THE TRUE ORDER OF STUDIES,

(FIRST ARTICLE.)

BY REV. THOMAS HILL,

Waltham, Mass.

WE take it for granted that there is a rational order of development in the course of the sciences, and that it ought to be followed in the course of common education. Starting from these assumptions, we seek to find what that order is, and arrive at the conclusion that there are five great studies for the human spirit, Mathesis, Physics, History, Psychology, and Theology,-which must be pursued in the order in which we have here named them. This circle of five points must be embraced in every scheme of education, whether for the nur sery, the subprimary school, the primary school, the grammar school the high school, or the college. No one of them is to be omitted, in any school, until the student enters the professional school in which he is to prepare directly for the exercise of his profession or calling in life.

We also take it for granted that there is a natural order of development in the human powers, and that studies should be so arranged as to develop the powers in this order. Starting from this assumption, we arrive at the conclusion that the ability to receive impressions, that is, the perceptive power, first shows itself; next, a power to conceive or imagine; thirdly, the power of reasoning; fourthly, the power to decide and act upon the decisions of reason. Moreover, these faculties are called out in their proper order of development by taking the five branches of study in their proper order, and this harmony of the results of our two lines of inquiry is a presumptive proof of their correctness.

These are the conclusions at which we have arrived, and which we propose to illustrate somewhat at length in the present paper. Their great breadth and generality, and the demand which they make, upon those who accept them, to change the whole character of our education from the hour of the child's birth to the day of his graduatior from college, must be our apology for the length of our remarks, and for our request that the reader should not dismiss them from his mine without a candid consideration of their value.

It is manifest that the faculties which are first developed should be

first exercised by a judicious training. It is true that, in one sense, all the faculties are developed together, that glimmerings of reason, and faint indications of a will, are perceived in the youngest infant. Thus, also, in education, the child is to be treated from the beginning as a reasonable and free agent. But the perceptive powers become perfected in their action long before the reason is matured, or the will strongly developed. For the first few years of a child's life its principal occupation is that of learning to recognize material things by their forms. This natural education in geometry begins through the eye at the age of a few days; and, during the whole of childhood, the attention is strongly directed to those characteristics of bodies which appeal to the senses. By the age of fifteen the perceptive powers are frequently in their highest state of development. The powers of imagination are not usually manifested at all until the age of two or three years; never in a distinct form before the age of seven or eight months, and seldom if ever attain their fullest vigor before the age of twenty. The reasoning powers cannot usually be shown to exist entirely distinct from the other faculties until the age of ten or twelve years, and seldom reach their perfection before the age of thirty. The will manifests itself, and comes to maturity no earlier than the power of reasoning.

Hence nature herself indicates that the studies of the child should follow in such succession that his perceptive powers should first be exercised more than any other; that his imaginative powers should next be called into play; and that those studies which require reasoning, and those which treat of his responsibilities, should not be given him at too early an age. A man must first learn facts, then conceive hypotheses, before he can reason of abstract truths, and deduce laws of duty.

It is also self-evident that there must be a natural sequence or order of truths, or, as it has been called, a hierarchy of sciences. In our view of the whole field of knowledge, we see it divided into five great branches; Mathesis, Physics, History, Psychology, and Theology. Theology treats of the uncreated Creator, and of our special relations to Him. Psychology treats of man, who may be called the created creator: History deals with the thoughts and deeds of men; that is with the creations of the created. Physics treat of the material world, that is, of the creations of the uncreated, with the creation in the usual sense of that word. Physics thus bear the same relation to Theology that History does to Psychology, and may hence be called Natural History. Mathesis treats of that field of space and time in which the deeds of History and of Natural History are wrought; that is, if we

consider time and space as having objective reality, Mathesis deals with the uncreating uncreated.

Now, all possible objects of human thought are comprised under one or another of these five heads, and these five studies logically precede each other in the order we have here indicated. Mathematics

must precede Physics, because conceptions of form, time, and number, necessarily precede any conceptions of material phenomena, which are subject to the laws of form, time, and number. In other words, Mechanics treats of motion in straight lines or in curved orbits, of the transfer of force in various directions subject to the conditions of geometry, of the strength of materials in various forms, and of the adaptation of those forms to the purposes of art; all of which implies geometrical knowledge. Chemistry deals with definite proportions, with the laws of multiples, and of combinations, so that it necessarily requires a knowledge of arithmetic. Botany and zoology in their morphology require both geometry and arithmetic; in their physi ology, chemistry, and in both departments, mechanics.

As Mathematics thus necessarily precede Physics, so Physics must precede History. All that men do must be done in this world of ours, upon these materials set before us, while subject to the conditions of our material frame. All the thoughts of men must be expressed either by word, by symbol, or by a work of art; - and, of these, even words imply a knowledge of the outward world, for all words were originally figurative. Hence, every historical study must be preceded by the knowledge of a certain amount of physical truth, that is, of Natural History. We might add that while the deeds of men are wrought by physical agents, a great deal of the thought of man has been expended upon physical theories; so that a just appreciation of human thought and action requires a knowledge of that material world which has been the theatre of men's actions, and the object of so many of their thoughts.

