEPTION. 179 
 
 quired, lies so close to its lieart or is so abiding in its 
 memory. The memory of work and play at home; of the 
 house, yard, trees, and garden; of parents, brothers, and 
 sisters, and in addition to this the experiences connected 
 with neighbors and friends, the town and surrounding 
 country, the church and its influence, the holidays, games, 
 and celebrations, all these things lie deeper in the minds 
 of children than the facts learned about grammar, geog. 
 raphy, or history in school. Any plan of education that 
 ignores these home-bred ideas, these events, memories, and 
 sympathies of home and neighborhood life, will make a 
 vital mistake. A concentration that keeps in mind only 
 the school studies and disregards the rich funds of ideas 
 that every child brings from his home, must be a failure, 
 because it only includes the weaker half of his experience. 
 Home knowledge itself does not need to be made a con- 
 centrating center, but all its best materials must be 
 drawn into the concentrating center of the school. But 
 children bring many faulty, mistaken, and even vicious 
 ideas from their homes. It is well to know the actual 
 situation. It is the work of the school, at every step, 
 while receiving, to correct, enlarge, or arrange the faulty or 
 disordered knowledge brought into the school by children. 
 We unconsciously use these materials, and depend upon 
 them for explaining new lessons, more constantly than 
 we are aware of. In fact, if we were wise teachers, we 
 would consciously make a more frequent use of them and, 
 in order to render them more valuable, take special pains 
 to review, correct, and arrange them. We would teach 
 children to observe moi'e closely and 1o remember better 
 the things they daily see. 
 
 We shall appreciate better the value of home knotol- 
 edge if we take note of the direct and constant depend-
 
 180 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 ence of the most important studies upon it. We usually 
 think of history as something far away in New England, 
 or France, or Egypt. History is mainly the study of the 
 actions, customs, homes, and institutions of men in dif- 
 ferent countries. But what an abundance of similar facts 
 and observations a child has gathered about home before 
 he begins the study of history. From his infancy he has 
 seen people of all sorts and conditions, rich and poor, 
 ignorant and learned, honorable and mean. He has seen 
 all sorts of human actions, learned to know their mean- 
 ing and to pass judgment upon them. He has seen 
 houses, churches, public buildings, trade and commerce, 
 and a hundred human institutions. The child has been 
 studying human actions and institutions in the concrete 
 for a dozen year-s before he begins to read and recite his- 
 tory from books. Without the knowledge thus acquired 
 out of school, society, government, and institutions would 
 be worse than Greek. Geography as taught in the books 
 would be totally foreign and strange but for the abund- 
 ance of ideas the child has already picked up about hills, 
 streams, roads, travel, storms, trees, animals, and people. 
 Natural science lessons must be based on a more care- 
 ful study of things already seen about home — rocks and 
 streams, flowers and plants, animals wild and tame. 
 These with the forests, fields, brooks, seasons, tools, and 
 inventions, are the necessary object lessons in natural 
 science which can serve daily to illustrate other lessons. 
 How near then do the natural scieiace topics, geography 
 and history, stand to the daily home life of a child ! How 
 intimate should be the relations which the school should 
 establish between the parts of a child's experience ! This 
 is concentration iu the broadest sense. A proper appre- 
 ciation of this principle will save us from a number of
 
 APPERCEPTION. 181 
 
 common errors. Besides constantly associating home and 
 school knowledge, we shall try to know the home and 
 parents better, and the disposition and surroundings of 
 each child. We shall be ready at any time to render 
 home knowledge more clear and accurate, to correct 
 faulty observation and opinion. While the children will 
 be encouraged to illustrate lessons from their own expe- 
 rience, we shall fall into the excellent habit of explaining 
 new and difficult points by a direct appeal to what the 
 pupils have seen and understood. In short, there will be 
 a disposition to draw into the concentrating work of the 
 scjiool all the deeper but outside life-experiences which 
 form so important an element in the character of every 
 person, which, however, teachers so often overlook. No 
 other institution has such an opportunity or power to 
 concentrate knowledge and experience as the school. 
 
 \. Another valuable educative result of apperception, 
 cultivated in this manner, is a consciousness of jiotoer 
 which springs from the ability to make a good use of our 
 knowledge. Theoftener children become aware that they 
 have made a good use of acquired knowledge, the more 
 they are encouraged. They see the treasure growing in 
 their hands and feel conscious of their ability to use it. 
 There is a mental exhilaration like that coming from 
 abundant physical strength and health. 
 
