Essays On Education And Kindred Subjects (Fiscle Part- 11), Herbert Spencer [historical books to read .txt] 📗

Part 1 Chapter 2 (Intellectual Education) Pg 28

Confounded Together--Only As Each Class Of    Co-Existences And Sequences

Becomes Familiar Through The   Recurrence Of    Cases Coming Under It--Only

As The   Various Classes Of    Relations Get Accurately Marked Off From Each

Other By Mutual Limitation, Can The   Exact Definitions Of    Advanced

Knowledge Become Truly Comprehensible. Thus In Education We Must Be

Content To Set Out With Crude Notions. These We Must Aim To Make

Gradually Clearer By Facilitating The   Acquisition Of    Experiences Such As

Will Correct, First Their Greatest Errors, And Afterwards Their

Successively Less Marked Errors. And The   Scientific Formulæ Must Be

Given Only As Fast As The   Conceptions Are Perfected.

 

 

 

3. To Say That Our Lessons Ought To Start From The   Concrete And End In

The Abstract, May Be Considered As In Part A Repetition Of    The   First Of

The Foregoing Principles. Nevertheless It Is A Maxim That Must Be

Stated: If With No Other View, Then With The   View Of    Showing In Certain

Cases What Are Truly The   Simple And The   Complex. For Unfortunately There

Has Been Much Misunderstanding On This Point. General Formulas Which Men

Have Devised To Express Groups Of    Details, And Which Have Severally

Simplified Their Conceptions By Uniting Many Facts Into One Fact, They

Have Supposed Must Simplify The   Conceptions Of    A Child Also. They Have

Forgotten That A Generalisation Is Simple Only In Comparison With The

Whole Mass Of    Particular Truths It Comprehends--That It Is More Complex

Than Any One Of    These Truths Taken Singly--That Only After Many Of    These

Single Truths Have Been Acquired Does The   Generalisation Ease The   Memory

And Help The   Reason--And That To A Mind Not Possessing These Single

Truths It Is Necessarily A Mystery. Thus Confounding Two Kinds Of

Simplification, Teachers Have Constantly Erred By Setting Out With

"First Principles": A Proceeding Essentially, Though Not Apparently, At

Variance With The   Primary Rule; Which Implies That The   Mind Should Be

Introduced To Principles Through The   Medium Of    Examples, And So Should

Be Led From The   Particular To The   General--From The   Concrete To The

Abstract.

 

 

 

4. The   Education Of    The   Child Must Accord Both In Mode And Arrangement

With The   Education Of    Mankind, Considered Historically. In Other Words,

The Genesis Of    Knowledge In The   Individual Must Follow The   Same Course

As The   Genesis Of    Knowledge In The   Race. In Strictness, This Principle

May Be Considered As Already Expressed By Implication; Since Both, Being

Processes Of    Evolution, Must Conform To Those Same General Laws Of

Evolution Above Insisted On, And Must Therefore Agree With Each Other.

