The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-06-23
THE AMERICAN PUBLIC SCHOOL
SYSTEM.

year closed last evening with the gradu-
ating exercises of the high school class of
1892. The whole exhibition has been an
admirable object lesson of the advance
ment and improvement of the American
public school system.
The public school system of this country,
as we find it today in the most progress
slve and intelligent communities, both in
the East and the West, shows a marked
Improvement over what it was but fifteen
years ago. In 1876 Wendell Phillips, the
flower of Harvard college culture. severely
criticised the public school system, which
then taught only arithmetic philosophy.
trigonometry, geometry, music, botany
and all that class of knowledge
to children seven ont of ten of
whom were destined to earn
their bread by the labor of their
hands. The child at Is went back to its
parents utterly untitled for any kind of
work that is worth a morsel of bread
Four-fifths of the boys could not intelll-
gently and agreeably read an ordinary
newspaper aloud to a family; four-fifths
OF the girls at ID could not read page in
telligibly. Mr.. Phillips pointed out that
this kind of superficial education injured
the boy or girl in three WAYS. They were
able only by forgetting what they had
learned to earn their days bread; they
earned it reluctantly; there was no ambi-
ton for perfection aroused. Mr.. Phillips
said that the public educator of his day
forgot that seven-tenths of the people born
into the world earn their living on
matter, not on mind, and ar
gued that the system of common
schools in Massachusetts lacked the
first element of preparation for life, and
urged that the pupils should be kept q
little longer and given other than INTEL
lectual training for the business of life.
In word, the public school system
should include not only the study of
books, but the study of things. The reason
why West Point graduate, if he makes
the best use of his opportunities, is one
of the best educated men in America is that
atWest Point the young fellows not only
study books, but study things. The study
of things Is not to be taken in a narrow
sense, for it would include access to scien-
title museums, to art galleries, to botan-
icai gardens, to industrial and mechanical
collections. The point taken by Mr..
Phillips was that while the study of books
was Indispensable, that education was not
simply book learning; that book learning
did not make up per cent of the mass of
common sense that s'runs" the world.
transacts its business, secures it. progress.
trebies its power over nature. raises the
standard of average justice and lifts off
Its burden. Two-thirds of the great in
ventors were not children of colleges or
schools of science; they were men of un-
trained natural power, but tireless stu
dents of things. Wordsworth. scholar and
poet. confessed this when he wrote that
"a few strong instincts and few plain
rules have wrought more for mankind
than all the pride ofintelect and thought"
The power of a student of things over a
mere student of books is illustrated by su
periority of Lincoln bred in affairs to col
lege-bred Seward. There is no need to
disparage the training of the mind
through the study of books. but it needs
to be associated with the study of object
lessons; with the study of things. These
words of Phillips were supported by other
Harvard scholars, like Charles Francis
Adams, Edward f. Hale, Thomas w. Hig-
ginson and Rev. DR.. Hedge. and they have
borne fruit in better public schools than
our country ever knew before. In the
best communities East and West the old
traditional methods of training have been
done away with. text books are no longer
the only sources of knowledge, for teach
ers IN public schools today make OBJ
jective lessons, experiments, investiga-
ton and reading, followed by oral
written statements the leading educative
processes. Manual training, nature study,
simple experiments in chemistry and
history and general literature are
now brought into the daily experience of
pupils in such a way as make the schools
furnish more agreeable and at the same
time more nutritious diet to the pupils
than was obtainable twenty years ago.
The public schools of Brookline, Mass,
now teach sewing, cooking. mechanical
drawing. wood working, wood turning,
pattern making and foundry practice four
hours per week The drift Of the public
school system IS toward individual train
ing of the eye and hand of the pupil by
the study of things in addition to the
study of books. The purpose of educa-
ton, as the great scholar Humboldt said.
is not TO make a scholar simply. but to
build up man." The noblest product
of education through books. art. literature.
experience is the finished man. not merely
the accomplished scholar.
Our public school system Is superior II
that of Europe because it is non-sectarisn
it leaves to the church that part of religious
doctrine that pertains 10 the various sec
tartan teachings about God and the CON
ditions Of future life, but our public school
system nevertheless furnishes g moral ed
ucation that IS substantially Christian $,
far as it deals with the social relations Of
men TO each other or IS related to the in
situations of the state. The public school
system while it IS not sectarian It does
teach reverence for truth. filial piety. m
selfshness and patriotism. and feeds
sound ethics 20 the pupils by introducing
them 10 good literature both prose and
verse. The non-sectarian public school
n Americs IS not ma.erialistlc.
immoral, irreligious and compared with
the sectarian schools of Europe shows no
toward the development of edu-