 '•Let us look back again at the results of our investi- 
 gation. We observed first what essential services ap- 
 perception performs for the human mind in the acquisi- 
 tion of new ideas, and for what an extraordinary ease- 
 ment and unburdening the acquiring soul is indebted to 
 it. Should apperception once fail, or were it not implied 
 in the very nature of our minds, we should, in the re- 
 ception of sense-impressions, daily expend as much power
 
 182 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 as the child in its earliest years, since the perpetually 
 changing objects of the external world would nearly al- 
 ways appear strange and new. We should gain the 
 mastery of external things more slowly and painfully, 
 and arrive much later at a certain conclusion of our ex- 
 ternal experience than we do now, and thereby remain 
 perceptibly behind in our mental development. Like 
 children with their ABC, we should be forced to take 
 careful note of each word, and not, as now, allow our- 
 selves actually to perceive only a few words in each sen- 
 tence. In a word, without apperception our minds, with 
 strikingly greater and more exhaustive labor, would at- 
 tain relatively smaller results. Indeed, we are seldom con- 
 scious of the extent to which our perception is supported 
 by apperception; of how it releases the senses from a 
 large part of their labor, so that in reality we listen 
 usually with half an ear or with a divided attention; nor, 
 on the other hand, do we ordinarily reflect that apper- 
 ception lends the sense organs a greater degree of energy, 
 so that they perceive with greater sharpness and pene- 
 tration than were otherwise possible. We do not con- 
 sider that apperception spares us the trouble of examin- 
 ing ever anew and in small detail all the objects and phe- 
 nomena that present themselves to us, so as to get their 
 meaning, or that it thus prevents our mental power from 
 scattering and from being worn out with wearisome, 
 fruitless detail labors. The secret of its extraordinary 
 success lies in the fact that it refers the new to the old, 
 the strange to the familiar, the unknown to the known, 
 that which is not comprehended to what is already under- 
 stood and thus constitutes a part of our mental furniture; 
 that it transforms the difificult and unaccustoined into the 
 accustomed and causes us to grasp everything new by
 
 APPERCEPTION. 183 
 
 means of old-time, well-known ideas. Since, then, it ac- 
 complishes great and unusual results by small means, in 
 so far as it reserves for the soul the greatest amount of 
 power for other purposes, it agrees with the general 
 principle of the least expenditure of force, or with that of 
 the best adaptability of means to ends. 
 
 "As in the reception of new impressions, so also in 
 working over and developing the previously acquired con- 
 tent of the mind, the helpful work of apperception shows 
 itself. By connecting isolated things with mental groups 
 already formed, and by assigning to the new its proper 
 place among them, apperception not only increases the 
 clearness and definiteness of ideas, but knits them more 
 firmly to our consciousness. Appercewing ideas are the 
 best aids to memory. Again, so often as it subordinates 
 new impressions to older ones, it labors at the association 
 and articulation of the manifold materials of perception 
 and thought. By condensing the content of observa- 
 tion and thinking into concepts and rules, or general ex- 
 periences and principles, or ideals and general notions, 
 apperception produces connection and order in our knowl- 
 edge and volition. With its assistance there spring up 
 those universal thought complexes, which, distributed to 
 the various fields to which thoy belong, appear as logical, 
 linguistic, aesthetic, moral, and religious norms or prin- 
 ciples. If these acquire a higher degree of value for our 
 feelings, if we find ourselves heartily attached to them, 
 so that we prefer them to all those things which are con- 
 tradictory, if we bind them to our own self, they will 
 thus become powerful mental groups, which spring up in- 
 dependent of the psychical mechanism as often as kindred 
 ideas appear in the mind. In the presence of these they 
 now pake manifest their apperceiving power. We
 
 184 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 measure and estimate them now according to universal 
 laws. They are, so to speak, the eyes and hand of the 
 will, with which, regulating and supplementing, reject- 
 ing and correcting, it lays a grasp upon the content as 
 well as upon the succession of ideas. They hinder the 
 purely mechanical flow of thought and desire, and our in- 
 voluntary absorption in external impressions and in the 
 varied play of fancy. We learn how to control religious 
 impulses by laws, to rule thoughts by thoughts. In the 
 place of the mechanical, appears the regulated course 
 of thinking; in the place of the psychical rule of caprice, 
 the monarchical control of higher laws and principles, and 
 the spontaneity of the ego as the kernel of the per 
 sonality. By the aid of apperception, therefore, we are 
 lifted gradually from psychical bondage to mental and 
 moral freedom. And now when ideal norms are apper- 
 ceivingly active in the field of knowledge and thought, of 
 feeling and will, when they give laws to the psychical 
 mechanism, true culture is attained." (Lange's Apper- 
 ception, edited by DeGarmo, p. 99, etc.) 
 
