Facts are Important

Of course facts are important. It is unlikely anybody will deny it. But is there not some danger that facts will be rated as all-important, or at least more important than they are to the human scheme of things? After all, a fact is important chiefly because of its fitting into that scheme, and one of the functions of education undoubtedly is to determine the proper relationship of facts to the human environment, if education is to be genuinely liberal.

In other words, education is concerned both with facts and their uses, physically and ethically, to such an extent that it must consider both theory and practice, and must not treat either as exclusive of the other. One may not greatly like the term "metaphysical," but whatever we choose to call it the physical is not all, and must be considered in its relation to the non-physical, the moral, the intellectual, or what you will. One must give the proper ratio between what Emerson called "law for man" and "law for thing."

Hence the contention that liberal education cannot be entirely "practical" any more than it can be entirely theoretical or "cultural," if it is to be really free and to the maximum degree useful in the world of men. Colossally important as atomic fission doubtless is, it is even more important to consider how we shall use it when we get to understand it. "Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom; and with all thy getting get understanding" for wisdom without understanding is very likely to be vain, and a knowledge of facts of little avail unless the world knows how to use them to the best advantage. We know more of physical facts than we used to know, but do we also know more about applying that knowledge to life in the world? It is fatally easy to be so enraptured by the progress of material science that we lose sight of its non-material side and forget how far the unknown transcends what we know. Facts are important—that's true enough. But it is not all and the last who should forget this are the colleges, with their duty to purvey both knowledge and understanding. The proper study of mankind is Man, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be.

AS OF OLD, GRADUATING SENIORS SMOKE THEIR PIPES OF PEACE AT THE OLD PINE