the custom of schoolmasters to be eternally thundering in their pupils’
ears, as if they were pouring into a funnel, while the pupils’ business
is only to repeat what their masters have said.” He is taught that “a
tutor ... should, according to the capacity he has to deal with, put it
[the child’s mind] to the test, permitting his pupil himself to taste
and relish things, and of himself to choose and discern them.... Too
much learning stifles the soul, just as plants are stifled by too much
moisture, and lamps by too much oil. Our pedants plunder knowledge from
books, and carry it on the tips of their lips, just as birds carry seeds
to feed their young.... We toil and labor only to _stuff the memory_, but
leave the _conscience and understanding unfurnished and void_.”
[Sidenote: Twentieth century schools cram]
As late as January, 1900, Edward Bok, editor of the _Ladies’ Home
Journal_, wrote concerning the cramming process of the popular schools:
“Do American men and women realize that in five cities of our country
alone there were, during the last school term, _over sixteen thousand
children_ between the ages of eight and fourteen taken out of the public
schools because their nervous systems were wrecked, and their minds were
incapable of going on any further in the infernal cramming system which
exists to-day in our schools?... Conservative medical men who have given
their lives to the study of children place the number whose health is
shattered by overstudy at more than 50,000 each year.... It is cramming,
cramming, cramming. A certain amount of ‘ground must be gone over,’ as
it is usually called. Whether the child is physically able to work the
‘ground’ does not enter into the question.”
The writer dwells upon the evils of night study, and continues: “True
reform always begins at the root of all evils, and the root of the evil
of home study lies in the cramming system.”
[Sidenote: Mrs. Lew Wallace on cramming]
Mrs. Lew Wallace says: “Go into any public school, and you will see girls
pallid as day lilies and boys with flat chests and the waxen skin that
has been named the school complexion. Every incentive and stimulus is
held out; dread of blame, love of praise, prizes, medals, badges, the
coveted flourish in the newspapers—the strain never slackens.... The
burden is _books_. The tasks imposed on the young are fearful. The effort
seems to be to make text-books as difficult and complicated as possible
instead of smoothing the hill so high and hard to climb.”
In her characteristic style, Mrs. Wallace condemns the usual methods of
teaching arithmetic and language:—
“Said a mother, ‘Two and two are what?’”
“The boy hesitated.
“‘Surely you know that two and two make four.’
“‘Yes, mama; but I am trying to remember the process.’
“Process, indeed!...
“One day Mary was bending over a tablet writing words on both sides of a
straight line, like multiplied numerators and denominators.
“‘What are you at now?’ asked grandma.
“Mary answered with pride, ‘I am diagraming.’
“‘In the name of sense, what’s diagraming?’
“‘It’s mental discipline. Miss Cram says I have a fine mind that needs
developing. Look here, grandma, now this is the correct placing of
elements. _Fourscore_ and _seven_ are joined by the word _and_, a
subordinate connective copulative conjunction. It modifies _years_, the
attribute of the preposition. _Ago_ is a modal verb of past time. The
root of the first clause is—.
“‘Why, that’s Lincoln’s speech at Gettysburg. I keep it in my work-basket
and know it by heart.’
“‘Indeed! Well, _ours_ is a simple personal—.’
“‘That’s enough. If President Lincoln had been brought up on such stuff,
that speech would never have been written. He called a noun a noun, and
was done with it.’”[173]
Montaigne could scarcely have given a more vivid description had he seen
the grind of modern education, where grades are strictly kept, and all
children, the strong and the tender alike, are forced through the same
process. There is no relief save in dropping by the wayside when disease
fastens its tendrils on the human frame.
Against this system all educational reformers have striven, but it
remains with us still. Christian parents, could they see the relative
value of soul and mental culture, would demand the establishment of a new
order of things. Christian education alone can effect a cure.