 Note. — The freedom with which we quote extensively from 
 Lange is an acknowledgement of the importance of his treatise. 
 We are indebted to it throughout for many of the ideas treated.
 
 THE WILL. 185 
 
 CHAPTER VI! 
 
 THE WILL. 
 
 We have now completed the discussion of the concept- 
 bearing or inductive process in learning and appercep- 
 tion, and find that they both tend to the unifying of 
 knowledge and to the awakening of interest. 
 
 It remains to De seen how the will may be brought 
 into activity and placed in command of the resources of 
 the mind. 
 
 The will is that power of the mind which chooses, de- 
 cides, and controls action. 
 
 According to psychology there are three distinct ac- 
 tivities of the mind, knotcing, feeling, and willing. These 
 three powers are related to one another on a basis of 
 equality, and yet the will should become the tnonarch of 
 the mind. It is expected that all the other activities of 
 the mind will be brought into subjection to the will. For 
 strong character resides in the will. Strength of char- 
 acter depends entirely upon the mastery which the will 
 has acquired over the life; and the Jornvttion of char- 
 acter, as shown in a strong moral will, is the highest 
 aim of education. 
 
 The great problem for us to solve is: 1. How far can 
 teaching stimulate and develop such a will? 
 
 There is an apparent contradiction in saying that the 
 will is the monarch of the mind, the power which must 
 control and subject all the other powers; and yet that it 
 can be trained, educated, moulded, and chiefly too by a 
 proper cultivation of the other powers, feeling and know-
 
 186 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 ing. Knowledge and feeling, while they are subject to 
 the will, still constitute its strength, just as the soldiers 
 and officers of an army are subject to a commander and 
 yet make him powerful. 
 
 We shall first notice the dependence of the will upon 
 i]\& knowing idi,cvMY . It is an old saying "that knowl- 
 edge is power." But it is power only as a strong will is 
 able to convert knowledge into action. Before the will 
 can decide to do any given act it must see its way clearly. 
 It must at least believe in the possibility. In trying to 
 get across a stream, for example, if one can not swim and 
 there is no bridge nor boat nor means of making one, the 
 will can not act. It is helpless. The will must be shown 
 the way to its aims or they are impossible. The more 
 clear and distinct our knowledge, the better we can lay 
 our plans and will to carry them out. It would be im- 
 possible for one of us to will to run a steam engine from 
 Chicago to St. Paul to-day. We don't know how, and 
 we should not be permitted to try. In every field of 
 action we must have knowledge, and clear knowledge, 
 before the will can act to good advantage. It is only 
 knowledge, or at least faith in the possibility of accom- 
 plishing an undertaking, that opens the way to will. 
 Much successful exjyerience in any line of work brings 
 increasing confidence and the will is greatly strength- 
 ened, because one knows that certain actions are possible. 
 The simple acquisition of facts therefore, the increase of 
 knowledge so long as it is well digested, makes it pos- 
 sible for the will to act with greater energy in various 
 • directions. The more clear this knowledge is, the more 
 thoroughly it is cemented together in its parts and sub- 
 ject to control, the greater and more effective can be the 
 will action. All the knowledge we may acquire can be
 
 THE WILL. 187 
 
 used by the will in planning and carrying out its pur- 
 poses. Knowledge, therefore, derived from all sources, 
 is a ineanti used by the will, and increases the possibili- 
 ties of its action. 
 
 But, secondly, there are found still more immediate 
 means of stimulating and strengthening the will, namely, 
 in the feelings. The feelings are more closely related to 
 will than knowledge, at least in the sense of cause and 
 effect. There is a gradual transition from the feelings 
 up to will, as follows: interest in an object, inclination, 
 desire and purpose, or will to secure it. We might say 
 that will is only the final link in the chain, and the feel- 
 ings and desires lead up to and produce the act of willing. 
 Even will itself has been called a feeling by some psychol- 
 ogists and classed with the feelings. But the thing in 
 which we are now most concerned is how to reach and 
 strengthen the will through the feelings. Some of the 
 feelings which powerfully inliuence the will are desire of 
 approbation, ambition, love of knowledge, appreciation 
 of the beautiful and the good; or, on the other side, ri- 
 valry, envy, hate, and ill-will. Now, it is clear that a 
 cultivation of the feelings and emotions is possible which 
 may strongly influence the purposes and decisions of the 
 will, either in the right or wrong direction. It is just at 
 this point that education is capable of a vigorous influ- 
 ence in moulding the character of a child. The cultiva- 
 tion of the six interests already mentioned is little else 
 than a cultivation of the great classes of feeling, for in. 
 terest always contains a strong element of feeling. It 
 is certain in any case that a child's, and eventually a 
 man's will, is to be guided largely by his feelings. 
 Whether any care is taken in education or not, feeling, 
 good or bad, is destined to guide the will. Most people,
 
