The Meaning of Education: VII, Education and War

The Meaning of Education

By E. G. Peterson, A. M., Ph. D., President Utah Agricultural College

VIII — Education and War

Education has assumed a new meaning since the beginning of

the world war. War in by-gone days was a certain governmental

activity in which a group of men, called the army or navy, fought

another similar group of the enemy. The remainder of the

people were in the nature of onlookers whose support was

largely emotional or inspirational and financial. War now is

an occupation of practically all the people. The complexity of

the present conflict, involving as it does manufacturing of muni-

tions and other supplies on a scale undreamed of previously, and

involving the issue of supremacy in the air, on land, on the sea

and under the sea, and involving also in a very critical way the

question of agricultural production and transportation, the com-

plexity of this conflict has drawn upon the whole citizenship of

the nations at war and especially upon the learning of the na-

tions.

There must be, if we are to win the war, a plentiful supply

of skilled agriculturists, engineers, chemists, physicists, doctors,

mechanics, builders, transportation experts, experts on sanitation

and economists who can guide the financial issues. I would say

with great emphasis that high morality, devotion and sacrifice,

will be necessary to win, even granting excellence of all our

other equipment of men and money and talent. Indeed this war

may be decided by the mothers — by the degree of true mother-

hood and the degree of sanctity and reverence which surrounds

the vital and beautiful attributes of family life. But this is a

subject by itself which will be treated separately. Now we are

particularly concerned with the question of the educational

necessities of the conflict.

We must recognize the fact that Germany, our enemy, is a

nation highly developed in the sciences and the arts. Her edu-

cational system surpassed that of anv other nation in the world

in the estimation of many. Her scholars were scholars of the

first water. It has often been strikingly said that the German

in his research and his educational endeavor went down deeper

and came up muddier than the scholar of any other nation. Be

that as it may, German education was thorough. Science was

202 IMPROVEMENT ERA

honored, scholarship was honored, and learning was honored,

with the result that German manufacturing, German agriculture,

German finance and civic control were eminent. The nation

was excellent by power of mind. There are those who believe

that with this power of mind there was a lack of vision, of

spirituality, which brutalized in a way the whole thought of the

nation. Be that also as it may, German thought was powerful

and the defensive strength of the central powers is in large

measure attributable to the downright learning of the Germans.

This is the world issue — not only the question of military

superiority, but, in the competition which will follow the war,

of educational and mental superiority. We must be worthy if

we are to achieve in the gruelling processes which from now on

will draw all of us to the test. Science has brought us all to-

gether— land transportation, aerial navigation, wireless, the gaso-

line engine — these have united the world so that no longer may

we as in the past be shielded from the competition of a more

worthy workman, no longer can we be denied the full reward

for our virtues. We can speak and sell to the whole world,

therefore our thought and our commercial product must be

superior.

Great Utah which has the germ of peaceful world dominion

in its being, has now an opportunity to excel. Let us know

science and the arts as no other people on God's earth have

known them. Let us lead our clean-souled young to the very

summit of achievement in human thought. And while we do

this let us not sacrifice one whit of the supremacy of spirit, the

religious exaltation, which already is a source of inquiry by all

the peoples of the earth.

Logan, Utah