How can the child learn to be a free and responsible citizen when the teacher is bound?

Without initiation into the scientific spirit one is not in possession of the best tools which humanity has so far devised for effectively directed reflection. One in that case not merely conducts inquiry and learning without the use of the best instruments, but fails to understand the full meaning of knowledge.

The plea for the predominance of learning to read in early school life because of the great importance attaching to literature seems to be a perversion.

As believers in democracy we have not only the right but the duty to question existing mechanisms of, say, suffrage and to inquire whether some functional organization would not serve to formulate and manifest public opinion better than the existing methods. It is not irrelevant to the point that a score of passages could be cited in which Jefferson refers to the American Government as an experiment.

The bad man is the man who no matter how good he has been is beginning to deteriorate, to grow less good. The good man is the man who no matter how morally unworthy he has been is moving to become better. Such a conception makes one severe in judging himself and humane in judging others.

The method of democracy is to bring conflicts out into the open where their special claims can be seen and appraised, where they can be discussed and judged.

Schools have ignored the value of experience and chosen to teach by pouring in.