best means of advancing the cause of the Church. Hence it is, that the Benedictine monasteries of the United States apply most of their surplus revenues towards the advancement of their educational institutions and are not discouraged even if they conduct their colleges at a financial loss. Since the existence of Benedictine colleges does not depend on their financial success, Benedictine educators do not care merely to have a large number of wellpaying students; they are on their guard to admit no student whose bad habits may exert an evil influence on his fellows. Benedictine educators do not cater to the whims of those entrusted to their care. They have the true welfare of the student at heart, but do not think that he is a competent judge of what is conducive to a thorough mental and moral training. It is also for this reason that the elective method of education, which has of late years done so much harm in our American institutions of learning, has found no entrance into the Benedictine colleges.

Following the long tradition of their Order, the Benedictines in the United States have made it a practice to erect their monasteries and educational institutions away from the distractions and temptations of large cities. In consequence, most of their institutions of learning are boarding schools. Every method of education has its defects, but it can scarcely be denied that a boarding school, if it is conscientiously managed and if undesirable students are excluded, is best adapted to build up and develop a sterling character in young men. The orderly manner of living, the wise distribution of time, the edifying example and the imposing personality of the Benedictine teacher in his religious gown, his disinterested devotion to duty, his many self-sacrifices for the moral and intellectual advancement of his pupils, in fact, everything the students come in contact with in a boarding school that is directed by a Benedictine community,

makes a lasting impression on their receptive minds and plastic hearts. They become accustomed to obedience, regularity, the exact performance of duty and are imbued with such principles as will make them good Christians and useful members of human society. Unlike the members of most other religious communities, the Benedictine monk takes the vow of stability, which binds him to his own monastery for life. He is, therefore, not transferred from one monastery to another at the will of his superior, but always remains a member of the monastery for which he made profession. As a result, the life in a Benedictine community has all the advantages of a happy family life—and this is perhaps the most beautiful feature of the Benedictine Order. This family life extends in some degree also to the students at Benedictine colleges. The officials and the teachers endeavor to make the college a second home to their students and treat them as a good father would treat his son. The discipline is mild and the necessary order is maintained rather by paternal admonitions, by appealing to religious motives and to the student's sense of honor, than by severer methods.

The courses of study pursued in Benedictine colleges are practically the same as in other American Catholic colleges. The Benedictines lay great stress on the classical course which, however, in accordance with the exigencies of the times, includes a thorough training in the natural sciences. Some of their colleges also have special departments of music, commerce and military training. In thoroughness the Benedictine colleges in the United States stand second to none. Following in the footsteps of their European ancestors they put great stress on what years of experience have designated as the essentials of a thorough education and are not affected by the short-lived educational fads which have in recent years greatly impeded the efficiency of American educational

institutions. The experience of fourteen hundred years of educational activity has made the Benedictine Order one of the most effective teaching bodies in the world. The names of Monte Cassino, Cluny, Bec, Canterbury, Fulda, Reichenau, Corvey, etc., are emblazoned in golden letters on the history of European civilization. The Protestant Reformation and, later, the French Revolution and the high-handed secularization of Benedictine monasteries and schools have temporarily lessened the number of Benedictines and, hence, diminished the extent of their educational activity, but have been unable to wrest from them their proverbial industry and thoroughness. The great achievements of their forefathers have spurred them on to follow in their footsteps. The late Archabbot Wimmer, who was the first to transplant the Benedictine Order upon the soil of our country, often expressed the desire that the Benedictines should do for the Church of America in our times what they did for the Church of Europe during the Middle Ages. May God grant that this free country of ours will never impede the growth of religious orders which have ever been the great mainstay of the Church and civilization; then the time will come when the ardent desire of Archabbot Wimmer will be realized. Meanwhile the Benedictine educators will continue their labors in the quiet of their monasteries regardless of earthly praise or material reward, always true to their motto: Ut in omnibus glorificetur Deus.

St. John's College,

Collegeville, Minn.

MICHAEL OTT, O. S. B.

HOW TO STUDY THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION

There are three questions pertinent to his work which every teacher ought to be able to answer. The first is What do you teach? the second, How do you teach? and the third, Why do you teach? The answers will describe more or less fully the content, the method and the ideal of the educational work in which he is engaged.

The first question is easily answered. A teacher is able, without hesitation, to tell us that he is teaching history, or grammar, or physics, or physical culture, or mathematics. These are called, very often, the branches taught. The programme of a school, which is a combination of several branches, is called the curriculum. The word curriculum is also applied to the total of branches studied in a historical period, or a geographical subdivision of the field of history. Thus, we speak of the curriculum of the medieval schools or the curriculum of the Roman schools. The student of history of education will, therefore, understand that by the content, curriculum, or branches taught, are meant those subjects of study and teaching which have engaged the attention of pupils and teacher in some particular school, or in all the schools of some period or in some locality.

The question, How do you teach? is answered by a description of the method used in teaching. Methods, in teaching, as in other activities, may be scientific or unscientific. Unscientific methods are haphazard, more or less instinctive, and individual, or personal. They may be eminently successful, yet they cannot be reduced to formulas or general principles. If the teacher who uses them is called on to justify his practice, he falls back on what he styles common sense. Like Lord Mansfield, who, advising a young man of no legal training but of practical good sense on the matter of a judgeship

to which the young man had been appointed, said, "Give your decision boldly, for it will probably be right, but never venture to assign reasons, for they will almost infallibly be wrong," so the teacher whose methods are unscientific recognizes that his success in teaching is not capable of being explained by an appeal to general principles. On the contrary, scientific methods are based on the study of the growing mind, and on the conclusions of biology, physiology, and psychology. The teacher who uses scientific methods has the advantage of knowing the reason why he adopts a certain practice, or discontinues the use of a certain device. He works intelligently in the best sense of that word. He is less exposed than the unscientific teacher to fall into mistakes, and he is able to impart to others the secret of his success. Scientific methods are not all of recent invention. The past, even the remote past, had some educators who studied in the light of such knowledge as was then available the needs. of the developing mind of the child. It is the task, therefore, of the student of history to study the efforts, successful or unsuccessful, of educators in former times to find a theoretical justification for the methods used in teaching. Neither are all unscientific methods necessarily harmful or useless. The human mind often discovered by intuition or acquired by experience an educational method which it could not justify by appeal to science, but which was successful because, as we now see, it really did conform to scientific principles. Thus, the savages knew the value of imitation; the Greeks realized the importance of expression; the Chinese had a clear conception of the practical function of recapitulation, and the Christian Church in its liturgy and practice of piety used many of the methods of modern education which it did not attempt to account for by principles of psychology. It is, consequently, also a part of our task in the history of education to study those methods, to describe how they