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Show Educational. The folio wing paper by C. C. Goodwin was read hv Mrs. C Watson before the Ladles' Literary club "' Friday, October 10th: Ladies: When Mrs. Bird did me the honor to ask me to prepare a paper to be read before your society, she especially desired my views upon the classics as an essential part of a college education. It is a difficult subject to handle, at least I fear it will be difficult to give my ideas clearly in any paper of reasonable length. It is first necessary to consider what an education educa-tion is; next, what is the aim desired to be attained at-tained in the pursuit of an education. We s?eak of a person who has just graduated with honors from a great university as "finely educated." What do we mean by that? Simply that he or she has mastered the studies of -the school so well that honors have been bestowed. We do not mean that from the vast stores of knowledge which the world supplies this person is finely equipped. That would not do, for we all know that thus far there has been but some gathering gath-ering of the pebbles of knowledge on the shore, while the great unfathomed ocean rolls beyond. We mean merely that the person has made a good start. But a much more important question in such a case is, What is the state of the mind of the graduate? grad-uate? Has the student through the University training learned to love study for its own sake? More important still, Has the student learned how to study? That is, has the mind been trained to think and investigate as it pursues a theme? Was graduation day looked upon as a goal beyond be-yond which there was to be no further effort? If that was the thought then, save for the name of heing a graduate, the student might just as well have been playing ping pong, shooting ducks, or attending pink teas, as to have been in school, for the brain is like the muscles. A horse is carefully groomed and fed and exercised for days before a great race. When the race comes off, no matter how masterful may be the performance of the animal, if then he is put back in the stable and merely fed without more care regarding his grooming or exercise, in a few days his muscles I become relaxed and flabby. You all know more than one student who graduated some years ago from some of the famous fa-mous schools. Have you not noticed in conversing convers-ing with some of them that their brains seem relaxed re-laxed and flabby? Is it not clear enough to you that all the reason they ever took a University course was to get from it a certificate of character? charac-ter? To have it said they graduated in the class of 18, and that .they were in the same class with Chistopher Columbus, Fitzroy and Hendrick Hans Stuyvesant? They have never made any use of their acquirements; ac-quirements; from nothing they received during the four years of their college life, did they acquire ac-quire an inspiration to enter some useful field, to open new doors of science or call down new light-enings light-enings of knowledge. Their studies stopped at the college door. As they left school it was with the same feeling that the man in Michigan gave vent to when, returning return-ing from the funeral of his wfe, he exclaimed, "Well, there is so much done." You will see that it does not much matter whether such a student pursues one or another class of studies. Benjamin Franklin never attended a university. univer-sity. If he had, we can see that he would have fought every proposition of the schools until their absolute truth had been demonstrated; then he would not only have retained all that he learned, but e ery day of his life thereafter he would have palled up that stored knowledge to help him in n's work, and had he possessed a thorough knowledge knowl-edge of physics he would have called down the 1'ghtnings sooner. With such a man as he the school days never end until the infirmities of age call a halt upon furthpr effort. With such a man, no matter what J?ay be prescribed as a proper course of study, if jnere is anything outside the course worth investigating inves-tigating he will search it out. Thomas Jefferson Pursued the study of mathematics to the end of. h'8 life. He studied architecture from a scientific Point of view for years in his old age; he advo-ted advo-ted the application of chemistry to the common affairs of life. His school days ended only when ne sank into the coma from which he never ay-'ak- ened; the flowers sent him on his final graduation day were those that were Btrown upon his bier. Now, as to what studies students should pursue, pur-sue, my thought is, two things should govern. What is the disposition and what the taste of the student? Second, What is the purpose of the education? edu-cation? You have all been bored by a stupid clergyman, preaching in a listless way Sabbath after Sabbath with monotonous stupidity about the wickedness of the human heart and picturing a heaven for the good which would make any one shudder at thought of going there and being locked in for keeps. Such clergymen are generally only sons; their fond old mothers thought that a clergyman's calling was the very highest, and so skimped themselves to provide means to educate them in that line. Such men are failures from the first. At the same time, those men, even while boys, could in ten minutes with a jackknife and shingle shin-gle have a wheel running In the brook that flowed by the schoolhouse. Could they have been given a scientific training they might have been Steph-ensons Steph-ensons or Watts, or Morses or Ericssons. Certain elementary studies must be pursued by all. All colts have to be halter-broken, but it is useless to try to make a race horse of a Clydesdale Clydes-dale or to dedicate to the dray a blood horse. My judgment is, that while all men and women wo-men should be given thorough training on the elementary ele-mentary branches of education, the higher education educa-tion should be limited to only the worthy. If I had my way, after students complete the elementary elemen-tary course, only those who pursue study for the love of the pursuit, should be encouraged to waste further time in the schools. Thus selected, what studies each should pursue pur-sue I would leave for each to select. I would have those competent to advise to state their ideas of the advantages of every line of investigation, then leave the student to choose. One foreign boy comes to this country and never can acquire the knowledge to speak or write the English language in an acceptable way. Another boy masters the language in a month. It would be foolishness to give those two boys the same studies in school. I would have the truth explained to them, that the chiefest object of a higher education is to enable a student to closer analyze all questions in life and to discipline disci-pline the mind in a way that will enable a person per-son to probe, without wearying, a subject to the bottom. Then I would have explained the advantages ad-vantages which would follow each study, then . leave the student to choose. But every day I would have lectures on the loveliness of knowledge, on the comfort and de light that comes with the acquirement of an education; edu-cation; how with his books and his memory a man can be alone without being lonely; how in the silence of the night he can surround himself with friends, friends of all the ages; how he can make the stars bend down and tell to him their secrets, and report to him their goings and their comings; how the sun and the moon are constrained con-strained to reveal when their faces are to be veiled in an eclipse; how to compel the deep sea to report when his tides are to ebb and flow; out of the viewless air to catch the breath of the hurricane hur-ricane and to learn, while yet it is far away, what path it will follow; how to analyzse the soils and the rocks and learn to reduce the language of the alphabet which nature has left scattered throughout through-out her domain, and which to inspired eyes supplies sup-plies the key that will unlock the doors to nature's treasure chambers. I would have pictured the advantages of knowing the histories of the nations, na-tions, that a clearer idea of the glories of our own nation may be realized. I would have the lives of the world's great dead studied to bring to the student the comfort of the company of these immortals, im-mortals, when the present world grows cold and trusted friends betray them. In short, I would have made clear the fact that the higher the mind can be trained, the higher the mortal ascends toward the fountain of all knowledge, how wisdom comes at length to give new interpretations to learning and exalts mortals mor-tals nearer and nearer toward the fulfillment of the promise that at last man shall have dominion over all the earth. When the love of knowlege is sincere and its pursuit is followed with diligence, it brings its reward in the peace and serenity which dull souls cannot comprehend, and in the fellowship of all the world's immortal dead, those who trod the wine press of this life in the long ago and then went to their rest. There is a reasonable theory that we begin our career in the next world, in an intellectual way, where we leave off here. Let us all so live that it will insure us congenial company in that higher circle toward which our lives are swjftly advancing. , i"t3ir |