But when we seek for the source of our most important national ideal,—­the ideal that we have called equality of opportunity,—­we must look to another part of the country.  The typical Americanism that is represented by Lincoln owes its origin, I believe, very largely to geographical factors.  It could have been developed only under certain conditions and these conditions the Middle West alone provided.  The settling of the Middle West in the latter part of the eighteenth and the early part of the nineteenth centuries was part and parcel of a rigid logic of events.  As Miss Semple so clearly points out in her work on the geographic conditions of American history, the Atlantic seaboard sloped toward the sea and its people held their faces eastward.  They were never cut off from easy communication with the Old World, and consequently they were never quite freed from the Old World prejudices and standards.  But the movement across the mountains gave rise to a new condition.  The faces of the people were turned westward, and cut off from easy communication with the Old World, they developed a new set of ideals and standards under the stress of new conditions.  Chief among these conditions was the immensity and richness of the territory that they were settling.  The vastness of their outlook and the wealth of their resources confirmed and extended the ideals of self-reliance that they had brought with them from the seaboard.  But on the seaboard, the Old World notion of social classes, the prestige of family and station, still held sway.  The development of the Middle West would have been impossible under so severe a handicap.  With resources so great, every stimulus must be given to individual achievement.  Nothing must be permitted to stand in its way.  The man who could do things, the man who could most effectively turn the forces of nature to serve the needs of society, was the man who was selected for preferment, no matter what his birth, no matter what the station of his family.

We might, in a similar fashion, review the various other ideals, which have grown out of our history, but, as I have said, my purpose is not historical but educational, and the illustrations that I have given may suffice to make my contention clear.  I have attempted to show that the chief purpose of the study of history in the elementary school is to establish and fortify in the pupils’ minds the significant ideals and standards of conduct which those who have gone before us have gleaned from their experience.  I have maintained that, to this end, it is not only the facts of history that are important, but the appreciation of these facts.  I have maintained that these prejudices and ideals have a profound influence upon conduct, and that, consequently, history is to be looked upon as a most practical branch of study.

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