Education, Learning and Wisdom

Chapter 9

Appreciation of Education, Learning and Wisdom

               From the formation of the United States of America there has been a history of appreciation of education, learning and wisdom.

               Education has always been important in the United States because we are a free nation.  If we do not see to the education of our children then it is possible that in a very short time every advantage and ability we have would be lost.  Ignorance is a terrible foe.

               It is also recognized that if everyone is given access to a public education, not only will we assure the continuation of our society but those persons who would have not been able to excel in a planned or controlled society will be able to distinguish themselves.

               Learning is important in the United States because besides having a basic education that will allow a person to read, write and perform arithmetic, learning should be ongoing throughout life.  It is a recent phenomenon, and somewhat painful to note, that learning has become associated with degrees and now seems to carry a price tag.

               Learning in the American sense is a continuing expansion of knowledge in a subject that you deal with on a regular basis or something that you take an interest in.  It is the application of the techniques taught in the schools to issues and concerns and interests in your own life.

               A construction worker does not stop learning just as a dentist does not stop learning.  Learning is the continuation of the education received from the schools and sometimes specialized education that is sometimes referred to as ‘higher’ education.

               Wisdom, of course, is the combination of education received from the primary schools combined with learning and the personal experience of the individual.

               Benjamin Franklin, famous American Statesman and scientist said, ‘Early to be and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.’

               It is important, of course, to have plenty of rest to take on these duties of education and learning in order to work towards acquiring wisdom.

               Without education and learning we as Americans have no connection to the future.  Many families have come to the United States primarily because they were seeking a way to better themselves and to gain an honest education for themselves and their children.

               It is through education, learning and the eventual accomplishment of wisdom that individuals can better themselves in American society and just generally make a very nice life for themselves.  By ignoring education and learning many people can condemn themselves to a lifetime of poverty and occupations to which they are ill-suited and which can bring them much unhappiness.

               From the point of view of American society and the United States of America – having a population of ignorant persons is not only irresponsible but dangerous.  Any nation that depends on the ignorance of the populace in order to keep order and maintain power is always in danger of its own destruction.

               Two things happen when education is kept from the populace and retained by just a few.  Learning loses its luster and eventually even the controlling minority falls into ignorance.  Brutality is the final result.  If the controlling minority needs to do nothing else than keep information from others after a generation or two they will not even be able to tell what they are doing.  It can even become enshrined in some sort of quasi-religion.  Czarist Russia is an example of that happening.

               In the case of Russia the ignorant majority rose up to destroy the ‘educated’ minority.  When they gained power, however, it was quickly realized that they lacked education and learning and their response to the situation showed a great deal of brutality which ended in the deaths of tens of millions of innocent people – their own citizens – the ones they were pledged to free and protect.

               It was a tragedy of immense proportions.  The situation in Russia spawned a similar catharsis of violence and ignorance in neighboring China.  The result of both of these ‘revolutions’ has been to create governments that are just now beginning to realize that their power is not of their own making but is a result of the people themselves.

               Without education and learning the situation in the United States could just as quickly deteriorate.  Many problems in the United States at this time can be directly traced to a lack of education and the negative reputation that learning has taken on in some communities.

               Drugs, violence, corruption – all of them have some root in a lack of education and disrespect for learning.   As a result the attainment of wisdom is fairly impossible.  Any wisdom that might be gained in such situations as drug dealing, criminal activity, political corruption or social abuse is either of an evil sort or quickly extinguished in a rising tide of blood.

                              President Thomas Jefferson had a deep appreciation for education and learning.  After leaving the Office of the Presidency of the United States he worked to establish the University of Virginia.  It is a secular institution centered on learning.  He believed, as many do today, that books and libraries are central to learning and a learned populace.  His beliefs shaped his actions and he designed the university around the library.

               President Thomas Jefferson wrote this about education, "Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves, therefore, are its only safe depositories. And to render them safe, their minds must be improved to a certain degree."

               It is through learning and education that you can find ways to participate more fully in the great American Journey and Adventure.

               Some people are pulled along or buffeted about – but you don’t have to be.

