Education
In Macvey Napier (ed.) Supplement to the Encyclopædia Britannica, London, 1825
Abstract
Education is the systematic employment of means to render the human mind an operative cause of happiness for both the individual and society. This objective requires a foundation in the science of the mind, specifically the laws of association that govern the sequences of thoughts and feelings. By utilizing custom and the prospects of pleasure or pain, education directs these mental sequences to foster the essential qualities of intelligence, temperance, and benevolence. These traits are influenced by four distinct categories of environmental factors: physical, domestic, technical, and social. Physical conditions, including health, nutrition, and labor, establish the material capacity for mental development, while domestic and technical education shape the primary associations and intellectual habits of youth. Ultimately, the social and political environment serves as the decisive influence on character; the structure of political institutions determines the means by which individuals attain power and esteem, thereby incentivizing either virtuous utility or detrimental subservience. The efficacy of all educational efforts depends upon the alignment of these external structures with the goal of general well-being. – AI-generated abstract.
Quotes from this work
The end of Education is to render the individual, as much as possible, an instrument of happiness, first to himself, and next to other beings.
The fact is, that good practice can, in no case, have any solid foundation but in sound theory. This proposition is not more important, than it is certain. For, What is theory? The /whole /of the knowledge, which we possess upon any subject, put into that order and form in which it is most easy to draw from it good practical rules. Let any one examine this definition, article by article, and show us that it fails in a single particular. To recommend the separation of practice from theory is, therefore, simply, to recommend bad practice.