Means and Ends of Education

and will cultivate those sciences which

are delivered on these occasions would be more appropriate and more effective if made to students who, having returned from the vacations with renewed physical vigor, feel also fresh urgency to exercise of mind. But now, so little is man in love with truth, the approach of the moment when you are to make esc

tudy, more earnest and more effectual than that which is followed within academic walls, because it is the result of his sense of duty alone and of his uncontrolled self-activity. And, though I am familiar with the serious disadvantages with which a reader as compared with a speaker has to contend, I shall read my address, if for

, the young gain a sense of the reality of science and culture, of religion and morality; which thus cease to be for them vague somethings of which they have heard and read, and become actual things,-realities, like monuments they have inspected, or countries through which they have travelled. They have been taken by the hand and led where, left to themselves, they would never have gone. The true educator inspires not only faith, but admiration also, and confidence and love,-all soul-evolving powers. He is a master whose pupils are disciples,-followers of him and believers in the wisdom he teaches. He founds a school which, if it does not influence

nings for richer and wider life, is to have our faith in the good of living revived and intensified. It is the divine privilege of the young to be able to believe that the world can be moulded and controlled by thought and spiritual motives; and in breathing this celestial air, the choice natures among them learn to become sages and saints; or if it be their lot to be

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velopment of life; it is the bringing of life in its highest form to bear upon life, individual and social, that it may raise it to greater perfection, to ever-increasing potency. To educate, then, is to work with the Power who makes progress a law of living things, becoming more and more active and manifest as we ascend in the scale of being. The motive from which education springs is belief in the goodness of life and the consequent desire for richer, freer, and higher life. It is the poin

o eat and drink. A sensible man who has sufficient wealth for independence and comfort does not wish for more money; but he who thinks and loves and acts in obedience to conscience feels that he is never able to do so well enough, and hence an inner impulse urges him to strive for greater power of life, for perfection. He is akin to all that is intelligible and good, and is drawn to bring himself into ever-increasing harmony with this high world. Hence attention is for hi

ch he is a member are multiplied, and become more intricate. As we pass from the savage to the barbarous, and from the barbarous to the civilized state, intellect and conscience are brought more and more into play. Mental power gains the mastery over brute force, and little by little subdues the energies of inorganic nature, and makes them serve human ends. Iron is forced to become soft and malleable, and to assume every shape; the winds bear man across the seas; the sweet and gentle water is imprisoned and tortured until with its fierce breath it does work in comparison with which the mythical exploi

it we can attain neither moral nor material good in the nobler forms. Virtue when it is enlightened gains a higher quality. And if we hold that action and not thought is the end of life, we cannot deny that action is, in some degree at least, controlled and modified by thought. Nevertheless, instruction is

f thought and behavior; and this, rather than what we learn, is the important thing. To imagine that youths who have passed through colleges and universities, and have acquired a certain knowledge of languages and sciences, but have not formed strongly marked characters, should forge to the front in the world and become leaders in the army of religion and civilization, is to cherish a delusion. The man comes first; and scholarship without ma

great service. It seems to me I perceive in our young men a lack of moral purpose, of sturdiness, of downright obstinate earnestness, in everything-except perhaps in money-getting pursuits; for even in these they are tempted to trust to speculation and cunning devices rather than to persistent work and honesty, which become a man more than crowns and all the gifts of fortune. Without truthfulness, honesty, honor, fidelity, courage, integrity, reverence, purity, and self-respect no worthy or noble life can be led. And unless we can get into our colleges youths who can be made to drink into their inmost being this vital truth, little good can be accomplished there. Now, it often happen

in truth, is faith in reason. Individuals, nations, the whole race, wander in a maze of errors. The world of the senses is apparent and illusive, that of pure thought vague and shadowy. Science touches but the form and surface; speculation is swallowed in abysses and disperses itself; ignorance darkens, passion blinds the mind; the truth

om God, and compels the whole mechanic world to acknowledge its absoluteness. The truths of religion and morality are of the essence of our life; they cannot be learned from another, but must be wrought into self-consciousness by our own thinking and doing,-by habitual meditation, and constant obedience to conscience. Virtue, knowledge, goodness, and greatness are their own reward: they are primarily and essentially ends, and only incidentally means. Hence those who strive for perfection with the view thereby to gain recognition, money, or place, do not really strive for perfection at all. They are also unwise; for virtue, knowledge, goodness, and greatness are not the surest means to such ends, and they can be acquired only with infinite pains. The highest human qualities cease to be the highest when they are made subordinate to the externalities of

be described. It is a state of soul which they alone comprehend who have been transformed by patient meditation and faithful striving. But once it is revealed, a thousand errors and obscurities fall away from us. If not educated, strive at least to be educable,-a believer in wisdom, and sensitive to all high influence, and eager to be quit of thy ignorance and hardness. As the dead cannot produce the live, so mechanical minds, however much they may be able to drill, train, and instruct, cannot educate. The secret of the mother's

d, cannot be grasped even by the mind; but that it is, nevertheless, that which they should strive to make themselves capable of loving above all things. And thus he prepares them to understand what is meant by the love of truth and righteousness, by the love of God. In the training of animals even, patience and gentleness are more effective than violence. How, then, shall we hope by physical constraint and harsh met