[Sidenote: Nature-study to prevent cramming]
Comenius strove to correct this error by the introduction of
nature-study. He says: “The right instruction of youth does not consist
in cramming them with a mass of words, phrases, sentences, and opinions
collected from authors, but in unfolding the understanding, that many
little streams may flow therefrom as from a living fountain.... Why shall
we not, instead of dead books, open the living book of nature? Not the
shadows of things, but the things themselves, which make an impression on
the senses and the imagination, are to be brought before youth. By actual
observation, not by a verbal description of things, must instruction
begin.... Men must be led as far as possible to draw their wisdom, not
from books, but from a consideration of heaven and earth, oaks and
beeches; that is, they must know and examine things themselves, and not
simply be contented with the observations and testimony of others.”
His fundamental principles were, “Education is a development of the whole
man,” and “Many studies are to be avoided as dissipating the mental
strength.”
[Sidenote: Modern science study and doubt]
A long stride was taken by Comenius toward breaking the mechanical
teaching of the papacy. The error into which his followers fall is in
making nature the all in all, failing to recognize the Word of God as the
only guide and interpreter of natural phenomena. This mistake has led
modern schools to take the position in science studies which is described
in the following words by Frank S. Hoffman, professor of philosophy in
one of America’s leading theological schools: “Every man, because he is
a man, is endowed with powers for forming judgments, and he is placed
in this world to develop and apply those powers to all the objects with
which he comes in contact.”[174] In such words does he plainly state that
human reason is the means by which man is to obtain his wisdom. Then
follows his explanation of the method of procedure when reason has been
thus exalted. These are his words: “In every sphere of investigation he
[man] should _begin with doubt_, and the student will make the most rapid
progress _who has acquired THE ART OF DOUBTING WELL_.”
Suppose, now, that the subject under consideration is some newly
discovered natural phenomenon, and the student of nature wishes to
investigate. According to Professor Hoffman, a modern theologian, and
hence a teacher, he must “begin with doubt, and the student will make
the most rapid progress who has acquired the art of doubting well.”
Christian education, in contrast with this method, says, “Through faith
we understand.”
[Sidenote: Methods in Sciences and theology]
That this method of study—to begin with doubt—is not only applicable
to the natural sciences, but to the study of spiritual truths also,
Professor Hoffman continues: “We ask that every student of theology
take up the subject precisely as he would any other science: _that he
begin with doubt_, and carefully weigh the arguments for every doctrine,
accepting or rejecting each assertion according as the balance of
probabilities is for or against it.... We believe that even the teachings
of Jesus should be viewed from this standpoint, and should be accepted or
rejected on the ground of their inherent reasonableness.”
Thus the spirit of doubt with which the child is taught to study nature,
goes with him through all his school years; it grows with his growth;
and if he enters a theological school to prepare for the ministry, he is
confronted by the same method in the investigation of the teachings of
Christ. What wonder that the results of modern education are a class of
infidels and skeptics?
The words of President Harper, of Chicago University, are worth
repeating: “It is difficult to prophesy what the results of our present
method of educating the youth will be in fifty years. We are training
the mind in the public schools, but the moral side in the child’s nature
is almost entirely neglected.” Not only is it neglected, but faith is
trampled to the ground, and human reason exalted above its prostrate
form. “_When the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?_” A
pertinent question, indeed, for educators to answer.
[Sidenote: The method of “doubt” is Socratic]
This method of doubting is papal, and can be traced directly to Socrates,
the Greek. Of him, we read: “Socrates was not a ‘philosopher,’ nor yet a
‘teacher,’ but rather an ‘educator,’ having for his function ‘to rouse,
persuade, and rebuke’.... _Socrates’ theory of education had for its
basis a PROFOUND AND CONSISTENT CONCEPTION._”[175]
In dealing with his students, the same authority thus states his method
of procedure: “Taking his departure from some apparently remote principle
or proposition to which the respondent yielded a ready assent, Socrates
would draw from it an unexpected but undeniable consequence which was
plainly inconsistent with the opinion impugned. In this way he brought
his interlocutor to pass judgment upon himself, and reduced him to a
state _of doubt_ or perplexity. ‘Before I ever met you,’ says Meno, in a
dialogue which Plato called by his name, ‘I was told _that you spent your
time in doubting and leading others to doubt:_ and it is a fact that your
witcheries and spells have brought me to that condition; you are like the
torpedo; as it benumbs anyone who approaches and touches it, so do you.’”
