m of education, middle or upper, which will work itself when the
contrivers pass from the scene. Hence the importance, it seems to us, of
having in every university, as part of the philosophical faculty, a
department for the exposition of this very question of education--surely
a very important subject in itself as an academic study, and in its
practical relations transcending perhaps all others. How are the best
traditions of educational theory and practice to be preserved and handed
down if those who are to instruct the youth of the country are to be
sent forth to their work from our universities with minds absolutely
vacant as to the principles and history of their profession--if they
have never been taught to ask themselves the question, "What am I going
to do?" "Why?" and "How?" This subject is one worthy of consideration
both by the universities and the state. It was the want of method that
led to the decline of schools after the Reformation period; it was the
study of method which gave the Jesuits the superiority that on many
parts of the Continent they still retain.[34]

In 1605 there appeared a book which was destined to place educational
method on a scientific foundation, although its mission is not yet, it
is true, accomplished. This was Francis Bacon's _Advancement of
Learning_, which was followed some years later by the _Organum_. For
some time the thoughts of men had been turning to the study of nature.
Bacon represented this movement, and gave it the necessary impulse by
his masterly survey of the domain of human knowledge, his pregnant
suggestions, and his formulation of scientific method. Bacon was not
aware of his relations to the science and art of education; he praises
the Jesuit schools, not knowing that he was subverting their very
foundations. We know inductively: that was the sum of Bacon's teaching.
In the sphere of outer nature, the scholastic saying, "_Nihil est in
intellectu quod non prius fuerit in sensu_," was accepted, but with this
addition, that the impressions on our senses were not themselves to be
trusted. The mode of verifying sense-impressions, and the grounds of
valid and necessary inference, had to be investigated and applied. It is
manifest that if we can tell how it is we know, it follows that the
method of intellectual instruction is scientifically settled.

But Bacon not only represented the urgent longing for a cooerdination of
the sciences and for a new method, he also repre