Universal education

“ Not only must universal education become the grand, the vital object of pursuit to all classes of our citizens; but the true means of making it what it should be, must also become objects of equal solicitude, of ceaseless, zealous, and ardent investigation. ”

“ The system of universal education is in our age the most prominent and salutary feature of the spirit of enlightenment, and it is peculiarly appropriate that the schools be made by the people the center of the day's demonstration. ”

“ And looking attentively at this universal foundation on which our own human value is supported—call it language, logic, law,—we were led to study the relationship existing between individuality, which is the aim of all forms of education, and this universal spirit which here intervenes as it does in every moment of the human life. It intervenes in education, as the science and the conscience and the entire personality of the teacher. ”

“ The Educational Suggestions and Achievements of Mann.—In surveying his educational positions, we find Mann’s foremost proposition was that education should Universal and free education, be universal and free. Girls should be trained as well as boys, and the poor should have the same opportunities as the rich. Public schools should furnish education of such a quality that the wealthy would not regard private institutions as superior. This universal education, however, with character as chief aim ”

“ TOO WIDE A MESH “The wide world dreaming on things to come” is concentrating on a luminous figure of education which it beholds, dimly, emerging from a cloudy horizon. This gracious presence is to change the world, to give to all men wider possibilities, other thoughts, aims: but, alas, this Education which is to be open to all promises no more on a nearer view than to make Opportunity universal—that is, in spiritual things, he may take who has the power and he may keep who can. ”

“ By the realization of these great principles educational progress has been encouraged. The greatest obstacles have been removed, and the future opens with possibilities of universal brotherhood, universal peace, and universal education.
It remains for us to study some of the men who have contributed to the educational progress of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, to trace the chief movements in the intellectual development of the race, and to examine the school systems of the representative nations of the world at the present time. ”

“ O thou teacher of the children of the Kingdom!
Thou hast arisen to perform a service which would justly entitle thee to vaunt thyself over all the teachers on earth. For the teachers of this world make use of human education to develop the powers, whether spiritual or material, of humankind, whilst thou art training these young plants in the gardens of God according to the education of Heaven, and art giving them the lessons of the Kingdom. ”

“ Bahá’u’lláh has announced that inasmuch as ignorance and lack of education are barriers of separation among mankind, all must receive training and instruction. Through this provision the lack of mutual understanding will be remedied and the unity of mankind furthered and advanced. Universal education is a universal law.... ”

“ The education of the future scholar for manhood will, therefore, as formerly, proceed in general simultaneously with the universal national education, and along with all the others he will attend the instruction it supplies. ”

“ Extract From a Letter Written by the Universal House of Justice
50: The cause of universal education, which has already enlisted in its... The cause of universal education, which has already enlisted in its service an army of dedicated people from every faith and nation, deserves the utmost support that the governments of the world can lend it. For ignorance is indisputably the principal reason for the decline and fall of peoples and the perpetuation of prejudice. No nation can achieve success unless education is accorded all its citizens. ”

“ In this new and wondrous Cause, the advancement of all branches of knowledge is a fixed and vital principle, and the friends, one and all, are obligated to make every effort toward this end, so that the Cause of the Manifest Light may be spread abroad, and that every child, according to his need, will receive his share of the sciences and arts—until not even a single peasant’s child will be found who is completely devoid of schooling.
It is essential that the fundamentals of knowledge be taught; essential that all should be able to read and write. ”

“ All these teachings of Christianity have a direct educational meaning, and suggest lessons for all humanity. For the school is not the only contributor to the education of a people. Every truth that affects mankind, every principle that touches the home or the State, has its influence upon the life and character of the individual, and is, therefore, an element in his education.
The natural consequence of these principles is that education must be universal. Every child must be fitted for the duties of life, both for his own sake and for the sake of the State of which he is a part. ”

“ That first idea of human duty I have never outgrown, but still believe universal education is the true culture of the American people, the reasonable service they owe to him who called them out of the Old World to be a nation of individuals. ”

“ This liberating and pacifying sort of education, capable of forming healthy and well-balanced organizations, a less fragmented generation, to which we could bind without temor the solution to the future's difficult problems, it would be defined by the ideal that has been proposed to reach. It can be characterized by different traits: it will be called rational, scientific education, because it is based on reason and adheres to scientific principles; universal because it should be everyone's in common, at least to the essential. ”

“ The education of each child is compulsory.... In addition to this wide-spread education each child must be taught a profession, art, or trade, so that every member of the community will be enabled to earn his own livelihood. ”

“ In the same way he must establish human education—that is to say, he must educate intelligence and thought in such a way that they may attain complete development, so that knowledge and science may increase, and the reality of things, the mysteries of beings, and the properties of existence may be discovered; that, day by day, instructions, inventions, and institutions may be improved ”

“ In this new and wondrous Age, the unshakeable foundation is the teaching of sciences and arts. According to explicit Holy Texts, every child must be taught crafts and arts, to the degree that is needful. Wherefore, in every city and village, schools must be established and every child in that city or village is to engage in study to the necessary degree. ”

“ Make every effort to acquire the advanced knowledge of the day, and strain every nerve to carry forward the divine civilization. Establish schools that are well organized, and promote the fundamentals of instruction in the various branches of knowledge through teachers who are pure and sanctified, distinguished for their high standards of conduct and general excellence, and strong in faith; scholars and educators with a thorough knowledge of sciences and arts. ”

