At the bottom of the first page of the translation of Emile by Miss Worthington is a note by Jules Steeg, Depute, Paris, bearing on the above first paragraph and running as follows: "It is useless to enlarge upon the absurdity of this theory, and upon the flagrant contradiction into which Rousseau allows himself to fall. If he is right, man ought to be left without education, and the earth without cultivation. This would not be even the savage state. But want of space forbids us to pause at each like statement of our author, who at once busies himself in nullifying it." Opposing statements like these are certainly enough to place the student in a dilemma.
Proper attitude of the student toward authorities.
Here are contradictions in political and religious beliefs and news items; very different interpretations of historical events; exaggerations bordering on misrepresentations; and evident omissions and absurdities on the part of educational philosophers. The weather bureau represents Old Reliability herself, in comparison with authors. What attitude shall the adult student assume toward such contradictory and faulty statements? Shall he regard himself as only a follower, taking each presentation of thought at its face value, sitting humbly at the feet of supposed specialists, and carefully preserving in memory as many of their principal opinions and conclusions as possible? Shall he assume the position of a mere receiver and collector?
That is manifestly impossible, for that would mean an ego divided a thousand times. It would prevent the final using of knowledge by the learner, instead of directing its use wisely; for the many opposing ideas and cross purposes would nullify one another. Besides that, wise application requires far more than a good memory as a guide, since memory takes no account of the adaptations always required by new conditions.
Whether he likes it or not, the student cannot escape the responsibility of determining for himself the fairness and general reliability of the newspapers and magazines that he reads; he must expect bias in historians, and must measure the extent of it as well as he can by studying their biographies and by observing their care in regard to data and logic; he must scrutinize very critically the ideas of the world's greatest essayists and dramatists. If a philosopher, like Rousseau, offers brilliant truths on one page, and equally brilliant perversions of truth on the next page, the student must ponder often and long in order to keep his bearings; and if footnotes attempt to point out some of these absurdities, he must decide for himself whether Rousseau or the commentator shows the superior wisdom. "Above all," says Koopman, "he [the student] must make sure how far he can trust the author." [Footnote: Koopman, The Mastery of Books, p. 47.]
"Read not to contradict and confute, nor to believe and take for granted, nor to find talk and discourse, but to weigh and consider," says Bacon. [Footnote: Bacon's Essays Of Studies.]
Every book we read may be made a round in the ever-lengthening ladder by which we climb to knowledge and to that temperance and serenity of mind which, as it is the ripest fruit of wisdom, is also the sweetest. But this can only be if we read such books as make us think, and read them in such a way as helps them to do so, that is, by endeavoring to judge them, and thus to make them an exercise rather than a relaxation of the mind. Desultory reading except as conscious pastime, hebetates the brain and slackens the bow string of Will. [Footnote: Lowell, Books and Libraries.]
The student, therefore, must set himself up as judge of whatever ideas appear before him. They are up for trial on their soundness and worth; he must uncover their merits and defects, and pass judgment on their general value. If he is hasty and careless, he suffers the penalty of bad judgment; and if he refrains from judging at all, he becomes one who "does not know his own mind," a weakling.
Who reads
Incessantly, and to his reading brings not
A spirit and judgment equal or superior
Uncertain and unsettled still remains,
Deep versed in books and shallow in himself.
[Footnote: Milton, Paradise Regained, Book 4, line 322.]
The necessity of this attitude in the acceptance as well as in the rejection of ideas.