if sometimes acutely unpleasant
character of the New England stock, or the strong and handsome character
of the race that dwelt in the thirteen original colonies as this
manifested itself well into the last century, and it has, in general,
bred no new thing in the millions of immigrants and their descendants
who have flooded the country since 1840 and from whom the public schools
and some of the colleges are largely recruited. It is not a question of
expanded brain power or applied aptitude, but of character, and here
there is a larger measure of failure than we had a right to expect. And
yet, had we this right? The avowed object of formal education is mental
and vocational training, and by no stretch of the imagination can we
hold these to be synonymous with character. We have dealt with and
through one thing alone, and that is the intellect, whereas character is
rather the product of emotions judiciously stimulated, balanced (not
controlled) by intellect, and applied through active and varied
experience. Deliberately have we cut out every emotional and spiritual
factor; not only religion and the fine arts, but also the studies, and
the methods of study, and the type of text-books, that might have helped
in the process of spiritual and emotional development. We have
eliminated Latin and Greek, or taught them as a branch of philology; we
have made English a technical exercise in analysis and composition,
disregarding the moral and spiritual significance of the works of the
great masters of English; we minimize ancient history and concentrate on
European history since the French Revolution, and on the history of the
United States, and because of the sensitiveness of our endless variety
of religionists (pro forma) text books are written which leave religion
out of history altogether--and frequently economics and politics as well
when these cannot be made to square with popular convictions; philosophy
and logic are already pretty well discarded, except for special
electives and post-graduate courses, and as for art in its multifarious
forms we know it not, unless it be in the rudimentary and devitalized
form of free-hand drawing and occasional concerted singing. The only
thing that is left in the line of emotional stimulus is competitive
athletics, and for this reason I sometimes think it one of the most
valuable factors in public education. It has, however, another function,
and that is the coordination of training and lif