EDUCATION : 
 
 INTELLECTUAL, MOKAL, AND PHYSICAL 
 
 BY 
 
 HERBERT SPENCER, 
 
 AUTHOR OF "a system OF SYNTHETIC PHILOSOPHT.' 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, 
 
 72 FIFTH AVENUE. 
 
 1896.
 
 Copyright, 1860, 
 Br D. APPLETON AND COMPANY.
 
 LS 
 GTS' 
 
 ^ 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 The four chapters of which this work con- 
 sists, originally appeared as four Review articles : 
 the first in the Westminster Review, the second 
 in the North British Beview, and the remaining 
 two in the British Quarterly/ Beview. Severally 
 treating different divisions of the subject, but 
 together forming a tolerably complete whole, I 
 originally wrote them with a view to their repub- 
 lication in a united form ; and they would some 
 time since have thus appeared in England, had 
 not the proprietor of the North British Beview 
 refused to let me include the one contributed to 
 that periodical. This interdict is, however, of no 
 effect in the United States ; and some transatlan-
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 tic friends having represented to me that an 
 
 American re-issue was desirable, I have revised 
 
 the articles, and placed them in the hands of 
 
 Messrs. D. Appleton & Co. 
 
 H. S. 
 
 LoxDON, July, 1860.
 
 CO^TE^TS. 
 
 I. WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH? . 21 
 
 ir. INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION, . . .97 
 
 III. MORAL EDUCATION, . . . .161 
 
 IV. PHYSICAL EDUCATION, . . , .219
 
 Education at Eton, 1842-5. 
 
 " Balston, our tutor, was a good scholar after the 
 fashion of the day, and famous for Latin verse ; but 
 he was essentially a commonplace don. ' Stephen 
 major,' he once said to my brother, ' if you do not 
 take more pains, how can you ever expect to write 
 good longs and shorts ? If you do not write good 
 longs and shorts, how can you ever be a man of 
 taste ? If you are not a man of taste, how can you 
 ever hope to be of use in the world ? ' " 
 
 {The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., by his 
 brother, Leslie Stephen, pp. 80-1.)
 
 EDUCATION 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WOETH f 
 
 It has been truly remarked that, in order of 
 time, decoration precedes dress. Among people 
 who submit to great physical suifering that they 
 may have themselves handsomely tattooed, ex- 
 tremes of temperature are borne with but little 
 attempt at mitigation. Humboldt tells us that an 
 Orinoco Indian, though quite regardless of bodily 
 comfort, will yet labour for a fortnight to purcliase 
 pigment wherewith to make himself admired ; and 
 that the same woman who would not hesitate to 
 leave her hut without a fragment of clothing on, 
 would not dare to commit such a breach of decorum 
 as to go out unpainted. Yoyagers uniformly find 
 that coloured beads and trinkets are much more 
 prized by wild tribes than are calicoes or broad- 
 cloths. And the anecdotes we have of the ways in 
 which, when shirts and coats are given, they turn
 
 22 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH? 
 
 tliem to some ludicrous display, show liow com- 
 pletely the idea of ornament predominates over 
 that of use. Nay, there are still more extreme il- 
 lustrations : witness the fact narrated by Capt. 
 Speke of his African attendants, who strutted about 
 in their goat-skin mantles when the weather was 
 fine, but when it was wet, took them off, folded 
 them up, and went about naked, shiyering in the 
 rahi ! Indeed, the facts of aboriginal life seem to 
 indicate that dress is developed out of decorations. 
 And when we remember that even among our- 
 selves most think more about the fineness of the 
 fabric than its warmth, and more about the cut 
 than the convenience — when we see that the func- 
 tion is still in great measure subordinated to the 
 appearance — we have further reason for inferring 
 such an origin. 
 
 It is not a little curious that the like relations 
 hold with the mind. Among mental as among 
 bodily acquisitions, the ornamental comes before 
 the useful. Not only in times past, but almost as 
 much in our own era, that knowledge which con- 
 duces to personal well-being has been postponed to 
 that which brings applause. In the Greek schools, 
 music, poetry, rhetoric, and a philosophy which, 
 until Socrates taught, had but little bearing upon 
 action, were the dominant subjects ; while knowl- 
 edge aiding the arts of life had a very subordinate 
 place. And in our own universities and schools at 
 the present moment the like antithesis holds. We 
 are guilty of something like a platitude when we
 
 THE OKNAMENTAL PRECEDES THE USEFUL. 23 
 
 saj that tliroiighout his after-career a boy, in nine 
 cases out of ten, applies his Latin and Greek to no 
 practical purposes. The remark is trite that in his 
 shop, or his office, in managing his estate or his fam- 
 ily, in playing his part as director of a bank or a rail- 
 way, he is very little aided by this knowledge he took 
 so many years to acquire — so little, that gener- 
 ally the greater part of it drops out of his mem- 
 ory ; and if he occasionally vents a Latin quotation, 
 or alludes to some Greek myth, it is less to throw 
 light on the topic in hand than for the sake of ef- 
 fect. If we inquire what is the real motive for giv- 
 ing boys a classical education, we find it to be sim- 
 ply conformity to public opinion. Men dress their 
 children's minds as they do their bodies, in the pre- 
 vailing fasliion. As the Orinoco Lidian puts on his 
 paint before leaving his hut, not with a view to any 
 direct benefit, but because he would be ashamed to 
 be seen without it ; so, a boy's drilling in Latin and 
 Greek is insisted on, not because of their intrinsic 
 value, but that he may not be disgraced by being 
 found ignorant of them — that he may have " the 
 education of a gentleman " — the badge marking a 
 certain social position, and bringing a consequent 
 respect. 
 
 This parallel is still more clearly displayed in 
 the case of the other sex. In the treatment of both 
 mind and body, the decorative element has con- 
 tinued to predominate in a greater degree among 
 women than among men. Originally, personal 
 adornment occupied the attention of both sexes
 
 24 -WHAT KNOWLEDGE 18 OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 equally. In these latter days of civilization, how- 
 ever, we see that in the dress of men the regard for 
 appearance has in a considerable degree yielded to 
 the regard for comfort ; while in their education 
 the useful has of late been trenching on the orna- 
 mental. In neither direction has this change gone 
 so far with women. The wearing of ear-rings, fin- 
 ger-rings, bracelets ; the elaborate dressings of the 
 hair ; the still occasional use of paint ; the immense 
 labour bestowed in making habiliments sufficiently 
 attractive ; and the great discomfort that will be 
 submitted to for the sake of conformity ; show how 
 greatly, in the attiring of women, the desire of ap- 
 probation overrides tlie desire for warmth and con- 
 venience. And similarly in their education, the 
 immense preponderance of " accomplishments " 
 proves how here, too, use is subordinated to dis- 
 play. Dancing, deportment, the piano, singing, 
 drawing — what a large space do these occupy ! If 
 you ask why Italian and German are learnt, you 
 will find that, under all the sham reasons given, the 
 real reason is, that a knowledge of those tongues is 
 thought ladylike. It is not that the books written 
 in them may be utilized, which they scarcely ever 
 are ; but that Italian and German songs may be 
 sung, and that the extent of attainment may bring 
 whispered admiration. The births, deaths, and 
 marriages of kings, and other like historic trivial- 
 ities, are committed to memory, not because of any 
 direct benefits that can possibly result from know- 
 ing them ; but because society considers them pai'ts
 
 WHY THE SHOWY PREDOMINATES. 25 
 
 of a good education — ^because tlie absence of sucli 
 knowledge may bring the contempt of others. 
 When we have named reading, writing, speUing, 
 grammar, arithmetic, and sewing, we have named 
 about all the things a girl is taught with a view to 
 their direct uses in life ; and even some of these 
 liave more reference to the good opinion of others 
 than to immediate personal welfare. 
 
