which we expatiate so fluently. Our books teem with admonitions to train
for citizenship in order that we may attain civilization of better
quality. But, in all this, we imply American citizenship and American
civilization, and here, again, we show forth our provincialism. But even
in this restricted field we arrive at our hazy concept of a good citizen
by the process of elimination. We aver that a good citizen does not do
this and does not do that; yet the teachers in our schools would find it
difficult to describe a good citizen adequately, in positive terms. Our
notions of good citizenship are more or less vague and misty and,
therefore, our concept of civilization is equally so.

Granting, however, that we may finally achieve satisfactory definitions of
citizenship and civilization as applying to our own country, it does not
follow that the same definitions will obtain in other lands. A good
citizen according to the Chinese conception may differ widely from a good
citizen in the United States. Topography, climate, associations,
occupations, traditions, and racial tendencies must all be taken into
account in formulating a definition. Before we can gain a right concept of
good citizenship as a world affair we must make a thoughtful study of
world conditions. In so doing, we may have occasion to modify and correct
some of our own preconceived notions and thus extend the horizon of our
education.

What society is and should be in the world at large; what good citizenship
is and ought to be in the whole world; and what civilization is, should
be, and may be as a world enterprise--these considerations are the
foundation stones upon which we must build the temple of education now in
the process of reconstruction. Otherwise the work will be narrow,
illiberal, spasmodic, and sporadic. It must be possible to arrive at a
common denominator of the concepts of society, citizenship, and