in the books and lessons
through which the usual school studies are to be mastered. 'Make'--said
the first of the articles setting forth this thought--'the [form of the]
facts and principles of any branch of study as simple as you choose, and
unless the order of their presentation be natural--be that order, from
observation to laws and causes, in which the mind naturally moves,
whenever it moves surely and successfully--the child, except in the rare
case of prodigies that find a pleasure in unraveling complexity, will
still turn from the book with loathing. He will do so because he must.
It is not in his nature to violate his nature for the sake of acquiring
knowledge, however great the incentives or threatenings attending the
process.' 'The child's mind ... with reference to all unacquired
knowledge ... stands in precisely the attitude of the experimenters and
discoverers of riper years. It is to come to results not only previously
unknown, but not even conceived of. Because their nature and faculties
are identical, the law of their intellectual action must be the same.'
'Study is research.' In subsequent articles, it was claimed that the law
here indicated is for intellectual education, the one true and
comprehensive law; and it was expressed more fully in the words: 'All
true study is investigation; all true learning is discovery.'

We say, now, that when the first of these articles appeared, the leading
thought it contained, namely, that our pupils can and should learn by a
process of _re-discovery_, in the subjects they pursue, had not in
distinct nor in substantial statement in any way appeared in the
educational treatises or journals; and further, that it was not, so far
as their uttered or published expressions show, previously occupying the
attention of teachers or of educational writers, nor was it the subject
or substance of remarks, speeches, or debates, in the meetings of
Teachers' Associations. We say further, and because history and justice
require it, that in our country, especially in the educational movements
in the State of New-York, and in the several national associations of
educators, a marked change and revolution in the course of much of the
thought and discussion touching matters of education has, since the year
1858, become apparent, and that to the most casual participant or
observer, and in the precise direction in which the thought above
referred to points. The essential issue itself--the pr