 Tlioroughlv to realize the truth that with the 
 mind as with the body the ornamental precedes the 
 useful, it is needful to glance at its rationale. Tliis 
 lies in the fact that, from the far past down even to 
 the present, social needs have subordinated individ- 
 ual needs, and that the chief social need has been 
 the control of individuals. It is not, as we com- 
 monly suppose, that there are no governments but 
 those of monarchs, and parliaments, and constituted 
 authorities. These acknowledged governments are 
 supplemented by other unacknowledged ones, that 
 grow up in all circles, in which every man or wo- 
 man strives to be king or queen or lesser dignitary. 
 To get above some and be reverenced by them, and 
 to propitiate those who are above us, is the univer- 
 sal struggle in which the chief energies of life are 
 expended. By the accumulation of wealth, by 
 style of living, by beauty of dress, by display of 
 knowledge or intellect, each tries to subjugate 
 others ; and so aids in weaving that ramified net- 
 work of restraints by which society is kept in order. 
 It is not the savage chief only, who, in formidable 
 war-paint, with scalps at his belt, aims to strike
 
 2G WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST AVOKTH ? 
 
 awe into his inferiors ; it is not only the belle who, 
 hy elaborate toilet, polished manners, and numer- 
 ous accomplishments, strives to " make conquests ; " 
 but the scholar, the historian, the philosopher, use 
 their acquirements to the same end. We are none 
 of us content -svitli quietly unfolding our own indi- 
 vidualities to the full in all directions ; bnt have a 
 restless craving to impress our individualities upon 
 others, and in some way subordinate them. And 
 this it is which determines the character of our ed- 
 ucation. Xot what knowledge is of most real worth, 
 is the consideration ; but what will bring most ap- 
 plause, honour, respect — what will most conduce to 
 social position and influence — what will be most 
 imposing. As, throughout life, not what we are, 
 but what we shall be thought, is the question ; so 
 in education, the question is, not the intrinsic value 
 of knowledge, so much as its extrinsic effects on 
 others. And this being our dominant idea, direct 
 utility is scarcely more regarded than by the bar- 
 barian when filing his teeth and staining his nails. 
 
 If there needs any further evidence of the rude, 
 undeveloped character of our education, we have it 
 in the fact that the comparative worths of different 
 kinds of knowledge have been as yet scarcely even 
 discussed — much less discussed in a methodic way 
 with definite results. Not only is it that no stand- 
 ard of relative values has yet been agreed upon ; 
 but tlie existence of any such standard has not 
 been conceived in any clear manner. And not
 
 RELATIVE VALUES OF KNOWLEDGE- 27 
 
 only is it that the existence of any such standard 
 has not been clearly conceived ; but the need for it 
 seems to have been scarcely even felt. Men read 
 books on this topic, and attend lectures on that; 
 decide that their children shall be instructed in 
 these branches of kiiowledge, and shall not be in- 
 structed in those ; and all under the guidance of 
 mere custom, or liking, or prejudice ; without ever 
 considering the enormous importance of determin- 
 ing in some rational way what things are really 
 most worth learning. It is true that in all circles 
 we have occasional remarks on the importance of 
 this or the other order of information. But whether 
 the degree of its importance justifies the- expendi- 
 ture of the time needed to acquire it ; and whether 
 there are not tilings of more importance to which 
 the time might be better devoted ; are queries 
 which, if raised at all, are disposed of quite sum- 
 marily, according to personal predilections. It is 
 true also, that from time to time, we hear revived 
 the standing controversy respecting the comparative 
 merits of classics and mathematics. Not only, how- 
 ever, is this controversy carried on in an empirical 
 manner, with no reference to an ascertained crite- 
 rion ; but the question at issue is totally insignifi- 
 cant when compared with the general question of 
 which it is part. To suppose that deciding wheth- 
 er a mathematical or a classical education is the 
 best, is deciding what is the proper cumculum, is 
 much the same thing as to suppose that the whole
 
 28 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 of dietetics lies in determining whether or not bread 
 is more nutritive than potatoes ! 
 
 Tlie question which we contend is of such tran- 
 scendent moment, is, not wlietlier such or such 
 knowledge is of worth, l>nt what is its relative 
 worth ? When thej have named certain advan- 
 tages which a given course of study has secured 
 them, persons are apt to assume that they have jus- 
 tified themselves : quite forgetting that the ade- 
 quateness of the advantages is the point to be 
 judged. There is, perliaps, not a snbject to which 
 men devote attention that has not some value. A 
 year diligently spent in getting up heraldry, would 
 very possibly give a little further insight into an- 
 cient manners and morals, and into the origin of 
 names. Any one who should learn the distances 
 between all the towns in England, might, in the 
 course of his life, find one or two of the thousand 
 facts he had acquired of some slight service when 
 arranging a journey. Gathering together all the 
 small gossip of a county, profitless occupation as it 
 would be, might yet occasionally lielp to establish 
 some useful fact — say, a good example of hereditary 
 transmission. But in these cases, every one M'oxild 
 admit that there was no proportion between the re- 
 quired lal)our and the probable benefit. No one 
 would tolerate the proposal to devote some years 
 of a boy's time to getting such information, at the 
 cost of much more valuable information which he 
 miglit else have got. And if here the test of rela- 
 tive value is appealed to and held conclusive, then
 
 TIME OF ACQUISITION LIMITED. 29 
 
 should it be appealed to and held conclusive 
 throughout. Had we time to master all subjects 
 we need not be particular. To quote the old song : — - 
 
 Could a man be secure 
 
 That his days would endure 
 
 As of old, for a thousand long years, 
 
 "What things might he know ! 
 
 "What deeds might he do ! 
 
 And all without liurry or care. 
 
 " But we that have but span-long lives " must ever 
 bear in mind our limited time for acquisition. A.nd 
 remembering how narrowly this time is limited, not 
 only by the shortness of life, but also still more by 
 the business of life, we ought to be especially solic- 
 itous to employ what time we have to the greatest 
 advantage. Before devoting years to some subject 
 which fashion or fancy suggests, it is surely wise to 
 weigh with great care the worth of the results, as 
 compared with the worth of various alternative re- 
 sults which the same years might bring if otherwise 
 applied. 
 
 In education, then, this is the question of ques- 
 tions, which it is high time we discussed in some 
 methodic way. The first in importance, though tlie 
 last to be considered, is the problem — how to decide 
 among the conflicting claims of various subjects on 
 our attention. Before there can be a rational cfur^ 
 rieulum, we must settle which things it most con- 
 cerns us to know" ; or, to use a word of Bacon's, 
 now unfortunately obsolete — we must determine 
 the relative values of knowledges.
 
