COEFFETEAU
91
COEFFETEAU
been devised, and as none can be devised, to make the
conditions of study exactly the same for both sexes,
co-education really means that girls are subjected to a
regimen intended and conducted for boys. To the
physical strain which is thus imposed on them, girls as
a rule are not equal ; in particular they are apt to suf-
fer from that very rivalry which is often cited as a de-
sirable feature of the mixed school. If education is
to take as its first principle conformity to nature, it
must certainly make allowance for dilTerences of or-
ganism and function. This need becomes the more
imperative in proportion as the dependence of .mind
upon organic processes is more fully realized and
turned to practical account in educational work. It
then appears beyond question that from a psychologi-
cal standpoint woman should have a different training
from that which men receive. There is no question
here as to the superiority or inferiority of either sex,
nor will it profit to say that "soul has no gender".
The fact is that each sex has its own mental constitu-
tion and its special capacities. To develop these is
the work of education; but this does not mean that
unlike natures shall be moulded into asuperficial resem-
blance to each other. Even if it were desirable to
have the finished product exactly the same in both
sexes, it does not follow that this result is to be ob-
tained by subjecting men and women to the same dis-
cipline. Educationists are agreed that the need of
the developing mind is the first t.iing to be consulted
in framing methods and in organizing the work of the
school. They rightly condemn not only a system
which treats the boy as though he were a man, but also
any feature of method that fails to secure adaptation,
even in detail, of the teaching to the present condition
of the pupil's mind. Yet many of them, strangely
enough, insist that the same training shall be given to
boys and girls in the secondary schools, that is at a
period which Ls chiefly characterized by the manifesta-
tion of profound mental differences between one sex
and the other. The attempt now so generally made
to obviate the physiological and psychological diffi-
culties of co-education by adapting the work of the
school to the capacities and requirements of girls, can
evidently have but one result, and that not a desirable
one, so far as Ijoys are concerned.
It must further be pointed out on vocational grounds that, since woman's work in the world is nec- es.sarily different from man's, there should be a corre- sponding difference in the preparation. Here again it is singular that while the whole trend of our schools is towards specialization in view of the needs of after-life, no such consideration should be had for diversity of calling based on diversity of .sex. The student is en- couraged to take up as early as possible the special lines of work that fit him for his chosen career in busi- ness, in literary work, or in any of the professions ; yet for the essential duties of life, widely different as these are, men and women receive an identical education. However great be the share which woman is to take in "the public expression of the ideal energies, for morality and religion, for education and social re- forms, and their embodiment, not in the home, but in the public consciousness" — it still remains true that her success as a supporter of these ideal endeavours is closely bound up with the right discharge of those du- ties which are at once the lot and the privilege of her sex. Any influence that tends to make those duties less sacred to her or less attractive, is a menace to her individual perfection and may lead to far-reaching calamity. The lowering of sex tension, which is the strongest argiunent brought forward to support co- education from the view-point of moralit}', tm-ns out on closer inspection to be a fatal objection; it proves too much. 'The " indifference" which it is said to pro- duce has its consequences beyond the limit of school- life, and these if left to work out their own results would be, as they undoubtedly are in many instances,
antagonistic to the essential interests of family and
home, and eventuallj' of the national life as well.
The element of religious instruction, essential to Catholic schools, has a peculiar significance in the present proljleni. It not onlj' gives free scope to ideal and jesthetic tendencies, but it also provides effectual safeguards against the dangers to which adolescence is exposed. As President Hall has said, "every glow of esthetic appreciation for a great work of art, every thrill aroused by an act of sublime heroism, every pulse of religious aspiration weakens by just so much the potential energy of passion because it has found its kinetic equivalent in a higher form of expression" (Pedagogical Seminary, March, 190S). The "pro- phylactic value" of religious training is, from the Catholic point of view, far greater than that of the conditions which co-education involves and on which it depends for the development of character and morals. But this value of course can be got only by teaching religion with the same thoroughness and the same perfection of method that characterizes the teach- ing of other subjects, and in such a way as to make the duties which religion imposes on both the sexes not merely pleasing items of knowledge, but also vital elements in habit and action. (See Education; Schools.)
For extended biblioarraphies see U. S. Commisnioner's Report for 1900-01. xx\iii; ibid, for 1903. xx; Clarke, Sex in Educa- tion (Boston. 1S73> Van pf W^rHPR. Woman's Unfitness for Higher Education t^f^-^y y"r^~ loiiii- Kimvs, Ueber die (jemein- sameErziehungb'vh '.' - hcrcn ^chulcn {Wajn- bura. 18S9): Haki. - - Sexes in Revort on Public Schools of Sf / ,, I)e Gjlrmo. Differ- entiation in the Hii!J,t i L.; .. .., H ..:;un in Educ. Rev., 25,
301; Shields, The Educalun of Uur Uuis (New York, 1907).
Thomas E. Shield.s.
CoeSeteau, Nicolas, preacher and controver- sialist, b. 1574, at Chateau-du-Loir, province of Maine, France; d. Paris, 21 April, 162.3. He entered the Dominican convent of Sens, 1588, and after his pro- fession, 1590, was sent to St-Jacques, the house of studies at Paris. There in 1595 he began to teach philosophy. On 4 May, 1600, he received the doctor- ate and was appointed regent of studies, which posi- tion he filled until 1606 and again from 1609 to the spring of 1612. He also served two terms as prior and was vicar-general of the French congregation from 1606 to 1009. At this time Coeffeteau had already acquired distinction by his preaching at Blois, Char- tres. Angers, and in Paris. Queen Margaret of Va- lois had made him her almoner in 1602, and in 1608 he received the appointment of preacher in ordinary to King Henry IV. In June, 1617, he was proposed by Louis XIII and confirmed by Pope Paul V as titu- lar Bishop of Dardania and Administrator of the Dio- cese of Metz. By his vigilance and zealous preaching he checked the spread of Calvinistic errors, renewed and re-established Divine services, and restored eccle- siastical discipline, especially in the great abbeys of Metz and in the monasteries of the diocese. After four years he was transferred, 22 .\ug., 1021, to the Diocese of Marseilles; but ill-health kejjt him from his see. He secured Francois de Lomenie as his coadjutor, but he himself remained at Paris until his death. He was buried in St. Thomas's chapel of the convent of St-Jacques. Coeffeteau's writings are chiefly polemi- cal. Five treatises on the Eucharist were occasioned by a controversy with Pierre du Moulin, Calvinist minister of Charenton. Another series on ecclesiasti- cal and pontifical authority was prompted by the action of the French Protestants in relation to political and religious disturl)ances in England. At the re- fpiest of firogorj- X^'. Coeffeteau wrote a refutation of the " De Republica Chri.stiana" by the apostate Arch- bi.shop of Spalato, Marc' Antonio de Dominis. In all these writings, at a time in which partisanship was wont to be violent, Coeffeteau maintained an ocjuable temper and a praiseworthy spirit of moderation,
