1. Interrelation of impression and expression: The many sources of impressions--All impressions lead toward expression--Limitations of expression. 2. The place of expression in development: Intellectual value of expression--Moral value of expression--Religious value of expression--Social value of expression. 3. Educational use of expression: Easier to provide for the impression side of education--The school to take up the handicrafts--Expression and character--Two lines of development. 4. Problems in introspection and observation . . . . . 294
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307
We are to study the mind and its education; but how? It is easy to understand how we may investigate the great world of material things about us; for we can see it, touch it, weigh it, or measure it. But how are we to discover the nature of the mind, or come to know the processes by which consciousness works? For mind is intangible; we cannot see it, feel it, taste it, or handle it. Mind belongs not to the realm of matter which is known to the senses, but to the realm of _spirit_, which the senses can never grasp. And yet the mind can be known and studied as truly and as scientifically as can the world of matter. Let us first of all see how this can be done.
THE PERSONAL CHARACTER OF CONSCIOUSNESS.--Mind can be observed and known. But each one can know directly only his own mind, and not another's. You and I may look into each other's face and there guess the meaning that lies back of the smile or frown or flash of the eye, and so read something of the mind's activity. But neither directly meets the other's mind. I may learn to recognize your features, know your voice, respond to the clasp of your hand; but the mind, the consciousness, which does your thinking and feels your joys and sorrows, I can never know completely. Indeed I can never know your mind at all except through your bodily acts and expressions. Nor is there any way in which you can reveal your mind, your spiritual self, to me except through these means.
It follows therefore that only _you_ can ever know _you_ and only _I_ can ever know _I_ in any first-hand and immediate way. Between your consciousness and mine there exists a wide gap that cannot be bridged. Each of us lives apart. We are like ships that pass and hail each other in passing but do not touch. We may work together, live together, come to love or hate each other, and yet our inmost selves forever stand alone. They must live their own lives, think their own thoughts, and arrive at their own destiny.