TEACHING, A SCIENCE: 
 
 THE 
 
 TEACHER AN ARTIST, 
 
 BY 
 
 KEV. BAYNARD R. HALL, A.M. 
 
 PRINCIPAL OF THE CLASSICAL AND MATHEMATICAL INSTITUTE, NEWBURGH, 
 AND AUTHOR OF " SOMETHING FOR EVERY BODY," ETC. 
 
 NEW-YORK: 
 BAKER AND SCRIBNER, 
 
 145 Nassau Street, and 36 Park Row. 
 
 1848. 
 
.H;7 
 
 Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1847, by 
 
 BAKER AND SCRIBNER, 
 
 In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Southern Dis- 
 trict of New-York. 
 
 E. O. JENKINS, PRINTER, 
 No, 114 Nassau Street. 
 
CONTENTS, 
 
 Page. 
 
 Preface, -.,..,.. y 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 The Artist, . . , ' ^ . . . , j3 
 
 CHAPTER li. 
 The Science, or the End of Teaching, ... 45 
 
 CHAPTFR III 
 The Toola and Instruments, . , g4 
 
 CHAPTER IV, 
 Arranging and Managing the Material, , , . 1 1 5 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 Schools, in their Kinds, Sorts and Varieties, . 16 j 
 
IV CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Page. 
 Common {Sehoois, ..,..., 203 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 PersorK5 most saitaWe for Teacherg, .... 260 
 
 CHAPTER Vlll. 
 To the Young, . ... 289 
 
PREFACE 
 
 This book is not an experiment, but an experience. 
 Facts are here stated rather than theories ; yet the 
 former verify the latter as held by the author, in 
 common with numerous educators of the past and 
 the present. The experienced may speak without 
 ^immodesty, although many have already spoken on 
 the same topic ; while it is not a necessary conse- 
 quence that nothing remains unsaid. Should nothing 
 new remain, the testimony of a person for years con- 
 versant with theory and practice, may aid the inqui- 
 ries of many, and especially of such as are influenced 
 by the number as well as the character of witnesses, 
 
 A right to be heard conceded, an author must still 
 consider whether his experience has been sufficiently 
 long and varied in favorable circumstances, to ren- 
 der his m#re testimony of value, in case he advances 
 nothing new. Mis-judgment on this point is very 
 possible. For, while men over-rate their talents and 
 under-rate their influence, yet most think that a spe- 
 cialty belongs to their lives which authorizes the 
 obtrusion of themselves upon the world. 
 
Vi PREFACE. 
 
 The author's reasons for deeming his experience 
 of some value are these : — During twenty-five years 
 he has been a teacher. In the transition from boy- 
 hood he was a private tutor in a gentleman's family. 
 His early manhood was passed, first, as principal of 
 a State institution, and then as a professor when that 
 institution became a college. Since then, and dur- 
 ing the prime of life, he has been principal of schools 
 various in their character, some incorporated, some 
 independent and private. These schools have been, 
 some day-schools, some boarding-schools, and others 
 a combination of both. He has been also an assist- 
 ant, and thus he has learned to follow as well as to 
 lead, to receive as well as give orders. Mathemat- 
 ics, sciences, languages, and the inferior and superior 
 branches of the english, have been taught by him ; 
 ahd his pupils have been of several nations, of 
 both sexes, of every age, and of two opposite col- 
 ors — descendants of Ham, and also of Japhet. 
 Schools under his care have been hundreds of miles 
 asunder, differing in latitude, morally and politically, 
 not less than geographically ; thus compelling him, 
 if not inclined, to several modes of teaching, gov- 
 ernment and discipline. From all which, and simi- 
 lar reasons, he judges that the world will give him a 
 favorable hearing. 
 
 But more than the force of this consi^leration is 
 claimed for a perusal of the book : it states some 
 things new, and some old things in a new way, and 
 both advantageous to the educational cause. The 
 real value, if the new things and methods are dis- 
 covered, must be determined by the courteous 
 reader. 
 
PREFACE. Vii 
 
 In preparing the work, certain books were sug- 
 gested as containing valuable hints : the author, how- 
 ever, declined consulting these. A few works on 
 education, in whole or in part, have, in the course of 
 his life, been read, but never with the least view of 
 obtaining materials for his own. His own was to 
 be an experience, and that cannot be transferred. 
 He has, too, always wished to write rather than 
 compile. Works recommended may be better or 
 worse than this ; courtesy allows the former. But 
 the value of this book depends not in the least on its 
 comparative merits. Its main value is in the sepa- 
 rate and independent testimony ; experience and 
 inference are stamped on the pages. 
 
 Ideas derived from reading and conversation are 
 undoubtedly in a work of this kind. They are, per- 
 haps, in the following chapters never in a detached 
 form ; they are woven with the texture, and contrib- 
 ute to form a whole piece. Possibly one or two 
 phrases, and frequent sayings, whose parents are 
 dead or unknown, have been adopted as the au- 
 thor's own ; yet he pleads guilty to the fault of being, 
 usually, himself, and speaking his own words. He 
 has been constantly mindful of the poet's caution 
 about following nature — that it was his own. The 
 fashion, of late, in educational essays, lectures and 
 treatises, has, indeed, been the other way ; but some 
 prefer being out of the fashion, even if they must, in 
 consequence, be out of the world. Originality may 
 be nothing very striking ; yet our own copper 
 thoughts may please better than silver ideas stolen 
 from a neighbor.^ Novelty, at least, is refreshing. 
 
Viii PREFACE. 
 
 The younger class of professional teachers may 
 be most interested in this work. These must, for a 
 time, follow mainly authority. However seeming 
 the paradox, they, who modestly submit, in earlier 
 life, to proper authority, are the only persons that 
 become, afterwards, independent of authority. These 
 " grow wiser than their teachers," and are taught by 
 masters how to become themselves authority for 
 others. The self-willed, in spite of all empty notions 
 of independence, are preparing for a servitude end- 
 less and severe. Humility before exaltation, de- 
 pendence before freedom, is a law of our being. 
 
 Views, indeed, different from those elsewhere ob- 
 tained, perhaps opposite, may be presented "in this 
 work. Then, the young teacher must decide, 
 whether to follow the former authorities or the new ; 
 or he may question both. The smoothness of a too 
 easy credence is roughened ; unthinking obedience 
 is disturbed ; he stands in the midst of wholesome 
 doubts. Deeper search commences, that leads to 
 thorough investigation, not of books — these he now 
 in a measure distrusts — but of his subject as it offers 
 in daily practice. He is compelled to study nature. 
 Soon comes a modification of former opinions ; and 
 finally, a set of opinions self-originated, and com- 
 pounded of old and new. 
 
 Resulting systems cautiously, slowly, and labori- 
 ously created in honest minds, independent and ca- 
 pable of thinking, must, of necessity, agree in essen- 
 tial features ; and that essential agreement is truth 
 and nature. While different minds arrive at the 
 same or similar conclusions, still each mind is a sep- 
 
PREFACE. ix 
 
 arate originator. For the results are all reached by 
 separate and independent efforts. A thinker is vir- 
 tually alone in the mental world ; although the vis- 
 ible and tangible teems with individuals creating, at 
 the same moment, the same systems and theories. 
 Originality does not mean singularity. Millions 
 see the same sun ; but each man sees for himself and 
 not another. He does not see because others see ; 
 and without eyes he would see nothing. So is it in 
 the world of thought, so with all arts and sciences, 
 and so with the art and science of teaching, 
 
 The present work is mainly valuable as one of 
 the resulting systems. If true, it must coincide 
 with the experience of many. Idiosyncratic pecu- 
 liarities may be discovered, or possibly suspected ; 
 yet it follows not, that seeming peculiarities may 
 not prove, after all, truth and nature. 
 
 From these remarks, a work of this kind may not 
 prove without value to teachers and theoretic edu- 
 cators, of maturer age. Few know absolutely 
 everything belonging to their profession. Men, too, 
 of sterling abilities are truly modest ; and when long 
 isolated, they often become timid. Then they value 
 highly in others, what they themselves possess in 
 greater degree and abundance. On many points 
 they have correct opinions ; but still they are not 
 confident in their conclusions. Could they only 
 know that other thinkers hold the same conclusions, 
 they would be bold. With them, two are better 
 than one ; although they themselves may be giants, 
 and their comrades pigmies. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 But theories and practices need occasional cor- 
 rections. And even seeming peculiarities in an au- 
 thor, may awaken a salutary suspicion of peculiarity 
 in the reader. Habit becomes, indeed, a second 
 nature ; still, a habit may be like an old and favorite 
 coat- — the worse from the wearing, and scarcely 
 worth the mending. If the book is instrumental in 
 furnishing a better habit, although such may, at 
 first, sit awkwardly and pinch and rub, it may, in 
 time, make some worthy gentlemen comport them- 
 selves according to the dignity of the profession. 
 
 Books and systems of education are not reviewed 
 in these chapters. Reasons are not studiously given 
 for animadversion or commendation. Professed art- 
 ists are allowed to furnish opinions ; and these opin- 
 ions have weight with the reader according to his 
 estimation of the author. They may, indeed, be 
 subjected to examination ; although, where we sur- 
 render ourselves to the character of a writer, we 
 think that a surrender to argument, and an acquies- 
 cence in logical conclusions. An author, however, 
 who deems his opinions truth, cannot object if they 
 are regarded as rules, whether the induction be per- 
 ceived or not. His own mind is satisfied ; he pre- 
 sumes his opinions will benefit others. Yet, they 
 who are moved by authority against a book or a 
 system to-day, will easily to-morrow be moved in its 
 favor by a greater, or possibly equal authority. 
 
 The author is willing that his remarks should be 
 applied or appropriated justly ; but earnestly does 
 he deprecate special application and appropriation, 
 in any of the communities where he may have been 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 XI 
 
 a resident. Few, very tew teachers have such 
 cause of gratitude, and to more friends and ac- 
 quaintances, in different sections of the Union, than 
 himself. He has not, indeed, been exempt from un- 
 pleasant things ; yet honestly does he affirm that all 
 have been not more than a small drop of bitter in a 
 full cup of sweetness. He has every reason to love 
 his profession ; and nothing would be more painful, 
 than a mis-appHcation or a mis-appropriation of his 
 severe animadversions. 
 
 This book may be read without detriment by any 
 class. It is designed, however, for teachers, theo- 
 retical and practical, and for educators generally 
 for all who have children to educate or intend to 
 have ; for trustees of schools, visitors^ and examin- 
 ers, and all who attend examinations ; for legislators, 
 both those who are deemed fit for the house of as- 
 sembly by majorities, and those that think themselves 
 fit, and who will be sent when the political complex- 
 ion changes, and the logic of majority changes with 
 it ; for true patriots and philanthropists, and all that 
 would be thought such. It is designed somewhat 
 particularly for clergymen and students of divinity. 
 It has a very special eye to the interest of book- 
 makers and book-mongers ; and even the book- 
 agents, that show off and talk off school-books with 
 an admirable liquidity of glibness, and offer " new 
 lamps for old ones," may find in this book some 
 profitable hints relative to their benevolent vo- 
 cation. 
 
 In general, the style of the work is the simple 
 style of testimony. No pretension is made to be 
 
Xii PREFACE. 
 
 ranked as a book of elegant literature. The author 
 rather walks in slippers than steps in boots. But 
 criticism is not deprecated : the author expects to 
 be set right where he is wrong. If scourging is 
 merited, he may wince, but he will not whine ; and 
 if critics are mistaken, he may perchance endeavor 
 to show their errors. And yet, in justice to himself, 
 it must be said that a better choice of words among 
 synonyms, a more terse style, and an easier flow of 
 sentences, might, perhaps, have characterized the 
 book, if time and opportunity had been at the au- 
 thor's disposal. But, like his other productions, this 
 has, of necessity, been hurried ; his study being in 
 no particular place, and the merry sound of juvenile 
 I'oices being ever in his ear. He will try and do 
 better next time. 
 
 In conclusion, he says, ex animo, that he aims in 
 this work solely at usefulness ; if he fails in that in- 
 tention, his sorrow will be unfeigned. 
 
 Newburgh, Orange Co., N. Y., Nov , 1847. 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE ARTIST. 
 
 The just appreciation of our own, is no dispar- 
 agement of other men's office, character, or dignity. 
 It is sometimes due to persons who sustain a charac- 
 ter, or discharge the duties of an office, or administer 
 a law, to set such in their true Hght. The neglect 
 of that duty is not infrequently fraught with many 
 and great evils. We may, at any time — we must, 
 at certain times — magnify our office. 
 
 The character and office of the teacher, if not 
 the first, are among the first, in importance and dig- 
 nity. Nor does courtesy, or proper humility, require 
 this remark to be restricted to the profession as it 
 might be ; it is true of the profession as it exists. 
 Teachers enough, of every age, and in all the grades, 
 can be selected, who, embodying in themselves all 
 that usually challenges admiration, insph'es confi- 
 dence, and begets reverence in beholders, show 
 plainly that the possible and desirable is in the con- 
 crete as well as the abstract. 
 2 
 
14 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Measuring importance, grandeur, dignity, by 
 the nature of a service and the end to be attained, 
 the profession of a teacher stands eminent. Its end 
 is to form man ; or, it fits man for his duties. The 
 numberless essays on education ; the laws ever 
 made in civilized nations, with the rich endow- 
 ments presented by the State ; the countless books 
 and apparatus of instruction ; the almost count- 
 less teachers and schools ; the lectures on all 
 these principal and subordinate topics ; these, and 
 the like, all proclaim, with endless repetition, and 
 with a thousand voices, the opinions of the good, 
 the wise, the learned, the patriotic, the Christian, 
 the philosopher, and the statesman, concerning the 
 training of man. These all say that man untaught, 
 untrained, undisciplined, is, with all his native pow- 
 ers, of small value, either to himself or the world. 
 
 Not only is man placed in a world of materials, 
 to be arranged, fashioned, wrought, and applied to 
 uses ; but man himself, especially in his earlier days, 
 is a material to be fashioned by his superiors, and 
 thus to become adapted to the ends of his riper and 
 mature state. Without the forming hand of others, 
 man, like the unwrought materials of the earth in a 
 confused mass, would be almost valueless. Some- 
 times, like these, he would be a nuisance. At best 
 he could become but a tool in the hands of the 
 adept and educated. lie may have much negative 
 happiness, and be forced into industrious habits, 
 while dwelling in an enlightened community where 
 cultivated intellects give him the law, and guide, and 
 govern, and protect ; but, deprived of these advan- 
 
THE ARTIST. 
 
 15 
 
 tages by accident, and thrown back into the savage 
 state, and remaining himself uneducated, he would 
 soon degenerate into the worst forms of barbarism. 
 
 It is a great error, and it has an extensive and 
 baleful influence on sound learning, the common 
 opinion entertained oftener' than it is expressed, and 
 yet often expressed in places polished and refined : 
 that as many are rich, and prosperous, and caressed, 
 and honored, who are without even the rudiments of 
 education, therefore, the discipline of the schools, 
 and of learning, is not essential. And this opinion, 
 like a thousand similar falsities, gains strength from 
 the unguarded remarks of pettishness and disap- 
 pointment in the well-educated themselves. Yet the 
 error is as egregious as when non-resistants, encom- 
 passed in their homes by the militia of the country, 
 and the bulwarks of defence, tell us how secure they 
 are in ultra-peace principles, without fighting or 
 self-defence ! Let such pitch a tent, or rear a bark- 
 hut, in the far-oflf prairies, or the wide and tangled 
 forest, away from friends and amid bandits, and that 
 will test the truth of the ultra principles of non-resist- 
 ants. So is it with the unlearned and undisciplined. 
 
 Would we see at once what these fortunate per- 
 sons would have been without the advantages of a 
 cultivated society for the place of their residence ? 
 Behold it in the savage state itself ! The external 
 difl^erences between the brute and the man are 
 scarcely greater and more apparent than between 
 the man of nature and the man of art ! And harsh 
 as it may seem, we yet must ever rank, and gener- 
 ally speaking we deserve to rank, in the scale of 
 
16 
 
 CHAPTER 1. 
 
 excellence according to the degree of our mental 
 and moral culture. 
 
 On this point observations may be indefinitely 
 extended ; for, after volumes should have been writ- 
 ten to prove and illustrate the position, that man is 
 truly man only when educated and disciplined, much 
 and different would remain unsaid. 
 
 Is the teacher indispensably requisite to this for- 
 mation ? or rather this creation ? — for an educated 
 man is as much a creation as a painting or a statue. 
 
 The materials, indeed, of the moral and mental 
 formation are sought by the artist within and not 
 without his subject ; but all the qualities of the 
 artist must belong to the teacher : quick and keen 
 perception, the faculty of arrangement, taste, skill, 
 tact, patience, enthusiasm ! What, then, the vast- 
 ness, the dignity, the grandeur of the teacher's pro- 
 fession ! 
 
 In some things a maker is known from his works ; 
 in others his work is admired, but with no thought 
 of himself. And yet in this latter class of creations 
 or formations,the maker is no less worthy admiration, 
 and reverence, and thanks, than in the former. 
 
 In poetry, painting, statuary, music, architecture, 
 and some other arts, the formations of which break 
 upon the monotony of life, and delight with compar- 
 ative novelty, thus serving to recreate the minds of 
 beholders ; or the formations of which force and 
 rivet, for awhile, our attention, by being placed 
 amidst surrounding objects, dull and ordinary, per- 
 haps discordant ; in these we see the beauties, the 
 grandeurs, at once. We spontaneously cry, How 
 
THE ARTIST. j^ 
 
 wonderful ! how delightful ! how majestic ! and, at 
 the same moment, with feelings in unison with the 
 real excellence of the works, we think of the maker. 
 An isolated monument — a triumphal arch — a solemn 
 cathedral — a stately ship, graceful in the repose of 
 a swan-like dignity upon the bosom of still waters — 
 awake sentiments of admiration and reverence, not 
 only towards the works, but towards the workman 
 and contriver. 
 
 Myriads of common things, however, awake no 
 interest. We think no more of them and their 
 makers than if, like mushrooms, they had fortuitously 
 sprung from the earth. Yet many such things are 
 intrinsically excellent ; some are grand ; and talents 
 the most versatile, and genius the most commanding, 
 marked the originators and doers. Who is stirred 
 with profound emotions in beholding daily the ma- 
 chinery of a cotton factory, or any other wonder- 
 ful, half-sentient, life-moving apparatus ? Who 
 thinks of contrivance, and skill, and of architects, 
 on the bank of a canal, or on a Macadamized road ? 
 Yet great minds conceived and created these. 
 
 The surpassing glories of a diurnal sun ; the 
 matchless beauties of a nightly moon ; the sweet 
 fragrance of garden flowers ; or the changeful and 
 grateful colors of the meadow's grass, do not always 
 instantly move the soul of the beholders : but the 
 sudden gleam of strange meteors ; or the keen vibra- 
 tion of the unexpected lightning ; or the awful roar 
 of the deep-voiced thunder ; the heavy moan of 
 the ocean's mountain waves ; or the throes of the 
 earth's agony in the convulsions of an earthquake ; 
 
28 CHAPTER 1. 
 
 these speak and are heard — these stir the stagnant 
 depths of the heart, and force us to exclaim, ^' Great 
 is God." 
 
 Thus in regard to education : its admirable and im- 
 portant effects are so common that, Hke the rising of 
 the sun, and the falling of the dew, and the congeal- 
 ing of the frost, they ordinarily arrest no attention — 
 they are things of course — they happened yesterday, 
 we see them to-day, they will be to-morrow. But 
 when some herculean achievement in literature or 
 science, or some literary work, aside from the com- 
 mon track, is announced, then the mind is attentive, 
 and notices the vast wideness of man cultivated 
 from man in his native nothingness ; and then the 
 true excellence of all the means of education — its 
 schools, and colleges, and teachers, and professors, 
 and books — all come in for a share of admiration 
 and praise. 
 
 The teacher, in his office and profession, aims at 
 these grand results. As such results are wonderful, 
 noble, beneficial, so is that office full of all dignity 
 and grandeur ; and this, whether, from the com- 
 monness of the excellencies, they are noticed and 
 admired or not. Nay, as our souls are frequently 
 moved in serious meditation on what is most com- 
 mon, so the more we consider the daily and hourly 
 excellencies and advantages of education — the deep 
 horror of darkness that would be, if all its lights 
 were withdrawn or extinguished — the more shall 
 we revere the men of instruction ! 
 
 Teaching is a science ; and the teacher, redacing 
 its principles to practice, is an artist. That many 
 
THE ARTIST. J 9 
 
 professed teachers are incompetent, is admitted : 
 every profession has its pretenders. That few com- 
 petent teachers are fully sensible of the majesty of 
 their office, and its many and great responsibilities, 
 is too true : selfishness is more general and domi- 
 nant than benevolence. But the true teacher is an 
 artist. He resembles not an engineer on a steam- 
 car, nor a helmsman at the rudder of a ship. Such 
 men must be faithful and watchful, yet do they need 
 little intelligence and skill beyond the ability to turn 
 a spiggot, or to push a lever, according to rules pre- 
 scribed by the master-spirits of the boiler and the 
 compass. The existence of so many teachers, how- 
 ever, whose competency is only that of an ordinary 
 engineer and helmsman, and the great deficiency on 
 the score of generous and elevated enthusiasm in 
 many who otherwise are masters, show how deeply 
 rooted in the very core of the community is the be- 
 lief, that education is indispensable to the well-being 
 of that community. The heathen nations, rather 
 than be without any God, choose a thousand : the 
 world, for a similar reason, tolerate false teachers ; 
 and where the good cannot be obtained, content 
 themselves with the bad. 
 
 The true teacher is an artist — a former — a crea- 
 tor. Books, apparatus, systems of instruction, are 
 his implements. With these tools he erects his edi- 
 fice, he shapes his block of marble. He that depends 
 on these tools to do his work in education, is no 
 teacher in the lofty and proper sense of the term. 
 He resembles more the mason that looks to the hod 
 and trowel to erect the wall, or the statuary that 
 
20 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 asks the chisel to create ! Some — many — do, in- 
 deed, teach by line and rule, even as a street organ- 
 ist plays music by a crank : the latter produces the 
 same tunes, with endless reiteration, till the mechan- 
 ism wears out ; the former do with one mind w^hat 
 is done with another, and by applying the same in- 
 struments, and in the same manner ! or, they ad- 
 minister books and lessons as quacks do their pills, 
 potions, and panaceas ; they are equally pretenders. 
 
 No competent teacher undervalues suitable books, 
 apparatus, and systems. But, without the compe- 
 tent teacher, all such things must be more or less 
 insufficient ; sometimes they may be injurious. A 
 botch may essay to use the tools of a master-work- 
 man ; and, although he may to many seem to use 
 them aright, to the discerning, his work will be the 
 same as caricature. A good carpenter will prefer, 
 indeed, a good adze, because he can do better than 
 with a poor one ; but the botch would often cut the 
 worse, and in a wrong direction. 
 
 Instruments for many trades and handicrafts may 
 be so improved that a child may do the labor of a 
 man ; and an apprentice, or, indeed, a person igno- 
 rant of all arts, may do as well as the most adroit 
 and skilful workman : yet not so in education. That 
 cannot be done by mere machinery. Whoever, 
 therefore, aims, in making school-books, at such per- 
 fection as that, in elementary education, accom- 
 plished and competent masters may be dispensed 
 with, aims at an utter impossibility. His claims to 
 such contrivances merit contempt. He has never 
 been properly schooled himself He can be classed 
 
THE ARTIST. 21 
 
 only with the makers and venders of nostrums and 
 specifics ; and all who buy his quackeries, and, with- 
 out any skill and genius of their own, expect by such 
 means to become teachers, are like the credulous 
 and sapient folk that procure an herb-doctor's book 
 of directions, and his botanical chest, and commence 
 the practice of medicine. No wise and learned man, 
 if an honest man, can make such books ; and an 
 honest man, without learning, is incompetent to make 
 any books for schools. 
 
 The teacher, as an artist, possesses intellectual 
 and moral qualifications that must class him with 
 the best, and show that his office or profession ranks 
 among the highest in dignity and importance. The 
 teacher must be, among other things, a philosopher, 
 a judge, a ruler, a parent, a preacher ; and he must be, 
 also, learned and scientific. He must have power 
 over himself. He must be conversant with men as 
 well as books. He must be disinterested. He must 
 possess an ardent love of learning, and must de- 
 light in his creations, as specimens of an approxima- 
 tion to the beau ideal. And this spirit, and this en- 
 thusiasm, make him press onward through difficul- 
 ties and discouragements, and over obstacles and 
 impediments, unwearied, towards the attainment of 
 his end, unmoved by the carpings of the envious, the 
 insolence of the rich and covetous, the revilings of 
 the slanderous, the prejudices of the ignorant, the 
 baseness of the fraudulent, the anger of the revenge- 
 ful, the ingratitude of the thankless and the vile ! 
 He has contemplated the way ; he has seen its dan- 
 gers and darkness ; he has heard the fierce cries of 
 2* 
 
22 CHAPTER 1. 
 
 the wild beasts, and the howl of the cruel tempest ! 
 He has counted the cost, and at the end of a labo- 
 rious life of toil and sweat, he has seen poverty and 
 reproach ; and yet he has resolved that he will edu- 
 cate ! He has done this, even as others say, I will 
 paint ! I will carve ! I will write ! 
 
 This man's reward is not the paltry price so often, 
 so very often, doled out by grudging spirits, and 
 with an unwilling hand and a supercilious brow, as 
 if the pittance were more than a price ! as if a mas- 
 ter gave something to a slave ! or as if the teacher 
 receiving his fee were a hateful necessity to be 
 borne — a beggar to be fed ! No ! the teacher's soul, 
 stung, indeed, at meanness, suspicion, distrust, thank- 
 lessness ; pitying ignorance, with its self-compla- 
 cency and conceit ; indignant at the repetition of 
 petty frauds — his soul soars away up, far above the 
 grovelling, and looks from the lofty heights far on- 
 ward, when his productions shall stand majestic 
 among the cultivated sons of earth ! He sees his 
 children enacting and guarding laws, administering 
 justice, defending right, punishing evil, vindicating the 
 wronged and oppressed, patronizing the arts, repel- 
 ling the invader, by skill as well as by force ; he sees 
 him, with keen and burnished weapons, asserting 
 and defending truth ! he sees him an ambassador 
 from God to man — a preacher of the gospel of Christ ! 
 And then calmly, yet with a thrill, does the teacher 
 await that day, when the voice of One shall say, 
 before assembled worlds, " Well done ! thou good 
 and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy 
 Lord !" 
 
THE ARTIST. 23 
 
 Rarely does the world see in an artist more than 
 his skill. What constitutes skill few can explain ; 
 few, indeed, can understand in what it consists, if it 
 were explained. Generally, practice is deemed 
 skill. The differences between an ordinary and a 
 great painter, or between an inferior and a superior 
 poet, are regarded as differences o^ practice ! Rules, 
 it is supposed, are in existence, by a persevering 
 compliance with which any one may become an 
 artist, and emerge from dim obscurity to broad light — 
 may become, at last, a master ! 
 
 The importance of rule, embodying the wisdom 
 and discovery of experience in the past, and tested 
 by the daily application of laborious diligence, is ac- 
 knowledged. Rule is even necessary to skill. But 
 he that reaches the summit heights in art, must have 
 genius, and be a philosopher. 
 
 Rules are only the expression of principles and 
 truths, in their broadest shapes and forms. They 
 present merely the tangible and visible ; they 
 cannot embody what is ethereal and spiritual. What 
 rules do show, is truth ; and what is formed in art, 
 must have essentially all that rules contain. And 
 the formation must have also what rules do not con- 
 tain : it must have sometimes more — sometimes 
 less — sometimes a difference and variety — and al- 
 ways a vitality, a breathing spirit, not in the rules. 
 That spirit must be bt^thed into the creation by 
 the artist himself ! Indefinable things, and countless, 
 rules cannot contain ; they were never made to con- 
 tain them ! Sounds to move the soul with sadness, 
 or joy, can never be evoked from an imperfect in- 
 
24 CHAPTER 1. 
 
 strument of music even by a master's hand ; and 
 yet, in vain does other than a master's hand touch the 
 keys or strings of a perfect instrument ! The other 
 may play by note and he may play by rule ; but his 
 performance will be noise in comparison of the mas- 
 ter's melody. 
 
 The rigorous application of written and tradition- 
 al rules sometimes produces caricature. Rules, 
 more than these, are applied by the artist ; but they 
 are formed by himself from recondite and elaborate 
 study and insight into the inner nature of his sub- 
 ject ; or, from an intuitive perception — the result in 
 part of philosophic habits — he becomes, in novel 
 circumstances, a rule unto himself. 
 
 These remarks apply to the teacher. His raw 
 material comes into his hands, all alike seemingly in 
 most things, and really alike in many respects ; and 
 all seem, to the superficial observer, fit subjects for 
 the rigorous application of certain well-known rules- 
 If such rules are only faithfully and perseveringly 
 applied, education, it is thought, will be done on the 
 whole mass, and it will, of necessity, be changed in 
 due season into beautiful and useful fabrics ! 
 
 The teacher knows better. He knows that vari- 
 eties in species very great, and differences in the 
 sorts minute and countless, will not be fitted to the 
 obvious rules. He knows that the more inflexible 
 the rigor of the application of rules in certain cases, 
 the more danger of ruining the minds. If the teacher 
 cannot now be a rule unto himself; if genius and 
 philosophic power be not resident in him as in other 
 true artists, he will mis-educate ! It may seem a 
 
THE ARTIST. 25 
 
 small matter who teaches a school — but hundreds of 
 children are utterly and hopelessly ruined by inar- 
 tistical and incompetent teachers ! Small compara- 
 tively is the ruin of a statue or a picture, to the 
 ruin of a mind, either intellectually or morally. And 
 yet men will laugh to scorn the pseudo-painter or 
 statuary, and tolerate — tolerate ? — nay, will often 
 prefer and more liberally reward, the pseudo- 
 teacher ! 
 
 It is passing strange, that often when a parent or 
 guardian is about to commit a child or ward to a cel- 
 ebrated teacher, with directions to examine the 
 same, and to put him at such studies as shall be 
 deemed best, and with a tacit acknowdedgment that 
 the teacher is the one who can and ought to know 
 and judge for others — it is strange, that often these 
 persons, on learning the price of a true education, 
 will, at the moment, change their intention and send 
 the pupil where the educating can be done for less ! 
 When convinced that a painter is the artist to do 
 them upon canvass as they should be done, these 
 men pay the price : a daub from an inferior artist, 
 they will not have at any price — they would not be 
 paid to receive such. And yet these game persons 
 will choose a school where work is done a few shil- 
 lings or even pence less ! It is a great matter that 
 a yard of canvass be spoiled ! — it is nothing, that the 
 mind and manners of a child should be ruined ! 
 
 A school is sometimes called the world in minia- 
 ture. This saying is true. It is an arena for the 
 conflict of opposing and varying interests and pas- 
 sions. Here emulation has its excitement ; ambi- 
 
26 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 tion, its aim ; industry, its reward ; and sloth, its 
 punishment. Selfishness, here, leads to ungenerous 
 and dishonest behavior ; and benevolence here 
 displays its spontaneous and disinterested love. In 
 this theatre cowardice conceals its tricks, and 
 chuckles in secret at its mischief; whilst chivalry 
 does its achievements of daring, openly violating 
 and apparently defying law, and yet not intending 
 to despise authority. 
 
 Badly trained, or wholly untrained, at home, and 
 with no domestic pattern of excellence for imitation^ 
 boys are too often cast, a species of incipient savage 
 and ruffian, into a school community, just as some- 
 times into the wider world, with a last hope that 
 novel and exciting duties and pleasures, and other 
 circumstances, may control evil passions, guide way- 
 ward propensities into some safe path, and awaken 
 the dormant sense of honor and virtue. Hence* 
 many individuals, thus ungoverned at home in as 
 many separate families ; undirected into any path of 
 truth or virtue ; their corrupt propensities greatly 
 developed and strengthened by indulgence ; are all 
 congregated into a single family to be converted, or 
 reformed, anj disciplined, and governed, by one man. 
 
 What, then, shall he be deemed who controls and 
 guides this mass of heterogeneous materials ? who 
 rewards and punishes ? who turns indolence into dil- 
 igence, dishonor into honor ? who out of nothing 
 seems to produce something ? And all this not in 
 one case, but many ; and where the current o( evil 
 had received a steady direction and violent impulse, 
 from long years of parental misrule and vice ! 
 
THE ARTIST 27 
 
 The man that does all this, is the teacher. And 
 that person concentrates in himself, and far beyond 
 the conception of ignorance, all the essential quali- 
 ties of the legislator, the judge, the advocate, the 
 jury, the executive. And in him all are tempered, 
 and adjusted to the peculiarities of the mass as a 
 whole, and to suit the ever-varying shades of good 
 and evil where results are partly accidental, partly 
 designed — partly of malice, partly of mistaken sport, 
 partly of selfish indifference ; and where offenders 
 vary in age from early childhood to incipient man- 
 hood ; and where some are tempters and others 
 tempted ; and where the punishment suitable for one 
 disposition would be scorned by another, or crush 
 forever a third ! and where, govern as you may, 
 the world around, not merely of ignorant and spite- 
 ful persons, but of intelligent men, will say that you 
 have governed wrong ! For all that have never 
 governed a school, know usually how it should be 
 ' governed, better than the experienced. 
 
 In view of the difficulties of his station, well may 
 the teacher, adopting the language of an Apostle 
 exclaim — " Who is sufficient for these things !" He 
 that is truly what the competent teacher should be, 
 is, in proportion to his degree of excellence, so far 
 qualified to govern the world. Many a man, at this 
 moment the head of a school, and occasionally the 
 sport of fools, and the sneer of unwhipped insolence, 
 is fit to be their master and teacher in legislation and 
 statesmanship, as well as in morals, literature, and 
 science. 
 
 Were it the fashion for the men of schools, and 
 
28 CHAPTER I. 
 
 the men of theology, to come down from their lofty 
 pinnacles of pure atmosphere, into the dirty arena of 
 political strife, and if such dared to fight with a 
 demagogue's weapons, many a brainless coxcomb 
 would slink away like a discomfited cur with a 
 drooping and trailing tail. But " strive for mas- 
 teries," this way, they may not — they cannot. The 
 moral qualities of a teacher must be such as to cause 
 eternal war with the unholy means of most political 
 contests. Place, however, teachers in the halls of 
 legislation, on the bench of justice, or in the chair of 
 the executive — where their disciples and pupils 
 often are — and, place them, without unworthy 
 means, by which cunning unscrupulousness works 
 and worms through filth and slime up to defiled and 
 dishonored ofiice and station ; and an order of 
 excellence should be visible, worthy all praise and 
 imitation. 
 
 In the estimation of the wise, moral virtues out- 
 weigh the intellectual, and still more the physical. 
 What has the nature of a gift, may be in itself beau- 
 teous and admit many useful applications ; yet it is 
 less praiseworthy than what is acquired and made 
 one's own by self-exertion. The grandeur of moral 
 courage is everywhere admired ; and the moral 
 hero stands his own monument. But separate acts 
 of heroism may not require such courage and vir- 
 tue, as the tenor of a life, made up of continuous 
 acts, unseen, unrewarded ! That is a great soul 
 that can continue courageous in the way of any 
 duty, when the forfeiture of his daily bread, and con- 
 tempt and persecution, are the rewards of perseve- 
 
THE ARTIST. 29 
 
 ranee. '^ Greater is he that conquers his spirit, than 
 he that taketh a city," is taught by an inspired pen- 
 man. In this greatness the teacher is eminent. 
 Nor is his self-mastery on special occasions, when 
 preparation may be made, and when important and 
 distinguished witnesses are expected ; which circum- 
 stances of excitement enable many an inferior man^ 
 proudly for once or twice to conquer himself, and 
 " give the soft answer that turneth away wrath." But 
 the teacher's contests are endless ! The war of life 
 with him is one enduring campaign ! There are no 
 witnesses — nQ celebrity ! — save God and his own 
 conscience, and the glory of the great day ! 
 
 Be it remembered, how the anger of the human 
 breast rises up, when attempt is made to point out 
 faults ; and specially at rebuke, when the monitor 
 insists, moreover, that the faults shall be amended. 
 The softest voice, the blandest manner, the truest 
 disinterestedness, will not always secure a monitor 
 from the hasty expressions of petulance, and even 
 from occasional ebullitions of wrath. Wound man's 
 self-love with the slightest puncture — intimate the 
 blur of the smallest blemish on his immaculate vir- 
 tue, or the least abrasion upon the smoothness of 
 its poHsh — and the keen sensibilities of the pierced 
 spirit flash forth on the reddening face the flame of 
 a deep fire within ! Or if self-command repress the 
 outbreaking, the fire will burn with worse cankering 
 of the feelings towards the censor morum. 
 
 But that censor is a man of like passions ; and 
 when, conscious of the purity of his motive, and the 
 benevolence of his intention, and the dutv of his 
 
30 CHAFrER I. 
 
 admonishing, he is met with frowns, and answered 
 with reproach, is it ordinary excellence or an easy 
 task to master himself and avoid " sinning with his 
 lips ?" The man that can habitually thus conquer 
 his own spirit, shall, when the voice of the trumpet 
 summons him to battle in a just cause, and to face 
 then the cannon's crushing tempest of iron hail, "in 
 the imminent deadly breach" — that man shall, with 
 a resolved soul fixed upon his compressed lips, and 
 the measured step of the warrior march — Onward ! 
 He had faced unmoved the frowns of indignant and 
 contemptuous men, and stood calm amid the torrent 
 of bitter scorn from burning lips ! — to honorable 
 and sensitive souls, the edge of drawn sword and 
 point of levelled spear are not so fearful. 
 
 A man of this sort is the teacher. His war is a 
 daily battle ! and a war without excitement and 
 without honor ! He must ever " rebuke and exhort 
 with all patience and forbearance." 
 
 Beyond the daily and hourly conflicts of the 
 school-room, is yet a harder conflict with a man's 
 rebellious spirit — at those times when parental 
 weakness, or vanity, or prejudice, or supercilious, 
 ness, or ingratitude, or all combined, lead parents to 
 an ill-advised and presumptuous advice and rebuke 
 of the master himself ! — and this, where there was 
 good ground to expect honor, praise, and even ap- 
 plause ! Then one's own burning indignation would 
 burst forth, were it not for the curb of iron, and 
 the strong holding of a might gained- by long prac- 
 tice. As it is, the spirit chafes within to madness 
 and the wise man is near to the fury of a fool ! 
 
THE ARTIST. 31 
 
 What are many parents, but children, themselves, 
 of the larger growth 1 In such, the evil tendencies 
 of childhood have become strengthened and invinci- 
 ble ; while self-conceit and vanity supply the place 
 of knowledge and skill. How should these, that 
 never learned in early life, learn in maturity ? They 
 are simply fixed in their ignorance ; and although 
 they are too crooked to be straightened, they yet 
 need a master to control themselves as well as their 
 children. Many are, indeed, too old to go to 
 school, who yet need a master. 
 
 Theories of education are plenty. Every place, 
 noted or obscure, abounds with lecturers on the art 
 of teaching. Sometimes the creatures come in 
 swarms, like the plagues of Egypt. Sentiments and 
 notions are, therefore, nearly as plenty '' as the 
 blackberries ;" and the whole population gather for 
 themselves — not "grapes and figs," indeed, for 
 such fruit is not found on " thorns and thistles" — but 
 something very like " the apples of Sodom !" A 
 school made up, consequently, of very diverse ma- 
 terials, is commenced ; and the unfortunate master 
 is blessed with a Proteus, in the shape of a public 
 opinion, to help him do the educating ! His own 
 theory, and all his experience and skill, avail nothing 
 now ; he must obey the opinion of the neighborhood ; 
 and that opinion varies with the arrival of every 
 successive lecturer, who gives the advice gratis, 
 and sells his booksellers' wares for money. The 
 spirit of traffic adroitly infuses itself everywhere, 
 and can turn all things into gold. " The blessings 
 of education !" is a catch-word of book-men, even 
 
32 
 
 CHAPTER 1. 
 
 as " the blessings of liberty !" is, of the dema- 
 gogues. 
 
 What artist under the afflatus would endure 
 schooling, in giving his thoughts the embodiment of 
 the f^hisel or the pencil ! Who could suffer the un- 
 taught pertness of sciolists to guide the touch of the 
 master ! And all have notions about painting, and poe- 
 try, and statuary, and music : all would dare to guide, 
 if the studio were as accessible as the school-room. 
 But the teacher may neither cease from his work 
 because of his disgust, nor repay contumely with 
 scorn. A sacred duty to God and man ever impels 
 him onward. And his creations must be from materi- 
 als not passive, but rebellious ; not inert, but restive. 
 
 The necessity of forbearance on the part of the 
 teacher ends not here. Be he ever so learned and 
 competent — ever so industrious and indefatigable — 
 let him with an unsellish spirit aim at being a bene- 
 factor, and the public will not rarely affect to patron- 
 ize him ! Alas ! nominal teachers so lower the dignity 
 of the office, as to speak, in addresses from the 
 rostrum and the press, of parents, whose sons they 
 are creating — as patrons f 
 
 When a professional teacher works with a grovel- 
 linsr soul, and estimates the value of his school bv 
 the amount of the quarter-moneys ; when he sinks 
 into a mere workman or trader, and aims simply to 
 give the money- worth, thou may he talk of patrons 
 and of patronage. But the true teacher is the patron 
 of society. He can do without the world ; but the 
 world, if it would remain free and civilized, cannot 
 do without the teacher. A true teacher can live, 
 
THE ARTIST. 
 
 33 
 
 in a hundred ways, without teaching — yes ! and live 
 hetter — perhaps longer ; but with some such, there 
 ever rings a cry, heard by some in a still nobler 
 ofRce — " Wo is me, if I teach not !" 
 
 Do we speak of patronizing a judge, or a senator, 
 or a minister of the gospel ? or even a lawyer or a 
 physician ? Do not these men, if true men, patronize 
 society? Could society, constituted as it is, of the 
 good and the bad, do without these persons ? On 
 the same principles, it is utterly wrong to talk of 
 patronizing a teacher. He pretends not to indiffer- 
 ence respecting the pecuniary reward of his toil. 
 He well earns, and has a right to it ; but the world 
 should rejoice that he consents to labor at all, and 
 pay him with gratitude. 
 
 Let no one, then, insult our profession, by affect- 
 ing to be a patron ; and let no teacher meanly lower 
 the loftiness of its grandeur by a sycophantic fond- 
 ling in miscalling persons who are deeply debtors 
 to his labor and skill, for the excellence of their 
 children. 
 
 The teacher must stand in place of a parent and 
 a minister of the gospel. 
 
 Perhaps, all things being equal, a home education 
 may be better than a public one. Still, under the 
 most favorable circumstances, it admits a question 
 whether any education can be complete that has, in 
 no degree, ever been public. Reasons, more at large, 
 will be assigned hereafter to show that, were it pos- 
 sible, it yet would not be advisable to abolish public 
 schools, nor to make domestic education so exclu- 
 
34 
 
 CHAPTER 1. 
 
 sive as to confine it to separate and individual 
 families. 
 
 Two things are certain : Domestic education, for 
 the immense majority of children, is an utter impossi- 
 bility : if these were not educated in associate and 
 public schools, they must remain uneducated. And, 
 again, in cases almost countless, children are, in all 
 respects, safer in a school only moderately well dis- 
 ciplined, than with their own parents. Not only are 
 precept, example, restraint, discipline, all absent in 
 very many families, but the opposite of these all 
 abound ; and the children can scarcely be in a worse 
 school than at home. It is a great blessing another 
 school can be found ; and a great privilege for the 
 majority of children to be sent to a teacher other 
 than the parents. 
 
 Doubt may, indeed, arise whether children from 
 such families should be received by a teacher. But, 
 first, let the reader consider the deplorable state of 
 society if all unmannered and ill-disciplined children 
 were refused ; and next, let him be told, if ignorant 
 of the fact, that objectionable pupils do not belong 
 wholly to what are deemed by many the poorer, or 
 inferior classes. Experience tells a different story. 
 Very generally the most unexceptionable pupils 
 come from families inferior in walk, fashion, and 
 station, and not rarely from families only a step or 
 two removed from poverty. The indulged pet of 
 affluence is always the sorest thorn to a teacher's 
 rest, and tests his passive qualities to their utmost 
 tension. 
 
 The polish from becoming and costly dress, and from 
 
THE ARTIST. 35 
 
 graceful exterior, may momentarily cheat even ex- 
 perienced persons into a hope that the beauty with- 
 out indicates a still greater beauty within ; but the 
 illusion is soon dispelled when the pressure of study 
 and law and implicit obedience is laid, like a yoke, 
 upon the beauteous neck ; it immediately galls the 
 untamed child, first into peevishness, and then into 
 open rebellion. 
 
 Good and bad, and from families differing in rank^ 
 station and wealth, are, of necessity, usually com- 
 prised in the same school. The most guarded cau- 
 tion, and the nicest discrimination, and the most re- 
 solute determination, cannot have *' a select school," 
 in its best sense — a moral school. A " select school," 
 as to numbers, is possible anywhere ; a " select 
 school" of children, distinguished by certain supe- 
 riority of dress and fashionable manners, may exist, 
 where a monied aristocracy is dominant, or preva- 
 lent ; ^ut a school of the perfectly good is impossi- 
 ble. The name is innocently adopted by many wor- 
 thy teachers ; but it is a misnomer. If it be con- 
 sidered as a school for a few, or possibly, a school 
 where some extraordinary rigor will be used to keep 
 out the uncommonly bad, the name may be toler- 
 ated ; but if it means to teach that such schools are 
 necessarily purer in morals than larger schools, and 
 schools at less prices, it is an error ; and sometimes 
 it is impertinence, falsehood and arrogance. 
 
 Inquiry would discover that whoever can pay the 
 high price, is in general select enough for " the se- 
 lect school." 
 
 The less good are not to be excluded from the 
 
36 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 advantages of moral and intellectual schooling. 
 Even the vicious may be taught and reformed. If 
 none but the good and v^^orthy are to be taught in 
 schools — wo to the purity and the stability of civil- 
 ized society ! Schools, then, are an unavoidable ne- 
 cessity, as well as a national blessing. Whoever, 
 therefore, means to avail himself of the moral and 
 other advantages of schools, must take such with an 
 alloy of some evil. It is a condition of civilization, 
 that we must receive in many things good and bad 
 united ; and that we must benefit our neighbors, at 
 the hazard even of some injury to ourselves. We 
 may not always flee from a sickly neighborhood. 
 We must sometimes attend the diseased and the dy- 
 ing, at the hazard of infection to ourselves. And so 
 we are not always at liberty to educate our children 
 privately, if without us, public schools cannot be sus- 
 tained, and our neighbors' children are, in conse- 
 quence, deprived of education both domestic and 
 associate. 
 
 We may not, of choice, seek infection either phy- 
 sical or moral ; but we must not, in search of unat- 
 tainable perfection, retire from "the men of the 
 world." Far from us to say that, generally speak- 
 ing, parents may not, if they prefer it, educate their 
 children entirely at home, because they may, in other 
 ways at the same time, aid in supporting other 
 schools ; but it is by no means certain that children, 
 sedulously kept from all contact with evil by a spe- 
 cies of monastic home education, will firmly and 
 successfully stem a deep and wide current of evil 
 pouring for the first, and with an unknown and un- 
 
THE ARTIST. 07 
 
 conjectured strength, full against the inexperienced 
 boy sent forth from the parental or domestic study- 
 room. 
 
 Special reasons exist for making daughters ex- 
 ceptions to the preceding remarks. Where possible 
 let such always be educated at home, or near home. 
 And yet, very often, all the reasons in favor of public 
 and associate education for the one sex, apply in full 
 force to the other. 
 
 These remarks made, it is manifest that the teacher 
 must sustain the office of a parent, and of a minister 
 of the gospel. All the prominent duties of these 
 offices pertain to his. The pupils must be regarded 
 as his children, and, in some respects, as parishion- 
 ers. Times are, when he must preach to them, as 
 one watching for their souls, and held to render an 
 account. He must warn, rebuke, entreat ; he must 
 pray with his pupils in public ; he must pray for 
 them in private ; he must love them ; he must re- 
 joice with their joy, and mourn with their grief. 
 Thus acting, he will soon find that teaching is a holy 
 vocation ; that he may not, for light reasons, forsake 
 it ; and that, if God would sustain him miraculously, 
 he is bound to teach, as others are to preach, "with- 
 out money and without price." 
 
 The spirit of the age, in its blindness, finds analo- 
 gies where there are none ; and hence, in its zeal 
 for the division of labor, has in many places sepa- 
 rated the intellectual and the moral. The latter it 
 assigns to the parent ; the former, to the teacher. 
 How the moral is to be done in education, when pa- 
 rents themselves have no morals, and where the 
 3 
 
2Q CHAPTER f. 
 
 pupils never attend any place of worship, and are 
 under no pastoral guidance, Protestant or Catholic, we 
 are not informed. Some, most zealous for this curious 
 divorce of mental trainings, are secretly indifferent as 
 to the answer. The word moral, with these, is a 
 mere catch-word. If the schooling be done accord- 
 ing to law, morality may take care of itself. Knowl- 
 edge, with them, and knowledge alone, is power 
 enough for this life. The life to come is a dreadful 
 necessity ! It is only a hated end of this life ! Any 
 enactment, therefore, of a legislature, or any sove- 
 reignty of a wicked public opinion, that shall make 
 the intellectual culture the main or only culture of 
 schools, is hugged to the bosoms of these pitiable 
 men as a choice blessing. 
 
 Some, however, who advocate this unnatural di- 
 vorce, are misled by the adroit craftiness of the 
 others ; and are led along, under this and that pre- 
 text, as if by a string around their necks, silly sheep 
 or bleating calves, to the butcher's knife. The nomi- 
 nal Christians, as well as the genuine Christians, all 
 hold that this republic cannot continue without a 
 due admixture of morality and religion with our 
 knowledge ; and he, therefore, who does anything 
 to divorce the intellectual and moral trainings, acts 
 absurdly. Many a man acts traitorously. The 
 State ought to care for both alike. Public opinion 
 that is against religious training in schools, is a 
 usurper, and not a legitimate king. It deserves not 
 a moment's regard. It is worthy indignant scorn. 
 
 A man, it is said, may be shorn as to his chin, and 
 its adjacents, by a happy division of labor, if one 
 
THE ARTIST. 
 
 39 
 
 skilful knight of the curled pole will keep a shop for 
 lathering, and a brother knight, exactly opposite, a 
 shop for the razor application — although, where we 
 trust our throats to the edge of a keen blade, we 
 may safely trust them to a foam of soap and water ! 
 • Equally sapient the division of the mind between 
 the operators. That is as much a unit as the beard; 
 and he that may be safely trusted to do on it the 
 one operation, may be trusted to do the other. An 
 adroit intellectual operator can, in a thousand ways, 
 operate morally on the mind, if he see fit ; in other 
 words, he can lather and shave both, even where 
 he affects to keep shop for one operation only. 
 
 The man who pretends to teach, and basely agrees 
 to be silent as to religion and morals, is, in the first 
 place, not the most fit to teach even intellectually ; 
 and he is not safe, since, if he teach not religion, he 
 may infidelity ! 
 
 Sectarianism is not taught in schools ; but, if it 
 were, vastly better is any sectarianism than infidel- 
 ity, or nothingism. If a boy has no creed of his 
 own, let him adopt that of his master. And if the 
 master may not teach the law of God, let him not 
 dare to teach at all ; either let him wholly abandon 
 his office, or, while the persecution lasts, " flee into 
 another city." 
 
 Turn we, now, to the teacher as an intellectual 
 man. If highly cultivated mind, and the most ex- 
 tensive learning in all departments of literature and 
 science, bestow dignity, what class of persons is 
 more to be revered than teachers ? Not rarely they 
 are endowed with the noblest genius, and the best 
 
40 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 talents ; and their excellencies find ample scope in 
 the school-room. But, that very great learning must 
 be acquired by many teachers, and may be by most, 
 is plain enough to those who understand the variety 
 and perfection always arising from repeated excur- 
 sions into literary fields, and endless practice in 
 using what is known. 
 
 Supreme excellence, it is true, is usually confined 
 to a few branches, or even one branch of learning. 
 Yet, this branch is itself a host. It is perfect knowl- 
 edge and adroit use of languages, or mathematics, 
 or philosophy, or logic ; or, more frequently, per- 
 fect knowledge and skill in all these ! Here the 
 teacher pushes -his minutest inquiries to the ultima 
 thule ! here has he, not dim and obscure vision, but 
 accurate perception ! Here he is at home, where 
 other scholars are comparatively ill at ease ! And 
 when it is considered, that these subjects are princi- 
 ples and powers, and not mere knowledges and facts 
 aggregated, and yet disconnected, the mind of the 
 teacher must be a store-house of as^encies and instru- 
 ments, with skill to use any or all in a thousand 
 ways beyond the applications requisite in a school- 
 room. Who is ignorant, however, of the commune 
 vinculum, linking together all branches of learning? 
 The man that gets fair hold of one ring in the won- 
 derous chain shall soon learn to pull forth and stretch 
 out the whole ! 
 
 Specially are many studies cognate — being united 
 by a sort of cousin-german relationship. An intro- 
 duction to one of the family leads to an easy acquaint- 
 ance with the. rest. To how many Oriental cousins 
 
THE ARTIST. a I 
 
 will not Hebrew introduce its familiars ? He that 
 is intimate with Latin and Greek, may very readily 
 be intimate with a dozen modern languages, and 
 have a speaking acquaintance with another dozen. 
 The abstract mathematician may wind his way with 
 a sure thread through the mazy labyrinths of me- 
 chanics, and not lose his balance on the dizzy 
 heights of astronomy. 
 
 All this we see daily in music. One class of in- 
 struments renders easy the others of that class ; a 
 knowledge of any keyed or stringed instrument, or 
 of any wind-instrument, helps a person to play seve- 
 ral analogous instruments. Persons are found who 
 play perfectly on one or two instruments, and not 
 badly on twenty others ! 
 
 Teachers are not deficient in the esp^Ht du corps. 
 Hence, while many are the questions asked by " fools," 
 that wise men cannot answer, yet the willingness 
 to answer such as the wise may, both increases the 
 ability of answering, and makes the vulgar " won- 
 der that one small head should contain so much !" 
 
 Thus far, the remarks have tended to show what 
 teachers may be — nay, what, in the nature of the 
 case, they must become. That they should be such 
 persons is desirable. The question is, are teachers 
 such men ? Many men, of sight and fact, may be 
 disposed to ask, *' whether all this is not a teacher's 
 enthusiasm ; and whether he resembles not the 
 worthy artisans in the besieged city, who severally 
 supposed ' brick, leather, and iron,' to be separately 
 the best defence for the walls?" 
 