 30 AVHAT KNOWLKDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 To this end, a measure of value is tlie first re- 
 quisite. And happily, respecting the true measure 
 of value, as expressed in general terms, there can 
 be no dispute. Every one in contending for the 
 worth of any particular order of information, does 
 60 by sliowing its bearing upon some jjart of life. 
 In rejjly to the question, " Of what use is it ? " the 
 mathematician, linguist, naturalist, or philosopher, 
 exphiins the way in which his learning beneficially 
 infiuences action — saves from evil or secures good — 
 conduces to happiness. When the teacher of writ- 
 ing has pointed out how great an aid writing is to 
 success in business — that is, to the obtainment of 
 sustenance — that is, to satisfactory living ; he is 
 held to have proved his case. And when the col- 
 lector of dead facts (say a numismatist) fails to make 
 clear any appreciable eff'eets which these facts can 
 produce on human welfare, he is obliged to admit 
 that they are comparatively valueless. All then, 
 either directly or by implication, appeal to this as 
 the ultimate test. 
 
 How to live ? — that is the essential question for 
 us. Not how to live in the mere material sense 
 only, but in the widest sense. Tlie general problem 
 wliich comprehends every special problem is — the 
 right ruling of conduct in all directions under all 
 circumstances. In what way to treat the body ; in 
 what way to treat the mind ; in what way to man- 
 age our afifaii-s ; in what way to bring up a family ; 
 in what way to behave as a citizen ; in Mliat way 
 to utilize all those sources of happiness which nature
 
 THE GREAT AIM OF EDUCATION. 31 
 
 bupplies — how to use all our faculties to the great- 
 est advantage of ourselves and others — how to live 
 completely ? And this being the great thing needful 
 for us to learn, is, by consequence, the great thing 
 which education has to teach. To prepare us for 
 complete living is the function which education has 
 to discharge ; and the only rational mode of judg- 
 ing of any educational course is, to judge in what 
 degree it discharges such function. 
 
 This test, never used in its entirety, but rarely 
 even partially used, and used then in a vague, half 
 conscious way, has to be applied consciously, me- 
 thodically, and throughout all cases. It behoves us 
 to set before ourselves, and ever to keep clearly in 
 view, complete living as the end to be achieved ; so 
 that in bringing up our children we may choose 
 subjects and methods of instruction, with deliberate 
 reference to this end. Not only ought we to cease 
 from the mere unthinking adoption of the current 
 fashion in education, which has no better warrant 
 than any other fashion ; but we must also rise above 
 that rude, empirical style of judging displayed by 
 those more intelligent people who do bestow some 
 care in overseeing the cultivation of their children's 
 minds. It must not suffice simply to t?t,inh that 
 such or such information will be useful in after life, 
 or that this kind of knowledge is of more practical 
 value than that ; but we must seek out some process 
 of estimating their respective values, so that as far 
 as possible we may positively Tcnow which are most 
 deserving of attention. 
 2
 
 82 -WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 Doubtless the task is difficult — perhaps never 
 to be more than approximately achieved. But, 
 considering the vastness of the interests at stake, 
 its difficulty is no reason for pusillanimously pass- 
 ing it by ; ])ut rather for devoting every energy to 
 its mastery. And if we only proceed systematic- 
 ally, we may very soon get at results of no small 
 moment. 
 
 Our lirst step must obviously be to classify, in 
 the order of their importance, the leading kinds of 
 activ'^y which constitute human life. Tliey may 
 be naturally arranged into : — 1. Those activities 
 which directly minister to self-preservation ; 2. 
 Those activities which, by securing the necessaries 
 of life, indirectly minister to self-preservation ; 3. 
 Those activities which have for their end the rear- 
 ing and discipline of offspring ; 4. Those activities 
 which are involved in the maintenance of proper 
 social and political relations ; 5. Those miscella- 
 neous activities which make up the leisure part of 
 life, devoted to the gratification of the tastes and 
 feelings. 
 
 That these stand in something like their true 
 order of subordination, it needs no long considera- 
 tion to show. The actions and precautions by 
 which, from moment to moment, we secure personal 
 safety, must clearly take precedence of all others. 
 Could there be a man, ignorant as an infant of all 
 surrounding ol)jects and movements, or how to 
 guide himself among them, he would pretty cer- 
 tainly lose his life the lirst time he went into thp
 
 CLASSIFICATION OF OUR ACTIVITIES. 33 
 
 street : notwithstanding anj amount of learning he 
 might have on other matters. And as entire igno- 
 rance in all other directions would be less promptly- 
 fatal than entire ignorance in this direction, it must 
 be admitted that knowledge immediately conducive 
 to self-preservation is of primary^ importance. 
 
 That next after direct self-preservation comes 
 tlie indirect self-preservation which consists in ac- 
 cpiiring the means of living, none will question. 
 Tliat a man's industrial functions must be con- 
 sidered before his parental ones, is manifest from 
 the fact that, speaking generally, the discharge of 
 the parental functions is made possible only by the 
 previous discharge of the industrial ones. The pow- 
 er of self-maintenance necessarily preceding the 
 power of maintaining offspring, it follows that 
 knowledge needful for self-maintenance has stronger 
 claims than knowledge needful for family welfare 
 ■ — is second in value to none save knowledge need- 
 ful for immediate self-preservation. 
 
 As the family comes before the State in order of 
 time — as the bringing up of children is possible be- 
 fore the State exists, or when it has ceased to be, 
 whereas the State is rendered jDOSsible only by the 
 bringing up of children ; it follows that the duties 
 of the parent demand closer attention than those of 
 the citizen. Or, to use a further argument — since 
 the goodness of a society ultimately depends on the 
 nature of its citizens ; and since the nature of its cit- 
 izens is more modifiable by early training than by 
 anything else ; we must conclude that the welfare
 
 84 WHAT KNOAVLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 of the family underlies the welfare of society. And 
 hence knowledge directly conducing to the first, 
 must take precedence of knowledge directly con- 
 ducing to the last. 
 
 Those yarious fonns of pleasurable occupation 
 ■which fill up the leisure left by graver occupations 
 — the enjoyments of music, poetry, painting, <fcc. — 
 manifestly imply a pre-existing society. Kot only 
 is a considerable deyelopment of them impossible 
 without a long-established social union ; but their 
 yery subject-matter consists in great part of social 
 sentiments and sympathies. ISTot only does society 
 supply the conditions to their growth ; but also the 
 ideas and sentiments they express. And, conse- 
 quently, that part of human conduct which consti- 
 tutes good citizenship is of more moment than that 
 which goes out in accomplishments or exercise of 
 the tastes ; and, in education, preparation for the 
 one must rank before preparation for the other. 
 
 Such then, we repeat, is something like the ra- 
 tional order of subordination : — Tliat education 
 which prepares for direct self-preseryation ; that 
 which prepares for indirect self-preservation ; that 
 which prepares for parenthood ; that which prepares 
 for citizenship ; that which prepares for the miscel- 
 laneous refinements of life. We do not mean to 
 say that these divisions are definitely separable. 
 We do not deny that they are intricately entangled 
 with each other in such \yay that there can be no 
 trainiiig for any that is not in some measure a train- 
 ing for all. Kor do we question that of each di'
 
 OKDEK OF SUBOKDINATION OF SUBJECTS. 35 
 
 vision there are portions more important than cer- 
 tain portions of the preceding divisions : that, for in- 
 stance, a man of much skill in business but little 
 other faculty, may fall further below the standard 
 of complete living than one of but moderate power 
 of acquiring money but great judgment as a pa- 
 rent ; or that exhaustive information bearing on 
 right social action, joined with entire want of gen- 
 eral culture in literature and the fine arts, is less 
 desirable than a more moderate share of the one 
 joined with some of the other. But, after making 
 all qualifications, there still remain these broadly- 
 marked divisions ; and it still continues substan- 
 tially true that these divisions subordinate one an- 
 other in the foregoing order, because the corre- 
 sponding divisions of life make one another 'possible 
 in that order. 
 
