elations. As students grow
mature, they will perceive problems of interest which may be pursued for
the sake of discovery, independent of the original direct interest in
gardening--problems connected with the germination and nutrition of
plants, the reproduction of fruits, etc., thus making a transition to
deliberate intellectual investigations.

The illustration is intended to apply, of course, to other school
occupations,--wood-working, cooking, and on through the list. It is
pertinent to note that in the history of the race the sciences grew
gradually out from useful social occupations. Physics developed slowly
out of the use of tools and machines; the important branch of physics
known as mechanics testifies in its name to its original associations.
The lever, wheel, inclined plane, etc., were among the first great
intellectual discoveries of mankind, and they are none the less
intellectual because they occurred in the course of seeking for means of
accomplishing practical ends. The great advance of electrical science in
the last generation was closely associated, as effect and as cause,
with application of electric agencies to means of communication,
transportation, lighting of cities and houses, and more economical
production of goods. These are social ends, moreover, and if they are
too closely associated with notions of private profit, it is not because
of anything in them, but because they have been deflected to private
uses:--a fact which puts upon the school the responsibility of restoring
their connection, in the mind of the coming generation, with public
scientific and social interests. In like ways, chemistry grew out of
processes of dying, bleaching, metal working, etc., and in recent times
has found innumerable new uses in industry.

Mathematics is now a highly abstract science; geometry, however, means
literally earth-measuring: the practical use of number in counting to
keep track of things and in measuring is even more important to-day
than in the times when it was invented for these purposes. Such
considerations (which could be duplicated in the history of any science)
are not arguments for a recapitulation of the history of the race or for
dwelling long in the early rule of thumb stage. But they indicate
the possibilities--greater to-day than ever before--of using active
occupations as opportunities for scientific study. The opportunities
are just as great on the social side, whether we look at the