 Happy for the world that any class, or any indi- 
 
42 
 
 CHAPTER 1. 
 
 vidiial of a class, aims high. Happy if any strive 
 to form themselves after the model of a fair picture 
 even if the loftiest height be not attained, and mark- 
 ed deficiencies be found in the copy. But, could 
 we evoke from their classic shades, their Parnassean 
 heights, and their academic groves, the mighty mas- 
 ters of the Teaching Art, a convocation would as- 
 semble such as earth never saw ! 
 
 In that w^onderous assembly, kings of the earth 
 would themselves be awed, before a sublimer maj- 
 esty, and stand uncovered in a more august pres- 
 ence ! Sages of the world, venerable with the pon- 
 derous lore of hoary antiquity, and severe in the 
 gravity of all philosophy, and grand in the ineffable 
 dignity of thought, would there be seated in the sol- 
 emn sanctity of gods, a second Roman Senate, to 
 strike beholders with awe ! There would sit mas- 
 ters in all departments of science and literature ! 
 Men would be there, who, in the depth of retirement, 
 had prepared law for the government of the world ! 
 — men, who had abstracted and condensed principles 
 for all that is startling in discovery, admirable in 
 invention, useful in practice ! — authors, whose talents 
 and rare genius had crowded libraries with tomes 
 on all profound metaphysics and abstract thought, 
 and all morals ; and, at the same time, had playfully 
 scattered " thoughts that breathe, and words that 
 burn," over the leaves of ever-changing periodicals ! 
 and who, stooping from their loftiness, and staying 
 in a flight through purer air, had furnished the 
 school-room with books, by which children and 
 youths could be trained in knowledge and religion ! 
 
THE ARTIST. 
 
 43 
 
 Behold there, also, men, the parents of legislation ! 
 whose theories have been reduced to practice by 
 their disciples, mighty statesmen and lawyers ! Be- 
 hold there, in short, men to whom the world owes 
 nearly alf valuable and lasting in sciences, arts, lite- 
 rature, law, medicine, divinity, war — in all things ! 
 
 The very names of some teachers are volumes : — 
 Socrates, Plato — Reed, Stewart — Chalmers ! Our 
 page could be crowded with a rich catalogue of 
 worthies, who, during life, or a part of life, were 
 teachers — Dionysius, Philippe of France, Southard, 
 a Secretary of the Navy, Parr, Valpy, Arnold, Nott, 
 Alexander, Miller, Wayland, McVean ! Add the 
 distinguished women, such as Sigourney, Kirkland, 
 Willard, and many beside : " Sed prata biberint 
 claudite rivos !" 
 
 That persons more or less incompetent and un- 
 worthy, may be found in every department of teach- 
 ing, from the meanest hedge-school to the noblest 
 university, is true. It is also true that many crowd 
 into the humbler walks of the profession, because 
 they can do nothing else ; some, too, out of indo- 
 lence, supposing a few shillings can be there picked 
 up without bodily labor ; some from worse motives. 
 But medicine has its quacks, law its pettifoggers, 
 divinity its fanatics, and teaching has its pedagogues. 
 Such fungi and poisonous accretions, black and foe- 
 tid, are not, however, the stately tree itself to which 
 they adhere. They may, indeed, for a while con- 
 ceal the tree ; but when they are scraped away and 
 removed, the beauteous symmetry of the columnar 
 trunk appears. 
 
44 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Be it remembered — weeds spring and flourish 
 only in suitable and neglected soil. In a truly en- 
 lightened, liberal, benevolent, discriminating com- 
 munity, quackery could not live ! " Like people, 
 like priest,'' applies to teachers as well as to parsons ; 
 and " The poor pay, and the poor preach," are com- 
 rades in teaching as in divinity. When a society 
 retails hackneyed jests and worn witticisms at the 
 expense of an honorable profession, they are either 
 too deplorably ignorant to know good teachers ex- 
 ist, or too miserly to pay their just price. The latter 
 is more common — the former not infrequent. 
 
 But while blur and blotch deface the profession, 
 and more especially in the inferior grades, it is hap- 
 pily true, that in those grades are many men of no- 
 blest genius and talent. Men are there who, after 
 a severe and laborious apprenticeship, shall one day 
 stand forth pillars and columns of matchless excel- 
 lence and grandeur. Let them bide their time. 
 Their light may now be small, but it is true and 
 certain ; and at length it shall burn a sun in the moral 
 and intellectual firmament. Be assured that they 
 ** shall reap if they faint not." 
 
 In no profession is rigorous servitude in early life 
 so indispensable to the honor and influence of mid- 
 dle life and old age, as in this ; and the very fact of 
 long years spent in its many toils, is alone proof in- 
 controvertible of a superior soul ! The dishonest, 
 the timid, the untalented, the selfish, fall away. The 
 prize here is too spiritual, too distant, too lofty to 
 keep their mean hearts always moved, and their 
 ambition ever strained. Bid them pass into the herd ; 
 
THE ARTIST. ^e 
 
 why -should they aspire to govern, who are fit only 
 to serve ? 
 
 Concentrating all that has been advanced, and 
 allowing the whole to rest upon the balance, the 
 profession of teaching, both as a science and an art, 
 must, in importance, grandeur and dignity, weigh, 
 with equal poise, against any other profession in the 
 opposite scale, while it will easily outweigh many, 
 either separate or united. It challenges the trial. 
 
 3* 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. 
 
 Negative definition is often convenient.* Some- 
 times it is necessary, and even required by courtesy 
 and honor. Men may join us in a journey towards 
 a common point, who would have either travelled 
 alone or remained at home, had it been known that 
 our intended route did 7iot pass through certain well- 
 beaten or flowery ways. And not rarely, persons 
 will continue searching for what is wanted, where 
 it is not to be found, unless explicitly told that the 
 thing is not there. The author and the reader may 
 agree in much, but yet they may disagree in more ; 
 and that in which they disagree, may be so essential 
 to their good and agreeable companionship, as to 
 render it important to be the first thing known. 
 
 From such and similar considerations, we shall 
 first say, what is not the end of teaching. The end 
 is not to impart knowledge ; it is not to fit one to 
 make money ; it is not to constitute a practical man ; 
 it is not to fit a person for any one special trade, art, 
 office, or profession. 
 
 Here is an open avowal of rank heterodoxy ! 
 
THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. 47 
 
 Perhaps, however, after this candid denial of all 
 that the vast majority deem to be education, some 
 curiosity may have been created to know what else 
 education can be. The author and his reader may 
 yet agree. 
 
 The test of most things is the Cui bono ? It is ap- 
 plied, not to plans of education only, but to the very 
 erection of school-houses, academies and colleges. 
 Such find no favor in places, till their existence can 
 be demonstrated to aid the value of surrounding 
 property. 
 
 As to logic, metaphysic, language, and many ab- 
 struse topics, needed as discipline, the multitude say of 
 them, as FalstafF of honor — '' Can they set a leg ? 
 no : then I'll none of them." 
 
 This selfish spirit separates the practical from the 
 abstract, as if the latter were not the parent of the 
 former ! The selfish, however, live by sight, and 
 therefore by works, yet not their own — the works 
 belong too thers. But they despise what is not seen ; 
 and they can see nothing except the showy, the 
 active, the bustling, the noisy. 
 
 Whence comes the light of the practical, by 
 which they see and work ? It comes from the spec- 
 ulative. The thinkers lay out the work for the 
 doers. These servants are, indeed, insolent enough 
 tosneer at the comparative poverty of their masters ; 
 for the practical imagine the life to consist in the 
 abundance of possessions, and they cannot under- 
 stand that the speculative may prefer the refined 
 and absorbing delights of an abstract world, to 
 money-making, money-spending, or money-hoarding 
 
48 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 — main pleasures of the gross and merely active. 
 And yet, when accident or experiment sends down 
 from his height, occasionally, a well-disciplined spec- 
 ulative man, to apply his own rules, such an one, 
 after the slight errors almost inseparable from the 
 awkwardness of first attempts at practice are cor- 
 rected, such an one can contend always the best in 
 the arena, and carry away prizes from hosts of or- 
 dinary competitors. 
 
 The abstract can be without the practical; but 
 the practical cannot be without the abstract. When 
 sun-light lingers after the sun itself has sunk below 
 the horizon, while we rejoice in the farewell rays, it 
 would be folly to say — " This light is sufficient ; 
 why wish a sun?" It is equally absurd to say — 
 *' Practice is the thing ; what is the use of specu- 
 lation ?" 
 
 Time was when speculative philosophy may have 
 despised practice. Now science keeps an open 
 house, and with regal munificence dispenses favors 
 to all comers ; — magic wands, elixirs of life, and phi- 
 losopher's stones ! To suit the impatience and im- 
 pertinence of a money-loving and labor-saving age, 
 science has even turned quack ; and extracting the 
 quintessence of all subjects, she has put up morals* 
 physics, politics, literature, yea, all things, in con- 
 venient and portable forms labelled with suitable 
 directions, so that anybody, though a mere child, by 
 duly swallowing the distilled and filtered condensa- 
 tion, shall in an incredibly short time know vastly 
 more than his grandmother ! Alas ! the selfish pa- 
 tients, or recipients of knowledge and wisdom by 
 
THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. ^g 
 
 the patent process, when brim full, bray and kick at 
 their doctors — they evidently deem themselves full- 
 grow^n asses ! 
 
 For a time, when the world began to roll in maj- 
 esty over levelled mountains and elevated valleys, 
 annihilating time and space, it was natural and easy 
 to glide into mistake, by analogy. We transferred 
 to the mind what belonged to the body ; and hence 
 supposed that the general mind was moving faster 
 than at any former period. Some, too, who could 
 have sneered at Fulton and other speculative men, 
 as mere thinkers, began to suppose themselves actu- 
 ally flying, and seemed to leave the philosophers 
 themselves away behind in a hazy distance ! Many 
 moved with noise and thunder, and thought they 
 were in the march of mind ! but alas ! they were 
 only marking time ! — stirring, yet not advancing ! 
 
 Practice, so improperly separated and unduly 
 honored, was naturally followed by many and radi- 
 cal errors in elementary education, both in the 
 means and the end. For, if the practical is the 
 main thing, and if practical purposes are countless, 
 then must our training refer not only to practice in 
 general, but to the separate ways and means by 
 which a living is made, wealth sought, honor cov- 
 eted, or pleasure expected. 
 
 Hence what wonderous and sudden growth over 
 all Alleghania of school plans and systems ! — the 
 analytical, the synthetical, the inductive, the pro- 
 ductive, the American, the North American, the 
 South American, the Whole Continental American ! 
 It was equal to a shower of infant frogs ! Schools 
 
50 CHAPTER U. 
 
 too became nurseries ; and children fed on hashes, 
 and minced meat of potent essence, composed of 
 travels real and imaginary, and all history past, 
 present, and future, bloated out under the new fat- 
 tening process, in a few months, to the requisite 
 practical dimensions ! 
 
 Behold, too, the school-books of a mere practical 
 age. Surely " of ma/an o- books there is no end!" 
 They are, indeed, made, not written f Booksellers, 
 if they would take the time, need not pay for the 
 jobs ; but by the division of labor, much and every 
 way, is gained. Systems and books are truly — pro- 
 ductive ! Happy era ! two boys, may trade the 
 same jacket between them, till each shall gain five 
 dollars ! The same book-stuff may be hashed and 
 cooked in a dozen different ways : — pictures now at 
 the top of a page, and questions at the bottom ! — 
 then, pictures and questions reversed ! — then, pic- 
 tures in the middle, surrounded by a frame of crab- 
 bed-looking questions in small type! Wonderful 
 variety ! — it furnishes little and big potatoes to-day, 
 and to-morrow, big and little potatoes ! 
 
 And what benevolent regard for the intellectual 
 shallowness of pupils and teachers ! — in minute 
 directions when, and how, and how often, lectures 
 are to be taken! — in tender appellations of the pupil, 
 and the coaxing addresses and cheer-ups, as he ap- 
 proaches a little up-hill pulling, and the winning 
 smile of approbation, as a sugar-plum is bestowed to 
 reward the toil ! — in the ingenious machinery for 
 doing the literary, by which a clever boy puts in 
 some words and out comes an essay, as easily as 
 
THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. 5J 
 
 you would make a gridiron ! — and lastly, for fear 
 the shallows of subjects may possibly be too deep, 
 in that exuberant love that furnishes peddling school- 
 masters with keys. 
 
 Man of abstraction ! put forth a work leading up- 
 ward to the heights, or downward to the depths of 
 a subject, and along its length and breadth. Hark ! 
 from the " down-east " is a cry ! and it is echoed to 
 the " far- west !" — " Too difficult for beginners — too 
 speculative for practice — too aristocratic for repub- 
 licans — too dear for the people/" Behold ! then, in 
 due season, and almost simultaneously, forth come a 
 score or two of convenient, nice, portable, cheap 
 abridgments ! — and these, by other plunderers, in 
 turn, re-abridged, and re-arranged, or re-pictured, 
 or done with new type, or in patent binding, or with 
 some adroit trick to elude injunction, till the thing 
 suits the latitude of every college, academy, com- 
 mon school, normal and abnormal, infant and adoles- 
 cent, high, low, and middle, in the republic ! 
 
 Learned and competent teachers there are ; yet 
 not rarely does a self-styled master become tagged 
 to a well-bepuffed system, and fly along with it as 
 bob-tail to kite. Another buys a right to administei 
 books or lessons from one to six ; and he will re- 
 fund the monev. if the doses kill and do not cure — 
 referring, however, failure to the lack of capacity 
 in the patient, and not to any impotency in the sys- 
 tem. Professors multiply, like doctors of divinity ; 
 because the wisdom of the times, to prevent the 
 overstocking of any one profession, multiplies the 
 professions themselves, to keep pace with the in- 
 
Kg CHAPTER II. 
 
 creased demand ; and in return, these professors from 
 the people's college transmute men into philosophers 
 and mechanicians, by virtue of set phrases, subtle 
 gases, and mechanical powers. 
 
 The practical, working spirit, is indignant at the 
 idleness of mute vowels and dronish consonants, 
 and hates the characters that monopolize a dozen 
 sounds. Hence it has a new patriotic and demo- 
 cratic alphabet, (or perhaps alphabets,) to spell 
 things as they sound, and fix shadows forever ; so 
 that the " monooments " of its glory shall look and 
 sound the same until the end of time ! This fiffura- 
 tive style amounts to talking and reading by short- 
 hand ; and that is next to doing them by steam ! 
 
 A class of narrow-minded persons, while disclaim- 
 ing the intention of educating boys in the common 
 schools for mere store-keepers, or farmers, and girls 
 for mere mantua-makers, stocking-knitters, and the 
 like, yet loudly contend for an education strictly re- 
 publican. But of what should a true republican be 
 ignorant, if knowledge is so important in education ? 
 Is his information to be restricted to things of this 
 continent ? Shall he be taught that all virtue re- 
 sides on this side the water, and all vice beyond it ? 
 Why must his education in any one respect be less 
 extensive and liberal than that of Europeans ? And 
 if a severely disciplined mind be necessary for the 
 duties of a free citizen, how can a mind be properly 
 disciplined but by studies the same as are employed 
 in its discipline everywhere ? 
 
 Formal lectures have been delivered before pub- 
 lic institutions, to prove that it is not proper for 
 
THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. 53 
 
 American youth to imitate ancient patriotism. But 
 what avails such a caution, if at the same time the 
 Bible be excluded, or if men neglect its copious 
 and decided instructions ? It is taken for granted, 
 in all such excessive cautions, that nobody will or 
 can think for himself — and, therefore, that the 
 thinking must all be done for him. This argument 
 for the necessity of withholding classical studies, be- 
 cause of accidental injury to the weak and careless, 
 from misapprehension and misapplication of ancient 
 sentiments, resembles the papistical argument for 
 withholding the Scriptures from the common peo- 
 ple. And, indeed, if we abandon the discipline of 
 the mind as the true and only education, it may be- 
 come necessary to take from the unthinking every- 
 thing in the shape of an edge-tool. 
 
 But admit the false and narrow principle, that our 
 S3^stem of education should form republicans, what 
 is true repubhcanism? Different sections of the 
 country have different standards of orthodoxy, in 
 politics as in religion. Attempts are sometimes 
 made to educate men as southerners, as eastern men, 
 as western men ! And what is the effect, but to 
 cultivate prejudice and engender strife, not towards 
 other nations only, but towards the members of our 
 republican family ? We lay thus foundation for 
 lasting and secret dislikes, for clannish hostilities, 
 as ruinous as ignorance or despotism. 
 
 Look, for instance, at certain school-books com- 
 piled on patriotic principles. A special section of 
 the country is assumed as the true centre, around 
 which others revolve, and the true meridian as to 
 
54 
 
 CHAPTER 11. 
 
 which all cHmates, cities, peoples, manners are com- 
 pared and contrasted. The comparisons are, often, 
 like that of comparing the size of a stone to a lump 
 of chalk. This presumption may provoke a smile ; 
 but what shall we do, when sometimes in such 
 school-books appeals are made to ignorance and 
 prejudice ? Pictures, we are told, give a condensed 
 representation of the leading features of a country 
 — its habits, tastes, pursuits, and the like. It is a 
 time and labor-saving mode of acquiring knowledge 
 and philosophy. In some school-books the South is 
 represented by the picture of a negro under the 
 lash ! or a planter on horseback, surrounded with 
 his dogs ! — to intimate that cruelty and idleness are 
 the characteristics ! And again, to show European 
 nations at a glance, we have pictures of noblemen 
 in sleighs, approving the dexterity of the driver in up- 
 setting half-a-dozen common folk into the deep snow, 
 and in spite of all their praiseworthy attempts to 
 keep out of harm's way ! or pictures of pampered 
 and lordly horses, most inconsiderately prancing on 
 a prostrate beggar, who in self-defence (first law of 
 nature !) is sticking up his wooden leg, not in defi- 
 ance, but in a most piteous and implo-ring attitude. 
 Alas ! hard-hearted urchins of the school-room 
 oftener laugh than cry at such pictures. 
 
 And this is repubHcan education ! We need do 
 nothing in school-books to foster prejudices, or pro- 
 mote political sectarianism ; weeds grow without 
 culture. Better to cultivate a spirit of philanthropy. 
 Grant us true teachers, with any or no system ; and 
 provided the State will let such men alone, our chil- 
 
THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. 55 
 
 dren, during the intellectual training, can be in- 
 structed in religion and morals ; and taught also to 
 value our civil liberties above all earthly blessings — 
 to die, if it must be, in their defence. The place of 
 their nativity they may specially love, and certain 
 employments they may prefer ; and yet they may 
 be taught to make a home in that place whither, in 
 the whole world, choice may lead or necessity drive ; 
 and to regard other men's sinless occupations and 
 recreations as equally honorable as their own. Our 
 children should not be forced by partial systems to 
 follow the trail of their ancestors, or to consider 
 trades, arts, professions hereditary. 
 
 Another class exists, not indeed narrow-minded, 
 but, through the influence of the practical spirit, 
 mistaken. These are willing to educate liberally 
 and extensively, provided short time be spent in the 
 process, and the greatest possible amount of all 
 kinds and sorts of knowledge be acquired. In their 
 hands, education becomes cramming. But, if possi- 
 ble to crowd a gallon of water into a gill measure, 
 it would end in the destruction of the receiver — un- 
 less phrenological art devise some way of making 
 heads stronger than nature. To this mistake, we 
 owe the flood of school-books ; for, whatever this 
 class of persons conceive important to be known at 
 any time of life, is deemed necessary to be known 
 in childhood ; and what may be needful for some, 
 needful for all. Hence, in addition to the former stock 
 of subjects, are books on mineralogy, conchology, bot- 
 any, anatomy, geology, natural history, architecture, 
 
56 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 infant chemistry, infant physics — perhaps, on swim- 
 ming, riding, shooting, saiHng — and on shoemaking, 
 tailoring, preaching, curing, lawing — and, what 
 not? If a boy studied at school the mere knowledges 
 for which school-books are prepared, he would, at 
 even sixpence apiece, soon exhaust his purse, and 
 require, not a satchel and a strap, but a wheelbarrow 
 and a porter. 
 
 We contend, that to impart knowledge is not the 
 chief, nor most important part of true education. 
 It is, in fact, no part of discipline. Without disci- 
 pline, knowledge is almost useless ; not infrequently 
 a folly and injury. Mere knowledge *' puffeth up." 
 Rarely is it ever increased beyond the meagre de- 
 tails of elementary books. The mind untrained, 
 endless misapplications of knowledge lead to losses 
 and constant derision. The " knowledges," as they 
 may be called, are innumerable ; but rigorous disci- 
 pline requires few books, and, after all the loud 
 cry in favor of cheapness, it requires less price, and, 
 if not a less, at least a definite time. 
 
 We are ready, now, to say what the end of edu- 
 cation should be, and what it always has been with 
 the wise. It is to teach an art. It is to'create or 
 form thinkers. The end of education is, the Power 
 or Art of Thinking. By this art is meant, a state of 
 the soul or mind in which it is Jitter fo^^ all and for 
 more uses than in its natural state. Like other arts, 
 this may be taught and learned ; and, like them, 
 it depends partly on rules and principles derived 
 from masters, and partly on its own exertions and 
 
THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. 57 
 
 practice. When the power approximates perfec- 
 tion, the soul begins to see intuitively, and the pu- 
 pil has what is termed presence of mind. 
 
 When perfect, this art renders the mind calm, 
 thoughtful, discriminating, prompt, energetic. It 
 helps to see and weigh the absolute and relative im- 
 portance of every subject within our scope ; to fol- 
 low truth in what is new, and reject error in what 
 is old. The soul, in possession of itself, hastens not 
 to conclusions ; it sees the end from the beginning ; 
 it counts the cost. We learn not to be amazed at 
 the mighty achievements of human skill, ingenuity, 
 perseverance : we scarcely are surprised. We 
 praise and blame, not as schemes are successful and 
 unsuccessful, but according to their intrinsic charac- 
 ter at the hour of formation. Taught by this art 
 self-knowledge, we make allowances for weakness 
 and errors, arising from temptation, nervous irrita- 
 tion, and irrepressible pains and anxieties. 
 
 In our intercourse, this art becomes tact. This 
 keeps us attentive to the minutest actions. To the 
 discerning, a man of disciplined mind may be known 
 by the way in which he walks, stands, sits, eats — 
 by the way he takes up or lays down a book, opens 
 or shuts a door, manages an umbrella, stirs a fire ! 
 The art promotes politeness, order, decency, rever- 
 ence, good will ; in short, " whatsoever is lovely and 
 of good report.*' It puts a man in possession of him- 
 self ; it gives him victory over his spirit ; it supports 
 unostentatious dignity ; it prevents the oft-used plea 
 of indolence, vanity, presumption, selfishness and 
 folly, condensed in the formula — " Oh ! I never 
 
58 CHAPTER n. 
 
 thought /" And it makes the man, when verging 
 towards that apology, rebuke his own spirit, in the 
 style of Chesterfield : " Why, you fool ! what were 
 you thinking about, when you should have thought !" 
 
 How shall this art be taught ? We answer, how 
 does a wise master mechanic proceed with an ap- 
 prentice ? Does he seek, and in the shortest possi- 
 ble time, to fill him with knowledge on the subject? 
 Does he simply tell the lad the names and uses of 
 tools, and the different parts and pieces of a con- 
 structed work ? and require the boy to commit to 
 memory pretty little books of pictures and questions, 
 to be recited like " a good little fellow," at proper 
 periods ? Does the master read to the apprentice 
 lecfures on the history of the art ? and by ingenious 
 methods look for the " developments ?" Does he, 
 in a word, allow the apprentice to be a passive re- 
 cipient ? and when stuffed, set him up with an im- 
 posing stock of ready-made articles, as are seen in 
 a slop-shop ? No ; he makes the boy work, like a 
 servant, with each and every instrument, from a 
 jack-planing process up to the French polish ; and 
 when idle and disobedient, he anoints him with an 
 unguent well known in the common arts, if unknown 
 in the chemical nomenclature — the oil of birch. 
 And when the well-disciplined apprentice has- the 
 whole subject wrought into him, and can think in 
 and about it, the master furnishes the raw material ; 
 and the boy, himself a master now, advertises inde- 
 pendently for orders, and is ready to work after any 
 model, new or old, or invent patterns of his own. 
 
 We know how changes are rung on the popular 
 
THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. 59 
 
 doctrine, " Knowledge is power !" We know, too, 
 the insufferable conceit of many well filled with all 
 " the knowledges," who swell out as if filled with 
 all power. But mere knowledge is not power ; at 
 best, a power to be used only by men of thought. 
 Men of mere knowledge are themselves obedient to 
 men of thought. The man of thought can do with 
 less knowledge than the other ; but he adds to his 
 daily store whatever he deems useful. The Art of 
 Thinking is power. 
 
 Does any one suppose that the facetious gentle- 
 man, who, when the ordinary means of pouring cold 
 water over their heads, and pulling at their tails, had 
 failed, separated the fighting dogs by emptying the 
 contents of his snuff-box into their eyes, did this be- 
 cause he had learned at school that " snuff, in suita- 
 ble quantities, administered fo eyes and nose, is a 
 good remedy for separating fighting dogs ?" No ; 
 the gentleman so acted because .he was a thinker. 
 Out of a dozen snuff-boxes present, not another was 
 produced ; not that the crowd did not know that 
 snuff would blind a dog and make him sneeze, but 
 because they did not think of that peculiar applica- 
 tion of their knowledge. When, therefore, this 
 thinker retired from the applause of the people, say- 
 ing, " Knowledge is power," he might have added, 
 *' provided you think when and how to use it." 
 
 Men of thought are, then, superior to men of 
 mere know^ledge. Like the poor wise man com- 
 memorated in the Ecclesiastes, men of thought may 
 be disregarded in days of prosperity ; yet these only 
 can save the city and the country in days of adver- 
 
50 CHAPTER II. 
 
 sity. Noisy and conceited doers may affect to 
 despise the others ; but men of thought are the real 
 masters of the world, and that mastership is ac- 
 knowledged in emergencies. Then they come from 
 their retirement, and show how knowledge is to be 
 used. It is of thinkers we stand in awe ; to them 
 we do homage ; to them we go for light in dark- 
 ness, guidance in prosperity, succor in danger. 
 Their predictions are quoted as oracles, their senti- 
 ments adopted for rules. The very concession that 
 the rigorous course of elementary training, of which 
 we shall presently treat, is proper for persons whose 
 employments are regarded as rather mental than 
 corporeal, shows that severe discipline is indispen- 
 sable for thinkers. It seems to say, too, that, as the 
 vast majority of persons are not to think, they need 
 only knowledge of rules, or laws of action, to be 
 furnished by the others, as masters to the servants . 
 
 If proper discipline, however, can transform any 
 into thinkers, who otherwise must remain mere 
 agents ; if that discipline can cause many to approx- 
 imate to the nobler rank ; are we tamely to relin- 
 quish privileges, and do what we can by apathy and 
 indolence, to create an upper caste ? Shall we be 
 governed by an oligarchy, who exercise the most 
 potent of all masterships, a mastership over our 
 souls ? and who, if bad men, will exercise that for 
 evil ? Granting that knowledge is a power, why not 
 make it two-fold, aye, a thousand-fold, by adding the 
 power of thought ? 
 
 The art of thinking is not for the poor, nor the 
 rich ; not for the mechanic, nor the farmer ; not for 
 
THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. gj 
 
 the clergyman, nor the layman ; it is for all. It may, 
 in some degree, be taught to all. True education 
 is not to constitue the pupil a practical artist of any 
 kind — a doer ; it does not make one immediately 
 even a scholar. Education, while elementary, is to 
 fit the pupil by training his mental powers for the 
 subsequent instruction of masters in law, medicine, 
 divinity, merchandise, politics, eloquence, poetry, 
 painting, engineering, farming — in everything intrin- 
 sically worthy of being styled an art, trade, science, 
 profession. Nay, those very mechanical arts that 
 put hats on our heads, shoes on our feet, and coats 
 on our backs ; that supply bread and meat for our 
 tables ; all such would be still more honorable and 
 profitable if their masters were not mere doers, but 
 also thinkers. 
 
 Who can estimate the loss of time, the misdirec- 
 tion of powers, the waste of material, the absurd, 
 schemes in ordinary mechanical arts, from want of 
 the power of thought ! How many fine estates 
 have been wasted, how many characters blighted, 
 how much good influence paralyzed, how many 
 lives lost, how many governments overthrown — in a 
 word, how much ruin, temporal and eternal, in 
 every class of life, has ensued, not always from any 
 special depravity, but simply from want of thought ! 
 
 Proper elementary education prepares for the 
 countless offices and duties of life, by far more diffi- 
 cult and important than the duties of any separate 
 art, trade, employment, or profession. The mode in 
 which we gain a livelihood, is not the only way in 
 which thought is to be used. Society claims us ; 
 4 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 and that society cannot be safe without the intellect- 
 ual culture of its members. We shall act as pa- 
 rents, as children, as citizens, as officers and law- 
 givers, as select-men and counsellors, as trustees 
 of corporations, as school-committees and exam- 
 iners, as commanders of armies and navies — yes, 
 we shall act in a thousand ways, when the interests, 
 characters and lives of men depend, not on our ac- 
 tivity, our industry merely, but on our power of 
 thought. It is a wretched theory that confines se- 
 vere mental discipline in primary education to a few ; 
 for although, if the majority choose to surrender 
 the right, a comparatively few thinkers may fill 
 many offices of ruling and teaching, yet there re- 
 main innumerable offices and duties, that unless the 
 many are competent, must be either wholly neg- 
 lected or badly filled and discharged. 
 
 But if society did not need all its members, shall 
 the delights of disciplined minds be denied to the 
 mass ? Are men made expressly and only to saw 
 boards, drive nails, polish marble, measure tape, 
 drive oxen, rake hay, inspect ledgers, command 
 ships? Are women made to study dressing, follow 
 fashions, sew at cat stitch, make butter, milk cows, 
 rub furniture, sweep rooms, alter bonnets ? When 
 weary of all this, shall they sleep, or betake them- 
 selves to frivolity or scandal ? Shall this be the an- 
 nual round, year after year, tiW the end of life ? 
 Shall the minds of these be forever occupied with 
 what they shall eat, and drink, and wear, and gain 
 and lose? Was the godlike spirit meant for this ? 
 A disciplined mind would enable such to find count- 
 
THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. go 
 
 less joys and refreshments at home ; and would do 
 more than volumes of censure to destroy the ball- 
 room, the theatre, and places of doubtful character 
 and tendency. 
 
 To the writer, an mdependent and deep thinker, 
 who, master of any art or trade, mechanical, agri- 
 cultural, or mercantile, adorns, improves, and makes 
 it more useful to himself and the community ; and, 
 ever and anon steps from his shop, his counter, or 
 his field, to fill adequately some office of honor and 
 trust, seems to stand on the same elevated plane 
 with men especially deemed scholars and professors. 
 This man is felt. He controls his neighborhood. 
 He blushes no more at his means of livelihood, than 
 men who live by the fine arts or by the learned pro- 
 fessions. Nay ; as he is practical, he can do as well 
 as direct. He is a light of the world ! He shows 
 there ought to be two castes only — the industrious 
 and the idle — the good and the bad. 
 
 True it is, that, with the best discipline, the ma- 
 jority will remain unable to cope with those whose 
 very professions are conversant with logic. But if 
 we may not move in orbits of the greatest ampli- 
 tude, shall we, therefore, resolve to move in orbits of 
 the least ? And if, with the best elementary train- 
 ing, we may be inferior, how is it if we have the 
 worst training, or none ? A man may not be com- 
 petent to lead ; but he may be competent to deter- 
 mine who shall lead, and whom he will follow. If 
 that be the competency of the mass, we shall be in 
 less jeopardy of becoming slaves of Rome, or any 
 other infidel or anti-christian hierarchy, or despot- 
 
64 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ism. And from this slavery mere knowledge cannot 
 save. Not only is a little knowledge a dangerous 
 thing ; but, without an educated, disciplined mind, 
 any or all knowledge is dangerous. 
 
 Minds, like bodies, have varieties, sometimes wide 
 differences ; and this, whether genius be separate 
 from talents, or the special power of concentrating 
 talents to one point, or for one object. No severity 
 and excellence of discipline can, therefore, destroy, 
 perhaps even lessen these distinctions. A mind of 
 inferior order, if duly cultivated, will usually excel, 
 in practice, an uncultivated mind of high order ; so 
 a well-tilled soil, although inferior, yields a more 
 abundant crop than a soil neglected, of a superior 
 quality. A persevering tortoise crawls slowly, in- 
 deed, but certainly, beyond a slumbering fox. But 
 while different orders of mind, equally disciplined, 
 go far beyond the progress of their undisciplined 
 state, their original, created, and relative distances, 
 in this life certainly, and possibly in the next, shall 
 remain as really and visibly as the spaces between 
 the forward and hinder wheels of the steam-car, 
 while all yet roll onward obedient to the impulse ! 
 
 Be the mind comparatively what it may, the 
 power of thinking gives it self-possession ; and that 
 mere knowledge received without effort, or with 
 small effort, never does. In this state the mind 
 craves knowledge as its pabulum and material, but 
 with an enlarged capacity of acquiring knowledge, 
 and ample room and skill to store the stock, with 
 art to use it when needed. Even tools that would 
 lie unemployed in other men's chests, who may have 
 
THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OB' TEACHING. Q^ 
 
 some knowledge of their use, serve the disciplined 
 better than untutored owners. Power of thought 
 turns a small capital to answer the purpose of a 
 large one, and laughs at the occasional prodigality 
 of mere knowing. 
 
 This valuable art can be learned. But the way 
 is long and difficult ; not, perhaps, more so than the 
 way through " the knowledges :" and yet well worth 
 double the toil and expense of the popular method, 
 if the intrinsic excellence and practical advantages 
 of the art are appreciated. The mind must be long 
 exercised in severe and rigorous studies. 
 
 Is the soul equal to the body ? then ought the 
 soul to be worth a discipline analogous to that of 
 the body. Is it superior ? then ought we to blush 
 at the preference generally shown for a bodily dis- 
 cipline. The body is subjected to the discipline of 
 the gymnasium in order to be formed to a graceful 
 carriage, to obtain robust health, to acquire adroit 
 motions, and to be competent to feats of dexterity 
 and strength. What is the awkward gait of the un- 
 practised to the fairy steps of the elastic dancer, or 
 the arrowy flight of the racer ? what the cleaver- 
 like hackings of a recruit to the lightning point of 
 the swordsman ? Trained skill of weakness shall 
 easily foil the giant efforts of rude strength. A child 
 by the aid of his hands, can, in many things, excel 
 an ox ; and what hands are to the body, so is the art 
 of thinking to the soul. 
 
 If the body, with the world's approbation, be sub- 
 jected to a rigorous discipline, why should the soul 
 be neglected ; or why be deemed unworthy pains 
 
66 
 
 CHAPTER 11. 
 
 bestowed upon the body ? Shall the clay taberna- 
 cle, tumbling into ruins from the shock of its own mo- 
 tions — a scabbard wearing from the keenness of its 
 own sword — receive all the care ? and -that which 
 becomes more alive from its very activity, and is 
 destined to flourish forever — the undying soul, not 
 be fully' prepared for the exercise of its noblest fac- 
 ulties ? Surely the soul ought not to grope in dark- 
 ness, to be appalled at imaginary danger, to be de- 
 based by superstition, to be driven about by every 
 wind of doctrine, to become a tool and a slave to 
 the designing ! 
 
 All feeling and argument, therefore, which favor 
 the smallest degree of suitable intellectual discipline, 
 separate from passivity, in the recipiency of knowl- 
 edge, favor the highest degree. 
 
 Let it be distinctly understood. The final end of 
 intellectual discipline, is the largest possible capa- 
 city to serve God. As we write in part for practical 
 men, and some such have small faith and others no 
 faithjWe remark, that, overlooking the true end, and 
 regarding the secondary — practical advantages — no 
 education so well secures that end as the one now 
 recommended. We are willing to do again, what 
 to a considerable extent we have done, in various 
 ways, repeatedly — to submit the matter to the test 
 of experiment. If possible, let two young persons, 
 equal in all respects, he selected, and separately edu- 
 cated ; let the period be for the same term of years, 
 but not less than five nor more than ten ; let one be 
 trained in the modern system of knowledges, and 
 the other in any system of the severe old school, 
 
THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHLNG. Q^ 
 
 rod-enforced, self-exerting, spirit-trying, patience- 
 provoking, labor-causing, toil-producing, but spe- 
 cially in the system directly to be recommended ; 
 then, launch both the pupils, at the same time and in 
 the same circumstances of poverty and destitution, 
 into the troubled waters of life. The latter shall be 
 seen swimming, or wading, or walking, as the tide 
 demands or admits ; the former, floating, or driven 
 at the mercy of the winds, mired or sinking ! Or 
 let both pursue a professional or literary life. The 
 truly disciplined, with even less knowledge, shall 
 very soon excel the other in any assigned task ; 
 shall, if necessary, excel him in acquiring knowl- 
 edge, and this with so much ease, that ten years af- 
 ter the academical training shall have ended, the 
 world shall ascribe the differences, not to the oppo- 
 site elementary trainings, but to differences in native 
 intellectual powers. 
 
 Turn we now to the proper system by which the 
 art or power of thinking may be acquired. This 
 system boasts no captivating name. It is not the 
 analytical, the synthetical, the inductive. Nor is it 
 antagonistical, opposing the Latin to the English, or 
 the English to the Latin. It is calculated for no 
 one meridian ; nor is it made specially for the great 
 valley of the Mississippi, or any other great valley. 
 The system — alas ! for its success ! — is not even a 
 new system ! It has some antiquity in its favor — it 
 has been tested by ages — and it is modest and sim- 
 ple ! But, before naming our favorite method, let 
 us look a moment at some leading things to be done 
 by any intellectual discipline. 
 
Qg ' CHAPTER 11. 
 
 And first, it is desirable to exercise and strengthen 
 the power of attention. In proportion to the inten- 
 sity and fixedness of the mind in contemplating ob- 
 jects, the mind comprehends these objects : hence, 
 other mental capacities being equal, success comes 
 to one man from his attention ; failure is encountered 
 by another, from want of attention. 
 
 Next, it is desirable to cultivate perseverance. 
 Even intense and fixed attention is often unavailing, 
 because not long enough continued, and because 
 not resumed again and again after repeated and 
 necessary failures, and unavoidable interruptions. 
 Perseverance is almost a talent, but it is an acquired 
 talent, and must have an inexorable master to 
 teach it. 
 
 But perseverance itself may be wholly stopped for 
 a season. Tools may not be at hand. Material may 
 be wanting. Patience, then, must be cultivated ; 
 for we must often wait, and without fretfulness, not 
 only days, but even months, and years, for opportu- 
 nities and other favorable circumstances. Success 
 often depends upon our power of forbearing and 
 restraining, as well as of acting. We must learn to 
 suspend, but not relinquish, or abandon. We must 
 bide the time. 
 
 If, however, attention, persevering and patient, 
 were always directed to one thing, or to one class 
 of things, the mind would become narrow instead 
 of enlarged ; and often a species of monomania 
 would result — that of drawing all or very extensive 
 conclusions from one or narrow premises. Caution 
 and comprehension are, therefore, to be cultivated ; 
 
The science, or the end of teaching. gg 
 
 and these, first, conclude not till after full examina- 
 tion of cognate subjects, and next, hold the conclu- 
 sions ready to be modified by subsequent discoveries. 
 
 In cultivating the preceding qualities, or states 
 of the soul, we cherish a state of contented reliance 
 on probabilities. And this reliance is unavoidable ; 
 but the undisciplined mind abhors it. Such a mind 
 looks for absolute moral certainties. A spirit of 
 faith is necessary to our success and happiness. 
 The mere man of practice goes wholly by sight ; 
 and what is not seen is not believed. And yet what 
 is unseen is often nearer truth than what is seen. 
 In patience we must learn to possess our souls. 
 
 Again, the Aristotelian logic may not safely be 
 despised ; still is it not sufficient for discipline to 
 know the terms of that art, or to apply them to ex- 
 amples in the text-books. Incessant practice in that 
 logic is needed, till thoughts and words rise and flow 
 in the logical channel between the banks of major 
 and minor, to the harbor of just conclusions. The 
 pugilist who attempts boxing by the rules of Men- 
 doza's book, endeavoring to recall them after a few 
 readings, with a friend who has practised the rules 
 and long since forgotten the words and the very 
 book, resembles a reasoner who merely knows, in 
 logical combat with an opponent, who to knowledge 
 has added experience, after a severe and rigorous 
 practice. 
 
 Nor let memory be forgotten. This faculty is 
 capable of indefinite improvement, whether we re- 
 gard its capaciousness or its tenacity. A very vul- 
 gar prejudice exists in places against a good memory, 
 4# 
 
70 CHAPTER II. 
 
 because uncultivated minds of quickness remember 
 things trifling in their nature, and empty out the en- 
 tire cargo on all occasions. But memory in a dis- 
 ciplined state may not only be vastly improved ; it 
 may be made to acquire and store things useful, and 
 such only. Without memory man would be like a 
 merchant without a warehouse. A warehouse may 
 indeed be crowded with stuffs of no value, but it can 
 be filled also with articles the most valuable. In 
 the disciplined state the memory is filled, however, 
 not with details, but with rules. An undisciplined 
 memory retains the very words of demonstration ; 
 the disciplined retains the principles. Every teacher 
 of the mathematics knows this distinction, as it is 
 daily manifested by different pupils. 
 
 A habit of order is indispensable, since by system 
 and arrangement not only is every sort of work 
 facilitated, but works differing and opposite in their 
 nature can all be equally well done in their turn. 
 Students, for instance, by an orderly arrangement, 
 may study several languages, ancient and modern, 
 and several branches of mathematics ; and also read 
 history, travels, mineralogy, with the cum multis ; 
 and yet be fair proficients as mere amateurs in mu- 
 sic, or drawing, or both ; and have, beyond, time for 
 company and recreation. No one need ever lose 
 his health by being a very hard student : that many 
 do, is certain, but it is not necessary that even one 
 should. Indolence of mind, laziness of body, wil- 
 ful rejection of what they know to be truth, kills 
 students, with the aid of smoking and chewing. 
 
THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. tyj 
 
 But hard study, with a proper arrangement, never 
 yet killed any man. 
 
 Nor ought the cultivation of taste, fancy, or imaor- 
 ination to be neglected in elementary training. All 
 these faculties may be excited and directed, in early 
 life, by daily acquaintance with living or departed 
 authors, long before we are capable of appreciating 
 reasoninsjs about their nature. 
 
 Such are some of the principal objects to be 
 gained by a proper school discipline. To attain the 
 end, we must find either many subjects of study, and 
 these neither too easy nor too difficult, and which 
 may be used, not as " knowledges," but as tools and 
 instruments ; or we must find a class of studies with 
 ample praxis for our purposes, and suited by pro- 
 gressive difficulty to the progressive demands of 
 the pupil. But it is of vital importance that this 
 elementary system should be used by a master ; and 
 the master should be such as has been drawn in the 
 preceding chapter 
 
 We are now ready to say that the system of ele- 
 mentary education or discipline advocated and 
 recommended, is the old-fashioned system of the 
 dead languages, and the pure mathematics, as taught 
 in the best schools of Great Britain, and, thirty years 
 ago, in the best schools in -the United States. 
 
 We leave out of view the mathematics in our 
 further consideration of the system, as the tendency 
 of the age, while mainly in favor of the mathematics 
 because of the practical and pecuniary advantages, 
 is yet not so adverse here to what is abstract, or 
 rather, is willing to submit here to the almost una- 
 
-72 CHAPTER n. 
 
 voidable abstract ; and because if any one can be 
 persuaded to take the true course in languages, he 
 by that act consents to the true course in mathe- 
 matics. 
 
 Confining, then, the view to the classics, v^^hat is 
 proper instruction here from first to last, other than 
 a series of incessant, yet ever-varied exercises in 
 fixedness of attention ? in concentrating all the pow- 
 ers and ingenuity of the soul, to read hidden mean- 
 ings, ascertain relations, reconcile seeming contra- 
 dictions ? in perseverance, where constant failures 
 attend often repeated attempts to find probable 
 truth 1 in patience, which resolutely waits for light 
 from other quarters, and without which the present 
 text is darkness impenetrable to the most perse- 
 vering attention 1 What are here, but endless exer- 
 cises of caution and comprehension, in surveys innu- 
 merable, at every step, of the ground passed over ; 
 correcting conclusion after conclusion, till the mind, 
 having complete and accurate perception of the 
 whole at once and of all its parts, settles upon a con- 
 clusion derived from the entire truth ? And al- 
 though the mind rejoices in its discoveries, it remains 
 watchful, and ready for suggestions that may even 
 yet modify. 
 
 The proper studying of languages, under a com- 
 petent teacher, (and very many professed teachers 
 are wholly incompetent,) is an unceasing exercise 
 in reasoning. Never is the full sense perceived till 
 subject, and copula, and predicate, with all their ac- 
 cidents, are completely understood and considered. 
 And what nice discrimination in the meaning of 
 
THE SCIENLE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. 73 
 
 words is requisite ! what minute inspection of par- 
 ticles ! what vigilant care to detect exceptions — 
 since rules are only general guides ! to say nothing 
 of the many scrutinizing inquiries, and rational con- 
 jectures instituted and paraded to make an errone- 
 ous interpretation of a part harmonize with the 
 probable interpretation of the whole ! Nor is the 
 advantage to the mind the less, if one utterly fails in 
 discovering the true meaning of a passage. Every 
 faculty of the mind is brought into play, with 
 more and more activity and determination, as the 
 difficulty increases, and fear of failing begins, and 
 yet hope of succeeding increases, because of re- 
 newed and more invincible endeavors to find the 
 sense. The use and practice of the faculties is the 
 very thing that is desirable. He that must walk for 
 exercise, may walk with almost equal advantage in 
 any direction ; and if he set out with an object in 
 view, he may fail in reaching a point, or gaining an 
 eminence, or finding a place — but he has his exer- 
 cise. Nay, if failure stimulates him to try again, or 
 to look in another direction, and he exercises more 
 — that repetition and increase of exertions are what 
 he needs. 
 
 All must concede, these studies do wonderfully 
 enlarge and strengthen, and so to speak, correct the 
 memory. Very much must be committed to me- 
 mory ; and that to be quoted and re-quoted, in 
 countless repetitions for months and years. And 
 this matter is of the nature of general principles, 
 applicable to all language ! Exceptions and re- 
 strictions are necessary ; but the mind exercised in 
 
74 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 hourly and minute exceptions, easily does this ever 
 after. The order and arrangement of the dead 
 languages in forms and changes of words, in struc- 
 ture of sentences and subjects, make impress on the 
 mind, never to be effaced. 
 
 In all literature, w^here are any better models of 
 everything imaginative, fanciful, impassioned, elo- 
 quent, poetic, humorous ? Where better specimens 
 of every kind of composition, through all their spe- 
 cies, varieties, and sorts? But, if as good or better 
 may be found in domestic literature, is that litera- 
 ture all accessible to boys ? And what can the 
 very best models avail, if not contemplated with 
 long, uninterrupted, intense attention ? 
 
 The preference for the system of education now 
 recommended, is founded not on a belief that there 
 is nothing equally good elsewhere ; but on the be- 
 lief, that in this system all that is good and necessary 
 in elementary training, is condensed and con- 
 centrated into the smallest possible compass. It is 
 accessible to all. A very few books comparatively, 
 and at a moderate price, contain the instruments and 
 tools and exercises of the whole discipline. These 
 books are so arranged, that without making educa- 
 tion for children a thing to be eaten as gingerbread, 
 or sucked as sugar-candy, the first parts are level 
 with the understanding of very young children ; or 
 rather, while exciting curiosity and exercising inge- 
 nuity from the first, the system follows the order of 
 nature — it begins with memory rather than judg- 
 ment — it is addressed to faith rather than reason. 
 
 Subjects suited for foundation studies are, indeed, 
 
A \ 
 
 THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. lyg 
 
 in the English, but so scattered over many works as 
 to be rarely available to schools. Nor is it probable 
 such can or will be so reduced and arranged as to 
 serve school purposes : the difficult would yet be 
 too difficult, the easy too easy. Boys never stop to 
 chop the logic for themselves, when, in text-books in 
 their own language, it is already chopped and dried 
 to their hand. The medium of another, and espe- 
 cially of a dead and ancient language, is impera- 
 tively necessary, to make the pupils pause, and by 
 self-exertion, dig out the hidden sense, like a valua- 
 ble ore, from the logical arrangement and connec- 
 tions. So far from removing hindrances to the most 
 rapid progress, such as that progress is, we wish 
 just that amount of impediment in elementary studies 
 which is interposed by the dead languages. To 
 translate them, or make them too easy by notes, 
 destroys the languages as instruments and tools, and 
 debases them into " the knowledges." Against this 
 spirit of the age in making everything plain, easy, 
 captivating — truth so like fiction — we earnestly pro- 
 test, and as loudly as one voice can cry. A child 
 fed on sweetmeats and tid-bits, turns from plain and 
 wholesome fare ; one ever carried in the nurse's 
 arms, will have no use of its legs : so boys, trained 
 as hundreds are, cannot but shrink from difficult 
 studies, however important, and can have no relish 
 for truth, unless it be also entertaining and exciting. 
 Many an indolent boy and mistaken parent prefer 
 that teacher, who tells, and explains, and carries the 
 boy gently in his bosom, over rugged and ill-looking 
 places; but they should for that very reason reject 
 
76 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 the teacher. The boy thus put out to the dry nurse, 
 will be a baby forever. His mind is ruined. The 
 teacher should be prosecuted for an incurable dam- 
 age. 
 
 For some twenty or thirty years past, a popular 
 current has been running against the study of the 
 dead languages. The age that has no patience to 
 allow seed sufficient time to vegetate and strike 
 root before it asks for the fruit ; that craves knowl- 
 edge first, and travels up the stream to the fountain- 
 head of principles ; that props a roof, hangs down 
 walls, and then underlays the foundation ; that, ad- 
 vancing backward like craw-fish, reverses the 
 natural order, so as to learn pictures first, then 
 things, words, and letters, has no need for a class 
 of studies so opposite as the ancient languages. 
 And yet very little knowledge of Greek jests, (who 
 had their Hibernian bulls,) would show some that 
 their boasted philosophy is but the revival of an old 
 theory, and that long ago men lived, who had re- 
 solved never to enter the deep waters until they had 
 learned to swim ! 
 
 All objections against the old system, that it is too 
 difficult, too tedious, too abstract, grant its peculiar 
 adaptedness to intellectual discipline ; while these 
 objections admit, in advocating the easier, if not 
 shorter methods, that the mass of men is weak and 
 selfish. Instead of elevating men by severe disci- 
 pline, we thus depress education to their baseness ! 
 This is levelling down and not up. Sometimes 
 great progress seems, indeed, at first to be made, 
 when rough places of learning are smoothed, its 
 
THE SCIEXCE, Oil THE END OF TEACHING. ^jfj 
 
 mountains levelled, its valleys raised, for the con- 
 struction of the educational railway ; but usually 
 the progress is about the same as that of the child 
 taught to spell by pictures, or " things," as the book 
 said, instead of the primitive, roundabout way — the 
 sounds of letters themselves. " What does that 
 spell, dear V said the father, covering the picture 
 with one hand, and pointing w^th the other to the 
 name printed in capital letters below. " Cow," was 
 the immediate answer. " Why, how do you know ?" 
 '' I see the legs." 
 
 In many places the dead languages are profess- 
 edly studied. But there is reason to say, that while 
 in a few colleges and academies efforts are made to 
 retain, or restore, the severe and rigorous method of 
 learning them, or at least to resist farther innova- 
 tions, yet in most schools the mode of going over — 
 studying it cannot be called — of going over the 
 classics, is tantamount to an utter abandonment of 
 the languages as a discipline. This aggravates ex- 
 isting evils, for many obvious reasons, and is a dis- 
 paragement of these very studies. If not used as a 
 discipline, the dead languages should be ivholly 
 abandoned as a school study. Unless as a discipline, 
 the time is worse than wasted that is bestow^ed. 
 The knowledge gained by a proper and severe 
 study of the languages is very great ; but the 
 knowledge acquired by the superficial method is 
 contemptibly small : if knowledge only is the end 
 of education, either let the classics be rigorously 
 studied as a discipline, or at once entirely aban- 
 doned. All superficial schools and schoolmasters 
 
78 CHAPTER II. 
 
 are, here, an unspeakably great nuisance — nay, if 
 the paper were stained with nameless epithets, 
 such epithets would not be unjust. 
 
 Pupils do, verily, go over the whole course,, and 
 beyond too ; but, as tourists frequently go over a 
 whole country and into the adjacent parts, in cars 
 and steamboats, such pupils can only say a jour- 
 ney has been taken. In the mind of the one, is 
 a dreamhke jumble of streaming fences, and patches 
 of grass, with human faces, mountains, tavern-bills, 
 hissing steam, ice-cream, boot-jacks and oyster pies ! 
 In the mind of the other is a mixture of Cicero with 
 Helvetians, and Cassar with Latin verbs, and De- 
 mosthenes with the first declension ! 
 
 The mania for simplifying — to coin a word, for 
 halifying — rages here, as in other parts or systems 
 of education. Copious dictionaries are rendered 
 more copious, and easy ones still easier ! nay, every 
 author has prepared for him specially, a special dic- 
 tionary, till a lexicon nearly equals a translation. 
 Indeed, the notes to many books, with the diction- 
 ary, are both a literal and free translation. Often, 
 too, translations are furnished, some in appendices, 
 some in separate books, and some interlined ! An- 
 alytical and synthetical written exercises — that in- 
 dispensable tool in strengthening the mind and en- 
 larging all its powers — are rare. Few, very few 
 graduates of colleges can put even the Latin words 
 of Mair's Syntax into proper construction ; and not 
 one in a thousand can make English sentences into 
 Latin. Graduates who take first honors pay a price 
 for Latin salutatories ! and students of divinity beg 
 
THE SCIEN'CE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. ^Q 
 
 and borrow Latin exegeses ! Examination is a form 
 — perhaps an hypocrisy — certainly a farce ! 
 
