Consider This: Charlotte Mason and the Classical Tradition

by Karen Glass

Charlotte Mason had very definite ideas about how these different areas of knowledge should be approached. With the principle—minds must be fed with ideas—firmly established, she reminds us that there is only one place in which ideas may consistently be found. A corollary of the principle that education is the science of relations, is, that no education seems to be worth the name which has not made children at home in the world of books, and so related them, mind to mind, with thinkers who have dealt with knowledge. We reject epitomes, compilations, and their like, and put into children’s hands books which, long or short, are living. (School Education, p. 226) Education is of the spirit and is not to be taken in by the eye or effected by the hand; mind appeals to mind and thought begets thought and that is how we become educated. For this reason we owe it to every child to put him in communication with great minds that he may get at great thoughts; with the minds, that is, of those who have left us great works; and the only vital method of education appears to be that children should read worthy books, many worthy books. (Philosophy of Education, p. 12) And what is a living book? Simply put, a living book is one that conveys living ideas. It should be of the highest literary quality and should present its subject in a way that engages both the mind and the heart of the reader. Charlotte rejects diluted texts, from which the living ideas have been reduced to mere informatio...