 Of course the ideal of education is — complete 
 preparation in all these divisions. But failing this 
 ideal, as in our phase of civilization every one must 
 do more or less, the aim should be to maintain a 
 due 'proportion between the degrees of preparation 
 in each. Not exhaustive cultivation in any one, su- 
 premely important though it may be — not even an 
 exclusive attention to the two, three, or four divis- 
 ions of greatest importance ; but an attention to 
 all, — greatest where the value is greatest, less where 
 the value is less, least where the value is least. For 
 the average man (not to forget the cases in which 
 peculiar aptitude for some one department of knowl- 
 edge rii'htlv makes that one the bread-winningc oc-
 
 3G -WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WOUTII ? 
 
 cupation) — for the average man, we say, the desid- 
 eratum is, a training tliat approaches nearest to 
 perfection in tlie things wliich most subserve com« 
 plete living, and falls more and more below perfec- 
 tion in the things that have more and more remote 
 bearings on coniplete living. 
 
 In regulating education by this standard, there 
 are some general considerations that should be ever 
 present to us. The worth of any kind of culture, 
 as aiding complete living, may be either necessary 
 or more or less contingent. There is knowledge of 
 intrinsic value ; knowledge of quasi-intrinsic value ; 
 and knowledge of conventional value. Such facts 
 as that sensations of numbness and tingling com- 
 monly precede paralysis, thattlie resistance of water 
 to a body moving througli it varies as the square 
 of the velocity, that chlorine is a disinfectant, — these, 
 and tlie truths of Science in general, are of intrinsic 
 value : they will bear on human conduct ten thou- 
 sand years hence as they do now. The extra knowl- 
 edge of our own language, which is given l)y an ac- 
 quaintance with Latin and Greek, may be consid- 
 ered to liave a value that is quasi-intiinsic : it must 
 exist for us and for otlier races whose laniiuao-es owe 
 mucli to theee sources ; but will last only as long as 
 our languages last. While that kind of information 
 which, in our schools, usurps the name History 
 — the mere tissue of names and dates and dead un- 
 meaning events — has a conventional value only : it 
 has not the remotest bearing upon any of our ac- 
 tions ; and is of use only for the avoidance of those
 
 INTEINSIC AND CONVENTIONAL VALUES. 37 
 
 onpleasant criticisms which current opinion passes 
 upon its absence. • Of course, as those facts whicli 
 concern all mankind throughout all time must he 
 held of greater moment than those which concern 
 only a portion of them during a limited era, and of 
 far greater moment than those which concern only a 
 portion of them during the continuance of a fashion ', 
 it follows that in a rational estimate, knowledge of 
 intrinsic worth must, other things equal, take pre- 
 cedence of knowledge that is of quasi-intrinsic or 
 conventional worth. 
 
 One further preliminary. Acquirement of every 
 kind has two values — value as knowledge and value 
 as discipline. Besides its use for guidance in con- 
 duct, the acquisition of each order of facts has also 
 its use as mental exercise ; and its effects as a pre- 
 parative for complete living have to be considered 
 under both these heads. 
 
 These, then, are the general ideas with which we 
 must set out in discussing a curriculum : — Life as 
 divided into several kinds of activity of successively 
 decreasing importance ; the worth of each order of 
 facts as reofulatino; these several kinds of activitv, 
 intrinsically, quasi-intrinsically, and conventionally ; 
 and their regulative influences estimated both as 
 knowledge and discipline. 
 
 Happily, that all-important part of education 
 which goes to secure direct self-preservation, is in 
 great part already provided for. Too momentous to 
 be left to our blundering, IS^ature takes it into her
 
 S8 -WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH? 
 
 own liands. Wliile yet in its nurse's arms, tlie infant, 
 by hiding its face and crying at the sight of a stran- 
 ger, shows the dawning instinct to attain safety by 
 flying from that which is iinlmown and may be 
 dangerous ; and when it can walk, the terror it 
 manifests if an unfamiliar dog comes near, or the 
 screams with which it runs to its mother after any 
 startling sight or sound, shows this instinct further 
 developed. Moreover, knowledge subserving direct 
 self-preservation is that which it is chiefly busied 
 in acquiring from hour to hour. How to balance 
 its body ; how to control its movements so as to 
 avoid collisions ; what objects are hard, and will 
 hurt if struck ; what objects are heavy, and injure 
 if they fall on the limbs ; which things will bear 
 the weight of the body, and which not ; the pains 
 inflicted by fire, by missiles, by sharp instruments 
 — these, and various other pieces of information 
 needful for the avoidance of death or accident, it is 
 ever learning. And wdien, a few years later, the 
 energies go out in running, climbing, and jumping, 
 in games of strength and games of skill, we see in 
 all these actions by which the muscles are devel- 
 oped, the perceptions sharpened, and the judgment 
 quickened, a preparation for the safe conduct of the 
 body among surrounding objects and movements ; 
 and for meeting those greater dangers that occa° 
 sionally occur in the lives of all. Being thus, as 
 we say, so well cared for by Nature, this funda- 
 mental education needs 'comparative^ly little care 
 from us. What we are chiefly called upon to see.
 
 EDUCATION FOR SELF-PRESERVATION. 39 
 
 is, that there shall be free scope for gaining this ex- 
 perience, and receiving this discipline, — that there 
 shall be no such thwarting of Nature as that by 
 which stupid schoolmistresses commonly prevent 
 the girls in their charge from the spontaneous phys- 
 ical activities they would indulge in ; and so ren- 
 der them comparatively incapable of taking care of 
 themselves in circumstances of peril. 
 
 This, however, is by no means all that is com- 
 prehended in the education that prepares for direct 
 self-preservation. Besides guarding the body 
 against mechanical damage or destruction, it has 
 to be guarded against injury from other causes — 
 against the disease and death that follow breaches 
 of physiologic law. For complete living it is ne- 
 cessary, not only that sudden annihilations of life 
 shall be warded off ; but also that there shall be es- 
 caped the incapacities and the slow annihilation 
 which unwise habits entail. As, without health 
 and energy, the industrial, the parental, the social, 
 and all other activities become more or less impos- 
 sible ; it is clear that this secondary kind of direct 
 self-preservation is only less important than the pri- 
 mary kind ; and that knowledge tending to secure 
 it should rank very high. 
 
 It is true that here, too, guidance is in some 
 measure ready supplied. By our various physical 
 sensations and desires, Nature has insured a tolera- 
 ble conformity to the chief requirements. Fortu- 
 nately for us, want of food, great heat, extreme cold, 
 produce promptings too peremptory to be disre-
 
 40 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 garded. And would men liahituallyohey these and 
 all like promptings when less strong, comparatively 
 few evils would arise. If fatigue of body or brain 
 were in every case followed by desistance ; if the 
 oppression produced by a close atmosphere always 
 led to ventilation ; if there were no eating without 
 hunger, or drinking without thirst ; then would the 
 system be but seldom out of working order. But 
 so profound an ignorance is there of the laws of life, 
 that men do not even know that their sensations are 
 their natural guides, and (when not rendered mor- 
 bid by long-continued disobedience) their trust'vt'or- 
 thy guides. So that though, to speak teleologic- 
 ally, Kature has provided efficient safeguards to 
 health, lack of knowledge makes them in a great 
 measure useless. 
 
