The New Order: On a Revolution in Education

by J. E. G. Dixon (April 2015)

The following is an excerpt from F for Failure: A Critical Examination of the Ineradicable Defects of Canadian Education available on Kindle now.

To the modern mind the Middle Ages stand for all that is most backward, reactionary and superstitious. The very word medieval is used as a term of abuse by people who thereby seek to gain a moment of cheap superiority. This commonplace misconception of a distant epoch in man’s upward striving towards civilization is a graver indictment of the modern mind than it is of the civilization of the Middle Ages.

We now jump ahead. It is probably fair to say that the most illustrious legal document in the world—or at least in the Western world—is Magna Carta. This legislation, signed under duress by King John in 1215, was confirmed voluntarily by successive kings of England in 1225, 1297, and 1341.

In the following centuries, among the most sublime buildings in the world we count the ancient cathedrals of Europe. And the 12^th and 13^th centuries are illustrious for the founding of universities at Bologna, Paris, Oxford and Cambridge, which still, after eight hundred years, are esteemed creative centres of higher learning.

I said at the outset that the Middle Ages were the creator of the trivium, or the three ways of learning. They are concerned with the acquisition and perfecting of the skills of reading and writing and critical discussion, skills essential to all subsequent studies. It is important to elaborate on them.

In 1946 a famous English writer of crime stories, Dorothy L. Sayers, who was also, and principally, a highly respected medieval scholar and translator of Dante, gave a lecture at Oxford which she entitled: “The Lost Tools of Learning.” She said of them in part:

Participation is of the essence of education, participation on both the individual and the class levels. What is the best way in which to encourage participation? Why, to introduce topics and themes with which they are familiar or with which they can identify. I am going to suggest there are two ready-made sources of ideas which our pupils can understand at even a very early age. They are proverbs and superstitions.

Children may be introduced to many dozens of proverbs from the earliest years and they will begin to learn not only the pithy use of language but also the rudiments of philosophy which they will be introduced to later.

Superstitions arise from a combination of a fear of the unknown, coincidental events, and an attempt to ward off future dangers.

The pupils will be invited to introduce proverbs and superstitions into class for discussion. They are endlessly instructive. Moreover, since they are universal and common to all peoples, their discussion carries in addition this important lesson, that all people are essentially endowed with the same human nature throughout the world and throughout the centuries.

Reading is an art that is acquired only by learning its skills, as we noted above. It is not enough to be able to say afterwards what a piece of writing was about, that is to say, the story narrated or the characters who play roles in it. The reader must try to enter into the mind of the writer by asking himself questions as he reads: what themes emerge from the events? what motivates the characters? how are the characters, the events and the themes related? is the author trying to manipulate the outcome or is he invisible? is the author trying to put across a particular philosophy or view of life or of mankind? how does he accomplish this?

In particular, we put ourselves in the place of the characters and judge their actions, and ask ourselves how we would have acted in their place. Over the years we learn to strengthen our own character and develop principles that serve us throughout our lives.

Literature is the heart and soul of what we call Humanity. It is more than that even. It is a sad fact that the Humanities have been crowded out of their once central place in any course of studies called Education. It has been elbowed to the periphery of our institutions of learning by callow upstarts called sociology and psychology. They have also been edged out by the natural sciences. Once, a man became educated before he became a scientist. Today people train as scientists before becoming educated, or even without becoming educated. I have met many a biologist who has never read Darwin’s Origin. To read Darwin’s Origin is an education in itself, partly because he was an educated man before he became a scientist. The Origin is not only a great work of science: it is also a great work of literature. It has to be, for the author’s objective was to persuade—to persuade readers who were encountering novel ideas.

We have seen that the trivium comprises three types of learning: Grammar, Dialectic, and Rhetoric, in that order. I venture to disagree: to my mind it is necessary to learn the skills of rhetoric before dialectic. We have dealt, briefly, with Grammar and Rhetoric, that is Language and its written and spoken forms. Dialectic is the art of Persuasion. Persuasion is achieved by discussion and debate.

Children, we must stress, need to be introduced at an early age to the arts of discussion—of forming an opinion, of defending one’s opinion, and of entering into a well-mannered discourse with others who have different opinions—yet opinions which are and recognized to be equally valid. There is a fine French expression which goes: Du choc des opinions jaillit la lumière. (From the clash of opinions springs light.) I will add a commentary in the words of the French writer André Gide:

I consider that the mind would be perverted if it listened to, or were allowed to hear, only one of two voices of [a] dialogue—a dialogue not between a political right or left, but, much more vital and profound, between secular tradition, submission to recognized authorities, and free thought, the spirit of doubt and examination, which works towards the slow and progressive emancipation of the human mind.³

tightly in check, and reason must prevail. There can be few more important lessons for life: hesitate, and look within, before blaming another.