               Martin Luther King, great American Statesman and Orator had this to say about education, “To save man from the morass of propaganda, in my opinion, is one of the chief aims of education. Education must enable one to sift and weigh evidence, to discern the true from the false, the real from the unreal, and the facts from the fiction."

               Education should be used by an American to take a look at an issue and delve into it.  Taking both sides into account and realizing there may be more to the story yet.  An education can allow the mind to tell one thing from another and quite simply to help us be able to tell right from wrong.

               Martin Luther King also said, "Intelligence plus character--that is the goal of true education."

               Finally – and this is not all that Martin Luther King said about education – he said, “Education must enable a man to become more efficient, to achieve with increasing facility the legitimate goals of his life.”

               What are you legitimate goals?  What are the legitimate goals of your family, friend and nation?  What are the legitimate goals of your local government or representatives?  You have a right to know these things and you have a right and responsibility to do those things that you feel are your legitimate goals.

               I can think of no other troubling kind of person than one who has attained great reason but lacks morality.  These are the men and women with whom an American must contend with.  They are the criminal sort, they are the corrupted sort.  They are the dangerous sort and the careless sort.

               Some of this work is not easy.  It requires some of your time.  It requires some of your attention.  It requires some of your reason.  The alternative is that you do not do it and that leaves open the very real possibility that no one will do it.

               Being American is a big duty.  It’s something that has either been put upon you because you were born here or it is something that you chose to take by coming here.  If you put it aside then what have you?

               Sometimes it appears that education is very expensive.  It must be told, though, that in the United States, one way or another, you can get to books.  If you can get to books you can get to knowledge.  If you can get to knowledge you can get to education.  If you learn you may strive for wisdom.

               These things that are available for you to learn and become educated in are new ways to make a living or to find a better way to do what you are doing now.

               I am not going to disparage a college degree but not everyone goes for one.  Not everyone who goes for one gets one either.

               Learning, education and wisdom are things available to us all.  They do not just fall into our laps, however, they must be sought out.

               Even the simple act of reading the newspaper or watching the news or some television programs about science can be of great use.  To do nothing is of no use.

               Just as this nation needs farmers and soldiers and doctors and lawyers this nation needs all of us to learn and use discerningly as much as we can and are able to do.

               As Americans we are alone in this world.  There is no one that is going to take it on themselves to correct us or help us.  Many other nations wait for us to fail.  Even more nations do not care whether we succeed or fail.

               If we do not work together we will all fall apart.

               Education and learning are the keys by which we can maintain our union and help assimilate new Americans joining us.  They do not come empty handed, and if you are a new American reading this, then you already know that.

                 As important as American education is to bringing facts to peoples’ minds and as important as learning is to understand how things work or how to make them work it is equally important to take into account that how that education and learning is used is also important.

               As already mentioned a learned person without morals is a dangerous person, indeed.

               It Is because of this aberrant behavior that as an American you always need to be on guard.  Because we have a free nation and because all of this knowledge and information is available to us all it is possible that along with the good people getting educated the bad people will likewise benefit.

               That is why it is important to strive for wisdom so that we can not only tell right from wrong in action plain and simple but in the possible uses and abuses of information and power.  Forewarned is forearmed.

               Education is sometimes a necessary thing.  For example – Americans need to be able to read and write in English and perform simple mathematics.  It is advantageous if they learn about the scientific method – especially since their competitors around the world in the most advanced countries are doing that.  That is about the minimum that someone needs to function in American society.

               Some people arrive in the United States and come with family, friends and acquaintances.  There have been historical examples of entire communities arriving and taking up residence in the wilderness.  That does not happen to any great extent today but there are towns called ‘Colonistas’ (Little Colonies) that have formed up in some parts of the Southwestern United States.  The Colonistas and the other communities like ‘Mexican Town’ in Detroit, or ‘China Town’ in San Francisco, New York and other places – have a unique place in American history and society but at the same time they have a darker purpose and are a mark against us.

               There are people that immigrate to the United States, who, because of age or intelligence, are unable to learn the language – they may not even need it.  There are many others, however, who are younger and fit and able but do not learn the language either because they do not want to, which is foolish, or they do not know how to, which is tragic.