 None but invincible difficulties, and obstacles in- 
 surmountable, should, in school-books, be lessened 
 and removed ; and these should be so done that the 
 instrument of removal should itself require mental 
 labor to work it. Let it be a lever — but not self- 
 acting ; let it be like a pump-handle, at which the 
 condemned criminal must diligently labor or be 
 drowned. Be it constantly remembered, that it is an 
 inwrought, deep-seated habit of studying, and think- 
 ing, and working, that is wanted — a habit not to be 
 eradicated — a habit or state, that can be destroyed 
 only by the annihilation of the soul ! We know that 
 we are behind the age, and yet, not that we cannot 
 catch up — it is because we will not try ; and hence, 
 at the hazard of being pitied, we aver, and, shame- 
 less, confess, that the Latin ordo, the Latin notes, 
 and the Latin definitions, in Greek lexicons, is a bet- 
 ter way to learn the dead languages, and to become 
 thoroughly disciplined in a thousand ways, than any 
 of the improved methods, from Hamilton to Arnold ! 
 
 Let it, however, be specially noted, our remarks 
 all refer to school-books. In these knowledge is 
 not the main end — we use them for discipline. But 
 in after life, when we use Latin and Greek authors 
 for literary purposes, we may seek for aid in all 
 quarters ; knowledge is now wanted. Here we re- 
 quire copious dictionaries, and all kinds of note, com- 
 ment, and opinions and conjectures. The wants of 
 the school-boy during his elementary training, and 
 the wants of the man in his profession as a literary 
 
80 CHAPTER If. 
 
 man, are totally different. Many recent works are 
 almost priceless in value to the man of literature, 
 that are a bane to the school-boy. The learned au- 
 thors meant well, but they have done disciplinary 
 education no service. 
 
 Thus far the course advocated has been consid- 
 ered in its disciplinary character only ; and in this it 
 would be of incalculable value, even if no knowledge 
 were acquired, and, like the gymnasium and its ap- 
 paratus, it were laid aside after having answered its 
 elementary, purposes ; but very extensive and very 
 important knowledge, and exact and permanent, by 
 the difficulty of its acquirement, is attained during 
 the study of the dead languages. Grammar, in its 
 widest sense, history, geography, astronomy, archi- 
 tecture, polity, war, manners, gardening — in short, 
 everything of the ancient world, its philosophies, 
 arts, religions, may be named as subjects, of which 
 knowledge must, of necessity, be gained. And until 
 it is shown that the history of the past is useless to 
 any present age, we may avail ourselves of the 
 knowledge acquired, as a collateral argument in fa- 
 vor of our educational system. But the important 
 consideration here is, that a disciplined mind can add 
 to its ancient stock, all modern knowledge in much 
 less time than the undisciplined mind. For instance, 
 a good classical scholar can learn, as far as the read- 
 ing of books is concerned, any modern European 
 language in a few months ; sometimes in a few weeks ; 
 sometimes in a few days. Languages, like the Span- 
 ish, Portuguese, Italian and French, he can read, 
 with a grammar and dictionary, almost at sight. 
 
THE SCIENCE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. QJ 
 
 Things, too, regarded as studies, he looks on as read- 
 ing, and uses as recreations ; such as botany, physi- 
 ology, natural history, mineralogy, chemistry, his- 
 tory, antiquities. He sports, too, with some things 
 the undisciplined fear — logic and metaphysics. The 
 true secret of immense learning lies in the entire 
 mastery of some grand principles ; and persons 
 rigorously and unsparingly disciplined in youth, are 
 nearly the only persons that have that mastery. 
 And such have a foundation of broad and immove- 
 able rock, and upon that they may build wide and 
 high ; their superstructure will stand. 
 
 Some parents resolve to give their children a clas- 
 sical education ; but, after they have received an 
 English education. If what we have written be 
 understood, such parents can scarcely fail to see, 
 that this distinction between educations, classical 
 and English, is an error. Education is but one. It 
 is partial, however, and complete. If it comprise 
 the classics it is complete ; and, therefore, it has its 
 beginning as well as its ending ; and that beginning 
 is in the languages themselves, or rather in the La- 
 tin. In case, therefore, any parent has determined 
 on the complete course, every hours delay in be- 
 ginning with the Latin, after the child shall have 
 learned to read and spell fluently, to write an ordi- 
 narily good hand, and to commit with some readi- 
 ness to memory, is worse than lost. Spelling, read- 
 ing, writing, arithmetic, English grammar, and geog- 
 raphy — add, also, composition and speaking — these 
 are considered as elementary English studies. Now, 
 experience here abundantly shows that the great 
 
82 CHAPTER II. 
 
 majority of mere English pupils, after years of seem- 
 ingly assiduous attention, and with good and com- 
 petent teachers, rarely become fluent and thorough 
 in these branches ; the pupils reach a certain point, 
 and there they remain, and usually in utter disgust at 
 . all schools, schoolmasters, and school-books ! Ama- 
 teurs in music, who play by ear, or learn from a 
 book, advance thus, with flute, piano, or violin, to a 
 certain inferior grade of skill, and then, like a bird 
 that builds its nest the same every year, these ama- 
 teurs play forever one tune ! Doubtless, many com- 
 petent classical teachers fail here ; yet these may 
 so order matters, as hundreds have done, that all 
 the elementary English studies, and many studies of 
 higher character, provided parents will have pa- 
 tience, and will aid in the attempt, shall be entirely 
 mastered by the time the elementary classical dis- 
 cipline is ended. 
 
 The mind finds relaxation in turning aside a few 
 hours daily from the severity of the disciplinary 
 studies to the lighter English branches. Hence, 
 with comparatively little labor, such branches are 
 pursued at the same time, while the mind, without 
 being rendered indolent, thus returns with fresh 
 vigor to the main study of the school. And thus, in 
 the same time, and for one price, the pupils are prop- 
 erly educated, and acquire all the English ordinarily 
 acquired by other boys, who, during that period, 
 pursue English branches only. 
 
 So confident is the writer, from experience, that 
 such is the case, that he is sometimes tempted to 
 imitate nostrum-doctors, and to offer, provided there 
 
THE SCIE.N'CE, OR THE END OF TEACHING. go 
 
 be no interference with the course of learning, to 
 refund all the tuition fees, if boys, during the classi. 
 cal cours3, shall not have studied, and studied bet. 
 ter all the branches of English pursued in the same 
 time by boys of like age and capacity. 
 
 Every consideration, therefore, of economy and 
 utility, is in favor of the system of elementary edu- 
 cation recommended ; and v^^e may hfre conclude 
 the subject. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE 'M)OLS AND INSTRUMENTS. 
 
 No error is more mischievous than to mistake 
 illustration for argument, and yet no error is more 
 frequent. Illustration does no more than place what 
 is to be considered in a sufficient light ; but, when 
 placed in that light, what before was deemed truth, 
 may be discovered to be falsehood. Analogy is thus 
 a fruitful source of error. Often one thing resem- 
 bles another in but a single respect ; in other re- 
 spects the things may differ greatly ; they may even 
 be, in some respects, opposites. But from the strong 
 resemblance in one point, it is hastily concluded the 
 subjects may agree in all ; and by applying the 
 same rules to both, the results in practice must, of 
 necessity, disappoint expectation. 
 
 The teacher is an artist. As a workman he, 
 therefore, needs tools, and tools must be made for 
 every branch of his business. A skilful artisan, 
 moreover, prefers patent tools — instruments so in- 
 geniously contrived that a boy may do the work 
 of a man, and the daily labor of a man equal the 
 labor of a week. The work, too, by such instru- 
 ments, is better done. It is done, also, at less cost. 
 How natural the transfer of all that pertains to the 
 
THE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. 
 
 85 
 
 mstruments of one workman to the instruments of 
 the other ! The teacher must have tools not only 
 suitable, but so ingeniously designed that by their aid 
 he may employ an apprentice, and turn out scholars 
 in a few months, that, by the use of old-fashioned 
 tools, could not, by the master himself, be manufac- 
 tured in as many years ! Nay, his tools judiciously 
 used, and in favorable circumstances, will per se 
 work up his raw material into the best fabrics !- — 
 and education may be done almost by the yard, and 
 nearly as cheap as domestic cottons ! 
 
 That school-books differ, and may be classed as 
 good and bad, no man doubts ; that a teacher will 
 prefer the better to the worse, is self-evident ; but 
 that any book, or series of books, can obviate the 
 necessity of a teacher's direct efforts, and the skil- 
 ful employment of his genius and talents, is the blun- 
 der of many book-makers, and of not a few teachers 
 themselves. 
 
 The excellency of a school depends, not mainly, 
 but wholly, upon the teacher. One competent and 
 faithful master, with books illy prepared or with no 
 books, is worth many incompetent teachers, aided 
 by the best contrived books and systems. The 
 army of stags, with a lion for general, can chase the 
 army of lions, with a stag at the head ! An honest 
 mechanic, with proper instruments, and by implicit 
 obedience to his directions, must when diligent turn 
 out work not a whit inferior to work done by me- 
 chanics greatly his superior in talents and ingenuity, 
 who use the same instruments or apparatus : the 
 machinery would, in fact, perform the same with 
 
86 
 
 CHAPTER m. 
 
 any attendant ; it can but act well^ if it move at all i 
 Gunpowder equalizes powers : a dwarf and a giant 
 would fire a cannon equally well — the ball strikes 
 with the same force, whoever may be at the touch- 
 hole ! 
 
 This is not so with books and boys ! JYo school- 
 book has any intrinsic force which will always exert 
 itself in the same direction, as soon as it is opened 
 and read, or even studied. The book does what 
 the master intends, not what the author designs or 
 wishes. And the boy, be well assured, ye theoreti- 
 cal gentlemen, that have never wielded the ruler, 
 nor flourished the birch, and yet teach by book — be 
 assured, the boy is not that pliant, non-resisting ma- 
 terial that runs into one grooved aperture a shape- 
 less mass, and, transformed by some hidden power, 
 runs directly from some other smaller aperture, a 
 ready-made man and scholar ! No ; verily, if like any- 
 thing mechanically wrought, he is like a mass of rough 
 iron in the potent grasp of a blacksmith's tongs' 
 He needs many a heat in a furnace, and many a 
 twist and twirl, and many a hard knock from a dex- 
 terous hand, before he is transmuted, and before he 
 will remain changed ! 
 
 Boys differ in a thousand ways — in age, intellect, 
 temper, industry, health, domestic training, and ex- 
 ample and excitement : wind, rain, sunshine, sum- 
 mer, winter — all affect them ! No classification can 
 possibly comprise individuals alike, save in a very 
 few general features ! Children cannot be thrown 
 as one sort of grain into a mill, and ground as the 
 same grist ! 
 
THE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. 
 
 87 
 
 Very many either will not, or cannot, perceive 
 the truth on this point. Failure is repeatedly attrib- 
 uted to the want of certain books, and forms, and 
 systems ; when almost invariably the failure is ow- 
 ing to the want of the right kind of teachers. But 
 renewed failures only tempt fresh inventors — if such 
 they may be called — to contrive new books, or, 
 more frequently, to alter old ones ; and then, with 
 the most adhesive obstinacy, to insist with teachers 
 on a trial ! Unworthy motives are not necessarily 
 to be suspected or attributed to all such book-makers ; 
 yet it is manifest that many people, neither original 
 authors nor practical teachers, are directly and indi- 
 rectly interested pecuniarily in the production of 
 school-books. And the enormous prices such can 
 afford to pay for newspaper advertisements and edi- 
 torials, is presumptive proof that the business is not 
 wholly profitless. The columns of advertisements 
 paid for by the year, in several leading papers at 
 the same time, is a pretty fair index that a nostrum- 
 doctor finds sales for his pills and plasters ; and yet, 
 from the frightful increase of panaceists, diseases of 
 the most deadly character, and in spite of the infal- 
 lible cures, seem to be multiplying ! So many of a 
 trade could not make fortunes if the diseases were 
 all stayed or eradicated. Nostrum-book doctors 
 augur badly for the health of learning ! 
 
 Happy for the world, that the cause of education 
 is prominent ap'iong the great causes of the age ! 
 As a natural consequence, school-books become ob- 
 jects of intense interest. Scholars, liberal and ele- 
 gant, moralists the most severe, and philosophers 
 
88 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 the most profound, have all lent assistance in the 
 writing and arranging of school-books ; and, there- 
 fore, it cannot be wonderful that works of great 
 excellence, in every department of elementary edu- 
 cation, abound. But, while improvement here may 
 have been needed, and while improvement may have 
 been made, yet improvement in the artist or teacher 
 himself would have done more for education than 
 any improvement in his instruments of teaching. 
 Had many eminent men, instead of writing school- 
 books, betaken themselves to teaching school-books ; 
 or, if they had not, for the sake of writing, aban- 
 doned teaching, schools would have been still 
 better. 
 
 Of the two sorts of learned men who make school- 
 books, they who have been teachers must be certainly 
 the better qualified for the task. However learned, 
 if the authors have had little practical acquaintance 
 with teaching, and almost invariably, if they have 
 had no acquaintance, their books become mere store- 
 houses of knowledge. But if a school-book contain 
 all the principles and rules of a subject, literary or 
 scientific, that is a good book, although it give no 
 knowledge beyond what is essential for illustration 
 and praxis. Any knowledge beyond is not essen- 
 tial to the purpose of the book. Yet, not very rarely, 
 while the principles are all in the book, they are so 
 inartistically involved with the mass of mere learn- 
 ine^ as to defv bein2^ disentnno-led. The book is a 
 valuable book, but it is a bad school-book. 
 
 We have heard it said of a crabbed and petulant 
 old man, " He forgets that he was ever a boy." So 
 
THE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. 
 
 89 
 
 it is with some authors of school-books. They for- 
 get how their soul loathed a text-book overloaded 
 with notes, observations, comments and exceptions. 
 They forget that they never voluntarily read such, 
 and that if the master wished to find exceptions, and 
 learned annotations, he might look for them himself. 
 They forget how, again and again, master and 
 scholar were alike bewildered in a thorny wilderness 
 of endless annotations, laced and tangled with subor- 
 dinate note and comment, and exception to excep- 
 tion, and blackened with daggers, single and double, 
 and paragraphs, sections, parentheses, dashes, brack- 
 ets, till rule and exception struggled for the guid- 
 ance, and comment seemed of more importance 
 than the principle it explained ! Or, perhaps, an 
 author, remembering all this, determines to be 
 avenged on another generation ! perhaps, remem- 
 bering how, in some idle urchin's dog-eared book, 
 he had turned from page to page, till somewhere 
 near the starting-point he found written, *' A fool 
 for your pains !" Thus a malicious author sends 
 boys turning through his whole volume, by means 
 of references, from spot to spot, till he finds what 
 he wants, and that a wonderfully small needle in an 
 amazingly large haystack ! 
 
 Some authors cannot be said to overlook the main 
 intention of a school-book, for the books made by 
 them are designed to display their own reading ; 
 and a text-book is a convenient nucleus around 
 which to heap all they know. These men cart and 
 wheel whole masses of learning from the great 
 quarries of ponderous folios, and empty load after 
 
90 CHAPTER m. 
 
 load in this and that spot ; here and there heaping 
 up piles of unwrought bullion ; and every now and 
 then scattering gems of value ; in certain stations 
 placing indices to direct one's search to different 
 heaps of the stolen treasures ! 
 
 Widely and loudly vaunted are books and sys- 
 tems of instruction built on the principle of induc- 
 tion. But, while something may be conceded in 
 favor of arithmetic and algebra, arranged in books 
 on that principle, yet, with due deference to the in- 
 ductive authors, induction belongs to the man and 
 not to the boy. Boys are made to be directed and 
 governed in an elementary course of education ; and 
 it is a matter of very little consequence either in 
 itself, or to the boys, whether the process of induc- 
 tion, on which rules and principles are formde for 
 their incipient guidance, be understood or not. 
 Rule and authority are admitted by young persons, 
 and generally they are indifferent to their reasons. 
 The attempt to show their foundation is uncalled- 
 for — it not unfrequently unsettles the children's 
 faith ! The master who begged the king to remain 
 uncovered in his school, while the master himself 
 retained his own hat, that the pupils might think no 
 one in the kingdom superior to their teacher, well 
 understood the nature of boys ; and his boys consid- 
 ered him superior to all inductions — his word was 
 their law. And they knew that whatever he en- 
 joined was founded in reason, and that, in due sea- 
 son, they would fully understand what was now 
 childlike, received in faith. 
 
 The application of the inductive method in form- 
 
THE TOOLS AXD INSTRUMENTS. gj 
 
 ing some school-books, such as grammars, rhetorics, 
 and the Hke, is preposterous. And where less pre- 
 posterous, the parade of facts before resting down 
 in the rule, is an egregious trifling — an affectation 
 of philosophy, eminently disgustful. And how, 
 pray, do young persons, especially children, better 
 understand by studying examples and illustrations 
 before the rule, than after the rule ? And that is, in 
 most schools, the amount of the inductive method. 
 What is this but the fulfilment of the vulgar pro- 
 verb — " The cart before the horse ?" True — the 
 boy who sees the cart may infer the horse ; but what 
 advantage is this, beyond the natural way of infer- 
 ring the vehicle from the quadruped ? This is un- 
 shackling the mind ! forsooth. This is breaking 
 away from the tyranny of authority ! This is the 
 light of " seven suns" in one day ! Courage — ye 
 priest-ridden ! modern philosophy will soon publish 
 the ten commandments, with an illuminated page of 
 induction ; and then shall ye see the reasonableness 
 of the divine will ! And then, when the reasona- 
 bleness of virtue is seen, all rational persons will of 
 necessity become virtuous ! 
 
 In the rage for induction, old land-marks in school- 
 books are all removed. Nothing is to be taken for 
 granted, except the assumptions^ often, in the induc- 
 tion itself; even where the rule is as plain as any- 
 thing else, perhaps plainer. Is " I think, therefore, 
 I exist/' better than, *' I exist, therefore, I think T' 
 In which is less assumption — " Twice one is two," 
 or — '* Two is one and another one ?" To a child 
 
92 
 
 CHAPTER lU. 
 
 two is two without either formula ; and perhaps an 
 extensive induction would start a doubt whether 
 two were not something else ; as one by a labored 
 proof of his existence will come to have logical 
 doubts whether he either thinks or exists ! In all 
 things, we need a starting-point — a fulcrum for a 
 lever ; and that, in school-books, are rules and prin- 
 ciples which the teacher knows are the embodiment 
 of truth. Children confide in his judgment ; and 
 that confidence is necessary to their improvement. 
 
 In some books the inductive process is by piece- 
 meal ! The disjecta membra of a little plain rule 
 are scattered over a dozen pages ; as if one took 
 delight in tearing the picture of a baby to pieces? 
 to show how skilfully and anatomically it could all 
 be constructed again, somewhere in the middle of 
 a book, as well as if never so ruthlessly torn !' 
 True, the boy saw, at first, it was a baby ; but how 
 could he be sure it was, unless he examined a foot 
 on one page, and a hand on another, and came to 
 the baby again by induction ? The first declension, 
 or the first conjugation in the Latin grammar, as 
 ^ither exists in all the ordinary methods, is short, 
 easy, perspicuous, and to almost every child of the 
 usual capacity, so great a novelty, as to be learned 
 with pleasure — sometimes to be devoured with 
 avidity ; and yet in Arnold's system, this brief and 
 pleasant unit is cut up and scattered into a dozen 
 little bits ! — and each bit is made a bitter pill, coated 
 with sugar ; as if it could not be sw^allowed other- 
 wise without effort ! And then, when all the parts 
 
THE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. 
 
 93 
 
 are separately swallowed, the poor child finds, nev- 
 ertheless, that the whole must yet be swallowed at 
 once ! 
 
 We are told that such systems are agreeable to 
 the order of nature ; and that m a given time more 
 is learned and better than in the usual methods. 
 
 The order of nature begins with the memory, 
 and exercises that, almost exclusively, for years. 
 One's own native tongue is simply heard and re- 
 membered, as far as words are concerned. A child 
 imitates and remembers any sounds of articulate 
 speech. But his style and the extent of his vocab- 
 ulary depend upon accident. He talks almost like a 
 parrot, precisely as he hears. He learns sounds, 
 or words, proper or improper ; and provided the ut- 
 terance, in any way, of such sounds answers his ex- 
 pectations, and procures what is needed, and keeps 
 off what he fears, he is satisfied. Of grammar and 
 logic he learns nothing, he cares nothing ; and for 
 all the ordinary purposes of life he need neither 
 know nor care anything. The vocabulary of very 
 many adults comprises not more than two or three 
 hundred words ! Some men do not use more than 
 a hundred nouns and verbs in all their lives ! and 
 these are mis-pronounced, mis-spelled, and con- 
 structed according to a syntax of their own — an 
 idiosyncratic grammar, whose figures of speech 
 consist in earnest gesticulation and motions of the 
 face, to render intelligible what it is suspected the 
 words employed have failed to make plain. 
 
 If we would teach beyond this, it must be by 
 teaching principles and giving rules. It matters not 
 .5* 
 
94 
 
 CHAPTER m. 
 
 whether orally, or otherwise, little of our native 
 tongue, beyond the point just named, is acquired 
 without rules and lessons. Much, indeed, is learned 
 by children without rules and lessons ; but it bears 
 only a small propoi'tion compared with what is 
 learned of the true nature and genius of the lan- 
 guage, in the same time, with these helps. 
 
 But whatever may be learned of the language by 
 imitation and mere memory, here is a very great 
 difference : we learn Latin through the medium of 
 our own language ; we learn our own without a 
 medium. To imitate nature fairly, our knowledge 
 of English should be entirely obliterated, and we 
 should then be placed in a Latin atmosphere ! And 
 what would even then be gained ? Do we wish to 
 talk, and read, and write in Latin, the first thing ? 
 And if we did all this from imitation and memory, we 
 should be no better acquainted with the philosophy 
 and logic of the language than myriads of others are 
 with the nature of the English. Notwithstanding as- 
 sertion to the contrary, children — English children — 
 taught to talk, and read, and write Latin, by English 
 teachers, in the way recently proposed as the order of 
 nature, will be inferior to other children taught in the 
 usual way, of equal age and capacity, and equal ad- 
 vantages, in the same time. The time should, how- 
 ever, not be less than what is mutually agreed upon as 
 a reasonable period for the mastery of the language ; 
 for while superiority does belong to any time, how- 
 ever short, that superiority could not be made appa- 
 rent to others, in the shortest time. In a race the 
 victorious horse is for one or two rounds, often, ap- 
 
 i 
 
THE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. 
 
 95 
 
 parently beat ; the advance at the coming-out de- 
 termines the victory. 
 
 This order of nature, as it is called, does well 
 with pupils who have thoroughly mastered one an- 
 cient language. Such carry with them the instru- 
 ments of mastering almost any other language ; and 
 it would be folly, indeed, to forego their advantages 
 for the sake of beginning every time at the begin- 
 ning. Many things are altogether proper for adults, 
 which would be unsuitable for children ; and hence, 
 while we might favor Ollendorff's method for disci- 
 plined minds, and especially for such as were versed 
 in the nature of grammar, we should deprecate it 
 for children that need discipline, and particularly 
 in reference to the Latin and Greek. 
 
 The sudden popularity of all these often-repeated 
 attempts of changing plans tested by ages, is owing 
 to many accidental circumstances ; but in regard to 
 the dead languages, it is, in part, owing to the in- 
 competency of so many teachers of the languages, 
 and the deplorably little depth and accuracy of their 
 pupils. Hence, Vv^hen comparison of results is 
 made, the new method, having superiority over the 
 old method misunderstood, and not properly em- 
 ployed, is at once lauded to the skies ! In medicine, 
 quackery often triumphs in places, because professed 
 members of the medical faculty are themselves in 
 those places little better than quacks ! 
 
 The old, time-honored method pursues the order 
 of nature, by exercising principally, at first, the 
 memory ; not by storing it with mere knowledge, 
 but rather with rules and principles. If such are 
 
96 
 
 CHAPTER in. 
 
 not learned soon, they cannot easily be learned af- 
 terward ; partly because the mind is not so capable 
 if undisciplined, and partly because of our im- 
 patience at later periods of committing to memory 
 what we do not fully understand, and yet think 
 we understand. Undisciplined minds will not com- 
 mit ve7'bati7n ; and yet that mode is in many sub- 
 jects almost .indispensable to future success. Chil- 
 dren that are not mis-managed, and rendered indo- 
 lent and pert by vain attempts to make them philo- 
 sophical, care not what they commit to memory ; 
 and they commit difficult words and sentences, al- 
 most as readily as the opposite kind. Multitudes of 
 English w^ords are as hard as Latin ones : it would 
 scarcely be possible to find Latin and Greek w^ords 
 half so hard as thousands of words in geography, 
 botany, physiology, natural history ; and which are 
 required, not merely to be pronounced, but to be 
 committed accurately to memory, and by children 
 little advanced beyond babyhood ! The time spent 
 (may it not be said wasted ?) in committing geogra- 
 phies, would, in many cases, if spent in Latin, have 
 easily and fairly put a child in possession of all the 
 essential forms and rules of that language ! 
 
 Many writers of school-books aim to delight chil- 
 dren by familiarity, sprightliness, anecdote, and the 
 •like ; bewailing the barbarity that compels to severe 
 and laborious study — when all might be such a pleas- 
 ure ! Why point to a steep hill, with a rugged as- 
 cent and thorny path ? when the darlings could be 
 so sweetly coaxed up an insensible inclination, 
 pausing here to eat a peach, and there to smell a 
 
XHE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. 97 
 
 rose ! and, ever and anon, reposing a few moments 
 on the grassy mounds near moss-crowned fountains 1 
 and regaled with the song of beauteous birds, feath- 
 ered with rain-bow glories ! till, in a delirious thrill 
 of dreaminess, the innocents found themselves on 
 the pinnacle of all learning and science ! 
 
 It may be well enough to amuse in education, as 
 a pastime ; but let once amusement become a 
 means of discipline, and children will not study at 
 all. Like all other responsible and moral beings, 
 these must find, if not the whole, yet their chief 
 their daily pleasures and enjoyments, in duty and 
 obedience ; and earn the good of learning, as all other 
 goods, by the labor and sweat of the brow. Any 
 book, or system of books, that obviates, in any 
 degree, that necessity, so far counteracts the law 
 of our nature. They weaken the mind, they unfit 
 for the fierce and endless struggles of life. 
 
 How far pictures may go in the way of proper 
 excitement, the author for himself cannot say : his 
 own experience has found them neither good nor 
 evil, except that they are always evil when they 
 give false or exaggerated views. If parents choose 
 to pay a few additional pence for pictures in school- 
 books, for a momentary gratification, or that the 
 urchins may touch and re-touch in their idle 
 moments — be it so. Booksellers have a right to 
 live. — A friend of the author's w^as principal teacher 
 some years since in a Sabbath school. Once, in 
 his office, he was lecturing a class of three little 
 boys, on the final results of idleness. He held in 
 his hand a penny pamphlet — the dying speeches 
 
98 CHAPTER ni. 
 
 and confessions of three murderers. The title-page 
 was very tastefully embellished with three forms 
 something like the human — that distant resem- 
 blance Taylor loves, in boys' pictures ; and these 
 forms were mournfully dangling from one gallows ! 
 My friend marked the deep and solemn hush of the 
 class ! The truth was silently sinking into their 
 softened hearts ! Why not ? there was the picture 
 of punishment — natural consequence before the 
 very eyes ! He warmed more with benevolent 
 love — (he was a noble-hearted sailor) — he poured 
 forth his full soul, and looked with moistened eyes ! 
 Alas ! the innocent little darlings peeped into his 
 face — and one, with a comical expression in his 
 laughing eye, and with a finger pointing to the pic- 
 tured tragedy, said : " Mr. M., don't them look like 
 three dried herrings ?" 
 
 The effect of the most solemn pictures in chil- 
 dren's books, is not, always, precisely what the 
 teacher wishes. But pictures and questions are 
 hobbies of the day — we must ride, even if we do it 
 backwards and forwards, without advancing : — and 
 these things do add to the value of the books ! 
 
 Far from us to say, school-books admit no im- 
 provement. Improvements have been made. Un- 
 necessary dryness has been relieved by sprightly 
 illustration ; the forbidding frown has been relaxed 
 into a smile ; the knotty points have, in a measure, 
 been disentangled ; needless difficulties removed ; 
 roughness and barbarism of style have been smoothed 
 and civilized ; and many judicious helps have been 
 furnished, for which laborious and pains-taking 
 
THE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. gg 
 
 teachers should be thankful. And yet we would 
 gladly have retained in Latin grammar, the barba- 
 rous verses ! They jingle yet in our ears ! The 
 noble linguists of by-gone days owed them much ! 
 We would welcome back this exploded method of 
 fixing the rules and exceptions in the mind ! — yes ! 
 fixing it was ! as if all were graved with the point 
 of a diamond on adamantine rock ! If boys learned 
 not to write and speak Latin in three months, before 
 they understood the language itself; they did, at 
 the last, come to translate Greek into Latin, to 
 parse in Latin, to recite grammar in Latin, to read 
 annotations in Latin, to translate any English author 
 into Latin ! and to commit Latin poets to memory 
 as if they were a native tongue ! 
 
 Few, in the fervor of improvement, can stop. 
 Because some things in the school-books are wrong, 
 all must be changed. Excellent books, one after 
 another, disappear ; and under plea of greater im- 
 provements, the latest improved works give place 
 to stronger pretensions. Each roars and flashes 
 like a rocket — and, like a rocket, falls to the earth 
 in dying stars, amidst the gaze and uproar of the 
 crowd, crying for something still more brilliant ! 
 
 The mania for changing prevails even among 
 original authors. These will not allow their school- 
 book to pass to a new edition without essential al- 
 terations, and sometimes not for the better. Hence, 
 not rarely teacher, pupil, and parent are thrown into 
 an agony of fume and fret, it being not possible to 
 class pupils for more than a few months with the 
 same book from the same author ! Except for the 
 
100 
 
 CHAPTER lU. 
 
 impolicy of the measure, it is bearable that original 
 authors should change their own works ; but when 
 the compiler, the abbreviator, the clarifier, and all 
 other tricksters and plagiarists, seize on works of 
 originators, and after cutting and carving enough 
 for serving up as a first course — that these miserable 
 appropriators should, under this and that pretext, 
 print a new edition every year, with alterations — that 
 is intolerable ! What ! when the whole subject is 
 before them, all the materials prepared to their 
 very hands, the thinking all done, and the mere ar- 
 rangement to be made, cannot these geniuses make 
 a book so near perfection, at first, that it may last 
 for some ten or twelve years ! Cannot these indus- 
 trious little ants bring enough from their neighbors' 
 heaps of corn at once ! And yet, when so many are 
 swarming and boiling in the pathway to the trea- 
 sure, all cannot get everything, and each must 
 make a book from what he can grab ! And then, 
 when his own book is manufactured, he must labor 
 to show the public that the other booksters did not 
 get the best material from the heap ! and whilst all 
 others have drawn from the same storehouses, they, 
 forsooth, have culled error only, and he the "truth !" 
 A difference in spelling a dozen words, or in six 
 definitions, or in a mode of counting time, becomes 
 a sufficient reason for a new book on the same sub- 
 ject, and quarried from the same original authors. 
 Then for the movement of heaven and earth, till 
 the new compend shall displace the old ! Editorials 
 pronounce the last the best ; learned men and shin- 
 ing lights, hitherto not known and unseen, make 
 
THE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. 1Q| 
 
 their dehitt in recommendatory notices, flashing forth 
 in graceful periods and studied elegance ; and 
 agents, with oily smoothness and the flippancy of a 
 circus-master showing off' his beasts and birds, or 
 liis monkey rider and stunted pony in the ring, pour 
 out their voluble praises in ipsissimis verbis; — till 
 the- younger teachers are effectually humbugged ; 
 the timid ones compelled to bite at the guzzle ; and 
 even the knowing ones either bribed by presents, 
 or yielding to importunity, are silenced and gained. 
 One would think, to hear some agents empty out 
 their lecture of prepared and set phrases, that, pro- 
 phecy to the contrary notwithstanding, the millen- 
 nium could not arrive till the universal adoption of 
 some new spelling-book, or some new arithmetic ! 
 
 Prudence should doubtless restrain the pen in 
 wanting, here ; and yet one could not exceed the 
 truth, if he wrote with a sharp pen dipped into 
 an ink of wormwood and gall ! In a lynching com- 
 munity, some pirates would be flayed alive ! And 
 yet, under the protection of the segis law of libel, 
 these plunderers can carry off* in the open face of 
 day ; and they are so unblushing as to demand 
 praise, when they should stand in the stocks ! Agra- 
 rianism is not confined to acres ; and white men 
 disguised as red Indians, play the savage in the 
 fields of literature as well as of agriculture. 
 
 In some branches of learning, are certain time- 
 honored text-books, whose authors are long passed 
 away ; and these books are so intrinsically valuable, 
 that, in all the changes of the day, they nevertheless 
 maintain their place in schools. Such books it is 
 
102 
 
 CHAPTER m. 
 
 lawful to correct, and now and then to modernize. 
 Still, it is to be regretted, that many changes in 
 these are from whim ; and although such changes 
 do not affect the intrinsic excellence of the works, 
 they prove very perplexing to the teacher, who 
 wishes to drill his pupils as he himself was drilled. ' 
 In this case the very w^ords of rules, and the former 
 arrangement of the whole subject, are part and par- 
 cel of his method. A finical taste pretends to give 
 him more elegant tools ; but the master prefers the 
 feel of the old articles, that he had long handled with 
 speed and dexterity. Why should he wish better 
 implements ? He defies the fanciful modernizer to 
 do, with the tools improved, work any better than 
 before. 
 
 But when a change is made in the fabric of these 
 time-honored text-books, it is almost invariably a 
 bad change. It adds raw cloth to the old — it makes 
 worse rents — it destroys old bottles with new wine • 
 The impertinence of working-in our own crudities 
 with the sterling matter of an author's text-book, is 
 surpassed only by that of mending the poetry of the 
 great geniuses — a trick performed every few years 
 with Christian psalms and hymns, under plea that 
 worship will be more acceptable if the poetry be 
 more fashionable ! 
 
 It may possibly be startling to some, but many 
 know it to be true : — a text-book needs not be per- 
 fect ! Nor is it at all important that everything 
 belonging to the subject should be crowded into the 
 book. And, spite of the fear about misleading 
 children, one way of wording rules is, in many sub- 
 
THE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. ]^Q3 
 
 jects, just as good as another. The rule cannot be 
 fairly understood till it is repeatedly apphed ; nor 
 then, without the teacher. And when rules are 
 well understood in all their extent, and with all their 
 exceptions, they may be laid aside, or forgot, or 
 changed by the disciple himself. Ignorance of all 
 this, as well as vanity and presumption, and some- 
 times " the love of money," have as much to do with 
 the alterations of standard text-books, as a benevo- 
 lent regard for the pupils, and the wish to promote 
 true learning. Such remarks may be deemed se- 
 vere ; but if such could prevent the conduct com- 
 plained of, the ill-will they beget could be more 
 cheerfully encountered. Indignation will speak, 
 even when it knows the words will not be heeded. 
 
 The inquiry may now^ be made as to what con- 
 stitutes a good text-book, specially in regard to 
 schools and academies. 
 
 In some subjects it matters little about the plan. 
 They may be variously and yet equally well stu- 
 died, and commenced in many different ways and 
 places. Of this kind are spelling, reading, and ge- 
 ography. But in other subjects, one mode of begin- 
 ning is almost indispensable : such are mathematics 
 and languages. Yet, in general, it may be said that 
 elementary text-books should be — 
 
 1. Brief, If the end of discipline is to indoctri- 
 nate in principles, the text-book should contain little 
 beyond the principles. But many text-books are 
 naked in principles and stuffed with knowledge, or 
 contain the principles diffused and diluted. Some 
 are mere scrap-books, or a kind of school album ; 
 
2Q^ CHAPTER 111. 
 
 full of opinions and sentiments of many authors col- 
 lected, but not condensed. Others are mere nuclei 
 for the aggregation of the autlior's learning — a sort 
 of buzzing hornet's nest, with wrapper after wrapper 
 of all sorts of things, real and imaginary, about a 
 small twig. Many are but miniature cyclopedias. 
 
 The difficulty in the way of the necessary brevity 
 arises, in part, from the wish to make a text-book 
 for all sorts of schools at once. If primary schools, 
 academies and colleges could be, either by compact 
 or law, kept distinct, honest men could and would 
 make suitable text-books. But the insane spirit of 
 an ultra-democratical and abolition sentiment, is at 
 war with distinctions. It demands inexorably a 
 dead level. It would have lands, houses, education, 
 religion, pleasure, all alike for the mass ; and indus- 
 try, skill, and perseverance, that would naturally 
 place one above another, must be decried and in- 
 sulted. It says nothing shall be special, private; 
 everything shall be common, public. It allows a 
 community, but not an individual. It is as tyranni- 
 cal, cruel and despotic as the most absolute and bar- 
 barous monarchy ; it will bend the individual man 
 to its will, or trample on all his sacred rights, sport 
 with his tenderest feelings, yea ! stamp with its iron 
 heel upon a man's very heart ! " The people ! the peo- 
 ple ! liberty ! liberty !" is its watchword and cry ; 
 but it is the people as a mass, as an abstraction, as a 
 soulless body conventional, and liberty to live and 
 act as a crowd ! Individuals and individual liber- 
 ties it abhors and destroys ! 
 
 Behold the tendency of this spirit as to schools ! 
 
THE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. JQ5 
 
 Common schools affect to equal academies, and 
 academies to equal colleges ! A single teacher in a 
 school with one hundred elementary pupils, professes 
 himself competent and ready to carry the whole 
 from the a, b, c, up to the f, i, n, i, s of the topmost 
 university ! For a few shillings, he will do what 
 elsewhere requires many hundred dollars and a 
 dozen masters in literature and science ! The hero 
 has caught the spirit of the age ! He swells out 
 with the bigness of the conventional man ! He is 
 as large as the million ! Here is a frog expanded 
 by steam ! He teaches by electro-magnetism ! — the 
 rich and poor alike — and just as well whether with 
 or without books and breeches ! 
 
 And then the colleges, in despair or revenge, or 
 in self-defence, step down voluntarily from their 
 places, and with a pitiable, scrambling avidity, 
 gather up the half-fledged younglings of the inferior 
 departments ; and, finding them too weak for a flight 
 in upper air, brood over them with motherly wings, 
 and feed them with delicate grubs, till in due time 
 they launch forth their graduates to flap awhile 
 with sheepskin wings, but, alas ! soon to fall down 
 undistinguished among the many ! 
 
 Is it wonderful, then, that money-loving authors 
 and booksellers joyously avail themselves of this 
 state of things, and make books that will do for all 
 schools ? And how can the disinterested make a 
 distinction in the text-books, when distinction exists 
 not in schools ? 
 
 Books for elementary instruction in primary schools 
 and academies, should, as a general rule, contain all 
 
106 
 
 CHAPTER m. 
 
 the principles, with important exceptions, and have 
 matter enough for ample illustration and praxis. 
 Books for colleges may differ, because in colleges, 
 in addition to the text-books, lectures are employed 
 as one medium of instruction, and fewer questions 
 are asked than elsewhere. Besides, pupils should 
 be beyond the elements when they enter college ; 
 they are now ready for the philosophy of their sub- 
 jects, and therefore their books may be more diffi- 
 cult and contain more knowledge. The hbrary of 
 the college may furnish what is omitted in the text- 
 book. 
 
 As to libraries for primary schools and even acad- 
 emies, they serve more for recreation than study. 
 Not rarely are they pernicious. If the master knows 
 his business, there can be little want of other than 
 the school books. The hours not devoted to rigor- 
 us studying, should be honestly devoted to playing ! — 
 yes — to good, wholesome playing ! — to running, 
 jumping, laughing ! Play is a duty for a hard stu- 
 dent ; and if he will play, fairly and conscientiously, 
 at the play hours, he cannot be hurt by any hard 
 studying. The library may be well enough for the 
 master, but the boy has no business with it. In- 
 deed, libraries in academies are either locked np 
 from one end of the year to another, or more usu- 
 ally are soon torn and scattered. Money spent for 
 them has been wasted. Besides, there are in all 
 places town libraries, and almost every private fam- 
 ily has a domestic library ; and if books for recre- 
 ation have to be bought, they can be had, such as 
 they are, for next to nothing. 
 
THE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. IQ7 
 
 Let a boy be well prepared for college before he 
 enters, and he may read a little there, and with 
 profit ; if not designed for college, let him remain at 
 the academy, and teach and read ; if he goes to a 
 trade, let \i\u\ work and read ; but if he read before 
 these times, and during the period of severe study 
 and discipline, he becomes almost invariably a ped- 
 ant, often a mere idler, and very often an insuffer- 
 able coxcomb. 
 
 We are aware that all this and much more in 
 these chapters is deemed heterodoxy ; but in a far- 
 off imitation of Patrick ^ Henry, we say — If it be 
 heterodoxy, make the most of it. 
 
 2. Elementary text-books should be precise. 
 Whatever else be cultivated, we iiiust, in education 
 worth the name, cultivate the memory. Rules and 
 principles should evidently, then, be expressed in 
 short sentences, and with the most appropriate and 
 comprehensive words. What must be committed to 
 memory should be wholly detached from inference 
 and exception, and should never be loaded and 
 embarrassed with parenthetical explanation. The 
 page should contain all that is to be committed at 
 the time — and nothing more. Boys do not like to 
 leave w^ork behind them ; and experienced teachers 
 know the difficulty in bringing back scholars to 
 commit something omitted at the first going over. 
 Better that rules or paradigms not needed at first 
 should follow in natural order, than be placed im- 
 properly. We do not like to leave forts occupied 
 by the enemy in the rear of an advance into the hos- 
 tile territory. We conquer and garrison as we 
 
108 CHAPTER III. 
 
 proceed. And when we make a road, it is folly to 
 leave behind parts unfinished. All this applies 
 to grammars. An error in leaving a portion un- 
 committed at the outset, is very frequently irre- 
 parable. 
 
 But precision is of vital importance in expressing 
 rules. Yet how loosely are these often wrorded ! 
 and how entangled with less important matter ; as 
 if the author had no clear perceptions, and did not 
 know which was of greater consequence, the rule 
 or the restriction and explanation ! Hence, some 
 teachers compel the pupils to learn both text and 
 comment — to swallow the bran with the unbolted 
 meal. But the majority of pupils do commit neither ; 
 for where the author has had no accurate sight, 
 others often have misty views through his cloudy 
 medium. And what is dimly perceived here is un- 
 dervalued. Even experienced teachers are fre- 
 quently so embarrassed by the clumsy, inartistical 
 text, that in despair they abandon the book, and de- 
 pend upon a few questions, which they have usually 
 to answer daily themselves, and to make explana- 
 tion, to be re-repeated with endless iteration at 
 every lesson, till they feel very much like flogging 
 the author, and not the boy. Books are over ex- 
 plained, the ignorance or conceit of authors not al- 
 lowing them to suppose masters and scholars can 
 understand the plainest thing, without it is made 
 still plainer. 
 
 Perhaps the text, properly expressed, should oc- 
 cupy the upper part of the page, with exceptions 
 deemed as indispensable as the rules themselves 
 
THE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. jQg 
 
 while all notes, remarks, observations, and the like, 
 should be placed below a line at the lower part of 
 the page. 
 
 A few years ago, some grammars from across the 
 water were in use here, which, in a pre-eminent de- 
 gree, possessed the essential requisites of a good 
 text-book — brevity and precision, and a distinct 
 visibility for text and comment. But, under some 
 silly pretext or other — perhaps to democratize them 
 — they were ruthlessly seized, and so marred by 
 mal-arrangement as soon to destroy their integrity ! 
 And then, by degrees, the cunning of a dexterous 
 legerdemain^substituted in their room new books ! 
 It was equal to a dissolving view — one melted so 
 insensibly into the other ! The schoolmaster is 
 indeed abroad in the land — and so is the book- wiz- 
 ard ! He touches a good book, and it becomes — any- 
 thing else ! 
 
 If it be asked, what should be committed to mem- 
 ory ; or in other words, what should be put into the 
 text ? the answer is, whatever is of daily and hourly 
 application. Different teachers may differ as to 
 w^hat is to be thus used ; but no other answer can be 
 given, because the book is a mere tool, and its effi- 
 cacy depends upon the workman. The book cannot 
 make the teacher. 
 
 Systems of books, from the foundation to the key- 
 stone, have been attempted by several, with what 
 success the author knows not. In some cases, fail- 
 ure may be attributed to uncalled-for changes in 
 long established forms and technical words. Per- 
 haps the authors intended these small changes should 
 
 6 
 
no 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 show their originality, or their more extensive read- 
 ing. Sometimes it arises from a sickly and slavish 
 imitation of German writers — a wish to train the 
 American mind like the German mind ! — the one 
 sort of mind being of com'se composed of material 
 different from the other. Or perhaps the ingenuity 
 of the authors intended a snare by the alterations ; 
 for if we could once be brought to commit the new 
 forms, we should have an almost insuperable aver- 
 sion to using others, even if better. But, alas ! what 
 is gained in velocity is lost in power ; the immove- 
 ability of habit nrrakes us reject what causes the per- 
 plexity ; and as long as we can have old forms we 
 hate the new. Get us to lay aside our prejudices 
 for the old, till you can create them for the new, 
 and then we are caught ! But that is a feat beyond 
 ordinary legerdemain. 
 
 Vain the hope, however, that any system of books, 
 whatever be the real character, should come into 
 very general use. Not only do authors love change 
 — the people also love it. The extreme and ultra- 
 democratical feeling is adverse to the aristocracy of 
 one dominant system. It will yield to nothing uni- 
 versal, unless a botanical medicine, or an extract of 
 sarsaparilla. The cupidity of many will incessantly 
 strive to displace popular books ; and any book or 
 system of books can for a season be advertised into 
 use. 
 
 Beyond all doubt, very important advantages — - 
 indeed, some of them incalculable, would arise if one 
 single system of text-books could be adopted for the 
 schools, in their distinctive character as primary. 
 
THE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. 
 
 Ill 
 
 academical, and collegiate. Such system might not 
 be perfect ; but without inconvenient changes in the 
 essence and forms of rules, they would become bet- 
 ter and better in time, provided learned persons, 
 sacrificing their individual love of gain, and the small 
 fame of being known as the author of a change in a 
 word or a phrase, would all aid to make that one 
 system perfect. But it is a chimera to expect one 
 system, unless under the authority of a corporate 
 body of colleges and academies ; and rather than 
 allow such a body to do good, the spirit of the age 
 would crush every college in the land ! It is an 
 aristocracy in literature to which it would never 
 submit. Give us a thousand gods, but not one ! 
 
 Amidst the countless systems and books, we choose 
 as we best can. To-day we get a good article, to- 
 morrow a bad one. The meteors and stars of the 
 literary firmament bewilder us. True, each partic- 
 ular star has its advocates, and bears on its head or 
 drags at its tail a long flame of recommendation ! 
 But, alas ! who can examine all ? As well go to all 
 the streets and alleys and lanes, in search of folk 
 cured by all the opposite and conflicting systems of 
 quackery and nostrum ! If the cold water process 
 boasts its thousands, so does the hot water and steam 
 process ! One swears he was cured by a box of 
 pills, another by a bottle of liquid ! Hundreds are 
 saved by homoeopathy, and hundreds by mesmer- 
 ism ! So every system of education, and each par- 
 ticular book, is sworn to and paraded as the grand 
 desideratum! 
 
 Of recommendations, some are from men good 
 
112 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 enough as lawyers, physicians, congressmen, and 
 divines, or as military and naval officers, but who of 
 practical teaching are as ignorant as a lord ! How 
 indignant would such frown were we to trench on 
 their professions ! Some recommendations are from 
 vanity. Small people wish to appear in print — to 
 stand for once in capitals ! Not a few recommend, 
 to be rid of importunity ! Many sign what others 
 have written, just as we put down our names upon 
 a paper, pledging ourselves to aid in buying a fresh 
 milch cow for some poor fellow, whose former brin- 
 dle has recently gone dry ! Pity will move in favor 
 of a new book ! We knew a worthy man that pur- 
 chased a bottle of a popular carminative, not to save 
 his children from summer disease — for though a hus- 
 band, he was not a father — but that he might volun- 
 tarily furnish the druggist with a recommendation ! 
 He had rather be printed, even if destined to be 
 wrapped around a bottle, than to remain in inglori- 
 ous obscurity ! And that person was a clergyman ! 
 
 Perhaps the best of all recommendations is a book 
 without any. Let recommendation be given to 
 books that need it. It is the fashion to be recom- 
 mended ; but it is nearly the same as a newspaper, 
 in which all the advertisements appear in the column 
 reversed. Indeed, we have become suspicious of 
 all contrivance. We laugh with the contrivers as 
 very merry fellows ; and we give them their re- 
 ward — not our custom, but our applause. They 
 wished to be considered quizzes : we class them ac- 
 cordingly. 
 
 For some twenty years past, school-books have 
 
THE TOOLS AND INSTRUMENTS. II3 
 
 been accompanied with questions ; but it does not 
 appear that the plan has been productive of any- 
 great advantages, even where the questions have 
 referred to the subject, and not to the paragraph 
 and page. No hesitation, surely, can be felt in pro- 
 nouncing many questions, and for many books, a 
 nuisance. When answers are furnished, the folly 
 is eminently preposterous. Of course, from such 
 censure must be excepted all subjects necessarily 
 studied by questions, and all books composed in the 
 form of dialogues. Questions, too, that become to- 
 pics or themes for essays, or discussions, on different 
 parts of a subject, are not only excepted, but they 
 are praiseworthy. 
 
 But, generally, questions in grammars, histories, 
 botanies, rhetorics, philosophies, and the like, are 
 evils — and that, even if the questions refer to the 
 subject ; for while ingenuity and diligence are, pos- 
 sibly, employed to find answers, yet the mind is di- 
 verted from studying the subject as a system, — and 
 when well understood as a system, any questions 
 can be answered. The questions are to spare the 
 memory by sharing the labor with the judgment, 
 and are part of the perpetually repeated plan to 
 shorten roads and smooth roughness. Let the pupil 
 master rules and principles ; and let not his mind 
 be prevented its proper exercise, by hints furnished 
 from the questions. 
 
 Doubtless, many authors print questions contrary 
 to their own judgment. Books must appear in the 
 fashionable style, even if grotesque ; and the weak- 
 
114 CHAPTER III. 
 
 ness of parents and indolence of teachers, sometimes 
 reject books that seem to be too hard. 
 
 In concluding this subject the author would say, 
 that, while certain books, systems, and authors, have 
 been in his view, some, on the one hand, worthy all 
 praise and thanks, and some, on the other hand, 
 .worthy of severe censure ; yet, his present object is 
 rather to throw out hints and suggestions, gathering 
 in his mind for years past, and which are to be ap- 
 propriated or applied where they may be suitable. 
 If no works and systems and authors exist, to which 
 the objections and censure apply, the animadver- 
 sions may be serviceable in deterring ignorance, 
 cupidity, and conceit, from making and publishing 
 works and systems of the sort condemned. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. 
 
 The author disavows all intention of teaching 
 teachers. Nothing is more abhorrent than an essay 
 or book intended as a model of the art of teaching. 
 A book, indeed, written by any one long practised 
 in any art or profession, may be, in a degree, profit- 
 able to the less experienced, provided the author 
 have talents or genius adequate to his task ; but if a 
 person be himself destitute of the essential qualities 
 of a teacher, no book can make him a teacher. If 
 the person have the qualities, he has anticipated 
 most that others can say. Or such an one has plans 
 and systems different, and yet not less valuable than 
 others ; perhaps, his are superior to anything which 
 may be written and disclosed. He is himself better 
 fitted for the work of an author, than the very au- 
 thor he miay be reading. 
 
 Men of talents and genius and learning, (and very 
 many such are teachers,) are a law to themselves : 
 they embody all that can be said. Hence it is dis- 
 tasteful to have obtruded the well-meant, but flip- 
 pant and conceited smartness of some lectures and 
 books, addressed to teachers. Some, self-elected, 
 and others legally appointed, have an ex-oflicio style 
 in discoursing to *' schoolmasters," as if they were 
 
21(5 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 actually '* green !" and some talk to them as if the 
 masters were slaves and fools ! Perhaps, some such 
 feel sore in the palm or somewhere else, and take 
 the opportunity of a little brief authority to butt 
 their hard heads, in a revengeful spirit. The lamb- 
 like patience of many teachers under the " punish- 
 ment" — severe as is the infliction — not rarely arises 
 from the baneful influence of a system of legislative 
 patronage and espionage, adverse to the teacher's 
 manly independence. But more of this in another 
 place. 
 
 We aim mainly, now, to show the world what 
 teachers do. Gentlemen of the profession are often 
 pleased and confirmed on discovering that others 
 think and practise as themselves. Many intelligent 
 and modest men pureue, with some hesitation, right 
 methods, who are at once emboldened and strength- 
 ened by a similar practice of men rich in experience, 
 and whose opinions, therefore, are entitled to some 
 respect. It is the arrogant assumption of originality 
 that is so offensive to teachers. 
 
 Success in a school depends upon many things, 
 some common to all schools, with slight modifica- 
 tions, and others special to an individual school. 
 The teacher himself may be an old or a young man ; 
 his personal appearance prepossessing and dignified, 
 or the contrary ; his manners winning or repulsive ; 
 his temper equal or variable. Pupils have countless 
 varieties, contrasts and oppositions, and in many 
 points of view. Parents are various, and different. 
 A thousand nameless things affect the character of 
 a school. Hence the egregious folly of any one 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. JI7 
 
 book, or treatise, or lecture, that aims at having all 
 teachers regulated by one standard or system. In 
 teaching it is as true as in medicine : — " The herring 
 that cures the Scotchman kills the Frenchman." 
 
 Of things common to schools, with modifications, a 
 few may be named. 
 
 1. Classification. — This saves labor, and renders 
 it possible to teach all, where otherwise it would be 
 impossible rightly to teach any. But beyond con- 
 venience, classification is important, since experi- 
 ence shows that pupils in classes learn more in quan- 
 tity, and better iii quality, than in any other way. 
 It is thus in most things. A single coal will die, sep- 
 arated from others. Hence one sufficient reason 
 for the superiority of public education over private. 
 Teachers need not be told the philosophy of this : 
 they know, however, that with rare exceptions, boys 
 in proper classes will double, often treble the amount 
 in quantity and quality beyond the amount in the 
 same time of a solitary boy under a private tutor. 
 Boys in classes usually do all the solitary boy does, 
 and yet attend to many additional exercises, which 
 the other wholly omits. Masters themselves, obe- 
 dient to the laws of sympathy, will ordinarily teach 
 a class often with more spirit and success than a 
 class of two. The occasional absence of two or 
 three good members of a class, has a visible eflfect 
 on the nerves of both pupils and teacher ; and hence, 
 a rainy day, in addition to other reasons, is dreaded, 
 because of the sad inroad upon the size of the class. 
 Baron Steuben carsed hare} enough in drilling a 
 whole regiment : it would have at once shut up his 
 6* 
 
21g CHAPTER IV. 
 
 profane mouth, had Congress compelled him, by way 
 of chastisement, to drill one man at a time ! He 
 would have been too dispirited and melancholy to 
 swear. 
 
