Part 3 (1/2)
SUBLIME CHAOS
=Acquisitiveness.=--In fancy, at least, we may attain a position over and far above the city of London and from this vantage-place, with the aid of strong gla.s.ses, watch a panorama that is both entrancing and bewildering. The scene bewilders not alone by its scope, but still more by its complexity. The scene is a s.h.i.+fting one, too, never the same in two successive minutes. Here is Trafalgar Square, with its n.o.ble monument and the guardian lions, reminding us of Nelson in what is accounted one of the most heroic naval engagements recorded in history.
As we look, we reconst.i.tute the scene, far away, in which he was conspicuous, and reread in our books his stirring appeal to his men.
Thence we glance up Regent Street and see it thronged with equipages that betoken wealth and luxury. Richly dressed people in great numbers are moving to and fro and giving color to the picture. A shabby garb cannot be made to fit into this picture. When it appears, there is discord in the general harmony. All this motion must have motives behind it somewhere; but we can only conjecture the motives. We have only surface indications to guide us in our quest for these. But we are reasonably certain that these people are animated by the instinct of acquisition. They seem to want to get things, and so come where things are to be had.
=Desires for things intangible.=--There are miles of vehicles of many kinds wending their tortuous, sinuous ways in and out along streets that radiate hither and thither. They stay their progress for a moment and people emerge at Robinson's, at Selfridge's, at Liberty's. Each of these is the Mecca of a thousand desires, and faces beam with pleasure when they reappear. Some desire has evidently been gratified. Others alight at the National Gallery and enter its doors. When they come forth it is obvious that something happened to them inside that building. The lines of care on their faces are not so evident, and their step is more elastic and buoyant. Their desires did not have tangible things as their objectives as in the case of the people who entered the shops for merchandise, but their faces s.h.i.+ne with a new light and, therefore, their quest must have been successful. As we look, we realize that desires for intangible things may be as acute as for tangible ones, and that the gratification of these desires produces equal satisfaction.
=Westminster Abbey.=--Not far away other throngs are invading Westminster Abbey. In those historic and hallowed precincts they are communing with the Past, the Present, and the Future. All about them is the sacred dust of those who once wrought effectively in affairs of state and in the realm of letters. History and literature have their shrine there, and these people are wors.h.i.+pers at that shrine. All about them are reminders of the Past, while the wors.h.i.+pers before the Cross direct their thoughts to the Future. Earth and Heaven both send forth an invitation for supreme interest in their thoughts and feelings. History and literature call to them to emulate the achievements whose monuments they see about them, while the Cross admonishes them that these achievements are but temporal. Here they experience a fulfillment of their desires. Their knowledge is broadened, and their faith is lifted up. The Past thrills them; the Future inspires them; and thus the Present is far more worth while.
=House of Parliament.=--Across the way is Parliament, and this conjures up a long train of events of vast import. The currents that flow out from this power-house have encircled the globe. Here conquests have been planned that electrified nations. Here have been generated vast armies and navies as messengers of Desire. Here have been voted vast treasures in execution of the desires of men for territorial extension and national aggrandizement. These halls have resounded with the eloquence of men who were striving to inoculate other men with the virus of their desires; and the whole world has stood on tiptoe awaiting the issue of this eloquence. Momentous scenes have been enacted here, all emanating from the desires of men, and these scenes have touched the lives of untold millions of people.
=Commerce.=--We see the Thames near by, teeming with s.h.i.+ps from the uttermost corners of the earth, and we think of commerce. We use the word glibly, but no mind is able to comprehend its full import. We know that these s.h.i.+ps ply the seas, bearing food and clothing to the peoples who live far away, but when we attempt to estimate the magnitude of commerce, the mind confesses to itself that the problem is too great. We may multiply the number of s.h.i.+ps by their tonnage, but we get, in consequence, an array of figures so great that they cease to have any meaning for the finite mind. The best and most that they can do for us is to make us newly aware that the people who dwell in the jungles of Africa, who roam the pampas of South America, who climb the Alps, the Rockies, the Andes, and the Himalayas, all have desires that these s.h.i.+ps are striving to gratify.
