Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 30.djvu/371

Rh which exist against a negative attitude of the state with regard to education generally. There are thinkers of eminence who believe that the state never should undertake to educate the young, leaving that work wholly to private agencies. Their position, I think, is an unsound one, because education is a necessity for security, and thus a legitimate matter of governmental cognizance. At all events, we have public systems, and, having them, it seems important that some instruction be given upon those topics which evidently take precedence of others in the minds of the people, and are of enough consequence to develop actively an opposition of opinion.

If this be so, there is only the third suggestion left, namely, to extend universally the scientific method of teaching. State the question fairly, give the facts bearing upon it accurately, explain impartially the differences of views with the reasons favoring each; then let the individual form his own conclusions, entirely free from any of the arts of persuasion. This is the only method which subserves the public good, the welfare of the whole organism instead of the interest of a party, and which does not work injustice. Then the tax-payer can not complain; or, if he does, it will clearly be because he is more desirous of serving his own particular idols, whether of personal creation or of party affiliation, than of promoting the cause of truth, in which alone lies the well-being of the community as a whole. The school which educates after this fashion is a powerful help to the stability of the commonwealth; the teacher who thus teaches is a faithful and valuable public servant, for whose support no tax should be paid grudgingly.

While these remarks apply to the whole curriculum of instruction, the practical difficulty of giving such truly scientific instruction is often very great. There is little fairness between contestants; and most people, even teachers, are partisans. Each seeks only to become the oppressor. Ascendency, conquest, domination, is dearer than truth. When this situation occurs, deplorable though it be, there is no alternative but to exclude rigidly all instruction upon the topic which is the subject of such anti-social striving. The first of our three propositions is intolerable; the third and best may be impracticable; then we must resort to the second, in the hope that better conditions may arise. As between the first two, in adopting the second, we are certainly choosing the minor evil.

This I conceive to be the wise practice to follow respecting public instruction, as based on that theory of society which holds that each individual is united in organic association with every other, being at once the means and end of all the rest. Kow, with regard to religion, we are to-day in the position where we are obliged to consider seriously whether religious instruction shall be excluded wholly from public institutions, or be given scientifically and impartially. We can make no exception here to the rule that anything actively disputed by any considerable number of individuals in the community shall not be