STRONG FACTS AND FIGURES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 12602, 4 March 1903, Page 8

STRONG FACTS AND FIGURES

Tho pages of the CENTURY DICTIONARY k CYOLOMDLV k ATLAS not only invito systematic study of the. history of words, but (hoy also havo a very real educational value. The child's first object lesson in political economy is the use of tho toy .savings bank; its first I'Ettty m self-restraint is the putting juvity of pennies until tlioy havo accumulated into shillings. The dogma of tho nnrsory is full of maxims about tho value of tho prumy saved; but when the question of odueatiou is approached, wo are all taught to tako care of tho foveroigne of a rounded curriculum and to let the pence of general information take caro of thcmselvcfi. And yet-—in tho ease, at anyrate, of secondary education, tho supplementary structure which the adult may build for himself—the pennies aro the only coins we arc apt io find in our pockets. Well-iucan-if somewhat tedious writers are forever telling us about tho stoker who spendy enthusiastic evmingfi in solemn course* of ; but he is an infrequent creature, for all that. A man who is busied in earning or spending money* is not tempted by the. prospect of a formal routine of reading, and if he will oven tuke the trouble to inform himself upon such subjects as casually present themselves to hiV> inind, he will do more than moat of his neighbours. Bits and scraps of knowledge arc, 110 doubt, movo bran-pie to the in jikl when one finds them neaped up in tho three-lino liowspaper items which are said to demoralise modern readers. llhj thoughtful men who cry out against this sort of reading havo right on their side when thoy .say that stray facts and figures, presented without any montal associations, are not remembered; and that thoy load to a dosultory habit of mind. But just such isolated picces of information, if one looks for them with nn intelligent .purpose, and in connection with eomo coherent train of thought, fix themselves in tho memory and increase, littlo by little, tho intellectual armament of tho reader. The Times will send von a handsome prospectus of THE CENTURY on application It will convinco you of the great merits of tho work if you are in doubt.