“All this is of comparatively little value and soon forgotten, because it does not depend on principle. It does not ‘conduce to the fullness of life.’ It does not make our homes brighter and happier. It does not elevate the people. It does not improve our intellect. In my opinion, it is immeasurably more useful and important for us to know how to enlarge the power of prevision--‘power of looking into the future’--by which we are enabled to avoid or remove the stumbling blocks of the future, so as to leave the road of progress in the future less bloody than we have left it in the past. To know that it is a plausible presumption that the late Civil War in the United States augmented, in one form or another, the aggregate slavery, is worth much more than a thousand trivialities of chronological history. An acquaintance of these principles enables us to avoid conflicts in the future, but no amount of chronological matter will.” “Our idea of history, Mr. Uwins, is almost similar to yours. We have long ceased to study and commit to memory such trivialities of history as you have just mentioned. We endeavor to develop historical principles, which enable us to unlock the future by the experience of the past. The philosophical part of history is the valuable portion. The science of history did not develop as rapidly with us as nearly all other sciences, and I find the same to be true with you also. But we have now some very excellent historical productions; productions by the side of which Mr. Buckle’s history appears to be in its infancy.” “How do you teach the higher sciences?” asked Rev. Dudley. “We have a laboratory which is in charge of an expert chemist. In this laboratory we keep a full supply of apparatus, drugs and chemicals; we can get all the practice and information we desire. We also have a scientific department well supplied with philosophical apparatus of all kinds. This department is in charge of able scientists who will give you all desired information. We have an inventor’s shop fitted up with all necessaries. In astronomy, our apparatus is grand and almost perfect. Biology, zoology, psychology, etc., we learn by practical experience, by individual inquiry, by reading, by lectures, and in countless other ways. “We must here keep in mind that not all instruction furnishes the mind with useful information. For example: If we were taught that fire does not burn, such teaching would be worse than no teaching; because it stores the mind with falsehood which requires evidence to remove before we can get at the truth of the case. So in all other cases where falsehood and superstition are taught as truth. That knowledge only which adjusts us more and more in accord with the facts of the universe is worth learning. We should strive only for the acquisition of that intelligence which makes us better, and, therefore, happier men, women and children; all other knowledge is not worth learning.