The prison mirror. [volume] (Stillwater, Minn.) 1887-1894, 1890-11-06

than to exercise ordinary prudence about
our health. And we readily believe the
doctors of learning when they assure us
that we can acquire new language by the
same method by which we can restore bod.
lily vigOr: take one small patent-right vol.
ume in six easy lessons. without even the
necessity of ''shaking." and without a reg.
ular doctor. and we shall know the Ian.
guage. Some one else has done all the
work for us. and we only need to absorb.
1t is pleasing to see how this theory is get
ting to be universally applied. All knowl-
edge can be put into kind of pemican. SO
that we can have it condensed. Everything
must be chopped up, epitOmized, put in
short sentences and italicized. And we
have primers for science. for history, SO
that we can acquire all the information we
need in this world in few hasty bites. 1t
| is an admirable saving of time-saving of
| time being more important in this genera
ton than the saving of ourselves.
And the age is SO intellectually active,
and so eager to know! If we wish to know
anything. instead of digging for it our
selves, it is much easier to flock all together
to some lecturer who has put all the results
into an hour, and perhaps can throw them
| all upon a screen, SO that we can acquire
all we want by merely using the eyes, and
bothering ourselves little about what is
said. Reading itself is almost too much of
an effort. We hire people to read for US
to interpret, as we call it-BrOwning and
lbsen, even Wagner. Every one is familiar
with the pleasure and profit of ''recita-
tiOns," OF conversations" which are mono
lOgues. There is something facinating in
the scheme of getting others to do our in
tellectual labor for us. to attempt to fill up
our minds as if they were jars. The need
of the mind for nutriment is like the need
of the body. but our theory is that it can be
satisfied in different way. There was an
old belief that in order that we should en-
Joy food, and that it should perform it's
function OF assimilation, we must work tor
it, and that the eXertiOn needed to earn it
brought the appetite that made it profitable
to the system. We still have the idea that
we must eat for ourselves, and that we can
not delegate this performance. as we do the
filling of the mind. to some one else. We
may have ceased to relish the act of eating,
as we have ceased to relish the act of study
ing, but we cannot yet delegate it, even al
| though our power of digestng food for the
body has become almost as feeble as the
power of acquiring and digesting food for
the mind.
1t is beautiful to witness our reliance
upon others. The house may be full of
books. the Libraries may be as free and as
unstrained of impurities as city water. but
if we wish to read anything or study any
thing we resort to club. We gather to-
gether number of persons of like capacity
with ourselves. A subject which we might
grapple with and run down by few hours
of vigorous. absorbed attention in library,
gaining strength of mind by resolute en-
cOuntering of difficulties. by personal effort,
we sit around for month or season in a
club, expecting somehow to take the in
formation by effOrtleSs cOntiguity with it.
A book which we could master and possess
in an evening we can have read to us in a
month in the club. without the least in
tellectual effort. Is there nothing. then, in
the exchange of ideas? Oh yes, when there
are ideas to exchange. Is there nothing
stimulating in the conflict of mind with
mind? Oh yes, when there is any mind for
conflict But the mind does not grow with
out personal effort and conflict and struggle
with itself. 1t is living organism, and
not at all like a jar or other receptacle for
fluids. The psychologists say that what
we eat will not do us much good unless we
chew it. By analogy we may presume
that the mind is not greatly benefited by
what it gets without considerable exercise
of the mind.
Still. it is beautiful theory that we can
get others to do our reading and thinking,
and stuff our minds for us. 1t may be that
psychology will yet show us how con-
gregate education by clubs may be the way.
But just now the method is little crude,
and lays us open to the charge-which
every intelligent person of this scientific
age will repudiate-of being content with
the superficial; for instance. of trusting
wholly to others for our immortal furnish
ing. as many are satisfied with the review
of book for the book itself. ora refine
ment on that-with review of the re-
views The method is still crude. Per-
haps we may expect a further development