Let us now turn to the second question, i.e., what precisely is the function of formal education.  For my own part I can answer this in a sentence.  It is primarily the fostering and development of the character-potential inherent in each individual.  In this process intellectual training and expansion and the furthering of natural aptitude have a part, but this is secondary to the major object which is the development of character.

This is not in accordance with the practice or the theory of recent times, and in this fact lies one of the prime causes of failure.  The one thing man exists to accomplish is character; not worldly success and eminence in any line, not the conquest of nature (though some have held otherwise), not even “adaptation to environment” in the argot of last century science, but character; the assimilation and fixing in personality of high and noble qualities of thought and deed, the furtherance, in a word, of the eternal sacramental process of redemption of matter through the operation of spiritual forces.  Without this, social and political systems, imperial dominion, wealth and power, a favourable balance of trade avail nothing; with it, forms and methods and the enginery of living will look out for themselves.  And yet this thing which comprises “the whole duty of man” has, of late, fallen into a singular disregard, while the constructive forces that count have either been discredited and largely abandoned, as in the case of religion, or, like education, turned into other channels or reversed altogether, as has happened with the idea and practice of obedience, discipline, self-denial, duty, honour and unselfishness; surely the most fantastic issue of the era of enlightenment, of liberty and of freedom of conscience.

As a matter of fact character, as the chief end of man and the sole guaranty of a decent society, has been neglected; it was not disregarded by any conscious process, but the headlong events that have followed since the fifteenth century have steadily distorted our judgment and confused our standards of value even to reversal.  By an imperceptible process other matters have come to engage our interest and control our action, until at last we are confronted by the nemesis of our own unwisdom, and we entertain the threat of a dissolving civilization just because the forces we have engendered or set loose have not been curbed or directed by that vigorous and potent personal character informing a people and a society, that we had forgot in our haste and that alone could give us safety.

Formal education is but one of the factors that may be employed towards the development of character; you cannot so easily separate one force in life from another, assigning a specific duty here, a definite task there.  That is one of the weaknesses of our time, the water-tight compartment plan of high specialization, the cellular theory of efficiency.  Life must be seen as a whole, organized as a whole,