Chapter IV: Part 4

Very different are the signs and symbols which mathematics employs as substitutes for the quantities to be considered. In adding a column in the ledger or in a statistical table the mind thinks the figures without reference to the concrete objects which they denote. In the solution of a problem in algebra the unknown quantities are represented by symbols like _x_ and _y_, the known quantities by the first letters of the alphabet or by numerical expressions; the relations between the quantities are indicated by equations; there is no thought of the quantities themselves while the mind is engaged in manipulating the symbols according to well-defined rules of operation, and only when the result is to be interpreted do the quantities reappear in the field of consciousness. The substitute symbol is a device for temporarily dropping an idea until it is needed for interpretation; the suggestive symbol is a means of bringing an idea or thought into the domain of consciousness. The latter furnishes or recalls material for the mind to act upon; the former lightens the burden which the mind would otherwise have to carry. The arithmetical solution of an age question in which the mind constantly carries the thought of A’s age and his wife’s age as compared with the algebraic solution of the same question in which A and his wife, as well as their ages, sink temporarily out of sight, shows the value of substitute signs and symbols in mathematical thinking, and explains why algebraic methods are so far superior to the clumsy and involved methods of arithmetical analysis.

[Sidenote: Expressive symbols.]

Different from either of these is the class of symbols used in expressing ideas. This class includes not only the words of written and spoken language, but also the natural signs of gesture language and the conventional signs of manual language taught to deaf mutes. The language is full of faded metaphors indicating the office of common words. They are said to express meaning, to convey thought, to embody ideas, to enshrine content. They may be likened to window-panes through which one sees what is back of them. Sometimes the window-panes, like spectacles when first worn, attract more attention from the person looking than the objects seen through them,—a parallel to what occurs when the articulate speech, or its rhetorical adornment, attracts more attention than the thought expressed. But if that which is seen through the window-pane is on the order of a Santa Claus loaded with toys and Christmas-gifts, then no notice is taken of the medium through which the object is seen. Hence the very best teaching—that which rivets attention upon the thought conveyed—always fails to teach the spelling of words incidentally. Furthermore, the instruction which frequently stops to draw attention to the grammar of the sentences, the spelling of the words or their mode of utterance, interferes with the formation of logical habits of thinking and divests the words of their function as expressive signs. When the word itself becomes an object of thought the mind is not thinking by means of that word. It has been well said that we may fail to apprehend the meaning of what a person is saying because the tone of his voice arrests our attention through its resemblance to that of some one else in whom we feel an interest; that so far as signs thus attract notice on their own account, they fail to fulfil their function as a means of attending to something other than themselves. For this very pertinent observation credit is due to Mr. G. F. Stout, who (“Mind,” lxii. page 18) has very clearly drawn the distinction between the three classes of signs or symbols used as helps in thinking. He says,—

[Sidenote: G. F. Stout.]

“Suggestive signs serve only to bring something to mind; they are not a means of minding it when once recalled. An expressive sign, on the contrary, is a means of attending to its signification.... Expressive signs differ from substitutes in a manner exactly the inverse of that in which they differ from suggestive signs. A suggestive sign has fulfilled its purpose and becomes of no further avail so soon as it has suggested its meaning. A substitute sign is a counter which takes the place of its meaning; so long as it fulfils its representative function it renders useless all reference to that which it represents. The counters are manipulated according to certain rules of operation until a certain result is reached, which is then interpreted. The operator may be actually unable to interpret the intermediate steps. Algebraical and arithmetical symbols are to a great extent used as mere substitute signs. The same is true of the symbols employed in formal logic. It is possible to use signs of this kind whenever fixed and definite rules of operation can be derived from the nature of the things symbolized, so as to be applied in manipulating the signs without further reference to their signification. A word is an instrument for thinking about the meaning which it expresses; a substitute sign is a means of not thinking about the meaning which it symbolizes.”

[Sidenote: Fixing concepts.]

In addition to these three purposes the technical term may serve still another important end. It helps to fix the new concept or notion after it has been developed by skilful instruction. Its association therewith makes it a suggestive sign whenever occasion requires the recurrence of the concept or thought for which it stands. The train of thought is facilitated and made possible by the use of technical terms as expressive signs. And if the idea denoted by it can be accurately defined, so that the definition becomes a triumph of intellect, or if it can be quantified, so as to become a unit of measure like the volts, ohms, ampères, and watts in applied electricity, the technical term may even serve a purpose analogous to the substitute signs in sciences like formal logic and mathematics.

[Sidenote: Proper use of technical terms.]

