Your Own Method by Sel.

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Jul 2, 1885

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 11, No. 26.

Your Own Method.

By Sel.

IMITATION in education is as objectionable as elsewhere. Indeed, with many teachers imitation has become almost a vice. The tendency to imitate rather than to originate, create, or develop, is a natural one, but it should be resisted. Our methods and practices should be individual, peculiar to ourselves, else they are of little value. The imitator is essentially an automaton. His models may be good—but his copies, lacking the spirit and appropriateness of the original, are deficient in every essential quality. Hence the servile following of even good methods often leads to ridiculous results. Hence the periodical crazes in various directions, because they generate nothing but foolish imitation, soon die out, and give place to others. The remedy is plain. In all things grasp the idea, seize the underlying principle—assimilate it, make it your own. Then whatever you do will be natural, reasonable, sagacious. Your methods then will be suitable, adapted to both time and circumstance—your work spontaneous. In a word, possess your methods, do not be possessed by them.