 188 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 as we know, are too much influenced by their feelings. This 
 is apparent in the adage, "Think twice before you speak." 
 Feelings of malice and ill-will, of revenge and envy, of 
 dislike and jealously, get the control in many lives, be- 
 cause they have been permitted to grow and nothing 
 better has been put in their place. The teacher by select- 
 ing the proper inateriaU of study is able to cultivate and 
 strengthen such feelings as sympathy and kindliness to- 
 ward others; appreciation of brave, unselfish acts in others; 
 the feeling of generosity, charity, and a forgiving spirit; 
 a love for honesty and uprightness; a desire and ambition 
 for knowledge in many directions. On the other hand, 
 the teacher may gently instill a dislike for cowardice, 
 meanness, selfishness, laziness, and envy, and bring the 
 child to master and control these evil dispositions. Not 
 only is it possible to cultivate those feelings which we 
 may summarize as the love of the virtues and develop a 
 dislike and turning away from vices, buL. this work of 
 cultivating the feelings may be carried on so systematic- 
 ally that great habits of feeling are formed, and these 
 habits become the very strongholds of character. They 
 are the forces acting upon the will and guiding its choice. 
 
 It is freedom of the will to chose the best that we 
 are after. We desire to limit the choice of the will if 
 possible to good things. We desire to make the character 
 so strong and so noble and consistent in its desires that it 
 will not be strongly tempted by evil. The will in the 
 end, while it controls all the life and action, is itself 
 under the guidance of those habits of thought and feeling 
 that have been gradually formed. Sully says, "Thus it 
 is feeling that ultimately supplies the stimulus or force to 
 volition and intellect which guides or illumines it. " 
 
 A study of the will in its relation to knowledge and
 
 THE WILL. 189 
 
 feeling reveals that the training and development of the 
 will depend upon exercise and upon instrucHo7i. There 
 are two ways of exercising will power. First, by requiring 
 it to obey authority promptly and to control the body and 
 the mind at the direction of another. The discipline of a 
 school may exert a strong influence upon pupils in teach- 
 ing them concentration and will power under the direc- 
 tion of another. Especially is this true in lower grades. 
 Children in the first grade have but little power or habit 
 of concentrating the attention. The will of the teacher, 
 combined with her tact, must aid in developing the ener- 
 gies of the will in these little ones. The primary value 
 of quick obedience in school, of exact discipline in march- 
 ing, rising, etc., is twofold. It secures the necessary 
 orderliness and it trains the will. Even in higher and 
 normal schools such a perfect discipline has a great value 
 in training to alertness and .quickness of apprehension 
 associated with action. 
 
 Secondly, by the training of the mind to freedom of 
 action, to self -activity , to independence. As soon as 
 children begin to develop the power of thought and action 
 their self-activity should be encouraged. Even in the 
 lowest grades the beginnings may be made. An ai)n 
 may be set before them which they are to reach by their 
 own efforts. For example, let a class in the first reader 
 be asked to make a list of all the words in the last two 
 lessons containing thy or oi, or some other combination. 
 Activity rather than repose is the nature of children, and 
 even in the kindergarten this activity is directed to the 
 attainment of definite ends. With number work in the 
 first grade the objects should be handled by the children, 
 the letters made, rude drawings sketched, so as to give 
 play to their active powers as well as to lead them on to
 
 11)0 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 confidence in doing, to an increase of self-activity. As 
 children grow older, the problems set before them, the 
 aims held out, should be more difficult. Of course they 
 should be of i7iterest to the child, so that it will have an 
 impulse and desire of its own to reach them. 
 
 There are few things so valuable as setting up definite 
 aims before children and then supplying them with incen- 
 tives to reach them through their own efforts. It has 
 been often supposed that the only way to do this is to 
 use reference books, to study up the lesson or some topics 
 of it outside of the regular order. But self-activity is by 
 no means limited to such outside work. A child's self- 
 activity may be often aroused by the manner of studying 
 a simple lesson from a text-book. When a reading or 
 geography lesson is so studied that the pupil thoroughly 
 sifts the piece, hunts down the thought till he is certain 
 of its meaning; when all the previous knowledge the 
 pupil can command is brought to bear upon this, to throw 
 light upon it; when the dictionary and any other books 
 familiar to the child are studied for the sake of reference 
 and explanation, self-activity is developed. Whenever 
 the disposition can be stimulated to look at a fact or 
 statement from more than one sta7idpoi)it, to criticise it 
 even, to see how true it is, or if there are exceptions, self- 
 activity is cultivated. 
 
