The record-union., 1899-07-13
Children" in which he pointed out
many of the promoting causes, and
suggested the remedy.

Howard ]. Rogers. Director of Edu.
cation and Social Economy Of the Unit
ed States Commissioners to the Paris
Exposition, spoke on the United States
Exhibit at Paris" in which he stated
that the limitation of space makes the
problem for this country not what may
be shown, but how can be shown what
must be shown. The exhibit will be
distinctively national in chracter, and
States will be regarded merely as con-
tributors to the grand total.
The paper that aroused the widest
comment at the evening session of the
convention was the one read by Pro-
fessor Elmer E. Brown of the Uni
versity of California upon the subject
of Art in Education" He said in
part:
when we speak of art in education,
do not understand that we are speak
ing simply of division or ingredient
of education, but we are speaking OF
one of those vital elements which per-
wade the best education and make it
worthy of the name of culture.
In the sense of the beautiful, and
whatever gives it strength and clear
ness, there is a subtle and pervasive
possessor wherever he may go. 1t
pervades, invigorates and vitalizes a
mans thought, whatever it be that he
thinks about.
1--WE can have no patience with an
education which merely affects man
piecemeal. We demand of the schools
that they shall transform and ennoble
the human mind. so that one that is
educated shall be different in everything
that he does. in his whole make-ur..
from what he would otherwise have
been. We are constrained to seek for
those things in education which are
far-reaching, universal, recreative. A
practical education which sets up an
artificial opposition between the beau
tiful and the useful is in danger of
defeating itself Beauty is a perma-
nent human need, and education with
out due attention to things beautiful
fails to give flexibility, elevation and
freedom-qualities which are necessary
to the full attainment of useful.
/. '"The taste which has been quickened
by the sight Of noble picture is a
new power for the appreciation of
other pictures. 1t is a great gain to
any one when fine music has taught
one to appreciate other fine music; and
still greater gain when it has fairly in-
troduced him to exquisite and majestic
harmonies of nature. Architecture, too
has been influenced by an appreciation
of the beauties of nature.
THE current demand for a larger
artistic element in the instruction in
the schools ought not to be apprehend-
ed simply as the demand for one thing
more In our crowded school curriculum.
1t is rather to be regarded as a grow
ing recognition of one of the essential
and universal aspects of all instruc-
tion. Art is the free expression of the
inner personality. So the artistic
spirit carried into the little details Of
school life is found to have everywhere
far reaching significance.
1T is not desirable that school
room should be SO decorated as to seem
like fairy land, when the child first en-.
ters it. Better that he should not find
it bewilderingly enchanting. Let him
find in the Schoolroom things that
grow upon him as he continues to live
with them. Let there be no singing of
cheap and catchy songs, or worse yet,
of excessively emotional melodies. Let
there be no straining after elaborate
grace of gesture, or undue expressive
ness in reading. Let there be no honeyed
sweetness in the intercourse of the
teacher with his pupils. If art is to have
any place at all in our scheme of edu-
cation, let it have opportunity of teach
ing its owner proper lessons-lessons
of quietness and confidence, of har-
mony, of proportion, of clear grained
truthfulness.
"Humor undoubtedly has a very i'm
pOrtant place in purely artistic culture,
and also in the more general culture to
which fine art is minister. The schools
will profit greatly from their associa-
tions with the artist, if they may mere
ly help the children to better appre-
citation of what is truly humorous and
what is truly pathetic. The laugh has
large place in society of all grades:
particularly among the less educated
there is great craving for the things
that are laughable. Humor is the great
esthetic possession of the multitude.
May we not say that the end of all
esthetic culture is to attain unto a true
appreciation of the beauty of holiness?'
Some one remarked of Archbishop
Lund that when he spoke of the beauty
of holiness, he meant no more than
decorum in public worship, the beauty
Of a well ordered church, and of proper
intonation and genuflexion.' 1t may be
that in different ways our own concep-
tions are as superficial and Inadequate.
But the moralists and the artists are
little by little leading us to more
perfect understanding.
And it is to be hoped that the scien-
fists and philosophers are leading us
by slow degrees to a fairer view of the
relation of truth to the other ends of
the highst human endeavor. The near
er we get to the ultimate heart of
things, the more intimate union do we
find between the good, the true and
beautiful. 1t is only by drawing near
to the heart of things that we can gain
that pervasive kind of culture which
goes forth with the man into every field
of activity which he may enter; be-
cause it is only in this way that we can
transform the man himself, rather than
some mere patch or province of his
being. Essential goodness and essential
truth belong to the heart of things.
and in them we find elements of such
universal culture. But essential beauty
has charm all it's own-a peculiar
freedom and vitality which we cannot
do without The flower in the crannied
wall leads out into all the mysteries of
the being of God and of man; but 1t
does so only for one who has learned
to see the strange deep beauty of the
flower"
Other papers were read by Hon. L.,
D. Harvey, Superintendent of Public
Instruction of Wisconsin, on "Funda-
mentals in Teaching; by Frank Rig