The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1902-10-09
DICKENS AS
AN EDUCATOR
Subject of Or. J. [. Hughes
Address Last Night.
MANY TEACHERS HEARD 1T
FAMOUS NOVELIST WAS GREAT
LOVER OF CHILDREN.

THE third lecture in the course CIV
en- by Dr. ]. l.. Hughes for the
teachers and the public, Dickens
as an Educator" was delivered last
evening to an audience which filed the
Assembly hall TO overlooking. The
people who had thought that Dickens
was merely a writer OF fiction We're
shown an entirely different man in the
subject of last nights talk. The lee
ture was preceded by a solo by George
d. Piper. The Children's Friend" Mr..
Pyper was obliged TO respond to an en-
core, and later sang. by request, 20
My Father" DIR. Hughes said;
Dickens was, next TO FFoebel, the
greatest lover of children that the
world has seen since the time of Christ
He wrote the best article ever written
on the kindergarten, and he is the
writer of more and more far-reaching
educational works than any other one
man In the world. He did not call
them works on education, but instead
he crystaliZed his ideas in fiction, and
his readers are numbered by millions.
Schools in His Writings.
'It was through no accident that
twenty-eight different schools figure in
his writings. II was because he loved
and reverenced children and rebelled
against the wrongs done to them IN
those schools. He was the first man
in England who interested the English
people in the education of the deaf and
blind He was the first apostle in Eng
land of neglected children, and at the
present time there are 100000 more
neglected children being cared for than
there were at the time of Dickens
death. He was the first man who ad-
vocated the education of feeble ininied
children. His purpose in all his writ
ing was to arouse England TO its need
of a great national system of educa-
ton. 1t was Dickens who sought the
introduction into English schools OF
music and art and manual training.
The fSst great work Of Dickens SIS
an educator was TO destroy the giant
Coercion. Many types of this giant are
found in his writings. ranging from the
brutal TO the gentle type. but all are
equally dangerous. The giant Cram is
shown particularly in Dombey & Son.
Dickens clamored for the rights Of
children. Children should be permit
ted all the joys of childhood. He I'M
derstood the law of selfhood as few
educators do. He sought the recogni-
ton of the child's individuality.
Make Children Unlike.
1.-The effort used to be to make all
children alike; the effort Of the edu-
cation of today is TO make them as un-
hke-as individual as possible. God
makes harmony, not with like things,
but with unlike things. The best gift
you can give to civilization is the gift
of your individuality. whatever it is.
The greatest thing a teacher can do
for a boy when ne is leaving school is
10 reveal to him the thing that he is
best able to do.
Dickens recognized the value of i'm
aginatien. In Hard Times he shows
his scorn of the system by which Grad
grind sought TO have facts alone sup
piled as intellectual food for children.
We cannot strange imagination In the
cradle but that its ghost will return
in later life in the form of grovelling
sensuality Mr.. McChokemchild said.
Give me a child when he is learning
to walk, and will see 20 il that he will
never wonder What we want is to
keep the child wondering. and TO Won
der with him. The purity and beauty
Of life itself is sustained by the wonder
around us"
Programme For Today.
The lecture was replete With hTmor
of Dickens and his quaint characters,
and was a most scholarly argument
for the cause Of education.
Today's programme has been changed
slightly from the original plan, and in
order to accommodate the teachers who
are here from distant points, and DR..
Hughes himself, the lecture Your
Boy which was TO have been given
Friday evening. will be delivered this
evening instead, and that on manual
training will be given this afternoon
at O'Clock
The day was spent most profitably
in visiting the schools in the morning,
and the informal institutes held in the
school buildings in the afternoon were
a thorough success. In many Of the
buildings a luncheon was served TO
the visiting and home teachers. and en-
enjoyable acquaintance made. The
same programme will be followed to