Education is nothing but the power to concentration

ॐ वीरेश्वराय विद्महे विवेकानन्दाय धीमहि । तन्नो वीर: प्रचोदयात् ।

Prerequisite for Education: Purity of mind
Education is nothing but the power to concentration. - Swami Vivekananda.

Mind is an instrument to gather knowledge.  Purity of mind is the prerequisite to acquire knowledge.  Once a Professor of Science visited a laboratory. The Professor –incharge of that department took that gentleman around the laboratory. When he came to the place where the microscopes were kept that gentleman tried to look through one of them. He found he could not see clearly. So, he took the microscope lens, cleaned it with his kerchief, replaced it and then was able to see clearly. The microscope is the instrument with which we are able to see things and gather knowledge about them. If it is not kept clean, but left dirty, how can we get a clear idea about the object which we are examining? The lens must be kept clean. Similarly, it is only if the mind is kept pure and strong, by observing certain ethical and moral principles, then it can easily grasp the subtle truth of things.  

In case of Swami Vivekananda the mind was so well equipped that he could read volumes in no time. At the Swami's bidding, Akhandananda used to bring books for him from the local library. Once the Swami asked him to bring the works of Sir John Lubbock. Accordingly Akhandananda brought them, one volume each day. The Swami would finish a volume in a day and return it the next day, saying that he had read it. The librarian argued with Akhandananda that the Swami had surely returned the volume without reading it, and remarked that the latter was only making a show of reading. Hearing of this the Swami himself went to the librarian and said, "Sir, I have mastered all those volumes: if you have any doubt, you may put any question to me about them." The librarian then examined the monk, and by doing so became fully satisfied. Great was his astonishment. Later Akhandananda asked Swamiji, how he could do it. The Swami replied, "I never read a book word by word. I read sentence by sentence, sometimes even paragraph by paragraph, in a sort of kaleidoscopic form." – Ref : Life of Swami Vivekananda - Volume 1     [  Page :259- 260 ] 14- WANDERINGS IN THE HIMALAYAS.

  So, when the memory, the mind, is developed in a particular way, it helps us to gather knowledge clearly.

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