The foregoing analysis indicates the proper method of teaching technical terms. First, the basal concept should be carefully developed and clearly presented; it should then be fixed in the mind by association with the corresponding technical term; finally, the union should be made permanent by frequently causing the two to appear together in the domain of thought, by treating them as welcome guests when they appear together in the citadel of mind. Divorce of one from the other should be as impossible as in the case of the two parties to a suitable marriage. On the _fête_ days of science they should appear together, each suggesting the presence of the other, the technical term serving as a helpmeet to the idea, and as its representative when, in the charmed circle of scientific investigation, the presence of the idea is not absolutely required. Circumlocutions, like name-word for noun, quality-word for adjective, and relation-word for preposition, may be helpful in presenting the idea or in introducing the technical term; they may be tolerated, like a third party in the making of a match; but when the match has been made, and the wedding has been solemnized, they should drop out of sight as of no further use. The figure of speech could easily be pressed too far; for many objects known to science have a common as well as a technical designation. Each has its proper place in the realm of thought,—the common name in ordinary conversation, the technical term when scientific precision is required.

VII

THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE

It seems to me quite certain that we can and do think things
without thinking of any sound or words. Language seems to me
to be necessary to the progress of thought, but not at all
necessary to the mere act of thinking. It is a product of
thought: a vehicle for the communication of it, a channel for
the conveyance of it, and an embodiment which is essential
to its growth and continuity. But it seems to be altogether
erroneous to represent it as an inseparable part of cogitation.
Donkeys and dogs are without true thought, not because they
are speechless, but they are speechless because they have
no abstract ideas, and no true reasoning powers. In parrots
the power of mere articulation exists sometimes in wonderful
perfection. But parrots are not so clever as many other birds
which have no such power.

Man’s vocal organs are correlated with his brain. Both are
equally mysterious, because they are co-operative, and yet
separable, parts of “one plan.”

ARGYLL.

That the language may be fitted for its purpose, not only
should every word perfectly express its meaning, but there
should be no important meaning without its word. Whatever we
have occasion to think of often, and for scientific purposes,
ought to have a name appropriated to it.

J. S. MILL.

VII

THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE

[Sidenote: Three possible contingencies.]

In the development of intellectual life three contingencies are possible.

1. The growth of the vocabulary may be more rapid than the acquisition of ideas.

2. The accumulation and development of ideas may exceed the ability to express them in language.

3. The acquisition of ideas and words, of thought and language, may be simultaneous.

Without doubt, these possibilities in mental growth exist for wise and beneficent purposes.

[Sidenote: Words without ideas.]

The tendency to acquire words without the corresponding ideas is, in at least one direction, a source of gain rather than loss. The pert phrases, profane words, and other objectionable language which the child accidentally hears from the lips of older persons, and at times uses to the unspeakable annoyance of parents and teachers, would be an occasion for far more serious alarm if the meaning were fully understood. Were it a law of our mental life that the hearing and learning of a profane or obscene word necessarily carried with it a clear grasp of the meaning, the resulting harm to the inner life of the soul would be immeasurably greater, and the stain upon the character would be vastly more difficult to remove. The objectionable language may mirror the habits of thought and speech into which those in charge of the child have fallen, awaken in them a new sense of their responsibility, and cause them to be more careful of what they say; or it may prove an index to the kind of company into which the child is drifting, and thus serve as a danger-signal to parent and teacher. When the mind has not learned to think the thought expressed, a simple warning against the use of such ugly words generally suffices to eradicate them from the child’s vocabulary; and in such instances it is a blessing in disguise that the learning of the words was not accompanied by the acquisition of their meaning. The loss to the intellectual life is more than balanced by the gain in moral training.

[Sidenote: Thinking without words.]

Is thinking possible without language? If by language is meant oral speech and written words, the sign-language of deaf mutes is sufficient to compel an affirmative answer to the question. Moreover, there are modes of thinking and of expressing thought other than by the use of words. Of the means of expressing thought without words, symbols like the ten digits and the sigma of the new psychology are well-known examples. The player in a game of chess, croquet, or billiards thinks movements in advance of making them, and generally without describing the same in words. The drawings and plans by means of which the architect designs a new building, the mental images of mechanical contrivances which precede the invention and construction of machines, the mental pictures used in designing, engineering, and sketching, in original geological thought, prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that thinking may go forward without words and sentences, and may find expression in ways better adapted to the needs of the artisan. The graphic method of presenting to the eye the results of an investigation is less cumbersome than any description in words. Some men depend so much upon mental pictures in their thinking that they assert they cannot think at all without them. In some kinds of gymnastic drill the movement is described in words, then conceived by the mind, and finally executed. This exercise has a different educational value from the exercise in which the student simply imitates the movements of the teacher, the latter being an instance of thinking and expressing thought without the help of words. The speed with which many movements must be executed, as in fencing, legerdemain, athletic sports, the manipulation of the lever in the hands of the engineer, requires thinking without the intermediate agency of words and sentences. The time it takes for an idea to pass into words, and through them into actions, is measurably greater than the time required for the direct translation of thought into action. Although the difference in specific instances is measured by the fraction of a second, it would involve serious loss of time as well as energy in the handicrafts if thoughts could only pass into action through speech or written language.

[Sidenote: Superfluity of words.]

[Sidenote: Thought and action.]

[Sidenote: Francis Galton.]

