Page:Path of Vision; pocket essays of East and West.djvu/47

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.

MINDS AND MONOMINDS

than the material benefits it afforded. Specialization was not known,—was not, at least, the dominating purpose of life. The tendency, the aim of all education was to produce well-rounded intellects, pleasing personalities, cultured individuals that could be at ease in any drawing room, at court, in the studios, the ateliers and the shops. An educated man was, indeed, a man of accomplishments—of circumambient intelligence. He had a general pass at least to the treasure house of knowledge; and he continued, unlike the university graduate of to-day, to make use of it, to enjoy its many priveleges, even though his calling were of the humblest and most prosaic. An excursion into the world of knowledge, under the exclusive management of men of genius, independent of the schools and universities, was, indeed, an uncommon joy.

For those whose business it was to reach the hidden springs of knowledge, no subject, natural or supernatural, human or divine, was ever too great or too small, too

[43]