Nevertheless This Particular Parallelism Is Of    Value For The   Specific

Guidance It Affords. To M. Comte We Believe Society Owes The   Enunciation

Of It; And We May Accept This Item Of    His Philosophy Without At All

Committing Ourselves To The   Rest. This Doctrine May Be Upheld By Two

Reasons, Quite Independent Of    Any Abstract Theory; And Either Of    Them

Sufficient To Establish It. One Is Deducible From The   Law Of    Hereditary

Transmission As Considered In Its Wider Consequences. For If It Be True

That Men Exhibit Likeness To Ancestry, Both In Aspect And Character--If

It Be True That Certain Mental Manifestations, As Insanity, Occur In

Successive Members Of    The   Same Family At The   Same Age--If, Passing From

Individual Cases In Which The   Traits Of    Many Dead Ancestors Mixing With

Those Of    A Few Living Ones Greatly Obscure The   Law, We Turn To National

Types, And Remark How The   Contrasts Between Them Are Persistent From Age

To Age--If We Remember That These Respective Types Came From A Common

Stock, And That Hence The   Present Marked Differences Between Them Must

Have Arisen From The   Action Of    Modifying Circumstances Upon Successive

Generations Who Severally Transmitted The   Accumulated Effects To Their

Descendants--If We Find The   Differences To Be Now Organic, So That A

French Child Grows Into A French Man Even When Brought Up Among

Strangers--And If The   General Fact Thus Illustrated Is True Of    The   Whole

Nature, Intellect Inclusive; Then It Follows That If There Be An Order

In Which The   Human Race Has Mastered Its Various Kinds Of    Knowledge,

There Will Arise In Every Child An Aptitude To Acquire These Kinds Of

Knowledge In The   Same Order. So That Even Were The   Order Intrinsically

Indifferent, It Would Facilitate Education To Lead The   Individual Mind

Through The   Steps Traversed By The   General Mind. But The   Order Is _Not_

Intrinsically Indifferent; And Hence The   Fundamental Reason Why

Education Should Be A Repetition Of    Civilisation In Little. It Is

Provable Both That The   Historical Sequence Was, In Its Main Outlines, A

Necessary One; And That The   Causes Which Determined It Apply To The

Child As To The   Race. Not To Specify These Causes In Detail, It Will

Suffice Here To Point Out That As The   Mind Of    Humanity Placed In The

Midst Of    Phenomena And Striving To Comprehend Them, Has, After Endless

Comparisons, Speculations, Experiments, And Theories, Reached Its

Present Knowledge Of    Each Subject By A Specific Route; It May Rationally

Be Inferred That The   Relationship Between Mind And Phenomena Is Such As

To Prevent This Knowledge From Being Reached By Any Other Route; And

That As Each Child's Mind Stands In This Same Relationship To Phenomena,

They Can Be Accessible To It Only Through The   Same Route. Hence In

Deciding Upon The   Right Method Of    Education, An Inquiry Into The   Method

Of Civilisation Will Help To Guide Us.

 

 

 

5. One Of    The   Conclusions To Which Such An Inquiry Leads, Is, That In

Each Branch Of    Instruction We Should Proceed From The   Empirical To The

Rational. During Human Progress, Every Science Is Evolved Out Of    Its

Corresponding Art. It Results From The   Necessity We Are Under, Both

Individually And As A Race, Of    Reaching The   Abstract By Way Of    The

Concrete, That There Must Be Practice And An Accruing Experience With

Its Empirical Generalisation, Before There Can Be Science. Science Is

Organised Knowledge; And Before Knowledge Can Be Organised, Some Of    It

Must Be Possessed. Every Study, Therefore, Should Have A Purely

Experimental Introduction; And Only After An Ample Fund Of    Observations

Has Been Accumulated, Should Reasoning Begin. As Illustrative

Applications Of    This Rule, We May Instance The   Modern Course Of    Placing

Grammar, Not Before Language, But After It; Or The   Ordinary Custom Of

Prefacing Perspective By Practical Drawing. By And By Further

Applications Of    It Will Be Indicated.

 

 

 

6. A Second Corollary From The   Foregoing General Principle, And One

Which Cannot Be Too Strenuously Insisted On, Is, That In Education The

Process Of    Self-Development Should Be Encouraged To The   Uttermost.

