I love quotes (they will feature heavily next month in the strip). I just ran across this C.S. Lewis quote in collection of quotes, and found it rather prescient in this age of readiness for college and careers. Of course his gender pronouns are all masculine (he was a product of his time), but he meant, I believe, all of human kind.: The purpose of education has been described by Milton as that of fitting a man to perform justly, skillfully, and magnanimously all of the offices both private and public , of peace and war. Provided we do not over-stress skillfully Aristotle would substantially agree, but would also add the conception that it should also be a preparation for leisure, which according to him is the end of all human activity. We wage war in order to have peace; we work in order to have leisure. Neither of them would dispute that the purpose of education is to produce the good man and the good citizen, though it must be remembered that we are not here using the word good in any narrowly moral sense. The good man here means the man of good taste and good feeling, the interesting and interested man , and almost the happy man... Vocational training on the other hand, prepares the pupil not for leisure, but for work; it aims at making not a good man, but a good banker, a good electrician, a good scavenger, or a good surgeon. You see at once that education is essentially for freemen and vocational training for slaves. ...If education is beaten by training, civilisation dies. That is a thing very likely to happen. I think you can see why I found this... relevant.
Posted on: Tue, 30 Dec 2014 13:31:59 +0000
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