Some persons run to mouth; others lack in this respect. To the former class belong those whose lips move in study; those who talk to themselves; and many whose paucity of ideas does not justify their superfluity of words. Let such a man be elected as a delegate to a synod or a convention, and the sessions will be prolonged beyond the usual time. As a rule, the energy of such men is exhausted in speech; they are not noted for getting things done. On the other hand, the men of great executive ability are oftentimes men of few words; their thought is translated into doing rather than talking. The man of deeds is always estimated above the man of words, the general above the orator, Cæsar the commander above Cæsar the orator. Sometimes the men of original turn of mind find that their thinking outstrips their power to express thought. Francis Galton says of himself, “It is a serious drawback to me in writing that I do not so easily think in words as otherwise. It often happens that after being hard at work and having arrived at results that are perfectly clear and satisfactory to myself, when I try to express them in language I feel that I must begin by putting myself on quite a different intellectual plane; I have to translate my thoughts into a language that does not run evenly with them. I therefore waste a great deal of time in seeking for appropriate words and phrases, and am conscious, when required to speak on a sudden, of being often obscure through mere verbal maladroitness, and not through want of clearness of perception. This is one of the small annoyances of my life. I may add that often while engaged in thinking out something I hatch an accompaniment of nonsense-words, just as notes of a song might accompany the thought. Also, that after I have made a mental step, the appropriate word frequently follows as an echo; as a rule, it does not accompany it.”

[Sidenote: Knowing and telling.]

This throws a new light upon one phase of school work. The boy who has a notion of the content of a lesson sometimes stops in the midst of a recitation and, without premeditation, exclaims, “I know it, but cannot say it.” The teacher retorts, “You do not know what you cannot express.” Both are right and both are wrong. There is, probably, a measure of truth in what each claims. If the pupil had mastered the text, he would not only have a clear idea of the lesson, but he would also have acquired from the book or from the teacher the words to express the idea. Nevertheless, if there is reason for thinking that the pupil has devoted reasonable time to the lesson, his linguistic powers should be developed by questions and other appropriate help. The good sense and native instincts of most teachers lead them to give this help. The teacher whose captious disposition issues in remarks calculated to repress a backward pupil’s powers of expression should find employment outside of the school-room.

[Sidenote: Foreign-born children.]

The child of foreigners may outstrip native children and astonish the school by unprecedented progress because, being already familiar with the ideas of the lesson, it is compelled simply to acquire the language by which the ideas are expressed. By reason of their inability at first to tell what they know, such children are often classified with those less mature, and the mastery of the new language in their case is not as difficult as the mastery of new ideas for which brain-growth may be the essential condition. To ignore the fact that such children often know more than they can tell is pedagogic folly in the highest degree.

[Sidenote: Language clarifies thought.]

[Sidenote: Literary societies.]

Courses of study are sometimes mapped out so as to cause inequality in the pace with which ideas are accumulated and language is developed. Undue stress on grammar, rhetoric, and belles-lettres may cause abnormal development in the direction of flowery language, a verbose style, an ornate diction. It is a fault difficult to correct. To insist that such a student shall have something to say, to force him into studies that will bring him face to face with great questions as yet unsettled, to beget in him a state of mind in which he is troubled with ideas, to compel him to work over and over what he writes until his sentences are as clear as crystals, seems necessary to counteract the one-sided development of such students. The curriculum of study may err on the other side. The graduates in the various courses of engineering (civil, electrical, mechanical, and mining) sometimes develop technical, to the neglect of linguistic, skill. In the presence of a body of capitalists they are made deeply conscious of the difference between the ability to think and the ability to express thought.[14] In one large school of technology the graduates established prizes in English composition and endowed chairs of the English language and literature, so that future students might acquire the power to state in clear and intelligible language the results of their work as specialists. In no long time it was discovered that for this purpose they also needed training in an art similar to that of the teacher,—namely, the art of developing the ideas and thoughts which underlie and condition the engineering project under consideration. For him who would be a leader among men, the ability to express thought is quite as important as the ability to think. Moreover, there is a vast difference between ability to express thought on one’s feet in the presence of an audience and ability to express it on paper in the privacy of the home. J. J. Rousseau and Washington Irving could write well, but neither of them could make a speech. Patrick Henry’s eloquence before an audience was unsurpassed; he never could write a satisfactory report. Power in both directions may be acquired in a college course through the exercises of a good debating society. The student who, during four years, carefully writes out his thoughts, then discards his manuscript while speaking, and studies how he can best convince his hearers and how he can prune himself of the defects pointed out by the merciless criticism of his fellows, can feel sure of ultimate success. President Barnard says of one of our largest institutions that half its glory departed when its literary societies were killed through the influence of the Greek letter fraternities. A public speaker who is a slave to his manuscript is deserving of pity. College authorities may well exercise their ingenuity in finding a substitute for the drill and practice which the literary societies of by-gone days afforded in learning to think and to express thought in the face of opposition, criticism, and other unfavorable conditions.

[Sidenote: Influence of language upon thinking.]

[Sidenote: Teaching English.]