Children Should Be Led To Make Their Own Investigations, And To Draw

Their Own Inferences. They Should Be _Told_ As Little As Possible, And

Induced To _Discover_ As Much As Possible. Humanity Has Progressed

Solely By Self-Instruction; And That To Achieve The   Best Results, Each

Mind Must Progress Somewhat After The   Same Fashion, Is Continually

Proved By The   Marked Success Of    Self-Made Men. Those Who Have Been

Brought Up Under The   Ordinary School-Drill, And Have Carried Away With

Them The   Idea That Education Is Practicable Only In That Style, Will

Think It Hopeless To Make Children Their Own Teachers. If, However, They

Will Consider That The   All-Important Knowledge Of    Surrounding Objects

Which A Child Gets In Its Early Years Is Got Without Help--If They Will

Remember That The   Child Is Self-Taught In The   Use Of    Its Mother

Tongue--If They Will Estimate The   Amount Of    That Experience Of    Life,

That Out-Of-School Wisdom, Which Every Boy Gathers For Himself--If They

Part 1 Chapter 2 (Intellectual Education) Pg 29

Will Mark The   Unusual Intelligence Of    The   Uncared-For London _Gamin_, As

Shown In Whatever Directions His Faculties Have Been Tasked--If,

Further, They Will Think How Many Minds Have Struggled Up Unaided, Not

Only Through The   Mysteries Of    Our Irrationally-Planned _Curriculum_, But

Through Hosts Of    Other Obstacles Besides; They Will Find It A Not

Unreasonable Conclusion That If The   Subjects Be Put Before Him In Right

Order And Right Form, Any Pupil Of    Ordinary Capacity Will Surmount His

Successive Difficulties With But Little Assistance. Who Indeed Can Watch

The Ceaseless Observation, And Inquiry, And Inference Going On In A

Child's Mind, Or Listen To Its Acute Remarks On Matters Within The   Range

Of Its Faculties, Without Perceiving That These Powers It Manifests, If

Brought To Bear Systematically Upon Studies _Within The   Same Range_,

Would Readily Master Them Without Help? This Need For Perpetual Telling

Results From Our Stupidity, Not From The   Child's. We Drag It Away From

The Facts In Which It Is Interested, And Which It Is Actively

Assimilating Of    Itself. We Put Before It Facts Far Too Complex For It To

Understand; And Therefore Distasteful To It. Finding That It Will Not

Voluntarily Acquire These Facts, We Thrust Them Into Its Mind By Force

Of Threats And Punishment. By Thus Denying The   Knowledge It Craves, And

Cramming It With Knowledge It Cannot Digest, We Produce A Morbid State

Of Its Faculties; And A Consequent Disgust For Knowledge In General. And

When, As A Result Partly Of    The   Stolid Indolence We Have Brought On, And

Partly Of    Still-Continued Unfitness In Its Studies, The   Child Can

Understand Nothing Without Explanation, And Becomes A Mere Passive

Recipient Of    Our Instruction, We Infer That Education Must Necessarily

Be Carried On Thus. Having By Our Method Induced Helplessness, We Make

The Helplessness A Reason For Our Method. Clearly Then, The   Experience

Of Pedagogues Cannot Rationally Be Quoted Against The   System We Are

Advocating. And Whoever Sees This, Will See That We May Safely Follow

The Discipline Of    Nature Throughout--May, By A Skilful Ministration,

Make The   Mind As Self-Developing In Its Later Stages As It Is In Its

Earlier Ones; And That Only By Doing This Can We Produce The   Highest

Power And Activity.

 

 

 

7. As A Final Test By Which To Judge Any Plan Of    Culture, Should Come

The Question,--Does It Create A Pleasurable Excitement In The   Pupils?

When In Doubt Whether A Particular Mode Or Arrangement Is Or Is Not More

In Harmony With The   Foregoing Principles Than Some Other, We May Safely

Abide By This Criterion. Even When, As Considered Theoretically, The

Proposed Course Seems The   Best, Yet If It Produces No Interest, Or Less

Interest Than Some Other Course, We Should Relinquish It; For A Child's

Intellectual Instincts Are More Trustworthy Than Our Reasonings. In

Respect To The   Knowing-Faculties, We May Confidently Trust In The

General Law, That Under Normal Conditions, Healthful Action Is

Pleasurable, While Action Which Gives Pain Is Not Healthful. Though At

Present Very Incompletely Conformed To By The   Emotional Nature, Yet By

The Intellectual Nature, Or At Least By Those Parts Of    It Which The

Child Exhibits, This Law Is Almost Wholly Conformed To. The   Repugnances

To This And That Study Which Vex The   Ordinary Teacher, Are Not Innate,

But Result From His Unwise System. Fellenberg Says, "Experience Has

Taught Me That _Indolence_ In Young Persons Is So Directly Opposite To

Their Natural Disposition To Activity, That Unless It Is The   Consequence

Of Bad Education, It Is Almost Invariably Connected With Some

Constitutional Defect." And The   Spontaneous Activity To Which Children

Are Thus Prone, Is Simply The   Pursuit Of    Those Pleasures Which The

Healthful Exercise Of    The   Faculties Gives. It Is True That Some Of    The

Higher Mental Powers, As Yet But Little Developed In The   Race, And

Congenitally Possessed In Any Considerable Degree Only By The   Most

Advanced, Are Indisposed To The   Amount Of    Exertion Required Of    Them. But

These, In Virtue Of    Their Very Complexity, Will, In A Normal Course Of

Culture, Come Last Into Exercise; And Will Therefore Have No Demands

Made On Them Until The   Pupil Has Arrived At An Age When Ulterior Motives

Can Be Brought Into Play, And An Indirect Pleasure Made To

Counterbalance A Direct Displeasure. With All Faculties Lower Than

These, However, The   Immediate Gratification Consequent On Activity, Is

The Normal Stimulus; And Under Good Management The   Only Needful

Stimulus. When We Have To Fall Back On Some Other, We Must Take The   Fact

As Evidence