6. The school must become a social institution, having as its chief functions (1) the unfolding of social ideals, (2) the development of social disposition, and (3) the formation of social habits.

(1) Social ideals are to be developed chiefly through the school studies.

(2) Social disposition must be cultivated through the awakening of an abiding interest in the social ideals.

(3) Social habits are to be formed by the conduct of the school with respect to regularity, punctuality, silence and industry, also with respect to punishments and to play. The practical efficiency of intellect, so necessary to the social man, is to be developed by rational methods of conducting the recitation.

THE RELATION OF SCHOOL DISCIPLINE TO MORAL

EDUCATION.

By W. T. HARRIS, LL.D.,

United States Commissioner of Education.

THERE is no topic related to education in the schools that excites so general discussion as that of moral education. And yet there is no topic concerning which the suggestions made are more idle and unprofitable. It is generally assumed that moral instruction is moral philosophy. Now the elementary schools do not attempt with success philosophical instruction of any kind, and in the nature of the case could not give successful lessons in moral philosophy. On this account it has been supposed that there is no moral instruction in the elementary schools. To correct this, suggestions are made on every hand for the preparation of some catechism which should form an introduction to moral philosophy, or more often it is suggested that religious instruction should be introduced for this purpose. Perhaps Bible reading alone without note or comment is proposed as the best means of meeting the want that is felt.

The important question that meets us at this point is, What is the difference between intellectual education and moral education? When we consider its answer we come very soon to the conviction that moral philosophy belongs to intellectual education. For it treats of principles and causes. It belongs to theory, while the moral should relate especially to practice. Moral instruction, strictly speaking, should secure the formation of correct moral habits. The nature of morality is explained in moral philosophy. A correct habit of thinking, a correct view of the world is important enough for moral education, but it does not amount to a moral education, but is only one side of it. One side perhaps leads to the other. Possibly a correct habit of thinking regarding the moral will lead gradually towards the practice of the moral. And certainly a practice of the moral will lead towards a correct thinking as regards the moral.

Again, the more elementary the grade of education the greater the

preponderance of practice over theory. It would seem that the children in the primary schools and the grammar schools should be taught moral practices and habits and that gradually as they go on through the secondary schools and into higher education they should learn the full theory of the ethical.

However this may be, as soon as one approaches the course of education as it is found realized in the existing school systems in America, he comes upon the fact that the matter of moral instruction in the schools belongs to the side known as discipline and not to the side known as instruction in books and theories.

The first thing the child learns when he comes to school is to act according to certain forms-certain forms that are necessary in order to make possible the instruction of the school in classes or groups. The school is a social whole. The pupil must learn to act in such a way as not to interfere with the studies of his fellows. He must act so as to reinforce the action of the other pupils and not embarrass it. This concerted action into which the pupil is trained may be called the rhythm of the school. The child must become rhythmical, must be penetrated by the spirit of the school order. Order is heaven's first law. Everyone has heard this statement quoted again and again. Inasmuch as the future member of the society will have two existences, an individual existence and a social existence, it is well that the school which fits him for life should be a social existence and have these two sides to it.

There are four cardinal rules that relate directly to the school discipline. The child must be regular and punctual, silent and industrious. Let us discuss the necessity of these rules in the school and see the immense importance which school discipline has for the formation of character. "Character," said Novalis, "is the completely rounded will.” The human will has acted upon itself and made grooves or ruts in which it may act with efficiency and without contradicting and embarrassing itself. The will in the case of moral action is directed upon itself, the will controls itself. Self-control in the interest of reasonable deeds-self-control in the interest of performing reasonable deeds and in aiding all one's fellow men to perform reasonable deeds-this self-control is the essence of the moral.

The commencement of this subjugation of the will on the part of the child is accomplished through the principle of regularity. The child must come regularly to school day by day, must not omit a

single session. He must study his lessons regularly, prepare himself for the tasks of the day without omitting any. Recitations or lessons must be attended regularly. Any tendency to yield to the feeling of the moment, any fits of indolence, any indisposition which offers itself must be inhibited by the child's will. He must vanquish his natural like or dislike and perform the reasonable task. He must sacrifice himself whenever necessary. The principle of self-sacrifice is another name for this will training which belongs to moral instruction. To theorize about self-sacrifice and self-control and habits of regularity is intellectual education, but not moral education.

The habit of regularity once confirmed, the pupil has attained some power of directing the action of his will upon his will. He has to that extent taken his will from its subjection to feeling or passion or mere unconscious habit. He does not will upon impulse, but wills rationally.

Not only regularity, but punctuality, is insisted on in the school. He must not merely attend the school, but he must attend it just at the time prescribed, say at the beginning of the morning and afternoon sessions. He must not be content with getting his lesson at some time in the day, but he must get the lesson at the proper time. He must be at the class at the proper time. He must be obedient to the word of command.

In order that there may be concerted action both regularity and punctuality are necessary. The rhythm of action by which the community of individuals is converted into an organic social whole requires punctuality as much as regularity. Without punctuality each individual is in the way of every other one and an obstacle or stumbling block. There can be no movement of the whole as a whole without punctuality. This rhythm is necessary in order that there may be unity of human action. A prescribed order issues forth from the will of established authority. This prescribed order is carried out by individuals acting as a higher individual, namely, as an institution. For an institution is an individuality given to many. It is a unity of effort, an e pluribus unum. The school is to be taught in classes. In the class the pupil learns much more than he could learn by himself. If the teacher should devote himself to one person he could not instruct him in so efficient a manner as he could instruct twenty persons at the same time. For in class recitation each pupil learns more from his fellow pupils (from all their mistakes and failures as well as from their brilliant achievements) than he does from his teacher. Each

pupil is more or less one-sided in his mind. It is, in fact, the object of education to bring out all sides of his mind so that each faculty may be reinforced by all the others. The pupil in learning his lesson understands some phases of it and fails to see what is essential in others, but the failures are not all alike; a given pupil fails in one thing and succeeds in another: his fellow pupil succeeds where he fails and fails where he succeeds. In the recitation each pupil is surprised to find that some of his fellows are more successful than himself in seeing the true significance. The pupil can, through the properly conducted recitation, seize the subject of his lesson through many minds. He learns to add to his power of insight the various insights of his fellow pupils. The skillful teacher knows his power of teaching by means of a class-knows that he can make each pupil understand much more through the aid of a class than he could make him understand if he were to attempt to do all of the explaining for an isolated pupil.

The class recitation is made possible only by regularity and punctuality. The efficiency of the school depends upon it. In the industrial civilization in which we live the same necessity, exists for these school virtues. Unless there is regularity the mill cannot manufacture and the shop cannot go on; there can be no combination between the mechanics who work on a joint enterprise. The engineer or the fireman without this virtue of punctuality would endanger the lives of his fellow workmen by an explosion of the steam boiler, or bring the machinery to a stop through the neglect of its fires.

We are pushing forward in our time into an era of the use of machinery, not merely in manufacturing and transportation, but for all the multifarious uses of the household and the daily life. Man is conquering nature by means of machinery, and the citizen cannot enter into the fruits of this victory unless he adapts himself, through regularity and punctuality, to the demands of this new form of civili

zation.

But regularity and punctuality are not the only schoolroom virtues. I have mentioned two others, silence and industry. Regularity and punctuality are in a certain sense negative virtues. Silence also belongs to this class, while industry belongs to the positive virtues. Silence is another virtue that depends upon inhibition-upon the inhibitory act of the will. The will acts to repress its self-activity; to guide its own utterance and to limit that utterance to the chosen province prescribed