We can readily trace the connection between the Socratic method of
doubting and the same method as advocated by the professor of the
theological school, for “his [Socrates’s] practice led to the Platonic
revival,” and the Platonic system of education and its introduction in
modern schools has been too thoroughly discussed in previous pages to
need repetition here.
[Sidenote: “Doubt” taught in modern schools]
The Socratic method of teaching—the development of doubt—seems to
characterize much of the teaching of to-day, if we can judge from an
article which appeared in the _Outlook_, written by the editor, Lyman
Abbott. The educational work is thus described:—
“The educational processes of our time—possibly of all time—are largely
analytical and critical. They consist chiefly in analyzing the subjects
brought to the student for examination, separating them into their
constituent parts, considering how they have been put together, and
sitting in judgment on the finished fabric or on the process by which it
has been constructed.
“Thus all, or nearly all, study is analytical, critical,—a process of
inquiry and investigation. The process presupposes an inquiring if not
a skeptical mood. _Doubt_ is the pedagogue which leads the pupil to
_knowledge_.
“Does he study the human body?—Dissection and anatomy are the foundations
of his study. Chemistry?—The laboratory furnishes him the means of
analysis and inquiry into physical substances. History?—He questions
the statements which have been unquestioned heretofore, ransacks
libraries for authorities in ancient volumes and more ancient documents.
Literature?—The poem which he read only to enjoy he now subjects
to the scalpel, inquires whether it really is beautiful, why it is
beautiful, how its meter should be classified, how its figures have been
constructed. Philosophy?—He subjects his own consciousness to a process
of vivisection in an endeavor to ascertain the physiology and anatomy of
the human spirit; brings his soul into the laboratory that he may learn
its chemical constituents.
“Meanwhile the constructive and synthetic process is relegated to a
second place, or lost sight of altogether. Does he study medicine?—He
gives more attention to diagnosis than to therapeutics; to the analysis
of disease than to the problem how to overcome it. Law?—He spends
more time in analyzing cases than in developing power to grasp great
principles and apply them in the administration of justice to varying
conditions. The classics?—It is strange if he has not at graduation
spent more weeks in the syntax and grammar of the language than he has
spent hours in acquiring and appreciating the thought and the spirit
of the great classic authors. It has been well and truly said of the
modern student that he does not study grammar to understand Homer, he
reads Homer to get the Greek grammar. His historical study has given him
dates, events, a mental historical chart; perhaps, too, it has given him
a scholar’s power to discriminate between the true and the false, the
historical and the mythical in ancient legends: but not to many has it
given an understanding of the significance of events, a comprehension
of, or even new light upon, the real meaning of the life of man on the
earth. Has he been studying philosophy?—Happy he is if, as a result of
his analysis of self-consciousness, he has not become morbid respecting
his own inner life, or cynically skeptical concerning the inner life of
others.
“It is doubtless in the realm of ethics and religion that the disastrous
results of a too exclusive analytical process and a too exclusive
critical spirit are seen. Carrying the same spirit, applying the same
methods, to the investigation of religion, the Bible becomes to him
simply a collection of ancient literature, whose sources, structure, and
forms he studies, whose spirit, he, at least for the time, forgets;
worship is a ritual whose origin, rise, and development he investigates;
whose _real significance_ as an expression of penitence, gratitude,
and consecration he loses sight of altogether. _Faith_ is a series of
tenets whose biological development he traces; or a form of consciousness
whose relation to brain action he inquires into; or whose growth by
evolutionary processes out of earlier states he endeavors to retrace.
