Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1881-01-19
Education as a Hindrance.


cent article in the Contemporary Reuiew, dis
cusses the question of education from a
common sense point of view, as follows
"Now, what will be the verdict of future
generations on learning that the education
which this great and powerful nation offers
to the children of its artisans, to the class
that will form the artisans of the next gen.
GRAFTON, was of class purely literary, in no
an education which, so far as it goes be-
yond the three elements Of reading, writ
ing and arithmetic, is framed in all its es-
sential features upon an exclusively collegi-
ate type of studies grammar, history, geog-
raphy, foreign languages, and the like, being
introduced to the utter exclusion in all the
most important of the successive "stand-
ards" of any teaching of drawing, of me-
chanics, of the simplest facts Of science or
of natural history-of all, in fact, that most
nearly concerns the workman throughout
his entire career. In all the constructive
trades the greater part of workman's in
structions are given to him in the form OF
working drawings. Yet we suffer the bud.
| ding artisan to pass through the schools ig
norant Of the first rudiments of science
that is as essential to his work as are the
four rules of arithmetic. And ought we
then, to be surprised if, in pursuance of the
system we have deliberately marked out for
the rising generation, we keep our future
artisans, till they are fifteen or sixteen, EN-.
ployed in no other work than sitting at desk
to follow, pen in hand, the literary course Of
studies of our educational code, we discover
that on arriving at that age they have lost
the taste for manual work. and prefer to
starve on a threadbare pittance as clerks OF
book-keepers rather than by the less exact
ing and more remunerative labor of their
hands ? At the present moment, this ten.
dency to despise life of honorable manual
toll in straining after a supposed gentility
would be truly pitiable, if the proportions it
has attained did not awaken more serious
| apprehensions.
The able Examiner and Chronicle of New
York, commenting upon Professor Thomp
sons article, says: "What wonder that q
bad educational system, supplemented by
vicious social ideas, should make our boys
and girls restless, and fill them with false
pride and falser ambitions ? The son of Q
farmer grows up with the idea that he will
be something better than farmer; he will
go to college and enter profession, or will
go to city and become a business man
And 80 the professions and clerkships are
overcrowded with men who ought to bt
digging potatoes or making shoes, while
the farmer has to rely upon stupid immi
grants for labor, and the master mechanic
must needs send to Europe for skilled arti
sans. The native-born workmen in our
shops and factories grow scarcer every day
and the starving lawyers and book-keepers a,
rapidly grow in numbers. But go to fac
tory where intelligence and skill command
high wages, to the Gorham Company's sill
yer works, for example, and the workmen
who do the finest work and receive an in
come that the briehess lawyer would con
slider small fortune are not Americans
But why should not Americans master thes,
higher handicrafts, these that require som,
artistic taste as well as manual dexterity
These trades are not overcrowded, and
skilled artisan can always command worl
at almost his own price. There is only on,
reason, that American-born boys conside
such an occupation beneath them. Th
whole tendency of their education and o
the social atmosphere which they breathe i
to fill them with disgust for the work the,
are fitted to do, and to lift them into place
that they are not fitted to fill."
The Examiner and Chronicle is sensibl,
paper, and yet while writing thus its edito
cannot free himself entirely from the poisol
of the very system he is decrying, but unde
which he became what he is. "The profes
sions and the clerkships are overcrowde
with men who ought to be digging potatoes 0
making Shoes" says he and again he says
"The whole tendency of this education an,
of the social atmosphere which they breath
| 40 w hii ehch Wibh eho WIN
are fitted to do, and to in them into place
they are not fitted to fill" The idea inhere
} in the mind of this writer (because it wa
fastened there by his educators) that clerl
J ships and professions are above industris
J employments, and that literary educatio
J iJls young man. The notion with man
of this kind seems to be to establish (by
change or addition to our educational syl
J tenn two distinct classes in society, on
, above, and the other, the industrial, beiou
Industrial schools must be provided to kee
! the professions from being overcrowded an
! the dignifed class from being impoverishe
by too much competition-"r ruined by Ch
: nese cheap labor" so to speak.
/ This is all "rot" II literary instructio
7 really fits boys and girls for high place
which industrial education will not, then il
dustrial education is dead before il is born
: The fact is just the other way. A propt
' industrial training will fit young man c