 If any one doubts the importance of an acquaint- 
 ance with the fundamental principles of physiology 
 as a means to complete living, let him look around 
 and see how many men and women he can find in 
 middle or later life who are thoroughly well. Oc- 
 casionally only do we meet with an example of 
 vigorous health continued to old age ; hourly do 
 we meet with examples of acute disorder, chroniu 
 ailment, general debility, premature decrepitude. 
 Scarcely is there one to whom you put the ques- 
 tion, who has not, in the course of his life, brought 
 upon himself illnesses which a little knowledge 
 would have saved him from. Here is a case of 
 heart disease consequent on a rheumatic fever that 
 followed reckless exposure. There is a case of eyes
 
 EFFECTS OF PHYSIOLOGICAL IGNORANCE, 41 
 
 spoiled for life by overstudy. Yesterday the ac- 
 count was of one whose long-enduring lameness was 
 brouglit on by continuing, spite of the pain, to use 
 a knee after it liad been slightly injured. And to 
 day we are told of another who has had to lie b;y 
 for years, l^ecause he did not know that the palpita- 
 tion he suffered from resulted from overtaxed brain., 
 Now we hear of an irremediable injury that follow- 
 ed some silly feat of strength ; and, again, of a con- 
 stitution that has never recovered from the effects 
 of excessive work needlessly undertaken. AVliile 
 on all sides we see the perpetual minor ailments 
 wliich accompany feebleness. Not to dwell on tlie 
 natural pain, the weariness, the gloom, the waste 
 of time and money thus entailed, only consider how 
 greatly ill-health hinders the discharge of all duties 
 — makes business often impossible, and always more 
 difficult ; produces an irritability fatal to the right 
 management of children ; puts the functions of citi- 
 zenship out of the question ; and makes amusement 
 a bore. Is it not clear that the physical sins— 
 partly our forefathers' and partly our own — which 
 produce this ill-health, deduct more from complete 
 living than anything else ? and to a great extent 
 make life a failure and a burden instead of a bene- 
 faction and a pleasure ? 
 
 To all which add the fact, that life, besides being 
 thus immensely deteriorated, is also cut short. It 
 is not true, as we commonly suppose, that a disor- 
 der or disease from which we have recovered leavee 
 us as before. No disturbance of the normal cours©
 
 42 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 of the functions can pass away and leave things ex- 
 actly as they were. In all cases a permanent dam- 
 age is done — not immediately appreciable, it may 
 be, but still there ; and along with other such items 
 which Xature in her strict account-keeping never 
 drops, will tell against us to the inevitable shorten- 
 ing of our days. Through the accumulation of 
 small injuries it is that constitutions are commonly 
 undermined, and break down, long before their 
 time. And if we call to mind how far the average 
 duration of life falls below the possible duration, 
 we see how immense is the loss. When, to the nu- 
 merous partial deductions which bad health entails, 
 we add this great final deduction, it results that or- 
 duiarily more than one-half of life is thrown away. 
 Hence, knowledge which subserves direct self- 
 preservation by preventing this loss of health, is of 
 primary importance. AVe do not contend that pos- 
 session of such knowledge would by any means 
 wholly remedy the evil. For it is clear that in our 
 present phase of civilization men's necessities often 
 compel them to transgress. And it is further clear 
 that, even in the absence of such compulsion, their 
 inclinations would frequently lead them, spite of 
 their knowledge, to sacrifice future good to present 
 gratification. But we do contend that the right 
 knowledge impressed in the right way would efl^ect 
 much ; and we further contend that as the laws of 
 health must be recognised before they can be fully 
 conformed to, the imparting of such knowledge 
 must precede a more rational living — come when
 
 STRANGE OBLIQUITIES OF OPINION. 43 
 
 that may. We infer that as vigorous health and 
 its accompanying high spirits are larger elements 
 of happiness than any other things whatever, the 
 teaching how to maintain them is a teaching that 
 yields in moment to no other whatever. And there° 
 fore we assert that such a course of physiology as is 
 needful for the comprehension of its general truths, 
 and their bearings on daily conduct, is an all-essen- 
 tial part of a rational education. 
 
 Strange that the assertion should need making ! 
 Stranger still that it should need defending ! Yet 
 are there not a few by whom such a proposition 
 will be received with something approaching to de- 
 rision. Men who would blush if caught saying 
 Iphigenia instead of Iphigenia, or would resent as 
 an insult any imputation of ignorance respecting 
 the fabled labours of a fabled demi-god, show not 
 the slightest shame in confessing that they do not 
 know where the Eustachian tubes are, what are the 
 actions of the spinal coigl, what is the normal rate 
 of pulsation, or how the lungs are inflated. While 
 anxious that their sons should be well up in the su- 
 perstitions of two thousand years ago, they care not 
 that they should be taught anything about the 
 structure and functions of their own bodies — nay, 
 would even disapprove such instruction. So over- 
 whelming is the influence of established routine! 
 So terribly in our education does the ornamental 
 override the useful ! 
 
 We need not insist on the value of that knowl- 
 edge which aids indirect self-preservation by facili-
 
 i4 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 tating the gaining of a livelihood. Tliis is admitted 
 l)y all ; and, indeed, by the mass is perhaps too 
 exclusively regarded as the end of education. But 
 ■while every one is ready to endorse the abstract 
 proposition that instruction fitting youths for the 
 business of life is of high importance, or even to 
 consider it of supreme importance ; yet scarcely 
 any inquire what instruction will so fit them. It is 
 true that reading, writing, and arithmetic are taught 
 with an intelligent appreciation of their uses ; but 
 when we have said this we have said nearly all. 
 While the great bulk of what else is acquired has 
 no bearing on the industrial activities, an immensi- 
 ty of information that has a direct bearing on the 
 industrial activities is entirely passed over. 
 
 For, leaving out only some very small classes, 
 what are all men employed in ? They are employ- 
 ed in the production, preparation, and distribution 
 of commodities. And on what does efficiency in 
 the production, preparation, and distribution of 
 commodities depend ? It depends on the use of 
 methods fitted to the respective natures of these 
 commodities ; it depends on an adequate knowledge 
 of their physical, chemical, or vital properties, as 
 the case may be ; that is, it depends on Science. 
 This order of knowledge, which is in great part ig- 
 nored in our school courses, is the order of knowl- 
 edge underlying the right performance of all those 
 processes by which civilized life is made possible. 
 Undeniable as is this truth, and thrust upon us as 
 it is at every turn, there seems to be no living con-
 
 NEEDS OF THE CONSTRUCTOR 45 
 
 scioiisness of it : its very familiarity makfts it unre- 
 garded. To give due weight to our arguuieiit, wc 
 must, tlierefore, realize this truth to the reader by 
 a rapid review of the facts. 
 
