8. CONQUEST NOT KNOWLEDGE THE DESIDERATUM.
In all great inventions, man has taken his cue from nature. In inventing the telescope, his model was the eye; in building his house, his inspiration was the cave. In reality man has accepted nature’s suggestions, and then attempted to improve upon them. In this he has met with success. From the crab apple tree, he has developed the northern spy; from the wild hen which laid 25 eggs a year, he has evolved the modern hen which produces 225 eggs a year. Moreover, man has attained his greatest successes by enlarging upon the thoughts of nature and not by unmixed substitutions. Burbank, through a long process of years, has changed the color ofa flower, but in accomplishing this did he not use some hidden tendency of nature? Burbank, with all his wisdom, cannot give a flower color unaided by “Dame Nature.”
When man commenced to study nature’s mode of education, he saw that fearful sacrifices were entailed, both in time and in energy as well as in life itself; and so he evolved a more economical way of leading the child through the experiences of the race. In consequence, he has developed the present splendid system of education.
In the evolution of all great institutions, there are in evidence crucial weaknesses, and in the evolution of man’s educational system it appears that he has erred in adopting nature’s form of education without her spirit of education. In his anxiety to have the young acquire as much as possible, man has overshot nature’s true purpose. For example, the big word in man’s educational system is knowledge; but the big word in nature’s educational system is conquest. Nature gives man knowledge simply to reward him for his effort; but man would give to his fellow the reward without the effort. According to nature, the strongest men are those who overcome most; according to man, the strongest men are those who know most. The common educational principles, such as, “From the concrete to the abstract and from the known to the related unknown,” etc., are interpreted by man from the viewpoint of knowledge; whereas nature would teach that these are a feasible way to develop power—to grow manhood. It is seen that nature uses knowledge only as a means to an end, and therefore when man usesknowledge as an end only, he is trying to substitute a plan of his own for nature’s plan. The best results can be secured only when man co-operates with nature in developing, and at the same time regulating, the spirit of conquest.