Consider This: Charlotte Mason and the Classical Tradition

by Karen Glass

The second guide that Charlotte Mason calls into service of the classical goal to establish right thinking and right acting is “the way of reason.” What she wants children to understand is the limitations of reason or logic, rather than focusing on formal logic. She tells us that reason has two functions—to provide logical demonstrations of mathematical truths (in which it may be trusted) and to provide logical reasons for ideas which we have already chosen to accept. This second function of reason is not widely considered, but Charlotte draws attention to it by way of warning. Once we permit an idea to cross the threshold of admittance, our minds naturally look for, and find, reasons to support that idea. Rather than training ourselves to do what we already do, she asks us to take a step back and look at the initial idea. It is there that we must accept or reject (an act of the will), not according to reason alone, but according to some other, higher standard.