Dodgeville chronicle. [volume] (Dodgeville, Wis.) 1862-current, 1872-09-13
Self-EducatiOn.

WE hear a good deal in our day about
"self- educated men," just as if there
were educated men of any other sort
Now the truth is that every man and
every woman who is educated at all, is
self-educated of very necessity Teach
ers and schools and colleges and universe
ties are all. very excellent things in their
way, but not one nor all of them can by
any possibility educate a man. They can
aid him greatly, no doubt, and facilitate
the work of self-education, but that work
is one which the man himself must do,
from beginning to end, if it is to be done
at all. xe# f& 1856
The real difference between people who
are commonly said to be sef-educated
and those whose Quotations have been
gotten in the regular way, is that, the for
mer have done without assistance, or with
limited assistance, that which the latter
have been aided in doing.
That The schools greatly facilitate the
work is unquestionably true, but where
these are beyond reach there is no reason
whatever why the work may not be done
quite as we'll and quite as thoroughly
without them. 1t will be somewhat more
difficult, that is all. d & e. e## ~
There are two opposite errors common
ly made on this subject. The first is
that the people whose education has been
secured outside of the scools are neces-
sarily less perfectly cultured than those
whose advantages have been better. That
this is an error is sufficiently seen in the
career of one of our leading magazine
editors, who quilted school at ten years of
age, and yet has made of himself, while
yet young. man, a polished writer, both
of prose and poetry, an accomplished
scholar in all that. is highest and best in
scholarship, aSkeens and judicious critic,
and an editor certainly without superior
in this country. He has not only made
himself successful mamie has placed
himself in the foremost rank in the very
fields of labor where ripe scholarship and
thorough culture are most essentially
necessary. In other words, he has edu-
Gated .himselfsout of school almost as
perfectly as he could have done it in the
regular way.
There are many other men who have
done the same thing, and while they
have doubtless found the task more diff
cult at times than it would have been in
school, they have accomplished it never
theless. The foot-farer finds his journey
slower and more wearisome than that Of
the traveller by rail, but there is no reason
why he may not reach the journeys end
for all that.
The second error is that at which Josh
Billings hintswhen he says that "Self
made men are apt to be little too proud of
the job.'' Certainly, their admirers near
ly always fall into this error, and the mis-
take is a serious one Inasmuch as all
educated men are self-educated, the per-
Torrance of the one who has cultured
himself outof schools not SO marvellous
after all. He has done nothing that any,
body else of good ordinary capacity
might not have done, and his work has
not been very much more difficult than it
would have been in school, while in most
cases it has not been quite so perfectly
The proper view of the matter appears
to be this: If we are to be educated at all,
we must educate ourselves, and we can.
do this more easily, and in most cases.
more perfectly, in school than out. Where
fore we should, by all means, embrace
every opportunity to secure regular in
struction. But we may educate ourselves
out of school, and if we are denied the adj
vantages of systematic training, we have
no reason to despair To abandon the
work of self cultivation because. OF this
want is simply a eowardIy giving up of a ]