=Social intercourse.=--Going up the river to Hampton Court we see people out for a holiday. There are house-boats with elaborate and artistic fittings and furnis.h.i.+ngs, and other craft of every sort that luxury can suggest. One could imagine that none but fairies could stage such a scene. The blending of colors, the easy dalliance, the rippling laughter, the graceful feasting, and the eddying wavelets all conspire to produce a scene that serves to emphasize the beauty of the sh.o.r.es.
Underneath this enchanting scene of variegated beauty we discover the fundamental fact that man is a gregarious animal, that he not only craves a.s.sociation with his kind but that playing with them brings him into more harmonious communion with them. In their play they meet upon the plane of a common purpose and are thus unified in spirit. Hence, all this beauty and gayety is serving a beneficent purpose in the way of gratifying the inherent desire of mankind for social intercourse.
=The travel instinct.=--At Charing Cross the commerce drama is reenacted, only here with trains instead of boats, and, mainly, people instead of merchandise. Here we see hurry and bustle, and hear the shriek of the engine and the warning blast of the guard. Trains are going out, trains are coming in. When the people step out upon the platforms, they seem to know exactly whither they are bound. There are porters all about to help them achieve their desires, and cabs stand ready at the curb to do their bidding. Here is human commerce, and the trains are the answer to the call of the human family to see their own and other lands. These trains are swifter and more agreeable for nomads than the camel of the desert or the Conestoga wagon of the prairie. The nomadic instinct pulls and pushes people away from their own door-yards; hence railways, trains, engines, air brakes, telegraph lines, wireless apparatuses, and all the many other devices that the mind of man has designed at the behest of this desire to roam about.
=Monuments.=--Further down the Thames we see Greenwich, which regulates the clocks for the whole world, and furnishes the sea captain the talisman by which he may know where he is. Over against St. Paul's is the Bank of England, which for long years ruled the finances of the world. Yonder is the Museum, the conservator of the ages. There is the Rosetta Stone, which is the gateway of history; there the Elgin Marbles, which proclaim the glory of the Greece that was; there the palimpsests which recall an age when men had time to think; and there the books of all time by means of which we can rethink the big thoughts of men long since gone from sight. There are things that men now call curiosities that mark the course of minds in their struggles toward the light; and there are the sentiments of lofty souls that will live in the hearts of men long after these giant stones have crumbled.
=Desire for pastoral beauty.=--Beyond the city, in the alluring country places, we see a landscape that delights the senses, ornate with hedges, flowers, vine-clad cottages, highways of surpa.s.sing smoothness, fertile fields, and thrifty flocks and herds. There are carts and wagons on the roads bearing the products of field and garden to the marts of trade.
Men, women, and children zealously ply the hoe, the plow, or the shovel, abetting Nature in her efforts to feed the hungry. In this pastoral scene there is dignity, serenity, and latent power. Its beauty answers back to the aesthetic nature of mankind, and nothing that is artificial can ever supplant it in the way of gratifying man's desire for the beautiful.
=Economic articulation.=--Through all the diversified phases of this panorama there runs a fundamental principle of unity. There are no collisions. In the economy of civilization the farmer is coordinate with the artist, the artisan, and the tradesman. But, if all men were farmers, the economic balance would be disturbed. The railroad engineer is major because he is indispensable. So, also, is the farmer, the legislator, the artist, and the student. There is a degree of interdependence that makes for economic harmony. The articulation of all the parts gives us an economic whole.
