The Dominion. SATURDAY, MAY 9, 1908. THE BEST IN LIFE.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 193, 9 May 1908, Page 4

The Dominion. SATURDAY, MAY 9, 1908. THE BEST IN LIFE.

There are moments in the lives of all when some familiar and commonplace scene on which we have looked perhaps a thousand times without emotion becomes transfigured and radiant with unsuspected beauty. A stretch of road along which we have walked every day, a valley among the hills in which' we have spent a lifetime, a glimpse of shipping and grime-covered workers, a stretch of wind-swept sea and sky, is for the nonce transformed; the scales fall from our eyes-; and for a fleeting instant, that is gone almost before .we can grasp it, the inner meaning and the soul of things stand revealed. Such moments as these are worth living for. Life and its possibilities are presented in a new light; we see beyond the pettinesses of every day, and feel what we might be were we but true to the best that is in us. "There is a difference," says Emerson, " between one hour and another hour of life in their authority and subsequent effect. Our faith cpmes in moments.

• • • Yet there is a depth in those uriei moments which constrains ; us to ascn be more reality to them than to all other experiences." We see that existence is something grander and nobler than the quarrels of theologians, the humbugs of professional etiquette, and the multitude of hypocrisies that are smuggled away beneath the old catchword that "'business is business." The fresh air of Heaven blows across our faces, find for one glorious instant we have climbed — 'lo those groat altitudes, wliorc.it tho weak Jjivo not, but only tho strong iiave loavo to strive, and suffor, and achieve." It is in these intense states of mind that men have changed all history, changed' for tho better or worse the creed of myriads, and desolated or redeemed provinces or ages. But how pitiable is the spectacle that most of us present! The insight and the vision go, and, though never quite forgotten, we allow ourselves to sink back into the old routine, pretend to satisfy our souls with the old shams and pettinesses, and talk wisely to clearsighted yovrth of how wo thought so, too, wlyrfi wo were young. And for what ® Merely to follow at the heels of a vast mob, almost every member Of which is feeling that lie would like to be doing things a little better if he was quite sure his neighbours would not laugh at him. The picture is not an heroic one. The man who has ideals that lie puts away.on a shelf, and makes no effort to live up to, is a contemptible object, and the more idoala he has the more contemptiblo does he become. What a difference to the face of things would not even so littlo a stiffening of the moral fibre make, a little better rjoulding at that plastic'age when the habits are_ being formed that are to be a blessing or a curse all through life. Man is a bundle of habits, daily spinning his own fate, good or evil, and never to be undone. livery action,' every smallest stroko of .viitue. or of vice, forget it though he may, leaves its little scar, and will bo .used for.br against him when next temptation comes.; The means that wo possess' in the. State schools for moulding the character of each succeeding generation are immense. The public has not yet realised this; when it does, it will not be satisfied until it has the very best men and the very best women it can find to teach its children. > It will not want teachers who bore their pupils with preaching and talk of goodness in the, abstract, but it'will want the teacher who lies in wait for the practical opportunities of demonstrating - what good conduct is without any flourish •of trumpets—the . men .arid women whose whole life, shall be an inspiration to their scholars. When young people .are brought; to. see'' the great work that they may do for.their country, here in the schools at their doors, we may bo sure that there' will be no lack of volunteers of the, very best type. Professor James, one of the most ' vigorous intellects iri. r America, speaking to a gathering of undergraduates in; Massachusetts somo'-'weeks ago,, said ;that what, the,. colleges 'arid schools should try at-least to give us was, "a general sense' of 1 /what'.'. ! .'. superiority' •has\\always i : signified . and' may still signify. Tlie feeling for a good human job anywhere, the admi-' ration of the really, admirable, the dis-. esteem of what .is cheap and trashy and impermanent—this is V'hat .-.we call the critical sense, the sense for [ideal values. It is the better part of what, men know as wisdom." The aim of education should be to enable us to "know a good man when we; see him." ■ It was, in this sort .of wisdom more than any other . that ix democracy needed its sons and daughters to be' 'skilful. Democracy, said 'Professor James, was_ on its trial, and no one knew - how it would stand the ordeal. Pessimistic prophets abounded, and its critics affirmed that its tastes .were iriveterately- for the inferior. "The bestof us;" continued the speaker, " are filled with the contrary vision of a democracy stumbling through eyerv error: till its institutions glow with justice and its customs shine with beauty. Our better men . shall show the way and we shall follow them." So they were brought, round again to the mission of > education in helping them to know'the better kind of man whenever they saw him. Democracy must , choose its leaders, well, for the notion that, a people could,run itself and its affairs anonymously was , now well known to be-the silliest of absurdities. Mankind did. nothing save by the initiative of inventors, great or small, and imitation by the rest of us —these were the sole factors in human progress. Summed .up, this all means that the great work in education is the building-up of character, and that a people that loses its ideals is doomed. A nation may' attain, to wealth, power, and'prosperity, but, unless she cleaves unto "the things that are moire excellent," the great truths to which all creeds and all religions have been striving to -give utterance since time itself began, she shall, in the end, count for nothing, and be no more than a mere cumberer of the. earth.