 The pursuit of definite aims always calls out the will 
 and their satisfactory attainment strengthens one's con- 
 fidence in his ability to succeed. Every step should be 
 toward a clearly seen aim. At least this is our ideal in 
 working with children. They should not be led on blindly 
 from one point to another, but try to reach definite results. 
 
 There is a gradual transition in the course of a child's 
 schooling from training of the will under guidance to its
 
 THE WILL. 191 
 
 iodepeodent exercise. Throughout the school course 
 there must be much obedience and will effort under the 
 guidance of one in authority. But there should be a 
 gradual increase of self-activity and self-determination. 
 When the pupil leaves school he should be prepared to 
 launch out and pursue his own aims with success. 
 
 Will effort, however, to be valuable, must have its roots 
 in those moral convictions which it is the chief aim of the 
 school to foster and strengthen. We have attempted to 
 show in the pi-eceding chapters how the central subject 
 matter of the school could be chosen, and the other studies 
 concentrated about it with a view to accomplishing this 
 result. In concluding our discussion of general princi- 
 ples of education, and in summing up the results, basing 
 our reasoning upon psychology, we are always forced to 
 the conclusion that education aims at the will, and more 
 particularly at the will as influenced and guided by moral 
 ideas. This is the same as saying that we have completed 
 the circle and come around to our starting point, that 
 tnoral character is the chief aim of education. 
 
 Teachers who are interested in this phase of pedagogy 
 will do well to study the science of ethics. Not that it will 
 much aid them directly in school work, but it will at least 
 give them a more comprehensive and definite notion of 
 the field of morals and perhaps indicate more clearly 
 where the materials of moral education are to be sought, 
 and the leading ideas to be emphasized. 
 
 Herbart projected a system of ethics, based on psy- 
 chology, with the intention of classifying the chief moral 
 notions and of showing their relation to each other. He 
 also developed a theory of the origin of moral ideas and 
 their best means of cultivation, and then based his system 
 of pedagogy upon it.
 
 192 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 The chief classes of ethical ideas of Herbart are briefly 
 explained as follows: 
 
 1. Goodwill. It is manifested in the sympathy we 
 feel for the sorrow or joy of another person. It is illus- 
 trated by the example of Sidney and Howard already cited. 
 
 2. Legal right. It serves to avoid strife by some 
 agreement or established rule; e. g., the government of 
 the United States fixes the law for pre-empting land and 
 for homestead claims so that no two persons can lay claim 
 to the same piece of land. 
 
 3. Justice, as expressed by reward or punishment. 
 When a person purposely does an injury to another, all 
 men unite in the judgment, "He must be punished." 
 Likewise, if a kind act is done to anyone, we insist upon a 
 I'eturn of gratitude at least. 
 
 4. Perfection of loill. This implies that the will is 
 strong enough to resist all opposition. David's will to 
 go out and meet Goliath was perfect. A boy desires to 
 get his lesson, but indolence and the love of play are too 
 strong for his will. There is nothing which goes so far 
 to make up the character of the hero as strength of will 
 which yields to no difficulties. 
 
 5. Inner freedom. This is the obedience of the will 
 to its highest moral incentive. It is ability to set the will 
 free from all selfish or wrong desires and to yield implicit 
 obedience to moral ideas. This of course depends upon 
 the cultivation of the other ideas and their proper subor- 
 dination, one to another. 
 
 The five moral ideas just given indicate the lines along 
 which strength of moral character is shown. They are of 
 some interest to the teacher as a systematic arrange- 
 ment of morals, but they are of no direct value in teach- 
 ing. They are the most abstract and general classes of 
 moral ideas and are of no interest whatever to children.
 