=Aspirations.=--This panorama is a picture of life; and the school is life. Hence the panorama and the school are identical; only the school is larger than the panorama, even though the picture is reduced in size to fit the frame of the school. The pupils in the school have dreams and aspirations that reach far beyond the limits of the picture of our fancy. And all these aspirations are a part of life and so are indigenous in the vitalized school. And woe betide the teacher who would abridge or repress these dreams and aspirations. They are the very warp and woof of life, and the teacher who would eliminate them would suppress life itself. That teacher is in sorry business who would fit her pupils out with mental or spiritual strait-jackets, or mold them to some conventional pattern, even though it be her own. These pupils are the prototypes of the people in our panorama, and are, therefore, animated by like inclinations and desires.
=Desire is fundamental.=--Here is a boy who is hungry; he desires food.
But so does the man who is pa.s.sing along the street. The man is focusing all his mental powers upon the problem of how he shall procure food. The man's problem is the boy's problem and each has a right to a solution of his problem. The school's business is to help the boy solve his problem and not to try to quench his desire for food or try to persuade him that no such desire exists. This desire is one of the native dispositions to which the work of the school is to attach itself. Desires are fundamental in the scheme of education, the very tentacles that will lay hold upon the school activities and render them effective. The teacher's large task is to strengthen and nourish incipient desires and to cause the pupil to hunger and thirst after the means of gratifying them.
=Innate tendencies.=--Each pupil has a right to his inherent individuality. The school should not only begin where the boy is, but should begin its work upon what he is. Only so can it direct him toward what he ought to be. If the boy would alight at the National Gallery in order to regale himself with the masterpieces of art, why, pray, should the teacher try to curtail this desire and force him into Westminster Abbey? If she will accompany him into the Gallery and prove herself his friend and guide among the treasures of art, she will, doubtless, experience the joy of hearing him ask her to be his companion through the Abbey later on. The Abbey is quite right in its way and the boy must visit it soon or late, but to this particular boy the Gallery comes first and he should be led to the Abbey by way of the Gallery. In school work the parties are all personally conducted, but the rule is that a party is composed of but one person.
=Ill.u.s.tration.=--The girl is not to be condemned because she desires to visit the Selfridge shop rather than the Museum. The teacher may rhapsodize upon the Museum to the limit of her strength, but the girl is thinking of the beautiful fabrics to be seen at the shop, and, especially, of the delicious American ice cream that can be had nowhere else in London. It is rather a poor teacher who cannot lead the girl to the British Museum by way of Selfridge's. If the teacher finds the task difficult, she would do well to traverse the route a few times in advance. The ice cream will help rather than hinder when they stand, at length, before the Rosetta Stone or read the original letter to Mrs.
Bixby. The store and the Museum are both in the picture, and the teacher must determine which should come first in the itinerary of this girl.
The native dispositions and desires will point out the way to the teacher.
The old-time schoolmaster was fond of setting as a copy in the old-fas.h.i.+oned copy book ”All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy”; but, later, when he caught Jack playing he gave him a flogging, thus proving himself both inconsistent and deficient in a knowledge of psychology and fair play. If we are going to Greenwich we shall save time by taking the longer journey by way of Hampton Court. As we disport ourselves amid the beauties and gayeties of the Court we can prolong our pleasures by antic.i.p.ating Greenwich, and so make our play the anteroom of our work.
=Variety in excellence.=--In the vitalized school we shall find each pupil eager in his quest of food for the hunger he feels, and the teacher rejoicing in the development of his individuality. She would not have all her pupils attain the same level even of excellence. They are different, and she would have them so. Nor would she have her school exemplify the kind of order that is to be found in a gallery of statues.
Her school is a place of life, eager, yearning, pulsating life, and not a place of dead and deadening silence. Her pupils have diversified tastes and desires and, in consequence, diversified activities, but work is the golden cord that binds them in a healthy and healthful unity.
This is sublime chaos, a busy, happy throng, all working at full strength at tasks that are worth while, and all animated by hopes and aspirations that reach out to the very limits of s.p.a.ce.
QUESTIONS AND EXERCISES