 For all the higher arts of construction, eome ac= 
 qiiaintance with Mathematics is indispensable. The 
 village carpenter, who, lacking rational instruction. 
 lays out his work by empirical rules learnt in his ap- 
 prenticeship, equally with the builder of a Britan- 
 nia Bridge, makes hourly reference to the laws of 
 quantitative relations. The surveyor on whose sur^ 
 vey the land is purchased ; the architect in design- 
 ing a mansion to be built on it ; the builder in pre- 
 paring his estimates ; his foreman in laying out the 
 foundations ; the masons in cutting the stones ; and 
 the various artisans who put up the fittings ; are all 
 guided by geometrical truths. Eailway-making i» 
 regulated from beginning to end by mathematics ; 
 alike in the preparation of plans and sections ; in 
 staking out the line ; in the mensuration of cuttings 
 and embankments ; in the designing, estimating, 
 and building of bridges, culverts, viaducts, tunnels, 
 stations. And similarly with the harbours, docks, 
 piers, and various engineering and architectural 
 works that fringe the coasts and overspread the face 
 of the country ; as well as the mines that run un- 
 derneath it. Out of geometry, too, as applied to 
 astronomy, the art of navigation has grown ; and 
 so, by this science, has been made possible that 
 enormous foreign commerce which supports a large 
 part of our population, and supplies us with many
 
 iQ AVHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST AVORTII ? 
 
 necessaries and most of onr luxuries. And now-a- 
 days even tlie farmer, for the correct laying out of 
 liis drains, lias recourse to the level — that is, to ge- 
 ometrical principles. "When from those divisions of 
 mathematics which deal with space, and numheVj 
 some small smattering of which is given in schools, 
 we turn to that other division which deals with 
 force, of which even a smattering is scarcely ever 
 given, we meet with another large class of activities 
 which this science presides over. On the applica- 
 tion of rational mechanics depends the success of 
 nearly all modern manufacture. The properties of 
 the lever, the wheel and axle, &c., are involved in 
 every machine — -every machine is a solidified me- 
 chanical theorem ; and to machinery in these times 
 we owe nearly all jiroduction. Trace the history 
 of the breakfast-roll. Tlie soil out of which it came 
 was drained with machine-made tiles ; the surface 
 was turned over by a machine ; the seed was put 
 in by a machine ; the wlieat was reaped, thrashed, 
 and winno\yed by machines ; by machinery it was 
 ground and bolted ; and had the flour been sent to 
 Gosport, it might have been made into biscuits by 
 a machine. Look round the room in which you sit. 
 If modem, probably the bricks in its walls were 
 machine-made ; by machinery the flooring was 
 sawn and planed, the mantel-shelf sawn and pol- 
 ished, the paper-hangings made and printed ; the 
 veneer on the table, the turned legs of the chairs, 
 the carpet, the curtains, are all products of ma* 
 chinery. And your clothing — plain, figured, of
 
 VALUE OF MECHANICAL SCIENCES. 4:'{ 
 
 printed- is it not wholly woven, nay, perhaps even 
 sewed, by machinery ? And the volume you are 
 reading — are not its leaves fabricated by one ma° 
 chine and covered with these words by another? 
 Add to which that for the means of distributiou 
 over both land and sea, we are similarly indebted. 
 And then let it be remembered that according as 
 the principles of mechanics are well or ill used to 
 these ends, comes success or failure — individual and 
 national. Tlie engineer who misapplies his formulse 
 for the strength of materials, builds a bridge that 
 breaks down. Tlio manufacturer whose apparatus 
 is badly devised, cannot compete with another whose 
 apparatus wastes less in friction and inertia. Tlie 
 ship-builder adhering to the old model, is outsailed 
 by one who builds on the mechanically-justified 
 wave-line principle. And as the ability of a nation 
 to hold its own against other nations depends on 
 the skilled activity of its units, we see that on such 
 knowledge may turn the national fate. Judge then 
 the worth of mathematics. 
 
 Pass next to Physics. Joined with mathemat- 
 ics, it has given us the steam-engine, which does 
 the work of millions of labourers. That section of 
 physics which deals with the laws of heat, has taught 
 us how to economise fuel in our various industries ; 
 how to increase the produce of our smelting furnaces 
 by substituting the hot for the cold blast ; how to 
 Ventilate our mines ; how to prevent explosions by 
 using the safety-lamp ; and, through the thermom- 
 eter, how to regulate innumerable processes. That 
 3
 
 48 WHAT KNOWLrnCE IS OF MOST WORTH? 
 
 division -which lias the phenomena of light for its 
 subject, gives eyes to the old and the myopic ; aids 
 through the microscope in detecting diseases and 
 adulterations ; and \>y improved lighthouses pre= 
 vents shipwrechs. Kesearchcs in electricity and 
 magnetism have saved incalculable life and prop- 
 srtj by the compass ; have subserved sundry arts by 
 the electrotype ; and now, in the telegraph, have 
 supplied us with the agency by which for the future 
 all mercantile transactions will be regulated, politi- 
 cal intercourse carried on, and perhaps national 
 quarrels often avoided. While in the details of in- 
 door life, from the improved kitchen-range up to 
 the stereoscope on the drawing-room table, the aiv- 
 plications of advanced physics underlie our comforts 
 and gratifications. 
 
 Still more numerous are the bearings of Chem- 
 istry on those activities by which men obtain the 
 means of living. The bleacher, the dyer, the calico- 
 printer, are severally occupied in j^rocesses that are 
 well or ill done according as they do or do not con- 
 form to chemical laws. The economical reduction 
 from their ores of copper, tin, zinc, lead, silver, iron, 
 are in a great measure questions of chemistry. Su- 
 gar-refining, gas-making, soap-boiling, gunpowder 
 manufacture, are operations all partly chemical ; as 
 are also those by which are producred glass and por- 
 celain. Whether the distiller's wort stops at the 
 alcoholic fermentation or passes into the acetous, is 
 a chemical question on which hangs his profit or 
 loss and the brewer, if his business is sufiicientl^
 
 CHEMISTRY AND AGRICULTURE. 49 
 
 large, finds it pay to keep a eliemist on his premises. 
 Glance tb rough a work on technology, and it be- 
 comes at once apparent that there is now scarcely 
 any process in the arts or manufactures over some 
 part of which chemistry does not preside. And 
 then, lastly, we come to the fact that in these times, 
 agriculture, to be profitably earned on, must have 
 like guidance. The analysis of manures and soils ; 
 their adaptations to each other ; the use of gypsum 
 or other substance for fixing ammonia ; the utiliza- 
 tion of coprolites ; the production of artificial ma- 
 nures — all these are boons of chemistry which it 
 behoves the farmer to acquaint himself with. Be 
 it in the lucifer match, or in disinfected sewage, or 
 in photographs — in bread made without fermenta- 
 tion, or perfumes extracted from refuse, we may 
 perceive that chemistry afiects all our industries ; 
 and that, by consequence, knowledge of it concerns 
 every one who is directly or indirectly connected 
 with our industries. 
 