 THE WILL. 193 
 
 III morals the only thing that interests children is 
 moral action. ' Whether it be in actual life or in a story oi- 
 history, the child is aroused by a deed of kindness or 
 courage. But all talk of kindness or goodness in general, 
 disconnected from particular persons and actions, is dry 
 and uninteresting. This gives us the key to the child'ti 
 mind in morals. Not moralizing, not preaching, not 
 lecturing, not reproof, can ever be the original source 
 of moral ideas with the young, but the actiona of people 
 they see, and of those about whom they read or hear. 
 Moral judgments and feelings spring up originally only 
 in connection with human action in the concrete. If we 
 propose then to adapt moral teaching to youthful minds, 
 wc must make use of concrete materials, observations of 
 people taken from what the children have seen, stories 
 and biographies of historical characters. A story of a 
 man's life is interesting because it brings out his particular 
 motives and actions. This is the field in which instruc- 
 tion has its conquests to mak'^ over youthful minds. 
 
 We will gather up the fruits of our discussion in the 
 preceding chapters. Having fixed the chief aim in the 
 effort to influence and strengthen moral character, we 
 (ind concentration to be the central principle ih which all 
 others unite. It is the focusing of life and school expe- 
 riences in the unity of the personality. The worth and 
 choice of studies is determined by this. Interest unites 
 knowledge, feeling, and will. The culture epochs supply 
 the nucleus of materials for moral-educative purposes. 
 Apperception assimilates new ideas by bringing each 
 into the bond of its kindred and friends, spinning threads 
 of connection in every direction. The inductive process 
 collects, classifies, and organizes knowledge, everywhere 
 tending toward unity.
 
 194 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 HERBART AND HIS DISCIPLES. 
 
 " Then, only, can a person be said to draw education 
 under his control, when he has the wisdom to bring forth 
 in the youthful soul a great circle or body of ideas, well 
 knit together in its inmost parts — a body of ideas which 
 is able to outweigh what is unfavorable in environment 
 and to absorb and combine with itself the favorable ele- 
 ments of the same." (Herbart. ) 
 
 Herbart was an empirical psychologist, and believed 
 that the mind grows with what it feeds upon; that is, 
 that it develops its powers slowly by experience. We 
 are dependent not only upon our habits, upon the estab- 
 lished trends of mental action produced by exercise and 
 discipline, but also upon our acquired ideas, upon the 
 thought materials stoi-ed up and organized in the mind. 
 These thought-materials seem to possess a kind of vital- 
 ity, an energy, an attractive or repulsive power. When 
 ideas once gain real sig.nificance in the mind, they become 
 active agents. They are not the blocks with which the 
 mind builds. They are a part of the mind it.self. They 
 are the conscious reaction of the mind upon external 
 things. The conscious ego itself is a product of experi- 
 ence. In thus referrino- all mental action and orowth to 
 experience, in the narrow limits he draws for the orig- 
 inal powers of the mind, Herbart stands opposed to the 
 older and to many more recent psychologists. He has 
 been called the father of empirical psychology. 
 
 Kant, with many other psychologists, gives greater 
 prominence to the original powers of the mind, to the
 
 HERHART AND HIS DISCIPLES. 195 
 
 innate ideas, by means of which it receives and works 
 over the crude materials furnished by the senses. The 
 difference between Kant and Herbart in interpreting the 
 process of apperception is an index of a radical difference 
 in their pedagogical standpoints. "With Kant, appercep- 
 tion is the assimilation of the raw materials of knowledge 
 through the fundamental categories of thought (quality, 
 quantity, relation, modality, etc.) Kant's categories 
 thought are original properties of the mind; they receive 
 the crude materials of sense-perception and give them 
 form and meaning. With Herbart, the ideas gained 
 through experience are the apperceiving power in inter- 
 preting new things. Practically, the difference between 
 Kant and Herbart is important. For Kant gives con- 
 trolling influence to innate ideas in the process 6f acquisi- 
 tion. Our capacity for learning depends not so much 
 upon the results of experience and thought stored in the 
 mind, as upon original powers, unaided and unsupported 
 by experience. With Herbart, on the contrary, great 
 stress is laid upon the acquired fund of empirical knowl- 
 edge as a means of increasing one's stores, of more rap- 
 idly receiving and assimilating new ideas. 
 
 Upon this is also based psychologically the whole edu- 
 cational plan of Herbart and of his disciples. As fast as 
 ideas are gained they are used as means of further acquisi- 
 tion. The chief care is to supply the mind of a child 
 at any stage of his growth with materials of knowledge 
 suited to his previous stores, and to see that the new is 
 properly, assimilated by the old and organized with it. 
 This accumulated fund of ideas, as it goes on collecting 
 and arranging itself in the mind, is not only a favorable 
 condition but an active agency in our future acquisition 
 and progress. Moreover, it is the business of the teacher
 
 196 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 to guide and, to some extent, to control the inflow of new 
 ideas and experiences into the mind of a child; to super- 
 intend the process of acquiring and of building up those 
 bodies of thought and feeling which eventually are to in- 
 fluence and guide a child's voluntary action. 
 