 Classes may be either too small or too large. 
 From six to fifteen will be a just medium, in primary 
 schools and academies. In colleges, or schools 
 taught by lectures, and where few or no questions 
 are asked, it matters not what may be the size of 
 classes, provided none are prevented from hearing. 
 Hence boys not well drilled before going to college, 
 cannot be profited ; the fault, however, not being 
 attributable to the college. 
 
 Proper organization of classes is often hindered 
 by accidents beyond the control of teachers. Equal- 
 ity in age, industry, talents, and the like, may be 
 desirable, but it is not possible ; and, therefore, the 
 expectation of parents for their children, and pupils 
 themselves, of being classed with those in all re- 
 spects equals, is unreasonable. Were parents as 
 liberal with their money as with their censures often, 
 principals of schools would be well enough paid to 
 employ more assistant tutors, and then classes could 
 be more and better arranged. But, although the 
 Israelites made brick and found straw, it does not 
 follow that schoolmasters will do the same, till Pha- 
 raoh be evoked ab inferis, to compel them. And yet, 
 without a separate and distinct teacher for every 
 three or four children in a school of fifty, classifica- 
 tion cannot comprise equals only ; nor if it could, 
 would it be, of consequence, right. 
 
 When unequals are comprised, provided the dis- 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. jjg 
 
 parities be not too great, a laggard is forced by- 
 shame and good examples to hasten ; while the one 
 in advance fears to be overtaken, and will not relax 
 his speed. Without means of comparing rates of 
 speed, important mistakes are made. Equals, equally 
 moving, may seem to be moving fast, but still more 
 slowly than possible ; but a quicker movement must 
 be educed by comparison or compelled by contrast. 
 In all communities we must act with many ; nor 
 are we at liberty, from every inconvenience and 
 loss, to act separately. We must pay something 
 for the countless advantages of a social compact ; 
 and selfishness must be counteracted in schools as in 
 active life. Here the strong must be taught to bear, 
 in a measure, the burdens of the weak ; and the 
 teacher, in the adjustment of classes, may regard 
 justice and yet love mercy. If parents insist on very 
 special attention, let them pay a very special price, 
 or employ a private tutor ; or let principals be ena- 
 bled to employ additional assistants. 
 
 It is the custom to tell of the obligations and du- 
 ties of teachers : it is pardonable, if teachers say 
 something about the duties of parents. We hope, 
 therefore, the fable of the lion and the man may be 
 recalled to mind, when it is shown, from time to 
 time, that the lion, furnished with the brush, will 
 paint the man underneath. 
 
 But a source of vexation in classing scholars, is 
 in text-books. The sorts on the same subject, used 
 by children coming from many different schools and 
 districts and parts of the Union, not only are innu- 
 merable — the varieties in the sorts are many ; and 
 
220 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 every sort is deemed by the parents, perhaps, the 
 best ! Hie labor est ! nune usus viribus / A class, 
 hov^^ever, is at length formed ; and the text-book, 
 partly by vote, partly by coaxing, and partly by 
 force, is selected. The master proceeds to assign 
 the lesson ; he names the page ; the books are shuf- 
 fled and tm'ned — happy omen ! — eagerness in the 
 manner, good natm-e in the eyes ! The passage is 
 named — and then come cries from several of the 
 class : *' Sir ! that is not in my book !" " Sir ! it is 
 different here !" Upon this, the master, so suddenly 
 checked under full sail, asks : " Have you not got 
 
 ?" — (we have a great mind to fill the blank.) 
 
 ** Yes, sir !" " Let me see the edition !" *' Aye ! it 
 is, indeed, the book ; but the editions are, severally, 
 six months later !" Of course, (hovi^ can ordinary 
 flesh and blood refrain ?) the master, in bitter indig- 
 nation, delivers an extemporaneous lecture on book- 
 sellers, book-makers, and book-agents ; hauls in his 
 flowing sheet, and rows laboriously against an ad- 
 verse tide, as best he can. 
 
 Why should not a man of medium understanding, 
 review and re-write his book till it is as perfect as a 
 text-book need be, and then, when published, let it 
 alone ? The changes made in every edition, show 
 plainly enough that the first was done in a hurry ; 
 that the writer feared some more active gentleman 
 would forestall the market. Some authors are but 
 raw hands at the business, and they expect to im- 
 prove as they go ; yet some such, although they 
 have had practice sufficient, are not yet perfect. 
 
 An imperfect text-book, (materially imperfect, or 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. 
 
 121 
 
 one which the author deems such,) should never be 
 adopted in a school ; and when a new edition differs 
 very materially from the former, it would be a 
 proper corrective of the evil, and an effectual one, 
 too, if that work was at once dropped. Let authors 
 of school-books be taught the '' seven years' rule," 
 and then we should, at long intervals, now and then, 
 have a good book, instead of seven bad editions of 
 the same work in as many years. Teachers are a 
 mighty body, if united ; and some persons, wise in 
 their own conceit, if the masters would take the 
 pains, might be taught salutary lessons. They could 
 be smart for once ! 
 
 The practice, in some schools of much and de- 
 served celebrity, is worthy all imitation, where 
 practicable. Sets of classes move, at a signal, into 
 separate apartments, where tutors are in attendance 
 to hear the several recitations ; and then, in due 
 season, at another signal, these sets are succeeded 
 by other sets, and take their places in the common 
 study-room. In the common study-room, the prin- 
 cipal, or some suitable assistant, presides — superin- 
 tending the studies, keeping order, aiding in diffi- 
 culties, correcting faults, marking delinquents, and 
 the like. The intervals between the sets of classes, 
 should not usually exceed forty-five minutes, nor be 
 less than thirty ; and, in this way, in a school of me- 
 dium size, with three or four teachers, from thirty- 
 five to fifty recitations may be heard daily, and 
 heard in the best possible manner. 
 
 This arrangement is not always possible ; but 
 
J 22 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 where many branches are studied at once, it cannot, 
 with advantage, be dispensed with. Where but one 
 or two things are studied all the time, as was for- 
 merly the mode, or where different branches are 
 appropriated to different days, as is practised by 
 some, a single room is sufficient ; and a less number 
 of classes requires a less number of teachers. With- 
 out entering into tha discussion here, as to the com- 
 parative advantages of a concentrated and a mixed 
 system of studies, the author inclines to the latter, pro- 
 vided studies are not too numerous. Such schools re- 
 quire, however, several teachers, and, of consequence, 
 as many recitation-rooms as there are teachers. 
 
 2. Lessons should be perfectly got. This rule 
 must be inexorably enforced. The success of a 
 school turns at last upon this point. Whatever excel- 
 lencies, beside, belong to the school, this is its life: 
 if this languish, everything else will decay with it. 
 No apologies must be admitted for the constant, 
 or even frequent violations of this rule. Care 
 must, indeed, be taken that pupils have neither 
 more nor less than they can fairly manage ; but that 
 quantum ascertained, it must be imperatively and 
 perseveringly required. Great difficulty is here ; 
 and all a teacher's sagacity and wisdom and expe- 
 rience are called forth to apportion tasks justly ; 
 but sooner or later, ruin or prosperity hangs on the 
 management. Elegance of building, beauty of scen- 
 ery, good intentions, learning, ability in teachers, 
 and many other things, may retard ruin ; but, if 
 pupils are not forced to master such lessons as they 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. J 23 
 
 can master, the ruin will come at last. We must 
 approximate perfection here ; and the nearer that 
 approximation, the fairer the prospect, other things 
 being equal, of a long enduring school. 
 
 It is spoken more in sorrow than in anger ; but 
 the enforcing of this prime essential is often — yes, 
 alas ! very often — rendered impossible by the weak- 
 ness of too indulgent parents. Such send to a good 
 school, in the vain hope, that in some indefinable 
 way, the name, the reputation, and other pleasant 
 things of the school, will do the boy good ! But 
 the only rule that can do him good, they wish not 
 enforced ! And when he becomes soured and rebel- 
 lious, under the faithful enforcement, his complaints 
 will be heard ! All punishment, whether of rebuke, 
 or confinement, or chastisement with the rod, will 
 be deemed anti-republican, kingly, despotic ! In 
 vain, all expectation of a good school, if in any com- 
 munity the majority of parents are indulgent, or 
 themselves undisciplined ; for the teacher must 
 either, at last, yield to the fierce storm, if he be 
 faithful, or he must relax his rigor ; and then ruin 
 comes in another shape. Doubtless, many schools 
 owe their failure to the teacher, but not a few to 
 the parents. Where parents duly sustain the teacher 
 in his rigorous exaction of possible tasks, there the 
 children grow in obedience, in manliness, in strength 
 of character, in knowledge — in everything " lovely 
 and of good report ;" and there is a good school. 
 
 Some parents wish tasks assigned for studying in 
 the evenings at home ; others wish all studying to 
 be confined to the school-room ; but variety here is 
 
124 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 unavoidable. Enough, if all the pupils have tasks 
 suitable in difficulty, and sufficiently numerous, and 
 that all these tasks are required to be fairly per- 
 formed : where or w^hen learned is of small impor- 
 tance. Parents think they have a criterion of a boy's 
 progress and improvement in the fact of his seeming 
 to be busy w^ith his lessons at home, or the contrary ; 
 but often this home-diligence is occasioned by indo- 
 lence in the school-room ; and not rarely, it is a de- 
 ception to prevent parental suspicion, or to lull it 
 when awaked. Nothing but examinations on the 
 part of the parent, and frequent interviews with the 
 teacher, and occasional visits to the school-room, and a 
 constant attendance at periodical public examinations, 
 can enable the parent to form a correct judgment. 
 
 As a general rule, a full half of the time in school 
 should be spent by each pupil in actual recitations. 
 The tasks can usually be learned in the other half, 
 with one or at most two hours home- studying, 
 or if at a boarding-school, extra studying. Seven 
 hours, or, at the very utmost, (and rarely that,) 
 eight hours per diem is sufficient time spent by 
 children in studies and recitations. The rest should 
 be devoted to playing, or to recreation, which, 
 sometimes, may be of a literary or philosophic char- 
 acter. But good, honest, wholesome sports are vi- 
 tally essential to children. Young men or women, 
 by proper system, may do more than children ; but 
 such, if studious, must beware of exceeding eight 
 hours in their laborious studies. 
 
 3. Discipline is used now in the sense of govern- 
 ment, and riot instruction ; and, with few exceptions. 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. J 25 
 
 all educators profess to believe that governmental 
 discipline is essential to the well-being of a school. 
 The no-government folk may be left to time — a 
 tardy, but sure and severe corrector of folly. And 
 yet, while many parents admit that discipline, cor- 
 rective, coercive, and even punitive, must, at times, 
 be applied to children — still only to children in the 
 abstract, while children specially and particularly are 
 always excepted ! — or that, if necessary, it is for 
 their neighbors' juveniles only — their own will give 
 no trouble ! Experience, however, shows invaria- 
 bly, that in large promiscuous schools the exceptions 
 are a very small minority ; and that this minority, 
 for the most part, would become idle, impertinent, 
 and often openly rebellious, if they were only per- 
 suaded that punitive and coercive discipline ought 
 not and would not be employed in their case. 
 
 With the best children, noble motives occasion- 
 ally lose their power. If allowed, then, to be neg- 
 ligent, they will, in time, despise the master : the 
 fear of the rod must be before their eyes. Fre- 
 quently, to every person's surprise, a boy, long re- 
 markably good, and a favorite, suddenly stands forth 
 in defiance of authority ! Some order, contrary to 
 his liking, had been given — some distasteful task en- 
 joined — and, in a moment, he rebelled ! A teacher, 
 in such circumstances, has but two alternatives — to 
 compel obedience, or resign his office. He may, 
 indeed, expel the boy ; but that is a cowardly and 
 injurious expedient, and often organizes against the 
 school an opposition, determined and successful. 
 If, indeed, parents, rather than allow a favorite boy 
 
126 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 to be properly compelled to his duty, withdraw him 
 from school, because of a threatened chastisement, 
 or because of its necessary infliction, that is an evil 
 unavoidable ; but the consequences belong to those 
 misjudging parents. 
 
 . Often we read, in school advertisements, that the 
 government is strictly par ejital ; sometimes, moral 
 and parental. But what is parental government ? 
 Such government is good or bad, according to the 
 intelligence, religion, and fii'mness of parents. Some- 
 times it is coercive ; sometimes, not. In some fam- 
 ilies, from special causes, little beyond persuasives 
 is necessary ; or, if coercion be occasionally called 
 for, the lightest pull of the reins serves : so tender 
 (to keep up the metaphor) are some children, that 
 the least check restrains — the slightest spur incites. 
 If domestic discipline eschew all coercion and puni- 
 tion, when children are rebellious and wilful, that 
 parental government will not do for schools ; at 
 least, not for all schools. It may, for a while, suc- 
 ceed in schools so fortunate as to be wholly com- 
 posed of the very best children, from the very best 
 families ; but such schools are liable to sudden re- 
 bellions, from the implied absence of corrective and 
 punitive discipline, while human hearts are naturally 
 evil and treacherous. 
 
 Perhaps the phrases, " parental government," 
 *' moral and parental," and similar ones, in adver- 
 tisements, are frequently mere words of course, with 
 any or no meaning ; but, sometimes, such phrases 
 are indicative in their character : the teacher in- 
 tending to proclaim that corporal chastisement will, 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. 
 
 127 
 
 in no case, be employed as a means of discipline. 
 In that case, it is more definite to say at once, '' cor- 
 poral chastisement " is not used. It is hardly fair 
 to appropriate the word " parental ;" because teach- 
 ers who occasionally appeal to the rod, consider 
 themseh^es as exercising a judicious and parental 
 government. Possibly, fear may induce a mild and 
 ambiguous term, lest certain schools might be wholly 
 composed of good-hearted youngsters, who have 
 made up their minds not to be whipped — a commu- 
 nity no teacher in his senses would, of choice, pre- 
 fer ; or, possibly, certain schools design to adminis- 
 ter " a parental government " both ways, to suit the 
 parents of opposite opinions. The policy may, per- 
 haps, be defended ; yet honesty is here also the best 
 policy. 
 
 The rod, in most mixed schools, must be a final 
 and possible resort. Its actual use, with judicious 
 masters, is always a tardy necessity. It should be 
 employed solemnly and, for most cases, separate 
 from beholders. Let the rod not be employed for 
 small mistakes and offences, nor for mere heedless- 
 ness ; and never for deficiencies, where reasonable 
 industry has existed. For these, and innumerable 
 faults, other modes of discipline are commonly suf- 
 ficient. But let the rod be confined to the greater 
 and graver oflfences ; to deliberate or often repeated 
 offences, after suitable admonitions and warnings ; 
 to all fixed and sullen obstinacy ; to a vicious and 
 rebellious spirit ; to all cases where mild discipline 
 would beget additional indolence and insolence. 
 
 Many shuffle off responsibility, and rid themselves 
 
128 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 of a disagreeable duty, by saying, '' Bad boys should 
 be expelled !" That may be, however, at a teach- 
 er's peril ! There is One who may, hereafter, re- 
 quire the bad boy's soul at the master's hands ! 
 Society, even, may have questions to ask of that 
 teacher, which may not so easily be answered, if 
 the expelled becomes a nuisance and a pest ! 
 
 Said a father once to the author, who expressed 
 an intention of dismissing his son : " Have you whip- 
 ped him, sir ?" To this was the reply : " No ; I am 
 opposed to corporal chastisement in schools." " What, 
 sir !" exclaimed the father, " do you mean to expel 
 my son, injure his character, injure his family, when 
 a good whipping would make him behave himself! 
 I entreat you, sir, whip him." The boy was prop- 
 erly chastised, though in violence to our own feel- 
 ings ; and he reformed in a moment, remaining a 
 comparatively good boy, till the school itself was, in 
 a year or two afterwards, discontinued. 
 
 Some tell us they have conducted schools with- 
 out chastising in any instance : so have we, and 
 many other rod-believing masters ; but we say, 
 schools cannot always be thus conducted. Time 
 was when our uniform response, to parents who 
 urged us to chastise bad boys, was : '' We will not 
 be whipping-post for the neighborhood ; do your 
 own whipping." Our experience has been of both 
 methods, and the resident conviction now is, that 
 the occasional use of the rod, in some schools, is in- 
 dispensable ; and its use in all should be deemed 
 possible. A slumbering power feared, prevents its 
 ever waking ! 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. 129 
 
 And this occasional use of the birch is parental. 
 The teacher, like a parent, must be careful not '' to 
 provoke sons to wrath ;" yet his " soul must not 
 spare for the crying." He may withhold correction 
 and hate the children. Pupils under a judicious, 
 although rigorous system, love the master, and can 
 be moved by a sense of honor and proper emula- 
 tion. But all rewards, and praise and blame — all 
 confinement, and extra tasks — all reports of bad be- 
 haviour to parents — all appeals to honor and con- 
 science — all these, and the many ever-varied expe- 
 dients of anxious teachers, sometimes fail ; and then 
 the " voice of the rod" must be heard. He who, 
 then, from mistake or indifference, will not allow 
 that voice to speak, is instrumental in forming a 
 demagogue — a liar — a thief — a murderer ! Inquiry 
 would show that many of the atrocious crimes of 
 men, are measurably owing to some radical defect 
 in the early education at home and at school — to 
 a want of wholesome rigor. 
 
 Generally, the rod must be used with young 
 children in school : we are to correct while " there 
 is hope ;" for if there is no hope of doing good, cor- 
 poral chastisement may harden. There is, as for 
 all other things, a time for the rod. And yet cases 
 exist when a flagellation of pretty large boys, has 
 acted " as a charm." In the instance named, the 
 boy was over sixteen years of age. In another 
 case, a large boy was a notorious truant, a liar, and 
 a species of forger : with a sincere reluctance and 
 a hopeless feeling, this lad, at the express and earnest 
 request of the parent, was chastised ; and his exter- 
 
130 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 nal reformation was instant and complete ! Indeed, 
 as to his own government, the author has often 
 erred from a deep-rooted aversion to the use of the 
 rod ; and his birchings have been few and far be- 
 tween. The boys, doubtless, did not, at the time, 
 consider these " angel visits ;" and yet more good 
 may have been done, than if their eyes had been 
 blessed with such sights. His present opinions 
 shall be yielded to argument supported by facts ; 
 but to the humdrum of lecturing superintendents, 
 paid for pelting frogs — never ! 
 
 In regard to girls, the rod should be used only 
 with very little ones — and that, always by a 
 woman. None but a woman should, if possible, 
 ever teach little girls. Many young girls advanc- 
 ing towards womanhood, do indeed behave in school 
 in a manner worthy severe chastisement ; but the 
 twig has become now inclined, and too rigid and 
 inflexible a branch for the warping into a right 
 direction, by any school discipline. The tree 
 must bear its fruit now. The coming age must 
 eat it ! 
 
 Such an avowal will render indignant young 
 gentlemen in the sparking age and perhaps old 
 bachelors, that cultivate hair on the upper lip and 
 wear wigs, strutting a brief noontide in the sunshine 
 of a lady's countenance. Looks, however savage, 
 do not kill everybody. Truth is more formidable 
 and awe-inspiring than angry words and scornful 
 faces. Teachers see young ladies in a light different 
 from that in which they are often viewed by men 
 of gallantry. The " angel" of a ball-room or a fash- 
 
ARRANGING AND M.INAGING THE MATERIAL. 13| 
 
 ionable party, changes wonderfully in the school- 
 room. Would a man not mistake in his choice of a 
 life's companion ? — let him consult her teacher, and 
 not her dress-maker or dancing-master. A young 
 lady that passes with honor and reputation through 
 the fiery ordeal of the school — a furnace that melts 
 away dross and tin from the pure gold — will always 
 make a wife worth the winning. The fop cannot 
 have her ; she is not for his asking. She reads him 
 at a glance, from his title-page, done in curled hair, 
 to the finis of his gilded volume, bound in French 
 calf-skin ! A woman deserves a man. 
 
 4. We prefer an admixture of various and oppo- 
 site studies. Studies may be ranked in two grand 
 classes. The most important class is mainly dis- 
 ciplinary ; although they, of necessity, have second- 
 ary uses, extremely valuable. The other class is 
 mainly important for knowledge ; but yet, they may 
 be so used as to become instrumental in strengthen- 
 ing the mind. 
 
 Of the first-named kind are, the dead or ancient 
 languages, the exact sciences, logic, and all kinds of 
 philosophy properly so called. Of the second kind 
 are, geography, history, chemistry, botany, reading, 
 spelling, and many more. 
 
 These two classes of studies may mutually par- 
 take in some degree each other's character ; yet 
 ground exists for the distinction just made. If our 
 views of education are correct, our school-books 
 and studies will appertain rather to the disciplinary : 
 if we aim to make the student's mind a mere store- 
 house, we shall select from the other kind ; or if 
 
132 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 the first be used, it will be simply for show, and, 
 therefore, superficially. 
 
 But, whatever our views, we must not expect 
 others immediately to adopt them. A very great 
 number of parents prefer the easier, the undisciplin- 
 ary studies; for, acquainted only with these them- 
 selves, they cannot appreciate the severe. The 
 stream cannot be higher than the fountain. In- 
 stances of great success in every walk of life are 
 found, where men with small education, and small 
 talents, move ; and instances of important failure, 
 where educated men, and men of talents, have tried. 
 Nay, very ignorant persons, unable to read, to 
 spell, to write their own native tongue, may be 
 seen everywhere in prosperity, in riches, in great 
 wealth. How then shall the majority of parents 
 know the advanta^^es and the uses of severe and 
 laborious, and apparently expensive discipline ? The 
 majority, the great majority, in most places, prefer 
 books and studies easy, common, cheap ; or if 
 higher studies are sought, it is on the principle of 
 the sheep in the Vicar's family picture — as much or 
 as many as can be put in for nothing ! 
 
 No small number, however, of parents who are 
 fully aware of the vital importance of thorough ed- 
 ucation, may everywhere be found ; and yet, from 
 want of time, or pecuniary ability, or some other 
 good reason, these forego the advantages of that 
 education, and, of necessity, restrict themselves to a 
 partial training of their children. For many rea- 
 sons, not necessary to state, pupils designed to be 
 most thoroughly disciplined in severe studies, should 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. igg 
 
 be exercised in the lighter branches. Hence, schools 
 generally must have an admixture of studies. This 
 may agree with a teacher's views, but it would exist 
 contrary to his views. The time is past w^hen 
 schools were wholly classical, or mathematical ; al- 
 though schools are often attempted that are com- 
 mercial, or elocutional, or for mere penmanship. It 
 is lawful to be taught by an enemy ; and, as systems 
 of partialism, or of quacker}^ have incidentally re- 
 formed many abuses, and corrected many errors in 
 medicine, so the well-founded objections to an edu, 
 cation too exclusively Latin, or mathematical, al- 
 though violently, and in many cases maliciously 
 urged, have, beyond doubt, rectified mistakes in for- 
 mer systems. A storm is useful no less in the liter- 
 ary and moral world, than the natural, and when 
 past, leaves truth and nature more verdant, and fra- 
 grant, and glorious than before. 
 
 In the apportionment of studies this will not be 
 found destitute of many advantages : — let each pu- 
 pil have from tw^o to four disciplinary studies, and 
 from four to six of the easier and lighter sort, accord- 
 ing to circumstances. And this applies to students, 
 whether they are to be educated or crammed. In 
 the first case, and w^here languages are to be used 
 as the instruments of the drill, let the pupil have 
 Latin or Greek, or both languages, every day — the 
 lessons here being the longest and most frequently 
 occurring 5 and, in addition, let him have a suitable 
 number of recitations in reading, spelling, geogra- 
 phy, or in botany, chemistry, book-keeping, and the 
 like. Or he may have a lesson in languages, while 
 7 
 
234 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 his other severe studies may be algebra, geometry, 
 logic. Or he may have Latin and Greek on alter- 
 nate days, and so also certain mathematical or phi- 
 losophical studies ; all being compounded and varied 
 according to his age, capacity, and progress. It 
 languages are not to be the instrument, then parts 
 of the mathematics, mechanics, logic, or mental 
 philosophy may be made the prominent studies, the 
 secondary being as has been just stated. 
 
 When, for special reasons, no severe studies are 
 allowed, then must the inferior studies be taught as 
 rigorously as possible, that the mind may be a little 
 aided, in spite of ignorance or prejudice. Some- 
 times it is long before parents find out the good " mis- 
 chief" the teacher is guilty of; and then they are 
 usuallj' well enough pleased to permit the evil to be 
 continued. This is often the case in arithmetic ; 
 when, to the surprise and gratification of the parent, 
 it is discovered that the boy, although despising rules, 
 can solve analytically, and from the merits of the 
 question. 
 
 When it is designed that boys shall have a com- 
 plete classical education, or a thorough mathematical 
 and scientific training, the study of history and 
 similar matters is, if not an absolute waste of time, 
 nothing beyond a mere recreation. What well-dis- 
 ciplined mind needs one to teach it history, botany, 
 political economy, mineralogy, and a host of *' knowl- 
 edges?" Any man of ordinary capacity, and of 
 ordinary diligence, can master all these at home ; he 
 need not go to school, save for such as are illus- 
 trated by experiments. But such will be considered 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. 235 
 
 sti^dies, and so studies let them be. The force of a 
 popular vote is almost omnipotent. Among the 
 Athenians the popular vote constituted common cit- 
 izens, w^ho had never served a campaign, generals. 
 A philosopher, struck with the potency of the Jiaty 
 advised them to vote " asses to be horses !" Yet if 
 the above-named are studies, let them be used as 
 studies, and not as reading books. 
 
 Is history, for example, to be used as a discipline 
 as well as a recreation? Then let the daily lesson 
 be committed to memory. A less perfect memo- 
 rizing is, perhaps, admissible here than in learning 
 the rules of a grammar, the text of a proposition, or 
 the principles of science ; and yet, if less perfection 
 be tolerated, latitude becomes wider — the inch, the 
 ell — till there happens an entire departure from the 
 starting-point. 
 
 To all who value a capacious and retentive mem- 
 ory, this mode of studying history must recommend 
 itself, especially as the memory is thus stored with 
 what is so very valuable. And if history be not 
 perfectly remembered, what, pray, is its great use? 
 If a busy idleness is anywhere, it is in reading his- 
 tory in schools and giving the sense ! 
 
 Tell us not, this cultivates the memory at the ex- 
 pense of the judgment. Does any one dare afhrm 
 that the slovenly reading of history at school, culti- 
 vates the judgment? Does a perfect remembrance 
 of the whole lesson impair the judgment, or prevent 
 its exercise ? If it does, then the teacher does not 
 understand his profession ; for why a most rigorous 
 and searching examination, and cross-examination, 
 
13G 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 into all the facts, and all the philosophy, and all the 
 inferences, and uses, both with the printed questions 
 and others not printed, is not possible and ought not 
 to be instituted, at every recitation, after the mem- 
 ory has done its part, who can say ? 
 
 In an easy matter like history, the boy doubtless 
 believes, while for the first time reading what is 
 novel and interesting, that he will not forget it, — 
 he wishes not to forget it ; but in a few days, nay, 
 a few hours after this, he remembers the promi- 
 nent facts possibly, and the outlines — all else is for- 
 gotten. If he is allowed to recite what he can 
 thus remember, or simply to pick out answers to 
 printed questions, the whole, in a few weeks, be- 
 comes a jumble and a jargon in his mind. Beside, 
 the boy must be kept busy with something. If not 
 fully occupied, he becomes mischievous ; in which 
 he indeed is to blame for a bad disposition, but the 
 false system for its cultivation, or at least its non- 
 resistance. Easy studies, or rather no studies, open 
 the work-shop for the great enemy ; and elementary 
 schools do, in this way, often unintentionally, become 
 schools of vice. There is a closer connection be- 
 tween severe studies and virtue than superficial 
 thinkers suppose. 
 
 As to the rules of grammar, the texts of geome- 
 try, the leading principles of any art or science — all 
 things of daily and hourly application — these should 
 be memorized beyond the possibility of forgetful- 
 ness ; and this cannot be done unless the very 
 words are themselves accurately learned. Indo- 
 lence and self-sufliciency on the part of most pupils 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. 
 
 137 
 
 will usually over-match the perseverance of the 
 master on this point. If, however, the mind is to be 
 properly disciplined, its perverseness subdued, its 
 impatience curbed — if a thousand nameless advanta- 
 ges are to be secured, and a thousand evils pre- 
 vented — the master must be, here, inexorable. He 
 must have the rule, the whole rule, and nothing but 
 the rule — nothing more, nothing less, nothing substi- 
 tuted, nothing varied. 
 
 A very serious difficulty arises here from the un- 
 philosophic verbiage of many authors in expressing 
 their rules — especially the parenthetical and explana- 
 tory authors. A man's heart relents at compelling a 
 boy to get by heart stuff, mere stuff! the vox prceterea 
 nihil. He begins in his softened state, by allowing 
 the boy to hunt the grain of wheal in the bushel of 
 chaff ; for which indulgence he is rewarded the next 
 recitation by having the chaff puffed into his face ! 
 While disturbed, he angrily proceeds to winnow out 
 the grain for the pupil, and not without a bitter phi- 
 lippic at book-makers and book-venders. Finally, 
 he abandons the class to its fate. Hence the half- 
 learning of the day. 
 
 To forget a rule, or not know where to find it 
 when required, is to enter a labyrinth and leave the 
 thread at the door- way. Neither rule nor thread 
 guides, unless carried with us. A subject fairly 
 mastered by incessant application of rule, stands no 
 longer in need of rule. Few masters of any art or 
 science recur to rules; knowinor the whole and all 
 the parts, the labyrinth being not only explored, but 
 
138 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 mapped and lighted, masters become guides them- 
 selves to others. 
 
 Boys have no right to start with a secret persuasion 
 that law and rule and principle are not well founded. 
 Nor would they ever dream of demanding reasons 
 before they can understand reasons, if the profound 
 ignorance and empty conceit of plagiarizing writers 
 did not invite and tempt them. The philosophy of 
 rule is a study for men. It cannot be understood in 
 the earlier periods of an education ; but if we be- 
 gin modestly with lifting the small calf over the 
 fence, we shall, in due season, end with flinging over 
 a cow or a bull, or even a brace of oxen, yoke and 
 all! 
 
 In arithmetic, the general principles only should 
 be memorized, including the customary tables of 
 weights, measures, and the like. It is an error to 
 commit rules for the special application of the gen- 
 eral principles, such as the single rule of three, tare 
 and trett, barter, fellowship. If these are deemed 
 important, they are easily enough studied by exam- 
 ples, whether* as induction, or as inference. Discus- 
 sion, however, of this subject is here unnecessary ; 
 others have settled the matter ; and the author only 
 says what is here written to show that his opinion 
 coincides with that of Colburn, and similar masters 
 of the subject. Few persons, after leaving school, 
 make much use of ordinary arithmetics. Most mat- 
 ters, in a promiscuous business, are treated and 
 solved according to the merits ; while brokers, com- 
 mission merchants, bankers, wholesale merchants, 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. jgg 
 
 carpenters, masons, painters, all have special rules 
 for the speedy calculations required ; and which, if 
 the clerk or apprentice have been properly disci- 
 plined in school, and have become master of fig- 
 ures, he can learn easily in a few weeks, and apply 
 as well as his employer. What discipline or great 
 exercise of mind can be, other than in the analytical 
 mode of studying arithmetic, or of treating a question 
 according to its merits, is hard to conceive. A bright 
 boy may " cipher clean through " a dozen arith- 
 metics, and even "the rule of promiscuous questions,*' 
 and yet be less prepared for a retail store, or lumber 
 yard, than an equally bright chap who has mastered 
 Colburn's First Lessons, and the first part of his Se- 
 quel, in which pencil and chalk aid his memory. 
 The latter will have a habit of mind different from 
 the former. The difference will be analogous to 
 playing music on a hand organ, or on a violin ; or 
 to taking a portrait by the apparatus of a daguerreo- 
 typist, and an artist's pencil and palette. The au- 
 thor was once present when a lady went into some 
 kind of fit — perhaps hysterical. It was in the woods 
 where physicians there were none. He thought he 
 would look up some '* rule " in Nicholson's Cyclo- 
 pedia, and accordingly he turned to a leading arti- 
 cle, at which was a reference to another, and here 
 again to a third, till nature becoming tired of the de- 
 lay, the patient got well of herself. And so a cus- 
 tomer, if not benevolent, might go off before a 
 rule could be found, by which to work out his ac- 
 count. 
 The countless imitators of Colburn, who, perhaps 
 
140 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 introduced into this country the method of Pesta- 
 lozzi, prove the superiority of the method. How 
 the system, hov;ever, escaped being nationahzed» 
 as too Itahan for republicans and Protestants, is a 
 wonder ! It is quite as dangerous as Itahan music 
 to our patriotism and virtue ! If some patriot could, 
 indeed, abolish pounds, shillings and pence, and let 
 us have the genuine North American improvement 
 of dollars and cents, in all arithmetics, both old and 
 new-fashioned, he would deserve a statue. How 
 this badge of continental servitude has remained, 
 with a people so sensitive to the mere semblance of 
 foreign domination, is really curious ! 
 
 5. Nothing is more important than review'ng 
 studies. But here many difficulties oppose, and 
 some obstacles almost insurmountable are in the 
 way. For instance, the parents and pupils are anx- 
 ious to go forward, and, therefore, impatient of de- 
 lay ; thinking that where much ground is passed 
 over, there the progress is great. Hence frequent 
 murmurings and direct requests that children shall 
 be put forward — not kept back; that they are not 
 to attend school but a limited time ; that schooling 
 is very dear, and it is wished to have as much as 
 possible ; and sundry similar remarks and mes- 
 sages, till teachers often give loose reins, and allow 
 the untamed and fretful to run as they please. 
 
 But, again, reviewing is always more or less te- 
 dious ; the interest of a study being measurably 
 diminished, sometimes lost, with its novelty. Where 
 neither pupil nor parent makes objections, to review 
 fairly is a hard task, or rather, an irksome task ; 
 
ARRANGING AXD MANAGING THE MATERIAL. 241 
 
 and nothing but a well-disciplined mind, and a mind 
 fired with the love of learning, can voluntarily sub- 
 mit to the drudo^erv. A teacher must manas^e well, 
 who insures a thorough review, and yet keeps up 
 the alacrity of the class. And without thorough 
 reviewing, going over old lessons is worse than 
 idleness — it renders mistakes incorrigible. It gives 
 a fresh lesson in error. It stamps, like a branding- 
 iron, absurdity and falsehood. More care is neces- 
 sary, in reviewing, to have all exactly right, than to 
 learn the original lesson. Without this, better by 
 far never to review at all. 
 
 The author lays no claim to originality in naming 
 any methods of his own ; and, therefore, without 
 insisting, he merely names the following as a good 
 method of reviewing : — the daily review of the for- 
 mer lesson. At least this is an excellent method in 
 some studies — languages, for instance, geometry, his- 
 tory, grammar, geography. The new lesson may 
 claim the first portion of time at the recitation, the 
 former lesson the remaining time. To this add a 
 monthly review, and then the final review, previous 
 to the examinations. But ever let there be con- 
 nected with the final review, an advance into new 
 fields, or new portions of old fields. This keeps the 
 mind fresh and active ; for if it falls into the listless- 
 ness incident to an unmitigated reviewing, it ig 
 worse prepared, usually, for the examination, than if 
 it had not reviewed. This is one fruitful source of 
 disappointment at examinations : the mind is re- 
 laxed and dulled by injudicious reviewing, and it 
 
142 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 cannot and will not be aroused and brightened in a 
 moment. 
 
 It may not be concealed that examination has some- 
 times its trickery. A not infrequent trick is where a 
 boy advances about a third part or a half of the 
 term, and is ever after kept reviewing and re-re- 
 viewing a mere minimum^ till he has it, not by mem- 
 ory, but by rote ; and then failure is scarcely possi- 
 ble, unless unexpected questions are asked, or the 
 boy falls asleep. The boy might have done reason- 
 ably well, and yet been prepared on a maximum 
 quantity ; and the maximum in both quantity and 
 quality should be regarded in the estimation of ex- 
 aminers. That union is best secured by daily re- 
 view of the preceding lesson, followed by the occa- 
 sional and the final reviews. A boy is thus always 
 ready for examination. 
 
 Some ask whether public examinations are advan- 
 tageous to the school or to the pupil ? Others have 
 abandoned them, and others (perhaps many others) 
 adhere to them pro forma. As often conducted, ex- 
 aminations are no fair test of a boy's progress or 
 his master's competency. It is a false barometer of 
 the literary atmosphere. Indeed, examinations not 
 rarely are a detriment both to a good teacher and a 
 good scholar ; nay, they injure even a bad scholar. 
 For an injudiciously conducted examination makes 
 superior things inferior to worse ; it discourages 
 diligent and successful scholars by preventing the 
 proper exhibition of their attainments, and em- 
 boldens the other sort in idleness and impudence, 
 by allowing the display of one single attainment, 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. J 43 
 
 whilst there was a shameful deficiency in a dozen 
 things that should have been well known. A good 
 school can be less hurt by no examination, than by 
 one badly contrived or badly conducted. A studied 
 injustice to a boy is base ! To plan that an idle and 
 disobedient boy shall be applauded with the best, is 
 both a meanness and a folly ; it begets contempt in 
 both the good and the bad ; it ruins, and deservedly, 
 the character of a school. But this injustice and 
 this partiality are very often wholly accidental. 
 Not infrequently the whole evil is owing to injudi- 
 cious or mistaken examiners. A teacher, however, 
 must insist on reviews, whether he have pubUc exam- 
 inations or not. To teach with an eye to an examina- 
 tion only, is not always honesty and is often punished 
 by a complete failure. 
 
 Diligent and careful teaching daily, with daily 
 reviews, and then the occasional and final reviews, 
 will keep a school always ready for partial or gene- 
 ral examinations ; and nothing else will. All special 
 and extraordinarv drillins: for an examination is 
 wholly improper, and almost invariably useless. A 
 boy cannot be driven, as a stage-horse, at a small 
 trot for nine-tenths of the way, and a hard gallop the 
 other tenth. The boy will break down or rebel. 
 He must keep an easy, steady, and slightly accele- 
 rated pace the w^hole way ; or, if we may be allowed 
 such a comparison, he must keep on ever, like a dog 
 on a churn-wheel, till the term is completed. Tasks 
 not well got at first, and fixed by daily review, are 
 never got ! — no, never ! Vain to try the forcing 
 system, a few weeks before examination ; there is 
 
^AA CHAPTER IV. 
 
 nothins: to be forced. The cistern has no water in 
 it — the forcing-pump cannot raise what is not there ■ 
 
 Teachers are, very often, not in the least to blame 
 for a boy's daily deficiency. For, generally, the 
 pupil will not make up his deficiency, unless he be 
 kept in after regular school-hours, and forced ; but 
 not one teacher in a thousand is able, if he were 
 willing, to remain one or two hours beyond the stip- 
 ulated six or seven. His health or life would be 
 the forfeit ; because, in any school of ordinary size, 
 some scholars are always deficient. Not a day 
 passes, where tasks are not to be made up after 
 school. But a parent has not the shadow of a right 
 to expect the extra time thus to be devoted to his 
 child, unless he pay an extra price — that is, in an 
 ordinary day-school. A teacher may, therefore, 
 even if able, properly enough be unwilling to remain 
 every day an hour or more beyond the agreement. 
 
 Those day-schools, however, which, from any ar- 
 rangement arising from higher price, or more schol- 
 ars, or any other cause, are able to employ assistants 
 who aid in keeping in, and thus compelling delin.- 
 quents to duty, are, other matters equal, the best. 
 
 6. As to examinations, this is the postulate : — r 
 Every scholar examined must have full opportunity 
 to show all that has been studied in a given period. 
 Has the scholar properly learned nine things, and 
 neglected one ? Let him show the nine, but be 
 justly exhibited deficient on the one. Has he learned 
 but one, and neglected nine ? Let him, while ex- 
 posed for the gross deficiency, still show the one. 
 If absent by any connivance of friends, still let his 
 
ARllANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. 
 
 145 
 
 real standing be made known to any or all whose 
 duty and right it is to know. 
 
 For the fulfihiient of the condition indispensable 
 to a good and fair examination, two things must be 
 found : — Ample Time, and a Competent Examiner. 
 
 Where examination is understood as a mere form, 
 and no inferences, adverse or favorable, are drawn 
 from the form, it matters not how little time is al- 
 low^ed : the less, commonly, the better. One hour 
 may do as well as one day. The excitement of the 
 thing is all that is sought ; and it answers as a safety- 
 valve, if it plays vigorously an hour at the last. 
 But, if a true examination be designed, one that shall 
 test the progress and excellency of pupils, much 
 time must be taken. Hurry and impatience are 
 absolutely fatal to the vitality of examination. If 
 worth doing at all, this is a matter that must be well 
 done; and it cannot be well done in a short time. 
 Hence, if ample time be not devoted, let no exami- 
 nation take place. 
 
 The time can only be approximated in a general 
 rule. It must evidently vary with countless cir- 
 cumstances ; but, as a rule, not less than one entire 
 hour should be deemed adequate to the wants of a 
 class of ten pupils. On some subjects, that sized 
 class would require two hours. Schools, if honestly 
 examined, will, according to their size and studies, 
 require from three to twelve days for the work. 
 
 Many persons, of remarkable perspicacity, profess 
 to judge a boy, or a class, from a sentence ! or even 
 word ! They are satisfied with one question, and its 
 answer ! And these short-metre gentlemen, who 
 
146 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 infer the building from a brick, after stepping, with 
 much self-complacence, into an examination, and 
 taking a very keen peep, step out again, and make 
 a report, harmful or helpful, as they have conjec- 
 tured or guessed wrong or right ! — a report, how- 
 ever, essentially false, whether it accidentally injure 
 or aid. To do justice, men must hear the whole 
 truth ; and that cannot be heard in less than the 
 whole time. And if the whole be not heard, a false 
 witnessinsT is borne a^^ainst the nei^i^hbor's school, 
 and the neighbors' children. 
 
 In going over the whole subject, at an examina- 
 tion, every member of a class should be allowed the 
 part or place that comes to him naturally, and with- 
 out contrivance — whether it be easy or difficult, 
 small or great in importance. Let each show, thus, 
 what he does know, and what he knows not ; what 
 he knows perfectly, or superficially ; what he recites 
 fluently, or with hesitation. There should be no 
 culling to favor indolence, or capacity, or age, or 
 deficiencies from absence during term time ; let 
 things take their course, the hard and the soft 
 things falling where they may — explanations, when 
 necessary, being given, from time to time, by the 
 teacher. 
 
 Often a good scholar trips on a very small parti- 
 cle, and a bad one slides along happily through a 
 great difficulty ; and this, sometimes accidentally, 
 sometimes of purpose : the good scholar despising 
 the small, and expecting the grand ; and the bad 
 one having specially prepared on the difficulty, thus 
 to atone for, or hide, his radical deficiencies. The 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. 247 
 
 most sagacious teacher is not always a match for 
 ingenious calculation and contrivance ; and it is not 
 very wonderful that a stranger should be " done " 
 by a cunning school-boy, and afterwards laughed at 
 for his easy credulity. Opportunity must be given, 
 that one boy may show that his single failure was an 
 accident, or an oversight ; and that another may 
 not impose a single satisfactory answer, or fluent 
 recitation, as a fair specimen of his attainments. 
 
 Dissatisfaction is the ultimate result of superficial 
 examinations. If a pupil is in reality a fine scholar, 
 and a parent has reposed a manly confidence in the 
 teacher ; and if, from his want of care, such a pupil 
 has no fair opportunity of appearing in a true char- 
 acter, and is deemed by strangers on a level with 
 the idle or inexpert, that pupil will sooner or later 
 be removed ; and usually the teacher will be left to 
 guess the reason. Or if, on the other hand, a pupil 
 has been idle, and yet is permitted to pass for an in- 
 dustrious and good scholar, a parent feels uncomfort- 
 able when congratulated undeservedly by friends, 
 and secretly despises a school and system where 
 falsehood is in the garb of truth ; or he loses all 
 confidence in the sound judgment, if not the in- 
 tegrity of the master. And as to the pupils them- 
 selves, from unfair examinations, every feeling of 
 discontent and of contempt arises ; and all induce- 
 ment to manly and generous exertion and competi- 
 tion is removed. 
 
 Such are the inevitable tendencies of bad exam- 
 inations. The master may, indeed, arrest or retard 
 the consequences, by an open, candid and honorable 
 
148 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 disclosure of all the facts in regard to each pupil ; 
 and that he should in justice to the pupil, and in self- 
 defence, always do, where,' from any accident or 
 oversight, a false impression is likely to be left on 
 the minds of examiners or spectators and auditors. 
 
 The other thing indispensable to a good examina- 
 tion, is a competent examiner. 
 
 Before proceeding with remarks on this point, the 
 author would say, that many gentlemen who are 
 often solicited to take upon them the office of exam- 
 iners, are, in all respects, eminently qualified ; that 
 their method of examining is worthy all praise and 
 imitation ; and that they bestow a great favor upon 
 a school and upon society in undertaking the severe 
 labor of the task. The remarks that follow can 
 have, therefore, no application, in their censuring 
 character, to these scholars and gentlemen. In- 
 deed, the learning, the candor, the gentleness, the 
 benevolence often witnessed in these by the writer 
 at various examinations, are suggestive rather of 
 the following remarks ; it being desirable that all 
 examiners should resemble the persons that are 
 now praised, and on behalf of the profession, thanked. 
 
 An examiner should well understand the subject 
 of examination. He should know, not merely the 
 prominent places or things isolated, but the subject 
 as a whole, and its details and connections. A knowl- 
 edge of the easier things only, begets disrespect in 
 a class and in the intelligent spectators, and makes 
 many suppose that such comparatively trifling mat- 
 ters are unw^orthy the many months bestowed on 
 them by the class. A knowledge of some few diffi- 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. 249 
 
 culties only, causes an examiner to confine himself 
 to the better portions of a class, and tempts him to 
 " stump" the poorer scholars ; for there were many 
 things these scholars knew, and knew well, but these 
 the partial examiner either did not know, or injudi- 
 ciously undervalued. Hence, a portion of the class 
 would be treated with injustice. 
 
 An examiner of this partial character often wan- 
 ders off, and asks questions connected, indeed, with 
 a subject, but rather in its practical bearings on his 
 own special art, trade, or profession. Of this rela- 
 tion the class knows little or nothing, and during 
 its school days need know little or nothing. The 
 class is ready for examination on the subject in its 
 theory, and as it is treated in a text-book. After 
 the examination has been restricted to this book, 
 till examiners are satisfied, then excursions are al- 
 lowable, often desirable ; and in arithmetic and all 
 kindred and similar subjects, a boy may be asked 
 properly enough, at the proper time, to " cipher 
 beyond his book." 
 
 jVot rarely is it the case that, if an examiner knows 
 many things not in the book, he is ignorant of more 
 that are in it ; and the class does, in reality, know 
 the subject, as a w^hole, better than he. True, they 
 have failed, it may be, to answer his questions ; but 
 change the relations of the two, and he can answer 
 few or none of theirs. Many a man who thinks he 
 has confounded a class, could, in turn, be discomfit- 
 ed and routed by the class. The stumper would 
 be stumped. 
 An examiner should be not cnly willing, but able, to 
 
J 50 CHAPTER rv. 
 
 let boys tell and show all they know and have done. 
 But this he cannot do if unacquainted with their text- 
 books. There is reason to fear that occasionally 
 examiners delight in-stumping boys — some from im- 
 proper temper, and many from misconception of the 
 office of an examiner. It is cynical purposely to 
 confound a class ; and yet a class is often purposely 
 confounded, where the disposition of an examiner is 
 really amiable. He mistakes the end of an exami- 
 nation, which is to ascertain what has been learned 
 and how it is understood. The true critic can dis- 
 cover wheat as well as chaft'. The true examiner 
 can find something to praise as well as blame. But 
 if it be resolved, either from misconception or mal- 
 ice-prepense, to stump a class, it will, indeed, in all 
 likelihood be stumped ; and yet it will not be exam- 
 ined. It may be possible thus to show what may 
 not be known, but not what is known ; and that is 
 injustice — injustice to teacher, scholar, parent, 
 school, community ! Besides, a certain manner 
 alarms timid boys, confuses slow thinkers, and pro- 
 vokes all, till they cannot tell what they do know, 
 and will not tell if they can: boys w^ill not, at such 
 times, give even a bone to a dog. 
 
 A benevolent, a parental, yes, a respectful man- 
 ner is due to a boy ; he feels manner, and then acts 
 spontaneously. Hence, some men show off — and 
 honestly, justly — show off a class, either stumped by 
 others, or so treated that they would not answer. 
 
 The term just used, is used with consideration ; 
 for why, pray, may not a class be shown off? Ought 
 it not to be shown off? If, indeed, a class be made 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. jgj 
 
 to show what is superficially known, as if well 
 known ; if trifles are represented as weighty ; if, in 
 short, any deception is practised upon spectators or 
 parents, all that showing off is mean as well as dis- 
 honest ; but if a class can be made to show off flu- 
 ently, brilliantly, all they ought to know, and which 
 they do fully and fairly know, that is not only right 
 and honorable, but a failure or incompetency to do 
 this, is itself unjust and worthy severe rebuke. 
 
 A teacher has a perfect and manifest right to make 
 his class appear as it is. It is folly most preposterous 
 to ask or expect him not to exhibit his workmanship 
 — the result of his art. The musician, the painter, 
 the poet, every tradesman, professor, artisan, is ex- 
 pected to *' show off" in a good sense — to put his 
 work or labor in its best light. And yet, when 
 classes in a school do extraordinarily well, how often 
 does a contemptuous and ill-mannered sneer coun- 
 teract the proper effect ? *' The class was shown 
 off!" And so it was — and so it should have 
 been. He that can, when corrected in his mis- 
 take, hereafter thus sneer at a splendid and yet 
 honest examination, provided he have learning and 
 sense adequate to judge, does himself deserve to be 
 *' shown off" in another sense, and " done up" also. 
 
 To some this may seem severe. It is not so 
 severe as is often merited. A long and intimate 
 acquaintance with all that belongs to the profession, 
 compels the author to believe that some folks who 
 pretend to examine, and some, who affect to judge, 
 deserve the application either of " the nine tails," or 
 nine rulers. Some ever and anon speak and act at 
 
152 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 examinations as if all teachers were impostors, and 
 Jill schools humbugs — and they the men to make the 
 expose. 
 
 Examiners, who occupy the platform or chairs at 
 an ^examination, either at the request of an independ- 
 ent teacher, or by legislative enaction at schools 
 sustained by law, should ever bear in mind, that 
 there is not the place for the unnecessary display 
 of their own reading or acumen. How often do 
 examiners wander, at a slight temptation, into a field 
 away from the true one, to display their treasures ? 
 or ask a question which can be answered by none 
 save themselves 1 perhaps not even by the principal 
 or any assistant ! And then some other examiner, 
 provoked or tempted, demurs, doubts, questions the 
 questioner, till all the grave doctors are involved in 
 a discussion. The class meanwhile remains, some 
 staring, some slyly pinching and pushing their neigh- 
 bors, and others quizzing at the squabblers on the 
 stage, — and all of opinion that no small latitude 
 should be indulged to the boys, where their masters 
 have so much. Finally, the hour is gone, and the 
 class retires — unexamined ! the teacher is baulked 
 in his hopes — the parents provoked — the boys dis- 
 appointed — the school hurt ! — all because the exam- 
 iners, instead of showing the boys off, preferred 
 showing themselves ! 
 
 There is one impertinence — (very rarely exhib- 
 ited, and yet it has been seen) — an impertinence 
 provoking almost beyond endurance. An empty- 
 headed, supercilious, conceited fellow attends the 
 examination of some modest and laborious young 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. J53 
 
 teacher, and vexed at getting an improper answer 
 from some dunce, asks with surprise — "What! have 
 vou never been taug-ht that?" 
 
 '* Yes, my lord /" the young teacher might reply ; 
 "yes, an hundred times ! but the boy has forgotten 
 again, as for months, whenever that, and similar 
 questions have been asked of him." Prudence or 
 self-respect restrains what more is thought — " Sir, 
 your insolence is insufferable ! leave the room !" 
 
 An examiner, to say all in a few words, should 
 be a good general scholar ; specially acquainted, if 
 not versed, with what he examines about ; desirous of 
 doing justice to all parties ; happy when an exami- 
 nation goes off well ; full of generous confidence in 
 the teacher ; never yielding to the temptation of 
 needless display of his own learning ; patient to en- 
 dure the fatigue of the whole hour ; himself a pa- 
 rent, or at least a person fond of young people ; and 
 lastly, one who perceives the value and importance 
 of schools to the welfare of the State. 
 
 Provided examiners of the proper kind can be 
 procured, the favor they bestow upon a teacher is 
 great ; and they well deserve, at his hands, thanks. 
 But, generally, a teacher, even when examiners of 
 his own choice are present, should commence the 
 examination of every class himself; and when the 
 class has been exhibited as it really is, then it may 
 be committed to the other examiners for such cross- 
 examination as may be deemed proper. A teacher, 
 as any other workman or artist, may reason- 
 ably expect to set forth his own performance, or 
 workmanship : when set forth, it is ready for criti- 
 
154 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 cism. Many, very many little accidents of an unto- 
 ward kind arise, even when the most excellent and 
 benevolent examiners commence with a class, un- 
 less they are accustomed to examine in the manner 
 of the teacher ; and these little inconveniences 
 either materially defeat his rational hopes, or mar 
 the beauty of his exhibition. And surely none is 
 so insensate as not to see why the teacher fears 
 this frustration of his hopes, or so cruel as to be 
 indifferent to his feelings ! Would any daub a por- 
 trait, or mutilate a statue, at the moment the artist 
 withdrew the curtain to reveal his approximation to 
 the beau ideal ? If so, then would he voluntarily 
 confuse, perplex, awe a class, the moment it was 
 presented for examination. 
 