 And then the science of life — Biology ; does not 
 this, too, bear fundamentally upon these processes 
 of indirect self-preservation ? With what we ordi- 
 narily call manufactures, it has, indeed, little con- 
 nexion ; but with the all-essential manufacture — ■ 
 that of food — it is inseparably connected. As agri- 
 culture must conform its methods to the phenomena 
 of vegetable and animal life, it follows necessarily 
 that the science of these phenomena is the rational 
 basis of agriculture. Various biological truths have 
 indeed been empirically established and acted upon
 
 50 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH 1 
 
 by farmers while yet there has been no conception 
 of them as science : such as that particular ma- 
 nures are suited to particular plants ; that crops of 
 certain kinds unfit the soil for other crops ; that 
 horses cannot do good work on poor food ; that such 
 and such diseases of cattle and sheep are caused by 
 such and such conditions. These, and the every- 
 day knowledge which the agriculturist gains by ex^ 
 perience respecting the right management of plants 
 and animals, constitute his stock of biological facts ; 
 on the largeness of which greatly depends his suc- 
 cess. And as these biological facts, scanty, indefi- 
 nite, rudimentary, though they are, aid him so es- 
 sentially ; judge what must be the value to him of 
 such facts when they become positive, definite, and 
 exhaustive. Indeed, even now we may see the 
 benefits that rational biology is conferring on him. 
 Tlie truth that the production of animal heat im- 
 plies waste of substance, and that, therefore, pre- 
 venting loss of heat prevents the need for extra 
 food — a purely theoretical conclusion — now guides 
 the fattening of cattle : it is found that by keeping 
 cattle warm, fodder is saved. Similarly Avith re- 
 spect to variety of food. The experiments of phys- 
 iologists have shown that not only is change of diet 
 beneficial, but that digestion is facilitated by a mix- 
 ture of ingredients in each meal : both which truths 
 are now influencing cattle-feeding. The discovery 
 that a disorder known as " the staggers," of which 
 many thousands of sheep have died annually, is 
 caused by an entozoon which presses on the brain ; 
 
 1 
 i
 
 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENCE TO FARMERS. 51 
 
 and that if the creature is extracted through the 
 softened place in the skull which marks its position, 
 the sheep usually recovers ; is another debt which 
 agriculture owes to biology. When we observe tht; 
 marked contrast between our farming and farming 
 on the Continent, and remember that this contrast 
 is mainly due to the far greater influence science 
 has had upon farming here than there ; and when 
 we see how, daily, competition is making the adopx 
 tion of scientific methods more general and neces- 
 sary ; we shall rightly infer that very soon, agricul- 
 tural success in England will be impossible without 
 a competent knowledge of animal and vegetable 
 physiology. 
 
 Yet one more science have we to note as bear- 
 ing directly on industrial success — the Science of 
 Society. Without knowing it, men who daily look 
 at the state of the money-market, glance over prices 
 current, discuss the probable crops of corn, cotton, 
 sugar, wool, silk, weigh the chances of war, and 
 from all those data decide on their mercantile oper^ 
 ations, are students of social science : empirical and 
 blundering students it may be ; but still, students 
 who gain the prizes or are plucked of their profits, 
 according as they do or do not reach the right con- 
 clusion. Not only the manufacturer and the mer- 
 chant must guide their transactions by calculations 
 of supply and demand, based on numerous facts^ 
 and tacitly recognising sundry general principles 
 of social action ; but even the retailer must do the 
 like : his prosperity very greatly depending upon
 
 62 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WOKTII 'i 
 
 the correctness of Lis judgments respecting the fu. 
 tiirc wholesale ]>ri('es and the future rates of con^ 
 sumption. Manifestly, all who take part in the en- 
 tangled commercial activities of a community, are 
 vitally interested in understanding the laws accord- 
 ing to which those activities vary. 
 
 Thus, to all such as are occui)ied in the produc- 
 tion, exchange, or distrihution of commodities, ac- 
 cpiaintance with science in some of its departments, 
 is of fundamental importance. Whoever is imme- 
 diately or remotely implicated in any form of indus- 
 try (and few are not) has a direct interest in under- 
 standing something of the mathematical, physical, 
 and chemical properties of things ; perhaps, also, 
 has a direct interest in biology ; and certainly has 
 in sociology. Whether he does or does not succeed 
 well in that indirect self-preservation which we call 
 getting a good livelihood, depends in a great degree 
 on his knowledge of one or more of these sciences : 
 not, it may be, a rational knowledge ; but still a 
 knowledge, though empirical. For what we call 
 learning a business, really implies learning the sci- 
 ence involved in it ; though not perhaps under the 
 name of science. And hence a grounding in science 
 is of great importance, both because it prepares for 
 all this, and because rational knowledge has an im- 
 mense superiority over empirical knowledge. More- 
 over, not only is it that scientific culture is requisite 
 for each, that he may understand the Junv and the 
 w/ii/ of the things and processes witli which he is con- 
 cerned as maker or distributor ; but it is often of
 
 THE SCIENCE OF SOCIIiTY. 53 
 
 much moment that he should understand the how and 
 the why of various other things and processes. In 
 this age of joint-stock undertakings, nearly every 
 man above the labourer is interested as capitalist in 
 some otlier occupation than his own ; and, as thus in- 
 terested, his profit or loss often depends on his knowl- 
 edge of the sciences bearing on this other occupa- 
 tion. Here is a mine, in the sinking of which many 
 shareholders ruined themselves, from not knowing 
 that a certain fossil belonged to the old red sand- 
 stone, below which no coal is found. Not many 
 years ago, 20,000^. was lost in the prosecution of a 
 scheme for collecting the alcohol that distils from 
 bread in baking : all which would have been saved 
 to the subscribers, had they known that less than a 
 hundredth part by weight of the flour is changed in 
 fermentation. Numerous attempts have been made 
 to construct electro-magnetic engines, in the hope 
 of superseding steam ; but had those who supplied 
 the money, understood the general law of the cor- 
 relation and equivalence of forces, they might 
 have had better balances at their bankers. Daily 
 are men induced to aid in carrying out inventions 
 which a mere tyro in science could show to be fu- 
 tile. Scarcely a locality but has its history of for- 
 tunes thrown away over some impossible project. 
 
 And if already the loss from want of science is 
 so frequent and so great, still greater and more fre= 
 quent will it be to those who hereafter lack science. 
 Just as fust as productive processes become more 
 scientific, wliich comj)etition will inevitably maktf
 
 54 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 tliem do; and just as fast as joint-stock undertak- 
 ings spread, which they certainly will ; so fast will 
 scientific knowledge grow necessary to every one. 
 
 That which our .school courses leave almost en- 
 Urely out, we thus find to be that which most nearly 
 concerns the business of life. All our industries 
 would cease, were it not for that information which 
 men begin to acquire as they best may after their 
 education is said to be finished. And were it not 
 for this information, that has been from age to age 
 accumulated and spread by unofiicial means, these 
 industries would never have existed. Had there 
 been no teaching but such as is given in our public 
 schrols, England would now be what it was in 
 feudal times. Tliat increasing acquaintance with 
 the laws of phenomena which has through success- 
 ive ages enabled us to subjugate Nature to our 
 needs, and in these days gives the common labourer 
 comforts which a few centuries ago kings could not 
 purchase, is scarcely in any degree owed to the ap- 
 pointed means of instructing our youth. The vital 
 knowledge — that by which we have grown as a na- 
 tion to what we are, and which now underlies our 
 whole existence, is a knowledge that has got itself 
 taught in nooks and corners ; while the ordained 
 
 igencies for teaching have been mumbling little 
 
 jlse but dead formulas. 
 
 We come now to the third great division of hu. 
 man activities — a division for which no preparation 
 whatever is made. If by some strange chance not
 
 TREATMENT CF OFFSPRING. 55 
 
 a vestige of us descended to the remote future save 
 a pile of our school-books or "some college examina- 
 tion papers, we may imagine how puzzled an anti-^ 
 quary of the period would be on finding in them nO) 
 indication that the learners were ever likely to be 
 parents. " This must have been the curriculum for 
 their celibates," we may fancy him concluding. 
 " 1 perceive here an elaborate preparation for many 
 things : especially for reading the books of extinct 
 nations and of co-existing nations (from which in- 
 deed it seems clear that these people had very little 
 worth reading in then* own tongue) ; but I find no 
 reference whatever to the bringing up of children. 
 They could not have been so absurd as to omit all 
 training for this gravest of responsibilities. Evi- 
 dently then, this was the school course of one of 
 their monastic orders." 
 
