Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from Complete Education: An Address Delivered at the Annual Commencement of the University of Michigan, July 1, 1880
Hardly less cruel is the introduction of a false utilitarianism into education\/ In education, the usefulness of a study is not to be measured by its availability for the business purposes of later life; but solely by its fitness to develop or educate the student's powers. Till that is completed he should never be required or permitted to learn a thing simply because he hopes to use it to make money with. The object of education is not to learn useful things, but to become able to learn and to use them; and it is a great wrong to the student to intrude the in struments and the spirit of mere money-getting into his educa tional life. Permit me to say that the practical denial or neglect of this is working unnumbered evils to this generation. In too many cases education is dwarfed or perverted by a prevailing tone and temper of false utilitarianism. The allurements of mammon and worldliness are too often permitted to call our ingenuous youth away from the pi'oper business of the school and college. Short roads and by-paths are opened up to tempt them to abandon the proper work of education, and to go prema turely to schools of professional and technical instruction. The consequence is the sending forth of half-educated men, and in experienced men to plead the causes, and heal the diseases, and lead the thinking of the generation. Let us all protest against this great evil; for unless it is counteracted it will lead to the impoverishment of the age. Let our colleges and universities make men first, and then make lawyers, and physicians, and teachers of them. Ordinarily, so far as education is concerned and we are confining our attention to that now - the only path to thoroughly complete manhood is through thorough educational training. The study of Latin and Greek and the higher mathe maties, of rhetoric and logic, and mental and moral philoso phy; these are the useful studies while a man is being educated; these are the studies by which such men as Newton and Bacon, and Butler, and Stephenson, and Gladstone were made. I rejoice to know that steadfast adhesion to this principle is ruling in the councils of this institution more and more. I rejoice to learn that the number of students who take the full classical and phi los0phical course, is steadily increasing. I rejoice to believe that utilitarianism, so called, is being discouraged here; and I hope that the day is speedily coming when none but those who have taken their bachelor's degree, will expect to be admitted to the professional schools of this great University.
About the Publisher
Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com
This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