 But whoever examines, whether teacher or friend, 
 this examiner should be uninterrupted till he has 
 done. Others present should, on no pretext or from 
 no temptation, break in with a question — unless 
 the teacher wishes to explain the situation of the 
 class or a pupil. This is common ; but evidently it 
 savors of disrespect to the examiner. Often the 
 question of the others is wholly unnecessary ; since 
 the examiner, if not interrupted, would in due time 
 have asked that very question. The proper time 
 for the others is when the examiner has satisfied 
 himself, or has occupied the allotted time ; and then 
 any one who wishes further examination can pro- 
 pound his questions ; but he should avoid any allu- 
 sion to his predecessor's error or inattention. 
 
 Upon tlie whole, proper examinations, and prop- 
 erly conducted, are advantageous to the school and 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. 
 
 155 
 
 to the community : all other examinations are at 
 best " a bore," often, a nuisance. The present chapter 
 may be concluded with a few remarks on a subject 
 closely connected with examinations — Exhibitions. 
 
 Exhibitions are, in reality, examinations in read- 
 ing, speaking, and writing. They are continuations 
 of the examinations. Like all other matters, they 
 may be good, bad, indifferent. When indifferent, 
 courtesy may incline the spectators to endure the 
 infliction with little external wincing ; but a bad 
 exhibition is too insufferably ridiculous and painful 
 for ordinary kindness or art to control the faces of 
 the patients. Some things must be almost perfect 
 for exhibition — paintings, statues, music : others 
 must be at least good ; and of this sort is a school 
 exhibition. 
 
 A bad exhibition consists of speeches illy selected, 
 prepared with no care, and delivered without art, 
 and, therefore, spite of seeming paradox, without 
 nature : add, want of taste and skill in the whole 
 arrangement. Such are not only intolerable ; they 
 are of mischieyous tendency, both in regard to the 
 people and the scholars. They should be forbidden 
 by an act of the Legislature. 
 
 We have many excellent books on the theory and 
 practice of elocution : some are worthy of all 
 praise ; and yet many schools seem unacquainted 
 with these works, or do not know how to use 
 them. Perhaps many, after all that has been writ- 
 ten, determine ''to let common sense guide, and 
 nature take her own course ;" the admirable results 
 of which compendious, labor-saving process, is seen 
 
156 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 once or twice a year, in town or country, in the 
 wonderful absurdities in the way of public reading 
 and speaking at exhibitions. If all this is nature, 
 art can beat her ! 
 
 But, while a bad exhibition is disgustful and 
 harmful, a good exhibition is a rich treat to the 
 hearers, and highly advantageous to the scholars. 
 That it is a pleasure to people of sense and refine- 
 ment, is apparent from the eagerness with which 
 such crowed to any place where a good exhibition 
 is expected ; from the profound attention through a 
 whole evening when the expectation is realized ; 
 and the spontaneous applause that breaks forth, and 
 even when its external showing is discouraged, per- 
 haps deprecated. That it is useful to scholars, all 
 teachers that know what good exhibitions mean, 
 can testify. And who but can see that it must 
 naturally elevate the character of a boy, when he 
 feels himself of sufficient consequence to aid in 
 drawing a company of intelligent and cultivated 
 persons of both sexes, to hear him read or speak? 
 to know that he is heard with pleasure — nay, with 
 a marked interest and fixed admiration ? He is more 
 and more fearful of stepping down from his moral 
 eminence : he discovers himself in a superior caste, 
 and will not lightly lose it. 
 
 Evils are doubtless incident here, as in all compe- 
 titions, or aspirings ; but these evils are not peculiar 
 to schools. Manly, honorable, generous competi- 
 torship is inseparable from active life. It meets us 
 everywhere ; and without it life would become a 
 stagnant pool exhaling its pestiferous miasma ; while 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. 
 
 157 
 
 with it, life is a noble river, bearing on its rolling 
 waves health, honor, enjoyment, happiness, pros- 
 perity. By nature, we are sensitive to praise and 
 blame. In accordance with a law of our constitu- 
 tion, rewards of some kind may be held out as col- 
 lateral inducements to virtue. Reward is proposed 
 in the Word of God, and bestowed upon men by the 
 Author of our being. The blessed Saviour himself 
 had ''an eye to the recompense of reward;" and an 
 apostle exhorts men so to run that they may obtain 
 a prize — " a crown of glory and reward." 
 
 Difficulty doubtless exists in arranging a system 
 of rewards and accessory excitements. Teachers 
 would certainly often consult their own ease, some- 
 times their own emolument, by affording no oppor- 
 tunity of generous emulation ; and thus permitting 
 the somewhat stormy elements of human nature to 
 sleep undisturbed beneath the smooth and stagnant 
 surface. But when the pupils emerge from this 
 quiescent pool, and come suddenly, unarmed, unprac- 
 tised, untutored, amidst the tumultuating waves and 
 angry storms of unavoidable rivalry and competi- 
 torship, they must be vanquished, or retire, alarmed 
 and spiritless, from many important and active du- 
 ties and enterprises of life. Education is incom- 
 plete, if the soul be not strengthened by the manly 
 and emulous and friendly contests of honorable com- 
 petition. 
 
 One means or opportunity for proper display, for 
 
 manly competition, for the rewards of approbation 
 
 and praise from worthy men, citizens and friends, 
 
 is furnished by an exhibition. The abuse of this, or 
 
 8 
 
158 
 
 CHAPTER \V. 
 
 the failure to have a good one, from the indolence, 
 the incompetency of the teacher, or other cause, 
 we cannot admit as argument against the whole sys- 
 tem. Several things, however, are indispensable in 
 procuring a good exhibition. 
 
 The principal, or his vicegerent, or whoever pre- 
 pares for the exhibition and superintends it, must be 
 a man that enters into the feelings of the boys — and 
 like a boy ! He may moderate himself; he is not 
 expected to behave exactly as a boy ; he is ex- 
 empted from talking loudly and earnestly, from 
 jumping, clapping his hands, from hurrahing in the 
 exuberance of joyous feeling ; but he must look as 
 if he would do all, if he dared. Nor must this be 
 an exterior garb put on for the occasion, or for pol- 
 icy's sake — which, however, boys will respect, for 
 they always respect v*^hat is evidently done to please 
 or profit them ; but the principal must struggle to 
 repress a spring bubbling up from a warm youthful 
 heart. That boys love ! And then they will hur- 
 rah for the exhibition ; and if they do not, it will be a 
 failure. 
 
 Enthusiasm will do much. It will not, however, 
 do all. There must be the most laborious and 
 artistical drill. Speeches must be selected accord- 
 ing to age, size, capacity, voice, port, mien, of every 
 boy. And every word, nay, almost every syllable 
 and letter, must be analyzed, weighed, mastered. 
 But love for the master and enthusiasm will carry 
 all safely through. Otherwise, all will be mere 
 labor, spiritless and profitless. In regard to selec- 
 tions, a single word of caution is deemed necessarv, 
 
ARRANGING AND MANAGING THE MATERIAL. 
 
 159 
 
 because the evil alluded to is common, almost uni- 
 versal. No speech with direct addresses to God, in 
 the manner of a prayer, should be chosen ; nor 
 should that venerable name be unnecessarily re- 
 peated in an exhibition speech. Other w^ords can 
 easily be substituted, and a slight periphrasis avoid 
 all irreverence. At least, this may akoays be done 
 with prose composition, and very often with po- 
 etical. 
 
 Manifestly, whoever drills or prepares for the ex- 
 hibition must know well, if not thoroughly, all that 
 belongs to reading and speaking. If he possesses 
 power in practice, still better ; and then if suitable 
 time be bestowed, and the material be of average 
 good quality, the exhibition will be good. Let it be 
 specially noticed, that no time whatever is necessa- 
 rily taken from what are deemed the more impor- 
 tant studies. Yet, why elocutionary exercises are 
 not among the most important studies, and why they 
 should not have due time, it would be a very diffi- 
 cult undertaking to show. All other, knowledge, 
 and the hard study of long years, is often absolutely 
 useless for want of proper drilling in elocution ! Still, 
 beyond the ordinary time given every week to com- 
 positions and speeches, in most academies worth the 
 name, scarcely an hour need be used in preparing 
 for an exhibition. This may surprise some ; but 
 many teachers who present the most elaborate and 
 tasteful and even recherche affairs, in this respect, take 
 only the ordinary time, and the "odds and ends" of time 
 that would otherwise be wasted, or applied to un- 
 worthy uses. Brick — and very fine, pressed, smooth 
 
160 
 
 CHAPTER rV. 
 
 brick — may be made by the skilful master, and yet 
 the boys be made to find straw without diminishing 
 aught of daily tasks and studies. The properly ex- 
 cited and skilfully directed enthusiasm of the boys 
 will " scatter them through all Egypt," in joyous 
 search of material. 
 
 Here, too, is a secret. Expectation looking to the 
 end of a term, and labor employed at play hours for 
 that end, is, first, a healthy incitement as to other les- 
 sons, and secondly, a safety valve for the steam of 
 exuberant feeling, that would often otherwise ex- 
 plode in mischief and rebellion. Hence good exam- 
 inations usually attend good exhibitions. Idle fel- 
 lows, too, who without the exhibition would have 
 learned nothing, will, for fear of being left out, study 
 2i little daily. Sometimes they turn into studious fel- 
 lows ; and where that is not the case, they at least 
 acquire reading and speaking. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. 
 
 Education divides itself into public and private. 
 The comparative excellency of these kinds has ar- 
 rayed hostile opinions. But to the vast majority of 
 persons, whatever be the preference and the rea- 
 sons for that preference, there can be one choice 
 only — the public. Domestic training of children in 
 all that is important and desirable, is possible to very 
 few ; while a number that can be counted, ready to 
 pay lavishly for private tutors of the proper char- 
 acter, find that these cannot be obtained. 
 
 Wherever choice is possible, where necessity 
 compels not to this surrender of a manly independ- 
 ence, the best men and the best teachers will hardly, 
 for a princely estate, merge their identity into that 
 of a household. They feel this a species of service 
 little superior to that of a head servant. Some ex- 
 cellent and learned persons may condescend to be- 
 come private tutors and governors in regal palaces, 
 and princely domes — the specialty of the case 
 makes them willing ; but generally all such men 
 feel it a species of degradation, a sinking of the 
 
152 CHAPTER V. 
 
 teacher into the pedagogue. In countries where 
 the democratical lineaments are strong in the fea- 
 tures of society, men that can do anything else, will 
 not become private tutors. They will never dig 
 with a little hoe on one sterile patch, when they can 
 drive a plough and furrow up a thousand fertile 
 acres ! Never will they voluntarily circle around, 
 wheel-like, in a single groove, w^hile they can roll 
 like a free locomotive over a wide-spread prairie 
 world ! They nurse no hot-house plants, who can 
 grow an hundred sturdy oaks ! Be it so — that some 
 prefer to nourish a brood long after fledging ; others 
 that can have a public school, will not sit, goose or 
 gander, over effeminate cacklings ! 
 
 This repugnance at becoming private tutors, and 
 the fact that few of choice do become such, or long 
 remain such, show, among others, two things : the 
 impossibility of making private education general, 
 and the probability that private education, if pos- 
 sible, is not the better, nor more desirable. 
 
 Here, then, further remark may be arrested as to 
 its influence on the conduct of the majority of pa- 
 rents ; yet they who are forced by circumstances to 
 educate in company, or in public, may be measura- 
 bly consoled by the fact that education in good pub- 
 lic or associate schools is superior to private or sol- 
 itary education ; and that wise men act as if they 
 so believed, preferring of choice the former to the 
 latter, when they themselves teach. 
 
 Objections to public education concentrate into 
 this : the necessity of exposure to bad company, the 
 contagion of evil example, and the harm to elegant 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SOllTS AND VARIETIES. ^(53 
 
 and refined manners from contact with occasional 
 vulgarity, or less refinement and polish. 
 
 Solicitude, on the score of morals, cannot be too 
 great ; and evil tendency, generated or increased 
 by community and companionship, if unchecked, or 
 not counterbalanced by an opposite, may generally, 
 and must in special cases, terminate in ruin tempo- 
 ral and eternal. But while evil tendencies are not 
 opposed in schools where religion is a subordinate 
 consideration with teachers or trustees ; or where 
 prevalent vice is constant ; or where parental influ- 
 ence is in unison with the evil of the school ; it does 
 not follow that schools may not have within them- 
 selves countervailing influences for good, and that 
 parental training may not coincide with their whole- 
 some discipline and instruction. 
 
 The amount of evil in most schools is over-rated 
 and mis-stated. The character of the evil is often 
 not even understood. Where domestics are em- 
 ployed, and where any companions are allowed to 
 associate with children, they will be exposed to as 
 much evil at home as at school, not infrequently to 
 more and greater evil. To isolate children so per- 
 fectly as to cut them off* from all contact with evil 
 is not practicable, nor is it desirable ; but if chil- 
 dren are shut up, a kind of prisoners, within rooms 
 and yards, separate from all playmates, they will 
 yet corrupt themselves. This may not be in the 
 ways and with the words of school-boys, but in w^ays 
 and with words equally bad. We cannot bring a 
 clean thing from an unclean ; children in puris natr 
 uralibus, under the most favorable of domestic cir- 
 
164 CHAPTER V. 
 
 cumstances, if yet suffered to be together a few 
 hours every day, will demonstrate the truth of Da- 
 vid's words, who confesses that " he was shapen in 
 iniquity." The conduct of children, however 
 guarded, soon confutes our philosophies, and it yet 
 remains true, " what is born of the flesh is flesh." 
 Besides, fences have loop-holes through which a 
 wicked world will peep, and gates at which curious 
 impertinence will intrude ; the idlers of streets, 
 lanes and alleys, in unguarded seasons, will, in an 
 hour, communicate as much contamination as a 
 school in a week ! As well barricade against an 
 atmosphere loaded with small-pox : pestilence, nat- 
 ural or moral, equally scorns mechanical contri- 
 vance ! 
 
 But what if children could be isolated perfectly, 
 and contamination sprang not up from within, and 
 were fenced from without ! how deplorable the re- 
 sults of excessive caution when these tender nurs- 
 lings came to be launched forth on a sudden into the 
 great world of. evil ! Temptation before had never 
 assailed ; and resistance had never tested its own 
 force, nor been trained to employ caution and skill. 
 Peril would be as imminent as when the theoretic 
 navigator is suddenly transferred from his diagrams 
 and tables to the helm, to guide, for the first, a noble 
 ship in a starless and Egyptian darkness, amid the 
 howling billows of a raging sea, and the loud thun- 
 dering of angry winds ! 
 
 In all things practice is necessary. Strength must 
 be tested and increased by trial of small difficulties, 
 before it may grapple successfully with the great. 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. jgg 
 
 Virtue thai would yield to-day will triumph to-mor- 
 row. Children may become adults in years and 
 size, and yet morally remain children ; but what 
 was delightful naivete once, becomes now disgust- 
 ful affectation. There is doubtless a sense in which 
 the world may be known without our being con- 
 taminated ; and, in a degree, children should have 
 that knowledge ; for while needful contact with the 
 world will, in time, give all important and indispen- 
 sable lessons, these lessons may come too late for 
 our own advantage and happiness. To this, and 
 much similar argument, will be opposed an opinion 
 of many worthy and yet mistaken people, that God 
 will graciously interfere to protect our children in 
 maturity, if we carefully guard them in childhood from 
 all mingling with the world and exposure to its 
 temptations. It may be so. Perhaps it is some- 
 times the case that Providence specially, and almost 
 miraculously, guards, where the conditions of his 
 interference have been ignorantly overlooked ; yet, 
 as reason is given for a guide, if we- overlook or neg- 
 lect its teaching, we may be tempting, when we 
 think ourselves trusting God. Too sedulous and 
 suspicious a care of health, and a cowardly avoid- 
 ance of every real or seeming danger, may ruin the 
 health and spirits ; and so, too anxious guarding 
 against moral evil, may produce it ! We may train 
 up a child in the way he should go, and yet the 
 very path may run near to, or occasionally intersect 
 that path in which he should not go. If a child is 
 to live in the world, he must be brought up in it as 
 8* 
 
266 CHAPTER V. 
 
 well as for it ; he must be taught how to discern 
 the true path, however interlaced with a thousand 
 false paths. 
 
 As regards intellectual superiority, if proper emu- 
 lation, always duly excited, and contests in endless 
 succession, and the laws of sympathy in aiding asso- 
 ciates, have anything to do with mental discipline, 
 public education must excel private. Temper and 
 disposition may be severely tried in school ; but 
 that very trial must, in the end, render these more 
 calm, less selfish, and less easily ruffled, A sweet 
 may be more palatable by a tinge of bitter or acid. 
 Good-nature is very often a mere negative quality, 
 arising from well organized bodies, when all around 
 is placid and cheerful, and where no great oppo- 
 sition to the will is encountered ; but many a' boy 
 deemed a mere non-pai'eil at home, for softness and 
 amiability, becomes, afterwards, peevish and quar- 
 relsome. If this woful change is discovered after he 
 has been trusted among comrades at school, it is al- 
 most invariably attributed to the influence of a pub- 
 lic school. But the boy, during his domestic train- 
 ing, had been tested by no temptation. He had 
 " not known sin," indeed, because he had not known 
 law adverse to his will ; but now came " knowledge 
 of the law," and his true temper appeared. The 
 touchstone revealed him. But the school is no 
 more to be blamed for this, than the Gospel for that 
 " sword " it so often sends. Strong and wholesome 
 food disagrees with weak digestion. The bad grain 
 of the boy's temper w^as always in existence — its 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. J 57 
 
 visibility to the eyes of his fond parents, depended 
 on a rubber. Happy when the disclosure comes 
 early enough for a remedy ! 
 
 If a prince is to be formed, who is expected to 
 live, in most things, above and separate from his fel- 
 lows ; or if a boy may be educated in a republic, that 
 he move in self-called superior classes, in an upper 
 caste, let him have private tutors. Let one teach 
 him how to walk and dance ; another how to ride 
 and fence ; another may give him the airs of high 
 life, (unless he be born to all this, and take it natu- 
 rally ;) and let separate teachers do for him every 
 separate thing to be done, and we may attain the 
 end. But if, in this country, boys are to live on 
 something like Spartan equality, they must be edu- 
 cated as associates. Fellow-feeling must be culti- 
 vated by exercise ; but what exercise can be in a 
 solitary or even domestic training, compared with 
 the exercise in a public school ? Doubtless, much 
 addressed to republicans as to a national education, 
 savors of demagogism ; occasionally it is revolu- 
 tionary, agrarian and anti-christian ; and yet none 
 can fail to see that separate and private education, 
 if very general, would be adverse to the best inter- 
 ests of a republican government. Our endeavors, 
 then, should be bent towards making public schools 
 perfect, and not, because of a few evils and some 
 abuses, to their annihilation. 
 
 The complexion of manners is colored in the do- 
 mestic circle ; the child reflects what there shines 
 upon him. Foreign aid, if deemed indispensable, 
 can easily be called in to impart additional graces, 
 
IQg CHAPTER V. 
 
 and this without great interference with the train- 
 ing of the school. But in regard to boys, what 
 more innportant or necessary, what more manly and 
 dignified, than the discipline of a properly con- 
 structed gymnasium, under the charge of an ac- 
 complished gymnast; to which is added the man- 
 ners of his own home ? Perhaps, had the author 
 moved all his life among the dancing world, and if 
 ambitious of figuring and attitudinizing in saloons, 
 on ** light fantastic toe," his taste would have been 
 altered or rectified, and his obtuseness been prop- 
 erly attrite to an edge ; but at present he cannot dis- 
 cern what a man wants beyond the strength, grace, 
 agility, and noble port of the gymnasium — all soft- 
 ened and guided by the advice and manners of an 
 intelligent father, mother, and sisters. If his home 
 be vulgar in opposition to polite, in the fashionable 
 parlance, no training of the body by foreign mas- 
 ters can give a boy manners : the graces at home 
 must mould, direct, elevate, refine, chasten ! n\the 
 graces do not enliven and adorn the home, the boy 
 can be refined only by intercourse, in after days, 
 with the world. 
 
 Schools are, indeed, some bad, and some good. 
 Parents may, they must, prefer the good, the better, 
 or the less bad. Justice to the children and to so- 
 ciety not only allows, but demands this. But some- 
 times the choice is between a bad school and ?io 
 school. In that case, let parents unhesitatingly pre- 
 fer no school — and that, whether the child can learn 
 anything at home or not ; for nothing can be worse 
 than a bad school, even if the schooling is bestowed 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. j QQ 
 
 as a gratuity ! Yet no child need be idle, even if 
 he cannot be schooled. If the means of the parent 
 will not pay for such private tutors as may be got, 
 and he cannot teach the boy himself, he may keep 
 him at work, or send him to learn a trade. 
 
 A boy apprenticed to an intelligent and benevo- 
 lent master, who conscientiously affords opportuni- 
 ties for mental culture, insists on that culture, and 
 encourages the effort — a boy thus situated will, by 
 his own exertions, learn vastly more than in a bad 
 school ; and his morals will be as much safer as 
 they would be in a church instead of a circus or a 
 theatre. A bad school is not inferior to either a 
 circus or a theatre ; evil, almost unmixed with good, 
 can be learned in any of the places, although the 
 evils may be different. 
 
 Schools may be bad in two ways — intellectually 
 and morally. The intellectually good may be morally 
 bad ; but the intellectually bad are not often morally 
 good. When inorally bad, however, whether from 
 want of religious principles in the master, or the ac- 
 cidental preponderance of evil principles in the 
 scholars, or from any cause assignable or not, such 
 schools are a source of moral pestilence and death ; 
 and no intellectual advantages can in the least com- 
 pensate for their existence. A good trade or any 
 honest employment is preferable, even if the boy 
 remains with the bare rudiments of an elementary 
 education. Nay, solitary wickedness and idleness 
 are not so bad as the associate and combined. 
 
 But schools are intellectually bad. And this is 
 likely to be the case wherever the mere elements of 
 
170 CHAPTEIl V. 
 
 learning, or the easiest parts of any subject, are to 
 be gone over again and again with countless itera- 
 tion, month after month, and year after year ; and 
 specially where the opinion is expressed or implied, 
 that all education beyond is fit for the rich only and 
 the aristocratic. Who has not noticed, that among 
 narrow-minded and prejudiced persons there is often 
 an affectation of vulgarity in the quality and style of 
 living, and dressing, and eating, and talking, as if 
 contempt and scorn were thus shown towards what 
 they deem the better sort ? This affectation extends 
 to education. It is full of pride and false humility. 
 It is itself worthy the bitterest scorn of the good and 
 wise. It is full of venom, and at every opportunity 
 will spit forth its spite at industry, decency, and 
 what is called honest pride. It levels down with a 
 will and a vengeance. In such a school let not a 
 boy remain an hour after he has once fairly and com- 
 pletely gone around the circle of its studies and 
 requirements. Remove him either to a higher 
 school, or if that be not within our reach, keep him 
 at home, or place him at any suitable trade or busi- 
 ness. The mind requiring no exertion to learn at 
 the third and fourth repetition, becomes listless ; and 
 it loses in force and elasticity, if compelled to go 
 over or around any more. It cannot live and thrive 
 on the old food. It is done with the milk, and 
 craves the meat of stronger learning. It learns to 
 loathe the poor porridge, and turns with disgust from 
 the whole dish of thrice-masticated hash ! Idleness 
 follows inevitably, and soon viciousness and mis- 
 chief. The real cause of the great idleness, and 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. ^^j 
 
 wickedness, and vulgarity, and meanness of some 
 schools, is — there are 'no studies ! Boys, poor and 
 rich, must all degenerate in schools where they are 
 compelled to beat again and again the often tramped 
 path of easy branches. It is a law of nature. It 
 must be so. Studies, therefore, should ever change 
 from easy to difficult, although no subsequent use 
 should be made of them, solely to preserve the morals 
 of schools. 
 
 Nothing is more dreaded by an experienced 
 teacher, than when a boy is delivered into his care 
 with some such formula as this : — 
 
 " Here, sir, is my boy. I have had him for year 
 after year at school, but he does not seem to im- 
 prove any ; and yet he has gone over his studies a 
 great many times. I have tried different schools, 
 but yet he has rather gone back in his learning. 
 He does not cipher any better than he did two 
 years ago ; and I believe he has forgot English 
 grammar ! And yet he is naturally a very good 
 and industrious boy, and used to be head of his 
 class ; but, somehow or other, he is rather idle and 
 mischievous now, and will need watching. I think 
 you may try him a spell, and let him go over his 
 studies once more!" 
 
 On this the heart-sick teacher suggests an altera- 
 tion in his studies — a kind of change in the medicine 
 and diet — the only thing by which the boy can be 
 restored ; but he is quickly interrupted with a self- 
 complacent and rather impatient remark : — 
 
 ** No, no, sir ! — I do not see what good that kind 
 of learning will do my boy. We do not intend him 
 for a doctor, nor a lawyer, nor an engineer, nor a 
 
172 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 surveyor, nor the like ! Besides, that sort of thing 
 makes boys proud ! ^Ve only intend the boy for a 
 farm or trade, or maybe we shall put him into a 
 store ; so that plain English reading, writing, arith- 
 metic, and so on, is enough — ^good, plain education !" 
 Alas ! the poor boy ! And so he is to be driven 
 and coaxed, pushed and pulled, like a stubborn, ill- 
 starred mule, around the old circle, but with a new 
 driver — the sole advance in his education being in 
 a change of schools ! Fortunate, indeed, if in 
 going round again, he can remember what he once 
 knew ! Fortunate, if to his stock of tricks he adds 
 no new ones ; and if, instead of going the old circle 
 of studies, he goes not a new circle of mischief! 
 Silly parent ! place your boy at the trade now ! try 
 no more schools unless you try new studies, and 
 studies more difficult ! And alas ! poor schoolmas- 
 ter ! thou must eat bread, and, therefore, the boy 
 is received ; but it is a thorn to thy side ! — he is des- 
 tined for thy ruler ! Yea ! whip and spur — thou hast 
 a half brute to manage, and he will be a whole 
 brute if he remains at school much longer ! The 
 boy has used his studies all up ! — he will tramp them 
 as waste fodder now under his feet ! Thou must 
 complete the ruin of his mind ! Yes, weep, be- 
 nevolent pedagogue ! well may thy soul be stirred 
 at parental folly and stinginess ! Men will often sell 
 their own souls to hoard up money for a son, to 
 whom they will basely deny an education, because 
 it would draw upon the hoard before the hour ! 
 Oh ! folly insensate ! it knows not its own art aright 
 — the true use of money ! 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. ^73 
 
 Schools for instruction in the elements of knowl- 
 edge not only must be, but they are indispensable. 
 When used contrary, however, to their intention, 
 thev are abused, and the abuse is mischievous. 
 None w^ill contend that these schools should be 
 used as places of seeming industry, but yet of real 
 idleness ; places, where mistaken or penurious pa- 
 rents may continue their children till they have 
 reached an age deemed suitable for some business 
 or trade ; places, where children may be kept out of 
 the parent's way, and have the semblance of going 
 to school, that the parents may not lose caste in so- 
 ciety ? Nevertheless, primary schools are liable to 
 this abuse ; and whoever insists, for any cause, that 
 his son shall remain in a primary school after he 
 has moderately well learned all there taught, injures 
 the school. Nor can any plea of convenience, nor 
 any plea of poverty, (pften the miserly whine of 
 niggardliness,) atone for that injury. No clamor- 
 ous twattle about education — sunshine and air — 
 running waters — rich and poor — common branches 
 — no voting — no grants of money — no combined ef- 
 forts of a whole community, can make a school good 
 used contrary to its intention. If a primary school, 
 a primary school it is, and must be used as such. 
 Use it otherwise, and it is ruined. It becomes a 
 nuisance. The idle mind is said to be the devil's 
 workshop : what shall we call an idle school ? And 
 a school must become essentially an idle school, just 
 in proportion as it numbers pupils who are again 
 and again made to go over the same studies, after 
 they fairly understand them. 
 
174 CHAPTER V. 
 
 From the foregoing remarks we may be better 
 able to determine, in some degree, the nature of a 
 good school — that is, intellectually. 
 
 The grand feature in a good school, is a limit in 
 the range of studies. If a school aim at teaching all 
 the branches that may properly be comprised in a 
 course of education, from the elements of the child 
 to those severe studies of the young man, that usually 
 finish the course, there must, without accident, be 
 confusion and failure. The tendency, or rather 
 one tendency of the age, is to act en masse ; and 
 this affects schools, as well as other places in which 
 persons are associated. " Union is strength," is a 
 very good maxim ; but the age misinterprets it. 
 There may be agglomeration without union ; but by 
 very many these separate and indeed opposite things 
 are confounded. Mere agglomeration may be weak- 
 ness ; for it may be wholly destitute of any cohe- 
 sive principle. A school on a very large scale may 
 have union, but the agglomerative power is all it 
 can boast : it is a sand ball that is easily pulverized 
 into its constituent grains. The very attempt to 
 move it with suitable energy breaks it. A school 
 of the conglomerate kind must have so many differ- 
 ent instructors, and so much apparatus, and so many 
 pupils, that one man cannot easily arrange and con- 
 trol, without giving his whole time to the govern- 
 ment ; and making it a special business, he is apt 
 to over-govern and over-direct. The mass will not 
 be simply governed. And there are all the various 
 and opposite modes of teaching and governing ap- 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. J 75 
 
 propriate to various and opposite studies, ages and 
 capacities — so that all will almost inevitably become 
 confusion ! 
 
 This may happen, it does happen, where the con- 
 glomerate school is honest, and intends to remain 
 honest; but such a school is almost invariably 
 found, upon nice inspection, to be dishonest. It has 
 narrow^ed down and compressed into a nutshell all 
 learning and science. It is full of patent books and 
 patent systems for doing much work in a little time. 
 It has a capacious hopper, in which wheat and 
 cockle grain and chaff may all be one grist, and fall 
 into a wondrous bolting sieve that shall sift forth 
 nothing but prime meal ! The principal teaches a 
 little of all things ; and with the aid of one or two 
 subordinates, he will, in a few months, send out work 
 that otherwise would require a dozen years and a 
 score of professors ! Cheap clothing stores are not 
 confined to the outer man : the inner man may be 
 furnished for next to nothing, and *' fits" contrived 
 at the shortest notice ! Generally speaking, the 
 academies that set forth pompous bills, professing 
 to teach a university course ; or a primary school, 
 professing to teach an academical course, is dishon- 
 est — and there is a bad school. This curious age, 
 so fertile in empty wonders, has nearly legalized a 
 word, or taken a vulgar word and stamped it as 
 current in literature — humhug, with all its deriva- 
 tives and cognates ; and that word seems to stare 
 one in the face in certain advertisements and pam- 
 phlets, discoursing so eloquently in favor of some 
 late invention or discovery in the art of educating. 
 
176 CHAPTER V. 
 
 One could hardly stare any more, if mesmerism 
 should open a new school, and teach by rubbing the 
 eyes instead of feruling the palms ! If heavenly 
 things are thus taught, surely we may expect the 
 earthly ! And then people of the weakest nerves 
 will be the strongest scholars ! and the indolent and 
 credulous will discover more than the industrious 
 and cautious ! Happy era ! — we border on a golden 
 age, when weak and strong will be on a dead 
 level ! and all may shut their eyes and yet see all 
 the arcana in the universe, and a mile or two be- 
 yond the limit that vanishes into nothingness ! — a 
 transcendentalism transcending the very German ! — ■ 
 a bottomless abyss with yet a lower bottom ! 
 
 From the preceding remarks, foundation may be 
 seen for the customary arrangement of schools under 
 three general kinds — the primary, the academical, 
 the collegiate. Other names may be given these 
 divisions: the primary may be called elementary, 
 common ; the academical may be called high- 
 schools ; the collegiate, universities ; but the grand 
 distinctions themselves are real. And, when these 
 distinctions are regarded, the end of an education 
 is better attained, than by confounding them. If 
 the distinctions are observed, then schools must be 
 in separate places, have separate modes of teaching, 
 be conducted by separate teachers, and be for pupils 
 different in ages and attainments. It is no part of the 
 author's plan to treat of these schools severally ; he 
 could not do it without twattling — genius higher 
 than his is competent: but he may say, that while 
 men of talent and learning may find ample scope 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. J 77 
 
 for all they have and all they are, in any kind of 
 school, yet worthy men of less talent and learning, 
 may be safely intrusted with many of the inferior 
 schools. 
 
 While, however, the grand division of schools is 
 allowed to obtain, the advantages of that division 
 cease whenever pupils fully prepared for a higher 
 school are kept in a lower. In case a boy has, for 
 instance, six years to be passed in schools, and two 
 are sufficient for the primary or academical course, 
 every day he remains beyond that two years is wast- 
 ed, and both he and the inferior school are injured. 
 And this rule applies to the repetition of a course of 
 studies even in college. A young gentleman was grad- 
 uated years ago at a distinguished college, and with 
 distinguished honor — the seventh honor ; for which 
 his comrades gave him a triumphal ride around the 
 campus on a — rail! He determined to re-enter, 
 and repeat the four years. His ambition was grati- 
 fied, for he once more took the seventh honor, and 
 was treated to a second rail ! But he was a liberal 
 fellow, and spent, during the eight years of his col- 
 lege life, one thousand dollars annually. A good 
 school of any kind is good only while confined to 
 its own nature. It is a stage-coach or a rail-road 
 car, in which a traveller does not wish to remain 
 after it has conveyed him to a given point on his 
 journey, or back with which he will not return for 
 the sake of travelling the same part of the road 
 twice or thrice over, when once is sufficient. 
 
 The ignorance, however, of many, even in an age 
 of surpassing light ; the vanity of some teachers ; the 
 
1 78 CHAPTER V. 
 
 profound nescience of many legislators, voted by a 
 majority to be wise men ; the selfishness of dema- 
 gogues ; the influence of wordy lecturers in lyce- 
 ums ever spouting about education, " physical, mor- 
 al, and intellectual ;" all these, wath other things pe- 
 culiar to a talking people and a talking age, incline 
 us to overlook, or disregard these, and most time- 
 honored distinctions. In vain is it urged, that evil 
 will arise if all schools are united or confounded : 
 like the child that was dehorted from some amuse- 
 ment because of the evil in it, we reply that we 
 wish to see the evil that is in plans and schemes, as 
 well as our fathers. The people often will that an 
 evil shall exist ; and its sovereignty must be obeyed- 
 A good school is rendered better by a compara- 
 tively small number of scholars. The ratio of in- 
 crease among the teachers, principal and accessory, 
 must be a ratio direct with the number of pupils. 
 In the best academies a teacher will be found ne- 
 cessary for nearly every twelve pupils, especially 
 where the studies are very numerous, and classifi- 
 cation extensive. A primary school of the best 
 sort, where only four or five branches are studied, 
 requires a teacher for about every twenty pupils. 
 In many places, perhaps it may be said, in most 
 places, the public entertain opinions adverse to this : 
 that, however, cannot alter truth or fact. In public 
 estimation a flourishing school is a school of an hun- 
 dred scholars. The number of teachers is not esti- 
 mated. Indeed, the fewer teachers the greater 
 the wonder ; or rather, it suits the spirit of the age, 
 to see great results from little causes. An hundred 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. 179 
 
 scholars and onlv one teacher ! On the contrary, a 
 school of twenty pupils and two teachers, is an 
 anomaly — it is a waste of power. A little stream ju- 
 diciously treated will turn a dozen mills ! why should 
 not one teacher he made to do an hundred boys? 
 And yet, spite of the thousand analogies of utilitari- 
 anism, a small school with several teachers, is incom- 
 parably better than a school ever so large with but 
 one master. 
 
 Honorable, nay, many honorable exceptions are 
 found to the following remark, as to all other simi- 
 lar remarks, yet we could not count easily that 
 number of parents who are too niggardly to pay for 
 a good education ; and that in many instances where 
 the value of such education is in a measure appre- 
 ciated, if not in thought, at least in words. Such 
 parents do not deserve a good education for their 
 children. For a good education costs money ; and 
 it should cost money. The popular sentiment, how- 
 ever verbally opposed to agrarianism in lands, and 
 goods, and chattels, loves it in education. There 
 something is wanted without an equivalent — and 
 something worth all the other good things of this 
 life, so coveted by parents for themselves and their 
 children. This is one true reason, often the only 
 reason, that fine, bright, intelligent children are 
 driven year after year around the circle of the same 
 easy and elementary branches : — primary schools are 
 comparatively cheap, and primary school-books 
 are cheap ! The people, therefore, in numerous 
 places, will combine and cram a school, and then 
 vote it a flourishing school. They will give one 
 
2QQ CHAPTER V. 
 
 teacher as many as a room can hold, and that is a 
 good school. 
 
 Alas ! the author has known a poor sickly teacher 
 applauded, because, unaided, he labored by himself 
 eight or nine honrs a day to teach some eighty pu- 
 pils, that he might put a little bread into his mouth, 
 and some coarse clothes on his family. His school 
 was called flourishing ! The parents paid a few 
 shillings a quarter, given out of their purses like 
 drops of blood from their hearts ! But one fair 
 morning the poor murdered victim of selfishness 
 and hypocrisy fell down in his school, over-wrought, 
 and was borne home to die ! And then his patrons ? 
 — yes, patrons! — carried him to a grave, saying — 
 " Poor fellow ! he was probably overwroug-ht !" and 
 they shed tears as the earth was shovelled on his 
 coffin. Tears ! — aye ! but those tears should have 
 been a loud wail for their own ineffable covetous- 
 ness ! But the spirit of the age says, ** Buy as cheap 
 as you can ;" and the voice of conscience being 
 hushed by a rule of political economy, the mourn- 
 ers turn from the grave to look for another cheap 
 schoolmaster. 
 
 Granted, that many are too poor to pay anything 
 for elementary tuition, and very many only a pit- 
 tance ; and that the obligation is binding and the 
 importance incalculable of making provision in some 
 way, for the education of the poor ; is that a rea- 
 son that teachers should work for nothing ? or is 
 that a reason why people who can pay, and pay 
 well, for education, should have it as a gratuity ? 
 We may, indeed, bear each other's burdens; but 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. JQJ 
 
 one man is under no obligation to bear a load that 
 would break a camel's back. A whole village may 
 not put the whole pack of their obligations on the 
 back of a single schoolmaster. Teachers may give 
 alms as they list. They ought not to demand less 
 for their services to all, because they charitably ask 
 a less fee from some ; no more than merchants 
 should sell at cost, or give away their wares to all, 
 because they benevolently do so to " the widow and 
 the fatherless." 
 
 No men are more justly entitled to fair prices, 
 and often to very large prices, than truly qualified 
 and competent teachers. And this, not barely be- 
 cause of the value of what they give in return; but 
 because of the great outlay of time and money 
 necessary to prepare for their profession. Some 
 teachers have spent a dozen years in preparation, 
 and have laid out many thousand dollars : a capital 
 of time and money, sufficient to have made them 
 rich in merchandise, or at any mechanical art. Few 
 persons can estimate the value of things where the 
 results are produced with ease and in a moment. 
 They must see the labor performed. Most can 
 readily believe that a rail-road, a canal, or a ship is 
 worth all the money asked for it; but they cannot 
 understand why a painting or a statue should be 
 held at many thousand dollars. Nor can they but 
 be amazed that a Paganini should expect twenty 
 guineas for a single " tune" performed on the violin ! 
 A plain, but frank-hearted and sensible farmer once 
 called at the office of a celebrated chief justice in 
 the South, and asked him a very important question, 
 9 
 
1^2 CHAPTER r. 
 
 that could be answered in an instant, categorically 
 —yes or no. ** No," was promptly returned. The 
 farmer was well satisfied. The decision was worth 
 to him many thousand dollars. And now the client, 
 about to retire, asked the lawyer the charge for the 
 information. " Ten dollars," replied he. " Ten 
 dollars !" ejaculated the amazed farmer — '* ten dol- 
 lars ! ! for saying .IVo .'" " Do you see" those rows 
 of books, my friend ?" rejoined the chief justice ; 
 "I have spent many years in reading them and 
 studying their contents, to answer — J\''o." " Right ! 
 right !" responded the honest farmer-—" right ! I 
 cheerfully pay the ten dollars !" 
 
 All this applies most appropriately to the compe- 
 tent teacher. The most assiduous study of many 
 books and of many subjects is necessary, before 
 he can properly and compendiously answer yes and 
 no ; but to the unthinking and the ignorant, that 
 hear the replies and notice the easiness with which 
 such words are uttered, the teacher seems to earn 
 money without labor ! Nor can one, who sees not 
 the daily toil — the mental toil — (and which, indeed, 
 none but a thinker can see) — nor can he appreciate 
 the kind and amount of labor bestowed to make a 
 boy, even a willing boy, a scholar ! The art and 
 difficulty in forming a good reader and a good 
 speaker, few can understand ! Hence the labor of 
 a teacher is too often paid with niggardliness ; and 
 the pittance is paid grudgingly — as if a penny were 
 given to be rid of the importunity of a beggar ! 
 
 It is preposterous to urge that the majority of per- 
 sons everywhere cannot pay a fair and usually a 
 
SCHOOLS, L\ THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. ^§3 
 
 generous price for good education. The price 
 might, generally, be paid without the curtailment of 
 conveniences. Very many persons who put on a 
 pitiful look, and use a whining tone, in cheapening 
 a school-bill, pay generously enough for other things, 
 even luxuries ! Nay, they heap on their children's 
 backs more than enouG^h to fill their heads and store 
 their minds, and adorn their persons, with the best 
 learning, and the most manly graces ! There is a 
 foul hypocrisy that affects to be poor, when a 
 teacher is employed, that is mean enough to heg or 
 the tuition freely given to the poor ! 
 
 But if important curtailments were called for, 
 what then ? Education is superior to all other mere 
 earthly goods. Buying property is the pretext for 
 " withholding what is meet'' from children ; but the 
 best property is that education so undervalued ! 
 This property is not affected by the rise and fall of 
 stocks ; by tariffs ; by embargoes ; by non-inter- 
 course ; by any of the innumerable changes incident 
 to all other possessions. This is an inheritance not 
 depending on the wording of wills, and the quibbles 
 of law. The finger of God only, touching the intel- 
 lect itself, can destroy its stores and deaden its 
 force. Here is a rich and vast estate ever carried 
 with us in a small compass : it cannot be stolen ; it 
 cannot decay ; it will increase from its own use ! It 
 may last forever ! A man who can educate his -chil- 
 dren well, and who is unwilling to pay the price, is 
 contemptible, and deserves rebuke when he dares 
 insult competent teachers by any oblique petition, 
 in a sneaking tone, to take less ! 
 
Jg4 CHAPTER V. 
 
 Small hopes are entertained that the idolatry of 
 covetousness shall be overturned by a few indignant 
 words : the cry will be, in spite of truth, justice 
 and generosity, in favor of cheap schools. But it is 
 well to let covetousness know that it wears a veil 
 of gauze, when it thinks itself screened behind a 
 *' whited sepulchre." It runs its odious head into 
 the bush, but its vile tail sticks out far enough ! 
 
 Let us hear no more of poor schools and poor 
 teachers. The public can have good schools, when- 
 ever and wherever it chooses to pay for them. 
 Small price generates small teachers ; and small 
 teachers cannot make great schools. It is pitiable 
 to walk through our flourishing villages, with stores 
 rivalling the great cities ; with patrician residences, 
 and tasteful cottages ; with large public halls, and 
 all the appearance of wealth, luxury, affluence ; or 
 to ride amidst farms equal in extent and richness to 
 those of European lords and nobles ; and hear from 
 town and country alike, the affected lamentation that 
 they have no good schools ! Nor will they, nor 
 ought they, while gold is dearer to their hearts than 
 intellectual improvement. Let no mistaken philan- 
 thropist offer to teach their children for nothing. 
 Let no honest politician mistake and offer to get the 
 aid of the legislature. What ! are these people in 
 abject poverty ? Are they beggars ? Have they 
 done the State such service that the State must 
 educate their children? If demagogues weep over 
 the poor people — are these the poor people ? What 
 must be the poor that have no stores, no money, no 
 farms, no conveniences, no luxuries, no elegant ba- 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES, jgg 
 
 rouches, no capacious barns ? Oh ! what deep con- 
 vulsive sobs would shake the demagogue's com- 
 misei'ative breast, if these rich poor were the j)oor 
 poor ! if these were the poor " that had no doors to 
 cover them !" 
 
 Men of talent, and tact, and energy may essay to 
 teach in these mean neighborhoods ; but their inten- 
 tion is only to make teaching a stepping-stone to 
 law, medicine, divinity, politics ; while a few may 
 feel impelled to teach, as others are impelled to 
 preach. These latter will struggle on against pov- 
 erty, and insult, and oppression, and scorn, even as 
 some " hope on, and hope ever !" They are the 
 great and godlike men ! They stand and walk 
 forth the embodiment of dignity and grandeur ! — the 
 surpassing excellence of the teacher's science and 
 art ! But still, where the reward is wholly inade- 
 quate, the majority of teachers must be incompe- 
 tent ; and the competent will ever escape into other 
 professions and employments, leaving the other 
 teachers to eat the pittance unwillingly bestowed 
 for their small services — the standing jest of every 
 brainless dunce and malicious worldling, who rejoice 
 to repay with contumely the well-merited feruling 
 of their idle and vicious school days ! 
 
 This is not the place to say how provision may 
 be best made for the education of the truly poor. 
 But not without reason is it now said, that multi- 
 tndes who cry out for the education of the poor at 
 the expense of the State, or of religious and corpo- 
 rate charities, care little or nothing for the poor and 
 their education ; they simply hope to avail them- 
 
Jgg CHAPTER V. 
 
 selves of the poor man's school, at the poor man's 
 price. The same dismterested benevolence would 
 open its mouth in favor of a poor man's eating house, 
 if it could dare to go in and eat for a penny what is 
 worth a shilling ! Hence a poor man's school is so 
 often filled with the rich man's children, that no 
 seat remains vacant for the former ! — public-spirited 
 and philanthropic persons love to set an example to 
 the poor ! And so virtue has its reward ! Such 
 excellency would, in its excess of zeal, shove pov- 
 erty frorii the public soup-table, under cover of pa- 
 triotism and condescension ! Hark ! the cry ! — 
 "Let us all sit down together on the same school- 
 bench — rags and robes ! let us all drink in learning 
 from the same iron ladle !" But mark ! — the robes 
 have filled the whole bench ! and the iron ladle is 
 exhausted by patrician lips ! 
 
 There are objections to legislative schools, which 
 shall be stated in due time. The author, however, 
 has noticed that persons, whose taxes for public edu- 
 cation are less than the amount of fair and decent 
 school-bills on independent principles, are usually 
 favorable to the imposts — because, first, these people 
 have an apology for obtaining the semblance of an 
 education at less price ; and, secondly, they educate 
 their own children at the expense, in some good 
 degree, of men whose taxes, owing to greater 
 wealth, are able to make up the deficiency of their 
 own. Some prominent men, too, with words of 
 kindness towards the poor on the tongue, and of 
 patriotism, when their property is very great and 
 liable to many and heavy taxes, contrive to put that 
 
SCHOOT.S. IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. JQ"^ 
 
 property in a shape in which it cannot be so readily- 
 taxed. When these have previously and openly 
 resisted what they deem injustice and oppression, 
 and have understood the humbug of mock philan- 
 thropy and patriotism, we blame them not for es- 
 caping the net and snare laid for their money ; but 
 where they have themselves affected to be friends of 
 wholesale systems of education, and then take such 
 methods of avoiding their natural share of burdens 
 imposed by themselves, their conduct is despicable. 
 The avarice, the cupidity, the cunning of men, aim- 
 ing to get something for nothing ; or their real in- 
 difference to the value of what is apparently sought, 
 accounts for the failure of many schemes of pretend- 
 ed philanthropy and patriotism. These are noisy, 
 but shallow streams ; there is at heart no perennial 
 fountain of living waters. One gush exhausts all. 
 
 To speak in general terms, we conclude that 
 schools, to be good, should be rather small than 
 large in the number of pupils ; the teacher 
 should be liberally paid, and honorably trusted. A 
 departure from these principles, verges towards an 
 evil or bad scliool. If, however, schools are neces- 
 sarily large in the number of the pupils, the num- 
 ber, also, of competent teachers should be in- 
 creased, that the equilibrium be preserved ; al- 
 though a very large school, with a sufficient number 
 of competent teachers, is apt to be inferior to a 
 smaller school. Pupils enough for spirit and emu- 
 lation, and variety of companionship, is the max- 
 imum ; more dilutes, and interferes with a prompt 
 and concentrated government. 
 
188 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 Thus far, schools have been considered as day- 
 schools, in which pupils are under the care of a 
 teacher during the school-hours, but reside with 
 their parents or guardians. A kind, or class of 
 schools, combining the advantages of a family and 
 a school, remains to be considered — boarding- 
 schools. 
 
 The most important consideration here, is the 
 comparative excellency of boarding-schools. Sup- 
 posing that the day and the boarding-school are 
 alike in size, in teachers, in pupils, in morals, and 
 other matters, we incline still to believe that board- 
 ing-schools are preferable. For, however excellent 
 the mental and moral discipline of a family, it can- 
 not surpass that of a proper boarding-school ; it 
 rarely equals it. During the hours of relaxation, 
 but more especially, those hours necessary for stu- 
 dying beyond the mere school-time, children cannot 
 be so well regulated in a family, as where the whole 
 is a business, and the system is formed with a view 
 to this necessity ; and that is the case in a boarding- 
 school. Unforeseen interruptions must occur in pri^ 
 vate families, and from a thousand causes, which 
 prevent any attention to a lesson at home ; and yet 
 that attention is always important, and sometimes 
 indispensable, to success in scholarship. The weather 
 forbids constancy and punctuality, so that many a 
 good student is hindered and discouraged by this 
 unavoidable accident. Beside, many boys and girls, 
 in passing to and from school, are often exposed to 
 temptations and dangers, that are worse than any 
 evil^ in the day-school itself. 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. jgy 
 
 It must be granted, that nothing is superior to the 
 moral influence pf a well-ordered and religious 
 family ; and where any moderate ^attention to the 
 superintendence of studies in such a family is pos- 
 sible, it seems not advisable that the children should 
 ever be sent to any boarding-school. A certainty 
 ought not to be yielded to a doubt. But it is also 
 true, and beyond all question, that on the score of 
 religion and morals, a boarding-school, under moral 
 and religious control, is greatly preferable to a 
 family, in which serious matters are neglected or 
 of secondary consideration. A boarding-school, to 
 many, is an ark of safety. It does for them, what 
 has been neglected by their own parents. It is ac- 
 tually, to some, the door to heaven ! Here we speak 
 understandingly and confidently ; and our words 
 would be true, if all printed in capitals. A child in 
 a good boarding-school has been known to become, 
 at least externally, transformed, that had come in 
 *' so questionable a shape" as to render a pause 
 necessary, and a doubt whether it would be safe to 
 admit such to the bosom of the family, and whether 
 it would comport with pledges given or implied, in 
 regard to parents of the other pupils ; and yet that 
 child has, after some years, gone away regretted 
 and honored, and even referred to as a model fit 
 for imitation. 
 
 A good boarding-school is, in fact, to many, a pre- 
 cious privilege — a privilege that may well be cov- 
 eted. In such a school, religion is, of necessity, 
 wrought in with the whole texture of duty and dis- 
 cipline. Without being the business exclusively of 
 9* 
 
190 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 the school, it belongs to all the business. It mingles 
 with the studies, with the rebukes, ihe chastisements, 
 the rewards, the counsels, the approbation. Boys 
 see how it is possible in all things to regard the au- 
 thority of God, and how all may be employed in 
 His service. Beside this, religion has its altar in the 
 family ; and praise and thanksgiving ascend night 
 and morning. God is implored for pardon, for illumi- 
 nation, for sanctification, for guidance, for salvation ; 
 and He is publicly worshipped on the Sabbath in 
 the congregation of the people. A jealous eye 
 watches and guards the morals of the pupils ; and 
 great care is exercised to defend from all wicked- 
 ness and impurity. 
 
 Sectarianism is no necessary part of all this reli 
 gion. But any sectarianism, if it contain any of the 
 vital principles of Christianity, is infinitely prefera- 
 ble in a boarding-school to no religion. Perhaps we 
 may be classed among the strong opponents of a 
 papistical religion ; but we had rather by far send 
 to a boarding-school where such sentiments were 
 even taught, than where religion was not taught at 
 all. A man may, perad venture, discern the truth, 
 however variegated with false colors, or overlaid 
 with gilding. The pearl of great price may ray 
 forth its light through rubbish ; but it is impossible 
 to perceive the truth where it is not, or find a jewel 
 where none is lost or concealed. 
 
 As a general rule, very young children are safer 
 at home than at even a good boarding-school. Mo- 
 thers, certainly, are the best teachers and guardians 
 for such. But where necessity requires, very young 
 
SCIIOOLP, IN THEIR KINjJS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. jqi 
 
 children are cared for as honestly, often, as at home ; 
 while many improper and hurtful indulgences are 
 withheld. 
 
 In a word, we may say a good boarding-school 
 is the combination of a family and a school. Where 
 that combination is perfect, the school is excellent. 
 The degree of excellence varies with the variations 
 of the constituents. Keeping in view this definition 
 boarding-schools, manifestly, should never be large. 
 A household of twenty-five pupils is, perhaps, a max- 
 imum : possibly, fifteen or twenty is a better num- 
 ber. Yet very far be it from us to say, that most 
 ".ellent boarding-schools may not be, where twice 
 V r thrice these numbers are found; but still the do- 
 mestic constituent is in jeopardy, whenever the num^ 
 ber of pupils is so great as to change i\\Q family as- 
 pect. True, Asiatics sometimes have sons enough to 
 ride on " threescore mules ;" but w^estern families, 
 with one mother, are usually much smaller ; and our 
 analogy must be restricted to the occidental sun. 
 
 The courtesies of the table, and of ordinary inter- 
 course, are better secured among a small number of 
 boarders ; and the importance of manners no wise 
 man can fail to see — none can undervalue. Man- 
 ners in a boarding-school may not be fine and ele- 
 gant, but they may always be pleasing ; yet they 
 cannot be pleasing, if indecorum at table is allowed • 
 and it must more or less prevail, when a large num- 
 ber of boys is there. But a great objection against 
 boarding-schools, is found in the partial destruction 
 of a home-feeling ; for when the sensibilities are 
 
292 CHAPTER V. 
 
 blunted or deadened, many virtues of a mild and 
 amiable character suffer. And boys governed 
 wholly by authority, and not moved by love, are 
 inclined to be slaves and not sons. Hence disobe- 
 dience, insolence, mischiefs, rebellions in boarding- 
 schools. The children, cut off from all family con- 
 nections and feelings, become cold, unsocial, inimical. 
 They set up opposite interests. The mellowing, 
 and melting, and harmonizing influence of family 
 and domestic feeling is wanting : they cannot 
 amalgamate with the school. Two masses or bodies 
 are in juxta-position : there should be a blending 
 into one. Not a few boys need a mother, a father, 
 a sister: that want unsupplied, renders them rest- 
 less and unhappy. They submit to authority, but 
 they hate it as tyranny. 
 
