mechanical knowledge in relation to manufacturing processes, but
defeated in that it lost its head over the achievement and forgot the
men. The accusation would stand, that the age failed to perform a like
service in the extension of history and art to the factory employees who
ran the machines; that the machine tenders, heavy and almost dehumanized
by monotonous toil, walked about in the same streets with us, and sat in
the same cars; but that we were absolutely indifferent and made no
genuine effort to supply to them the artist's perception or student's
insight, which alone could fuse them into social consciousness. It would
further stand that the scholars among us continued with yet more
research, that the educators were concerned only with the young and the
promising, and the philanthropists with the criminals and helpless.

There is a pitiful failure to recognize the situation in which the
majority of working people are placed, a tendency to ignore their real
experiences and needs, and, most stupid of all, we leave quite untouched
affections and memories which would afford a tremendous dynamic if they
were utilized.

We constantly hear it said in educational circles, that a child learns
only by "doing," and that education must proceed "through the eyes and
hands to the brain"; and yet for the vast number of people all around us
who do not need to have activities artificially provided, and who use
their hands and eyes all the time, we do not seem able to reverse the
process. We quote the dictum, "What is learned in the schoolroom must be
applied in the workshop," and yet the skill and handicraft constantly
used in the workshop have no relevance or meaning given to them by the
school; and when we do try to help the workingman in an educational way,
we completely ignore his everyday occupation. Yet the task is merely one
of adaptation. It is to take actual conditions and to make them the