Page:Education and Art in Soviet Russia (1919).djvu/38

 period of child-caring—and necessary, for the higher stages of the educational system.

7. The struggle for existence in primitive days—transformed in our epoch to a struggle of classes, and within some classes to a struggle of individuals, demanding subjugation of one person by another—must be changed into an organized cooperation for making nature follow the commands of man, and for the attainment of new truths. Acquaintance with the most essential of sciences, complete familiarization with the technique of one or several of the sciences contributing towards making a human being most adapted for directing functions—within the sphere of its special endeavors and executive in all the rest.

8. The circumstances attending the modern transition period, financial and organizing difficulties, limit, to a certain extent, the practical application of the principle of equality of education. Hence, a selection is necessary.

9. Whereas the old pseudo-individualistic school of the nobility and bourgeoisie had applied in its systems of education the principle of selection in accordance with economic qualifications, namely, purchasing a maximum of knowledge, only partially elaborating the latter for its class aims, by a selection of the most capable individuals—the new socialistic school unequivocally denies such qualifications.

10. On the contrary, with inflexible consistency, including that of denying to the rich, but incapable individuals accessibility to higher education—the new school applies selection on the principle of intellectual ability.

11. With the object of a rational utilization of special abilities, having constantly in view the most intensive development of the productive forvesforces [sic] of the socialist fatherland, the school—uniform in its primary stages—becomes more complex in its structure as it advances and is finally crowned by a number of special faculties.

12. Likewise, the essential principle of the socialistic school—the principle of productive endeavors, which destroys the bourgeois conception of the two would-be contradictory forms of labor—mental and manual, high and contemptible—assumes in the first stages a polytechnic character and grad-