The watchman and southron. [volume] (Sumter, S.C.) 1881-1930, 1904-09-14
Practical Education.

ca DtlOu WUlCu, III S6SulS 10 US, Is apt
to be lnisconstrued aud hence to DO
much harm, not so much from what
WAS said, most of which was good in
its way, but from certain inferences
which the average reader would al
most certainly draw therefrom. The
writer begins by quoting from an i'm
aginary questioner this query: :" If
you had a son about II years old and
ready for college would you let him
take French and German or some
thing he would >baye more practical
use tor?' He then goes on to define
practical things as things for which
he will have most frequent use in
life.' He then says truly enough
that 1.-THE things that shall be most
practical for our sons, after all, will
not be a knowledge of any one or sew
eral things, but mind, clear and
discriminating and we'll balanced and
comprebendins and along with that the
love of truth and justice and right
eousness to guide the mind like com.
pass" &c. Having started out with
the question whether the II year old
boy Shall study the practical or the
useless, of which French and German
are merely examples, and having end
ed by saying that the boy needs some
thing else more than he does practical
knowledge the practical conclusion
which the parent is apt to draw is that
the boy had better study the useless
things than the practical things 1t
is almost impossible not to think that
the writer intended to have this prac-
tical inference drawn from his article.
Else, why did he not state explicitly
that the desirable traits in our boys
were much more apt to be acquired in
acquiring useful store of informa-
tion than a useless one.
Is the writer of that editorial one of
those queer theorists of past age who
thought that the best mental equip
ment for life was to be obtained by
examining the mind with things that
didn't equip it? Does he think that
sweet disposition and lofty sense
of honor and smiling, happy face
would be better produced by diet Of
saw dust and pine needles than by one
of bread and meat and milk and eggs?
Does be think that lawyer would
be better equipped for his business
by sudying law or by reading the Chi
nese hieroglyphics from side street
laundry? Has he never seen enough
of the world to know that the men
who have by years of patient toll
mastered the practical in some line
are much moregcommonly also endow-
ed with the desirable traits enumera-
ted in the above quotation? Is there
in his opinion, a probability that a
man whose years up to 30, have been
pottered away in learning useless
things yill be morally superior to one
whose years. have been spent in learn
ing to do something that needs doing?
We do not imagine, for a moment
that the editor of the State is as silly
as these questions seem to intimate.
We merely state the absurdity of the
conclusions which his article may
allow some reader to draw
There used to be an idea now gen.
eral everywhere and even yet linger-
ing here and there III certain cranial
hooks and corners, that culture was a
thing to be had directly and immedi-
ately by studying certain things rather
than others. The idea is on a par
with the idea that happ iuess is a
thing that one can 90 for and bring
home in gallon bucket or crocus
sack. But culture and happiness are
flowers You can't get the perfect
flower without the perfect plant, and
if you want them to bloom in your
front yard you must get down in the
dirt and do a good deal of digging
and sweating around the root of the
plant So if you want we'll rounded
man or woman either. high toned,
morally, delightful socially, and use
full generally. you can only get him
or her by equipping the boy or girl
for filling efficiently some place where
the worlds work is done. Culture of
any other kind is wax flower, an
empty rose, painted ship upon a
painted sea.
So, to answer the question which
the State asked but did not answer we
would say Let your boy take some
thing useful. If French and German
are useless or will be relatively use
less to him, omit them. Don't imagine
that the kind of culture and character
you would like your boy to have are
going to be produced by snattering
of dead languages. That idea is a dead
fetish. Find out what thing in life
your boy is best adapted to do and let
him learn to do it, and do it better
than others can do it. There is moth
ing in all this world so useful in max
ing character as years of arduous pre-
par~.ion spent in learning how to be
useful to the world and to do some
one thing we'll which the world needs
done; And he can learn to do this one
thing only by doing it and not some
thing else. No man ever learned to
play the fiddle by beating the drum,
and no boy ever became useful and
great by learning to do useless things
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