t and
completest faith in the process of individual and social improvement and
in accepting the assumption, I am merely adhering to the deepest and
most influential of American traditions. The better American has
continually been seeking to "uplift" himself, his neighbors, and his
compatriots. But he has usually favored means of improvement very
different from those suggested hereinbefore. The real vehicle of
improvement is education. It is by education that the American is
trained for such democracy as he possesses; and it is by better
education that he proposes to better his democracy. Men are uplifted by
education much more surely than they are by any tinkering with laws and
institutions, because the work of education leavens the actual social
substance. It helps to give the individual himself those qualities
without which no institutions, however excellent, are of any use, and
with which even bad institutions and laws can be made vehicles of grace.

The American faith in education has been characterized as a
superstition; and superstitious in some respects it unquestionably is.
But its superstitious tendency is not exhibited so much in respect to
the ordinary process of primary, secondary, and higher education. Not
even an American can over-emphasize the importance of proper teaching
during youth; and the only wonder is that the money so freely lavished
on it does not produce better results. Americans are superstitious in
respect to education, rather because of the social "uplift" which they
expect to achieve by so-called educational means. The credulity of the
socialist in expecting to alter human nature by merely institutional and
legal changes is at least equaled by the credulity of the good American
in proposing to evangelize the individual by the reading of books and by
the expenditure of money and words. Back of it all is the underlying
assumption that the American nation by taking thought can add a cubit to
its stature,--an absolute confidence in the power of the idea to create
its own object and in the efficacy of good intentions.

Do we lack culture? We will "make it hum" by founding a new university
in Chicago. Is American art neglected and impoverished? We will enrich
it by organizing art departments in our colleges, and popularize it by
lectures with lantern slides and associations for the study of its
history. Is New York City ugly? Perhaps, but if we could only get the
authorities to appropriate a few