Homer ought to be driven from the lists and whipt, and Archilochus likewise.—Heraclitus.
Thou needs must have knowledge of all things,
First of the steadfast core of the Truth that forceth conviction,
Then of the notions of mortals, where true conviction abides not.
—Parmenides.
All things were undistinguished: then Intellect came and brought them into order.—Anaxagoras.
Man is the measure of all things.
In regard to the Gods, I am unable to know whether they are or are not.—Protagoras.
Strepsiades. Don't you see what a good thing it is to have learning? There isn't any Zeus, Phidippides!
Phidippides. Who is there then?
Streps. Vortex rules, having dethroned Zeus.
Phid. Pshaw! what nonsense!
Streps. You may count it true, all the same.
Phid. Who says so?
Streps. Socrates the Melian, and Chærephon, who knows the footprints of fleas.—Aristophanes, Clouds.
There is an old-fashioned saw, current of yore among mortals, that a man's happiness, when full-grown, gives birth and dies not childless, and that from Fortune there springs insatiate woe for all his race. But I, dissenting from all others, am alone of different mind. It is the Irreverent Deed that begets after it more of its kind. For to righteous homes belongs a fair-childrened lot forever; but old Irreverence is sure to beget Irreverence, springing up fresh among evil men, when the numbered hour arrives. And the new Irreverence begets Surfeit of Wealth, and a power beyond all battle, beyond all war, unholy Daring, twin curses, black to homes, like to their parents. But Justice shines in smoky homes, and honors the righteous life, and, leaving, with averted eyes, foundations gilded with impurity of hands, she draws nigh to holy things, honoring not the power of wealth, with its counterfeit stamp of praise. And her will is done.—Æschylus.
From the time they are children to the day of their death, we teach them and admonish them. As soon as the child understands what is said to him, his nurse and his mother and his pedagogue and even his father vie with each other in trying to make the best of him that can be made, at every word and deed instructing him and warning him, "This is right," "This is wrong," "This is beautiful," "This is ugly," "This is righteous," "This is sinful," "Do this," "Don't do that." And if the child readily obeys, well and good; if he does not, then they treat him like a bent and twisted stick, straightening him out with threats and blows. Later on, they send him to school, and then they lay their injunctions upon the masters to pay much more attention to the good behavior of their sons than to their letters and music (κιθάρισις); and the teachers act upon these injunctions. Later yet, when they have learnt to read, and are proceeding to understand the meaning of what is written, just as formerly they understood what was said to them, they put before them on the benches to read the works of good poets, and insist upon their learning them by heart—works which contain many admonitions, and many narratives, noble deeds, and eulogies of the worthy men of old—their purpose being to awaken the boy's ambition, so that he may imitate these men and strive to be worthy likewise. The music-teachers also, pursuing the same line, try to inculcate self-control (σωφροσύνη) and to prevent the boys from falling into mischief. In addition to this, when they have learnt to play on the lyre, their masters teach them other poems, written by great lyric poets, making them sing them and play the accompaniments to them, and compelling them to work into their souls the rhythms and melodies of them, so that they may grow in gentleness, and, having their natures timed and tuned, may be fitted to speak and act. The truth is, the whole life of man needs timing and tuning. Furthermore, in addition to all this, parents send their sons to the physical trainer, in order that their bodies may be improved and rendered capable of seconding a noble intent, and they themselves not be forced, from physical deterioration, to play the coward in war or other (serious) matters. And those who can best afford to give this education, give most of it, and these are the richest people. Their sons go earliest to school and leave it latest. And when the boys leave school, the State insists that they shall learn the laws and live according to them, and not according to their own caprice ... And if any one transgresses these laws, the State punishes him ... Seeing that so much attention is devoted to virtue, both in the family and in the State, do you wonder, Socrates, and question whether virtue be something that can be taught? Surely you ought not to wonder at this, but rather to wonder if it could not be taught.—Plato, Protagoras (words of Protagoras).