“Vivisection is almost sure sooner or later to become a post-mortem;
and the subject of it, whether it be a flower, a body, an author, or an
experience, generally dies under the scalpel. It is for this reason that
so many students in school, academy, and college lose not merely their
theology, which is perhaps no great loss, but their religion, which is an
irreparable loss, while they are acquiring an education.”[176]
[Sidenote: Ministers accept Socratic reasoning]
This spirit of doubt characterizes the teachings of modern higher
critics. The critical study of the Bible, Dr. Newton tells us, “has
disposed forever of the claim that it is such an oracle of God as we can
submit our intellects to unquestioningly.” “Dr. Briggs says that there
are three co-ordinate authorities—the church, the Bible, and reason. ‘But
when they disagree, which is to be the final court of appeal?’ asks Dr.
Newton. ‘They do disagree widely to-day.’ Dr. Newton believes that the
ultimate court of appeal is reason,—not the reason of Thomas Paine and
the present-day realistic rationalists, but rather the ‘_Divine Reason_’
_of Socrates and of Plato_.... Reason in this sense means not merely
or chiefly the rationalizing faculty, but the moral nature—the whole
spiritual being of man. ‘It is what conscience teaches, as well as what
intellect affirms, that, together with the voice of the heart, forms the
trinity of true authority—of reason.’”[177]
[Sidenote: Secular methods and religious truths]
This is indeed the exaltation of reason. There is, in such a system,
no room whatever for faith. W. T. Harris, United States Commissioner
of Education, writing of Sunday-schools, attributes their decline to
the adoption, by Sunday-school teachers, of the methods employed in the
secular schools. A few words from him will suffice. He says: “With the
spectacle of the systematic organization of the secular schools and the
improvement of methods of teaching before them, the leaders in the church
have endeavored to perfect the methods of the religious instruction of
youth. They have met the following dangers which lay in their path;
namely, first, the danger of adopting methods of instruction in religion
which were fit and proper only for secular instruction; second, the
selection of religious matter for the course of study which did not lead
in a most direct manner toward vital religion, although it would readily
take on a pedagogic form.”[178]
In order to show the reason why methods which are perfectly proper in
giving secular education are not adapted to religious instruction, Mr.
Harris explains: “The secular school gives positive instruction. It
teaches mathematics, natural science, history, and language. Knowledge
of the facts can be precise and accurate, and a similar knowledge of
the principles can be arrived at. The self-activity of the pupil is
... demanded by the teacher of the secular school. The pupil must not
take things on authority, but must test and verify.... He must trace
out the mathematical demonstrations.... He must learn the method of
investigating facts.... The spirit of the secular school therefore comes
to be an enlightening one, although not of the highest order.”
The whole tendency of secular education, according to Mr. Harris, is
to develop a spirit of investigation and proof. This, he says, is a
means of enlightening, but not of the highest order. The highest means
of enlightening the mind is by faith. That is God’s method. Christian
schools must avoid the secular methods of instruction, adopting in their
stead that highest form of enlightening,—faith. That separates Christian
schools from secular schools in methods as well as in the subject matter
taught.
[Sidenote: Secular methods require material proof]
This secular method of investigation saps the spiritual life, and
is responsible for the decline in modern Protestantism. Mr. Harris
continues: “Religious education, it is obvious in giving the highest
results of thought and life to the young, must cling to the form of
authority, and not attempt to borrow the methods of mathematics,
science, and history from the secular school. Such borrowing will result
only in giving the young people an overweening confidence in the
finality of their own immature judgments. They will become conceited
and shallow-minded.... Against this danger of sapping or undermining
all authority in religion by the introduction of the methods of the
secular school which lay stress on the self-activity of the child, the
Sunday-school has not been sufficiently protected in the more recent
years of its history.”
If the adoption of secular methods of teaching in the Sunday-school,
where children are instructed one day only in the week, has so weakened
Protestantism, what must be the result when children are daily taught in
the public schools by methods which tend always to exalt human reason
above faith. It is little wonder that five days’ instruction can not be
counteracted by the very best Sabbath instruction even in those schools
which have not adopted secular methods in teaching the Bible.
Protestants should learn from this that in starting Christian schools the
methods followed in the secular schools can not be adopted. Here is the
stumbling-block over which many are apt to fall. Religious instruction
demands methods of teaching which will develop faith.