 The critics therefore accuse Herbart of a sort of archi 
 tectural design or even of a mechanical process in educa- 
 tion. If our ability and character depend to such an 
 extent upon our acquirements, and if the teacher is able 
 to control the supply of ideas to a child and to guide the 
 process of arrangement, he can build up controlling cen- 
 ters of thought which may strongly influence the action 
 of the will. In other words, he can construct a character 
 ^by building the right materials into it. This seems to 
 leave small room for spontaneous development toward 
 self-activity and freedom. 
 
 Herbart, on the other hand, criticises Kant's idea of the 
 transcendental freedom of the will, on the ground that, 
 if true, it makes deliberate, systematic education impos- 
 sible. If the will remains absolutely free in spite of 
 acquired knowledge, in spite of strongly developed ten- 
 dencies of thought and feeling; if the child or youth, at 
 any moment, even in later years, is able to retire into his 
 trancendental ego and arrive at decisions without regard 
 to the effect of previously acquired ideas and habits, any 
 well-planned, intentional effort at education is empty and 
 without eft'ect. 
 
 John Friedrich Herbart, the founder of this movement 
 in education, was born at Oldenburg in 1776, and died 
 at Gottingen in 1811. He labored seven years at Got- 
 tingen at the beginning of his career as professor, 
 iind a similar period at its close. But the longest 
 period of his university teaching was at Konigsberg,
 
 HERBART AND HIS DISCIPLES. 197 
 
 where, for twenty-five years, he occupied the chair of phil- 
 osophy made famous before him by Kaut. His writings 
 and lectures were devoted chiefly to philosophy, psy- 
 chology, and pedagogy. Previous to beginning his 
 career as professor at the university, he had spent three 
 years as private tutor to three boys in a Swiss family of 
 patrician rank. In the letters and reports made to the 
 father of these boys, we have strong proof of the practi- 
 cal wisdom and earnestness with which he met his duties 
 as a teacher. The deep pedagogical interest thus 
 developed in him remained throughout his life a quick- 
 ening influence. One of his earliest courses of lectures at 
 the university resulted in the publication, in 1806, of his 
 AUgemeine Piidagogik, his leading work on education, 
 and to-day one of the classics of German educational liter- 
 ature. His vigorous philosophical thinking in psychology 
 and ethics gave him the firm basis for his pedagogical 
 system. At Konigsberg, so strong was his interest in 
 educational problems that he established a training- 
 school for boys, where teachers, chosen by him and under 
 his direction, could make practical application of his de- 
 cided views on education. Though small, this school contin- 
 ued to furnish proof of the correctness of his educational 
 ideas till he left Konigsberg in 1833. This, we believe, was 
 the first practice-school of its kind established in connec- 
 tion with pedagogical lectures in an}' German university. 
 It should be remembered that, while Herbart was a 
 ])hilosopher of the first rank, even among the eminent 
 thinkers of Germany and of the world, he attested his 
 profound interest in education, not only by systematic 
 lectures and extensive writings on education, but by 
 maintaining for nearly a (juarter of a century a practice- 
 school at the university, for the purpose of testing and
 
 198 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 illustrating his educational convictions. Lectures on 
 pedagogy are more or less common-place, and often nearly 
 worthless. The lecturer on pedagogy who shuns the 
 life of the school room is not half a man in his profession. 
 The example thus set by Herbart of bringing the matur- 
 est fruit of philosophical study into the school room, and 
 testing it day by day and month by month upon children 
 has been followed by several eminent disciples of Herbart 
 at important universities. 
 
 Karl Volkmar Stoy (1815-1885) in 1843 began his ca- 
 reer of more than forty years as professor of pedagogy 
 and leader of a teachers' seminary and practice-school at 
 Jena. (A part of this time was spent at Heidelberg.) 
 During these years more than six hundred university 
 students received a spirited introduction to the theory 
 and practice of education under Stoy's guidance and in- 
 spiration. His seminary for discussion and his practice- 
 school became famous throughout Germany and sent out 
 many men who gained eminence in educational labors. 
 
 Tuiskon Ziller, in 1862, set up at Leipzig, in connec- 
 tion with his lectures on teaching, a pedagogical semi- 
 nary and practice-school, which, for twenty years, con- 
 tinued to develop and extend the application of Herbart's 
 ideas. Ziller and several of his disciples have attained 
 much prominence as educational writers and leaders. 
 