y who have no faith in God can have little faith in the worth of life, which can be for them but an efflorescence of death, a sort of inexplicable malady of atoms dreaming they are conscious. If the age tends irresistibly to destroy belief in God, the end will be the ruin of belief in the good of life. In the mean while the doubt which weakens the sprin

n its wings the poet, the lover, the orator, the hero, and the saint are borne in rapture through worlds whose celestial glory and delightfulness cold and unmoved minds do not suspect. It is not a flame from the dry wood and withered grass, but a heat and glow from the abysmal depths of being. It makes us content to follow after truth and love in dark and narrow ways, as the miner, in central deeps where sunlight has never fallen, seeks his treasure. It keeps us fresh and young; and, like the warmer sun, reclothes the world day by day with new beauty. It teaches patience, the love of work without haste and without worry. It gives strength to hear and speak truth, and to walk in the sacred way of truth, as though we but idly strolled with pleasant friends amid fragrant flowers. It gives us deeper consciousness of

med by effort, resistance, and patience. If necessity is the mother of invention, suffering is the mother of high moods and great thoughts. Poets have sung to ease their sorrow-burdened or love-tortured hearts; and the travail of souls yearning with ineffable pain for truth has led to the nearest view of God. Wisdom is the child of suffering, as beauty is the child of love. If a truth discourages thee, thou art not yet ripe fo

be made so by the deeper thought and diviner love of men and women. Let the old tell

s horse to the road and to his gait, is a result of educ

purpose. Pardon every one except thyself, and put thy trust in God and in thyself. "If I buy thee," asked one of a Spartan captive,

strong and contented; it is so good for thee to have it t

ls, then, there is something good. If thou couldst but bear this always in mind, thou shouldst be better able to suffer pain, whether of body or soul. There are things thou h

have been denied us, nor feel that those we have enjoyed were a gain unless they are associated with the memory of high faith and thought and virtuous action. He who is careful to fill his

ifles weans from the habit of work more effectually than idleness. Perfect skill comes of talent, study, and exercise; and the study and exercise must continue through the whole course of life. To cease to learn is to lose freshness and the power to interest. We lack will rather than strength; are able to do more and better than we are inclined to do; and say we can not because we have not the courage to say we will not. The law of unstable equilibrium applies to thee, as to whatever has life.

om ease, idleness, gain, and pleasure-to the high and lonely regions, where the command of conscience speaks in the name of God and of the nature of things. Forget thyself and do thy best, as unconscious of vain-glorious thoughts as though thou wert a wind or a stream, an impersonal force in the service of God and man. Obey conscience, and laugh in the face of death. Convince thyself that the best thi

or vile, he is so. It is the expression of life as it has come to consciousness within him. It is the revelatio

t to serve G

-worshippe

liars are imbeciles. From the educator's point of view, truthfulness is the essential thing. His aim and end is to teach truth

oherent thought, for lack of the understanding of the principles of knowledge itself, he is unable to bring into organic unity. The things he knows are confused and intermingled, and thus fail either to enlighten his mind or to impel him to healthful activity. He forms opinions lightly and pronounces judgment rashly. Knowing nothing thoroughly, he has no suspicion of the infinite complexity of the world of life and thought. The evil effe

erings of the heavenly voices. God is here; but we, like plants and mollusks, live in worlds of which we do not dream, upheld a

realms of sense, beyond the ken of the dialectician, to the Infinite and Eternal, before whom the m

ery man to improve his position in the world is the motive power of all social development, of all progress," says Scherr, unable to perceive that the mightiest impulses to nobler and wider life have been given by those who were not thinking at all of improving their position, but were wholly bent upon improving themselves. Make choice, O youth! between having and being. If having is thy aim,

t whether it shall prevail for us, for our own age and people. It is of the nature of spiritual gifts to work in every direction; they enrich the individual and the nation; they develop, purify, and refine the intellectual, moral, and physical worlds in which men live and strive. The State and the Church are organisms; the body, the social and religious soul, under the guidance of God, creates for itself. And not only should there be no conflict between them, but there should be none between them and the free and full development of the individual. A peasant whose mental state is what it might have been a thousand years ago is for us, however moral and religious, an altogether unsatisfactory kind of man. All knowledge is pure, and all

stand upon the threshold of the new century. You speak Shakspeare's and Milton's tongue; in your veins is the blood which in other lands and centuries has nourished the spirit which makes martyrs, heroes, and saints. Your religion strikes its roots into the historic past of man's noblest achievements, and looks to the future with the serene confidence with which it looks

e grown to be one of the most populous and wealthy and also one of the most civilized and progressive nations of the earth. Your opportunities are equal to the fullest measure of human worth and genius. In the midst of a high and noble environment it were doubly a disgrace to be low and base. In intellectual and moral processes and results the important consideration is not how much,

m the press nor the pulpit nor legislative halls do we hear highest wisdom rightly uttered. To be an intellectual force in this age one must know-must know much and know thoroughly; for now in many places there are a few, at least, who are acquainted wit

Christian men than that you should do deeds which will make your names famous. And if you could believe this with all your heart, you would find peace and freedom of spirit, even though your labors should seem vain and your lives of little moment. The more reason and conscience are brought to bear upon you, the more will you