The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-06-26
THE VOICE OF THE PULPIT
A PRACTICAL TALK
WITH STUDENTS AND GRADUATES.
BY the Rev. samuel v. Cole, A. NJ
President Wheaton Seminary for
Young Women, Norton, Mass.

At this season our young men and young
women are either pausing for little in
their school life or standing upon the thresh-
old of that larger school. the world. 1t is
an opportune time for either class of stu
dents to take account of stock" to con-
slider whether the business of education is
being conducted along right lines. so far as
the pupils personal responsibility is con-
cerned.
One of the best instructors of my youth
was known In the colloquial language OF
student life as What For" This was owing
to the fatal facility with which he was ac-
customed to launch forth that little phrase
at what seemed to the bewildered student
most inopportune moments. He insisted on
knowing the what for" of every process.
Let us put the same interrogative beside
the word education at the outset: What is
education for?
The answer is not difficult. Education Is
to enable us to live well; or, in the happier
phrase of Herbert Spencer, to prepare us
for complete living The object then is not
a diploma, or better social standing or a
means of livelihood, but life, more album
dant life. 1t is as desirable for women as IL
is for men; and not only for those who
teach and lecture and write books and adj
vocate causes" but for those who keep
house and cook bread and darn stockings.
The story is told of an old lady from the
country, who on her first visit to Boston,
entered the elevator of a large store and
remained comfortably seated while that in
strument of locomotion made several sue
cessive trips. Finally the elevator boy looked
at her so inquiringly that she said: II wish
you would let me know when we reach the
Union Station" We must be careful in
our education, not to put ourselves into the
attitude of that innocent old lady. We must
beware of the perpendicular motion, which
would keep hanging always over the
onward sweep of the times-or we shall new
er reach the Union Station of our hopes.
Not only is life the object of education,
but the process is living process. Educa-
ton is what the word suggests-a drawing
out 1t draws out from their concealment
and immaturity the natural faculties and
powers, as the sun draws the flower from
the bud, and the fruit from the flower. 70
educate is to quicken, cultivate, direct, in
accordance with natures laws, the growth
of a living being. The word is growth
NO SHORT CUTS.
And this is one Of the reasons why there
are no short cuts to education. 1t takes
time to grow. We cannot force the process,
unless We are willing to accept inferior re-
suits. young man once asked the presi-
dent of Oberlin College if he could not take
a shorter course. 20 yes" said the presi-
dent, but that depends on what you intend
to make of yourself. When God wants to
make an oak He takes hundred years, but
when He only wants a squash He takes six
months" We shall never see machines bear
ing the inscription, Drop a nickel in the
slot and take out a complete education"
Ftyt-
third thing which ought to be mentioned
here, and that is-symmetry. One of the
most beautiful objects of nature is an elm
tree This is largely due to it's symmetry.
All the parts are proportioned and subordi-
mated to the whole. We should become like
a tree. Education must be directed upon
the entire personality-body, mind and
spirit. Otherwise we get poor result; the
length and the breadth and the height of it
are not equal.
There must be a physical basis to start
with The body demands the first care. We
make no attempt to educate disembodied
spirits The age of the pale student and
the midnight oil has fortunately passed
away; it is no longer virtue to be ply
sically weak. The diet is a far more impoP-
tant factor in education than once it was
thought to be. And so are sleep, exercise
ana fecredUOn. BAN, tennis racket ana Di-
cycle may claim place in the educational
apparatus; and, in order to maintain a
healthful touch with mother earth, an easy
access to the open fields and woods and
streams is one of the most desirable things
of ALL
And now, to pass from the physical, there
are four things which require a careful
training before the person can rightfully be
called educated.
First-The power to see. This does not
lie with the eye alone The eye is only the
window. The first thing which education
attempts is to call the invisible Somebody
within us to the window, that we may be in
a position to see the beauty and truth of the
universe around US. We must learn to see
the resemblances between things that look
different and the differences between things
that look alike; we mus- discriminate be-
tween a will-o-the-wisp and fixed star,
whether in nature or in literature or in life;
we must see the relative value of a spring
bonnet and refined manner OF great riches
and good name, of a mess of pottage and
ones birthright of social standing and
character; we must get the right perspec-
tive-see the great things large and the lit
tie things small.
We need the intellectual vision which sep
arates kernel from husk and discerns the
signs of the times, and the moral vision
which recognizes right and wrong through
whatever DISCUSSES, and the spiritual vision
which outruns our logic into the deep things
of life.
POWER TO THINK AND FEEL.
Second-The power to think. When pupils
are taught always 20 repeat, never to think:
when the judgments which they express are
never their own judgments, ii is evident
enough that the mind sleeps. The cultiva-
ton OF the power to think is what guards
the sacredest thing which we possess-our
own individuality, or the right and duty of a
person TO be himself rather than somebody
else. 1t fans the spark of originality which
God has planted in every soul.
Socrates set the Interrogation point before
his pupils at every turn. not to bewilder
Them but to make them think. What
Christ left on earth not great mass
of knowledge in regard to the kingdom Of
God. but a certain number of awakened
minds. Every educated person must have a
well-developed power of thinking for him.
self. The greater stress must be laid on
the study of things rather than the study
about things. The mind should go forth as
battery of instincts and living forces. not
as a mere storehouse of secondhand furni-
ture- And that. by including the word ia