Thought and language exercise a reciprocal influence. Thought is stimulated and clarified by the effort to express it. Often it is shaped by the limitations of one’s vocabulary and the range of the words with which one’s hearers or readers are familiar. The faded metaphors of language betray us into fallacies. Phrases like the witness of the spirit, total depravity, have led to extravagant expectations and unwarranted conclusions. People sometimes have a religious phraseology without a corresponding religious experience, and hence deceive themselves and others. Everywhere we see instances that go to show how important it is that the development of the power to think should keep pace with the growth of the power to express thought. Very much is said in these days about the use of good English. As Adam threw the blame upon Eve, and Eve cast it upon the Serpent, so every one blames some one else for the poor English used at school and college. In the end the teachers are usually made to bear most of the blame: the college professor blames the teachers in the high school; these, in turn, blame the teachers in the lower grades; and when the matter is cast up to the primary teacher, she throws the blame upon the street and the home. A professor in the college department of a university gave many ludicrous specimens of English in the work handed to him by students. He was asked of what college class he had charge, and when he replied the sophomore, a high-school teacher suggested that the specimens reflected quite as much upon the teachers of the freshman class as upon the schools below the university.

[Sidenote: The committee.]

A women’s society in one of our large cities sent a committee to the superintendent to complain of the poor English used by the children in the schools. He agreed that strenuous efforts should be made to provide a remedy. He added, “If you will take care of the English in the homes and on the streets, I will get the teachers to look after the English in the schools.” Instead of throwing blame upon others, it were far more sensible for each educated person to ask wherein he is to blame for setting others a bad example and wherein he can help the teachers of English to accomplish the desired result.

[Sidenote: Aim.]

The aim in teaching English is twofold,—first, to get the student to appreciate good English and good literature; secondly, to get him to use it in speaking and writing. The latter end cannot be reached by mere practice in essay-writing. Ability to think is a condition of ability to express thought. Too many of the subjects assigned lay stress upon the forms of speech and not upon the content of language. When pupils think in words and disconnected phrases rather than sentences, when they violate the rules for capitals, punctuation, and paragraphs, the teachers of English may be solely to blame; but, in so far as the use of good English depends upon good thinking, the blame for the use of faulty language rests upon all who teach. If the ability to think is not developed in proportion to the use of language, the school will produce stylists who exalt the forms of speech above their content, slaves of beautiful and flowery language who resemble the fops and dudes of social life. To emancipate from such slavery requires more than an emancipation proclamation from the president of a college association.

[Sidenote: Linguistic studies.]

[Sidenote: Language tributary to thinking.]

The labors of the brothers Grim, Max Müller, and others have reduced the knowledge of language to a science. Linguistic studies have become as interesting as any branch of natural science. They shed new light upon the history of mankind. In furnishing material for thought, as well as mental discipline, they are not inferior to any other study in the curriculum. It would, however, be a mistake to suppose that philological studies are superior to other disciplines as means for developing power to think and power to express thought. The professor of any language is apt to regard that language as an end, and not as means to an end. Primarily, language is a medium of communication. It distinguishes man from the brute creation, and furnishes him the instruments of thought by which he carries forward processes of reasoning beyond the reach of the lower animals. At the university language in general, or any particular language, may be studied as a specialty, and can thus be made an end in itself as appropriately as any other subject which is studied for its own sake. In the lower schools language should always be made tributary to the art of thinking. It should be employed to embody thought, and to convey thought, without intruding itself upon our attention as the thing of chief value. Any phase of linguistic study may be lifted by an enthusiastic teacher into the chief place in the course of study. Orthography has sometimes been taught as if it were the chief end of man to spell correctly. Grammar has been taught as if a faulty sentence were one of the sins forbidden by the Decalogue, and as if the fate of the republic depended upon parsing, analysis, and diagramming. The pronunciation of words may be emphasized until the lips of teacher and pupil smack of an overdose of dictionary, until the overdoing of obscure vowels draws attention away from the thought to the manner of utterance. A sensible man articulates his words in such a manner as readily to be understood, but never in such a way as to excite remark or draw the mind of the listener from the subject-matter of the discourse.

In educational practice, the manner of expressing the thought should not supplant the more important art of making the pupil think. Getting and begetting thought are of more consequence than the expression of thought; in fact, they condition the correct use of language. All talk about English, or German, or Spanish, or Latin, or Greek, as if any one of these languages were an end in itself for the average pupil, is wide of the mark. Correct sentences, beautiful expressions, and rhetorical phrases can never make a nation great or perpetuate its free institutions. Flowery language can never save a dying sinner or console the widow who is following the bier of a son, her only child and support. Fine words never win a battle by land or by sea. The most eloquent orations against Philip of Macedon did not keep him from destroying the liberties of Greece.

Correct and forceful language is a gift to be coveted, a prize worth striving for; but it should never be made the all-absorbing aim of education. The teacher of any phase of language must for a time make his instruction the object of chief concern; but he should never ignore the fact that language is and ever should be an aid to thought, a stimulus to thinking, an embodiment of ideas, a medium of communication, a means to an end.

