Mind to Mind: An Essay Towards a Philosophy of Education

This is Charlotte Mason as you have not seen her before: Mind to Mind is her well-seasoned final work, originally titled An Essay Towards a Philosophy of Education. Divested of outdated material, the essential philosophy is brought into sharp relief. Ms. Mason wrote, “The message for our age is, Believe in mind, and let education go straight as a bolt to the mind of the pupil.” Our generation needs to hear that message more acutely than ever. Karen Glass, with deep respect for the original, has preserved the essentials in Ms. Mason’s own words, while delivering the material in a format that speaks to today’s readers. This book is an abridgment in the literal Latin sense of “to shorten.” What has been shortened is not merely the length of the original volume, but the path between the modern reader and the mind of Charlotte Mason.

In this book, Charlotte Mason presents the vital principles that underlie her methods, and with the confidence of many decades of practice behind her, recommends those methods to a wider audience. She wanted to reform and regenerate the educational practices of Great Britain in the early 20th century, but 21st century readers will find her ideas just as potent, just as penetrating, and even more refreshing than they were when they were originally penned. Her first principle is “Children are born persons”: not machines, not animals, not accidental conglomerations of cells, but persons, with all the magnificent possibilities that personhood implies. The education we should offer a person is the education Charlotte Mason offers to us.