Show Books vs the Powers of Observation Obser-vation It was lately remarked in these columns that one of the dangers at tendent on education was that it might lessen mens powers of observation obser-vation There is no doubt we apprehend ap-prehend that this possibility does exist Bookishness and aosence of mind are no new faults among students stu-dents Among the more cultivated classes they have indeed been for a considerable time in process of diminution and the last half century more particularly has seen a great change in this respect Physical science has roused students stu-dents who in former ages would have been abstract thinkers and nothing more to careful and steady observation of external things Facilities Fa-cilities for traveling have acted as another stimulus in the same direction and the love of nature has been a power over sentimental minds and has led them insensibly from a quiet enjoyment of their surroundings to mgre active investigation So that altogether the classes which at the I present day have the advantage of the higher education are far more observant than were their forerunners fore-runners of three or four centuri sago s-ago and though even now many of the mathematicians and philosophers philo-sophers who walk the streets of our universities live largely in a mood of abstract thought we must be careful ol finding undue fault with this for the inward eye has some claims not lightly to be despised But with respect to the mass of the nation the question we have raised is one that deserves a good deal of attention Popular education is still in the bookish stage and without complaining of what is inevitable we may and ought to enquire whether literary study does now in the lower ranks promote that vice of inobservance I which it certainly promoted in the higher ranks a century or two ago Equally we have to enquire whether the virtue which is the converse of this error maybe fostered whether and how the study of books may be made to minister to powers of direct observation instead of being adverse ad-verse to them and to assist in the general business of lifePopular Science Monthly for January J |