Education and the Philosophical Ideal by Horatio W. Dresser - Read the Complete Text for free at NewThoughtLibrary.com

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Horatio W. Dresser's

Education and the Philosophical Ideal

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Preface - Introduction - The New Point of View - Educational Ideals - Equanimity - The Subconscious Mind - The Spiritual Ideal in Childhood - An Experiment in Education - The Expression of the Spirit - An Ideal Summer Conference - The Ministry of the Spirit - The Mystery of Pain and Evil - The Philosophical Ideal - The Criteria of Truth - Organic Perfection - Immortality - Index - p. 247

It is the special privilege of the childhood of the world to rejoice, to build air castles, to have great hopes, to have firm convictions. But it is the task of intellectual manhood to analyse these very hopes, and even to doubt them. We are inclined to hold fast to our childish dreams. The religious world has scarcely passed through this stage. Yet the philosopher tells us that we do not know until we have tested our visions.

Yet there is a sense in which we should cling to our deepest hopes: until we prove them to be false. But we must make sure of three points: (1) that we love truth more than any statement of it; (2) that we are open to growth through experience, reason, and intuition; (3) that we are not holding something to be true for which we have no evidence.

Above all, then, be concrete; cling fast to practical evidence. Remember that art comes first, in the natural order of things, then science. Therefore, seek first life, experience; then the meaning of your experience. Live deeply, then think philosophically.

The philosophical temper or attitude of mind has seldom been better suggested, at least so far as its superiority to circumstance is concerned, than in these words from Amiel's Journal¹:

All our senses, all our powers of mind and soul, all our external resources, are so any ways of approaching the divinity, no many ways of tasting and

(1) Translated by Mrs. Hamphry Ward. Macmillan, 1853.

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