 A year after the death of Stoy, 1886, Dr. Wilhelm 
 Rein was called to the chair of pedagogy at Jena. He 
 had studied both with Stoy and Ziller, and had added to 
 this an extensive experience as a teacher and as principal 
 of a normal school. His lectures on pedagogy, both 
 theoretical and practical, in connection with his semi- 
 nary for discussion and his practice-school for applica- 
 tion of theory, furnish an admirable introduction to the 
 most progressive educational ideas of Germany.
 
 HERBART AND HIS UISCITLES. Ht9 
 
 The Herbart .school stands for certain progressive 
 ideas which, while not exactly new, have, however, re" 
 ceived such a new infusion of life-giving blood that the 
 vague formulae of theorists have been changed into the 
 definite, mandatory requirements and suorgestions of real 
 teachers. The fact that a pedagogical truth has been 
 vaguely or even clearly stated a dozen times by promi- 
 nent writers, is no reason for supposing that it has ever 
 had any vital infiueuce upon educators. The history of 
 education shows conclusively that important educational 
 ideas can be written about and talked about for centuries 
 without finding their way to any great extent into school 
 rooms. What we now need in education is definite and 
 well-grounded theories and plans, backed up by honest 
 and practical execution. 
 
 The Herbartians have patiently submitted themselves 
 to thorough-going tests in both theory and practice. 
 After years of experiment and discussion, they come for- 
 ward with certain propositions of reform which are de- 
 signed to infuse new life and meaninof into educational 
 labors. 
 
 The first proposition is to make the foundation of edu- 
 cation immovable by resting it upon ijroxrtli in moral 
 character, as the purpose which serious teachers must put 
 first. The selection of studies and the organization of 
 the school course follow this guiding principle. 
 
 The second is per/natient, tnuinj-sided tiiterent. The 
 life-giving power which springs from the awakening of 
 the best interests in the two great realms of real knowl- 
 edge should be felt by every teacher. Though not en- 
 tirely new, this idea is better than new, because its 
 deeper meaning is clearly brought out, and it is rationally
 
 300 GENERAL METHOD. 
 
 provided for Uy the selection of interesting materials and 
 by marking out an appropriate method of treatment. All 
 knowledge must be infused with feelings of interest, if it 
 is to reach the heart and work its influence upon charac- 
 ter by giving impulse to the will. 
 
 Thirdly, the idea of organized unity ^ or concentration, 
 in the mental stores gathered by children, in all their 
 knowledge and experience, is a thought of such vital 
 meaning in the effort to establish unity of character, that, 
 when a teacher once realizes its import, his effort is toned 
 up to great undertakings. 
 
 Fourthly, the culture epochs give a suggestive bird's- 
 eye view of the historical meaning of education, and of 
 the rich materials of history and literature for supplying 
 suitable mental food to children. They help to realize 
 the ideas of interest, concentration, and apperception. 
 
 Apperception is the practical key to the most import- 
 ant problems of education, because it compels us to keep 
 a sympathetic eye upon the child in his moods, mental 
 states, and changing phases of growth; to build hourly 
 upon the only foundation he has, his previous acquire- 
 ments and habits. 
 
 Finally, the Herb&rtians have grappled seriously with 
 that great and comprehensive problem the common school 
 course. The obligation rests upon them to select the 
 materials and to lay out a course of study which embodies 
 all their leading principles in a form suited to children 
 and to our school conditions. 
 
 Some of the principal books published in English bear- 
 in 2 on Herbart are as follows : 
 
 De Garmo, Charles. Essentials of Method. D. C. 
 Heath, Boston.
 
 HKRHAKT AND HIS DISCIPLES. 201 
 
 Felkin. The Science of Education; u translation of 
 some of Herbart's most important writings on education, 
 with a short biotrraphy of Herburt. D. C. Heath & Co.. 
 Boston. 
 
 Lange. Ueber Apperception, translated by the Her- 
 bart Club and edited by Dr. De Oarmo. D. C. Heath Sc 
 Co., Boston. 
 
 Lindner's Psychology, translated by Dr. De Garmn. 
 D. r. Heath & Co.. Boston. 
 
 Smith, Miss M, K. Herbart's Psychology, transjatt'il. 
 International Ed. series. Appleton. 
 
 Van Liew. Outlines of Pedagogics, by Rein and \'an 
 T.,iew. r. W. Bardeen, Syracuse. N. Y. 
 
 The latter book contains a full bibliography of the 
 German works of the Herbart school as well as of tiiose 
 thus far published in English. 

 
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