 In proportion, however, as a boarding-school has 
 few pupils, the objection has less force, and often 
 loses its entire force. For with a few, the teacher 
 and his family may with great propriety have such 
 intercourse, as to supply, in a great degree, the 
 natural cravings of the heart after home. It is not 
 enough that the judgment of the children is con- 
 vinced that the family is kind ; they must come into 
 contact, and feel what is fatherly and motherly and 
 sisterly in it. The heart requires touch to be moved. 
 But this is almost impracticable in a large board- 
 ing-school. There, the life is wholly by rule, ac- 
 knowledged to be right, but felt to be cold. And 
 nothing is so hurtful to a school, as chilled affection ! 
 Y{g may be told, that in large boarding-schools 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. J 93 
 
 * 
 
 children are regarded as members of the family ; 
 but it can be only pro forma — the actual fulfilment 
 of the promise is next to impossible. 
 
 The same mistaken parsimony that destroys or 
 prevents good day-schools, does, in a degree, aflfect 
 boarding-schools. Many are unwilling to pay a 
 suitable price. Boarding-schools, therefore, if they 
 exist at all, must, in some places, be large. High 
 prices, with a limited number of boarders, not to 
 exceed twenty, would, in reality, be cheaper than 
 low prices and five times that number ; but an age 
 that lives by sight and not by faith, can see little, if 
 it must be seen through a large sum of money. A 
 guinea may aid the vision of a corrupt judge ; but 
 it has an opposite effect on the eyes of money-lov- 
 ers — when the guinea is before them, they can see 
 nothing else ! 
 
 This chapter will be concluded with a few re- 
 marks on Gymnastic Exercises. That boys should 
 play, and play honestly and actively and joyously, 
 even if somewhat boisterously, no man who has had 
 jnuch to do with schools for a moment doubts. Nor 
 does plenty of play, at suitable times, the least in- 
 terfere with studies ; on the other hand, it greatly 
 aids the studies. Generally speaking, the best schol- 
 ars play the best ; although the reverse is not ne- 
 cessarily true. But play and recreation may be 
 made conducive to a very valuable purpose, sepa- 
 rate from the beneficial result upon the studies. 
 While a boy plays, he may be made to acquire pro- 
 digious strength and activity ; and this, combined 
 
194 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 with beauty of form and grace of movement. And 
 that end, although it may be in some degree attained 
 by any suitable exercises, such as running, leaping, 
 playing ball, and the like, is more speedily and more 
 effectually attained by the exercises of a properly 
 regulated gymnasium. 
 
 Good schools would be rendered better by this 
 appendix to their studies and fixtures. That so few 
 have gymnasiums must be entirely owing to igno- 
 rance of their utility : it may, sometimes, be owing 
 to misconception of their nature. A gymnasium 
 may not be properly constructed ; or it may not be 
 properly directed ; or it may not be directed at all, 
 the pupils being left to self-instruction : in which 
 cases, no very valuable results are to be expected, 
 and sometimes hurtful accidents. In a proper gym- 
 nasium, properly directed and governed, every mus- 
 cle of the body is exercised and strengthened ; while 
 accidents, except of a trivial sort, are by far less 
 than at the ordinary sports of the play-ground. 
 The exercises of the gymnasium may be taken in 
 all kinds of weather, both in winter and summer ; 
 and they will supersede, more or less, many games 
 and plays — some doubtful in their character, and 
 others trifling, if not silly. 
 
 A gymnasium, by which is meant the house and 
 the fixtures or apparatus, should be erected and dis- 
 posed, under the direction of an experienced and 
 practical gymnast. Without this, the instruments 
 may be mere lumber. Besides, if the whole is done 
 according to a suitable plan, few things are made to 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. 295 
 
 answer many purposes ; and thus, many dollars are 
 saved that otherwise would be wasted on needless 
 fixtures. 
 
 An instructor is necessary ; for the whole of gym- 
 nastics is really an art, and that art has its principles. 
 Without a teacher, deformity and weakness might 
 be the result, by working in a wrong way, or at a 
 wrong time. The gymnasium, too, if ungoverned, 
 would, after the novelty had passed, degenerate 
 into a play-house ; but while amusement and recre- 
 ation are always found, work and labor are the es- 
 sential features of a good gymnasium. Few will 
 continue with perseverance and punctuality suffi- 
 cient to reap the wonderful advantages, unless they 
 are compelled. Hence, school-boys so often be- 
 come expert gymnasts, while young men, who are 
 their own masters, rarely excel. And hence, school- 
 boys who are forced year after year to exercise in 
 the gymnasium, shall, at eighteen or twenty, surpass 
 most unexercised men of any age. Besides, their 
 strength shall abide throughout life. 
 
 The object of these exercises is not that men 
 may perform extraordinary feats of strength or agil- 
 ity ; and yet, so easy do difficulties become, that 
 hundreds of exercises, accounted feats by strangers 
 to the exercises, are done daily by boys, and without 
 an effort or a thought. But when occasions in ac- 
 tual life do arise, in which daring actions of strength 
 and agility must be done, persons trained for years 
 in gymnastic exercises will do them, as if they 
 were only a little different from ordinary actions. 
 Strange ! that spite of all the countless lectures and 
 
196 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 essays on '* physical education," that sort of educa- 
 tion should be so singularly neglected. True, under 
 the impulse of the moment, attempts are every now 
 and then made by young men at colleges or in villa- 
 ges to exercise in gymnasiums ; but when the novelty 
 is passed, and the labor remains, the enthusiasm sub- 
 sides, and " physical education " is at an end. Board- 
 ing-schools, however, ought not to neglect the phys- 
 ical training of their pupils ; and they can easily be 
 thus trained under a suitable instructor. This book 
 professes to be the result of experience ; nor is this 
 part of it any exception. The author has experi- 
 enced, in his own case, the great advantages of a 
 gymnasium. If ever there was a case where an 
 allowable accommodation of Scripture words exists, 
 it is his own — " youth renewed like the eagle's ;" 
 and his deep and abiding conviction of the great ad- 
 vantage of gymnastic exercises thus acquired by 
 experiment, induces the author, for the sake of good 
 to others, to obtrude himself. 
 
 The present occasion is a proper one for saying 
 that two things are very desirable, nay, almost in- 
 dispensable addenda to all theological seminaries ; 
 and, if it depended on the author, every orthodox 
 theological institution in the land should have a 
 gymnasium, and a teacher of reading and speaking. 
 
 What more humiliating than the many puny, ill- 
 formed, effeminate young clergymen ! — as though 
 piety and paleness, theology and thinness, devotion 
 and dyspepsy, were all twin sisters ! — as if the pul- 
 pit were disgraced by able-bodied and robust minis- 
 ters ! Surely false sentiments of dignity and consist- 
 
SCHOOLS, IN TIIETR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. J 97 
 
 ency must be prevalent, if the effeminacy of young 
 clergymen can be, for a moment, tolerated ; or if a 
 feminine look and manner be deemed interesting. 
 Alas ! it is sometimes considered indicative of extra- 
 ordinary goodness ! And there are Pharisees that 
 v^ould shudder at the thought of a gymnasium for a 
 theological school, as if it savored of worldly-mind- 
 edness. Many think that moral light is like natural, 
 and cannot shine out of a man, unless through some 
 transparency of the flesh macerated by fastings ! 
 
 Silly sentiments are found among very good men. 
 Religion does not wholly remove the weakness of 
 the natural understanding. Affectation still clings to 
 the naturally vain and priggish ; and these do the 
 religious, as they were wont to do other things — 
 they put it on in a style of their own, and wish to 
 set a fashion for their brethren. These people often 
 pet young clergymen and nurse them into a most dis- 
 gustful semblance to themselves. But while they pity 
 such for weakness, they had better rebuke them for 
 sheer laziness ! Doubtless tobacco has slain some ; 
 but laziness has killed more. A society for the 
 suppression of inactivity, and for the promotion of 
 " bodily exercise," would be just as wise, and quite 
 as efficacious, as anti-chewing and smoking corpora- 
 tions. The noxious weed might be allowed, if di- 
 vinity students would work an hour a day in a gym- 
 nasium. Nor does this permission arise from self- 
 indulgence ; we neither snuff nor scent in the to- 
 bacco line, except by way of good-natured endur- 
 ance of the infirmity of the weaker brethren. 
 
 Had the author power over other men's purses, 
 
1 93 CHAPTER V. 
 
 or a purse heavy enough of his own, he would at- 
 tach a ffvmnasium with its teacher to every theo- 
 logical school ; and admit no student till he had 
 pledged his word to exercise one hour daily in the 
 gymnasium, Sundays excepted. He should make it 
 a point of conscience. A teacher would be neces- 
 sary at first only : young men could soon teach 
 themselves, and some expert gymnasts would al- 
 ways be in the school to instruct the new students. 
 But a gymnast should be the first instructor. 
 
 Dignity is useful in its place. It cannot be 
 learned, however, and is very ridiculous and oflfen- 
 sive when put on. Of itself it does little good, even 
 where natural to men ; but where made a substitute for 
 benevolence or active duty, it deserves to be laughed 
 at. The truest dignity for a Christian minister is a 
 faithful discharge of duty in his natural manner ; 
 and to fit him for that discharge in the best way and 
 for the longest period, health and strength are of 
 prime importance. Perfumes, lassitude, and all the 
 et cetera of clerical effeminacv, may be left to such 
 as do not prefer hearty nature to sickly nicety. We 
 need men for Protestant pulpits : icomen the apostle 
 has forbidden to teach. 
 
 As to Elocution, the author, with due deference, 
 considers what usually goes by the name of Oratory^ 
 as of very small account for the pulpit. Eloquence, 
 indeed, which is something different from mere ora- 
 tory, is highly valuable ; but even that is not indis- 
 pensable. The most successful preachers haA''e, and 
 not rarely, been destitute of any other eloquence 
 than what belongs to earnest manner and pious 
 
SCHOOLS, IX THEIR KINDS, SORTS A\D VARIETIES. jgg 
 
 hearts. God seems to prefer here, as in many other 
 matters, " the small things ;" that the success of the 
 Gospel may not seem owing to the wit of man. But 
 clear, distinct articulation is so vitally important to 
 a preacher of the Gospel, that an irreparable want of 
 that power should debar a candidate from the office 
 of the ministry. 
 
 The design, therefore, in having reading and 
 speaking taught systematically and perseveringly in 
 a theological school is, by no means, as some might 
 conjecture, to teach or make what is usually under- 
 stood by the term — orators. These, we apprehend, 
 cannot be made — they are born. Or, rather, certain 
 talents and susceptibilities necessary to an orator 
 must be con-natural ; and where these exist the 
 orator may be developed ; or if he accidentally 
 break forth, he may be pruned, trained, and in many 
 ways aided by art to reach his highest eminence. 
 The design is to form preachers, that they may be 
 easily and distinctly heard in any house usually de- 
 voted to preaching ; and that they may with ease 
 accommodate their voices to the sizes of different 
 rooms. 
 
 It would seem that what is so natural to us, and 
 so necessary, might be safely left to itself. But al- 
 though articulate speech is one of our characteristic 
 distinctions from the irrational animals, few people 
 know how to talk ; very few can read ; not one 
 in a million can speak ! How painful and how won- 
 derful, to find so many highly educated men in the 
 pulpit that cannot be understood when they speak ! 
 How distressing and vexatious, when it is known that 
 
200 CHAPTER V. 
 
 the best of men are pouring forth treasures from ex- 
 haustless stores ; and this, when clear, articulate, 
 distinct enunciation is within their reach, or was 
 once, though now it may be too late. 
 
 Perhaps the remedy of bad articulation, or the 
 prevention, is so simple that it is despised. The rem- 
 edy, however, must be laboriously and persever- 
 ingly used ; and as this takes a good deal of time, 
 theological students deem the time misspent ; some 
 deem it, perhaps, a sin. Prejudice has, we know, 
 arisen on this subject from the overweening conceit 
 and folly of many teachers, real and pretended, 
 of elocution. These, too often, talk and act as if 
 the salvation of the w^orld depended on elocution ; 
 a folly most persons commit who substitute a part 
 for a whole in anything — morals, politics, religion, or 
 learning. Indeed, the narrower their base the 
 grander they propose to erect the superstructure. 
 The men of one book are to be dreaded in one 
 sense ; the men of one idea in another. Professed 
 elocutionists frequently fall into a grand error — try- 
 ing to make all men speak and read in the same 
 way. For while some things are common to all es- 
 sentially good reading and speaking, idiosyncracy 
 varies and colors for itself. Nothing more is here 
 contended for than clear, distinct articulation, and a 
 voice trained to suit the size of any building. Add 
 also an easy and graceful carriage of the body, and 
 unimpeded, natural use of the hands. The whole 
 style, manner, force, pathos, inflection, and all other 
 matters, by no means to be despised however, may 
 yet be safely left to every man's taste, genius and 
 feeling. 
 
SCHOOLS, IN THEIR KINDS, SORTS AND VARIETIES. 201 
 
 Great, indeed, would be the error, and most ridic- 
 ulous in itself — any thought, care, or effort in regard 
 to voice, or gesture, or accent, at the time of speak- 
 ing. All things must be so mastered and practised 
 in private as to become natural to us, and then voice 
 aijd everything else spontaneously and instinctively 
 accommodates itself to all circumstances, in the 
 same way it does in singers, or as do our limbs in 
 the daily and hourly actions. No one thinks of 
 rules who plays an instrument of which he is master. 
 No adept swims by a book. A very worthy brother 
 did, indeed, so misapprehend a lesson given gratui- 
 tously by a friend, that he essayed its practice in his 
 next sermon, but, after laboring very conscientiously 
 to inhale and exhale at the proper intervals, and to 
 explode his voice at each sentence, he declared that 
 the whole was too laborious, and did not seem to 
 assist any. In his case, indeed, there certainly was 
 additional ground of dissatisfaction ; for, alas ! he had 
 unwittingly sucked in his breath, when he should 
 have allowed its egress ! 
 
 But can any folly be more preposterous than the 
 expectation of benefiting men by our preaching, if 
 they cannot hear us ? We may think what we 
 please about this and that method of acquiring dis- 
 tinct utterance, but it is a grievous sin against Christ 
 our Master, if we refuse to overcome an impediment 
 in our voice or strengthen a weakness. Besides, a 
 teacher for a theological school need not be spe- 
 cially employed. In all these schools are young 
 men of extensive learning, of fine taste, of undoubted 
 genius ; and not infrequently themselves born to be 
 
202 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 good speakers, if not great orators. Let one or 
 more, of these, whether " brothers of high or low 
 degree," be chosen as teachers, and then, let " the 
 brethren " honestly and gratefully, under the direc- 
 tion of such, submit to an incessant drill in articula- 
 tion and other exercises of the voice. Let them 
 practise on all keys, from the almost inaudible whis- 
 per of a profound bass to the finest altissimo of fal- 
 setto tones ; in volume ; in diminuendo, crescendo, 
 forte, piano. Let them learn to talk up and down a 
 scale, and to speak the common chord ; to speak one 
 word on the octave and another in the key note ; let 
 them do all with a speaking voice that is usually 
 done with a singing voice. Let them practise sus- 
 taining the voice, by uttering monotonously senten- 
 ces, from short to long, at every pitch. Many of 
 these methods are taught in no books. Let the 
 teachers elected derive all they can from books : 
 their own good sense and ingenuity will invent and 
 vary ad libitum and almost ad infinitum. 
 
 Great interest may be kept up for a long while ; 
 but, when the interest ceases, still let young men de- 
 voted to Christ, persevere with endless iterations 
 till they can read and speak articulately, and with- 
 out weariness, for an hour and a half, in any kind 
 of a room in which they are likely to preach. Then, 
 let each go forth, strong in body and voice, as 
 well as in faith and love ; and then " in a known 
 voice and tongue," as God shall give him utterance, 
 let him in simplicity, or in eloquence, or in mechan- 
 ical skill, preach Christ. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 COMMON SCHOOLS. 
 
 Like other words or names, representing several 
 ideas, the term, Common School, suggests different 
 thoughts to different persons, and to the same per- 
 son, at different times and places. The effect on 
 the mind may sometimes be evil, and even when 
 good is meant. Perhaps no class of words do more 
 harm, at times, than those which are designed to 
 represent good things, and yet, at the same mo- 
 ment, introduce by association evil or mean things. 
 The latter often substitute themselves for the for- 
 mer, or lessen the effect of the good : as when we find 
 a very worthy person in contact ever with the vile, 
 although he may not be a companion or a friend. 
 We cannot see the excellent person, without think- 
 ing of the mean man : we wish, at least, the honor- 
 able person had a contiguousness with what was 
 like himself. 
 
 By common, applied to schools, is sometimes 
 meant the lower English branches, the elements of 
 learning — common branches. In that case, the 
 term primary, preparatory, elementary, is prefer- 
 able ; for, these are the beginning of all learning, 
 
204 CHAPTER V. 
 
 and partake of its noble and excellent character. 
 There is as much honor in beginning, as in finishing. 
 The summit of learning could never be reached, if 
 the first steps of the ascent were not taken. We 
 may not carelessly apply a word that may tend to 
 destroy the impression we might and ought to have 
 of the essential importance and grandeur of these 
 elementary studies. 
 
 Sometimes, by common schools, however, is 
 meant, schools for the common people — from which 
 is an easy declination to the poorer sort of people ; 
 and then, the term is fraught with many and great 
 evils. It tends at once to divide the community 
 into classes. And hence, while we profess zeal for 
 the welfare of society, and a wish to equalize, 
 wherever possible — and it is more practicable in 
 both learning and religion, than is usually thought — 
 we have invented a term that creates castes where 
 they had not existed, and recognizes them where 
 they have existed. It is no part of an educator's 
 duty to create factitious distinctions, nor to minis- 
 ter to the pride of a monied or fashionable aristoc- 
 racy. And yet, amidst our benevolent zeal for 
 man's intellectual advantage, we indirectly create 
 and acknowledge radical distinctions in society, 
 such as the self-called superior classes themselves 
 had hardly dared, even with power in their hands^ 
 to legalize. This may seem too fine ; but less 
 things than this produce quite as important results. 
 The very sneer and contempt with which the word 
 common school is often uttered, shows our suspi- 
 cions to be well founded. 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 205 
 
 It may be said, the schools in question are so 
 called, because common to the poor and rich ! So 
 is a third-rate tavern ; but the rich do not often visit 
 such — the poor are allowed to have all the common- 
 ness to themselves. Besides, w^hat school is not 
 common to poor and rich, provided the poor could 
 contrive to pay the fees of a high school ? The 
 cheapest schools could not be common in any other 
 sense, if money from some quarter did not sustain 
 them ; and if the poor could pay the price, the low- 
 est or highest school would be open. 
 
 That the poor should be educated, and that 
 money should be paid for them, we both affirm and 
 will directly argue ; but our object now is to depre- 
 cate fronf schools in which many poor are educated, 
 names that may mark them. Such names widen 
 the gulph, already nearly impassable, in certain 
 quarters, between the poor and rich ; they acknowl- 
 edge the visibility of that separation ; they force 
 many good men to see what they wish to shut from 
 sight. Charity sometimes turns all eyes upon a 
 poor worshipper, by assigning him a pew in a 
 corner ! although in superfine churches, she gives 
 him a pew nowhere — not, perhaps, by voting him 
 out, so much as by dressing him out. As some evil 
 may arise from the word common, and none from 
 the other w^ords often used, such as primary, ele- 
 mentary, and the like, we shall use in the sequel one 
 or any of these better terms. 
 
 That elementary schools should exist, has been 
 repeatedly affirmed. An important inquiry, how- 
 ever, remains : — Should these schools be a matter 
 10 
 
206 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 of independent and individual, or of private and as- 
 sociate enterprise ? Or, on the other hand, shall 
 they be sustained by geographical districts, or by 
 the^whole State as a civil and State policy, and by 
 taxation, direct or indirect ? 
 
 The author inclines to the former opinion. Be- 
 fore entering on a statement of reasons, he would 
 prevent or remove an impression adverse to the 
 calm consideration of the subject, and prejudicial to 
 the just appreciation of the arguments ; and hence, 
 it is distinctly said now, what will be repeated and 
 enlarged directly, that provision ought to be made 
 for the education of the poor ; and that legislatures 
 and corporate bodies, intrusted with the collection 
 and appropriation of public moneys, may, in their 
 wisdom, allot portions for educational, as for all 
 other purposes important to the common weal. 
 
 1. From a careful reading and consideration of 
 the foregoing chapters, among other convictions, 
 there must have been left an impression on the mind, 
 that the management of a school, and the applica_ 
 tion of any system of education, belongs to one class 
 of men, and to that class exclusively — practical 
 teachers, of many years' experience. Dictation to 
 such, from any quarter, but specially from the un- 
 skilled, is an impertinence, at best — often an inso- 
 lence ; and interference from such, if allowed or 
 forced, can only distract, harass, and finally ruin. 
 
 But in schools controlled as public schools (that is, 
 legislative and similar schools) are sometimes, and 
 may be constantly it comes to pass, that the inter- 
 ference will be perpetually, not a benevolent and 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 207 
 
 skillful ov^'seeing, but an officious and pragmatical 
 meddling. The books — the studies — the mode of 
 teaching — the discipline — the whole system — the 
 very teachers themselves^ — shall all be watched, criti- 
 cised, scolded, ordered, a thousand ways ! If all 
 this were by persons long experienced, and pro- 
 foundly versed in learning and teaching, the control 
 would be endurable ; but this interference is often 
 by truly ignorant persons, and almost always by 
 men who know no more of teaching than they do 
 of type-cutting. How often the meddlesome person 
 is a second or third-rate local politician, in search of 
 popularity and office, who in this way seeks to ingra- 
 tiate himself with parents ! Many small gentlemen* 
 elected superintendents or visiters of some sort, 
 think they must do something ; and that they will 
 do, whether anything is to be done or not. For 
 what were they elected or appointed ? The legis- 
 lature awaits their report ! The world is impatient 
 to have the journal of their proceedings ! Shall 
 they seem ignorant or careless ? They must, there- 
 fore, find fault and amend. And of course, if we 
 make a business of anything, we can find or make — 
 especially, if honored and paid for it ! Hence, more 
 unmitigated and atrocious twattle never was 
 penned, than the profoundly pompous reports of 
 nothingness, in the shape of official statements of 
 school visitations ! And what paltry jealousies and 
 envyings, about the distribution oi patronage ! And 
 how teachers are often reproached, as if rioting on 
 the spoils and plunder of the people ! Sometimes, 
 too, they are called u to be paid their pittance, as 
 
2Q^ CHAPTER VI. 
 
 swine are invited to a pig-trough ! Sometimes they 
 are even disappointed — the trough being miracu- 
 lously empty ! 
 
 From this insolence, turmoil, and meanness, the 
 best teachers escape whenever possible ; and com- 
 mon education becomes commoner. Bees, it is said, 
 endure not constant meddling with their hives ; but 
 when they are thumped, rattled, pushed, and blown 
 around, the bees fly away. Teachers imitate bees, 
 and whenever they can, escape the din and strife of 
 a thousand self-conceited tinkers, swarming around 
 their schools. They prefer peace to war, freedom 
 to slavery. For if, in addition to the watchfulness 
 and rebukes of parents, who have a right to inspect 
 and find fault, teachers, because of some small allot- 
 ment of public money, must bear the control and 
 obey the orders of a dozen or more officials, they 
 lose their independence and manliness — they are 
 slaves ! — and some, alas ! are contented or awed 
 slaves, who hug their chains and polish the links ! 
 Keen discerners see in such a debased and dejected 
 spirit — they crouch and fawn like dogs ! they bring 
 contempt on the profession ! Slaves were peda- 
 gogues at Rome ; and our experimenters in educa- 
 tion, while they go for the largest liberty for the 
 people, and strive to make their education cost 
 nothing — apparently, do all this at the expense of the 
 teacher's manliness and freedom, and his pocket. 
 Indeed, what slavery can be more complete, than to 
 live in constant anxiety and fear ? to fear the parents 
 and the children ? to fear the people and the legisla- 
 ture ? to fear the trustees and visiters, the dema- 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 
 
 209 
 
 gogue, the superintendent, the opposite sectaries, 
 yea ! the very infidel and atheist ? to earn a miser- 
 able pittance thrice over? to have the character, the 
 domestic circumstances, open to impertinent scru- 
 tiny ? to have the mouths counted, that corn just 
 sufficient may be measured out ? and, after all, to 
 be liable to an unceremonious dismissal at a mo- 
 ment's M^arning ? Alas ! poor slave — he is to be 
 pitied ! and yet, in a thousand cases, he deserves it. 
 If he be incompetent as a teacher, the treatment is 
 a just punishment for his wicked presumption — en- 
 gaging in a noble and hol}^ cause, without the ability ; 
 and if competent, that he should meanly sell himself, 
 when the world is full of other employments. 
 
 Under these and similar circumstances, it would 
 be strange if public schools disappointed not the ex- 
 pectations of their advocates ; and while the circum- 
 stances continue, disappointment must continue. 
 Where meanness and degradation exist in the heart, 
 similar fruits will be borne. Public schools may 
 occasionally be found exempt from these evils ; but 
 these evils are incident to their nature ; and if an 
 Argus watch with an hundred eyes, when he sleeps 
 with one, his charge is in jeopardy. 
 
 It seems unreasonable to object to the examina- 
 tion of teachers by competent examiners. And yet, 
 when even competent persons examine, the truth is, 
 with great difficulty, elicited ; and usually injustice 
 is done to the candidate by an erroneous and too 
 low an estimate, or to the community by too high 
 an estimate. The mischief belonging to the recom- 
 mendation of books pertains to this subject, and in 
 
210 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 time no more dependence is placed on a certificate 
 of examination than on a newspaper advertisement. 
 Any teacher has testimonials, or, if his moral char- 
 acter is not impeached, he can procure them ; and, 
 therefore, the people can no more, from this source, 
 discriminate in the character and competency of 
 men, than in the qualities of books. Both are taken 
 at a venture. 
 
 Usually, examinations, such as they are, are made 
 by incompetent examiners, and that is almost of ne- 
 cessity the case when examiners are not practical 
 teachers. Men cannot be voted into good examin- 
 ers any more than into good teachers. The sover- 
 eignty of the people in the mass, or delegated to 
 representatives, is efficacious enough in some things 
 and to be venerated in its sphere ; but it cannot be- 
 stow mental qualities, or bodily strength, as it can 
 money and place. Examinations, then, by mere 
 voted or elected examiners, is a foolery in itself, and 
 not rarely a vile injustice to the teacher ; although 
 the teacher who voluntarily subjects himself to such 
 examiners deserves to be baulked in his hopes, and 
 to depart with a suspicion attached to his profes- 
 sional character. Men ought to be examined, as 
 well as tried, by their peers. If they will acknowl- 
 edge incompetency as competency, let them submit 
 to an adverse decision without repining. Many an 
 inexperienced, although talented, learned and wor- 
 thy young man, has been stamped by the ignorant 
 and conceited with a brand that months, and some- 
 times years, are required to erase. The author is 
 wholly averse to any college of examiners, what- 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 
 
 211 
 
 ever be the moral, intellectual, and even practical 
 character of the faculty. The beginning may be 
 well ; the argument in its favor is plausible ; but the 
 end must be disastrous. No set of examiners can 
 judge of a young man till he is tried, and it cannot 
 be knov^n a priori how he will teach — that must be 
 tested by the act and effort itself. The spirit of the 
 age here shows itself as in all other matters : all 
 must be done by masses, by corporations, societies, 
 colleges. And yet all this care to be public, and to 
 give pubhcity to everything, is no guarantee against 
 ignorance, incompetency, injustice, selfishness, par- 
 tiality, tyranny ! These very bodies catch the spirit 
 of sovereignty, and wish to make themselves feared, 
 respected, courted ! and from their insolence, injus- 
 tice, and oppression, there is no escape till their des- 
 potism becomes general and intolerable, and revolu- 
 tion dashes down their thrones to erect new ones ! 
 
 There is no need of any college of examiners. 
 A recommendation from the high schools, acade- 
 mies, colleges, where a young man has been educa- 
 ted, and perhaps been employed as an usher or tutor, 
 is free from suspicion ; and that recommendation 
 only presents him to a community or society at large 
 as a person worthy of being tried as a teacher. It 
 shows merely that the young man has learning suf- 
 ficient, and is of good moral character ; and that 
 learned men, his tutors and friends, believe he will 
 make, in time, a good teacher. And what more could 
 a college of examiners say, especially if they had no 
 previous acquaintance with the person ? and, if they 
 had, what more dare they say ? The success or 
 
212 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 failure of the young man depends on experiment. 
 He and his commendators are honest in all they pro- 
 fess and say : the public understand this point, and 
 the young man is put upon trial. It is now a plain, 
 easy, honest, common sense affair ; but some, in a 
 mistaken zeal, would render it complicated, expen- 
 sive, unmeaning, unsatisfactory, and deceptive. The 
 educational cause is in danger from its friends — its 
 true friends. If they proceed they will ruin it, just 
 as in some places true friends ruined the temperance 
 cause. The lessons furnished by the failures of 
 other excellent schemes, from the rashness or pride 
 of their ultra-going advocates, should be studied and 
 remembered. 
 
 The power of example the world will bear in 
 certain associations, but the power of sovereignty 
 they will scorn. Attempts to become corporate and 
 receive legislative sanction, will become the signal 
 of the rallying and concentrating of opposition. It 
 may be possible that a legislature adverse to the 
 wishes of a medical faculty may, because of the 
 seeming popularity of the step, grant to a college of 
 teachers what they will not grant to a college of 
 surgeons and physicians ; but yet it is highly im- 
 probable that what in many States has been refused 
 to the latter will be granted to the former ; and thus, 
 in addition to failure with the legislature, will be a 
 triumphant host of opponents, and not a few of 
 these opponents former friends. 
 
 Preference in the community, on a large or small 
 scale, should, as a general rule, be given to such 
 young men as teachers who have been employed as 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 213 
 
 ushers and subordinate tutors in well-known schools. 
 It is not necessary to institute comparisons between 
 normal and other schools as to the superiority of 
 teachers furnished ; but this may very safely be said 
 — that no teachers can possibly surpass hundreds 
 formed in independent schools. And if young men 
 can learn to teach, as very many can, in connection 
 with good principals of high schools or academies^ 
 and under their supervision and guidance, these 
 young men need no normal school. In one respect 
 teachers formed in academies and other schools have 
 an important advantage : they aid in teaching chil- 
 dren as they are, and not children furnished for the 
 experiment, and often those that are themselves 
 intended for teachers ; both which, to a large extent, 
 must be the case with a normal school. This re- 
 mark is made because the author has seen school- 
 advertisements in which the principal says his assist- 
 ant is from a normal school ; as if an assistant may 
 not equal and easily surpass the best that can be 
 sent forth by any normal school ! We have, in this 
 work, no special quarrel with the normal school sys- 
 tem, but we must forestall a prejudice that will nat- 
 urally, in places, arise against young men trained 
 elsewhere as teachers. Many young men, as the 
 author well knows, and therefore most confidently 
 affirms, are young men of rare excellence, as men 
 of genius, learning, piety, and skill and industry as 
 teachers, who could not if they would, and would 
 not if they could, learn to teach elsewhere than in 
 an academy ; who would submit to no board or fac- 
 ulty of examiners, legal or illegal, and who should 
 10* 
 
214 en AFTER vi. 
 
 receive a preference in any community as teachers. 
 The affected or real scorn with which it is said some 
 young men from normal schools regard other young 
 teachers, is in some cases not only ungentlemanly, 
 but wonderfully misplaced: a more intimate ac- 
 quaintance with the essential characters and skill of 
 both would make the self-sufficient blush. If this 
 report be unfounded, still the improper behavior, 
 under all circumstances, is so likely to occur, that 
 young men from normal schools, admonished in time, 
 may be careful not to afford so powerful an argu- 
 ment against the system. 
 
 The men of this age live out of doors. We wish 
 all corn ground at a public mill, and bolted in one 
 vast sifter ! all clothes washed in one big tub, and 
 dried on a line stretched to the gaze of the world, 
 to inspect the quality and cut of every nether gar- 
 ment, male or female ! and all must feed at a public 
 table ! Liberty and openness for all ; yet no indi- 
 vidual separate Hberty for any ! Each must do 
 what he does before others — eat, drink, sleep, think, 
 talk, die, in company ! He that does not this is no 
 republican ! If he takes not liberty in common, he 
 shall not have liberty for himself! 
 
 2. Another objectionable feature, therefore, in a 
 legislative system of education is, it becomes arbi- 
 trary and anti-republican. 
 
 By those persons, who believe that the rich and 
 the thriving have no rights, or should suffer a diminu- 
 tion of rights ; that the individual man is ever to be 
 sacrificed to the theoretic man, this may be treated 
 with a sneer. If distinctions in societv arising from 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 215 
 
 skill, industry, learning, are all factitious distinctions 
 and erroneous ; if men may not honestly consult their 
 tastes, and avail themselves of superior advantages, 
 either accidental or sought after ; if after proper toil 
 in suitable ways, it be wicked for men to dress bet- 
 ter, eat better, or do or have anything better than 
 others less fortunate or less industrious and careful ; 
 if by equalizing be understood levelling up, if possi- 
 ble, but levelling down rather than no levelling, then 
 is it improper and presumptuous to have, or wish, 
 any other education for our children than the com- 
 mon education, and all may be forced by law or 
 public opinion to have one kind of school and one 
 sort of education. 
 
 But, if the essence of liberty in a republic, be lib- 
 erty to seek individual advantage and happiness in 
 the use of honorable means, and not interfering un- 
 necessarily and illegally with others, then if exten- 
 sive and liberal education,if good manners, if choice 
 of comrades and teachers are advantages, whatever 
 prevents our liberty in these choices and tastes, is of 
 the nature of tyranny. When we come into the so- 
 cial compact, theoretically, (for civil society is the 
 naturaFsociety, and constituted such by God himself,) 
 we come that we may enjoy many liberties, by the 
 surrender of a few, and those of small importance ; 
 and we also do and must resist the formation of a 
 society, or the abuse of an existing formation, by 
 which a mere mechanical man may be made. 
 Christian men could not allow to be formed such a 
 republic as Sparta, in the days of Lycurgus, nor 
 eould thev remain members of it. 
 
216 
 
 CIIAriER VI. 
 
 Majorities do compel — they can compel ; but, that 
 majorities are right when they compel, is not always 
 the case ; indeed, that the right is with a majority is 
 never self-evident. King Majority may be a despot 
 as well as any other king, and then this despot may 
 be resisted ; he may be mistaken, and then should 
 be instructed ; he may be a madman, and then 
 should be confined and have his keepers. Majority 
 has no right to avail itself of numbers to oppress 
 any class. The sole logic is not in or by a ballot- 
 box. Alas! the faces of the poor may, indeed, be 
 ground by the unjust and lordly ones of the earth ; 
 but a majority of political persons, poor and even 
 houseless, yea, wanderers from other lands, (and 
 some for whose absence their own countries are the 
 better,) can be made to do that special kind of mill- 
 ing, not, indeed, on the faces of the rich, but of in- 
 dustrious persons, whose taste, and fancy, and views 
 are different from their own. A state of thraldom 
 under the government of mere majority may be so 
 intolerable, that men may be willing to prefer exile 
 or death. 
 
 Whatever, therefore, aims at compelling us to 
 educate our children as the mass may happen to 
 imagine, or be represented as imagining, to be the 
 best education, is of the nature of tyranny. What 
 liberty is that which forces all to sit, whether they 
 like or dislike the school, on one bench? to be 
 classed in one form ? and be taught by one man ? 
 This may, indeed, be done by law ; it may see7n a lit- 
 eral carrying out of the constitution ; but it is con- 
 trary to the essence and spirit of free government. 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 
 
 217 
 
 A majority ought not to demand it ; they ought, 
 when instructed, to correct the error. And all indi- 
 rections to attain this power over any portion of a 
 minority, small or great, are crimes and misde- 
 meanors deserving severe punishment. 
 
 " The public good," is the sole answer most 
 vouchsafe to all argument and remonstrance against 
 any scheme of moral, political, or literary agrarian- 
 ism. Provided that a corporate body is happy as a 
 whole and in the mass ; provided it have a public, 
 open, visible goodness of any kind, the individuals 
 may be separately wretched, poor, illiterate. Citi- 
 zens are thus no more than servants and slaves to 
 a body politic. But the public good is the result of 
 individual good ; and the most flourishing, potent, 
 happy states are composed of members separately 
 prosperous, industrious, strong, healthy, intelli- 
 gent. Laws and government make not the people so 
 much as the people make them : man is not made 
 for these things, they are made for him. If, how- 
 ever, the public good be a proper plea for legislative 
 schools, let us try the force of that plea in another 
 and kindred direction. 
 
 Knowledo^e without religion can never make or 
 preserve a republic. Knowledge separate from re- 
 ligion may even propel the ruin of a State. A com- 
 munity of atheists may constitute, on earth, no in- 
 significant semblance of hell ; nor would the learn- 
 ing of" men and of angels" make that community a 
 free and generous republic: that requires "love!** 
 Give men religion and virtue, and the state is safe. 
 Fill the land, therefore, with churches, and ministers 
 
21Q CHAPTER VI. 
 
 of religion, and with Bibles and religious tracts, and 
 more is done for the permanency of our repubtic, 
 than if all were one vast common school, or a house 
 of learning, with a myriad of godless teachers. 
 Why not legislate in favor of religious institutions, 
 and by law compel men to support these institu- 
 tions, and to attend church ? 
 
 Perish the man, and perish the State, that would 
 seriously advise and attempt this union of the civil 
 and ecclesiastical ; and yet it is, essentially as bad to 
 compel citizens to educate in the mode the State, or 
 a majority, or a mass may determine. We may as 
 well meddle with a man's religion, as with the mode 
 of his education. A power that controls the edu- 
 cation may, in time, with an altered population, 
 trained in common schools without religion, control 
 the religion of the country. Possibly no such use 
 of the public mind thus trained in schools to act in 
 masses, is avowed ; but it would be rash to say 
 it is not entertained. They that believe nothing are 
 easily made to believe anything ; just as disbeliev- 
 ers in angels and devils, believe often in revelations 
 made to people abnormally asleep ! The extreme 
 that has banished religion from schools, may meet 
 the extreme that lets a religion into the government ! 
 Nil desperandum Teucro duce ! 
 
 Perhaps no evil would arise if the State became 
 " a nursing father and mother " by donations of mo- 
 ney to existing schools and churches, but without 
 asking in return or expecting a dictation or inter- 
 ference in their arrangements. But all attempt, di- 
 rect or indirect, will be more or less abortive ; and 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 
 
 219 
 
 this inevitable frustration constitutes one ground of 
 hope, that the concentration of the powers of educa- 
 tion and literature, will be found as impossible as the 
 too great consolidation, deemed by many politicians 
 essential to a federal government. The ultraism of 
 extreme democracy has nearly gone around far 
 enough to meet the extreme of a by-gone political 
 federahsm ; but if all this be done by a mass-meet- 
 ing, all is, of necessity, virtue, liberty, and equality. 
 This force, whether of law, or of erroneous amd 
 misdirected, or adroitly directed public opinion, is 
 injurious to what are called by some the inferior 
 classes, and to the poor: it begets against these a 
 determined hostility. To benefit them, near and 
 dear rights are invaded ; and that awakes and 
 arms an opposition. Even thus rampant abolition- 
 ism has riveted the chain of the slave, and freed 
 none but by hypocrisy and theft. 
 
 Sometimes it is answered, if you like not the pub- 
 lic school, choose one of your own. We will do 
 that, when you restore the money that you took 
 away by taxes. We cannot pay two schools. We 
 are compelled to support the public school ; and, 
 therefore, we are forced to forego a school more to 
 our taste. We had a few shillings with w^hich we 
 could have got a slice of venison to our taste ; but 
 you drove us to another stall and made us buy salt 
 beef and pork ; and now, when we complain that 
 this provision is not to our liking, you taunt, and bid 
 us go then and dine on venison ! 
 
 But, suppose we cannot get what we wish, al- 
 though willing to pay twice ? The majority in 
 
220 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 many places will, for a time at least, attend the pub- 
 lic school ; and that renders it next to impossible if 
 not wholly so, to have an independent school, unless 
 the few desirous of the school pay three or four pri- 
 ces. The tyranny of a forced public opinion in- 
 duces very many, who secretly detest the public 
 schools, yet to send their children thither. Many 
 fear being made to suffer in their business, perhaps, 
 in their character — being branded with some odi- 
 ous name, like that of aristocrat — held up to ridicule 
 as wishing to be superior to their fellows ; and> 
 therefore, these by compulsion sustain the public 
 schools. 
 
 Good independent teachers by degrees, insensibly 
 disappear before the operation of a legislative school. 
 They look for other employments. Many go to the 
 West and South, from which they will again de- 
 part, when the hurricane of experiment sweeps over 
 those regions. Others are starved into compliance 
 and become, in a very rigorous sense, the servants of 
 the public. Meanwhile, as the academy and the high 
 school die away, the boarding-school system arises 
 from their ashes — ark of safety, not to the poor, 
 scarcely to the middle class, but to the rich. And so 
 this mighty movementof the ultra-democratic mind, 
 that expected to be an iron roller to level all down 
 into one republican smoothness, ends with elevating 
 the rich still higher, and creating schools in which 
 the great may be educated like nobles and princes. 
 
 3. Another objection to the public school system 
 is, it must lower, in most places, the standard of edu- 
 cation, or at least keep it from rising. It is re- 
 
COMMON SCHOOI.S. 
 
 221 
 
 peated — primary schools must exist : but primary 
 schools must not be the only schools. Two things, 
 however, tend to make primary public schools fixed, 
 and to prevent the existence of schools beyond 
 them : — 
 
 Public funds, whether by gift or taxation, are 
 adequate to primary schools only ; and the people 
 are sometimes directly and in express words, but 
 oftener indirectly and by implication, taught, that 
 education beyond the essential elements is, for the 
 mass, needless. 
 
 The ever-reiterated and earnestly impressed ar- 
 gument in favor of public schools, is the cheapness. 
 The essential branches of study are like " air, sun- 
 shine, running waters ;" and they must, beside 
 being as common, be made as cheap. If they were 
 dear, or even at a reasonable commercial price, the 
 poetry of the spouter's figures would be spoiled. 
 True, this wondrous cheapness is ostensibly for the 
 poor ; but men of every sort are exhorted to set the 
 poor an example, and to place their children side by 
 side with poor men's children, and sometimes with 
 the mechanic's children — as if American artisans 
 were an inferior race ! — and there all to drink in 
 learning together, and for nothing ! Hence a single 
 teacher is to impart the elements — not air and wa- 
 ter, but the five elements of learning — to a whole 
 village ! But when these elements are fairly im- 
 bibed, and something beyond is needed, if not de- 
 manded, more is not to be had. The elements must 
 be absorbed again ; and so again and again, if the 
 children go to school for five or twice five years ! 
 
222 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Better schools would require better teachers, and 
 these, better prices; and then, free schools, or public 
 schools free in part, would be found as dear as inde- 
 pendent schools. In many places, a country district, 
 or a village district, rarely advances beyond the 
 five elements — reading, writing, English grammar, 
 geography, and arithmetic. Young persons taught 
 in public schools of the sort, are very often admitted 
 into academies ; and, although from nineteen to 
 twenty-one years of age, they have never studied 
 beyond the above-named branches ! 
 
 In very large and rich villages, and generally in 
 cities, legislative schools, or schools not independent 
 of public moneys and taxes, may, for special rea- 
 sons, consist of primary, academical, and even col- 
 legiate departments and courses ; but this is never 
 the case in small villages and country districts. 
 But wherever schools are thus constituted, if they 
 do really carry out tJieir plans, they must cost mo- 
 ney — as much as independent schools, although the 
 money may not be paid directly by parents. Teach- 
 ers, such as are connected with these public high 
 schools, do not teach for nothing! They cannot be 
 had for a song ! Their salaries, perhaps, excel the 
 incomes they themselves received when independ- 
 ent teachers. The combined or concentrated sys- 
 tem of public schools cannot be cheap. Possibly 
 such schools may be as good as independent ones, 
 perhaps better — although this is by no means admit- 
 ted — yet it is the essence of oppression, to force a 
 minority, directly or indirectly, by law or an adroitly 
 managed public opinion, to- educate children as 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 223 
 
 the State pleases, or a community of any size or 
 name. The State does not own the citizens ! If the 
 education were in all places as it may be in some, 
 an equivalent is granted for the invasion of rights, 
 to all who can get the equivalent ; but as the educa- 
 tion is generally, and must of necessity remain, 
 gross injury is added to injustice. Many are forced 
 to pay high taxes for what is next to worthless, 
 and, in no few cases, pernicious. 
 
 Not only is a grade of education beyond the five 
 elements impossible in most places, but the higher 
 degrees of education are disparaged. The lan- 
 guages are undervalued, and all that learning be- 
 longing to mental, and moral, and political philoso- 
 phies — all that pertains to taste, or the belles-lettres 
 in general, and not rarely even the abstract math- 
 ematics. Useful learning is talked about, in opposi- 
 tion to other learning ; and useful learning is, in one 
 way or another, found to be what fits a boy for the 
 retail store, the counting-house, and other ordinary 
 modes of getting a livelihood — to wit, the five ele- 
 ments ! Nay, what is beyond, is looked upon with 
 suspicion, as apt to nurture pride — to make a boy 
 despise his plain parents — making him unwilling to 
 work — or, at best, a mysterious sort of thing, with 
 an indefined power to form professional men ! Self- 
 made men are deemed examples sufficient to show 
 that higher schools are needless ! as if any really 
 self-made 7nan ever could undervalue the learning 
 that makes him ! The most of self-made men are 
 insufferable, for their amazing self-conceit ! and they 
 evidently need making over again ! Many, styling 
 
224 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 themselves, and so called by others, self-made, affect 
 beholders as a dancing-bear affected Dr. Johnson: 
 the philosopher was surprised, not that the bear 
 danced well, but that it danced at all! We are sur- 
 prised, not that the self-made know so much and so 
 well, but that they know at all ! A few, indeed, of 
 this sort, are fall of all learning and wisdom ; but 
 these are not the men who can despise the higher 
 schools, and they must not be quoted as persons 
 whose example proves the needlessness of the better 
 schools. 
 
 4. We object to the discipline of public schools, 
 that is, of public schools not independent — schools 
 actually controlled by trustees, and directors, ap- 
 pointed by law. 
 
 A teacher is responsible mainly to the parents. 
 And parents can restrain, if they will, the violence 
 of a bad or passionate master. They can also ren- 
 der the cautious more watchful. Public opinion and 
 self-interest are no small conservatives ; and the law 
 is open to the parent or guardian, if a teacher abuse 
 a boy, or be criminally severe. But very frequently 
 men, not even parents themselves, and very rarely 
 teachers, and ever and anon, disciples of some hum- 
 drum philosopher, who is illuminated beyond the 
 revelations of the Bible, prescribe the rules of disci- 
 pline in public schools. They dare to direct their 
 own masters! The lamb devours the wolf! We 
 aver, and without terror, that some men who under- 
 take to direct many teachers, need the instruction 
 and discipline which those teachers impart and ad- 
 minister ; and that, if such men had brains enough 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 225 
 
 to see, they would shrink from presumhig to " enter/' 
 where none but the schoolmaster " should tread !" 
 
 The best and wisest of men, parents as well as 
 teachers, admit the occasional and judicious use of 
 the rod. Legal superintendents and educators for- 
 bid it. Hence, what endless squabbles and rigma- 
 role, or twattle, about government ! what law upon 
 law, and regulation after regulation ! what mutual 
 Jesuitical watching, and reporting of reporters ! 
 And all can, severally, squeak better than piggy 
 himself! But with due deference to all ventrilo- 
 quism of this kind, no man is more competent to de- 
 termine the character of disciplinary punishment, 
 than the teacher. 
 
 Power and authority supreme must reside some- 
 where ; and final appeal must be final. In the gov- 
 ernment of a family, God, and Nature, (the instinc- 
 tive feeling of the soul,) and experience, say, this 
 supremacy resides in the parent. He is the judge, 
 from whom is no appeal. It may, indeed, be pre- 
 tended, perhaps it is even now indirectly taught^ 
 that men are made for the State, and not the State 
 for men ; agrarianism or Fourierism may seek to 
 abolish the family, and with it, family authority and 
 right ; but on Bible and Christian principles, we 
 must believe that the supremacy over children is in 
 the parent. The laws do, indeed, punish abuse of 
 authority ; but the laws take not away nor deny the 
 authority, and never interfere, except when the pa- 
 rent is deemed theoretically incapable of supreme 
 government. In a state of nature, this supreme au- 
 
226 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 thority extends to more than in the social state — 
 whether deemed conventional or divine. 
 
 The whole, or a great portion of this supremacy, 
 the parent voluntarily delegates to the teacher ; and 
 every true teacher ought to be, and is, a parent to 
 his flock of intrusted children. A teacher who ad- 
 mits not the reality of this relationship, lacks dis- 
 cernment : one who will not and cannot feel, in 
 some degree, its tenderness, is unworthy the name 
 of teacher. He should betake himself to banking, 
 or engineering, or any lawful means of making mo- 
 ney and enjoying himself: in the school-room he is 
 out of character. When the parental power is thus 
 delegated, the parents only have the right of watch- 
 ing and supervision ; and they may, in all cases, ap- 
 peal to the law, in which the law would interfere 
 with themselves. If a teacher can of choice submit 
 to other watching and supervision than that of the 
 parents, that teacher is a coward and a slave. 
 
 In a healthy state of the public mind, the constant 
 decisions of judges in favor of teachers, arraigned 
 for alleged abuse of power, and the nominal pen- 
 alties awarded where seeming injury had been 
 done to a child, speak the sense of law on this point. 
 Thousands, too, of wise parents exclaim, " Sustain 
 the teacher, right or wrong !" by which they mean 
 to say, that extreme caution, forbearance, tender- 
 ness, and allowance must be exercised and used 
 towards teachers, even when in error ; that some 
 wrong is rather to be endured, than that an author- 
 ity like the parental should be endangered, if not 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 227 
 
 subverted. It is felt that the fewer the appeals 
 from the teacher, the better. 
 
 The government of the teacher is commonly su- 
 perior to that of the parent. But where unusual 
 severity is used, the public can never judge fairly. 
 No man can collect and concentrate the countless 
 acts of disobedience, running through weeks or 
 months, and present the whole as a condensed of- 
 fence, and cause the whole to appear to a court as 
 it appeared to the teacher — all aggravated by a 
 hundred cautions despised, by rebukes disregarded, 
 by threatenings laughed at, till open rebellion and 
 direct insolence had to be crushed by a severe cas- 
 tigation. Who can paint the look — the gesture — 
 the tone — the thousand nameless and indescribable 
 things that are connected with the boy's manner, 
 and which add to his other offences, and of them- 
 selves merit a sound whipping ? Stripped of these 
 circumstances and aggravations, the final and fin- 
 ishing act of disobedience which called for the 
 chastisement, appears, to the superficial view, a ve- 
 nial offence ! and the man who severely chastised 
 for that offence, a monster of cruelty and revenge ! 
 Often it is said, let the parent scourge the boy. 
 But what if there be no parent able to do it ? Few 
 women or mothers can properly whip a large boy. 
 Or what if the parent will not do his duty ? Is the 
 boy to be turned out of the school into society, 
 triumphant in wickedness and rebellion ? Is this the 
 wisdom of the popular lecturer, ever blating about 
 the vices of society, and the ounce of prevention 
 better than the pound of cure ? Dare these bab- 
 
228 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 biers sneer at prisons and scaffolds — marks of a 
 barbarous age ! Shall they pretend to set up for 
 lights ! 
 
 Some silly people have said, '' We had rather our 
 children should die, than be whipped." This insane 
 wish shall be gratified ; but the teacher will not be- 
 come the executioner. Let the hangman do his 
 office when the time comes : the teacher will try to 
 prevent that catastrophe. If tears flow not now, 
 blood will hereafter. They who, on every slight 
 provocation and pretext, are planting knives in each 
 other's bosoms, and shooting down their comrades 
 in the streets of the cities, are not the persons who 
 were properly disciplined at school. The sons of 
 the pilgrims may deem themselves wiser than their 
 fathers ; but the alarming degeneracy of morals 
 speaks little in favor of undisciplined children. The 
 wholesome rod of a stern morality prevents the jail 
 and the gibbet : he that banishes the rod, builds the 
 prisoner's cell, and holds out a rope to the hang- 
 man. 
 
 5. A fatal objection to most public schools not in- 
 dependent of State patronage, is on the score of re- 
 ligion. 
 
 The writer agrees with those who deem it uncon- 
 stitutional and impolitic to provide, by law, for re- 
 ligious observances in public schools. No legislat ion 
 on this point can be definite, that shall not prefer one 
 sect or party to another. The only thing law can 
 do, is to let schools alone, and not to forbid religious 
 observances. But if, under pretext of impartiality, 
 all forms and observances of religion are forbidden, 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 
 
 229 
 
 partiality is yet not avoided ; because some sects of 
 religionists, and all sects of irreligionists, believe 
 that religion should be proscribed in schools ; and 
 such, therefore, are specially favored and their cause 
 promoted by this very prohibition. Hence religious 
 men are taxed for the advantage of heresy and irre- 
 Hgion. They are made to support systems adverse 
 even to civil liberty. 
 
 Whether the Bible should be read as a class book 
 in schools, the author does not conceive to be a point 
 of vital importance. Many good and wise men, cor- 
 dial lovers of the Bible, who have unhmited control 
 over their schools, do not use the Bible as a mere 
 class or reading book. Some important objections 
 may be urged against that use of the Bible. As a 
 mere reading book, it has no great advantage either 
 intellectually or morally. The book may even be 
 desecrated by this use. It cannot operate as a 
 charm. The use of the Bible in schools is not "as 
 a classic," but for nobler purposes — even religious 
 and devotional. It should be a part of the worship, 
 in the school as in the family. The master himself 
 should read it, as the father of his flock ; or if the 
 pupils read, they should read soberly and devoutly. 
 The reading should never be as a task or an exer- 
 cise. The Bible has a grander use than as a school- 
 book. Children may, indeed, store their memory 
 with passages of the Bible, but always as a part of 
 religion, as they learn hymns, prayers, catechisms. 
 