"Isn't it true, Lysis," said I, "that your parents love you very much?"—"To be sure," said he.—"Then they would wish you to be as happy as possible?"—"Of course," said he.—"And do you think a person is happy who is a slave, and is not allowed to do anything he desires?"—"I don't, indeed," said he.—"Then, if your father and mother love you and wish you to be happy, they endeavor by every means in their power to make you happy."—"To be sure they do," said he.—"Then they allow you to do anything you please, and never chide you, or prevent you from doing what you desire."—"By Jove! they do, Socrates: they prevent me from doing a great many things."—"What do you mean," said I; "they wish you to be happy, and yet prevent you from doing what you wish? Let us take an example: If you want to ride in one of your father's chariots, and to hold the reins, when it is competing in a race, won't they allow you, or will they prevent you?"—"By Jove! no: they would not allow me," said he. "But why should they? There is a charioteer, who is hired by my father."—"What do you mean? They allow a hired man, rather than you, to do what he likes with the horses, and pay him a salary besides?"—"And why not?" said he.—"Well then, I suppose they allow you to manage the mule-team, and if you wanted to take the whip and whip it, they would permit you."—"How could they?" said he.—"What?" said I: "is nobody allowed to whip it?"—"Of course," he said; "the muleteer."—"A slave or a free man?"—"A slave," said he.—"And so it seems they think more of a slave than of their son, and entrust their property to him rather than to you, and allow him to do what he pleases, whereas they prevent you. But, farther, tell me this. Do they allow you to manage yourself, or do they not even trust you to that extent?"—"How trust me?" said he.—"Then does some one manage you?"—"Yes, my pedagogue here," said he.—"But he is surely not a slave?"—"Of course he is, our slave," said he.—"Is it not strange," said I, "that a freeman should be governed by a slave? But, to continue, what is this pedagogue doing when he governs you?"—"Taking me to a teacher, or something of the kind," he said.—"And these teachers, it cannot be that they too govern you?"—"To any extent."—"So then your father likes to set over you a host of masters and managers; but, of course, when you go home to your mother, she lets you do what you like, in order to make you happy, either with the threads or the loom, when she is weaving—does she not? She surely doesn't in the least prevent you from handling the batten, or the comb, or any of the instruments used in spinning."—And he, laughing, said: "By Jove, Socrates; she not only prevents me, but I should be beaten if I touched them."—"By Hercules," said I, "isn't it true that you have done some wrong to your father and mother?"—"By Jove, not I," he said.—"But for what reason, then, do they so anxiously prevent you from being happy, and doing what you please, and maintain you the whole day in servitude to some one or another, and without power to do almost anything you like. It seems, indeed, that you derive no advantage from all this wealth, but anybody manages it rather than you, nor from your body, nobly born as it is, but some one else shepherds it and takes care of it. But you govern nothing, Lysis, and do nothing that you desire."—"The reason, Socrates," he said, "is, that I am not of age."—Plato, Lysis.
The present state of the constitution is as follows: Citizenship is a right of children whose parents are both of them citizens. Registration as member of a deme or township takes place when eighteen years of age are completed. Before it takes place the townsmen of the deme find a verdict on oath, firstly, whether they believe the youth to be as old as the law requires, and if the verdict is in the negative he returns to the ranks of the boys. Secondly, the jury find whether he is freeborn and legitimate. If the verdict is against him he appeals to the Heliæa, and the municipality delegate five of their body to accuse him of illegitimacy. If he is found by the jurors to have been illegally proposed for the register, the State sells him for a slave; if the judgment is given in his favor, he must be registered as one of the municipality. Those on the register are afterwards examined by the senate, and if anyone is found not to be eighteen years old, a fine is imposed on the municipality by which he was registered. After approbation, they are called epheboi, or cadets, and the parents of all who belong to a single tribe hold a meeting and, after being sworn, choose three men of the tribe above forty years of age, whom they believe to be of stainless character and fittest for the superintendence of youth, and out of these the commons in ecclesia select one superintendent for all of each tribe, and a governor of the whole body of youths from the general body of the Athenians. These take them in charge, and after visiting with them all the temples, march down to Piræus, where they garrison the north and south harbors, Munychia and Acte. The commons also elect two gymnastic trainers for them, and persons who teach them to fight in heavy armor, to draw the bow, to throw the javelin, and to handle artillery. Each of the ten commanders receives as pay a drachma [about 20 cts.] per diem, and each of the cadets four obols [about 13 cts.]. Each commander draws the pay of the cadets of his own tribe, buys with it the necessaries of life for the whole band (for they mess together by tribes), and purveys for all their wants. The first year is spent in military exercises. The second year the commons meet in the theatre and the cadets, after displaying before them their mastery in warlike evolutions, are each presented with a shield and spear, and become mounted patrols of the frontier and garrison the fortresses. They perform this service for two years, wearing the equestrian cloak and enjoying immunity from civic functions. During this period, to guard their military duties from interruption, they can be parties to no action either as defendant or plaintiff, except in suits respecting inheritance, or heiresses, or successions to hereditary priesthoods. When the three years are completed they fall into the ordinary body of citizens.—Aristotle, Constitution of Athens (Poste's Version, with slight alterations).