VIII

THE STIMULUS TO THINKING

Good methods of teaching are important, but they cannot supply
the want of ability in the teacher. The Socratic method is
good; but a Socrates behind the teacher’s desk to ask questions
is better.

THOMAS M. BALLIET.

Of all forms of friendship in youth, by far the most effective
as a means of education is that species of enthusiastic
veneration which young men of loyal and well-conditioned minds
are apt to contract for men of intellectual eminence in their
own circles. The educating effect of such an attachment is
prodigious; and happy the youth who forms one. We all know
the advice given to young men to “think for themselves;” and
there is sense and soundness in the advice; but if I were
to select what I account perhaps the most fortunate thing
that can befall a young man during the early period of his
life,—the most fortunate, too, in the end, for his intellectual
independence,—it would be his being voluntarily subjected for a
time to some powerful intellectual slavery.

DAVID MASSON.

VIII

THE STIMULUS TO THINKING

[Sidenote: Thought stimulus.]

Whilst the distinction between thinking in things and thinking in symbols should never be ignored or lost sight of by the teacher, it need not be brought to the attention of the learner,—at least not in the elementary stages of instruction. It is more profitable for the learner to be absorbed in gathering the materials of thought and in learning by practice how the educated man uses the instruments of thought for drawing correct conclusions by the most effective methods. If the eye of consciousness is turned inward upon the mental processes too early, the flow of thought is interrupted and turned away from its logical trend. The teacher, on the other hand, is expected to watch the growth of the mind, to awaken its powers, and to rouse these into vigorous activity. It is essential not merely that he furnish the pupils with the proper materials and the best instruments of thought, but it is necessary also to stimulate and direct their thinking; otherwise that which is given them may overload the memory, lie undigested in the mind, exhaust the energy of the intellect in the effort at retention, and ultimately cause mental dyspepsia.

[Sidenote: Competition.]

[Sidenote: Socratic question.]

Men engaged in the struggle for existence or preferment usually find ample stimulus to their thinking faculties in the competition which real life affords. If the merchant does not think accurately and effectively, the consequences make themselves visible in his bank-account. The desire for gain is the stimulus to thought in the commercial world. An appeal to the same motive is often made through the offer of prizes and fellowships. The competition of maturer years finds an adumbration in the competition for class-standing and for superiority in field sports. The teacher who employs no higher stimulus to thought must be a stranger to the mysteries of the art which he professes to practise. The best device for stimulating thought has come down to us hallowed by the ages. It bears the name of the greatest teacher of ancient Athens. It is the question as employed in the Socratic method. Not every question is the Socratic question. A man who has lost his way may ask a question, but it is for the sake of getting information. The teacher may be striving to fix in the memory the salient points of the lesson: he asks questions, the answers to which the pupils are expected to have at their tongue’s or fingers’ end. A question thus used for purposes of drill is often called a categorical question. It is not the Socratic question. Yonder sits a boy who for half an hour has been wrestling with a problem. Unable to find a clue to the solution, he asks the teacher for help. Instead of telling him directly what he wishes to know, the Socrates behind the teacher’s desk asks a question which causes the pupil to put side by side in his mind two ideas never before linked together in his thought. Upon the learner’s face is seen an expression as if light had broken in from on high. He goes back to his seat, and ere five minutes have elapsed he is rejoicing in the glory of a triumph. The teacher did not do the pupil’s thinking; he simply asked the Socratic question, which aims to make the pupil think for himself.

[Sidenote: Substitute teachers.]

This stimulus to thought is employed by every master in the art of teaching. The question may be used to badger and confuse a pupil, especially if the teacher is not fully acquainted with the ideas and thoughts already in the learner’s mind. To cause each pupil to place side by side in his mind ideas and concepts whose relation he had not before perceived, it is necessary that the teacher be familiar with the intellectual storehouse of every member of the class. At this point the substitutes who occasionally supply the places of regular teachers are at a serious disadvantage. Not knowing what the pupils have mastered, they must often waste time in finding out where the new should be linked to the old, and where it is necessary to clarify and develop ideas with which the members of the class are only partially familiar. Often these lose interest in the recitation while the new teacher quizzes them on things that have grown stale by repetition.

[Sidenote: The living teacher.]

[Sidenote: The dead line.]

[Sidenote: Knowledge and teaching power.]

[Sidenote: The course of study.]

[Sidenote: Difficulties.]