 But here is the vital point : shall the religion of 
 the Bible, the principles of the Bible, be acknowl- 
 edged in schpola ? Shall the divine authority be 
 11 
 
230 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 brought to bear directly, and in all their studies and 
 conduct, universally upon the pupils? If by legisla- 
 tive enactment, or the force of public opinion, a 
 master may not, if he wished, and does not, because 
 he is irreligious, when he might, use the Bible as a 
 part of worship ; if he for that purpose read not 
 himself, nor cause his flock of pupils to read ; if he 
 may not refer to its authority, and draw from it 
 solemn rebuke and warning, and matter to incite 
 to a wholesome emulation, his school has no religion 
 worth the name. Its existence cannot be favorable 
 to virtue or to the State. It may be fatal to the 
 children's best interests. When a school of this sort 
 breaks up, and is dispersed, that event is no evil. If, 
 therefore, all State schools, where religion is pro- 
 scribed, are abandoned, it would call for rejoicing 
 and not lamentation. It follows not, that no schools 
 w^ould exist ; but time will show, provided all reli- 
 gion in public schools be forbidden or despised, and 
 this system be universal, that an entire destitution 
 of schools cannot be more disastrous, than schools 
 in which the authority of the Bible is not acknowl- 
 edged and enforced. 
 
 The State, or a combination of political parties 
 for the purpose of general education, may not be 
 blame- worthy, if they order no special ^orm of reli- 
 gion in schools ; yet, not a few pretending a fear of 
 union between the Church and the State, wish, nay, 
 are possibly endeavoring^by means of the present ris- 
 ing generation, to banish religion, first, from educa- 
 tion, and then, from the State. The disastrous con- 
 sequences of a school system without religion can- 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS: OQI 
 
 not be felt immediately. The enemy does not wish 
 them to be felt. A community not yet wholly irre- 
 ligious, if alarmed, would take measures to prevent 
 the evils. Long is it before the influence of original 
 impulse ceases. If a person be within what moves 
 less and less swiftly by an equable decrease, he is 
 not sensible that the motive power is withdrawn, or 
 ceases to act, till there is a stop. Indeed, in case the 
 man is asleep, he wqll not know he has stopped till 
 he be awaked. The author has been in a car, from 
 which the locomotive, in full flight, became accident- 
 ally detached ; but, engaged in conversation, it was 
 long before the thing was noticed : all seemed 
 tending onward happily as before. In this commu- 
 nity, in most places, the mass of society is under the 
 propulsion of an hereditary religion, whose force was 
 inherent in by-gone institutions and practices. But 
 men not asleep or wilfully blind, who choose to look 
 at external objects, discern plainly enough that the 
 great machine of our civil society is slacking 
 speed ; or if it moves rapidly, it is oft' the track ! 
 Some are destined to wake up with a shock ! Others 
 will find, like Horace and his comrades in the Brun- 
 dusian journey, that the villainous muleteer has 
 tied the mule ; and that, during the night of ease 
 and security, they have advanced not a jot ! 
 
 Is there not a visible, confessed, and sad deterio- 
 ration in the morals and manners of the young? Is 
 there not a woful and wide-spread disregard of pa- 
 rental, and, by consequence, of all other rightful au- 
 thority ? And is not resistance to authority usually 
 continued, in one form or another, till an unhappy 
 
232 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 victory is obtained ? The school-book itself is ex- 
 purgated, not of licentiousness, but of religion; not 
 of falsehood, but of historical fact ! History, that 
 tells all, may not speak in some public schools ; and 
 morals rest, not on the will of God, but on utility and 
 honor ! Herod and Pilate come together, shake 
 hands, and embrace even nov^ ! A narrow inspec- 
 tion of some public school libraries would discover 
 licentiousness and infidelity ! Many will cease their 
 mutual " bitings and devourings," if they can all em- 
 ploy their teeth on the common foe ! 
 
 6. The abstract principle in our polity, that the 
 majority rules, is not disputed. Notwithstanding its 
 many and manifest abuses, and repeated acts of tyr- 
 anny, notwithstanding the adroit movements of a 
 deep intrigue, by which a bare majority, from the 
 dregs and scum of domestic and foreign voices, may 
 be bought and drugged for dishonest purposes, we 
 must hold to our country in this respect, " right or 
 wrong ;" for the opposite doctrine is fraught with 
 tenfold evils. But there are things of which a ma- 
 jority should be ashamed ; there are things a major- 
 ity should scorn to do. Among these is taxing the 
 people for the education of the mass. 
 
 Preposterous is it to say, the tax is for the advan- 
 tage of the poor. The truly poor are not bene- 
 fited ; and they can easily be educated without com- 
 pelling all to be educated with them, and educated 
 better. Equally preposterous to say, that the good 
 of the State requires this taxation ; for we have 
 shown that the system of education is fraught with 
 evil. Besides, on this plea, the State is bound to 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 233 
 
 support churches and the ministers of religion : in- 
 deed, the support of these would benefit the com- 
 munity vastly more than the support of any system 
 of education. Knowledge cannot preserve the 
 State ; religion can. 
 
 A very large class of citizens, the best members 
 of society, called often, for want of a more appro- 
 priate term, the middle class, is specially oppressed by 
 this tax. These cannot support free schools and yet 
 pay independent schools, in which their children can 
 obtain an education worthy the name — in which, 
 too, the children can be kept in the fear of God. 
 These persons have not commonly money to loan ; 
 but they are forced to invest all they possess in 
 property, visible and tangible, and therefore taxable. 
 They cannot put their property in bank stock, or in 
 stocks of any sort. The rich, however, can do all 
 this, and many other things, to avoid assessment ; 
 and then send away their children to the boarding- 
 schools. Thousands of persons, too, have a fair 
 income from their labor, who yet have no visible 
 and taxable property of any kind ; and these, with- 
 out a scruple or a twinge of conscience, avail them- 
 selves of what are termed free schools ! How 
 many are even willing to be deemed poor to avail 
 themselves of other men's industry to educate their 
 children ! 
 
 It is not to be wondered at, that honest men, after 
 having honorably schooled their children, should be 
 indignant when compelled by a majority to educate 
 their neighbors' children ; and that majority, not 
 infrequently, a majority without house or lands ! 
 
234 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 The effect of all this is an Asiatic despotism, which 
 forces men to conceal their property, lest it should 
 be legally stolen by rapacious and dishonest citizens. 
 The author has been told, that in some districts, 
 farmers from the country, and persons from other 
 disti'icts, and even from Canada, inove into a village 
 in the w^inter season, to have the benefit of a free 
 school at the expense of that village ! 
 
 Has a bare majority a right to do this ? — and es- 
 pecially a majority coaxed and misled ? Is not this 
 a mere trick ? Siimmum jus, summa injuria^ may 
 here be translated, the majority is oftentimes grossly 
 unjust ! 
 
 These are some of our main objections to free 
 schools, supported by the State, or by taxation — by 
 any system, in short, that is adverse to the independ- 
 ence of schools and teachers. 
 
 Is it asked, how^, then, shall schools be supported ? 
 Our answ^er is, schools will take care of themselves. 
 All w^ho wish education for their children, will pro- 
 vide schools for themselves. If they have the 
 means, and will not pay honestly and equivalently 
 for schooling, let them go w^ithout schooling. If 
 any will not work, they should starve ; if any beg 
 from door to door, and yet have money, they de- 
 serve the punishment of swindlers. 
 
 But what shall they do who have no money and 
 cannot work ? Shall these starve ? By no means ; 
 for these exists the poor-house. Let these be sup- 
 ported. 
 
 The number of persons w^holly incapable of pay- 
 ing a fair price for elementary branches in education 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 235 
 
 is less than is presumed. And all able to pay that 
 price, ought to be ashamed to receive assistance. 
 For what else should effort and sacrifices be made, 
 if not for education ? And will not that which costs 
 us something, be, for that very reason, the more 
 valued ? Hundreds of people find money enough for 
 trade, for houses, lands, furniture, dress, amusements, 
 refreshments, luxuries, who, at the bare mention of 
 a tuition fee, begin a whine about hard times ! If we 
 wish to see long and melancholy faces, call for pew- 
 rents, physicians' bills, or school-moneys ! Nay, 
 such calls are, not rarely, resented as impertinent ; 
 and the collector is often treated as if he were akin 
 to a swindler ! 
 
 Truly poor persons, however, are found ; and 
 these are more or less unable to educate their chil- 
 dren. Some such cannot afford to buy necessary 
 school-books; others, not even decent apparel* 
 These are the proper objects of charity and gen- 
 erosity. How shall such poor be educated ? By 
 taxation? Certainly. Let us, however, be well 
 satisfied that the poor, and the poor only, are bene- 
 fited by the taxes. Thousands are loud and vehe- 
 ment in behalf of starving Ireland, who intend to 
 speculate in breadstuffs ! And ten thousands bawl 
 out for educating the poor, who intend to divert the 
 money to their own children. 
 
 But when aid is extended to the poor, is it not 
 
 possible that their children be educated in the best 
 
 #ndependent schools, and on an honorable equality 
 
 with all other children ? Why should inferior 
 
 schools exist for the poor, or an inferior grade of 
 
23G CHAPTER VI. 
 
 education ? Schemes may be devised, if the people 
 are really in earnest, by which all visible distinctions 
 between rich and poor may disappear in schools, 
 ' except what may arise from dress ; and teachers 
 may find it to their interest to treat all alike. Schools 
 need not be levelled down to meet the wants of the 
 poor ; nor need the poor be made to feel every hour 
 their inferiority. A slave cannot be treated among 
 freemen as a freeman ; he must be first set at 
 liberty. 
 
 Among schemes for this purpose, we venture to 
 propose a very simple one ; not with entire confi- 
 dence in its perfection, but as a scheme that is prac- 
 ticable. It may also furnish a hint for something 
 better. 
 
 In every district or village, let a Board of Edu- 
 cation be elected by the people, or appointed by the 
 Legislature. This Board should be composed of 
 responsible and influential persons, willing them- 
 selves to educate their own children, and at their 
 own expense. The members should not be oflice- 
 holders, nor in any way entitled to an election to 
 the Board because of political views or principles. 
 No overseer of the poor should be a member. The 
 expenses of the Board or its officers should be paid ; 
 but no emolument or salary of any kind should per- 
 tain to the Board, or any member of the Board. 
 
 Into the treasury of this Board should be paid all 
 moneys bestowed by the Legislature, or raised by 
 taxation, for the education of the poor. Twice at 
 least every year, a minute and accurate statement 
 should be published in the newspapers of the dis- 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 237 
 
 trict, and also, if necessary, should be otherwise 
 printed and circulated for the public information, of 
 appropriations and expenses, and all matters deemed 
 suitable for publication. Or the books might be 
 open at certain offices for any person's inspection, 
 every quarter. 
 
 The main duty of the Board would be to deter- 
 mine what children, either in whole or in part, 
 required aid ; and then such children, as far as the 
 funds allowed, should all be sent to the existing 
 schools of the district, and at the regular school pri- 
 ces. The teacher would thus feel as deep a pecuni- 
 ary interest in the poor as in the rich boy ; and the 
 poor boy would claim the fall benefits of the 
 school. 
 
 The Board could easily know at once, from their 
 intimate acquaintance with the district, who would 
 be entitled to aid ; but they would be empowered, if 
 necessary, to put certain legal inquiries, prepared 
 under the authority of the legislature ; and thus, they 
 could ascertain the truth in all cases. If, beyond the 
 payment of the school bills, additional assistance 
 were necessary, school-books, and in some cases 
 clothes, could be furnished. In this way the poor 
 children would have the best schools, the best teach- 
 ers, the best books. 
 
 Sometimes it is said, the poor will never consent 
 to be educated without the rich will go with them. 
 This is simply— /a/^e. But if it ever is the case, the 
 remark applies only when a school system is made 
 exclusively or mainly for the poor, and where all 
 who go to a certain school are deemed to be poor. If 
 11* 
 
238 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 the school be branded with a bad name, of course the 
 poor, having the same nature and generous senti- 
 ments as other people, will be more or less delicate 
 in going alone to that school. In the way now pro- 
 posed, or any similar and better way, the poor are 
 not known ; and instead of being the innocent cause 
 or occasion of dragging down any unwilling persons, 
 they are themselves placed for the time being on a 
 par with their townsmen. 
 
 The truly poor do not refuse aid in building a 
 house, unless we consent to build in the same style ; 
 nor to take a deck passage, unless others desert the 
 cabin. Nor do the truly poor refuse an education 
 when offered them, although the rich may refuse 
 to be educated with them. . This and many other 
 weak objections arise from the miserly, the hypo- 
 critical, the dishonest — persons who wish to make 
 charity-schools popular and fashionable, for their 
 own selfish purposes. 
 
 It may, indeed, be necessary, in certain places, to 
 have primary schools at inferior prices. Yet if all 
 religious sects would do as some, parochial schools 
 would be connected with every important congrega- 
 tion ; and the congregational poor would there be 
 religiously and intellectually educated. If the State 
 assisted such schools, it would be praise- worthy. 
 The poor, however, not connected with religious 
 bodies, could all be in some degree educated by the 
 Board of Education, and, without visible distinc- 
 tions, in the best schools of the village or district. 
 Inducements, too, could be held out to extraordinary 
 diligence or excellence, in the prospect of an educa- 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 239 
 
 tion beyond that of the primary school. For certain 
 attainments, or industry, or morals, the Board might 
 carry from one to twenty, through an academical 
 course, and from one to five through a college 
 course. 
 
 Of those carried through the superior courses of 
 study, many would voluntarily, when able, refund to 
 the Board of Education the amount advanced for 
 their education ; although no obligation, written or 
 implied, should be demanded or expected. The 
 whole should remain a matter of conscience and 
 honor. And yet, if any, with the consent, and by 
 the advice of the parents, preferred borrowing and 
 giving a note, payable in a given time and without 
 interest, that would be admissible. 
 
 After all, here and there might be found a district 
 without any good independent school, and where 
 the great majority of the inhabitants might possibly 
 be unable to pay anything for primary branches. 
 There let the Board of Education establish a primary 
 school. Let them invite a good teacher, and pay 
 him a suitable price for every scholar sent ; and 
 rigorously compel any other than a poor citizen, 
 according to his ability, to pay the whole or a part 
 of the regular fee. But let the school itself and the 
 teacher be independent. A teacher should not be 
 asked to take less, simply because his pupils are sent 
 by the State or the district. Teachers are, perhaps, 
 as liberal and generous as other men. Many distin- 
 guished men ow^e themselves to benevolent teachers; 
 To concentrate and lay on the teacher the aggregate 
 burden of cheap or gratuitous education in any com- 
 
240 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 munity, is the quintessence of a covetous and mi- 
 serly meanness. The monuments improperly raised 
 to the memory of men who devised plans of educa- 
 tion for the poor, and gave nothing, should oftener 
 be erected in memory of the laborious teacher who 
 executed the plan ! Alas ! how very many, with 
 large farms, large stores, large means of every kind, 
 are mean enough to din a teacher's ears with admo- 
 nitions and hints that they should charge less for the 
 poor ! Did it never occur to such benevolent friends 
 of the poor, who wished to serve a neighbor at a 
 neighbor's expense, and to obtain a reputation for 
 charity never bestowed, that they themselves ought 
 to make up the deficiency in the poor man's quarter 
 bill? 
 
 The Board of Education would not, indeed, have 
 always a pleasant task. In civil polity, however, as 
 in theology, it is equally true, *' He that would be 
 chief among his brethren, must becom.e their ser- 
 vant." Members of any society, civil or ecclesias- 
 tical, and, particularly, prominent members, must 
 bear, and willingly bear, evils. They must be stung 
 by the reproaches of envy, fraud, knavery, selfish- 
 ness. This Board would be bitterly opposed by the 
 hypocritically poor, and the base among the rich. 
 All endeavoring to obtain something for nothing, 
 and yet ashamed to be seen taking it alone, and, 
 therefore, striving to skulk towards the object in a 
 crowd — all these, and their kinsfolk, would be chief 
 maligners and misrepresenters. All demagogues in 
 want of political capital, and all common-place 
 spouters of educational lectures, would open their 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 241 
 
 foul mouths. The age of rigmarole would be pass- 
 ing ! The poor, dear people would have been al- 
 ready accommodated ! An occupation is gone ! 
 
 The Legislature, it has been said, may, beyond the 
 moneys given to aid the education of the poor, 
 donate to schools. Perhaps schools, colleges, acad- 
 emies, may be required to possess certain property, 
 and have a certain number of pupils, or to have 
 and do anything not affecting their independency 
 and integrity ; but no interference with their reli- 
 gious or literary character should be attempted. 
 The grant should not be accompanied with an offen- 
 sive dictation. Grants also may be made to 
 churches ; but such should be simple and honest 
 gifts. Nothing may be asked or expected in return, 
 except that the several sects should behave them- 
 selves better than ever, and more earnestly strive to 
 benefit the State by maintaining a burning and shin- 
 ing light in the midst. The donations should, in all 
 cases, be a reward, and not a bribe or a temptation. 
 Let the Legislature be a father and not a lord. If the 
 State cannot give moneys in this spirit, let the State 
 keep its money, for internal improvements, or office- 
 holders and office-seekers. 
 
 Moneys may be given to schools in various ways. 
 The common ways are to aid in erecting buildings, 
 or in buying libraries and apparatus. But money, 
 for certain excellencies, might, over and above the 
 tuition fees, be given directly to teachers ; even as 
 prize money to officers and seamen. In such cases 
 the teacher ought not to be required to lessen the 
 ordinary tuition fees : because, under one pretext or 
 
242 CHAPTER \1. 
 
 another, teachers who are beguiled into cheapness 
 by grants of money, are apt, at last, to lose the 
 grant ; and then the district, being accustomed to a 
 low rate of quarter-bills, will not pay a higher. 
 Patriots will arise who will take away grants made 
 by former legislatures ; and that, whether it ruin 
 teachers and trustees or not. Teachers often find, 
 that gifts from the people, in any way, are like the 
 gifts of Asiatic princes — they call for a larger 
 gift in return. Upon the whole, if the State will 
 provide for the truly poor, and provide that none but 
 the truly poor receive that aid ; if they will pay 
 teachers for educating those truly poor ; and, then, 
 if they will let the schools alone, from the college to 
 the primary school, teachers ask no more, no less. 
 If they receive a reward — well ; if they receive it 
 not — better ! Teachers are not beggars, nor pen- 
 sioners. All they ask is to be let alone. If the State 
 will mind its business, we shall mind ours ; and in 
 this way, both will be most benefited. The author has 
 seen several good independent schools wholly ruined 
 by State interference, and nothing but the most con- 
 temptible schools established in their room. State 
 or non-independent schools cannoty in a fair field, 
 compete with private schools. 
 
 The remarks, thus far, have had particular refer- 
 ence to no one State in the Union. The remainder 
 of this chapter relates to the academies under the 
 supervision of the Regents of the University of New- 
 York. 
 
 The appropriation of moneys from the Literary 
 and Deposit funds, to the academies, arose from the 
 
COMiMON SCHOOLS. 243 
 
 most philanthropic feelings. Statesmen, too, of great 
 learninof, and ardent and honest lovers of their coun- 
 try, originated and advocated these appropriations ; 
 while the Regents themselves have al^^ays, with the 
 most laborious diligence and scrupulous honor, en- 
 deavored to carry out the intention of the laws orig- 
 inally and from time to time enacted in regard to the 
 distribution of the gifts. But a fundamental error in 
 the whole scheme lies in an interference with the 
 plan and mode of studies whenever an academy 
 wishes to partake in the liberality of the State. It is 
 not, indeed, said that there is ever any direct inter- 
 ference, unless the somewhat self-complacent direc- 
 tions of Secretaries or other officers of the Board, 
 contained in the annual or periodical pamphlet sent 
 to the academies, may be deemed such ; but it is 
 said, that the practical workings of a system, where 
 the right to a part of the appropriation is based on 
 certain branches studied, (the higher English 
 branches, and certain Latin books,) the workings of 
 that system, wherever regarded, is an interference, 
 and an evil interference, with the proper independ- 
 ence, and, therefore, excellence of the schools. 
 
 Waive, for the present, a very important fact, that 
 the whole plan and all its original laws, were framed 
 when books, systems, everything in education, were 
 widely different from what these all are now ; and 
 suppose that all these remain in every respect as 
 when the plan and the laws and directions first arose ; 
 still the evil results are many. 
 
 1. Teachers are compelled to shape the whole 
 system of education so that it may comprise certain 
 
244 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 studies recommended, or ordered by law ; and in 
 that scheme they are induced to embrace all they 
 can among the pupils, who are over a certain age. 
 Occasionally the resulting system may be the sys- 
 tem itself which would have been adopted of choice, 
 had the master been free from any lure or tempta- 
 tion in the shape of patronage and gift ; but not in- 
 frequently the course enjoined or fixed, is materially 
 different from his approved course, and even some- 
 times opposite to that course. And when the forced 
 system is accidentally right, the teacher feels joy at 
 the good luck, but not gratification that the excel- 
 lence resulted from his art and contrivance. No 
 room, however, is left the teacher for such experi- 
 ments as must be made by the best masters : the four 
 months are evanishing, and the money may be lost, 
 if the boy to be reported is not immediately stretched 
 and fitted to the bed-stead. The boy would, in many 
 cases, be more benefited by a wide departure from 
 the prescribed plan ; but, although this may be the 
 case, and the teacher have, by pursuing a better plan, 
 much more labor, he cannot legally draw the money 
 in the supposed case, unless he report hooks-, pages, 
 and a nominal progress ! He hazards, at least, the 
 gift or premium ; and that he can rarely aftbrd to 
 lose. His rent depends on the somewhat rigorous 
 adherence to the letter of his instructions. The law 
 will not allow the Regents to believe the teacher, 
 even on oath, unless he measure the boy's progress 
 by lines and pages ! And yet it may be but a seem- 
 ing progress. The pupil could have been improved 
 by inferior studies ; but he had gone over, as ''in 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 245 
 
 the common schoolsj^ certain preliminary matters — 
 had learned that a big stone was as large as a lump 
 of chalk — and now, being some eighteen years of 
 age, he is set at studies technically superior, (for 
 which, however, he is in reality altogether unpre- 
 pared,) that his name may not be struck from the 
 report ! 
 
 2. While many boys are forced into advanced stu- 
 dies before suitable preparation, a still larger num- 
 ber is compelled to study things next to useless, or 
 at least things that may with safety be omitted. 
 Young men who have only a few months in the 
 year to attend school, and are yet seriously deficient 
 in branches of study carelessly gone over in boy- 
 hood, are forced or persuaded to study, for instance, 
 History — a matter which any young man, with an 
 ordinary amount of common brain, can 7'ead at 
 home — being thus prevented, in a manner, from 
 duly attending to what are called the inferior stu- 
 dies, but to him worth all the histories ever written* 
 real or imaginary. And why is this ? Because his- 
 tory is one of the studies denominated " higher /" 
 a study which must be reported in order to obtain a 
 premium ! The industry, the improvement, the ad- 
 vantage, the labor, the time, are all unavailing with- 
 out this legal and prescribed branch ! However 
 negligent the pupil may have been in all other re- 
 spects, if he have gone over some thirty or forty 
 pages of any history, he helps to pay the master's 
 rent or stockholders' dividends. Mere children, 
 about the age of ten years, are made to study (?) 
 infant physiologies — infant histories — infant chemis- 
 
246 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 try — and twenty babyish higher branches, all for 
 the same purpose. Every boy, in fact, that enters 
 the school, is contemplated in the light of an instru- 
 ment to pay rent, or dividends ; and so he is man- 
 aged W4th one eye to his own advantage and another 
 to that of the teacher or the trustees. 
 
 3. Constant iteration of elementary studies has 
 been shown hurtful to the mind, and prejudicial to 
 the character of schools. Evils of great magnitude 
 result, also, if a boy be forced to re-study the higher 
 branches after a fair drilling in them once or twice. 
 A scholar already formed, a literary man, may with 
 increased advantage review and re-review old 
 studies ; but school-boys never improve after the 
 freshness is wholly departed — novelty is an essen- 
 tial ingredient in their studies. An old study must 
 be dis-placed by a new one ; or the old must have 
 in itself an endless variety in its praxis and applica- 
 tions. But some things called studies are soon ex- 
 hausted. Among these may be classed the smaller 
 systems of botany, physiology, chemistry, anatomy, 
 and the smaller bahyized histories. These abound 
 in many academies, or in some ; and as parents are 
 often slow to procure new books in these subjects, 
 children, and even young men, are carried regularly 
 once a year over the same thrice-beaten way ! The 
 teacher is weary of all these ; his soul loathes the 
 very sight of the dog-eared pages ; but these things 
 are *' the higher English branches !" they are en- 
 titled to the premium ! 
 
 4. Not only has the English education been sadly 
 injured, in some, if not all the reporting academies, 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 247 
 
 but in them classical learning has been nearly de- 
 stroyed. There is little accurate knowledge of the 
 grammar of the dead or ancient languages ; syn- 
 thetical and analytical exercises are almost un- 
 known ; works like Mair's Syntax are nearly obso- 
 lete ! The well-meant rewards of the State have 
 innocently served as a premium to neglect, and, alas ! 
 to cupidity ! In some cases the express letter and 
 spirit of the Regents' directions are deliberately 
 violated ; and boys are skipped from no-grammar 
 into Caesar and Virgil ! In most cases the pupils 
 are propelled or drawn over -the ground of gram- 
 mar, a modicum of Historiae Sacrae, Viri Romse, 
 First Book of Caesar, and First Book of the -^neid, 
 and the demand then made for the bonus at the hand 
 of the Regents — as a hackney coachman w^ould 
 drive them to their homes in a smart gallop, let down 
 the steps, and hold out his hand for a dollar ! Young 
 men come forth from the academies yearly, with the 
 merest smattering of the languages ; and when un- 
 wittingly taken as tutors or assistants, they are 
 found to need the rudiments of what they are ex- 
 pected to teach ! Not a few leave college — some w^ith 
 high honor — who cannot parse plain sentences of Latin 
 and Greek, and arfe profoundly, and not rarely, boast- 
 fully ignorant of everything save the college lessons ! 
 5. At the time w^hen the whole scheme of colle- 
 giate and academic appropriations was originated, 
 systems of studies and books employed now were 
 unknown. Whether the changes have any or all of 
 them been for the better, it is not necessary here to 
 determine ; although reading Caesar or Virgil, for 
 
248 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 instance, means things very different, according as 
 we use different editions ; but it is always next to 
 impossible, and often wholly impossible now, to re- 
 gard any more than the intention of the laws and 
 directions sent down from time to time to the acad- 
 emies. The canon in regard to age is plain enough ; 
 although teachers of equal scrupulosity, vary in 
 judging of that law : in all other matters a rigid ad- 
 herence to the letter of the laws would defeat the 
 intention of the legislature — no scholars could be 
 reported ! Upon the minds of conscientious men, 
 both teachers and trustees, the greatest doubts re- 
 main ; and after honest endeavors to make modern 
 changes suit the former age, trustees and teachers 
 become a law unto themselves ! The book of di- 
 I'ections comes to be wholly disregarded. The care 
 of the legislature to guard the whole with law after 
 law, has been unavailing ; the attempt to bind most 
 stringently has given the largest liberty, or license ! 
 In some places the book of directions is little read ; 
 in others it is laughed at. 
 
 So will it ever be — so ought it to be — when one 
 class of men dictates to others how they shall think 
 and act for all coming ages. So will it be, and must 
 be, when mere legislators, wise and competent 
 enough in their sphere, venture out of that sphere to 
 give orders to teachers, poets, musicians — to any 
 artists — as to the sciences and arts belonging to their 
 professions. Dictation and restriction from the leg- 
 islature would retard improvement in shoemaking — 
 mere legislators cannot prepare suitable lasts for 
 cord-wainers. Crispin will make shoes to suit the 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS, 249 
 
 affe. He ouorht not to be bribed to stick to shoes 
 with buckles, or boots with yellow tops. This is 
 said to be a liberal age ; and must teachers, who can 
 direct others, must they be forced or bribed to think 
 on teaching as legislators thought fifty years ago ? 
 If the State wishes to give money, let the teacher 
 be allowed to do his work still his own way ; en- 
 courage him to make improvements ; neither tempt 
 nor bribe him to stand immoveable, chained to the 
 legislature of a by-gone age ! 
 
 Very far be it from the author to intimate that 
 teachers are wrong, when they crowd all they can 
 into legal studies, and keep others in the legal stu- 
 dies four months, at least, every year, even if the 
 boys know the whole perfectly. Some teachers 
 may, indeed, be indifferent as to the workings of the 
 system ; but all have a moral and legal right to 
 force the parents, by means of the children, to a per- 
 formance of their part of the contract. If any evil 
 is done the pupils, the community itself and its rep- 
 resentatives are to blame. The decree of the com- 
 munity is, cheap education. The legislature is peti- 
 tioned and threatened alternately, till they digest 
 some scheme to diminish the amount of a fair quar- 
 ter-bill. In time a plan is devised, and aid is given 
 to an academy, provided less than an honest price 
 is charged for the tuition, on the part of trustees and 
 teacher ; in other words, the State undertakes to 
 make up the deficiency, that the teacher may not 
 lose. All this would be fair enough, and perhaps 
 productive of no evil, if the legislature did not make 
 it necessary for the teacher, or the academy, 
 
250 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 to raise that part of the pay intended to be given, 
 from the pupils themselves. The tuition fees are 
 put as low as possible, to avoid a high direct tax ; 
 and then the pupils are made into conduit pipes to 
 convey indirectly the rest of the tax. Teachers 
 will, and ought to be paid. It is an impertinence 
 most insufferable to ask them to heat pokers for 
 nothing. Neither parent nor boy has a right to com- 
 plain when each is used just as the law intends ; and 
 although education is not the best with the gifts thus 
 bestowed, yet in many places, if the plan were sud- 
 denly altered, by the withdrawment of the appro- 
 priation, an academy would be instantly destroyed, 
 because the diminished tuition fee, diminished for the 
 sake of the donation, could not be immediately raised 
 to a proper point. It is, indeed, not improbable that 
 all appropriations to colleges and academies will be 
 finally taken away, not, however, for reasons assigned 
 in this chapter, and similar ones, but because the 
 legislature wish to pet the people in another way, 
 and to try their hand at a little common school edu- 
 cating. At that they will fail, too, if they give the 
 money and meddle with the system. Railroads, 
 telegraphs, banks, and all secular things are their 
 province : sacred matters, religion and education, are 
 beyond their ken. 
 
 Be the community, on a large or small scale, well 
 assured, that some old things are yet as good as 
 new : among these are, ex nihilo nihil Jit — no stream 
 higher than its fountain — action and re-action are 
 equal ; or more vulgarly — if you kill my dog, I will 
 kill your cat. Teachers must be paid. Treat them 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 251 
 
 as men should be treated, and the result is, high 
 price and large work ; otherwise, low price and 
 small work. But in either case, there is returned 
 the money's worth. Let there be no whining com- 
 plaint: the call was for cheap education — and 
 cheap education came. The sovereign voice can 
 have what it asks. 
 
 A very important objection in the scheme admin- 
 istered by the Regents of the Universiy, is the very 
 solemn oath required, not of the trustees only, but 
 of the teachers. 
 
 The best moralists lament the multiplication of 
 oaths. They deem many oaths a source of reck- 
 lessness and profanity. In the teacher's oath, and 
 the manner of administering it, there seems nothing 
 to weaken that conclusion. Indeed, it is, with all 
 the seeming care in its construction, inaccurately 
 worded ; so that without the explanation of legal 
 gentlemen, (and such differ in its interpretation,) a 
 scrupulous man fears to take it ; and yet, such lati- 
 tude is allowed in other parts, that anybody may 
 take the oath, if he have only confidence in the 
 trustees. 
 
 A special hardship in the oath is, that a teacher 
 swears, not to his hurt, but to his profit — he swears 
 to get money! After all the explanation the author 
 has heard, of the intention of the law and the inter- 
 pretation said to be put on the matter by the Re- 
 gents, it comes to that naked fact. A teacher, bear- 
 ing witness in a court of justice, and swearing to 
 facts in which he had no interest, could swear with 
 less trepidation ; but here, he has to suppose the 
 
252 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 facts are agreeable to the intention of the law, and 
 is all the time alarmed, lest his pecuniary interest 
 in these accommodated or substituted, or equivalent 
 facts, may have blinded his perceptions. Some, we 
 well know, do consider this whole matter a tempta- 
 tion and a snare : conscientious men always feel 
 alarmed and humbled, when called to take that 
 oath. 
 
 But not rarely is the oath deemed a mere form. 
 Except as to the age of the pupil, teachers do not, 
 they cannot swear according to the letter of the 
 directions ; for books, systems, modes of education, 
 all are changed. As there is no literal obedience to 
 these requirements, there can be nothing but a form 
 in swearing the words of the oath. If an oath is 
 insisted upon, a new and very general form should 
 be prepared. 
 
 It is said advisedly that teachers, in some cases, 
 and also trustees, go wholly by tradition, as to the 
 meaning of the Legislature and Regents. These 
 persons, when pointed to the letter of the require- 
 ments, have uniformly said, if we follow literally, 
 we can i-eport none ; and that, certainly, is not 
 what the Legislature wish — we have followed, and 
 will yet follow what seems to be the meaning. Di- 
 rections given with great minuteness some half a 
 century ago, are unmeaning now ; and hence every 
 teacher in this sea of uncertainty, being left to his 
 own latitude and longitude, contrives to thrust into 
 his report as many as possible, and as unconcern- 
 edly as if no restriction were intended, or oath on 
 the matter were to be taken ! Besides, trustees and 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 
 
 253 
 
 teachers do not believe the moneys belong to the 
 Regents : they see no necessity for so much com- 
 plication ; and provided they know enough of the 
 pamphlets to ke^p the form, they care little for the 
 substance. 
 
 The author knows that several most excellent and 
 worthy gentlemen, both trustees and teachers, con- 
 nected with more than one academy, labor under 
 much distress and anxiety as to the oaths ; and for 
 himself he can honestly say, that more nights than 
 one have been devoted by him to something besides 
 gentle and balmy slumbers, in coming to a deter- 
 mination v/hat pupils to report, and how to take that 
 formidable oath. He has been several times on 
 the very verge of resigning his station in an acad- 
 emy reporting to the Regents ; and he is yet not 
 wholly free from disquietude. The compensation 
 is a small remuneration for the suffering endured. 
 He has consulted legal gentlemen, who, however, 
 have given different and almost opposite opinions; 
 while some treat the anxiety as an unnecessary 
 scrupulosity. And yet, it is alarming to think that 
 one may be so near perjury — and for money ! 
 
 Strange, that gifts should be so offered, that when 
 you hold out the hand to receive them, you at the 
 moment must bow your neck to a yoke as galling 
 as a slave's or criminal's ! Why not swear to the 
 truth of every quarter-bill presented to a parent ? 
 If we swear to obtain one part of our price, why 
 not the other ? *' How near to a prison," says Ci- 
 cero, " is one who judges himself fit to be watched !" 
 — and how near are we deemed to falsehood, if we 
 12 
 
254 
 
 CHAPTER Vr. 
 
 cannot be believed but on oath ? 11" teachers carmoi 
 be trusted without a nriost solemn oath, in matters sc 
 plain and of daily occurrence, of what value is their 
 swearing? It is hard enough to judge of the inten- 
 tion of the law-maker, and to earn the money, with- 
 out endangering one's soul by a possible perjury — 
 and to be bribed to it ! 
 
 Honorable and patriotic men fram-ed the teacher s 
 oath. But these gentlemen were used to oaths in 
 CGUii:s of justice, in the halls of legislation, in cus- 
 tom-houses — in short, everywhere ; and it was, 
 therefore, natural and easy that they should require 
 an oath in attestation of school-reports. The State, 
 indeed, gives away and intrusts nothing, without 
 requiring an oath ; and so religion and education 
 n>ust be sworn. An apostle could hardly obtain a 
 book or parchment from a representative body, un- 
 less he should sXvear to return it, and, perhaps, give 
 additional security. And yet, while the numerous 
 oaths may do well enough to " end strife," they are 
 too often found unavailing to secure the State from 
 incessant frauds. If we may judge of the efficacy 
 of oaths, from the solemnity with w^hich they are 
 usually taken and administered, we should have 
 little confidence in them — they seem to be regarded 
 as a mere form. 
 
 The teacher who obeys the spirit or letter of the 
 Regents' Instructions, and particularly he that keeps, 
 in addition, the Meteorological Journal, and draws, 
 in consequence, some one or two hundred dollars, 
 has more, far more than earned his wages, even 
 by honest labor, without being forced to swear to 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 255 
 
 the fact. Were tuition fees at the just point, and 
 the State would not assist the community to keep 
 the fees below that point, most teachers would 
 gladly exchange the slavery and humility of the 
 present mode, for the freedom of the other. 
 
 A deep conviction is seated in the author's mind, 
 that however well-meant endowments and grants, 
 and however high-minded the noble men who may 
 have moved for these gifts — that these things do 
 finally, and from many causes, differing however in 
 different places, work evil and not good ; and 
 mainly because the endowments or gifts do usually 
 or at least frequently, lead the people to depend 
 unduly upon that aid ; because, from various causes, 
 the gifts are bestowed with more or less of inter- 
 ference with the independency of the school, the 
 teacher, the system, the books ; and because not 
 infrequently, an absolute right is claimed and exer- 
 cised over the teacher, as an hireling and a slave. 
 
 Objection to existing plans may render it obliga- 
 tory on the objector to furnish better ; although it 
 does not necessarily follow that a person incompe- 
 tent to provide a substitute, is not able to see the 
 faults and appreciate the evils of existing systems. 
 Perhaps, it may be fair enough to ask the objector 
 for his remedy, if he have one, both for the sake of 
 adopting that remedy, if a good one, and also be- 
 cause the objector should be willing to be himself 
 severely criticised, who severely criticises others. 
 The present objector is, however, not moved by 
 any improper spirit in his remarks ; and is willing 
 to propose a plan, not wholly free from objection, and 
 
256 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 yet better, in his opinion, than the existing one ; or 
 which, at least in the hands of more competent men^ 
 may be made better. 
 
 One main intention of the law in the present case, 
 is to remunerate the teacher, w^ho, in consequence 
 of the gift, asks less tuition fees from the parents ; 
 and also, to reward and encourage him for his exer- 
 tions in behalf of education. It is, therefore, most 
 expressly and unequivocally stated, and in several 
 places, in the instructions furnished by the Regents 
 to the academies, that the moneys appropriated by 
 the legislature shall be paid to the teachers. This 
 end will be gained at once, if for every pupil over 
 twelve years, who shall have studied one entire 
 quarter, calendar or academical, and in any branch 
 of learning, primary, superior, english, mathemat- 
 ical, or classical, a given, or -pro re nata, portion of 
 the moneys shall be allowed ; the time of continu- 
 ance in the academy, and the age of the pupil, being 
 the only limitations. 
 
 By commencing wdth twelve instead of ten years, 
 the numbers reported would be diminished ; while 
 by limiting in time to three months instead of four, 
 many, and the very best scholars in the school, 
 would be secured to the master ; while scholars do 
 now frequently go away at the end of a first quar- 
 ter, and cannot conscientiously be put into the re- 
 port and claimed. The combined action — increas- 
 ing the age and diminishing the period of studying 
 — would make the number reported about the same, 
 or perhaps rather less than at present. But as a 
 pro re nata allotment would be made, a less number 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS. 257 
 
 reported would raise the amount paid by the Re- 
 gents on each pupil claimed. 
 
 Let also a teacher who keeps the Meteorological 
 Journal be paid for that very troublesome duty. It is 
 unequal to pay all alike, when their duties and labors 
 are so unlike. A few cents per head might be 
 allowed those academies that keep the Journal, over 
 and above the portion of the other academies. 
 
 Let, moreover, no academy be required to have 
 a library or apparatus. Let that be rigorously re- 
 quired of the colleges, but not of the academies. 
 The academies do not need these things. The true 
 academical course of education dispenses with a 
 library and apparatus. JYever, in some academies, is a 
 book taken from the library ; and only once or twice 
 in a year, is there use for any part of an apparatus. 
 Few academies — unless independent ones, where a 
 liberal tuition fee is paid — can afford to employ a 
 professor, competent to lecture and exhibit experi- 
 ments ; and for ordinary teachers to try experiments 
 is always ridiculous, and not rarely dangerous. 
 Fun and foolery accompany the experiments of an 
 unskillful philosopher. In many academies, there- 
 fore, the few articles of apparatus, costing origi- 
 nally some one hundred and fifty dollars (I), is 
 rusted into fixidity and wholly out of repair, and 
 would require an outlay of thirty or forty dollars 
 to prepare it for producing air or w^ater! And 
 what an idea of chemistry and natural philosophy ! 
 to be fully and fairly taught wuth an apparatus worth 
 only one hundred and fifty dollars ! The apparatus is, 
 therefore, used just as such an one should be used — 
 
258 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 to make up the yearly report ! And yet, it requires 
 a considerable strain on the swearing organ of some 
 presidents, to hoist that dead weight into the trus- 
 tees' report. Far from me to impute any intended 
 fraud : it is, doubtless, presumed in all such cases, 
 where an apparatus is useless or not used, that it 
 would be regarded favorably by the legislature or 
 the Regents, and that the latitude of interpretation 
 is allowable. Indeed, the " present value" is always 
 sworn to, of both books and apparatus ; but it is no- 
 where defined what is meant by that value. The 
 intrinsic value, as far as use is concerned, is often 
 exactly — nothing ! But the present value is ever 
 interpreted to signify what the articles or books 
 cost at the time when they were purchased, pro- 
 vided their form remains, and however soiled or 
 worn. Nor does it matter whether ten times the 
 amount both in number and quality, can now be got 
 for the sum given for things reported, perhaps dur- 
 ing twenty years ! It is taken for granted that the 
 whole is a mere form. It is, indeed, a hardship in 
 almost all cases to require a board of trustees to 
 have, over and above their academy lot and build- 
 ing, books and apparatus. If a very strict interpre- 
 tation were insisted on, either most academies would 
 cease reporting, or find it as cheap to pay a salary, 
 as to keep books and apparatus in order sufficient 
 to draw the small sums which many of them obtain. 
 Whether the plan just hinted, or some similar 
 plan, ever be adopted, in place of the complicated 
 one in the Regents' directions, cannot be said ; but 
 it is virtually acted upon, in all probability, by the 
 
COMMON SCHOOLS 259 
 
 •academies. All pupils over ten years are, in some 
 way or other, worked into classical or high english 
 studies ; and not more would be put into a report on 
 the new method, than the existing method. Perhaps, 
 if a difference happened, less would be reported than 
 at present ; and certainly as much to the honor of 
 the academies, and the advantage of the State. 
 
 Nor should any oaths be taken by either trustee 
 or teacher. Men at the head of literary institutions, 
 whether theoretically as trustees, or actually as 
 principals, may surely be credited on their bare 
 word, especially in regard to two very simple facts 
 — the age of a boy, and the period of time he may 
 have spent in an academy. In short, all the ends 
 intended by the legislature in appropriating moneys 
 to academies, would be answered by the new plan, 
 and the teacher saved from a great and needless 
 labor, and from some things at w^ar with his con- 
 science, dignity, and honor. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 PERSONS MOST SUITABLE FOR TEACHERS. 
 
 From what has been said respecting the character 
 of the teacher, and the true ends of education, it must 
 be manifest, that, in addition to mental culture and 
 furniture, and other qualifications, a teacher should be, 
 not merely a moral man, but a sincerely religious 
 man. When possible, teachers should be ministers 
 of the Gospel ; not, indeed, ministers who cannot 
 preach ; not persons, vs^ho, from infirmity, or disap- 
 pointment, or caprice, or a mistaken and mischievous 
 expectation of a more quiet sphere, or any cause 
 other than love of the duty, take up teaching as a 
 secondary matter. 
 
 This is, unhappily, too often the case. Alas ! min- 
 isters of the Gospel, even as laymen, frequently teach 
 because they can do nothing else. Lords beyond the 
 water, it is said, provide for younger sons by making 
 them parsons : inefficient parsons, in this land, provide 
 for themselves, now and then, by teaching. If right 
 views of education are possessed, it will be seen that 
 ministers of the best talents, men able to preach and 
 to command both salaries and hearers, but who decide 
 
PERSONS MOST SUITABLE FOR TEACHERS. ^Qi 
 
 that teaching is either the whole or a part of their 
 duty to God and man, to the Church and the State, 
 are the proper persons to become teachers. And 
 such ministers should undertake the office of a 
 teacher as conscientiously, as solemnly, and with as 
 true a sense of responsibility, as others take on them 
 the pastoral relation. 
 
 Ministers may, sometimes, unite teaching with a 
 pastoral charge. At other times they may separate 
 teaching, and preach as they have opportunity, 
 either to regularly organized congregations, or as 
 missionaries in their neighborhoods. 
 
 Next to a congregation in importance is a school. 
 A minister specially apt to teach a school, may do 
 wrong if he prefer not a school. Cases exist, they 
 can easily be supposed, where a school is, for a sea- 
 son, more important than a congregation. 
 
 The author is aware that he is advancing senti- 
 ments at variance with the common opinion, nay, in 
 direct opposition to doctrines fulminated like a phi- 
 lippic by some late-learned brethren, against clergy- 
 men who teach schools, as though such ministers 
 had become secularized. True, these " lords over 
 God's heritage" do, now and then, condescend to sit 
 in the high places of education, whatever they may 
 say and think of smaller folk, who are found plodding 
 a wearisome way in the low places. Whether this 
 contrariety between conduct and sentiment, arises 
 from a change in sentiment for the better, or from 
 love of eminence and power, we cannot always de- 
 cide ; but wherein a minister that teaches, becomes 
 secular, in any invidious sense of that term, we dis- 
 12* 
 
262 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 cern not. When a minister of the Gospel has chil- 
 dren and young persons under a species of parental 
 and pastoral charge, is he secular, because, in ad- 
 dition to clerical or spiritual care over them, he 
 teaches them literature and science ? 
 
 Moreover, in teaching the sciences or the classics 
 — especially the latter — innumerable opportunities 
 offer, of giving the very best religious instruction. 
 He is fit neither for a minister nor a teacher, who 
 cannot make lessons often as solemn as a sermon. 
 The number may be small thus preached to, but 
 they may be again and again more deeply im- 
 pressed, than if they were in a pev^r, and not on a 
 bench. Among the hundreds addressed in a church 
 on the Sabbath, sometimes but one or two are bene- 
 fitted ; that number is frequently benefitted in a 
 small class. The Gospel may be preached by the 
 road-side to a single traveller : why not in a school- 
 room to fifty or sixty scholars ? It may be preached 
 without a text, and without a manuscript. Is every 
 other method of conveying divine truth to the minds 
 of men, a secularizing affair, save that of a sermon 
 delivered in a church on the Sabbath-day ? The 
 teacher is always with his flock. He may fail in 
 seizing the occasions opportunity offers ; but he 
 may do the good if his soul is in his business. 
 As to the love of mone}^ sometimes too uncharita- 
 bly attributed to ministers who teach a school, 
 the salaries of the teachers are often less than the 
 salaries of the men who rebuke. Few teachers ever 
 make much money ; and they have no kind con- 
 gregation to sympathize in their sorrows, or to 
 
PERSONS MOST SUITABLE FOR TEACHERS. 263 
 
 make occasional exertions for orphan children or 
 widowed wives, when death removes the fathers. 
 Bat what money is got, teaciiers fairly earn : 
 whether they love it, of necessity, more than a min- 
 ister his salary, man, who reads not the heart, neither 
 may nor can judge. A melancholy day will it be 
 for education, if ministers of the Gospel all withdraw 
 from participation in its practical duties. In moral 
 matters, ministers are essential. The temperance 
 cause has been put in jeopardy in most places, and 
 wholly ruined in others, by the justifiable withdraw- 
 ment or forcible expulsion of the clergy from its 
 management and advocacy. The cause of educa- 
 tion is already in jeopardy in certain quarters, for 
 want of ministerial co-operation : its ruin is certain 
 whenever the sentiment becomes universal, that 
 clergymen are acting an inconsistent part by be- 
 coming actually teachers. 
 
 Among the reasons why clergymen should be 
 teachers, are the following : — 
 
 1. For obvious causes these persons are more 
 likely than other men to become professional and 
 permanent teachers. Teaching is analogous to their 
 main duty, and it is easily associated with that duty. 
 Other men may easily and without inconvenience or 
 scandal^ from time to time, leave the office of teach- 
 ing : law, medicine, merchandise, farming — every- 
 thing, in short, may be exchanged by laymen for 
 teaching, whenever teaching becomes irksome or of 
 little profit. Not so with the clergy. These are sup- 
 posed to take the office of teaching, from motives sim- 
 ilar to those with which they take the pastoral office : 
 
2g4 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 regard for the moral and spiritual interests of men. 
 But if clergymen become weary or discouraged » 
 whither can they go, except to the pulpit ? Without 
 the most urgent and manifest reasons, they may not 
 betake themselves to mere secular pursuits. The 
 world will not, at present, tolerate that exchange ; it 
 expects ministers to depart no farther from the pulpit, 
 than the school-room. Hence the double security that 
 ministerial teachers will be professional and not ama- 
 teur teachers ; and hence the vast superiority of the 
 former over the latter. The business of education de- 
 mands the life, the soul : ministers are, of choice and 
 necessity, more bound than other men to devote the 
 life to the cause. 
 
 2. Generally speaking, and specially in this coun- 
 try, clergymen are more extensively learned. In 
 mathematics and languages they are commonly well 
 taught, and eminently well in all that pertains to 
 logic, metaphysics, and general literature. They 
 may, indeed, be excelled in this and that special 
 branch, by a professed mathematician, or linguist, 
 or critic ; or by other professional men, physicians 
 and lawyers, they may be surpassed in certain parts 
 of logic and physiology ; but taking into account the 
 great variety of topics not specially pertaining to 
 any one art or profession, clergymen are more 
 extensively learned than other persons. They 
 havcj in short, more of the mental furniture neces- 
 sary to form a professional teacher than the other 
 classes of learned persons. A master requires 
 far more than is apparent to superficial thinkers 
 even to teach common and plain things properly — 
 
PERSONS MOST SUITABLE FOR TEACHERS. 265 
 
 such as Geography, History, and most particularly, 
 Grammar; but to teach higher matters profitably, 
 he must be deep, if not absolutely profound. He is 
 not competent to instruct in any branch, who knows 
 little or nothing beyond the text book. When pa- 
 rents suspect or discover that a stream is noisy and 
 shallow, the influence of the teacher is gone. Many 
 a teacher's depth is fathomed with a line an inch or 
 two longer than the one let down by the inquiring. 
 The inquirer may tremble as did Don Quixote and 
 his esquire, while hanging all night in the dark to 
 the sides of a dreadful clifl?* — one foot from the bot- 
 tom ! — but a ray of additional light would discover 
 how little was critical in the situation. 
 
 3. If a clergyman assume the office of a teacher, 
 particularly if it be thought that it was assumed 
 voluntarily and from a sense of duty, greater dig- 
 nity attaches to the office, and, by consequence, 
 greater influence. Judgment is formed among men 
 of the character and nature of an employment or 
 profession, very commonly, from the character and 
 standing of persons who choose it. And judgment 
 once formed in this way, is satisfied ; and after- 
 wards, our best and dearest interests are at once 
 committed to these men, without further inquiry or 
 solicitude about the machinery of their art, trade, 
 or profession. Hence the world is deeply impressed 
 with the importance of education and the value of 
 schools, when they see men of the rank, dignity, 
 learning, and morality of clergymen, voluntarily en- 
 gaging as teachers, and seeming to regard educa- 
 tion as important enough to turn them aside from 
 
266 
 
 CH AFTER VII. 
 
 their more direct duty. " Great reverence is due to 
 boys," is a good maxim; and w^hen reverend men 
 set the example^in devoting themselves to the train- 
 ing of boys, the world learns to reverence schools. 
 If wc would elevate schools or preserve them at a 
 proper elevation, elevate the teachers and keep 
 them elevated. 
 
 4. Clergymen, from education and habit, are best 
 fitted to teach morality and religion. Children, too 
 regard with greater attention and respect teachers 
 of religion, reverenced in that office by men them- 
 selves. Laymen may, they often do, give religious 
 instruction to their pupils ; but, generally speaking, 
 laymen are not so much disposed as clergymen, nor, 
 when they attempt it, can they do this duty as well. 
 
 If, indeed, religion is to be expelled from schools* 
 or not admitted, then may clergymen stand aloof 
 from the whole business of education. They have 
 no more to do with schools than with that necessary 
 abortion, the Girard College. Lay-teachers, who 
 make no pretensions to more piety than their neigh- 
 bors, and who have, perhaps, as much contempt or 
 indifference towards the Christian religion as their 
 patrons, may then serve. But if religion is to be in- 
 corporated with the whole machinery and discipline 
 of schools, then are clergymen better adapted to that 
 end than other men. 
 
 That the teachers in an academy, or college, or 
 wherever several are required, should all be minis- 
 ters of the Gospel, is not necessary. The grand ad- 
 vantages are gained if the principal or president be 
 a clergyman. And wh ere bvit a single teacher is re- 
 
PERSONS MOST SUfTABLE FOR TEACFIERS. 
 
 267 
 
 quired, the best teacher there would be a clerical 
 one, wholly and for life devoted to his profession as 
 a teacher. No alarm need be felt by other teach- 
 ers from such a declaration : because not the slight- 
 est ground exists for supposing that all clergymen 
 will become teachers, or that all teachers will become 
 clergymen. We only state that if a consequence? 
 never likely to happen, did happen, or were sup- 
 posed to happen, it would not be a disastrous conse- 
 quence. It is, however, a consequence that may be 
 approximated ; for, if our views are true, or par- 
 tially true, then may young men who seek the holy 
 office of the ministry, regard in their training that cog- 
 nate office, school-teaching. Some men are educated 
 in theological institutions for special objects in 
 view of foreign fields ; and among such objects is 
 teaching heathen children, not merely religion, but 
 arts and sciences. And is there no important rea- 
 son manifest why divinity students may design to 
 become, in whole or in part, teachers of schools at 
 home? 
 
