Means and Ends of Education

t all adversity;-bright fancies, satisfied memories, noble histories, faithful sayings, treasure-houses of precious and restful thoughts;

be brave men and worthy patriots, dear

ies contain, for the most part, books as dry and lifeless as the dust that gathers on them: bu

h. But in his eyes the flowers also, the flowing water, the fresh air, the floating clouds, chi

s communion with the thought and love, the hope and faith of the noble dead, and, in thus enlarging itself, to become the inspiration and source of richer and wider life for those who follow. As parents are consoled by the thought of surviving in their descendants, great minds are upheld and strengthened in their ceaseless labors by the hope of entering as an added impulse to better things, from generation to generation, into the lives of thousands. The greatest misfortune which can befall genius is to be sold to the advocacy of what is not truth and love and goodness and beauty. The proper translation of t

are borne to bless his fellowmen. If he who gives a cup of water in the right spirit does God's work, so does he who sows or reaps, or builds or sweeps, or utters helpful truth or plays with children or cheers the lonely, or does any other fair or useful thing. Take not seriously one who treats with derision men or books

eels, says or does, whatever happens within the sphere of his conscious life, may be made the means of self-improvement. "He is not born for glory," says Vauvenargues, "who knows not the worth of ti

s instructive as it is delightful, but it is seldom in our power to call around us those with whom we should wish to hold discourse; and hence we go back to the emancipated spirits, who having transcended the bounds of time and space, are wherever they are desired and are always ready to entertain whoever seeks their company. Genius neither can nor will discover its secret. Why his thought has such a mould

it is as delighted as children making escape from restraining w

pleasing without teaching that of lying. The discouraged are already vanquished. In judging the deed let not the character of the doer influence thy opinion, for good is good, evil evil, by whomsoever done. When the author is rightly inspired his words need not interpretation. They are as natural and as beautiful as the faces of children or as new-blown flowers, and their meaning is plain. The spirit and love of dogmatism is characteristic of the imperfectly educated. As there is a commu

nmesh us more hopelessly in error. Deeper knowledge is the remedy for the foolishness of sciolism: like cures like. In the books in which men worth knowing have put some of the vital quality which makes them wor

when we are asked to point out the books one should learn to love, we are confronted with much the same difficulty as had we been asked to name the persons whom he should make his friends. A book can have worth for us only when we have learned to love it; and since a real book, like a real man, has its proper character, it is not easy to determine whom it will please or displease. Once it has taken a safe place in literature, it will, of course, be praised by everybody; but this, like the praise of men, is often meaningless. All who read know something about the great books, but their knowledge, unless it leads them to intimate acquaintance with some one or several of these books, has little worth. Books are, indeed, a world whi

of things become plain only when things are clothed in words, which, in truth, are things, being nothing else than the very form and body of nature as it reveals itself within the mind of man. The world is chiefly a mental fact. From mind it receives the forms of time and space, the principle of causality, color, warmth, and beauty. Were there no mind, there would be no world. The end of man is the pursuit of perfection, through communion with God, his fellows, and na

sorrow and suffering. We pity the hard-driven beast of burden. How then is it possible to look with complacency on a world in which multitudes of human beings are condemned to the work of the ox and the ass? For the healthy man, wealth and happiness would seem to be identical, if his desires are con

nds they are ready to profess to hold opinions and beliefs about which they care nothing or which they really do not accept

ought and deed, to find the way which leads to God and to be a pioneer therein for those who wander helpless and astray? The more we dwell with truth and love, the more conscious we become that they are the best, and are everlasting; and thus our immortality is revealed to us. Visibly we float on the boundless stream and disappear; but inasmuch as we are truth-loving and love

the same laws which bind the body to earth, and cause the water to flow and the vapor to rise. For the senses there is separateness, but for the mind there is union and unity. Communion is

are truly akin who consciously live in the same world, who think, believ

e we believe; and our growing consciousness does not make us content to rest in a mechanical view of nature, but it brings home to us with increasing power the awfulness of the infinite mystery, which we more and more clearly perceive to be a spiritual rather than a material fact. If at present there is a certain failure of will and cons

p to law, fro

cendant path i

d in ways that

s meet in one

raelites, the Greeks, or the Romans imagined, so they who see rightly in the luminous ether of modern intelligence understand better than the ancients th

wisdom of the Ancients we cannot accept: for we, not they, are the true ancients. The purest and the holiest prayer men speak is this: "Thy will be done." They who utter it from the inmost soul, find peace, even as a fretful child sinks to rest upon the mother's bosom. In learning to love the will

ough pleasant fields where great souls move to and fro in freedom and at peace. And as he grows accustomed to his labor, the world widens, the h

se, and when to give the wings of the soul free sweep through the high and serene realms of truth and beauty. The farther we dwell from the crowd, with its curre

