The new dominion. [volume] (Morgantown, W. Va.) 1876-1904, 1897-03-06
Some Rambling Thoughts.
BY MEMO.

BY MEMO.
Shall we search around for an IL
lustration that portrays a too com
mon idea of the child-mind?
~
To produce the famous Strasburg
pates de foie gros, luckless geese are
shut up in coops so small that the
birds can neither turn, nor flap their
wings, nor even preen the feathers.
Several times day each unhappy
goose is forced full of food by feed
ing machine. The result of this con-
centration of efforts upon one organ
is very quickly seen. In two weeks
a large, sturdy bird is reduced to a
foul and living skeleton; but the de
sired effect has been produced upon
the liver, which now weighs two to
three pounds.
~
Is there not something akin to
this in the methods applied to chill
dren by machine teachers, and taeit-
ly approved of by indifferent par
ents? Without thought of a child
being possessed of any other organ
beside brain, and any other func-
ton beyond the requirement of facts,
and any other responsibility apart
from earning a living, the little
creature is stuffed with instruction
not education in its best sense
until its limbs jerk from over-strain-
ed nerves. A sure proof of the act
ual damage of such training both
to the child and to the community
is found in the fact stated by Forbes
Winslow, the famous authority on
the brain, that Infant Prodigies sell
dom do well in after life, because of
over-development in one direction
and neglect of training in another,
the result being that they are easily
led away by temptation and often
"go to the bad" when thrown on
their own resources. All thinkers
most fully acknowledge the need Of
brain-culture as means of broaden
ing the life and enabling the indi-
vidual to acquire consciousness of
other things beyond those that he
can touch and taste and handle in
his own neighborhood. For instance:
Without the power to read, our lives
are apt to remain as narrow as those
of savages. But it is a mere dream
to suppose that knowledge of all
the rivers of all the continents, with
length, breadth, and characteristics,
will deter little pilfering fingers from
taking another scholars lunch. You
may drag the child through miles of
arithmetic and over mountains of
spelling; you may whirl it through
the universe till its knowledge is
marvellous to relate, but all such
brain development will not save your
sweet little girl from the corruption
of the boy with unrestrained pas
sions. Where is the uplifting power
of vulgar fractions or the heart
training in repeating the bounds of
the Mediterranean sea? Though we
speak with the tongues of savants,
and treasure facts like the miser
treasureth gold; though we compass
all knowledge so that we can name
the stars in their courses and the
strata in their order, yet without
judgment we are nothing. And
Judgment cometh not by knowledge
forced into the brain and appealing
only to memory. Judgment and con-
scientious conduct are part of the
heritage of the race, inherent and
capable of development in each nor
NAL child. They are strengthened
by the play ground and the home,
by the personal influence of the
teacher and the parent; SO that any
who think duty to the child com
pleted by books alone are cruel to the
child and traitors to the race. Far
be it from me to belittle the brain,
for by it's powers the material pro
gress of the world has reached its
present height; and far be it from
anyone else to belittle the heart with
it's social instincts, and the charac-
ter with it's fateful powers. Mental
giants are capable of being moral
dwarfs, and possibly fiends. The
very forcing to which they have
been subjected hides, hinders, even
destroys their better capabilities of
usefulness of brain and honor of
conduct.
~
Be not deceived; Nature is not
mocked. The different elements Of
our being-body, mind, and spirit
have to be trained up together. Each
child has the tendency within it to
slip back to wild, untrammeled def
ence of the things that are right,
unless all sorts of influences are
brought to bear upon it. With it
and with us as with the universe
there is no such thing as standing
still. We are either moving forward
physically, mentally, and morally or
we are slipping backward. So by
neglect of proper means of educa-
ton, and proper interest in your ed
ucators, you are possibly. helping
to thrust the child back to the start
ing point Of your family ages ago.
Scientists will tell you there is al
ways at work among domestic ami
mails a tendency to slip back to the
savage stage. Your house cat filters
in the barn, and the kittens unless
brought to the house will be almost
unapproachable later. Then their
offspring incline to hunting in the
fields and the woods and so on back
to the wild cat stage. Thus also
with the pariah dogs Of CONSTANT
nople, with the wild horses of the
Pampas, with the wild cattle Of the
| Western plains. In The same man
ner. but Ii more ffatetnl degree, is it
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