The object of education is the generation of power. But to generate and store up power, whether mental or physical, or both, is a waste of effort, unless the power is to be exerted. Why generate steam if there is no engine to be operated? Steam may be likened to an idea which finds expression through the engine—a thing. Why store the mind with facts—historical, philosophical, or mathematical—which are useless until applied to things, if they are not to be applied to things? And if they are to be applied to things, why not teach the art of so applying them? As a matter of fact, the system of education which does not do this is one-sided, incomplete, unscientific. Rousseau says, “Education itself is certainly nothing but habit.” If this be true, it will be conceded that the habit of expressing ideas in things should be formed in the schools, because the chief way in which man is benefited is through the expression of ideas in things. The system of education which tends to form this habit is that of the kindergarten and that of the manual training school. These systems are one in principle. They are not new; they at least date back to Bacon, who declared that he would “employ his utmost endeavors towards restoring or cultivating a just and legitimate familiarity betwixt the mind and things.” The kindergarten and the manual training school exactly realize Bacon’s idea. The idea of the manual training school was in the mind of Comenius when he said, “Let things that have to be done be learned by doing them.” It was in the mind of Pestalozzi when he said, “Education is the generation of power.” It was in the mind of Froebel, not less than the kindergarten, when he said, “The end and aim of all our work should be the harmonious growth of the whole being.”
These are excellent definitions of education, and they are sequential. If things that have to be done are learned by doing them, there will be in the course of the process a wholesome exercise of both body and mind, and this exercise will result in the generation of power—power to think well, and to do well; and the process being continued, the result cannot fail to be the harmonious growth of the whole being. This is scientific, as opposed to automatic, education.[72]
[72] “Intellectual progress is of necessity from the concrete to the abstract. But regardless of this, highly abstract subjects such as grammar, which should come quite late, are begun quite early. Political geography, dead and uninteresting to a child, and which should be an appendage of sociological studies, is commenced betimes, while physical geography, comprehensible and comparatively attractive to a child, is in great part passed over. Nearly every subject dealt with is arranged in abnormal order—definitions and rules and principles being put first, instead of being disclosed, as they are in the order of nature, through the study of cases. And then, pervading the whole, is the vicious system of rote learning—a system of sacrificing the spirit to the letter....
“A leading fact in human progress is that every science is evolved out of its corresponding art. It results from the necessity we are under, both individually and as a race, of reaching the abstract by way of the concrete, that there must be practice and an accruing experience with its empirical generalizations before there can be science.”—“Education,” pp. 61, 124. By Herbert Spencer. New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1883.
[E13] But the protection to property afforded by arms is only temporary. An increase of the standing army involves an increase of ignorance and poverty, and the last analysis of ignorance and poverty is anarchy. The anarchists of Chicago [1886] were of foreign birth. They came to the United States from the standing-army-ridden countries of Europe. They were the product, the victims, of the European governmental system. Hence, the proposal to adopt arms as a remedy for anarchy is a proposal to abandon the American idea of government for that of Europe. To preserve the society of to-day from violent dissolution, it is necessary to shoot the anarchist. But to assure the permanence of society it is necessary to educate the child of the anarchist.
CHAPTER XXI.
EDUCATION AND THE SOCIAL PROBLEM—HISTORIC.
EGYPT AND GREECE.
Fundamental Propositions. — Selfishness the Source of Social Evil; Subjective Education the Source of Selfishness and the Cause of Contempt of Labor; and Social Disintegration the Result of Contempt of Labor and the Useful Arts. — The First Class-distinction — the Strongest Man ruled; his First Rival, the Ingenious Man. — Superstition. — The Castes of India and Egypt — how came they about? — Egyptian Education based on Selfishness. — Rise of Egypt — her Career; her Fall; Analysis thereof. — She Typifies all the Early Nations: Force and Rapacity above, Chains and Slavery below. — Their Education consisted of Selfish Maxims for the Government of the Many by the Few, and Government meant the Appropriation of the Products of Labor. — Analysis of Greek Character — its Savage Characteristics. — Greek Treachery and Cruelty. — Greek Venality. — Her Orators accepted Bribes. — Responsibility of Greek Education and Philosophy for the Ruin of Greek Civilization. — Rectitude wholly left out of her Scheme of Education. — Plato’s Contempt of Matter: it led to Contempt of Man and all his Works. — Greek Education consisted of Rhetoric and Logic; all Useful Things were hence held in Contempt.
It is a fundamental proposition of this work that selfishness is the essence of depravity, and hence the source of all social evil; and in previous chapters it has been shown, argumentatively, that exclusively subjective processes of education tend, in a high degree, to promote selfishness. Another fundamental proposition of this work is that the useful arts are the true measure of civilization, and that, as they are the product of labor, contempt of the laborer leads inevitably to social disintegration and the destruction of the State. If these propositions are true, the solution of all social problems is to be sought through a radical change in educational methods. If they are true, it is of the first importance that they be proved, not only by argument, but by the citation of such facts of history as bear upon the subject. Civilization is the product of education.[E14] If the education is good the product will be good, if evil the product will be evil. The purpose of this and the four following chapters is, therefore, to trace the progress of civilization, to sketch in bold outline the social history of man.
The aphorism, all men are created equal, is a fine phrase, but its truth is reserved for realization by the civilization of the future. A tendency to the formation of class-distinctions in human society, whether savage or civilized, is disclosed by all history.