process of converting
information into knowledge is a comparatively easy one when we are
dealing with matters of detailed fact. Information as to the dates of
the kings of England, as to the bays and capes of the British Isles,
as to the exports and imports of Liverpool, as to the weights and
measures of this or that country, is in each case readily convertible
into knowledge of the given facts. But directly we get away from mere
facts, and begin to concern ourselves with what is large, vague,
subtle, and obscure,--with forces, for example, with causes, with
laws, with principles,--the difficulty of collecting adequate and
appropriate information about our subject becomes great, and the
difficulty of converting such information into knowledge becomes
greater still. Information as to the dates and names of the English
kings, and other historical facts, is easily converted into knowledge
of those facts, but it is not easily converted into knowledge of
English history. Information as to the names and positions of capes
and bays, as to areas and populations, and other geographical facts,
is easily converted into knowledge of those facts, but it is not
easily converted into knowledge of geography. Information as to
arithmetical rules and tables, as to weights and measures, and other
arithmetical facts, is easily converted into knowledge of those
facts, but it is not easily converted into knowledge of arithmetic.
In each case a _sense_ must be evolved if the information is to be
assimilated, and so converted into real knowledge; and though it is
true that the sense in question grows, in part at least, by feeding
on appropriate information, it is equally true that if, owing to
defective training, the sense remains undeveloped, the information
supplied will remain unassimilated, and the tacit assumption that the
possession of information is equivalent to the possession of real
knowledge will delude both the teacher and the taught. It is
possible, as one knows from experience, for a boy to have mastered
all the arithmetical rules and tables with which his master has
supplied him, and to have all his measures and weights at his
fingers' ends, and yet to be so destitute of the arithmetical sense
as to give without a moment's misgiving an entirely nonsensical
answer to a simple arithmetical problem,--to say, for example, as I
have known half a class of boys say, that a _room_ is _five shillings
and sixpence wide_. Such a boy, thou