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EDUCATION, HOW OLD THE NEW

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Nothing under the sun is new, neither is any man · able to say: Behold this is new: For it hath already gone before in the ages that were before us."-Ecclesiastes i: 10.

"Nullum est jam dictum, quod non dictum sit prius.”TERENCE, Eun. Prol., 41.

[Nothing is now said which was not said before.]

St. Jerome relates that his preceptor Donatus, commenting on this passage of Terence, used to say:

"Pereant qui ante nos nostra dixerunt.”

[May they perish who said our good things before us.]

OF THE

UNIVERSITY

OF

CALIOMA

EDUCATION, HOW OLD THE NEW *

POPULAR lectures are usually on some very upto-date subject. Indeed, as a rule they are on subjects that are developing at the moment, and the main aim of the lecturer is to forecast the future. It is before a thing has happened that we want to know about it now, and though, as not infrequently occurs, the lecturer's forecast does not in the event prove him a prophet nor the son of a prophet, for nature usually accomplishes her purposes more simply than the closet philosopher anticipates, at least we have the satisfaction for the moment of thinking that not only are we up to date but a little ahead of it. Unfortunately I have to claim your indulgence this evening in this matter, for taking just the opposite course. I am to talk about the oldest book in the world, its oldfashioned yet novel contents, its up-to-date applications, and its significance for the history of the race and, above all, the history of education. The

* Material for this lecture was gathered for one of a course of lectures on Phases of Education delivered at St. Mary's College, South Bend, Ind., at the Sacred Heart Academy, Kenwood, Albany, N. Y., and at St. Mary's College, Monroe, Mich., 1909. In somewhat developed form it was delivered to the public school teachers of New Orleans at the beginning of 1910. In very nearly its present form it was the opening lecture at the course of the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences, on "How Old the New Is," delivered in the spring of 1910.

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