Cambridge Essays on Education | Page 3

the problems that confront a great nation. We in
Great Britain have been too apt to rely upon our energy and courage
and practical resourcefulness in emergencies, and thus have tended to
neglect those efforts to accumulate knowledge, and consider how it can
be most usefully applied, which should precede and accompany action.
This deficiency is happily one that can be removed, while a want of
qualities which are the gift of nature is less curable. The "efficiency"
which is on every one's mouth cannot be extemporised by rushing
hastily into action, however energetic. It is the fruit of patient and exact
determination of and reflection upon the facts to be dealt with.
The view that it was the finest minds that ought to be most cared for,
and that to them of right belonged not merely leadership, but even
control also, was carried by the ancients, and especially by Plato and
Aristotle, almost to excess. Their ideal, and indeed that of most Greek
thinkers, was the maintenance among the masses of the military valour
and discipline which the State needed for its protection, and the
cultivation among the chosen few of the highest intellectual and moral
excellence. In the Middle Ages, when power as well as rank belonged
to two classes, nobles and clergy, the ideal of education took a religious
colour, and that training was most valued which made men loyal to the
Church and to sound doctrine, with the prospect of bliss in the world to
come. In our times, educational ideals have become not merely more
earthly but more material. Modern doctrines of equality have
discredited the ancient view that the chief aim of instruction is to
prepare the few Wise and Good for the government of the State. It is
not merely upon this world but also upon the material things of this
world, power and the acquisition of territory, industrial production,
commerce, finance, wealth and prosperity in all its forms, that the
modern eye is fixed. There has been a drifting away from that respect
for learning which was strong in the Middle Ages and lasted down into
the eighteenth century. In some countries, as in our own, that which
instruction and training may accomplish has been rated far below the
standard of the ancients. Yet in our own time we have seen two striking
examples to show that their estimate was hardly too high. Think of the
power which the constant holding up, during long centuries, of certain
ideals and standards of conduct, exerted upon the Japanese people,
instilling sentiments of loyalty to the sovereign and inspiring a certain

conception of chivalric duty which Europe did not reach even when
monarchy and chivalry stood highest. Think of that boundless devotion
to the State as an omnipotent and all-absorbing power, superseding
morality and suppressing the individual, which within the short span of
two generations has taken possession of Germany. In the latter case at
least the incessant preaching and teaching of a theory which lowers the
citizen's independence and individuality while it saps his moral sense
seems to us a misdirection of educational effort. But in it education has
at least displayed its power.
Can a fair statement of the educational ideals which we might here and
now set before ourselves be found in saying that there are three chief
aims to be sought as respects those we have called the best minds?
One aim is to fit men to be at least explorers, even if not discoverers, in
the fields of science and learning.
A second is to fit them to be leaders in the field of action, leaders not
only by their initiative and their diligence, but also by the power and
the habit of turning a full stream of thought and knowledge upon
whatever work they have to do.
A third is to give them the taste for, and the habit of enjoying,
intellectual pleasures.
Many moralists, ancient and modern, have given pleasure a bad name,
because they saw that the most alluring and powerfully seductive
pleasures, pleasures which appeal to all men alike, were indulged to
excess, and became a source of evil. But men will have pleasure and
ought to have pleasure. The best way of drawing them off from the
more dangerous pleasures is to teach them to enjoy the better kinds.
Moreover the quieter pleasures of the intellect mean Rest, and a greater
fitness for resuming work.
The pity is that so many sources capable of affording delight are
ignored or imperfectly appreciated. May not this be partly the fault of
the lines which our education has followed? Perhaps some kinds of
study would have fared better if their defenders had dwelt more upon
the pleasure they afford and less upon their supposed utility. The
champions of Greek