The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1888-04-29
rHoUenrs AND WORDS.
Are Yards the Only Means of the Expression
OF Thoughts2

Are yards the Only Means of the Expression
of Thoughts?
Educational Leanst ls by G; H. Ham.
The most discoura2ing feature OF the educa-
Honal situation Is the blind automatism which
prevents fruitful thought To the reader who,
In familiar phrase, stops to think" the ques-
ton winch forms the title Of this paper seems
too simple for discussion. But recently
elaborate report Ia support OF German in the
public schools drawn by professional educator
IN large city, has appeared, which contains
this stupid proposition: Ideas find their ex-
preston alone in Words
The absurdity Of such dogma would be
iauehAhle were it not for the gravity Of the sub
ject Is cannot be suffered TO pass, however,
without peremptory challenge. It viii hardly
do to say. for example, that there 10 not an idea
in a vestibuled railway train. or in the locOmo-
tive that draws it, or in the track over which 1T
Is borne so smoothly, at great speed. across
continents; in the telegraph, the telephone
the printing.prees, the sawing-machine, the mi
eroscope, the telescope, or the steamship; nor In
a thousand and one other applications of al to
use. Nor il be said. with any more propri-
ETY., that there 20 iGea in q masterpiece of
Michael Angelo, or in q marble chiseled by Phid-
las. or Ia the architectural spiendors of the Par
thenou. in the presence of whose majesty the
awe-strg.ck oeholder trernbles with emotion. or
rises 70 sublims heights Of creative enthusiasm.
And yet these noble types OF the useful and the
beautiful in art are things, not w0rds-things
made By the hand OF man. And they may,
might have been. made-every of them-by
deaf artisans and artists-men who
could neither hear nor utter a single word.
The proposition of the report has the appear
ance either of unspeakabie mendacity, or of the
grossest ignorance. neither of which presump-
lions, however, will lie against the author in
this instance. It s doubtless. rather the result
of torpid mental habisude, which robs the
mind of its vigor, leaving it vapid, and hence in
capable of healthy action. The man who can
seriously put forward such proposition as that
quoted is neither a knave nor . fool; he is
merely automaton, designed to grind out lam
guage. He affords an illustration of one of those
ever-recurring curious reversions of the civilized
man toward savagery. Eor if can imagine
time when there was language, but no form of
art-when man lived like q beast of the field.
but spoke and reasoned like Plato-we may con-
ceive of q world in which ideas would find ex
preston alone in words.
This analysis shows the artihciality OF pre-
vailing methods OF educational thought and
speech. Educators struggle to maintain the
supremacy of language n the curriculum or the
schools with much persistency il /. were
the supreme educational end and not nero in
strument. They devise courses OF instruction
precisely as IL words in fact the sole
means Of expressing thonght; and ingenu-
theory and indicated their practice with brutal
franknsss. In neatly turned phrase he mas
relegated to nothingnessi all the manifestations
of art on the face of the earth. from the Ratchet
OF sayagery 10 the steamship of civilization, and
exalted words TO the sublime height of an apo
theosisi And yet it is none the less true that
science is the sole dissovsrer, aud that art diff
ferentIates the civilized from the savage man.
1t is the despair of thts educational reformer
that although he may demonstrate for the
hundredth time that words are not the sole
means Of expressing ideas, our automAtou rises
had transpired since the battle Of Marathon,
solemniy reiterete tic old formuia--like .
parrot crying, Polly wants cracker. Polly
wants 3 cracker.D