Back of the Socratic method must be a Socrates to ask the questions. Education results not from highly differentiated methods, but primarily from the play of mind upon mind, heart upon heart, will upon will. In the difficult art of making others think the most important factor is the teacher himself. Thinking begets thinking. In this connection one cannot forbear contrasting the living teacher with other educational forces. Treatises on education are in the habit of printing nature with a capital letter, whilst words like teacher, humanity, unless they stand at the beginning of the sentence, begin with a small letter. Are lifeless rocks, dead leaves, stuffed birds, and transfixed bugs more potent in begetting thought than the teacher himself? If nature were such a wonderful teacher, then the savage, who is in daily contact with nature, and who knows little or nothing of the artificial life of our great cities and great seats of learning, should be the best thinker. A teacher whose power to stimulate thought is not superior to dead leaves and bugs and butterflies must have reached the dead line. Teachers may be divided into two classes,—those who have ceased to grow and those who are still alive and growing. Under the tuition of the former the boy soon loses interest in study, and seldom acquires the power to think. From a dead tree you cannot propagate life. Ingraft a lifeless teacher upon the school; the most skilful devices of school management and recitation serve only to intensify the dull routine, the mechanical iteration and repetition which Bishop Spalding declares to be the most radical defect in our systems of education. It takes life to beget life. A growing mind is required to beget growth in other minds. A good thinker begets habits of close and careful thinking in those whom he moulds. Some minds are more gifted in this respect than others. Without doubt the reader can recall the difference between knowledge and teaching power which he felt while under several instructors at the same time. From those gifted with stimulating power he came away with a mind full of interrogation points, and with the attention riveted upon problems calling for investigation. Under their tuition the commonest things acquired new interest and became food for thought. The thinking seemed to spring out of that upon which the mind was feeding. Without the stimulating influence which comes from a live teacher, contact with nature, access to libraries and laboratories, may amount to very little. The chief trouble in our schools is not that the courses of study are too crowded, but the teachers are too empty. There is not enough fuel in their minds to keep alive the glow of thought. A course of study in the hands of a skilful instructor is like a good bill of fare under the direction of a skilful caterer. The latter does not expect every guest to eat his way through the entire bill of fare; he so manages the succession of dishes as to stimulate the appetite to the end of the feast; he sends the guests away without the feeling of satiety,—in fact, anxious for the next banquet. The wise teacher does not expect the pupils to assimilate everything in the course of study; he aims so to feed and stimulate their minds that they find genuine pleasure in thinking, and go away from him with a desire not only for more knowledge, but also for things that give suitable exercise to the reflective powers. Watch a boy at work upon a puzzle, and you will be convinced that he finds genuine delight in thinking that which is difficult. The most popular teachers are not they who smooth away every difficulty in the pathway of the student, but they who stimulate his thinking and help him to a sense of mastery over intellectual difficulties. The quickening, stimulative influence of the Socratic question lies in its content rather than its form; and both form and content derive their vivifying power from the personality of the teacher.

[Sidenote: Conscious and unconscious influences.]

The stimulating influences which go forth from a live teacher are partly conscious and partly unconscious. The latter are the more effective. Minds gifted with quickening power create about themselves an intellectual atmosphere that is like the invigorating atmosphere of the mountains or the tonic breezes which blow from the sea. The woman who touched the hem of the Saviour’s garment felt at once the vivifying influences which were all the time going forth from the Great Teacher. Here we stand face to face with the greatest mystery of the teacher’s art.

[Sidenote: The heart.]

Some light is shed upon the mystery by the intimate relation which exists between the conscious and the subconscious life of the soul. The ideas upon any subject which the individual cherishes during his conscious moments, the train of logical thinking which he pursues when the will gives direction to reflection, the creative effort which he seeks to put forth in a given direction,—these shape the activities which go forward in the depths of the soul when perhaps the attention is directed to the discharge of routine duties. “Out of the heart are the issues of life.” “Out of the fulness of the heart the mouth speaketh.” From the treasure-house of the heart come welling up thoughts, ideas, sentiments, and purposes which largely determine the influence exerted upon others when the individual is not aware of it. The teacher must make himself what he wishes his pupil to be. If foot-ball and base-ball and boating form the staple of his thinking, the centre of his affections, these athletic sports, in ways that are marvellous and often past finding out, become the objects of thought in which his students will delight. If the truths and principles of science absorb his interest and engage the best thought of his conscious hours, these will determine the moulding influence which he will unconsciously exert upon others. If he delights in germ-ideas, in seed-thoughts, these will emanate from him whenever he is thrown into contact with inquiring minds. Much, of course, is due to native ability, to inherited qualities. The circle of minds which one teacher can reach is further limited by the breadth or narrowness of his views, by the points which he has in common with others, by the amount of sympathetic interest which he manifests in their progress and welfare, by the sum total of the characteristics of generic humanity which he has taken up into himself. In other words, his stimulating power depends upon the extent to which his inner life is representative of the best thought and the best traits of the age in which he lives and of the people to whom he belongs.

[Sidenote: Exhaustive treatment.]

[Sidenote: Hope.]

A teacher may destroy his power to awaken and stimulate thought by developing every subject in all its bearings to its logical or final conclusion. He should send his classes away from the daily lecture or recitation to the library or the laboratory, to the study, the shop, or the field, with the sense of something to be achieved, with the feeling that there are fields of research for them to explore, fields that will amply repay careful study, investigation, and reflection. There is nothing that tires a boy so soon as the feeling that there is nothing for him to do, nothing that he can master, achieve, or conquer on his own account. The normal child is so constituted that it loves activity, looks into the future, and regards itself as an important factor in the world’s life. The advance from childhood to youth is marked by a transition into the period that is brimful of hope and ambition. The pampered son of a rich man may feel no longing of this sort; his opportunities for early travel and premature indulgence in every whim may have brought him to the point where the whole world seems like a sucked orange for which one has no further use. Unless the rich father and mother possess an extraordinary amount of good sense, their children do not have an even chance with the children of the middle classes whose outlook upon life supplies abundant motives for study and exertion.

