ABSTRACT
OUR whole discussion of education has been dominated by the thought that its end and aim is an ethical one. I hardly know whether this would be universally admitted; but some presentday tendencies to follow instinct or the will of nature, or to leave the child free to follow his own course, seem, to say the least, to interpret the ethical end in rather subversive or random fashion. So, whether we are thinking of the child's native endowments, of which by far the most central and important is the capacity for inward receptivity, self-judgment and aspiration, or whether we are thinking of the future contents of his mind in which those capacities operate and come to fruition, it is immensely urgent to press for a real recognition of this spiritual purpose. Many, particularly of the older educational institutions, have happily set the making of character before themselves as their greatest hope. I t must be said that there has not always been anything conspicuously Christian about the character sought after, but it has been at any rate a moral end consciously pursued. Where all these have, I think, erred is in part that they have not seen character as intimately associated with and
springing from the contents of the mind. The mind is the self in contact with reality, and the nature of this contact is character.
