The Encyclopaedia Britannica Company
INTRODUCTION
In your ordinary use of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, you give your attention to the one article that will answer the one question you have in your mind. The aim of this Guide is to enable you to use the Britannica for an altogether different purpose, namely, for systematic study or occasional reading on any subject.
The volumes of the Encyclopaedia Britannica contain forty-four million words—as much matter as 440 books of the ordinary octavo size. And the subjects treated—in other words, the whole sum of human knowledge—may be divided into 289 separate classes, each one completely covering the field of some one art, science, industry or other department of knowledge. By the mere use of scissors and paste the alphabetical arrangement of the articles could be done away with, and the Britannica could be reshaped into 289 different books containing, on the average, about half as much again as an ordinary octavo volume. It would misrepresent the Britannica to say that you would then have 289 text-books, because there is an essential difference in tone and purpose. A text-book is really a book intended to be used under the direction and with the assistance of a teacher, who explains it and comments upon it. The Britannica, on the other hand, owes the position it has enjoyed since the first edition appeared in 1768 to the fact that it has succeeded, as no other book has succeeded, in teaching without the interposition of a teacher.
It is not, of course, claimed that the idea of reading certain groups of Britannica articles in the order in which they will combine themselves into complete books is a novel invention. Thousands of men owe the greater part of their educational equipment to a previous edition of the Britannica. And not only did they lay out their own courses of reading without the aid of such a Guide as this, but the material at their disposal was by no means so complete as is the 11th Edition. Every edition of the Britannica before this one, and every other book of comparable size previously published, appeared volume by volume. In the case of the last complete edition before the present, no less than 14 years elapsed between the publication of the first volume and the last. It is obvious that when editors have to deal with one volume at a time, and are unable to deal with the work as a whole, there cannot be that exact fitting of the edges of one article to the edges of another which is so conspicuously a merit of the 11th Edition. All the articles in this edition were completed before a single volume was printed, and the work stood, at one stage of its preparation, in precisely the form which, as has already been said, might be given to it by merely rearranging the articles according to their subjects.
In this Guide, the principal articles dealing with the subject of each chapter are named in the order in which you may most profitably study them, and the summaries of the larger articles afford such a preliminary survey as may assist you in making your choice among the courses. Besides, where it seems necessary, there is added to the chapter a fairly complete list of all articles in the Britannica on the subject, so that the reader may make his study exhaustive.
A brief review of the six parts into which the Guide is divided will show the general features of its plan, of which a more detailed analysis is given in the Table of Contents.
Part 1 contains 30 chapters, each designed for readers engaged in, or preparing for, some specific occupation. To the beginner, who still has everything to learn, the advantages derived from such a course of study may well be so great as to make the difference between success and failure in life, and to those who have already overcome the first difficulties, to whom the only question is how marked a success awaits them, the Britannica can render invaluable service of another kind. No amount of technical training and of actual experience will lead a man of sound judgment to believe that he alone knows everything that all his competitors put together know; or that his knowledge and theirs is all that ever will be known. The 1500 contributors in 21 different countries who wrote the articles in the Britannica include the men who have made the latest advances in every department of knowledge, and who can forecast most authoritatively the results to be expected from the new methods which are now being experimentally applied in every field of activity. The experienced merchant, manufacturer, or engineer, or the man who is already firmly established in any other profession or business, will naturally find in some of the articles facts and figures which are not new to him, but he can profit by the opportunity to review, confirm, reconsider and “brush up” his previous knowledge.
Part 2 contains 30 chapters, each devoted to a course of systematic study designed to supplement, or to take the place of, some part of the usual school and college curriculum. The educational articles in the Britannica are the work of 704 professors in 146 universities and colleges in 21 different countries. No institution of learning in the world has a faculty so numerous, so authoritative, or so highly specialized. Nor has any system of home study ever been devised by which the student is brought into contact with teachers so trustworthy and so stimulating. The fascination of first-hand knowledge and the pleasure of studying pages intended not for reluctant drudges submitting themselves to a routine, but for students eager to make rapid progress, are factors in the educational value of the Britannica that cannot be overestimated, and the elasticity with which any selected course of study can be enlarged and varied is in full accordance with the modern theories of higher education.
Part 3 is devoted to the interests of children. The first of its chapters describes Britannica articles of the utmost practical value to parents, dealing with the care of children’s health, with their mental and bodily training, and with the intelligent direction of their pastimes. The second chapter indicates varied readings in the Britannica for children themselves, showing how their work at school can be made more interesting and profitable to them by entertaining reading on subjects allied to those included in their studies. The third chapter in this Part gives a number of specific questions such as children are prone to ask, as well as questions which may be put to them in order to guide their natural inquisitiveness to good purpose. The references to pages in the Britannica show where these questions are clearly and instructively answered.