ral
habits, that have a considerable value; but to frame a theory of moral
education, on a level in a point of definiteness with the possible
theory of intellectual education, is a task that I should not like to
have imposed upon me. In point of fact, two problems are joined in one,
to the confusion of both. There is _first_ the vast question of _moral
control_, which stretches far and wide over many fields, and would have
to be tracked with immense labour: it belongs to the arts of government;
it comes under moral suasion, as exercised by the preacher and orator;
it even implicates the tact of diplomacy. I do not regard this as a
properly educational question (although it refers to an art that every
teacher must try to master); that is to say, its solution is not
connected with education processes strictly so called. The _second_
problem of moral education is the one really within the scope of the
subject--the problem of _fixing moral bents_ or habits, when the right
conduct is once initiated. On this head, some scientific insight is
attainable; and suggestions of solid value may in time accrue, although
there never can be the precision attainable in the intellectual region.
* * * * *
I will next advert to the applied science of Art or Aesthetics, long a
barren ground, so far as scientific handling was concerned, but now a
land of promise. The old thesis, "What is Beauty?" a good debating
society topic, is, I hope, past contending about. The numerous
influences that concur in works of art, or in natural beauty, present a
fine opening for delicate analysis; at the same time, they implicate the
vaguest and least advanced portion of psychology--the Emotions. The
German philosophers have usually ranked aesthetics as one of the
subjective sciences; but, it is only of late that the department has
taken shape in their country. Lessing gave a great impulse to literary
art, and originated a number of pregnant suggestions; and the German
love of music has necessarily led to theories as well as to
compositions. We are now in the way to that consummation of aesthetics
which may be described as containing (1) a reference to psychology as
the mother science, (2) a classification, comparison, and contrast of
the fine arts themselves, and (3) an induction of the principles of art
composition from the best examples. Anything like a thorough sifting of
fine-art questions would strain psychology at every
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