The Monticellonian., 1905-09-28

, Copyright. 1905 by Joseph E. BowleS.t 1 don't blame you much. Dorothy, for i your great dislike of mathematics. 1 have never particularly enjoyed study i ing them for my own part, and have always looked with respectful wonder and almost awe Ql other people who have professed to find them delightful. Yet. my dear. the girl next you in he | class may approach this subject in a quite different mood from yours She may fully enjoy the abstract and con i crete principles of the science of num- bers: may fairly reyei ia difficult prop ositions, and may regard the hour fos l algebra. trtgonometry or whatever else it may be IS the most exhilafating h6W of the day. Not infrequently two sisters may be entirely in contrast when the question concerns this abstruse and, on the whole formidable study; one may l love il as much as the other loathes it. You need not expect to receive much help from the people at home when you are puzzling over diagrams. examples and problems in mathematics Most of Us. after our school days, remember enough of what we learned there to ell able Us to foot up household accounts. and 10 see that we do not overrnn our weekly or monthly income. But we do not retain much more.
 If We are thoHghtless persons. We are apt to regret that We were compelled 10 spend a lot Of time over things We did not like when there were so many other things that would have given Is great deal of pleasure
 But Dorothy stop moment before you condemn your teachers for insisting on making mathematics the test 0f your scholarship h the first place, t is good for most of HIS to do what We don't very much want to do We are better for be- ing compelled to exercise some selt-de- nal. You and 1 are bound 10 meet ob- stacles of one sort or another all along the road of life. If we are towards. we shall shiver and shake and turn away and look for some little by-path by which we may avoid he issue. If on the contrary. we are brave. We shall go bold ly up to the thing in our path and see whether it cannot be put aside In order to get along creditably i'll this world every one of us must have good supply of moral courage and real force of char acter. These tasks of the schooroom are chiefly valuable because in them there is hidden the element which turns the raw recruit into soldier, the ele- ment called drill. You get an enormous amount of drill for your mind when you Ctt1 q | hot tt.a, 1t agreeable, but that does not matter The fruit will be reaped later on.
 
 You need not laugh at me, Dorothy when tell you that a girl who has been thoroughly trained and disciplined by struggles with mathematics. that for her mean conquest, will bear herself much more finely than one who has spent her time dawding over lessons that never taxed her powers. For in- stance, 1t is shame for woman to scream when she sees poor little mouse Scuttling as fast as it can out of the closet, or to go into fits when a bat or a spider or some other uncanny creature crosses her field of vision Women who do this are women who have never had any practical drill in self-control. You may not know 1t, but there is the great est peril to women in not being able to keep good grip of themselves.
 once met lady approaching middle age, who boasted that she had never re- strained an emotion in her life. If any thing goes wrong. l just go to pieces, she said, and everybody has to fly around and wait on me" She seemed to think this a meritorius thing. In re- ality. it was disgraceful. The one duty beyond all others for you and me, Dor othy, is to be equal to the occasion when ever it comes, and to rule our own spirit How are we ever going to rule anybody else If we do not rule ourselvss2
 Having said this, let me add that l 1 look upon mathematics very much as the builder looks on the foundation of he house. If you are planning to build beautiful mansion, with many rooms and corridors, with tower on the top and windows open wide to the sunshine, you must first of all dig deeply into the earth and see that your underpinnlng  will be safe and your foundation stable.
 The whole of education Is built on the alphabet, the multiplication table and the Ten Commandments On these you may rear whatever beautiful edifice you please. It would be a very one-sided development that a girl would have who knew nothing except mathematics. Once in awhile this has been shown in the case of some mathematical prodigy who has performed astonishing feats with figures and has done nothing else. At one end of the scale place mathemat-
 cs for ballast; at the other give play to imagination and then you will have perfectly balanced character. Do not make the mistake of thinking that there is no virtue outside the ledger. Every child who solves difficult problem should be told fairy story immedi- ately afterward as reward. Whatever else you omit be sure you cultivate your mind in the region of poetry and fancy.
 A traveller was vending his way over the mountains of Kentucky, when he cane. at pigktfall to cabin in lonely