“ Divine education is that of the Kingdom of God: it consists in acquiring divine perfections, and this is true education; for in this state man becomes the focus of divine blessings, the manifestation of the words, “Let Us make man in Our image, and after Our likeness.”4 This is the goal of the world of humanity.
Now we need an educator who will be at the same time a material, human, and spiritual educator, and whose authority will be effective in all conditions. ”

“ It is incumbent upon the exalted body of the Hands of the Cause of God to watch over and protect these schools in every way, and see to their requirements, so that all the means of progress will continually be at hand, and the lights of learning will illumine the whole world. ”

“ They must promote by every means in their power the material as well as...” They must promote by every means in their power the material as well as the spiritual enlightenment of youth, the means for the education of children, institute, whenever possible, Bahá’í educational institutions, organize and supervise their work and provide the best means for their progress and development. ”

“ This education, however, in order to be adequate and fruitful, should be comprehensive in nature and should take into consideration not only the physical and the intellectual side of man but also his spiritual and ethical aspects. ”

“ And finally, in the effort to provide ourselves with 250 a motto, so to speak, and a rallying banner, I set forth the doctrine of educational unity—of the education which is always at all moments education of the spirit. For even physical culture is conceivable only as formation of the mind, and more properly of character. Education, we saw, may be made actual in a thousand different ways, only always on condition that we observe the law which proceeds from its innermost essence and constitutes its immanent ideal. ”

“ We must therefore look intently at the significance of that principle which identifies culture with man’s personality, notice its most important consequences, and set these up as the laws of education, since by education we mean the creation of a living culture which shall be the life of the human mind. The first and foremost of these consequences, the direct corollary of our proposition, is the concept of the Unity of Education. ”

“ The instruction of the people in every kind of knowledge that can be of use to them in the practice of their moral duties as men, citizens, and Christians, and of their political and civil duties as members of society and freemen, ought to be the care of the public, and of all who have any share in the conduct of its affairs, in a manner that never yet has been practiced in any age or nation. The education here intended is not merely that of the children of the rich and noble, but of every rank and class of people, down to the lowest and poorest. ”

“ Men we shall have only as we make manhood the object of the work of the schools—intelligence, broad sympathy, knowledge of the world that was and is, and of the relation of men to it—this is the curriculum of that Higher Education which must underlie true life. ”

“ But to understand business on this plane, and to conduct it in this large way, needs a fine education, an education built, first of all, on a practical basis, such as the education of our common schools. Then should follow a course in the ideals of the race, the classic studies in language, literature, history, science, and philosophy. ”

“ We do not refer to a condensed preparation of our spiritual and intellectual possessions, suitable for the needs and interests of the great masses; we are not thinking of a diluted concoction of the real draught of education which we are so kind and condescending as to dispense to the majority. No!... There is only one education common to us all.” “We can all unite in the construction of a spiritual world over against that of petty human routine. Thus there is, in truth, a possibility of a truly human education, and therefore of a true education of the people.” ”

“ What I claim is liberal education; opportunity, that is, to have my share of whatever knowledge there is in the world according to my capacity or bent of mind, historical or scientific; and also to have my share of skill of hand which is about in the world, either in the industrial handicrafts or in the fine arts; picture-painting, sculpture, music, acting, or the like: I claim to be taught, if I can be taught, more than one craft to exercise for the benefit of the community. ”

“ Science, history, philosophy, literature, must [43] no longer be the luxuries of the ‘educated’ classes; all classes must be educated and sit down to these things of the mind as they do to their daily bread. History must afford its pageants, science its wonders, literature its intimacies, philosophy its speculations, religion its assurances to every man, and his education must have prepared him for wanderings in these realms of gold. ”

“ Thus even if we imagine a perfect educational process, carried out by teachers who are all men and women of light and leading, the result of that process will be ultimately conditioned by the quality of the human beings who pass through it. Just as democracy pre-supposes education, so education pre-supposes children who are educable. ”

“ The education and training of children is among the most meritorious acts...” The education and training of children is among the most meritorious acts of humankind and draweth down the grace and favour of the All-Merciful, for education is the indispensable foundation of all human excellence and alloweth man to work his way to the heights of abiding glory. If a child be trained from his infancy, he will, through the loving care of the Holy Gardener, drink in the crystal waters of the spirit and of knowledge, like a young tree amid the rilling brooks. ”

“ Have these institutions succeeded in raising the general level of character and improving the general conditions of life? Can we indulge any sure and certain hope that the work of education will be increasingly fruitful? ”

“ If such benign results have followed the establishment of schools of an inferior character, is it unreasonable to claim that education and the processes of education, however imperfect they may be, are calculated to increase the sum of human progress, virtue, and happiness? ”

“ By what agency can we most effectively elevate our national ideals? By extending and improving our system of popular education, by reversing the usual order and beginning where school curricula now end, by placing our school-children from their earliest years in close and familiar contact with the life and thought of the race as expressed in literature, by exciting in every child admiration and emulation of the world's true heroes, by feeding the imagination and cultivating the moral faculties, by putting every child into the way of acquiring a social and a historic perspective. ”