The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1878-10-24
Education by the State.

The question of popular education
more and more occupies public attention,
and no more valuable contribution to the
literature of the subject has been made
recently than the address of DR.. Sears,
delivered before the Nashville Normal
School last May, and now published and
circulated as an appendix to his annual
report to the Directors Of the Peabody
Fund.
DIR. Sears sets out with this striking
statement of the philosophy of education:
"In sll great public interests there is a
simple underlying principle from which
the whole may be developed. That
principle in regard to public schools may
be stated thus: Man was made for edu-
cation as much as the earth was made
for cultivation. Both the rational and
the material world lose most of their
value when neglected" Having elabo-
rated this idea from his own experience
and from history, thea speaker next al
luded as follows to the effects of want
of general education on human happi-
ness. Said he:
with all the learning of individual
men, there is among US and around US
'frightful mass of ignorant and almost
useless citizens, which the educated class
cannot control. If you inquire
into the cause of much of our domestic
unhappiness, you will find that it is the
want of culture and refinement. The
son goes out at night for pleasure, be-
cause he finds so little at home. The
daughter seeks amusement abroad by day
and by night, for the same reason. The
husband goes to the saloon and other
places of resort, because his wife's stock
of entertaining conversation is exhausted;
and she herself sits solitary at home in
the wearisome and dull evenings, be-.
cause the family finds more pleasure else
where. Now, if this be the history of
many families in every community, how
much of intellectual elevation, of high
toned moral sentiment and public spirit,
will be found among them? What are
their social enjoyments and Manners
rational and improving, or low and de-
grading? elevating and refining inter-
course, or sensual pleasures, and vulgar
and commonplace conversation I
need not ask what are the occupation of
such families. They will be of the
plainest and coarsest kind. The arts
will be of the rudest sort. That skill,
which in this age is an essential element
of prosperity, will be wanting. The sad
story to be told Of this class is that indi-
vidual life is dull, monotonous, and un.
thinking home life, coarse, blunt, and
uninviting social life, low and unim-
proving; civil life, jealous, selfish and
quarrrsome and political life, narrow
minded, clansh and semi barbarous.
1t is as Beotia compared to Attica
Ireland compared to Scotland Spain,
to England or Prussia; Spanish Ameri-
ca, to the United States"
In regard to the opponents Of pub
lie system of education DIR. Sears says:
"And yet there are men who are in
different, and others who are even hos
tile, to the general diffusion of knowl-
edge by means of public schools. The
former know not its value, because they
have not yet learned what all others have
that knowledge is power" Of its
elevating influence, its broad daylight
upon the soul, and its life-giving energy,
they are totally Ignorant. Though the
world is full of examples, to them the
page of history is blank.
"The other class appear to be more
knowing than the wisest men are, and
assume to be public teachers and guides.
They are the apostles of ignorance, as if
divinely commissioned to keep the veil
on the human mind, which others are
endeavoring to remove. They forget
that truth and the soul are made for each
other, as much as light is made for the
eye and the eye for the light. They
heed not the proverbs of Solomon, nor
the voice of the wise men of hundred
generations, in regard to seeking knowl-
edge. In their view, the many exist for
the benefit of the few: the one to do the
thinking of society, the others to do the
work. Light is to shine upon these few
favored sons of fortune, while thick
darkness is to cover the people,"
The folly of the clamor about Cheap"
instruction is clearly exposed:
"There are men who, If we may be-
lieve them, are not hostile to the public
schols: they only wish to cut down un-
necessary expenses. They want cheap
schools--the cheaper the better. They
would graduate the pay of teachers by
the day laborer. The poor they say,
do not need accomplished teachers or e1-
pensive schools. Nothing but the simp-
lest elements of knowledge need be
taught them. They have no claim for
anything better. Many of them are
vicious. Let them put their children to
work. The lower classes will never rise.
Why trouble ourselves about them ?
Education is to them doubtful boon; it
often Injuries the laborer by making him
discontented. 1t is all fanaticism and
false philanthropy They are now pre-
pared to turn round and say that the
public schools are vulgar; that it is no
place for the children of good families.
| Of course, the rich ought mt to pay
taxes for schools that do not benefit them.
These men are not opposed to public
schools. Oh, no! They are the friends
of moderate, economical system of ed
ucation. Deliver us from such friends.
How came such fossils to turn up in this
age? They arc at least three centuries
behind the times. They were born and
bred in Sleepy Hollow. The wheel
of time has been turning, and will not
60 back to accommodate them. The
world has moved somewhat since such
ideas were entertained. Feudalism is
dead and buried, and not even its ghost
will ever revisit the glimpscs Of the
moon. The peasant Of former centuries
has disappeared; the citizen has taken
his place. Now, we have cnly to neg
lect this mass of the people, to suffer
their offspring to grow up in Ignorance,
and we shall have rs plentiful harvest
of Communists as France and of Char
lists as England has ever had. Indeed,
these untutorcd, imported citizens, bu-
ried in our coal mines as deeply as they
are buried in ignorance, are foremost in
all disturbances. They come mostly
from the Old World. They are secluded
| from society. and breathe not the atTnOs-