Discovering the American Mind
Received the "On Principles" newsletter from the Askbrook Center today. In it, Director Peter Schramm wrote an excellent essay on discovering the American mind.
The below section, where he quotes Lincoln is quite poetic and encapsulates exactly what a truly worthy education should consist of.
"Literacy not only frees the mind, it teaches the mind to know that it is free. If you can read and write, Lincoln says, you can 'converse with the dead, and the unborn, at all distances of time and space.' Eventually you can have conversations with Aristotle and Locke, Homer and Shakespeare, Jefferson and Lincoln. You can meet these great thinkers directly, rising to their level as you come to understand them and pursue the questions that engaged them.
Notice that Lincoln says rise to equality. Equality is not a lowering. Once the habit of freedom of thought is established, the mass of men can rise. This is their opportunity, Any they must re-learn this - and establish and maintain the habits necessary - in each generation. This, the heart of a liberal arts education, undergirds that last best hope of the world called America. When a student really begins to see this - the conditions of freedom - he knows he has risen to the level of the American mind.
What Mr. Schramm said is exactly what should be said to each and every child in America. Its greatness is its ability to allow all to rise to greatness, not be levelled down into mediocrity. This is the real hope of America lyrically expressed. I hope it is still heard by enough.
The below section, where he quotes Lincoln is quite poetic and encapsulates exactly what a truly worthy education should consist of.
"Literacy not only frees the mind, it teaches the mind to know that it is free. If you can read and write, Lincoln says, you can 'converse with the dead, and the unborn, at all distances of time and space.' Eventually you can have conversations with Aristotle and Locke, Homer and Shakespeare, Jefferson and Lincoln. You can meet these great thinkers directly, rising to their level as you come to understand them and pursue the questions that engaged them.
Notice that Lincoln says rise to equality. Equality is not a lowering. Once the habit of freedom of thought is established, the mass of men can rise. This is their opportunity, Any they must re-learn this - and establish and maintain the habits necessary - in each generation. This, the heart of a liberal arts education, undergirds that last best hope of the world called America. When a student really begins to see this - the conditions of freedom - he knows he has risen to the level of the American mind.
What Mr. Schramm said is exactly what should be said to each and every child in America. Its greatness is its ability to allow all to rise to greatness, not be levelled down into mediocrity. This is the real hope of America lyrically expressed. I hope it is still heard by enough.
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