[Sidenote: The field of vision.]

If a boy has not made a mistake in selecting his parents, if the atmosphere of the home in which his first six years are spent is normal, he comes to school with a sense of something to be achieved. Should this feeling be lacking, the true teacher will aim to beget it by the instruction he gives and by appeals to the innate desire for knowledge. As the intelligence dawns, the interrogation points on the boy’s face multiply; his appetite for knowledge grows by what it feeds on. If the branches of study do not become more interesting than any occupation by which the boy can earn coppers, there is something wrong either with the boy or his teacher, or with both. In the ascent of the hill of science every step upward widens the horizon, increases the field of vision, and stimulates to new effort. Every field explored beckons to new fields of investigation. It is the prerogative of the teacher to point out what is in store for the aspiring youth. Take, for instance, the domain of pure mathematics. A pupil had learned in his geometry that parallel lines never meet. The teacher told him that his geometrical studies would after a while acquaint him with lines that are not parallel and yet never meet. No sooner had he met lines of this kind, situated in different planes, than his teacher told him of lines that continually approach but never meet. The appeal to his curiosity helped to stimulate the desire for knowledge and kept him thinking earnestly and seriously until he met the asymptote and its curve. The study of asymptotes soon grew more interesting than chess or any sports upon the athletic field.

[Sidenote: Master minds.]

The aim of the teacher should be to make himself useless. In other words, the school should aim to lift the pupil to the plane of an independent thinker, capable of giving conscious direction to his intellectual life and of concentrating all his powers upon anything that is to be mastered. It is to be reckoned a piece of good fortune for a bright and talented youth to fall under the dominating influence of a master mind. In endeavoring to walk in the footsteps of an intellectual giant, to comprehend his theories and speculations, and to carry the burden of his thoughts, unexpected strength and power are developed, and when the day of emancipation comes—as it always does come in the case of gifted youth—the learner will find that he has entered a higher sphere of intellectual activity, and will henceforth rank among the world’s productive thinkers.

[Sidenote: False stimulants.]

[Sidenote: Mental lethargy.]

As was said at the beginning of the chapter, the competition of men in mature life is usually sufficient to stimulate their thinking. The men whose duties make a constant drain upon their productivity need other forms of thought-stimulation. Reference is not here made to the narcotics, alcoholic stimulants, and other drugs which brain-workers use in periods of reaction and fatigue: these stimulate only for a short time, and leave the nervous system and the brain weaker than before; they shorten life by burning the candle at both ends; they cannot supply the need of sleep, rest, and recreation. To take rational exercise, to eat proper food, and to obey all the laws of health is the sacred duty of every person who teaches by word of mouth or pen. Every effort should be made to keep vitality at its maximum. Often the mind resembles the soil which yields a richer harvest if permitted to lie fallow for a time. If at the close of a period of rest or a summer vacation the mind refuses to work, what shall then be done to stimulate mental activity? Different men derive stimulus from different sources. One finds help from taking a pen in hand, another by facing a sea of upturned faces. A clergyman of considerable repute uses an Indian story to start his mental machinery. Henry Ward Beecher declared that the greatest kindness which could be shown him was to oppose his public utterances. Opposition roused all his powers and helped him to think vigorously and to the best advantage. Schiller is said to have kept rotten apples in his desk, because he believed that the odor stimulated his mind. Some men find help in solitude, from the singing of birds, from the sound of rustling leaves and falling waters, from the noise of ocean waves, or from the glimpse of distant waters or far-off mountains. An eminent theologian is stimulated by the playing of a piano in the next room. The stimulus from books is reserved for discussion in a separate chapter on the Right Use of Books.

[Sidenote: Hinderances.]

As there are helps, so there are hinderances to good thinking. Petty cares, executive duties, noises in the same room, or in the next room, or upon the street, are well-known examples. Their name is legion, and their cost is enormous if they come from manufacturing establishments near the school. A word about the extra-mural music which emanates from vile machinery on the streets is not out of place in this connection. An English writer asserts that the organ-grinders of London have done more in the last twenty years to detract from the quality and quantity of the higher mental work of the nation than any two or three colleges at Oxford have effected to increase it. A mathematician estimates the cost of the increased mental labor these street-musicians have imposed upon him and his clerks at several thousand pounds’ worth of first-class work, for which the government actually paid in added length of the time needed for his calculations.

[Sidenote: Our fellow-men.]

