us, and, more or less,
of those who are connected with us, do depend upon our knowing
something of the rules of a game infinitely more difficult and
complicated than chess. It is a game which has been played for
untold ages, every man and woman of us being one of the two players
in a game of his or her own. The chess-board is the world, the
pieces are the phenomena of the universe, the rules of the game are
what we call the laws of Nature. The player on the other side is
hidden from us. We know that his play is always fair, just, and
patient. But also we know, to our cost, that he never overlooks a
mistake, or makes the smallest allowance for ignorance. To the man
who plays well, the highest stakes are paid, with that sort of
overflowing generosity with which the strong shows delight in
strength. And one who plays ill is checkmated--without haste, but
without remorse.

My metaphor will remind some of you of the famous picture in which
Retzsch has depicted Satan playing at chess with man for his soul.
Substitute for the mocking fiend in that picture, a calm, strong angel,
who is playing for love, as we say, and would rather lose than win--and
I should accept it as an image of human life.

Well, what I mean by Education, is learning the rules of this mighty
game. In other words, education is the instruction of the intellect in
the laws of Nature, under which name I include not merely things and
their forces, but men and their ways; and the fashioning of the
affections and of the will into an earnest and loving desire to move in
harmony with those laws. For me, education means neither more nor less
than this. Anything which professes to call itself education must be
tried by this standard, and if it fails to stand the test, I will not
call it education, whatever may be the force of authority, or of
numbers, upon the other side.

It is important to remember that, in strictness, there is no such thing
as an uneducated man. Take an extreme case. Suppose that an adult man,
in the full vigor of his faculties, could be suddenly placed in the
world, as Adam is said to have been, and then left to do as he best
might. How long would he be left uneducated? Not five minutes. Nature
would begin to teach him, through the eye, the ear, the touch, the
properties of objects. Pain and pleasure would be at his elbow telling
him to do this and avoid that; and by slow degrees the man would receive
an education, which, if narrow, would be