tunity and responsibility.

IV

THE EYE PROBLEM IN THE SCHOOLS

_A Paper read before the 1914 meeting of the North Dakota State
Association of Opticians. It was printed in the May, 1914, issue of "The
Optical Journal and Review," also in the same issue of "The Keystone"_

I do not know how fully people appreciate the importance of the eye as
an agent, or factor, of human cultivation. Judging from the amount of
work it is being made to do in our schools and in nearly all our
processes of education, we might perhaps be led to feel that its
importance is fully appreciated, indeed, that it is being looked upon as
the sole factor, or agent. But, on the other hand, this very excessive
use, especially in the early school years, leading, as it does in such a
large percentage of cases, to serious impairment of vision, almost tells
us that its great value is not appreciated. If it were, should we be
likely to abuse it as we do in these early years and thus render it
incapable of performing its larger, fuller use later on? The attitude
seems rather to be that its conservation is not thought to be necessary.
That, however, springs from ignorance rather than from studied
disregard.

But let us look for a moment at the processes of education and note
where the eye comes in. If there is anything upon which leading
educators are now practically agreed, or upon which they tend to agree,
it is that education as a process is a matter of development rather than
the learning of knowledge facts. Now, that development is analogous to
the growth and development of the plant, that is, it is brought about
thru nourishment. In the plant this nourishment is taken in thru the
roots, becomes absorbed and assimilated and thus ministers to growth and
development. In the child, looking at it from the physical point of view
and having in mind psychical, not physical, nourishment, the sense
organs serve this purpose. Did you ever stop to think that the sense
organs form the only connecting link between the great outside world,
which serves as raw material for the nourishment, and the inner life of
the child, the development of which we are seeking? Did you ever stop to
think that these sense organs, the eye, the ear, the nose, the tongue,
and the surface of the body as the organ of touch, form the only
possible avenue of approach to that inner life? Cut off, or close up,
these avenues and no development of this inner life would be possible i