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The ruling principle of method applied to education
The ruling principle of method applied to education Author:Antonio Rosmini Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 12. " It is an old maxim in common use, that whosoever will rightly learn great things must not attempt to grapple with the... more »ir whole extent at once, but must begin with their smaller and easier parts."2 This rule of method laid down by Plato was declared by him to be, even in his time, as old and commonly accepted as it is self-evident. It would be a great mistake, however, to underrate a maxim because it has become trite. It is rather the habit of the best and profoundest minds to find the deepest wisdom in those truths which are the most common, which every one knows and repeats, which none can dispute, and none avoid seeing. But to do this we must look far below their common aspect to their inward depth and power, where lie the true foundations, the true reason, of whatever is accepted as scientific. As it is, how " 1 This book was published by Prof. Dom. Berti in the form of an appendix to his work on Method Applied to Elementary Teaching (Turin, 1849) with the name of Prof. Tarditi. No moral blame can be attached on this account to Rosmini, Tarditi, or Berti. Rosmini wrote the book in 1839 ; Tarditi had read and copied it for his own use in 1845; and Berti, having found it among his papers after his death, published it as a thing worthy to see the light. The public, which received it with satisfaction, was entirely the gainer, though its usefulness was probably a good deal impaired by its detachment from the other parts, which in the present work illustrate and confirm it. — Fuancesco Paoli. 2 Plato in the Dialogue entitled the Sophist: oo-a fi'au riav ;xe-yaAwp Sei S1aTroceurfla1 KaAut, wepi rSiv To1ovTwy Se'6'oKTflu T1aai Ka'1 TraAai, To Trpdrepop tv ffIi1Kpo1s Kal piioaiv aura fiel? peAeTap, 1rplv av iv avroi? Toi? nfyiirTo1f. ...« less