ifler, however blameless his conduct. The power to inspire faith in the seriousne

at makes him a man. The dignities we possess at the cost of knowledge and virtue are like jewels for the s

men feel and see. The difference between man and man, between the child and the youth, the youth and the adult, is chiefly a difference in feeling, in the manner in which they are impressed;

ath which the dewy flowers exhale in the face of the rising sun, and they

is the dawn which shall merge into the fulness of day, when, in oth

shall remain with God. There is no liberty but obedience to the impulse of the higher nature which urges us to think nobly, t

commend itself to young women, whose fair faces should bend over it, and find there a reflection of their own pure sou

which keep watch at our birth, and which bend over our cradles, and which alone lift us into the world of enduring peace and hold us within the shelt

must have virtue; for learning breeds conceit, and power

e cannot be evil. If earth were a hell and life a curse and the Universe but a cinder, i

elated to the mind of man. Since, however, mind is reason and not unreason, there is harmony between it and things, between it and God; and hence to be conscious of its relation to God and the universe is to be conscious of a real relatio

r behind and within the visible world, of whose presence he is always, however dimly, conscious, and to whom

s spiritualized and made human. To understand the things of the spirit we must have spiritual experience. The intuitions of time and space, as well as the principle of causality, are given in the constitution of the mind. So is the idea of being, of perfection, of beauty, of eternity, of infinity, of duty. To think implies being, to perceive things as existing in time and space implies consciousness of eternity and infinity. To know the imperfect is possible only in the light of the perfect. Subject is itself object, the first known and best understood, and the laws of mind are laws

ho impart knowledge, those who give delig

re and bud and blossom and bear fruit; but if there is no life in them, be content to have them fall and lie amid the dust of the dead. God and the universe are what they are, and the best even genius can do is to throw over them a revealing light. He who feels that he is always in the presence of God will strive as re

e into regions where what is true and beautiful is so forever. This little band of chosen ones accompanies him adown the centuries, and listens to the melody which wells in his heart and breaks into songs that shall give delight as long as the air of spring is pleasant

iner power, because it makes us feel that we were alive thousands of years ago amid the Grecian isles,

turn from a great author because in his life and works there may be things of which we cannot approve. Shall we abandon God because His world is full of evil, or Christ because there is corruption in the church? St. Paul appeals to pagan literature, St. Augustine is the disciple of Plato, St. Thomas Aquinas of Aristotle, and the cu

or writing. The author yields to the spirit of vainglory, whereas he should be wholly bent upon uttering his thoug

ugh fine, so one's own style, though infer

ics, by virtue of their vital quality, which a

rishment only when it has been digested and assimilated. It is, after all, but a little while since man began to think. As yet he is learning the alphabet. Take heart then, and apply thy mind. As we grow older the years seem

rt, wisdom would lead us to think with and like all the world. They who are eage

loss of sincerity and without stooping to the service of vulgar interests. Not how much or how many things thou knowest is of import.

the best in life or literature, is to expect them to be what they have never been and will probably never be. Would you have an ox admire the sunrise or

ut what they are worth to thee; for thou art able to judge of t

ht have free and healthful play in ever-during darkness and isolation, life would still be good. Could I live surrounded by those I love, I should feel less keenly the discontent which the consciousness of my higher needs creates; and besides, it is not easy to rest in the comforts and luxuries which make and keep us inferior,

ne are fortunate who are able to persevere in pursuits which give them pure delight. "All good," says

nal world of truth, goodness, and beauty. Think for thyself with a single view to truth; for so only will thy thought be of worth and service to others. We feel ourselves only in action, and hence the need of doing lest we lose ourselves and be swallowed in

inds no will-o'-the-wisp from chimera worlds flits to and fro. It is only by keeping men in ignorance and vice that it is possible to keep them from the contagion of great thoughts. They who have littl

mpetent judges should declare it to be worthless in form and substance, the verdict would be interesting to me, and I should set to work to discover why and how I had so far failed in discernment. "A thoroughly cult

l the orators, who also are paid, for the most part, in inverse ratio to the amount of truth they utter. Fame, as fame,

ho are able to see should look for themselves. There is, indeed, in the words of genius a glow which never dies; but it only dazzles and misleads, if it fails to stimulate and strengthen our

ices to tell the man is ignorant or the book worthless. As the body is nourished by dead things, vegetable and animal, so the mind feeds

esent an objection is to lack culture. One may believe what cannot b

main to cheer, to illumine, to strengthen and console, is to be like God; an

or the designing and dishonest will wish to receive credit for more ability and virtue than they have. An exaggerated reputation may n

and seek with care, difficulty, and

each day, like a simple-hearted child, to the task God sets thee; and remember when th