The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1904-09-11
INCIDENTS
AzGOBsERvArIoNs'
BY Il. l. GRAY

Miss Meta Folger. that was, now
Mrs r. L. Townsden. of Mt Airy, who
as a teacher in the Raleigh pupllu
schools. was about the longest-headed
woman who ever essayed the task or
coaxing reason into the minds of a
conglomerately gathered riot of small
bovS aud who is today one of tho
most attractive of the States writer's,
had a good deal TO say the otnef Gay
about genius and its manifestation ~
the work of certain preSent-day VIII
tiers in this State.
Now it is enough for me to say in
this respect that do not agree with
Mrs. Townsden on the question OF
genius which. to me. has been best
described in Hudsons Law of Psychic
Phenomena as the natural fusion or
the objective in the subjective mind;
for l believe that the past century
could easily check off it's genluses, one
to a sdecade. The determination of
genius is after all. largely mat
ter of individual opinion depending
upon ones own definition of the term,
and there are a good many more
definitions than there will ever De
geniuses. According to Hudson, should
say that Poe and Hawthorne, who,
opened up the depths of the human
soul in an enlightening way which
seer, were 'Geniuses": and that Elmer
son, whose completed sentences are
at once as strong and as highly pol
ished and 90 their work with as lit,
tie friction, as the steel piston rods
of an engine, was not. To my mind.
Poe saw the things he wrote and put
them down on paper before they gos
away; while Emerson set his brain on
the trail and ran his thoughts into a
corner The one case was genius.
the other calculated intellectual ex-
ercise; but as there will be scarcely
two people out of ten 10 agree with ait
this-why, what's the USE:
What I intended to come TO about
Mrs Townsien was the matter of con-
trol--of self and Of others. AT tina
time she came to Raleigh, the public
schools of the city had been conduct
ed apparently on the principle that lit
tie boys were savages who could bh
whipped and that little girls were
other savages whom an insane puDha
sentiment decreed should not!be whip
ped. Consequently the little boyS
used their best endeavors to approach
as nearly as possible to the limit oI
the teachers patience for the sake
of the excitement; and the little girls,
delerious with the example OF the lit
tie boys and intoxicated with the sense
of their immunity from corporeal pun
ishment, ran rapidly to seed with gig
giles AS a result the limit of the
teachers endurance shortened in in!
verse ratio to the extension Of the
daring of the little boys and the
nerve-racking inanity of the little
girls, and the whippings, from highly
deserved chastsements. came to indl-
cate i'm many instances merely the
vent of the teachers passion. Natur-
ally all that was learned was absorbed
through contact and the small fry 81
the schools developed from n species
of simian mischief makers into first
class little devils.
Now, "Miss Meta" didn't whip: she
merely looked, calmly, and was mex
orablea 1t was not often that she per-
mitted herself the indulgence OF COM
ing to a positive issue. but when she
did she stuck it out. At the begin
ming, she fought apparently LOSING
battle but always she advanced her
positions She manipulated the quick
hatred of the small boy so that she
Won him by degrees to think it out fon
himself and to behave on account OF
reasons of personal expediency. There
was little fun in the character OF heI
observation-disclosures OF the red panoplY
of war that clings, about licking even
to the licked--and there was always a
well-defined way to avoid them. The
avoidance, however, always lost the
scholar ground and strengthened the
teachers influence. Gradually-the
small boy is just, at bottom--the pol
icy of eXpediency came to be merged
in the sense of respect and, then, at
the psychological moment, the boy
found himself burdened with some re-
sponsibility some trust. He seit ting
load, but what he did not feel was the
nf FOE 81, roiy tab
her watchful eye. He swelled with
pride and, before he knew it, the
youthful anarchist had come to be 81,
influential citizen under sort OF limi-
ted monarchy and to love his sow
cign as the fountain, not only of wis
dom, but of liberty as well. There
was as much difference in the men.
tai and moral tone of the units of
this teachers classes after they Mad
been with her for a year as there is
in the clean, straight figure of the
army unit on parade and the sloucb<
ing dirty creature of the slums who.
signed the papers OF enlistment. AND
slight light-haired. gentle-voiced girl
Of possibly, twenty-four years OF
age!
According to Hudson. there was &C.
MUS there Such things cannot be done
effectively although, perhaps, in tbs
case of a woman teacher OF the rarely
right sort, there is more of love mixed
up in the matter than OF subjective
divination. The objective application
of the subjective mind may
be genius-but love. in the alb
stract. is species of fenlininity. But.
to win. its way to influence CT a posi-
tive sort, even love must do two
things: it must feel so deeply as to
know-that, take it. is the subjective
sense-and it must see SO clearly
o55ectively-as to put to practice the
strange sense that is really an inner
mystery and yet seems to brush the
brain from without the unknown,
When the two qualities merge into
a rational purpose or a definite Incl
dent of being, We sometimes call i.
tact" sometimes personal mugne-
tsm." But when it happens to live III
so high a place that the world MAY
see its movements. when it chances
that its results are enlarged from q
circle in the sand to embrace human
ity in the mass we stand aghast at the