Again, Psychology requires a knowledge of Physiology and of History. We know nothing of the human soul save through its actions, interpreted by our own consciousness; - including in its actions its thoughts as uttered in words. Lastly, Theology requires a knowledge of Psychology and of Natural History. For we can know nothing, by nature, concerning the Creator, in whose image we are made, except by first studying his works, and especially that image of Himself which He has placed within us. We may have religion with but little theology, but we cannot have any theology, at all, without some previous knowledge of ourselves, and of the other works of God.

It must be evident, therefore, that the Mathematics logically take

the lead as the great and indispensable foundation of all learning. It is not only impossible to dispense with them, but impossible to place them anywhere else than at the beginning of all intellectual education. No man can possibly attain to the knowledge of anything in the world without first attaining some mathematical knowledge or power. That mathematical knowledge may have been gained unconsciously, and may not have arranged itself in a distinct scientific form in his mind; but it must be there, for there cannot possibly be any intellectual life whatever upon our planet which does not begin with a perception of mathematical truth. A natural method of education requires us therefore, to pay our earliest attention to the development of the child's power to grasp the truths of space and time.

Mathesis would naturally divide itself into three great branches, treating of space, of time, and of number. Geometry unfolds the laws of space; algebra those of time; and arithmetic those of number. Other branches of Mathematics are generated by the combination of these three fundamental branches. Now, geometry, arithmetic, and algebra, should be taught in a natural order. There is a difficulty in deciding, simply from the logical sequence, what that order is, because the fundamental ideas of the three studies are so nearly independent of each other. Pure algebra, as the science of time, cannot, however, be evolved without reference to number and space; it will, to say the least, in the very process of its evolution, generate arithmetic. But geometry can be evolved without the slightest reference to time, although not, to any extent, without reference to number. The idea of number is one of the earliest abstractions from our contemplation of the material world.

The relative order in which these studies should be pursued will, however, be made more manifest on reference to the order of development of the child's powers. Number, though an early abstraction from phenomena in space, is a much higher and more difficult conception than conceptions of form. The child recognizes the shape of individual things long before he can count them, and geometry should therefore precede arithmetic in his education. But time is much more difficult of comprehension than space, it requires a riper effort of the mind to conceive of pure time without events, than of pure space without bodies. The latter remains, so to speak, visible to the mental eye; the former does not even in imagination address any of the senses. Geometry is, therefore, the first study in an intellectual course of education; generating and leading to arithmetic, and through that to algebra; preparing the way also for Physics, and thus for History, Metaphysics, and Theology. We must begin intellectual education

with geometry, leading the child through other studies as rapidly and in such order as the amount of his geometrical knowledge justifies and demands. Some knowledge of geometry is gained by an infant within a week of its birth; and when it first comes to school it has usually gained at first hand from nature a sufficient knowledge of the laws of space to serve as a basis for a good deal of other information picked up here and there.

If, now, we consider the order of subdivision in physical study, we shall find here, also, three principal departments of science; mechanical, chemical, and vital. The laws of color, sound, odor, and flavor, may appear at first sight irreducible to either of these three divisions; but a closer examination of the question will show us that this arises simply from an intermingling of psychological relations with the physical phenomena. The three divisions of Physics naturally follow each other as we have named them. Some knowledge of mechanics, that is, of the laws of force and motion, is necessary to any knowledge of chemistry, and some knowledge of chemistry and of mechanics is necessary for any thorough understanding of plants and animals. But it is evident that all knowledge of Natural History must begin with observation; and that one of the uses of the previous knowledge of Mathematics is to teach the child to observe with accuracy. The senses through which we observe material phenomena are, of all the human powers, the earliest to be developed, and should, therefore, be the first to receive a deliberate cultivation. Now, the mechanical relations of bodies, including color and sound, are those most obvious to sense; the chemical are more difficult of discovery, and the effect of vital powers can scarce be perceived without an interpretation from our own consciousness. Thus it is manifest that the order of arrangement in these three departments of Physics is conformed to the order of development of the human powers; and we may add that, in every subdivision of these smaller departments of science, the same principles of classification will give us both a theoretical and practical guide to the natural and most effective mode of teaching them; give first that which is most dependent upon direct perception, and, afterward, that which is more dependent upon an analysis of consciousness; - give first that which is most nearly a simple function of space, and, afterward, that which demands the conception of time or of force.

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In attempting to subdivide the great department of History, we shall find difficulties arising from the complexity of the objects of human thought and action, and from the multiplicity of modes in which men have expressed their thoughts and emotions. But we are