Part 23 (1/2)
and this _command of nature_ is represented by the fact that man sees the horizon as a curved line!
The example of Seguin serves to ill.u.s.trate the necessity of a _special education_ which shall fit man for _observation_, and shall direct _logical thought_.
The observation must be absolutely objective, in other words, stripped of preconceptions. Seguin has in this case the preconception that geometric design must prepare for writing, and that hinders him from discovering the truly natural proceeding necessary to such preparation.
He has, besides, the preconception that the deviation of a line, as well as the inexactness with which the child traces it, are due to ”_the mind and the eye, not to the hand_,” and so he wearies himself _for weeks and months in explaining_ the direction of lines and in guiding _the vision_ of the idiot.
It seems as if Seguin felt that a good method must start from a superior point, geometry; the intelligence of the child is only considered worthy of attention in its relation to abstract things. And is not this a common defect?
Let us observe mediocre men; they pompously a.s.sume erudition and disdain simple things. Let us study the clear thought of those whom we consider men of genius. Newton is seated tranquilly in the open air; an apple falls from the tree, he observes it and asks, ”Why?” Phenomena are never insignificant; the fruit which falls and universal gravitation may rest side by side in the mind of a genius.
If Newton had been a teacher of children he would have led the child to look upon the worlds on a starry night, but an erudite person might have felt it necessary first to prepare the child to understand the sublime calculus which is the key to astronomy--Galileo Galilei observed the oscillation of a lamp swung on high, and discovered the laws of the pendulum.
In the intellectual life _simplicity_ consists in divesting one's mind of every preconception, and this leads to the discovery of new things, as, in the moral life, humility and material poverty guide us toward high spiritual conquests.
If we study the history of discoveries, we will find that they have come from _real objective observation_ and _from logical thought_. These are simple things, but rarely found in one man.
Does it not seem strange, for instance, that after the discovery by Laveran of the malarial parasite which invades the red blood-corpuscles, we did not, in spite of the fact that we know the blood system to be a system of closed vessels, even so much as _suspect the possibility_ that a stinging insect might inoculate us with the parasite? Instead, the theory that the evil emanated from low ground, that it was carried by the African winds, or that it was due to dampness, was given credence.
Yet these were vague ideas, while the parasite was a definite biological specimen.
When the discovery of the malarial mosquito came to complete logically the discovery of Laveran, this seemed marvellous, stupefying. Yet we know in biology that the reproduction of molecular vegetable bodies is by scission with alternate sporation, and that of molecular animals is by scission with alternate conjunction. That is, after a certain period in which the primitive cell has divided and sub-divided into fresh cells, equal among themselves, there comes the formation of two diverse cells, one male and one female, which must unite to form a single cell capable of recommencing the cycle of reproduction by division. All this being known at the time of Laveran, and the malarial parasite being known to be a protozoon, it would have seemed logical to consider its segmentation in the stroma of the red corpuscle as the phase of scission and to await until the parasite gave place to the s.e.xual forms, which must necessarily come in the phase succeeding scission. Instead, the division was looked upon as spore-formation, and neither Laveran, nor the numerous scientists who followed the research, knew how to give an explanation of the appearance of the s.e.xual forms. Laveran expressed an idea, which was immediately received, that these two forms were degenerate forms of the malarial parasite, and therefore incapable of producing the changes determining the disease. Indeed, the malaria was apparently cured at the appearance of the two s.e.xual forms of the parasite, the conjunction of the two cells being impossible in the human blood. The theory--then recent--of Morel upon human degeneration accompanied by deformity and weakness, inspired Laveran in his interpretation, and everybody found the idea of the ill.u.s.trious pathologist a fortunate one, because it was inspired by the great concepts of the Morellian theory.
Had anyone, instead, limited himself to reasoning thus: the original form of the malarial insect is a protozoon; it reproduces itself by scission, under our eyes; when the scission is finished, we see two diverse cells, one a half-moon, the other threadlike. These are the feminine and masculine cells which must, by conjunction, alternate the scission,--such a reasoner would have opened the way to the discovery.
But _so simple_ a process of reasoning did not come. We might almost ask ourselves how great would be the world's progress if a special form of education prepared men for pure observation and logical thought.
A great deal of time and intellectual force are lost in the world, because the false seems great and the truth so small and insignificant.
I say all this to defend the necessity, which I feel we face, of preparing the coming generations by means of more rational methods. It is from these generations that the world awaits its progress. We have already learned to make use of our surroundings, but I believe that we have arrived at a time when the necessity presents itself for _utilising_ human force, through a scientific education.
To return to Seguin's method of writing, it ill.u.s.trates another truth, and that is the tortuous path we follow in our teaching. This, too, is allied to an instinct for complicating things, a.n.a.logous to that which makes us so p.r.o.ne to appreciate complicated things. We have Seguin teaching _geometry_ in order to teach a child to write; and making the child's mind exert itself to follow geometrical abstractions only to come down to the simple effort of drawing a printed D. After all, must the child not have to make another effort in order to _forget_ the print, and _learn_ the script!
And even we in these days still believe that in order to learn to write the child must first make vertical strokes. This conviction is very general. Yet it does not seem natural that to write the letters of the alphabet, which are all rounded, it should be necessary to begin with straight lines and acute angles.
In all good faith, we wonder that it should be difficult to do away with the angularity and stiffness with which the beginner traces the beautiful curve of the O.[13] Yet, through what effort on our part, and on his, was he forced to fill pages and pages with rigid lines and acute angles! To whom is due this time-honoured idea that the first sign to be traced must be a straight line? And why do we so avoid preparing for curves as well as angles?
[13] It will, of course, be understood that this is a criticism of the system in use in Italian schools. A. E. G.
Let us, for a moment, divest ourselves of such preconceptions and proceed in a more simple way. We may be able to relieve future generations of _all effort_ in the matter of learning to write.
Is it necessary to begin writing with the making of vertical strokes? A moment of clear and logical thinking is enough to enable us to answer, no. The child makes too painful an effort in following such an exercise.
The first steps should be the easiest, and the up and down stroke, is, on the contrary, one of the most difficult of all the pen movements.
Only a professional penman could fill a whole page and preserve the regularity of such strokes, but a person who writes only moderately well would be able to complete a page of presentable writing. Indeed, the straight line is unique, expressing the shortest distance between two points, while _any deviation_ from that direction signifies a line which is not straight. These infinite deviations are therefore easier than that _one_ trace which is perfection.
If we should give to a number of adults the order to draw a straight line upon the blackboard, each person would draw a long line proceeding in a different direction, some beginning from one side, some from another, and almost all would succeed in making the line straight.
Should we then ask that the line be drawn in a _particular direction_, starting from a determined point, the ability shown at first would greatly diminish, and we would see many more irregularities, or errors.
Almost all the lines would be long--for the individual _must needs gather impetus_ in order to succeed in making his line straight.
Should we ask that the lines be made short, and included within precise limits, the errors would increase, for we would thus impede the impetus which helps to conserve the definite direction. In the methods ordinarily used in teaching writing, we add, to such limitations, the further restriction that the instrument of writing must be held in a certain way, not as instinct prompts each individual.