[Sidenote: Religion in schools of Comenius]
I can not refrain from recurring to the teachings of Comenius, since
they so strongly opposed the methods of education followed by those who,
to-day, claim to be his disciples. James H. Blodgett says: “Comenius,
anticipating more modern leaders in the philosophy and the art of
education, prepared an outline of the Pansophic School about 1650, in
which the work of a complete education was divided for seven classes.
The general school was to spend the first hour of the morning in hymns,
Bible reading, and prayers.”[179] “Class III, the Atrial,” we are told
by the same writer, “was to have the inscription, ‘Let no one enter who
can not speak.’ In this class the boys should begin to read the Bible....
The history of this class is the famous deeds of the Biblical narrative.”
Of Class IV we read: “A special collection of hymns and psalms must be
arranged for this class; also an epitome of the New Testament, which
should comprise a continuous life of Christ and His apostles, compiled
from the four Gospels.... The accessory study is Greek.... It is
comparatively easy to learn to read the New Testament [in Greek], and
this is the chief utility of the study.” Bible study formed an important
feature of the work of Class V, for concerning its work we read: “A Bible
Manual, also, called the Gate of the Sanctuary, is to be placed in the
pupils’ hands. This is to contain the whole of Scripture history in the
words of the Bible, but so digested that it may be read in one year.”
Class VII was theological; and the reader will readily note the
difference between the course of instruction marked out for it by
Comenius, and that suggested by Professor Hoffman for theological
students in the twentieth century. “Inscription over the door: ‘Let
no one enter who is irreligious.’ ... The class book should be a work
dealing with the last stage of wisdom on earth, that is to say, the
communion of souls with God. Universal history should be studied, and in
particular the history of the church for whose sake the world exists....
The future minister must learn how to address a congregation, and should
be taught the laws of sacred oratory.”
Let it be remembered that Comenius was a bishop of the Moravian Brethren,
a denomination noted for its extensive missionary work, its missions
dotting the earth. Their activity in church work can readily be accounted
for by their system of education. Any Protestant church which wishes to
survive, and desires the spread of its principles, must see that its
children are educated spiritually as well as mentally and physically.
[Sidenote: Christian education emphasizes practical]
We are now brought to consider another very important phase of
education,—the relation of mental to physical training. False systems
have ever exalted the former to the neglect of the latter. Christ
combined the two, and educators from the seventeenth century on have
presented correct views on the subject.
Locke begins his “Thoughts on Education” with these words: “A sound mind
in a sound body is a short but full description of a happy state in this
world.” “The attainment of this happy condition,” observes Painter,
“is the end of education.... In his [Locke’s] mind, the function of
education was to form noble men well equipped for the duties of practical
life.”[180]
A PURE SOUL IN A SOUND BODY SHOULD PRECEDE STUDY OF MERE FACTS. Locke’s
ideas of education are thus described by Quick: “His aim was to give
a boy a robust mind in a robust body. His body was to endure hardness,
his reason was to teach him self-denial. But this result was to be
brought about by leading, not driving him. He was to be trained, not
for the university, but for the world. Good principles, good manners,
and discretion were to be cared for first of all; intelligence and
intellectual activity next; and actual knowledge last of all.... The
prevalent drill in the grammar of the classical languages was to be
abandoned, and the mother-tongue was to be carefully studied.... In
everything the part the pupil was to play in life was steadily to be kept
in view.”
And yet to-day, when the editor of one of our magazines proposed that our
university students discuss the question, “What order of studies is best
suited to fit the average man for his duties in the world of to-day?” or,
“What is the relative importance of the various branches of education
in fitting a man to secure his own happiness and rendering him a useful
citizen and neighbor?” the president of Yale University replied: “Some
of the men hesitate to give the official sanction of the university to
a debate on short notice on questions of which most of the contestants
know very little. Why should not our university students know and choose
the practical studies? If they do not know them, why not?”[181]
[Sidenote: Manual training and mathematics]