Page:Counter-currents, Agnes Repplier, 1916.djvu/197

Popular Education of subjects—reduces any sane teacher to hopelessness, because he, at least, is well aware that his pupils cannot possibly absorb or digest a tithe of the material pressed upon their acceptance. Experience has taught him something which his counsellors never learn,—the need of limit, the "feasibility of performance." Hear what one teacher, both sane and experienced, has to say concerning the riot of facts and theories, of art and nature, of science and sentiment, which the school is expected to reduce into an orderly, consistent, and practical system of education.

"It is not enough that the child should be taught to handle skilfully the tools of all learning,—reading, writing, and arithmetic. His sense of form and his æsthetic nature must be developed by drawing; his hand must be trained by manual work; his musical nature must be awakened by song; he must be brought into harmony with his external 181