The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1900-10-13
MODERN EDUCATION.


DR.. Weir Mitchell, and there is
perhaps no medical practitioner of the
day who can speak with more author
ity on this subject in an address to
the students of Radcliff College,
few days ago, spoke of the danger of
excessive mental work to women.
you are tired by midday" said
he; "you cannot get to sleep at night,
or you wake too early, or are rest
less, and wake and sleep, and wake
again. These are natures first sig
nails of alarm" He adds, II would
rather be healthy waiting maid than
Professor Menerva with yellow skin
and lazy liver" Women, he ayers,
Cannot stand the trials of college
work as men can, and commends the
example of Amherst in requiring of
all students an entrance examination
as to physical conditions.
In the haste for great learning he
would not have the pracricai sfRairs of
life overlooked. "I wish all women,
before they go to college, to have
sensible competency Of common
household knowledge, and all house
needs where means are small" Says
that the French are more wise than
we. Their primary and grammar
schools demand a certain amount of
knowledge as to sewing and cooking,
&c., and these are elaborately set
forth in the programs. These mat
tiers are much insisted upon and in
those higher schools are taught heat
ing and lighting, care of furniture, of
stufs, of linens, the art of washing
and ironing cooking is most elabor-
ately dealt with, and a host of other
such things.
The care of the injured in minor ac-
cidents, the hygiene of the nursery,
care of children, and sewing, are not
overlooked. Compare this with the
curriculums in Our American schools,
and we may see quite clearly why it
is said that the French can live on
what we waste. They have been
drilled in home arts-the most need
ed part of their education is not ne
elected, while our girls have only a
slip-shod training in the lines where
a great proportion of them are to
spend their lives.
DR.. Mitchell speaks of having seen
many, many break downs of college
women: II see the wrecks come
ashore to sail the seas of success no
more. Is it any wonder / wish to
warn those who are sailing or about
to sail on treacherous seas ?"
1t is Americas pride that her wo-
men can be educated as literally and
thoroughly as men, and in our Joy
we are almost forgetting that they
are women still, and have not the
physical endurance the sterner sex.
Writers, doctors and thinkers are be-
ginning to see that the ambition of
women to compete with men in col
lege halls, in the professions, and in
aa 6aSnsSs he hasn IAN
family, if it has not already done so.
The many nervous, discontented and
helpless married women and sickly
children, the lone mothers, overtask-
ed in doing the entire work of the
family and trying to save enough
money to keep their daughters away
from home training for they know
not what the fearless increase in the
manufacture and sale of rubber-top-
ped nursery bottles-signs that point
towards decline of the race the un-
willingness of women needing en-
ployment to accept positions in the
home as aids, or as housekeepers !;
all go to show that the trend of mod
ern education is away from those i'm
portant duties that center in the
homes.
While we scramble for promotion,
it is worth Our while to remember
what is said to be fact, that all the
American women who have won dis
tinction in original work of any kind
received the old-fashioned training.
College-bred women, so far, have
been successful only as teachers.
This training of SO many teachers,
whose only business seems to be to
train other teachers, is of doubtful
benefit and imposes added burdens on
those left to work at home, for they
all can eat if they cannot cook.
Our greatest and most successful
men, with only very few excep-
tons, were without college education.
Vanderbilt, Astor, Stewart, Peabody,
Girard, Cooper, Wanamaker, Will
hanson, and long list of others who
commenced their careers of service to
the world, which led on to great
wealth, by doing the duties and fill
ing faithfully the humble stations
nearest at hand.
Learned men have no time to do
anything useful" said Lyof N. Toll
stoi, and he makes a plain showing of
the uselessness of the ever increasing
sciences their names alone would fill
large dictionary. He writes, 1--WE
are busy about something which we
call art and science, and it turns out
that what we are busy about is neither
necessary nor ineligible to men,"
1t would be the better part of wis
dom for the young to choose their
life work early, and then educate
themselves along that line, making
perfection their aim. After all these
years of spending fortunes in aimless