In matters of this kind every man must be a law unto himself. Since no two human beings are exactly alike, but each is a new creation fresh from the hands of the Creator, it follows that each person must study his own peculiarities, form his own habits of work, and acquire the power to think in the midst of the circumstances in which he is placed. By resolute effort the mind can ignore many a hinderance and distraction. The best stimulus from without comes from our fellow-men. “Our minds need the stimulus of other minds, as our lungs need oxygen to perform their functions.” At school the stimulus comes from classmates, from those in the higher and lower classes, but above all else, from the best books and the best teachers. In the life beyond the school the stimulus comes from the daily contact and competition with others, from conversation and discussions with those who think, from communion with the best books, with nature, and with nature’s God.

[Sidenote: Sources of stimulus.]

After the powers of the mind have been awakened and disciplined, stimulus and inspiration may come from ten thousand sources. Silence and solitude, city and country, business and pleasure, observation and travel, observatories and laboratories, libraries and museums, nature and art, poetry and prose, fiction and history, may each in turn serve as a spur to creative, inventive, and productive thinking, as an incentive to original research, fruitful investigation, and profitable reasoning. Among all the sources of stimulation, the good teacher and the good book take superlative rank.

IX

THE RIGHT USE OF BOOKS

Even the very greatest of authors are indebted to miscellaneous
reading, often in several different languages, for the
suggestion of their most original works, and for the light
which has kindled many a shining thought of their own.

HAMERTON.

He reads a book most wisely who thinks everything into a book
that it is capable of holding, and it is the stamp and token of
a great book so to incorporate itself with our own being, so
to quicken our insight and stimulate our thought, as to make
us feel as if we helped to create it while we read. Whatever
we can find in a book that aids us in the conduct of life, or
to a truer interpretation of it, or to a franker reconcilement
with it, we may with a good conscience believe is not there by
accident, but that the author meant we should find it there.

LOWELL.

Much as a man gains from actual conflict with living minds,
he may gain much even of the same kind of knowledge, though
different in detail, from the accumulated thinking of the
past. No living generation can outweigh all the past. If
books without experience in real life cannot develop a man
all round, neither can life without books do it. There is a
certain dignity of culture which lives only in the atmosphere
of libraries. There is a breadth and a genuineness of
self-knowledge which one gets from the silent friendship of
great authors without which the best work that is in a man
cannot come out of him in large professional successes.

PHELPS.

The great secret of reading consists in this,—that it does
not matter so much what we read or how we read it as what we
think and how we think it. Reading is only the fuel; and, the
mind once on fire, any and all material will feed the flame,
provided only it have any combustible matter in it. And we
cannot tell from what quarter the next material will come. The
thought we need, the facts we are in search of, may make their
appearance in the corner of the newspaper, or in some forgotten
volume long ago consigned to dust and oblivion. Hawthorne in
the parlor of a country inn on a rainy day could find mental
nutriment in an old directory. That accomplished philologist,
the late Lord Strangford, could find ample amusement for an
hour’s delay at a railway station in tracing out the etymology
of the names in Bradshaw. The mind that is not awake and alive
will find a library a barren wilderness.

CHARLES F. RICHARDSON.

IX

THE RIGHT USE OF BOOKS

[Sidenote: A novel.]

A clergyman who found the reaction from his pulpit efforts so great that often he could not bring himself to think vigorously and consecutively before the middle of the following week was advised by his physician to try the effect of an Indian tale or an exciting story, and found that a good novel works like a charm in bringing the mind back to normal action. After the interest in the story or novel begins to grow there is danger of reading too long, of reading until another spell of fatigue and reaction comes. The book should be laid aside as soon as the first glow of mental action is felt.

[Sidenote: Books.]

Most thinkers need the stimulating influence of other minds. These can be found at their best upon the shelves of a well-selected library. They are ready to help us whenever we feel ready to give them our attention. Men put the best part of themselves into their books. The process of writing for print intensifies mental activity, spurs the intellect to the keenest, most vigorous effort, and arouses the highest energy of thought and feeling. Authors that exert a quickening influence upon our thinking should be kept for use whenever we need a stimulus to rouse the mind from its lethargy.

Leibnitz got his best ideas while reading books. He had acquired the habits of a librarian to whom favorite volumes are always accessible.

[Sidenote: As stimulus.]

A scientist of repute says he gets the necessary stimulus from Jevons’s treatise on the inductive sciences. Professor Phelps has collected an instructive list of authors whose writings have been helpful to other authors of note. He says,—

[Sidenote: Examples.]

“Voltaire used to read Massillon as a stimulus to production. Bossuet read Homer for the same purpose. Gray read Spenser’s ‘Faerie Queene’ as the preliminary to the use of his pen. The favorites of Milton were Homer and Euripides. Fénelon resorted to the ancient classics promiscuously. Pope read Dryden as his habitual aid to composing. Corneille read Tacitus and Livy. Clarendon did the same. Sir William Jones, on his passage to India, planned five different volumes, and assigned to each the author he resolved to read as a guide and awakener to his own mind for its work. Buffon made the same use of the works of Sir Isaac Newton. With great variety of tastes successful authors have generally agreed in availing themselves of this natural and facile method of educating their minds to the work of original creation.”[15]

[Sidenote: Great thinkers.]