Tradition has it that it was conceived as a game designed to train leaders in the art of war, for to be sure it teaches the fundamentals of strategy and of tactics. Be that as it may, it is easy to see that a skilled chess player will make a good leader in many fields of human endeavour. Above all, it teaches the little understood and less practiced skills of patience, of playing the waiting game, of appearing to do nothing while calmly setting up the coup de grâce. And surely, there must be much to be said for it if it is opposed by all the current and recent past ayatollahs and the Taliban and the present imams of Iraq.

Why should they oppose it? Consider. A holy man can only move in one direction, and he can be knocked off by a simple peon. The most powerful player is a woman. Above all, each player has his appointed role, is powerful one moment and vulnerable the next, and cannot be enslaved, dictated to or brainwashed. All team games, whether the teams comprise two or fifteen players, properly coached and played, have the power both to instill patience and understanding of one’s partner’s mistakes, and to induce admiration of one’s opponents’ skill. Players will always strive to improve their skills, and there are few more effective ways of improving than to play with better players than oneself. Indeed, is that not a lesson of life? and of education?

III

One of the major aims of all these studies is the development of our pupils’ intellectual faculties. It is well that we should spend some time on discussing them, for they are a crucial part of their education, one which teachers seem united in neglecting.

Criticism is therefore justly applied not only to the cultural creations of mankind, but to his social and political activities. Criticism, thus conceived and practiced, is one of the five essential pillars of Civilization.

What is understanding? Understanding is the intellectual grasp of a theme or event or phenomenon sufficiently thoroughly as to enable you to explain its origin, history, and consequences. Example: what is sunrise? It is easy to say, in a few words, what it is. But can you explain clearly and fully, to another person who is eager to learn, what the Earth and the Sun are, their relationship, their motions?

Freedom, most especially intellectual freedom in all its manifestations and expressions, is only for the courageous. Yet, despite all that we read and hear in praise of freedom as the birthright of all who are born or who live in a society that calls itself a democracy, and as indispensable to life as the air we breathe, it is on the contrary as rare a quality as courage. For the two, freedom and courage, are soul-mates, inseparable twins.

We will begin by quoting a delightful little ditty by Rudyard Kipling, Rudyard Kipling called “Six Honest Serving Men” :

I kept six honest serving men,

They taught me all I knew.

Their names are What? And Where? And When?

And Why? And How? And Who?

The important thing in education, as in life, is to know what questions to ask. The basic questions—or proximate questions— are What? Where? When? and Who? They prompt immediate answers. Yet, as we have learnt already, the answers are not necessarily the same from different people. However, once we have settled on satisfactory answers, even if only provisionally, we are faced with the most searching of questions: How? and Why?—the ultimate questions, according to Ernst Mayr.

The urge to ask questions is impelled by curiosity, a desire to know and to learn. It is the pre-eminent impulse of scientists. But it should be born in us. As a matter of fact, it is. Infants exhibit an insatiable desire to explore and to learn. When do we lose it? I suggest it is driven out of us most often by parents, who get tired of constantly answering questions, or embarrassed by questions they cannot answer. And it is driven out by our schooling, by the indoctrination that passes for education, instead of its being, as it should be, one of the principal tasks of education to encourage it.

What of parents? Every parent witnesses a miracle unfolding before their eyes, the miracle of infants learning speech from listening to their parents speak, yet do they ever wonder about it and how the infants do it?⁷

This lack of curiosity, the lack of a desire to learn, and apathy in the face of their ignorance, is the gravest possible indictment against parents, teachers, teachers’ schools, and education administrators.

I’m afraid that the good Santayana failed to understand the nature of Power—and, paradoxically, failed to learn a lesson from History. For Power is its own justification and rationale. Few men and women are drawn to political office in order to serve their people. They are drawn by the consuming passion exercised by the prospect of Power, not of bettering others lives, whatever they may say, but of controlling and directing them.

I cannot refrain at this point from offering a word of advice to readers who may be tempted to judge others. It is the easiest temptation to succumb to, for we are all frail beings who seek to boost our tender egos by scoring points off others. Our sole legitimate targets of judgement—by which I mean, precisely, moral judgement—are People in Power. Who are they? They are Politicians, Preachers, Professors, Plutocrats and Police.

You are uncomprehending? Good. Shocked? Better.

