Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 70.djvu/137

Rh part in the debate of every question that relates to human welfare. It is only by the most active participation in public affairs that he can keep himself in proper training for the task of teaching the people's children.

The coming era of education will be marked, not by its material resources, but by its teachers. Our school houses are good enough; now let there be trained teachers, then we shall have schools. Such teachers will be equipped, of course, with knowledge; but above all they will be trained in discernment—in the power to see and appreciate the fundamental things of human growth and in its output of character. They too must work with the children, not alone for them, and be creative; to create they too must be free. The present system that grinds and chafes at every move was developed under archaic ideals; it has become antiquated and in large measure useless. The organization of the schools must grow out of the professional necessities of the teachers, the greatest of which is that even the poorest shall be free to put the best of himself into his work. Under such conditions every teacher and every child will become a positive creative moral force in the upbuilding of the social structure.