               The individuals who live in these cultural enclaves may be interesting and a diversion to other Americans to go and visit but is it fair to them?  It is clear that many people object to their incursion into American society.  Navigating around a modern American city is hard enough if you don’t read English well yourself but imagine what it is like if you are lost or trying to deliver a package or do work and you suddenly find yourself in a community where all the street signs and store signs are in Chinese or Spanish or some other language.

               President Theodore Roosevelt wrote the following :

“We should insist that if the immigrant who comes here does in good faith become an American and assimilates himself to us he shall be treated on an exact equality with every one else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed or birth-place or origin.

But this is predicated upon the man's becoming in very fact an American and nothing but an American. If he tries to keep segregated with men of his own origin and separated from the rest of America, then he isn't doing his part as an American. There can be no divided allegiance here. . . We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language, for we intend to see that the crucible turns our people out as Americans, of American nationality, and not as dwellers in a polyglot boarding-house; and we have room for but one soul loyalty, and that is loyalty to the American people.”

These words may seem a little harsh but what President Roosevelt is trying to express, I believe, is that if you have decided to join the American Journey and Adventure as an American then in order to fully participate the English language is the best and most common way to communicate.

Some concepts are difficult to translate from one culture to another.  The concepts of freedom, liberty and the pursuit of happiness take on different meanings in different languages.  In the United States and in the context in which we use them in relation to the Constitution of the United States and our rights as free people – it is all rather clear.  To listen to it and work with it in a foreign language while in this country is like having left-over pie or stale bread.

Some people insist with a mania that everyone speak English.  It is right, I feel to insist that everyone have a knowledge of and be able to speak English for the simple reason that if you do not then it is more easy for someone to take advantage of you in this economy.

Again the history books are filled with examples of this.  Entire companies made up of immigrants who, ignorant of their rights gave away their God given gifts of expertise and authority to people intent only on extracting an unfair profit from their labor.  Instead of sharing in the American dream these people are plunged into the American nightmare.  The plain fact is that when they allow this to happen and some shanty town springs up as a result of it the neighborhoods, businesses and lands around it can be blighted as well.  In the end people may ask, and these are the same people living in this conditions, ‘How can this happen in America?’

The answer is that it can happen anywhere that trusting, scared and ignorant people gather.  Unless there is a strong impetus to ensure that everyone is getting a fair shake there is a danger that they will be exploited.  Once the situation is uncovered it may be altogether too tragically late.

The experience of the farm laborers in California is a good example.  By exploiting the laws and business practices on both sides of the border the farmers, corporations, local governments, state governments (in Mexico and the United States) conspired together in loose agreements to get some work done – that is – pick fruit and vegetables.  The result was a long exploitation of migrant workers.  Many people died in the fields of modern America just as if they had been laboring for some old tyrant back in Europe.  To this day the disagreements and corruption evident on both sides and even in ‘organized’ labor purportedly representing these folks is still evident.  How could all these negative effects be blunted or stopped?

It is possible that if English were used as the regular business language and there was not a middle level of interpreters drawn, in some cases, from the worst of society and amounting to little more than slave holders and slave drivers – then things might have been and might still be different.

In many places in the United States ignorance is praised as a manly quality.  This can often mask learning disabilities and also allow for bullies and violence to rule the roost rather than learning and ability.

It is sorry to say that shear brutality sometimes rules the day and not common sense.

The way any American can navigate safely through and beyond these narrow barriers imposed by the ignorant and greedy is simply to get education, acquire learning and strive for wisdom.  It may sound like a lot but learning how to read is not that difficult for most people.  If there is a problem with reading these days there are taped books and other ways to get information.  Learning disabilities or time constraints do not need to be allowed to cut you off from what rightfully belongs to you which is your own ability to reach for and attain your own legitimate goals in life.

In the United States it is easy to get a hold of alcohol, cigarettes – even illegal drugs.  Some people use these to ‘escape’ their problems little realizing that they are the source of most of the problems that they may be facing in living in modern America.  These things rob many Americans of their rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Learning, education and wisdom are the keys to success in America, but not only that, to success in life and society.  People have a natural affinity for and attraction to a person strongly grounded in knowledge.

How to get these benefits?  It is an act of Self-Control. With Self-Control these and many other things may be achieved.  Self-Control is what we will discuss next.