The young human being, unlike the puppy or the kitten, is
not confined to the use of his own senses as sources of information and
discovery; but can enjoy the fruits of a prodigious width and depth of
observation acquired by preceding generations and adult members of his
own generation. A recent illustration of this extension of the method of
observation in teaching to observations made by other people is the new
method of giving moral instruction to school children through
photographs of actual scenes which illustrate both good morals and bad,
the exhibition of the photographs being accompanied by a running oral
comment from the teacher. In this kind of moral instruction it seems to
be possible to interest all kinds of children, both civilised and
barbarous, both ill-bred and well-bred. The teaching comes through the
eye, for the children themselves observe intently the pictures which the
lantern throws on the screen; but the striking scenes thus put before
them probably lie in most instances quite outside the region of their
own experiences.

The essay on "What Knowledge is of Most Worth?" contains a hot
denunciation of that kind of information which in most schools used to
usurp the name of history. It is enough to say of this part of Spencer's
educational doctrine that all the best historical writers since the
middle of the nineteenth century seem to have adopted the principles
which he declared should govern the writing of history. As a result, the
teaching of history in schools and colleges has undergone a profound
change. It now deals with the nature and action of government, central,
local, and ecclesiastical, with social observances, industrial systems,
and the customs which regulate popular life, out-of-doors and indoors.
It depicts also the intellectual condition of the nation and the
progress it has made in applied science, the fine arts, and legislation,
and includes descriptions of the peoples' food, shelters, and
amusements. To this result many authors and teachers have contributed;
but Spencer's violent denunciation of history as it was taught in his
time has greatly promoted this important reform.

Many twentieth-century teachers are sure to put in practice Spencer's
exhortation to teach children to draw with pen and pencil, and to use
paints and brush. He maintained that the common omission of drawing as
an important element in the training of children was in contempt of some
of the most obvious of n