Washington, Mt. Marcy, Mt. Shasta,
and Mt. Rainier, will bring forth points of contrast and similarity
that will surprise and instruct a child. In every branch of study
there are certain underlying principles and forms of thought whose
thorough mastery in the lower grades is necessary to successful
progress. They are the important and central ideas of the subject. It
was a marked quality of Pestalozzi to sift out these simple
fundamentals and to master them. It is for us to make these simple
elements intelligible and interesting by the use of concrete _types_
and illustrations drawn from nature and from human life. If we speak
of history and nature as the two chief subjects of study, the simple,
fundamental relations of persons to each other in society, and the
simple, typical objects, forces, and laws of nature constitute the
basis of all knowledge. These elements we desire to master. But to
make them attractive to children, they should not be presented in bald
and sterile outlines, but in typical forms. All actions and human
relations must appear in attractive _personification_.
Persons speak and act and virtues shine forth in them. We do not study
nature's laws at first, but the beautiful, _typical life forms_ in
nature, the lily, the oak, Cinderella, and William Tell.
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