In his method he gives us the following illustration of the rise and progress of an idea:-- “We can recall no incident of human history that impresses the imagination more deeply than the moment when Columbus, on an unknown ocean, first perceived that startling fact, the change of the magnetic needle. How many such instances occur in history, when the ideas of nature (presented to chosen minds by a Higher Power than Nature herself) suddenly unfold, as it were, in prophetic succession, systematic views destined to produce the most important revolutions in the state of man! The clear spirit of Columbus was doubtless eminently _methodical_. He saw distinctly that great leading _idea_ which authorised the poor pilot to become a ‘promiser of kingdoms.’” Notice the genesis of such ideas--“presented to chosen minds by a Higher Power than Nature;” notice how accurately this history of an idea fits in with what we know of the history of great inventions and discoveries, with that of the _ideas_ which rule our own lives; and how well does it correspond with that key to the origin of “practical” ideas which we find elsewhere:-- “Doth the plowman plow continually to ... open and break the clods of his ground? When he hath made plain the face thereof, doth he not cast abroad the fitches, and scatter the cummin, and put in the wheat in rows, and the barley in the appointed place, and the spelt in the border thereof? For his God doth instruct him aright, and doth teach him.... “Bread corn is ground; for he will not ever be threshing it.... This also cometh forth from the Lord of hosts, which is wonderful in counsel and excellent in wisdom.”[2] Ideas may invest as an atmosphere, rather than strike as a weapon. “The idea may exist in a clear, distinct definite form, as that of a circle in the mind of a geometrician; or it may be a mere instinct, a vague appetency towards something, ... like the impulse which fills the young poet’s eyes with tears, he knows not why.” To excite this “appetency towards something”--towards things lovely, honest, and of good report, is the earliest and most important ministry of the educator. How shall these indefinite ideas which manifest themselves in appetency be imparted? They are not to be given of set purpose, nor taken at set times. They are held in that thought-environment which surrounds the child as an atmosphere, which he breathes as his breath of life; and this atmosphere in which the child inspires his unconscious ideas of right living emanates from his parents. Every look of gentleness and tone of reverence, every word of kindness and act of help, passes into the thought-environment, the very atmosphere which the child breathes; he does not think of these things, may never think of them, but all his life long they excite that “vague appetency towards something” out of which most of his actions spring. Oh! the wonderful and dreadful presence of the little child in the midst.