What Is and What Might Be: A Study of Education in General and Elementary Education in ParticularHolmes, Edmond
Philosophy
What Is and What Might Be: A Study of Education in General and Elementary Education in Particular
Holmes, Edmond
Education
And if we have never before realised how great are the opportunities
and responsibilities of the teacher, we must surely do so now. For a
certain number of years--the number varies with the social standing
of the child, and the financial resources of his parents--the teacher
can afford to disregard utilitarian considerations and think only of
what is best for the child. What use will he make of those years?
Will he lead the child into the path of self-realisation, and so give
a lifelong impetus to the growth of his soul? Or will he, in his
thirst for "results," lead him into the path of mechanical obedience,
or, at best, of one-sided development, and so blight his budding
faculties and arrest the growth of his soul? On the practical answer
that he gives to this question will depend the fate of the child.
For to the child the difference between the two paths will be the
difference between fulfilling and missing his destiny, between
knowledge and ignorance of God.
If any of my readers have imagined that I am an advocate of what is
called "secular education," they will, I hope, now realise that they
have misread this book. Far from wishing to secularise education, I
hold that it cannot be too religious. And, far from wishing to limit
its religious activities to the first forty minutes of the morning
sessions, I hold that it should be actively religious through every
minute of every school session, that whatever it does it should do to
the glory of God.
But how does knowledge of God show itself? Knowledge, so far as it is
real, always shows itself in right bearing, and (if action is called
for) in right action. Knowledge of arithmetic and of other more or
less abstract subjects, shows itself in the successful working of the
corresponding problems, theoretical or practical as the case may be.
Knowledge of the laws of physical nature shows itself in practical
mastery of the forces and resources of physical nature. Knowledge of
history and geography, in a right attitude towards the problems and
sub-problems of these complex and comprehensive subjects, an attitude
which may on occasion translate itself into right action. And so on.
Knowledge of God, being a state or attitude of the soul as such, must
show itself in the right bearing and the right action of the soul as
such, in other words, of Man as Man,--not as mathematician, not as
financier, not as sculptor, not as cricketer, but simply as Man. Now
Man as Man has to bear himself aright towards the world in which he
finds himself, and in particular towards the world which touches him
most closely and envelops him most completely,--the world of human
life. Therefore knowledge of God will show itself, principally and
chiefly, though by no means wholly, in dealing aright with one's
fellow-men, in being rightly disposed towards them, and in doing the
right things to them. I have found it convenient to disconnect the
moral from the religious aspect of self-realisation. We can now see
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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