 A class of schools is now advocated — a class that 
 ought and must, and for many important reasons, 
 become numerous — parochial schools. The religious 
 people of the country will have religion in schools. 
 Destroy the common schools by prohibiting the 
 Christian religion there ; and the religious denomi- 
 nations will before long give us better schools. 
 True, they may be robbed by indirect taxation to 
 sustain infidel schools, or anti-protestant schools ; 
 but they will not be robbed at the same time of their 
 own children, or have them, in other words, trained 
 
20Q CHAPTER Vll. 
 
 for the State only. In case, then, a parochial school 
 is established, there the school is brought under the 
 minister's direction, discipline and influence ; it may, 
 often, be wholly or partially under his actual and 
 daily instruction, and that in learning as well as 
 morals. Perhaps among a weak people a minister 
 can be supported only in his two-fold office, as 
 teacher and pastor. Perhaps, here we may behold 
 a collegiate charge — the one minister devoted 
 mainly to the preaching and visiting, the other to 
 the school, and occasional clerical duties in the 
 church and congregation. Wherever ages place 
 two ministers in the relation of father and son, this 
 species of collegiate charge may be delightful, and 
 productive of all the advantages of a collegiate 
 charge, and few or none of its disadvantages. Pa- 
 rents and children would thus be one flock, and all 
 be led and trained from childhood to old age. To 
 the author many beauties in this plan are discerni- 
 ble. And children could thus be retained under pa- 
 rental influence till a good elementary education 
 was secured. 
 
 The vulgar canting cry of *' union between 
 Church and State," is not unheard by the writer — 
 but it is simply unheeded. If the union did take 
 place, and must be an alternative, better by far than 
 that horrible union — the union of infidelity, or of 
 no-religion and State ! The worst form of the Prot- 
 estant religion is infinitely preferable to any form or 
 phase of Atheism, Deism, Nothingism — yea, Indif- 
 ferentism 1 Any form of Protestantism is superior 
 to the best form of Romanism ; but the verv worst 
 
PERSONS MOST SUITABLE FOR TEACHERS. 269 
 
 form of Romanism is better than no religion. Of 
 two evils we prefer the least. Romanism devours 
 only professed foes ; Atheism, scorpion-like, after de- 
 stroying its foes, destroys its friends, and then itself! 
 Romanism is purgatory ; A theism is hell. From one 
 is a chance of a resurrection — in the other is eter- 
 nal death. Possibly the evils of superstition may, 
 sometimes, balance the evils of Atheism ; but wher- 
 ever the sign of the cross is found, there may 
 we, peradventure, find Him that died upon the cross. 
 Could Rome, in 'power, be tolerant — could Rome 
 allow men to be evangelical in the midst of her forms 
 and follies — contenting herself with argument and 
 entreaty, and not arming with fire and sword — a 
 State might, in a degree, flourish, and some happiness 
 be secured for all. But Atheism has no vital princi- 
 ple. Its breath is pestilence — its life, death ! its 
 existence, damnation ! To this tends any school 
 system, which, of choice or necessity, admits no re- 
 ligion. Counteracting elements may be in a half- 
 christianized community ; but these elements are 
 hourly becoming weaker and weaker, and in no long 
 period will have changed into an atmosphere of pol- 
 lution, pestilence, and destruction. 
 
 But the writer, who has had favorable opportuni- 
 ties for observing, well knows that schools, not pro- 
 fessedly sectarian, and in which pupils from all or 
 many other denominations are congregated, make 
 no attempts to bias the minds of the pupils to any 
 special creed, religious or political. If, however, a 
 school is professedly a denominational school, and is 
 so published to the world, it has a right not only to 
 
270 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 teach religion, but what is termed sectarianism. 
 Nay, further, the author deems sectarian schools in- 
 trinsically right, although they are usually very im- 
 politic ; and whoever sends to such has no right to 
 complain that his child is instructed in rites, cere- 
 monies, and certain orthodoxies or heterodoxies, as 
 the case may be. On the other hand, he should be 
 surprised if all this is not done. A pledge, indeed, 
 may be given or implied on the part of an institu- 
 tion known to be sectarian or denominational, that 
 pupils from other sects or denominations will not be 
 biased either directly or indirectly towards the creed 
 of the institution. If that pledge is disregarded, and 
 any systematic endeavors are made to bias the pupils, 
 there is fraud — nay, something deserving a harsher 
 name. That school should be destroyed. It can- 
 not be a truly religious school, that employs fraud, 
 whether pious or impious — its religion, like itself, is 
 a lie. 
 
 From the preceding chapters it is moreover man- 
 ifest, that the prosperity of the educational cause 
 depends very much upon the parents and guardians 
 of children. 
 
 Many things severe, but not bitter, in this work, 
 have been said relative to parents and guardians — 
 not in a spirit of anger, but of faithfulness. The re- 
 buke of a friend is better than the kiss of an enemy. 
 The great and holy cause of education depends so 
 essentially on correct views in the community; and 
 errors and mistakes are so numerous, and among 
 the best of men ; and so false a spirit in many places 
 prevails, that a heart, in proportion to its benevolence 
 
PERSONS MOST SUITABLE FOR TEACHERS. 211 
 
 and earnestness, is prone to employ pungent words. 
 Indeed, a dull or insensate state of the public mind 
 calls for ardent and penetrating language ; and the 
 " proud flesh" of a corrupt community requires the 
 caustic. The author may not be deemed an enemy 
 because he tells the truth. Great injustice, however, 
 w^ill be done the author, if his remarks in this, or the 
 foregoing chapters, are applied universally ; and if, 
 in many districts and sections of the States and the 
 country, they are applied even generally. That 
 they will not be applied generally in some places, he 
 knows from his own personal acquaintance. And 
 yet, it is believed, the application should be made far 
 more extensively everywhere, than is commonly 
 supposed. Without scrupulously weighing and meas- 
 urini^ his words, the author beo^s leave without 
 offence to add a few other general observations, rel- 
 ative to parents and guardians. 
 
 It is important that these have adequate concep- 
 tion of the nature and importance of education. 
 These two things are not always united in the same 
 mind. Some, honest in their belief of the paramount 
 importance of education, have yet no true views of 
 its nature. Of consequence they are liable to many 
 and serious mistakes in their attempt to educate their 
 children — mistakes, almost as pernicious to the cause 
 of education, to the comfort and peace of the teacher, 
 as when children are sent to school, merely that 
 they may be kept out of the street ! 
 
 Where no regard for the importance of education 
 is found, there is, of necessity, utter indifference to 
 its character or nature. Then a school has little 
 
272 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 use beyond its being a place in which children are 
 kept out of harm's way. It is a sort of nursery, or 
 an honorable prison house. The master is a species 
 of dry nurse — a pedagogue — a keeper-in of boys — 
 a half-jailor ! If parents happen to be covetous or 
 inclining to mediocrity of life, they look around for 
 the cheapest school — a school where the restraint, 
 and watching, can be had for the least money — and 
 anybody seems competent to keep a jail-school. If 
 they are fashionable people, or careful observers of 
 •' what the world says," then they look out for a 
 fashionable school and a popular master ; and if they 
 are aristocratic in style, sentiment, and pretension, 
 then they seek a very expensive and select school. 
 
 But, in all this, is no real regard or respect for the 
 teacher, as a teacher. Other things in connection 
 with him may beget respect, such as general char- 
 acter, personal appearance, mental qualities ; but his 
 preceptorial character is never considered. He is 
 valued, not because of his profession, but in spite of 
 it : without the accidents, he might be despised. As 
 it is, the parents now meant deem it a condescension 
 often, when they hire his services ; they never look 
 towards him with reverence and respect — they only 
 -patronize him ! And these parents, unless restrained 
 by good breeding, or by conventional customs, 
 will so speak at home and in company, as to betray 
 their real estimation of schools and schoolmasters. 
 From this, children and young persons imbibe the 
 thoughts and sentiments of the superiors, and soon 
 show, by words and actions, and other signs not to 
 be mistaken, what is said in the domestic circle and 
 
PERSONS MOST SUITABLE FOR TEACHERS. 273 
 
 elsewhere. Hence, unless, as the rabble in politics, 
 the children are awed by the majesty of knowledge 
 and intellect discernible in their preceptor, his office 
 itself begets contempt in them, and they soon become 
 insolent and rebellious. Children at school are al- 
 most uniformly the true exponents of the parents 
 and guardians at home : the skillful and experienced 
 teacher can read the roots from the radical signs. 
 Patronizing parents think they well know teachers ; 
 but teachers do know, when they study the children, 
 e sanguine oriuntur! These parents, regarding a 
 school as a species of nursery, are content if the 
 children are taking the education — as they took the 
 measles, or cow^-pox — finely ! If this goes not on 
 smoothly, another pap-house or inoculation-house 
 is sought ; while the former is decried as a place 
 where the master likes money well enough, but 
 does not understand children ! 
 
 The vital importance, however, of education is 
 deeply impressed as a sentiment on many minds, 
 where vet is radical mistake as to its nature. 
 
 Of this class of persons, some are willing, at least 
 for a time, to leave the whole business with the teacher, 
 not because of any clear perception of the truth, but of 
 some misty views of its necessity, and a conviction 
 that they themselves cannot, if an opportunity of- 
 fered, guide. The expectation is great ; but by 
 what process the educating of children is carried on, 
 or how it goes on, there is no just appreciation. A 
 certain time, longer or shorter, is, in their minds, al- 
 lotted for the transformation, or the transmutation ; 
 and beyond that period, they become almost inev. 
 
274 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 itably suspicious as to the boy's capacity, thesys tern 
 of educating, or the dihgence and capabiHty of the 
 teacher. They look every way now, eijicept the 
 right way — they are disappointed because they had 
 misjudged ; but they lay the blame not at their own 
 door, they lay it at their neighbor's ! Sick men, and 
 sick men's friends, occasionally deem weakness and 
 paleness after a fever unfavorable tokens : so these, 
 when a boy is robbed of his false strength, and be- 
 comes less pert and loquacious, and more timid, im- 
 agine sometimes that he has lost his smartness, that 
 books have repressed his growth ! Hence, if confi- 
 dence in the importance of education is not lost, con- 
 fidence in the teacher or plan is gone ; and so the 
 school or plan is changed. 
 
 Others, who truly value education, value it not as 
 a whole, but in its parts. Sentiments here are varied 
 by a thousand prejudices and interests. The class 
 may be sub-divided into two — the one in favor of an 
 english course, the other, of a language course, or^ 
 as usually called, the classical. The latter partial- 
 ism, for it is nothing more, when it arrays one part 
 of education against another, is a more fortunate 
 mistake ; for a child under a judicious teacher of 
 language, is led aright, notwithstanding the error of 
 the parents. Still, any partialism in education is to 
 be lamented, as in law, medicine, morals, or divinity. 
 And in case teachers are partialists, as well as the 
 parents, children can never, save by accident, be- 
 come complete scholars. We are, however, com- 
 paratively rejoiced at lighting on a community 
 where the classical course is the fashion, although 
 
PERSONS MOST .SUITABLE FOR TEACHERS. 275 
 
 views of the modus operandi are false. There usu- 
 ally is found more patience ; and more time is allowed 
 for a teacher to do right, even if the opinion in his 
 favor is a prejudice, and the fortune that favors him 
 is blind. Indeed, parents here often become rest- 
 less, and send occasional petitions in favor of drop- 
 ping or suspending some English study, and simply 
 because they are partisans of Latin and Greek ! 
 But, by a thousand innocent contrivances, the 
 teacher, if he belong not to the unfortunate class of 
 touchy folk, may yet work into this partial course 
 some good amount of English, if not a quantum suffi- 
 cit ; and he may send home a boy a better scholar 
 than the parents designed. And this not rarely de- 
 lights, as it was supposed to have been done accord- 
 ing to the recipe — the Latin and Greek pill ! 
 
 Next are the advocates of the English course. 
 These have frequently a triumph, because boys done 
 on the other recipe, and treated according to the 
 language system^ often fail in knowledge of common 
 english studies, and, for a while, in making business 
 men. As far as the objection lies against a partial- 
 ism in education, it is valid. Objections, however, 
 against the english partialism, are more numerous 
 and more forcible ; and that, not from the quarter of 
 a complete education, comprising english and clas= 
 sics, but from the classical course as a mere partial- 
 ism itself. The english advocates are often liberal, 
 philanthropic, and in all respects good and worthy ; 
 yet if their views of an english course are not ex- 
 tensive, they incline to keep children in an endless 
 iteration of the same elementary studies. And their 
 
276 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 parents, not understanding that even their studies at 
 first require much labor and dihgence, too often in- 
 tercede for a decrease in the length of tasks, or for a 
 less inflexible rigor in exacting the " full tale of 
 brick." 
 
 But the number that values education for special 
 ends is vast. By some, it is regarded as an orna- 
 ment ; by others, as a means of acquiring influence, 
 honor, wealth. The kind and extent of education 
 depend, then, on the kind of influence or honor val- 
 ued by the parents ; or the ornament prized ; or 
 whether riches or moderate fortune be deemed de- 
 sirable. Every selfish end determines, in some de- 
 gree, the education. Arithmetic and book-keeping 
 are sufficient for some : they are to be store-keepers. 
 Others may learn chemistry : they are designed for 
 druggists, or perhaps for scientific farmers. This 
 boy may learn surveying, that he may always as- 
 certain, with great exactitude, the boundaries of his 
 estate. Here and there one wishes Greek enough 
 for medical terms ; another Latin, for law books and 
 writs. Some parents object to declamation or 
 speaking, as the child is not intended for public life. 
 Nay, the main argument against many valuable 
 studies is with many, " We see no use in them !" Man 
 not only begets a son in his own likeness — he con- 
 trives to make him keep it ; and when the boy reaches 
 manhood, he sees to no greater extent nor more 
 clearly than his father. 
 
 A class comparatively small, and yet a very large 
 class of persons, is everywhere found, especially in 
 the older States, who have true and just views and 
 
PERSOxXS MOST SUITABLE FOR TEACHERS. 
 
 277 
 
 appreciation of the nature and importance of edu- 
 cation. With them, the great amount of valuable 
 knowledge necessarily got in a process of correct 
 training and discipline is not overlooked ; but all 
 studies are regarded as tools and implements during 
 an elementary course ; although some such studies 
 may, after the completion of the whole education, 
 be continued, as necessary to a business or profes- 
 sion, or as a means of keeping the mental powers in 
 activity and vigor. Here is no vulgar preference; 
 no mistaken partialism ; no array of english against 
 latin ; of literature against mathematics ; nor of the 
 useful against the ornamental. Education has with 
 them a value, if others cannot see how it will drive 
 a nail, spread manure, make a pudding, mend a 
 shirt, or darn a stocking. These see how^ a well- 
 ordered and "well-balanced mind can recreate itself 
 with fine and ornamental studies, and yet be never 
 wanting in the soberer duties of life ; and how a piano 
 interferes not with a wash-tub. Such persons are 
 also patient. They know a boy has some things to 
 unlearn, as well as some to learn ; and that a desire 
 of studying implanted and fostered, and a habit of 
 studying acquired, is, of itself, worth a large price, 
 although no knowledge should have been gained in 
 a year. 
 
 An honest, laborious and eminently skilful teacher 
 may have taught a boy the art of studying ; he may 
 have inspired him with a noble resolution ; and the 
 boy is now ready to advance in his studies with ra- 
 pidity ; but, from some mere whim, or impatience, 
 the misjudging parent, at that moment, removes the 
 13 
 
278 CHAPTER V7I. 
 
 boy. He removes him, perhaps, to an equally good, 
 but not infrequently to an inferior school, where, 
 however, the boy makes a rapid and immediate pro- 
 gress, for which he had been so well prepared. The 
 new school and teacher are, of course, now credited 
 for this progress ; while the former school and it8 
 teacher are cruelly and unjustly reported as un- 
 skilful. 
 
 A very general error prevails among parents of 
 every sort — a desire that children should finish their 
 elementary training at too early an age. The con- 
 sequent mischiefs are many and great. Indeed* 
 some are fatal to mind and body. A legal age is 
 indispensable for the purposes of civil life ; yet the 
 civil or municipal maturity, is not necessarily co- 
 temporaneous with the natural, 'either as respects 
 the physical or mental man. Perhaps the purposes 
 of independent action and business require twenty- 
 five as the period of majority rather than twenty- 
 one. Many efforts are made to change the structure 
 of civil society ; this we conjecture would be a valu- 
 able change: let a boy be kept at a primary school 
 and the academy till he is nineteen or twenty — then 
 in college till he is two-and-twenty — and then let 
 him study his profession or his trade, till he is twenty- 
 five. We may be excused more minuteness here, 
 till symptoms appear in favor of the change ; then 
 we could be more prolix, v/ithout danger of weary- 
 ing the reader. 
 
 A change, however, in tlie college system is prac- 
 ticable, and not, we apprehend, disadvantageous. 
 Indeed, as the academies improve, unless the studies 
 
PERSONS MOST SUITABLE FOR TEACHERS. ^79 
 
 of the colleges are proportionally raised, the change 
 must virtually take place. In most, if not all the 
 colleges in the United States, it has virtually taken 
 place already. It ought, how^ever, to be formally 
 announced. The college course should be only 
 two years, instead of four, or even three. The 
 classes should be only the Junior and Senior. None 
 ought to be admitted, then, into college under twenty 
 years of age. Colleges are designed for men ; boys 
 and youths can be far better drilled, and better 
 taught the sophomore and freshman studies, in acad- 
 emies. If not taught them in academies, pupils are 
 never taught in colleges. The whole plan of study- 
 ing and reciting and governing in college, is greatly 
 different, and ought to be greatly different, from 
 these things in academies. The intercourse between 
 students and professors, is almost the opposite to the 
 intercourse between the scholar and preceptor in 
 academies. If colleges, therefore, do not receive 
 well-taught and well-disciplined students from the 
 academies ; and if they pretend to carry forward 
 the student beyond the academical course and in 
 appropriate college style ; the students v^^ill not be a 
 whit profited if they remain collegians ten years in- 
 stead of four. But if the colleges receive well-drilled 
 students, they can, in two years, do a thousand fold 
 better than now, in the four years' course. It is 
 owing to the undisciplined minds of college students, 
 that in so many, so very many cases, the college life 
 is a total loss, nay, worse than a loss, mentally, mor- 
 ally, physically ! Adopt the proposed plan, and col- 
 leges will have more pupils, because the time 
 
2gO CHAPTER VII. 
 
 would be short ; and, therefore, the tuition fees would 
 amount to the same sum, if not more. Besides, fewer 
 tutors would be needed ; the studies all being of a 
 manly and advanced sort, would demand professors 
 altogether. In some colleges, the two lower classes 
 are mostly instructed by tutors ; and those tutors are 
 generally very inferior to assistants in good acade- 
 mies. Some of those tutors are scarcely worth 
 their bread and butter. How much more noble and 
 dignified a college, too, whose students are all young 
 men ! How inconsistent with the true nature of a 
 college, the urchins that often constitute the majority 
 of the students ! It is this renders it easy to believe, 
 that an academy is equal to a college, and sometimes 
 superior. The colleges will never save themselves 
 by stooping down. When enemies attack them, 
 friends are unable to defend. Let something be 
 done consistent with their nature and intention, and 
 honest friends will do battle in their support : if they 
 will not put their own shoulder to the wheel, in the 
 mire will they remain. Let us have true colleges, 
 and we will try and uphold the collegiate depart- 
 ment of education. 
 
 In the new plan proposed, young men would seem 
 to be losing two or three years ; but it would be 
 only a seeming loss. The innumerable evils of a 
 hasty preparation in most cases, and of no prepara- 
 tion in many cases, would all be avoided ; and if 
 two years were apparently lost at the commence- 
 ment of a civil life, the whole of life itself would be 
 gained. And life, in this sense, is usually lost now, 
 by the present system of education. 
 
PERSONS MOST SUITABLE FOR TEACHERS. 28 1 
 
 Well do we know that many young men cannot 
 delay if they would ; but these need not be gradu- 
 ated. The academical education would be ample 
 yet ; and that is better by far than these persons 
 now obtain usually in colleges. Many can de- 
 lay, however, and the number would be gradually 
 increased. For these we now write. If they, after 
 being graduated at twenty-two, studied a profession 
 until twenty-five years old, quacks of every kind 
 would be contrasted, and not compared, with the regu^ 
 lar students of science. The superficial attainments 
 of the pretendedly regular, encourage, invite, em- 
 bolden quacks. Not a few regular students and pro- 
 fessors seem to depend as slavishly on certain rules 
 and formiJse, as if they were panaceas and nostrums ; 
 and that pertains to the very essence of quackery. 
 The latter appeals to authority not more, in many 
 cases, than do the former when they understand the 
 exterior nature only of these rules. 
 
 In regard to women, the author is entirely con- 
 fident that their education is, almost universally, so 
 hurried, as to be little more than nominal. Where 
 accomplishments are deemed indispensable — and 
 the author is a decided advocate for most accom- 
 plishments — the whole education of women is very 
 superficial. 
 
 In schools eminently good, and where the most 
 learned instructors are employed, but where young 
 ladies are graduated at sixteen or eighteen, the edu- 
 cation, in the nature of things, if considered as a 
 complete education, embracing all the studies ex- 
 hibited in the prospectus, must be a superficial edu- 
 
282 
 
 CHAPTER Vir. 
 
 cation. The mind cannot have received all sup- 
 posed to be furnished. We repeat, that a gallon of 
 fluid cannot be compressed into a quart measure, 
 without the destruction of the vessel. Lives are 
 constantly sacrificed, in the vain attempts at the 
 forcing system. The folly of this system has ever 
 been acknowledged as regards men : why is it 
 not confessed with regard to women ? One answer 
 to this must be looked for in that preposterous and 
 unnatural conventional practice of considering 
 young ladies at eighteen as marriageable women. 
 All the reasons of this practice need not be men- 
 tioned ; one is obvious and sufficient — the prema- 
 ture period assigned for commencing the civil life 
 of men. The limit for woman's civil life would at 
 once be farther removed, if that of man's were 
 changed. Make it fashionable to regard a woman 
 as a girl till she is twenty, and her education may 
 be more profound and complete, without being less 
 extensive. But if this be impracticable ; then hu- 
 manity, and religion, and policy all cry out, and 
 say : — " Let woman's education be less extensive 
 and more perfect." Hence, while institutions grant- 
 ing diplomas to girls are very imposing, they are 
 also a little farcical. They can be no more than a 
 certificate that the girl has tripped lightly over a 
 very large field ; but not that she is learned, in any 
 fair sense of that term. If it be intended to say^ 
 that her education is, in any good degree, as to ex- 
 tent or depth, similar to that of a college, in the 
 proper use of the word, it is an imposition ; if it be 
 intended to say, that the diploma is for an inferior 
 
PERSONS MOST SUITABLE' FOR TEACHERS. 
 
 283 
 
 degree, then let it not be called a diploma — a name 
 specially appropriated to what is higher in charac- 
 ter. The exact truth is of vital importance in every- 
 thing pertaining to education. Already, the lines of 
 demarcation are effaced between kindred, and yet 
 separate and distinct parts of education. Confusion 
 is the result of these follies ; and education has be- 
 come a jumble and a contradiction. Here, as else- 
 where, the agrarian and extreme democratical prin- 
 ciple is at work, not of design, but in obedience to 
 the spirit of the age. Perhaps, when this spirit has 
 wrought out an intolerable evil, it will, corrected 
 and chastened by the consequent suffering and dis- 
 appointment, be ready to lay the foundation anew ; 
 and then, will be *' a place for everything, and every- 
 thing in its place." 
 
 To parents, guardians and trustees would we re- 
 spectfully, but most earn estly, recommend, that as 
 far as possible, they should, when the fact can be 
 ascertained, prefer as teachers men that make teach- 
 ing their profession, and who are determined to be- 
 come finished artists ; and the decidedly religious to 
 the merely moral ; and lastly, ever and without hes- 
 itation, that they should reject, and with indignation, 
 the infidel, or the immoral man. These have no 
 right to be practical educators : belief in the Chris- 
 tian religion and good morals are essential qualities 
 of the practical educator. 
 
 It would be, indeed, both unjust and ungenerous 
 to intimate that persons who intend making a school 
 the stepping-stone to what they deem a higher em- 
 ployment ; or who, for any other reason, intend to 
 
Ogl CHAPTER VII. 
 
 teach but for a short season ; that these are not gen- 
 erally worthy men, and to some extent competent 
 and successful teachers. And yet many things con- 
 join to render men who are devoted for life to the 
 employment, still more competent and successful. 
 These have besides from that very choice a superior 
 and prior claim. Hundreds of distinguished per- 
 sons now in the pulpit, at the bar, in the senate, or 
 in the counting-house, would have, out of choice* 
 and from a sense of duty, remained teachers, had 
 they perceived themselves and their profession prop- 
 erly appreciated and rewarded. They are lost to 
 the cause of practical education, because parents did 
 not duly appreciate them. Let the world say, we 
 will have teaching a science and teachers artists ; 
 we will not allow mediocrity here, more than in 
 other sciences and arts ; our children shall be trained 
 and disciplined by the learned, the talented, the dig- 
 nified, the skilful ; our primary schools, academies, 
 and colleges, shall rise in glory and majesty all over 
 the land, even as temples to God ; we will esteem 
 learning and discipline next to religion, and teach- 
 ers next to the ministers of our most holy religion ; 
 and then shall a body of men exist and be increased 
 in our land, worthy all praise, reward and admi- 
 ration. 
 
 That some, who make teaching an intermediate 
 affair, are deplorably deficient in every essential re- 
 quisite of an artist, is too true. It is natural that 
 this should be the case. Some, moreover, engage 
 ia teaching, under a false impression that it is an 
 easy life ! We may well pity the man who makes 
 
PERSOxVS MOST SUITABLE FOR TEACHERS. gSS 
 
 it an easy life ; his account will be a melancholy one 
 — nearly as much so, as that of the minister who 
 finds little to do, and does that little badly ! Even 
 idle men, if otherwise learned and competent, ought 
 not to be chosen as teachers. 
 
 A parting word to associates in teaching, will 
 conclude this chapter. 
 
 Our office is honorable and important. But much 
 depends on ourselves to make it thus in the estima- 
 tion of the world. We may compel men to think 
 and speak of the profession with due respect. That 
 is a good rule : "Would a man appear in any char- 
 acter ? — be that character." Yet, if men are ever 
 so intrinsically worthy, and are still seemingly 
 ashamed of their employment, that is reason suffi- 
 cient for the world to despise the office. If a 
 teacher seem to undervalue his profession, men may 
 respect and revere him, but they will lament that 
 he should have thrown himself away upon an un- 
 suitable or undignified employment. 
 
 Not infrequently, when a person of evident talents^ 
 of ready and brilliant wit — a man that commands 
 the attention of an intellectual and polished com- 
 pany — when he has passed into a different room, or 
 withdrawn from the company, leaving a delighted 
 assembly to regret his departure ; some stranger, in 
 answer to a query relative to the gentleman, re- 
 ceives a whispered answer,' with something like 
 sorrow in the responding voice : " He is a teacher !" 
 
 Often, too, in written articles in newspapers and ma- 
 gazines, when necessary mention is made of certain im- 
 portnnt persons — important, for talents, discoveries, 
 13* 
 
286 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 station, or other causes, a hurried and apologetical ref- 
 erence is made to his present or former *' school !' 
 and not rarely, hopes are expressed that the person 
 may soon find a more fitting field of usefulness, and 
 theatre of display ! ! 
 
 Are not teachers themselves, in a measure, blame- 
 worthy for this misapprehension, and this imperti- 
 nent, although ignorant, apologizing and lamenta- 
 tion ? If we be truly what we should be, and our 
 profession in its science and art be what we know it 
 to be ; then why not always, when proper, speak 
 and write about this profession, and act in regard to 
 it, as if, in our estimation, it was the noblest or next 
 to the noblest office on earth ? It may be severe, 
 and yet it is just to say, that a man really ashamed 
 of the teacher's office, is unworthy that office : per- 
 haps real shame here is inconsistent with profound 
 learning — it certainly is, with acute discernment 
 and benevolence. Some, indeed, not really ashamed, 
 may yet out of delicacy seem ashamed, on certain 
 occasions, who, when a necessity arose, would yet 
 dare to magnify the office ; but that false shame 
 argues a conviction in our minds, that the public do 
 not appreciate our office aright. This, however, is 
 the very reason why we should ever magnify the 
 office. Society needs correction and instruction on 
 this very point. Like a chamelion, society takes its 
 color and tone from a few leading men : teachers 
 could easily change its complexion and sentiment, 
 respecting education and its artists. 
 
 Our profession is, in many parts of the world, 
 owins^ to the wide-spread and profound ignorance 
 
PERSONS MOS r SUITABLE FOR TEACHERS. 287 
 
 of the people, liable to a peculiar quackery, which 
 may be called pedagogueism. And as many chil- 
 dren are to be educated, many pedagogues will be 
 found. Like other fooleries they equal the demand. 
 But they stamp on education and its science a brand, 
 which gives a false idea of their true nature. This 
 takes place in medicine, law, divinity ; and if the 
 caricaturists of these sciences continued as long 
 after the greater civilization and enlightenment of 
 the community, as do the caricaturists of our pro- 
 fession, their science would be as much under- 
 valued. A community is not so soon nor so easily 
 disabused, respecting education ; and, therefore, our 
 profession is often in comparative contempt, long 
 after the other professions have attained their due 
 elevation in the public estimation. 
 
 The cure of this unavoidable evil is, in a mea- 
 sure, to be found in our being just to ourselves ; but 
 parents and trustees can do much if they will uni- 
 formly prefer, when the two come into competition, 
 the professor to the amateur. If an amateur is 
 needy, better make him up a purse. If he wishes 
 to amuse himself, he may find recreation in less sol- 
 emn things — schools are for holier and better pur- 
 poses. 
 
 Legislative aid, on whatever principle bestowed, 
 should never be given where incompetent teachers 
 are employed. Dullness and ignorance here should 
 be punished, not rewarded. As to pedagogues, 
 they should be set in the stocks. Perhaps, whilst 
 the laws of libel admit no facts in justification of 
 censure, and severely punish, not the rogue but the 
 
288 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 rogue's enemy, quackery, pedagogueism, and trick- 
 ery of every kind, will rule and run triumphant. 
 Morbid sympathy and licentious hberty are on the 
 side of crime and cheatery. Law forbids a man to 
 get for his money any but an interest fixed by the 
 State, under plea of protecting the people from usu- 
 rers ; but law gives up the people thus defended from 
 a probable evil to be gulled, tricked, cheated, hum- 
 bugged without stint and without mercy, making it 
 penal for the good and honest and intelligent to ex_ 
 pose the liars and rogues who are amassing fortunes 
 beyond the dreams of even Jewish money-lenders. 
 
 Finally, gentlemen associates, be untiring in dili- 
 gence, enthusiastic in soul ; look onward and up- 
 ward. We have a'noble cause ; we are a mighty 
 body : let us, in the fear of God, and for the love of 
 Jesus Christ, and the love of men, train our disciples 
 in the way they should go, and send them forth our 
 living epistles, open, and to be read of all men : let 
 us in this manner specially, but also in all other 
 suitable ways, and on every suitable occasion, mag- 
 nify our office. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 TO THE YOUNG. 
 
 Human life may be divided into three stages : 
 youth, middle life, old age. Measuring by the time 
 that we are under the authority of parents and of 
 opinion, youth may extend from the period after in- 
 fancy to the vigor of manhood ; terminating about 
 the thirtieth year. Here begins middle life. This 
 period, determined by defects of mind and body 
 ordinarily then visible, and by timidity relative to 
 new enterprises, and the despondency then manifest, 
 ends, perhaps, with our fifty-fifth year — lasting, con- 
 sequently, about five-and-twenty years. The third 
 period, old age, now begins. This, under suitable 
 regimen, would usually cease with the extinction of 
 life at threescore and ten ; but it is commonly, by 
 criminal abuse and negligence, ended five or ten 
 years earlier than the assigned and natural limit. 
 
 Viewing man as born for others as well as for 
 himself, as constituting part of a divinely consti- 
 tuted and organized social state, or of a state neces- 
 sarily and inevitably resulting from physical and 
 mental organization, youth may be regarded as an 
 
290 
 
 CHAPTEIl VIII. 
 
 age of preparation, and middle life an age of activ- 
 ity. For it is then onjj, in the middle state, when 
 the powers of our nature have all been properly 
 disciplined, the passions controlled, the appetites 
 curbed, forbearance practised, and prudence exer- 
 cised, that we are ready to serve our generation in 
 the orderly and full discharge of every duty. 
 
 A few excepted, prematurely worthless, all young 
 persons anticipate a time when they shall mingle in 
 the busy scenes of the world ; not as mere men and 
 women, or spectators at a show, but to act their 
 several parts as husbands, wives, parents, rulers, 
 teachers ; a time, when they shall share in its enter- 
 prises and honors, no longer humble imitators, but 
 themselves the models ; not the servants but the 
 masters of opinion ; directing, not impelled by the 
 spirit of the age. 
 
 It becomes, hence, to the young, an obvious and 
 highly important inquiry : *' What preparation can 
 best fit us for one main end of existence, the benefit 
 of our generation ? and how shall we become ade- 
 quate to the discharge of all our duties with dignity 
 and success ?" A brief answer will be given in 
 this chapter. 
 
 In the production of grand effects, not the opera- 
 tion of a single cause, but the combined and harmo- 
 nious operation of several, may be traced. Thus 
 in moral or political life, good depends not on mere 
 talent, or genius, or enterprise, or industry ; it de- 
 pends on the union of all these. Indeed, good very 
 frequently depends not even on the union of any acr 
 tive causes ; it depends rather on cautiop, patiepce^ 
 
TO THE YOUNG. 291 
 
 disinterestedness. Sometimes it depends on cessa- 
 tion from all attempts and labors. Men very often 
 must be enlightened, soothed, entreated, led ; and 
 that for their advantage. Here, then, v^^e need all 
 our passive and scarcely any of our active virtues. 
 
 The main preparation, therefore, for youth is a dis- 
 cipline of restraint and self-denial. 
 
 Knowledge may not be undervalued. Without 
 adequate knowledge, no complete discharge of duty 
 can ever occur ; yet while the acquisition of knowl- 
 edge is one end of study in schools, the young need 
 more to be taught self-government, self-knowledge, 
 self-respect, and consequent habits and qualities. 
 Differences in success are by no means so much at- 
 tributable to differences in learning, as to differences 
 in caution, prudence, forethought, self-control, and 
 similar habits ; and, indeed, it is in such habits and 
 qualities, that boys differ from men, and not, as is 
 commonly imagined, in talents, genius, and even ac- 
 quirements. As to mere literary efforts, the man 
 often does not surpass the young person. 
 
 The prophet Jeremiah has embodied an important 
 sentiment in these words : " It is good for a man that 
 he bear the yoke in his youth." Doubtless refer- 
 ence is here made principally to afflictions ; but, 
 since afflictions are advantageous mainly in produ- 
 cing self-denial, self-government, and self-knowledge, 
 the prophet's words may be extended, and without 
 violence, to comprehend any other discipline pro- 
 ductive of like results. As the neck, therefore, of a 
 |tubborn or rebeUious ox is bowed down under a 
 yoke, and his vjist strength thus rendered subservi- 
 
292 CHAPTER VIII, 
 
 ent to the master's purposes, so must young persons 
 be subjected to wholesome and severe discipHne, 
 that they may best subserve the designs of a benev- 
 olent Creator in forming men social beings. 
 
 Young persons must be subjected, first, to the 
 yoke of a severe and laborious moral and intellect- 
 ual training. 
 
 We repeat, that simply or mainly to impart 
 knowledge, is not the sole end of judicious instruc- 
 tion. Were it possible, which it is not, properly to 
 train ihe mental, the moral, and the physical nature, 
 and impart no knowledge, one thus disciplined is 
 better qualified for the duties of middle life, than 
 another of boundless knowledge and yet of an un- 
 disciplined mind and heart. A man that can use a 
 few dollars properly, is superior to an idiot with the 
 estate of a prince. The art of acquiring, arranging, 
 and applying knowledge — the art of thinking, rea- 
 soning, concluding — the art of prompt acting on oc- 
 casions and in emergencies — these most difficult and 
 delicate arts, are the true ends of intellectual and 
 moral training. Hence the instruments of the dis- 
 cipline are often with safety laid aside, after an- 
 swering their uses ; although, where the duties of 
 middle life allow, educated men, as well as all pro- 
 fessional scholars, will be fully compensated, by con- 
 tinuing and extending their acquaintance with the 
 classics and mathematics. And for these many 
 books are highly valuable, which are of little impor- 
 tance, or even detrimental as school-books. 
 
 The young persons addressed in this chapter ar^ 
 in a measure free from parental authority, and their 
 
TO THE YOUNG. ggg 
 
 education is, in some degree, in their own hands. 
 Some, perhaps, have even to commence their own 
 education. But happily, that kind of education 
 which is most valuable, depends on ourselves ; and, 
 in some respects, all men must be self-educated. 
 
 It is, truly, a pitiable thing to hear so many young 
 people lamenting the want of schools and teachers, 
 and favorable opportunities, when we can all do so 
 much for our own improvement ; and not a few can 
 do immeasurably more for themselves than the vast 
 majority of common schools can do for them. Pay- 
 ing for many schools is like paying for a ride in a 
 canal boat, and then leading the horses on the tow- 
 path : the scholar might have staid -at home, except 
 for the name of going to school. 
 
 If young persons would seriously set about the 
 work of self-instruction, (where good schools are 
 not found, or where not possible to attend a school,) 
 even with poor materials, helps, and instruments, 
 they would be surprised, at length, by their progress 
 in all that is valuable, and at the success with which 
 they had overcome seemingly invincible obstacles. 
 Let such always remember, that it is not the mere 
 acquisition of knowledge they should have in view, 
 but the exercise of their minds. Hence, if after se- 
 vere study, we fail to comprehend fully, we have 
 still gained the grand end of effort — practice in 
 thinking. This exertion itself, made and repeated 
 again and again, is of countless price : this state or 
 habit of soul, thus dearly bought, will, under more 
 favorable circumstances, which always in time hap- 
 
294 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 ' pen, enable us, at once, to master the most difficult 
 subjects. 
 
 Let the young, therefore, begin with fit subjects 
 of disciplme, subjects within their reach, and in the 
 best way they can ; let them persevere, and as abil- 
 ity and knowledge increase, let them extend and 
 systematize their labors, correct their errors, avail 
 themselves of all accessible aids, and we shall see 
 them all happier, and not a few raised to the high- 
 est walks of life ; and this in spite of their want of 
 common schools, or even academies. Perhaps some 
 may wish us to recommend studies. Among disci- 
 plinary studies, we recommend arithmetic, mainly 
 the mental ; algebra, the mathematics generally ; 
 natural and mechanical philosophies ; latin, greek, 
 french, german, and other modern languages gram- 
 matically studied ; the English classics, such as Ad- 
 dison, Shakspeare, not as a mere writer of plays, Mil- 
 ton ; political economy ; mental and moral philoso- 
 phy ; composition ; above all, the Bible. Add, evi- 
 dences of Christianity. 
 
 One reason fur condemning works of mere fiction 
 is now evident. To such works, as far as ordinary 
 readers are concerned, are many objections : their 
 tendency, designedly or undesignedly, is usually im- 
 moral ; they vitiate the taste ; they mis-inform ; they 
 give false and exaggerated views of individuals, 
 presenting mere fancy pictures or sketches of aggre- 
 gated virtues and vices ; they defile the imagination 
 and inflame the passions ; they weaken the sense of 
 duty ; they beget a disgust of life as it is, of daily 
 and common life. But the grand objection at pres- 
 
TO THE YOUNG. 295 
 
 ent urged is, that such works are not sufficiently 
 difficult for studies ; they are designed almost solely 
 for amusement. Where young persons, therefore, 
 are seeking to improve themselves, and especially 
 where there has been little previous cultivation, and 
 all the time and money *are, needed for better pur- 
 poses, to these we give, as a deliberate advice, that 
 they instantly collect and burn every novel and ro- 
 mance in their possession ; nay, further, let this class 
 of young people at the end of their year, discontinue 
 those newspapers whose sole or leading recommend- 
 ation is — " original and selected stories and tales." 
 Freely do we admit that some of these are, in all 
 respects, unexceptionable ; that we have ourselves 
 read some that are worthy all praise for elegant 
 diction, ingenious plot, moral tendency : but as 
 freely do we affirm that by far the great majority is 
 poor in all respects, and of no good tendency ; and 
 that many are in every point of view contemptible, 
 and meriting a place in no publication making pre- 
 tensions to a literary or moral character. 
 
 But we cannot study always. Recreation is ne- 
 cessary to the digestion of mental and corporeal 
 food. Some things, too, can be learned from obser- 
 vation only, and testimony. It is important to con- 
 template models in the discharge of duties, public 
 and domestic. We must long float with the tide of 
 opinion, before we may venture successfully to stem 
 it. In short, for innumerable reasons, society is ne- 
 cessary to us ; and no pleasures -are more exciting 
 than those of companionship. And yet, it is here 
 that the young are in imminent danger of losing the 
 
296 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 whole advantage of private discipline, and of con- 
 tracting habits fatal to expected success. To them 
 is no safety, except in good society. Without that, 
 they would be better without any. 
 
 Good society is, indeed, apparently severe in its 
 external appearance. Hence the young rarely seek 
 such, regarding it a hindrance to hilarity and pleas- 
 ure ; but if we seriously desire improvement, we 
 must be found in good company. With such let us 
 ride, walk or play ; let us see paintings, or hear mu- 
 sic ; let us attend elections, or engage in iijnocent 
 amusements, or do any lawful thing : and then oc- 
 casions innumerable will arise, of asking advice and 
 hearing opinions on religion, politics, literature, the 
 fine arts and sciences, and of obtaining hints and di- 
 rections on important pursuits and studies. We 
 shall find a thousand knotty difficulties solved, and 
 perplexing intricacies unravelled ; see many living 
 exemplars of written rules; and, finally, among other 
 benefits, become strengthened in correct conclusions, 
 and rectified in erroneous ones. 
 
 Is it asked, what is good company ? Without 
 negative description, we reply : by good society is 
 here meant, the best educated and disciplined ; the 
 most moral, prudent, sober and religious. Good so- 
 ciety is yet better composed of both men and women. 
 Nor is the contemptible frivolity of many mixed 
 companies valid objection to this remark ; because, 
 if women were generally educated as this work ad- 
 vocates, we are fully persuaded no society could be 
 so pleasant, so honorable, so elevating, as that in 
 which educated women formed a part. Well edu- 
 
TO THE YOUNG. 
 
 297 
 
 cated women could not form a part, where men vi* 
 cious, rude and foolish obtamed, or even expected 
 admission. Elevate women, and we elevate our- 
 selves. Policy, as well as duty and generosity, de- 
 mand the complete education of women. Hence, 
 women should be educated as men are, as far as is 
 practicable. 
 
 Let it not be said, good society is hard to be found. 
 It exists on a larger or smaller scale in every com- 
 munity. Nor is it impossible to gain admittance; 
 for while this society has its necessary barriers and 
 restraints, like any other society, it has none other 
 than utility, virtue, patriotism, and religion itself, 
 impose ; and it would voluntarily open its bosom for 
 the reception of the young, being grieved by their 
 refusal, and not by their attempt, to enter. 
 
 There is one yoke the young must wear, if they 
 would be useful in middle life — the yoke of temper- 
 ance. 
 
 Intemperance from intoxicating drinks, alas ! so 
 common, is doubtless, from that circumstance, the 
 first, and with many of our readers, perhaps, the 
 only species of intemperance supposed to be meant. 
 Prevalent as this horrible vice is, what wonder so 
 many, so very many, should against this rock dash 
 all hopes of peace, usefulness, and honor ( The 
 grand and sometimes the sole lesson to the young is 
 — "to drink." To this they are welcomed with 
 smiles, and wheedled by flattery ! are assured that 
 to drink fearless, is one evidence of an independent 
 soul and generous disposition. The houses they 
 visit, the hotels that refresh them, the stores where 
 
ogg CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 they deal, the places of their recreation ; the men 
 that frame, and the men that execute law ; the phi- 
 losopher, the patriot ; alas ! in some cases the di- 
 vine ; even woman with mis-applied entreaties ;^- 
 yes, the very fathers on whose knees they have 
 sported in infancy, and the very mothers from whose 
 bosoms they have drawn life — these, all thqse, in a 
 thousand ways, mix, and dilute, and sweeten, and 
 render fragrant with spices and sparkling with 
 beauty the bowl — the accursed, damned bowl ! to 
 overcome distaste, to subdue shame, to abate fear, 
 to lull conscience, to make the young abandoned, in- 
 fatuated. Heaven-daring sinners. No wonder that 
 young men who have been redeemed from the hor- 
 rible abyss shudder as they look back ! No wonder 
 bereaved parents, mourning over the lost, look up 
 to Heaven and ask vengeance on the destroyers ! 
 
 We stay not to prove — all know — examples are 
 everywhere around — all know, how drunkenness 
 debilitates the body, poisons the breath, enervates 
 the soul, brutalizes the appetites, — yea, transforms 
 man into a brute and a beast ! Alas ! too well we 
 know, that drunkards, should they reach the middle 
 life, become objects of pity to the good, of scorn to 
 the proud, andof grief to friends — mere examples of 
 warning and beacons of danger to the sober ; and 
 how, at last, the groaning community feels in a 
 measure relieved, when the bloated and unseemly 
 carcasses are covered in the grave ! 
 
 Temperance — nay, rigorous abstinence from what 
 intoxicates, must be, therefore, practised by the 
 young. Still, this single species of temperance is 
 
TO THE YOUNG. 299 
 
 not the sole form now recommended. Our desires, 
 our appetites, om- passions, must, in the use and en- 
 joyment of things lawful and innocent, be studiously 
 moderated ; because, among many other reasons, 
 this self-denial and control are the means of afford- 
 ing health, time, money, and spirits for our studies, 
 and is itself a paramount design of self-discipline. 
 Would we insure success ? be temperate in all 
 things^n eating, in apparel, in recreation, in study- 
 ing, in the enjoyment of good society itself Thus 
 shall we be well fitted for the duties of middle life, 
 and obtain, during our' disciplinary state, the highest 
 degree of self-satisfaction and peace. 
 
 Not a little from experience and more from ob- 
 servation, and also from the nature of the divine 
 economy in the government of the world, the au» 
 thor is satisfied, that the preceding general direc- 
 tions, although few, must and will, if faithfully fol- 
 lowed, place a man, in after life, upon high and coni= 
 manding ground among the virtuous and the honora- 
 ble. But, if we would be more certain of success, 
 and especially if we aspire to rewards nobler than 
 the emoluments and honors of place, and approba- 
 tion of men ; if we would be had in everlasting re- 
 membrance — and distinguished remembrance — af- 
 ter mere worldly great men shall have been forgot- 
 ten ; then must we, in youth, wear the easy yoke of 
 our Lord Jesus Christ's moral and intellectual dis- 
 cipline. Without that yoke men may, by other dis- 
 cipline, become extensively useful, and obtain mer- 
 ited honors and respect. God permits us to gain the 
 rewards we voluntarily propose. But, if we would, 
 
300 
 
 CHAPTER VIU. 
 
 in addition to the perishing, gain the immortal re- 
 wards, nay, if we would be certain of the perishing 
 ones, let us become submissive and joyous disciples 
 in the school of Christ. 
 
 There is a means of discipline not found in 
 schools, nor in books, nor voluntarily chosen by any 
 one — a discipline unpleasant to all, but specially so 
 to the young — a discipline, however, without which 
 no character becomes perfect, and which, bitter in 
 the root, is sweet in the fruits — we mean affliction. 
 
 Whatever be the mental powers and acquisitions, 
 the personal dignity and comeliness, the adventitious 
 circumstances, a man needs severe lessons to trans- 
 form his nature : he must know himself. Self- 
 conceit must be eradicated, haughtiness humbled, 
 impatience subdued, presumption chastised, watch- 
 fulness aroused, indolence punished, selfishness dis- 
 carded. To accomplish all these tasks — each an 
 herculean labor — affliction is the only competent dis- 
 cipline. That is God's blessed mode of instructing 
 his own children. 
 
 Yet affliction will effect no good, unless we are 
 patient and observant of the ends and uses. Prop- 
 erly regarded, they are a blessing ; improperly, a 
 curse. Let the young, therefore, in all disappoint- 
 ments, or deluded hopes, or sickness, or poverty, or 
 reproach, or bereavement, or sorrows of any sort, 
 be well assured that a merciful and wise Creator is 
 thus showing, not merely his anger at sin, but his 
 wish to discipline men for the noble purposes of the 
 social state and the rewards of the future. 
 
TO THE YOUNG. 
 
 301 
 
 Nothing but a severe and long-continued disci- 
 pline of every kind can prepare the young for the 
 middle life. For w^ant of this, men encounter only 
 disappointment and chagrin. Without it, in pre- 
 sumptuous haste they engage in schemes imprac- 
 ticable, or beyond their capacities, or demanding 
 more skill and prudence than they possess ; hence, 
 after a few unavoidable defeats, they yield to oth- 
 ers, inferior often in native talents, but superior in 
 tact, forethought, and patience. 
 
 Happy if the defeated could retire to their now- 
 narrow sphere with a good grace. On the other 
 hand, retiring with feelings of mortified pride and 
 vanity, they sink down to the lowest level, and 
 there vent malignant spleen against persons deemed 
 fortunate ; and strive to drag these hated ones down 
 with blackened characters. This is a constant sight. 
 Without any gift of prophesy we may foretell, that 
 unless the renovating Spirit of God mercifully pre- 
 vent the necessary consequences from his own 
 abused laws, the idle, the lounging, the trifling 
 young persons must descend down the scale of hon- 
 orable reputation to the class of snarling and cap- 
 tious maligners ; or at best, to the class of instru- 
 mental slaves, to be used and ordered according to 
 the wisdom and will of the well-disciplined. 
 
 How noble a well-disciplined youth ! Contrast 
 with him a youth of the opposite kind : the first is sober 
 and cheerful, the second frivolous ; the one culti- 
 vates the soul, the other pampers the body ; the 
 former lives for his fellows, the latter for himself. 
 The disciplined person is lord of his appetites and 
 14 . 
 
3Q2 CHAPTER viir. 
 
 passions ; the undisciplined is the slave of their 
 clamorous demands. In a word, the one does every- 
 thing that lifts him up tov^ards the angels; the 
 other, everything that thrusts him dov^^n towards the 
 devils. 
 
 Disciplined youth prolongs the period of middle 
 life far into the period of old age. 
 
 Proper care of the body and the avoidance of all 
 excesses make the human frame more lasting ; but 
 the mental discipline advocated now retards the 
 imbecility of old age ; and it will, perhaps, always 
 prevent that kind of weakness called dotage and 
 second infancy. It is a well-attested fact in our 
 history, that the mind fails prematurely because of 
 its disuse ; and the mind must be disused in old age, 
 if one have not in youth acquired habits of thinking 
 and studying. Much learning in cases of physi- 
 cal disease may, possibly, have made some ''mad/' 
 but beyond a doubt, the want of learning has, in 
 old age, when the activity of the^middle life is over, 
 rendered many a person insane. Many literary 
 men, by preserving studious habits to the last, have 
 reached extreme old age with the perceptible loss 
 and decay of no mental power. A few, from chance 
 or indolence having discontinued their studies, have 
 exhibited symptoms of premature weakness and 
 idiocy. 
 
 What a blessed old age, when a person has sub- 
 mitted to the yoke of discipline in youth ! By that 
 the has been able to discharge with honor and satis 
 action to himself so many duties profitable to his 
 fellow-men. Bv that he has noblv won the venera- 
 
TO THE YOUNG. 
 
 303 
 
 tion always paid to a hoary head, after a well-spent 
 life. How calm the eveninoj of such a life ! How 
 unlike the picture of gloom falsely thought to belong 
 necessarily to declining years ! The body may 
 grow old, but the soul may be kept in a youthful 
 vigor and cheerfulness, till earth is exchanged for 
 heaven. 
 
 But if a person has lived aright, and has worn 
 the yoke of Christian discipline, how blessed, not 
 merely the retrospect of the past, but the anticipa- 
 tion of the future ! what ineffable joys in contempla- 
 ting the assured reward — a crown of glory and 
 honor ! and while he has a heart to accomplish yet 
 many good things for his generation, how he longs 
 for the coming of a messenger, ghastly and terrific 
 to the faithless, but to the wise and watchful serv- 
 ant, an angel of mercy, smiling and welcome ! 
 
 Such, youthful readers, are some leading direc- 
 tions in answer to our proposed inquiry ; such are 
 a few of many advantages flowing from the disci- 
 pline advocated in this whole book. What shall be 
 the effect of the whole upon yourselves? We fain 
 would, but we dare not hope all will be benefitted. 
 Mournful experience of the almost invincible levity 
 and presumptuous arrogance of too many young 
 people, forbids that hope — nay, bids us expect some- 
 times derision and scorn ! — -and that where we hon- 
 estly mean to do them good. 
 
 Is it, however, too much to hope that some of our 
 readers will become fixed and immoveable in good 
 resolutions ? Surely some do soberly look at their 
 weighty responsibilities ; surely some are burning 
 
3Q4 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 with a sacred ardor to discharge with honor and 
 success the grand and solemn duties of hfe ; surely 
 some are captivated by the picture of moral gran- 
 deur pertaining to the disinterested performance of 
 duties, and to the dignified demeanor of Christian 
 meekness under the ingratitude of the wicked and 
 thankless ; surely some abhor being drones in the 
 political hive, or mere tools for the use of others, or 
 instead of standing out in bold relief amidst the ar- 
 chitecture of society, becoming hateful excrescences 
 on the body politic, to be cut off by public senti- 
 ment, or by loss of liberty, or perhaps by the sword 
 of justice ! It must be, some are looking onward to 
 the realities of old age, and desiring then the retro- 
 spect of a well-spent life, and the joyous expectation 
 of a life to come ! 
 
 By all these lofty and holy purposes ; by the de- 
 mands of the coming generation, destined to be 
 either better or worse from your conduct ; by the 
 preciousness of our liberties, bought with blood — 
 liberties to be transmitted to posterity by your vir- 
 tues and knowledge, or lost by your vices and igno- 
 rance ; by the majesty of a nature fitted for duty 
 and the endurance of suffering and trial ; by the 
 baseness and cowardice of sloth ; by all the peace 
 and joy that gladden the otherwise cheerless days 
 of old age ; by your desires of finding comfort in 
 death ; by your regard of the Supreme Judge, who 
 shall say at the final day to his faithful sons, " Well 
 done, enter ye into the joy of your Lord," and to 
 faithless servants, " Depart, ye accursed ;" by all 
 these momentous considerations, the author exhorts 
 
TO THE YOUNG. 
 
 305 
 
 and implores the young who read this work, to put 
 on and submissively wear that yoke of discipline 
 and obedience which inspiration teaches, and all ex- 
 perience confirms, it is good for a man to bear in his 
 youth. 
 
 FINIS. 
 
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