The Frankfort roundabout. [volume] (Frankfort, Ky.) 1882-1908, 1904-10-08
written for the Roundabout
ETHICS OF EDUCATION.
Second Paper.

Ruskin in his broad expanse of in
! dividual thought once said: ''Edu-
cation Is leading human souls to
what is best, and making what is
be of them. Education does not
mean teaching the people to know
what they do not know; 1t means
teaching them to behave as they
do not behave"
So indirectly We follow this line
of analysis to a broader apothesis
and decide with Emerson: That
every action, with its natural conse-
quence, forms whole which cam
not be broken. Justice is never
postponed; perfect equity adjusts
its balance in all parts of life, every
secret is told, every crime is pun
ished, every wrong redressed in
silence and certainty. What we call
retributon is the universal neces-
sity by which the whole appears,
the Divine Nemesis, of the spiritual
as well as of the materialistic har-
vest
Whatsoever a man sows that
J shall he also reap"
If smoke is seen there must be
fire, while crime and punishment
grow out of one stem, cause and
effect seed and fruit can not be
severed-for the effect already
blooms in the cause, the end pre-
exists in the means-the fruit in
the seed.
We are the future representative
men and women, of franklin
county, to come from if not from
the rank and file OF the kingdom of
the child? How and by and
through what means and methods
must this class of legislation (com-
pulsory which is not enforced), be
reached?
The public schools are crowded
to death, and the public school
teacher so harrassed and circum-
scribed that her daily routine of
duty which should otherwise be q
pleasure becomes a g sounding brass
and a tinkling symbal."
The oft-recurring excuse for tardi-
ness and nOn-attendance is THAT
the child is needed at home" 1t
requires money and suitable cloth
ing to send the children to private
school, and, being unable TO procure
either money or clothing, the
parents turn the children out into
the broad fields of labor or idleness
in the country, or loose upon the
sheets to breathe not only the
nausina of dirty atmosphere, but
a communicating influence of cor
rupt association. If the habits are
formed in this plastic mold of
youth the children have a fair
show of growing up to manhood
and womanhood disqualified, by
ignorance, to accept or occupy any
Office in the gift of the State, and
by reason of vicious tastes, also OBJ
jectionable to hold places of trust
either in city or country. But they
must be heard! What must the an
swer be? Grave and conscientious
questions in the quiet cloister of
heart and home, in the subpoena
of civil, judicial, and legislative
enacment, as we'll as at the bar of
God. There seems, just at the pres
ent moment, an evident desire on
the part Of certain professionals to
censure the theorem of a bill before
Congress for laboratory for the
investigation of schools, i'm the
study of criminals by anthropolog-
zeal methods.
The controversy is very interest
ing, and the datum positively
alarming! The document on "sta
tistics,' ETC., says: 1.-The group of
States tt at show the greatest edu-
cation and intelligence, the North
Atlantic, North, Central and West
ern, also exceed in patho-social
evils, as insanity, suicide, nervous
diseases, juvenile criminals and
alms-house paupers. The assump-
tion is deprecated THAT education
and intelligence tend to increase
social evils" and some inconclu-
sive reasons for doubling such an
influence Is given. Yet the statis-
teal analysis is accepted without