How to Lengthen Our Ears An Enquiry Whether Learning From Books Does Not Lengthen the Ears Rather Than the Understanding Classic Reprint

Excerpt from How to Lengthen Our Ears: An Enquiry Whether Learning From Books Does Not Lengthen the Ears Rather Than the Understanding

It must not be thought that this book is an attack on my own class. Very much the reverse. The kind of brain that Wins scholarships bears more resemblance to a tiller of the soil of persis tent industry and energy, who has taken up books, than it does to the carelessness of mind found among the gentry. My Opinion is that the upper classes are, as human beings, very superior to trade unionists, but they have paid far too much attention to men of learning, and mark-makers. Hence they have not yet shaken off an inherited tradition that books are better for the mind than handicraft. Why should not gentlemen of small means remedy this, and educate their children, from their earliest years, not in books, but by practical work in mechanical appliances, in mechanical forces, and in the properties of certain very ordinary chemical compounds?

It is generally considered that, the higher the price paid for the work, the more valuable the work is, and there is nothing ungentlemanly in doing valuable work. In which case, it will be our own fault if the less affluent of us cannot become well-paid mechanics and superior foremen, while trade unionists will become schoolmasters and bachelors of science and prattle of the uni versal advantages of books and learning, while receiving a considerably smaller wage than those who do without these advantages.

The trade unionist class are now forced to be in a council school, doing lessons, from 5 years of age to I4, and the age looks like being raised considerably. This is the gentleman's chance, for the education prowler only visits the homes of those in humble circumstances, and they cannot withstand him. If a cottager resents the intru sion, the education spy will report the home as dirty, and the father as mostly in the public-house, and the children will be packed Off to an industrial school. The gentry have an enormous advantage here, for they can afford to boot the spy out, as he is well aware, consequently they could give their children a non-book education and start well ahead of the State-educated trade unionist. Such a course would be a great gain to the com munity, especially in extensive strikes. At pre sent, superior people are book-educated and can do nothing except read, consequently they are at the mercy of those who become labour leaders backed by a party catering for their votes. In escaping the Education Acts, the superiors of small means can remedy this. The trade unionists will do the reading and have many letters after their names and secure the aural development, while the superiors regain their power. In this direction there is room for improvement.

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