INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION

In your ordinary use of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, you give your attention to theonearticle that will answer theonequestion you have in your mind. The aim of this Guide is to enable you to use the Britannica for an altogether different purpose, namely, for systematic study or occasional reading on any subject.

The volumes of the Encyclopaedia Britannica contain forty-four million words—as much matter as 440 books of the ordinary octavo size. And the subjects treated—in other words, the whole sum of human knowledge—may be divided into 289 separate classes, each one completely covering the field of some one art, science, industry or other department of knowledge. By the mere use of scissors and paste the alphabetical arrangement of the articles could be done away with, and the Britannica could be reshaped into 289 different books containing, on the average, about half as much again as an ordinary octavo volume. It would misrepresent the Britannica to say that you would then have 289text-books, because there is an essential difference in tone and purpose. A text-book is really a book intended to be used under the direction and with the assistance of a teacher, who explains it and comments upon it. The Britannica, on the other hand, owes the position it has enjoyed since the first edition appeared in 1768 to the fact that it has succeeded, as no other book has succeeded, in teaching without the interposition of a teacher.

It is not, of course, claimed that the idea of reading certain groups of Britannica articles in the order in which they will combine themselves into complete books is a novel invention. Thousands of men owe the greater part of their educational equipment to a previous edition of the Britannica. And not only did they lay out their own courses of reading without the aid of such a Guide as this, but the material at their disposal was by no means so complete as is the 11th Edition. Every edition of the Britannica before this one, and every other book of comparable size previously published, appeared volume by volume. In the case of the last complete edition before the present, no less than 14 years elapsed between the publication of the first volume and the last. It is obvious that when editors have to deal with one volume at a time, and are unable to deal with the work as a whole, there cannot be that exact fitting of the edges of one article to the edges of another which is so conspicuously a merit of the 11thEdition. All the articles in this edition were completed before a single volume was printed, and the work stood, at one stage of its preparation, in precisely the form which, as has already been said, might be given to it by merely rearranging the articles according to their subjects.

In this Guide, the principal articles dealing with the subject of each chapter are named in the order in which you may most profitably study them, and the summaries of the larger articles afford such a preliminary survey as may assist you in making your choice among the courses. Besides, where it seems necessary, there is added to the chapter a fairly complete list of all articles in the Britannica on the subject, so that the reader may make his study exhaustive.

A brief review of the six parts into which the Guide is divided will show the general features of its plan, of which a more detailed analysis is given in the Table of Contents.

Part 1 contains 30 chapters, each designed for readers engaged in, or preparing for, some specific occupation. To the beginner, who still has everything to learn, the advantages derived from such a course of study may well be so great as to make the difference between success and failure in life, and to those who have already overcome the first difficulties, to whom the only question is how marked a success awaits them, the Britannica can render invaluable service of another kind. No amount of technical training and of actual experience will lead a man of sound judgment to believe that he alone knows everything that all his competitors put together know; or that his knowledge and theirs is all that ever will be known. The 1500 contributors in 21 different countries who wrote the articles in the Britannica include the men who have made the latest advances in every department of knowledge, and who can forecast most authoritatively the results to be expected from the new methods which are now being experimentally applied in every field of activity. The experienced merchant, manufacturer, or engineer, or the man who is already firmly established in any other profession or business, will naturally find in some of the articles facts and figures which are not new to him, but he can profit by the opportunity to review, confirm, reconsider and “brush up” his previous knowledge.

Part 2 contains 30 chapters, each devoted to a course of systematic study designed to supplement, or to take the place of, some part of the usual school and college curriculum. The educational articles in the Britannica are the work of 704 professors in 146 universities andcolleges in 21 different countries. No institution of learning in the world has a faculty so numerous, so authoritative, or so highly specialized. Nor has any system of home study ever been devised by which the student is brought into contact with teachers so trustworthy and so stimulating. The fascination of first-hand knowledge and the pleasure of studying pages intended not for reluctant drudges submitting themselves to a routine, but for students eager to make rapid progress, are factors in the educational value of the Britannica that cannot be overestimated, and the elasticity with which any selected course of study can be enlarged and varied is in full accordance with the modern theories of higher education.

Part 3 is devoted to the interests of children. The first of its chapters describes Britannica articles of the utmost practical value to parents, dealing with the care of children’s health, with their mental and bodily training, and with the intelligent direction of their pastimes. The second chapter indicates varied readings in the Britannica for children themselves, showing how their work at school can be made more interesting and profitable to them by entertaining reading on subjects allied to those included in their studies. The third chapter in this Part gives a number of specific questions such as children are prone to ask, as well as questions which may be put to them in order to guide their natural inquisitiveness to good purpose. The references to pages in the Britannica show where these questions are clearly and instructively answered.

Part 4 suggests readings on questions of the day which relate to American citizenship and to current politics. A study of the articles indicated in this section of the Guide will aid the reader not only to form sound opinions for himself, but also to exercise in private or public life the influence for good which arises from a clear view of the arguments on both sides of controverted questions. It is no exaggeration to say that the Britannica is the only existing work in which such subjects as tariffs, trusts, immigration, labour and the relation between legislative and judiciary powers are treated without partisan bias and with adequate fulness.

Part 5, especially for women, deals with their legal and political status in various parts of the world, their achievements in scholarship, art and science, as well as with home-making, domestic science and kindred subjects. The important part which women, both among the contributors and on the editorial staff of the Britannica, took in the preparation of the work sufficiently indicates that the editor-in-chief made ample provision for the subjects peculiarly within their sphere.

Part 6 is an analysis of the many departments of the Britannica which relate to recreation and vacations, travel at home and abroad, photography, motoring, out-door and indoor games and other forms of relaxation and of exercise. The extent to which the work can be used in planning motoring tours, and the superiority, in such a connection, of its articles to the scant information found in ordinary guide books, are shown in the extracts, included in this Part 6, relating to a trip from New York through the Berkshire Hills to the White Mountains.

It will be seen from this brief survey of the field covered by the Guide that provision has been made for every purpose which can dictate the choice of a course of reading. But as you proceed to examine its contents for yourself, you should remember that the lists it gives name only a fraction of the articles in the Britannica, and that for a fuller summary of the work as a whole you should turn to the Table on pp. 881–947 of Vol. 29.

Finally, the form in which this Guide is printed may call for a word of justification. It is inevitable that chapters, of an analytical character, bespattered with references to the numbers of volumes and of pages, and terminating with lists of the titles of articles, should bear a certain air of formality. There is no danger that the possessor of the Britannica, familiar with the fascination of its pages and the beauty of the illustrations which enhance their charm would permit his impression of the work itself to be affected by the bleak appearance of the Guide. But he may feel that because a list has a forbidding aspect the pleasure he has derived from browsing at will in the Britannica would give place to a sense of constraint if he rigidly pursued a course of reading. It may easily be shown that such a fear would be groundless, for the Britannica articles are all the better reading when one carries forward the interest which one of them has excited to others of related attraction. But to anyone who is firmly determined that he shall not be persuaded to read systematically, the Guide will none the less be useful, for he may flit from one chapter to another, selecting here and there an article merely because the account which is given of it pleases him. Or, better yet, he may find, in one portion only of a selected course, a series of only three or four articles which will, in combination, make the best of occasional reading.

THE EDITORS.

THE EDITORS.

THE EDITORS.

THE EDITORS.


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