When such a youngster arises—and it is not an uncommon occurrence—it would be inflicting a grievous injustice on other children who felt bent on pursuing a passion or marked aptitude for or interest in, say, aircraft design or carpentry or the sea or birds. Or anything under the sun.

Let me here emphasize that the work of thinking and the work of doing are of equal importance. I know a man, a municipal employee, whose work is collecting refuse. He is a happy married man with children who are doing well at school and who takes his family on vacation regularly once a year. I know another man whose father, a doctor, persuaded his son to follow him in his profession. Being bright he had no difficulty in passing the examinations. Though successful in the crude material sense, he is desperately unhappy. The fact is he has a passion for photography, and in his soul he is withering away. To be an amateur and part-time photographer is not enough. He is forced to spend most of his days and years doing medicine, and treating people he cannot pretend an interest in.

I sought the views of some friends on these two new ideas. One of them wrote: “Among other difficulties with this order of things one stands out: how will you recognize a subject when you see one? Furthermore, how will you know what is not a subject and is therefore to be retained?”

I was tempted to rebut this suggestion as introducing a note of flippancy into a serious discussion, and to remind him of the occasion when Huxley and Bishop Wilberforce debated Darwin’s theory of evolution before a large audience at Oxford on June 30, 1860, just seven months after the publication of the Origin of Species.⁷

A third objection will be raised here—and it is a reasonable objection—that such a study program isolates students from each other, so that they are alone much of the time. A valuable part of school life lies in the very opportunity it offers for friendship and companionship. My answer is that students will be invited—nay, required!—to meet together frequently to discuss their discoveries, and to share ideas. A cross-fertilization such as would ensue would confer considerable intellectual benefits on all.⁸ Then, of course, it is quite likely that two pupils or more would opt for the same course of study. If they were of different ages, that would be all to the good, in that such a relationship would confer benefits on both.

A fourth objection, and an equally important one, is the possibility that this proposed free-for-all in the selection of fields of study will not lead to the education or training of our young people in the trades and professions that contemporary society requires. It is indeed possible that no one will choose to be a brewer or a welder or a mental hospital nurse or a prison warden. My answer is that our present school system does not either, and it has been in effect for untold years.⁹ Moreover, precisely because of the narrow limits of our contemporary schooling, thousands of our youth are directed into work for which they have no aptitude or taste. It is also an inescapable fact of life that the capacity for prolonged study and the level of human intelligence and human skills vary to a great degree within every population.

Given these limiting factors, we must also recognize that every individual is a unique personality. It is their most solemn duty in life and to themselves to develop their unique personalities to the fullest of which they are capable. It is the solemn duty and work of education to devote itself to that task. It is a form of heresy to try to force all children into the same mould, in the name of conformity and subservience to the state, as decreed by Authority. As we will see, Authority is to be challenged and questioned wherever it exists, on firm grounds.

We stressed earlier that we are each of us responsible for our own minds and thoughts. So we are responsible for the course of our lives. At the end of our school years we will find that we have reached such an advanced state of learning in our chosen field or fields that we are in a position to meet prospective employers secure in the knowledge that we go out into the world with something valuable to offer them—instead of adopting the attitude, all too common today, that employers are duty-bound to give work to all currently-minted graduates.

I am standing the curriculum on its head. Today the pupil is forced by that hydra-headed beast called Authority to study a range of useless subjects until finally, after many wasted years, he is permitted to choose an area of concentration. I say, on the contrary: Choose a single field of study according to your talents and aptitudes as early in life as possible and follow it into all the rich pastures it leads you to.

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¹ Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy (Penguin Classics, 1969) p. 13, Introduction by V.E. Watts.

³ The Cornhill Magazine, August 1946.

⁴ The reader is referred to Arnold’s essay, “The Function of Criticism.” To that I would add: “and done.”

⁶ This was the issue dealt with in the first section of our essay, not reprinted here.

⁶ “Most modern day accounts of the debate include a story that Wilberforce supposedly asked Huxley whether he was related to an ape on his grandfather’s or his grandmother’s side. To which Huxley is alleged to have replied that he would prefer an ape for a grandfather to a man who employed his faculties and influence for the purpose of introducing ridicule into a grave scientific debate.” (Ref. Http://creation.com/wilberforce-huxley-debate) In point of fact, it has been shown that this exchange was apocryphal, and originated in a statement made later by Huxley that that is what he would have replied if the question had been put to him.

⁷ This isolation from others is the major disadvantage of, and the compelling argument against, distant and online learning—except for students who are necessarily house-bound.

⁸ Today, after years of mismanagement, government is forced to accord accelerated immigration to skilled workers.

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The Literary Culture of France (New English Review Press, 2013)

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