That perfect harmony between power and worth at which the Athenian State aimed, was something not easily attained or preserved. As far back as its recorded history reaches, we find a struggle for power going on between a party which possessed more power than its worth justified, and a party which possessed less; that is, between a party which, having once been worthy, strove to hold power in virtue of its past history, and one that claimed power in virtue of the worth into which it was growing: in a word, a struggle between declining aristocracy and growing democracy. To the party in power, of course, this seemed a rebellion against lawful authority and privilege, and it did its best to suppress it. Hence came the rigorous legislation of Draco; later the more conciliatory, less out-spoken, but equally aristocratic legislation of Solon; then the tyranny of Pisistratus, lasting as long as he could hold the balance of power between the contending parties; then the constitution of Clisthenes, with the breaking up of the old Athenian aristocratic system, the remodelling of the tribes, the degradation of the Areopagus, and the definite triumph of democracy. To complete the movement and, as it were, to consecrate it, came the Persian Wars, which mark the turning-point, the peripeteia, in Athenian history and education. Whatever efforts aristocracy makes to maintain itself after this, are made in the name of, and under cover of a zeal for, democracy.
The aristocratic Athenian State was based upon land-ownership, slavery, and the entire freedom of the land-owning class from all but family and State duties, from all need of engaging in productive industry. So long as the chief wealth of the State consisted in land and its produce, so long the population was divided into two classes, the rich and the poor, and so long the former had little difficulty in keeping all power in its own hands. But no sooner did the growth of commerce throw wealth into the hands of a class that owned no land, and was not above engaging in industry, than this class began to claim a share in political power. There were now two wealthy classes, standing opposed to each other, a proud, conservative one, with "old wealth and worth," and a vain, radical one, with new wealth and wants, both bidding for the favor of the class that had little wealth, little worth, and many wants, and thus making it feel its importance. Such is the origin of Athenian democracy. It is the child of trade and productive industry. It owed its final consecration to the Persian Wars, and especially to the battle of Salamis, in which Athens was saved by her fleet, manned chiefly by marines (ἐπιβάται) from the lower classes, the upper classes, as we have seen, being trained only for land-service. Thus the battle of Salamis was not only a victory of Greece over Persia, but of foreign trade over home agriculture, of democracy over aristocracy.
The fact that the Athenian democracy owed its origin to trade determined, in great measure, its history and tendencies. One of its many results was that it opened Athens to the influx of foreign men, foreign ideas, and foreign habits, not to speak of foreign gods, all of which tended to break up the old self-contained, carefully organized life of the people. In no department were their effects sooner or more clearly felt than in that of education. From about the date of the battle of Salamis, when the youthful Ionian, Anaxagoras, came to Athens, a succession of men of "advanced" ideas in art and science sought a field of action within her borders. Such a field, indeed, seemed purposely to have been left open for them by the State, which had provided no means of intellectual or moral education for its young citizens, after they passed under its care (see [p. 87]). Nothing was easier or more profitable than for these wise foreigners to constitute themselves public teachers, and fill the place which the State had left vacant. The State might occasionally object, and seek to punish one or another of them for corrupting of the youth by the promulgation of impious or otherwise dangerous ideas, as it did in the case of Anaxagoras; but their activity was too much in harmony with a tendency of the time,—a radical and individualistic tendency inseparable from democracy,—to be dispensed with altogether. Hence it was that, within a few years after the battle of Salamis, there flourished in Athens a class of men unknown before within her boundaries, a class of private professors, or "sophists," as they called themselves, who undertook to teach theoretically what the State had assumed could be taught only practically and by herself, viz., virtue and wisdom. Their ideas were novel, striking, and radical, hence congenial to a newly emancipated populace, vain of its recent achievements, and contemptuous of all that savored of the narrow, pious puritanism of the old time; their premises were magnificent, and their fees high enough to impose upon a class that always measures the value of a thing by what it is asked to pay for it; their method of teaching was such as to flatter the vanity, and secure the favor, of both pupils and parents. No wonder that their success was immediate and their influence enormous.
From the days of Socrates to our own, 'sophist' has been a term of reproach, and not altogether unjustly so. Hegel, Grote, and Zeller have, indeed, shown that the sophists did not deserve all the obloquy which has attached itself to their name, inasmuch as they were neither much better nor much worse than any class of men who set up to teach new doctrines for money, and, as wise economists, suit supply to demand; nevertheless, it may be fairly enough said that they largely contributed to demoralize Athens, by encouraging irreverence for the very conceptions upon which her polity was built, and by pandering to some of the most selfish and individualistic tendencies of democracy. If it be said that they have their place in the history of human evolution, as the heralds of that higher view of life which allows the individual a sphere of activities and interests outside of that occupied by the State, this may at once and without difficulty be admitted, without our being thereby forced to regard them as noble men. The truth is, they represented, in practice and in theory, the spirit of individualism, which was then everywhere asserting itself against the spirit of nationalism or polity, and which perhaps had to assert itself in an exaggerated and destructive way, before the rightful claims of the two could be manifested and harmonized. It is the incorporation of this spirit of individualism into education that constitutes the "New Education."