The kind of content proper to early childhood is determined by the nature of the child himself. It is the child that is to be educated. The teacher must take him as he is, with full trust that the strengthening of those powers at present active will result in his highest good. All attempts to improve on nature has been abortive. Every normal child is active in those ways which the race experience has embedded in him. His activities are echoes of those by which the race has been successful. The conception of the child standing over against the real subject matter of education and in direct antagonism[12] to it, between which and him there is no intrinsic relation and into which he must be introduced by external means, is not in harmony with an optimistic philosophy or with a correct understanding of pedagogical principles.

There must be, in the nature of things, a relation between the activities already functioning in the child and the material the assimilation of which will constitute him not only a thoroughly equipped individual but also a socially efficient factor. It is a mistaken view to suppose that the exercise and the development of the activities dominant in early childhood will lead away from the best interests of the individual or endanger his efficiency as a member of society. It is anomalous to assume that the impulses and interests of childhood must be suppressed or eradicated in order to fit him for participation in social life. These impulses have been implanted in his nature by actual participation in a social life on the part of his ancestry, and they are the possibilities of a worthy social development.

While this is true, while the determining factor in the selection and arrangement of the subject-matter of education is the child himself, yet the undoubted parallelism between his growth and that of the race widens the scope and furnishes the broader basis for such selection and arrangement. It matters little to what extent such a parallelism is accepted. The principle once established makes it a matter of indifference[13] whether we proceed from the individual or from the broader standpoint of the psychological history of the race. This psychological history is made out by a study of the literature products left behind in the ascent from the lower levels of development to the higher, as represented in modern civilization.
PHASE OF MIND ACTIVITY IN EARLY CIVILIZATION.

A survey of the literary remains of the past gives conclusive proof that the characteristic phase of mind activity in the dawning periods of civilization is the imaginative or mythical. The earliest literary product of every people is the epic, whose chief elements are legends, myths and the heroic, and whose authorship is not individual but of the race itself. Such a product, not the creation of any one mind, but slowly fashioned through the centuries by the poetic genius of the race, however trivial it may seem, has strong claims on our deepest veneration. It should receive most careful study and consideration.

These epic remains come from the innermost life of a people. They are the expression of this life. They are eloquent witnesses of a strong imagination dealing with the mysteries of earth, of sky, and of life itself. They tell of the morning of history, when man was close to nature—a part of nature. The earth, trees, waters, animals—all forms, animate and inanimate,[14] had voices for him. He communed with them. He treated them as of equal rank with himself.
A THIRD ELEMENT OF THE RACE PRODUCTS.

But, in addition to their imaginative character and their closeness to nature, these race products have still a third element of the utmost value for use as material for primary instruction. While they “enforce no moral” they tell “a story, and the moral in solution with the story.” Each tale is a narration without comment. The ethical teaching involved is in the most concrete form. It is not set out and emphasized, but lies wrapped up in the movement of the narrative itself and awaits the exercise of the child’s ethical judgment.

Viewed from our ethical standpoint, folklore does not always come up to the highest standard. There are objectionable features in many tales. In this respect they reflect the uncritical and even crude morals of the time. While this is true of some of the tales, in many the ethical teaching is pure, lofty and wholesome, and furnishes an element greatly needed in our primary schools. We have here held up for esteem and veneration these virtues of head and heart and action that lie at the base of a happy, considerate and industrious home life. Baseness, cruelty, ingratitude, and laziness are brought home to the individual in their consequences. The corresponding[15] virtues are shown in their true relation to happiness and well being. This may not be the highest form of ethical activity, but it is the only kind of ethical teaching on a level with child thought. The morality of the stories is set forth in the concrete as a principle of action found valuable in the race’s history.

That such a content is a great desideratum for purposes of ethical instruction in our schools all will admit. The condition of religious thought is such as to preclude the use of sacred literature. Perhaps it would not afford so many advantages for purposes of ethical teaching in the first year of school life as literature closer to the childhood of the race in its origin. Some subject-matter that affords opportunity for the exercise of the ethical judgment is an imperative demand for our time. What is there more suitable than this embalmed judgment of the race as to what is valuable in conduct and character? Here are stored up in a form that appeals to the child material for generalizations as to the conditions of well-being and of happiness, as well as of a moral and a useful life. All that the race has thought, felt, and experienced is here at the service of the child. One is almost tempted to use the expression of Hegel and say that, in assimilating the ethical teaching of these racial literatures, the child is being suckled at the breast of the Universal Ethos.

[16]
THE LEGENDARY AND THE MYTHOLOGICAL THE CHILD’S NATURAL FOOD.