The Complete Prose of T. S. Eliot: The Critical EditionVol. 7: A European Society, 1947-1953

The Aims of Education

We have, so far, arrived (I hope) at the conclusion that there is a reciprocal implication between education for citizenship, or as a social being, and the development of the latent powers of the individual, or the improvement of “man as man.” A man cannot be altogether a good citizen unless he is also a good man; and the wholly good man must also be a good citizen – at least in the sense that he is one who cares for the good of his neighbors. The distinction, and the relationship, are similar to that between work and play. There is something wrong when a man gets no enjoyment from his work; and to play any game properly you have to work at it.

Even, however, if we recognize the mutual implication of citizenship and individual development, we still lack a standard by which to measure one or the other. We therefore incline to take either as the standard for the other in different contexts. In one context, citizenship is undefined; we take for granted that whatever it means, we all understand it; and our notion of individual development will be adapted to the undefined citizenship. In another context, we may do exactly the reverse. The limitation to one point of view will tend to make us either authoritarians, placing strict limitations upon the exercise of individual choice or caprice; the limitation to the other point of view will make us libertarians, holding, as some people have, that the best government is that which governs the least. The latter will tend to believe that human beings are naturally good, and that left to themselves they will flower into good citizens; the former that you can make them good by enforcing good laws – or else, that the residue of a human being’s behavior, beyond what can be controlled by legislation, does not matter. And in this contest it is likely to be the authoritarians who will win, because authority is a short cut to dealing with abuses and injustices; and the contexts in which we are members of a mass are more compulsive than those in which we are individuals. In the latter, we stand alone; and it is easier to submit to an authority with which we identify ourselves than to tolerate nonconformity in others.

Although we may at this point agree that citizenship and individual development imply each other, we lack an outside standard by which citizenship and individual development can both be measured; for the measurement by each other leaves us in a vicious circle of illusory definition, defining each in turn in terms of the other. We have found that “the improvement of man as man” is an empty phrase, unless we can agree about what is improvement; and that we cannot agree about this unless we find a common answer to the question “What is Man?” Now we cannot expect to agree to one answer to this question; for with this question, our differences will turn out in the end to be religious differences; and it does not matter whether you are a “religious person” or not, or whether you expressly repudiate everything that you call “a religion”; there will be some sort of religious attitude – even if you call it a nonreligious attitude – implied in your answer.

There are two questions which have to be distinguished: that of the place of religion in education, and that of the place of education in religion. The first is the question with which we are more familiar. To the question of the place of religion in education, there are several answers. The most important seem to be the following:

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Where the State itself professes allegiance to a particular religion, or religious denomination, this religion may be affirmed, and taught, in all the educational institutions controlled by the State; and the teaching will be in conformity with the doctrines of this religion. Private institutions, for those who profess another religion or branch of the same religion, and for those who object to all...