The Cairo bulletin., 1904-04-03
TEACHERS HAVE
LEFT THE CITY
Southern illinois Teachers Meet.
ing Closed.
WAS A GREAT SUCCESS
NEXT MEETING WILL BE HELD
AT oLNEY-TEACHEHS
PLEASED WITH
CAIRO.


Illinois Teachers association closed
yesterday morning at Ii O'Clock with
the following address by r. G.. Blair
professor of the Eastern Illinois State
Normal school at Charleston. who
chose for his theme: "The Child and
His Education" which was as fol
lows.
The Child and His Education.
The social reformer and the teach
er are both working for the better
ment Of society. but their methods OF
work are essential different There.
former directs his effort largely to-
wards those chronic forms of social
ylce--those antl-social habits that
have become rigid and fixed. His
work is to repair old human machines
that are running out OF harmony with
the social order. to patch them nn
and adjust them TO the social order
so that their workings shall be help
full rather than hurtful TO society as a
whole. Every reform worker realizes
that much Of the time and energy
spent in this repair work Is wasted.
The reformed product has q strong
tendency to revert 10 former condi-
tions. The junket man, in gathering
old iron, picks up here an old sewing
machine and there an old stove 1nd
loads them ON to his wagon. What is
he going to do with them? Patch
them up and put them onto the mar
ket again? Nothing Of the kind, He
piles them onto tlat car and sends
them to foundry, where they are
crushed up and put into furnace
and changed into a molten mass, In
which we cannot tell where the cook.
! ing stove leaves off and sewing ma
| chine begins. This sparkling fluid
material Is run out into new molds
l99atha& sfashlsH new raokirg efoves and
I new sewing machines, according 10
modern patterns that will accomplish
| a maximum of work In minimum, ot
time. Now the social roformc" often
wishes that he, like the Junket man.
n,leht take the old defective human
machines, aud melt them down tnn
4 remoId them Whenever
child IL born In slum family the
rcformer should see thas in very
true sense the old vicious human ma
chines---father and mother-are melt.
ed down into the plastic. molten con.
ditlon of childhood, and distinct
call comes up to every well wisher Of
society to run this Welding uniformed
social material Into new molds that
\ shall make out Of it new human ma
chine that shall work In harmony
with the established order and for
\ the common good II Is at tlssl point
the child--that the teacher attacks
IN, problem Of better citizenship.
Here he finds that the results ara
commensurate with the outlay OF en-
/ ergy. But while this Is working at
the problem along the line of least
I resistance. II Is by no E'canS Tree
/ from difficulties As we Hand IN the
presence of the child and consider
the ways and means Of unfolding linn
INTO an individual fitted for complete
social living, VIC are confronted n
I the outset by serious question
How much Of The shaping OF THIS
chfld's character Is to be heterniued
nv his parents through the Law OF
heredity?
When oliver Wendell Holmes said
! thar a childs education shouli be
begun 200 years before be Is born.
he simply stated In this somewhat
startling way the thought that hered'
! nv Is one of the most powerful forces
/ M giving form 10 life and character.
That. somehow. down from the tombs
of our ancestors. down rom the
moldy, mIdewed sepulchers OF tie
past. are ever reaching the spiritual
hands Of forefathers. and in some
subtle. unseen way, laying hold upon
the delicate tissues Of lives. and.
whether we will or not. fashlonlrg
I
And when Ralph Waldo Emerson
said THAT fellow has been to school
for thousand years, he stated, sub
stantially the same thing-that every
child born into the world Is in very
true sense an heir Of all the ages.
With trailing clouds of ancestral
glory or enveloped in the dark cloud
Of Adams sin, he may come. and We
are wont to say Of him that he Is
born TO be this or that. Now
every teacher must acknowledge the
influence Of herediiy in the child's
education. but he must also see that
there Is such a thing as stating the
law Of heredity in such an extreme
way as TO make II fatalistic. as to rob
the child OF individual responsibility
and to palsy the arm of the teacher.
There is such way OF stating the In
Huence Of heredity as to make II cru
tradict the power of individual iuitis-