 Seriously, is it not an astonishing fact, that 
 though on the treatment of oflfspring depend their 
 lives or deaths, and their moral welfare or ruin ; 
 yet not one word of instruction on the treatment of 
 offspring is ever given to those who will hereafter 
 be parents ? Is it not monstrous that the fate of a 
 new generation should be left to the chances of im- 
 reasoning custom, impulse, fancy — ;joined with the 
 suggestions of ignorant nurses and the prejudiced 
 counsel of grandmothers ? If a merchant com° 
 menced business without any knowledge of aritho 
 metic and book-keeping, we should exclaim at his 
 folly, and look for disastrous consequences. Or if, 
 before studying anatomy, a man set up as a surgi-
 
 50 -VVIIAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 cal operator, m'c slioiild wonder at his audacity and 
 pity his patients. But tliat parents slioukl begin 
 the dithcnlt task of rearing eliildren witliont ever 
 having given a thought to the principles — physical, 
 moral, or intellectual — which ought to guide them, 
 excites neither sur2>rise at the actors nor pity for 
 their victims. 
 
 To tens of thousands that are killed, add hun- 
 dreds of thousands that survive with feeble consti- 
 tutions, and millions that grow up with constitu- 
 tions not so strong as they should be ; and you will 
 have some idea of the curse inflicted on their oft- 
 spring by parents ignorant of the laws of life. Do 
 but consider for a moment that the regimen to 
 which children are subject is hourly telling upon 
 them to their life-long injury or beneflt ; and that 
 there are twenty ways of going wrong to one way 
 of going right ; and you will get some idea of the 
 enormous mischief that is almost everywhere inflict- 
 ed by the thoughtless, haphazard system in com- 
 mon use. Is it decided that a boy shall be clothed 
 in some flimsy short dress, and be allowed to go 
 playing about with limbs reddened by cold ? Tlie 
 decision will tell on his whole future existence — ■ 
 either in illnesses ; or in stunted growth ; or in de- 
 ficient energy ; or in a maturity less vigorous than it 
 ought to have been, and consequent hindi-ances to suc- 
 cess and happiness. Are children doomed to a monot 
 onous dietary, or a dietary that is deficient in nutri- 
 tiveness ? Tlieir ultimate physical power and their 
 efficiency as men and women, will inevitably be
 
 RESULTS OF PARENTAL IGNORANCE. 57 
 
 rr.ore or less diminished by it. Are they forbidden 
 vociferons play, or (being too ill-clothed to bear ex- 
 posure), are they kept in-doors in cold weather 1 
 They are certain to fall below that measure of health 
 and strength to wliicli they would else have attain- 
 ed. When sons and daughters grow up sickly and 
 feeble, parents commonly regard the event as a 
 misfortune — as a visitation of Providence. Tliink- 
 ing after the prevalent chaotic fashion, they assume 
 that these evils come without causes ; or that tlie 
 causes are supernatural. Nothing of the kind. In 
 some cases the causes are doubtless inherited ; but 
 in most cases foolish regulations are the causes. 
 Yery generally parents themselves are responsible 
 for all this pain, this debility, this depression, this 
 misery. They have undertaken to control the lives 
 of their otfspring from hour to hour ; with cruel 
 carelessness they have neglected to learn anything 
 about these vital processes which they are unceas- 
 ingly affecting by their commands and prohibitions ; 
 in utter ignorance of the simplest physiologic laws, 
 they have been year by year undermining the con- 
 stitutions of their children ; and have so inflicted 
 disease and premature death, not only on them but 
 on their descendants. 
 
 Equally great are the ignorance and the conse- 
 quent injury, when we turn from physical training 
 to moral training. Consider the young mother and 
 her nursery legislation. But a few years ago she 
 tt^as at school, where her memory was crammed 
 with words, and names, and dates, and her reflect'
 
 58 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH? 
 
 ivo faculties scarcely in the sli^jhtest degree exc^ 
 cised — where not one idea was given her respecting 
 the methods of dealing witli the opening mind of 
 childhood ; and where her discipline did not in the 
 Seast fit her for thinking ont methods of her own. 
 The intervening years have been passed in practis- 
 ing music, in fancy-work, in novel-reading, and in 
 party-going : no thought having yet been given to 
 the grave responsibilities of maternity ; and scarcely 
 any of that solid intellectual culture obtained which 
 would be some preparation for such responsibilities. 
 And now see her with an unfolding human charac- 
 ter committed to her charge — see her profoundly 
 ignorant of the phenomena with which she has to 
 deal, undertaking to do that which can be done but 
 imperfectly even with the aid of the profoundest 
 knowledge. She knows nothing about the nature 
 of the emotions, their order of evolution, their func- 
 tions, or where use ends and abuse begins. She is 
 under the impression that some of the feelings are 
 wholly bad, which is not true of any one of them ; 
 and that others are good, however far they may be 
 carried, which is also not true of any one of them. 
 And then, ignorant as she is of that with which she 
 has to deal, she is equally ignorant of the effects 
 that will be produced on it by this or that treat- 
 ment. What can be more inevitable than the dis- 
 astrous results we see hourly arising ? Lacking 
 knowledge of mental phenomena, with their causes 
 and consequences, her interference is frequently 
 more mischievous than absolute passivity would
 
 EDUCATION OF THE YOUNG MOTHER. 59 
 
 have been. This and that kind of action, wliich 
 are quite normal and beneficial, she perpetually 
 thwarts ; and so diminishes the child's happiness 
 and profit, injures its temper and her own, and 
 produces estrangement. Deeds which she thinks 
 it desirable to encourage, she gets performed by 
 threats and bribes, or by exciting a desire for ap- 
 plause : considering little what the inward motive 
 may be, so long as the outward conduct conforms ; 
 and thus cultivating liypocrisy, and fear, and self- 
 ishness, in place of good feeling. While insisting 
 on truthfulness, she constantly sets an example of 
 untruth, by threatening penalties which she does 
 not inflict. While inculcating self-control, she hour- 
 ly visits on lier little ones angry scoldings for acts 
 that do not call for them. She has not the re- 
 motest idea that in the nursery, as in the world, 
 that alone is the truly salutary discipline which 
 visits on all conduct, good and bad, the natural 
 consequences — the consequences, pleasurable or 
 painful, which in the nature of things such conduct 
 tends to bring. Being thus without theoretic guid- 
 ance, and quite incapable of guiding herself by 
 tracing the mental processes going on in her chil- 
 dren, her rule is impulsive, inconsistent, mischiev- 
 ous, often, in the highest degree ; and would indeed 
 be generally ruinous, were it not that the over- 
 whelming tendency of the growing mind to assume 
 the moral type of the race, usually subordinates all 
 minor influences. 
 
 And then the culture of the intellect — is not
 
 60 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WOU'lll? 
 
 this, too, mismanaged in a similar manner ? Grant 
 tliat the phenomena of intelligence conform to 
 laws ; grant that the evolntion of intelligence in r. 
 child also conforms to laws ; and it follows inevita- 
 'bly that education can be rightly guided only by a 
 knowledge of these laws. To sup])ose that yon can 
 properly regulate this process of forming and accu- 
 mulating ideas, without understanding the nature 
 of the process, is absurd. How widely, then, must 
 teaching as it is, ditfer from teaching as it should 
 be ; when hardly any parents, and but few teachers, 
 know anything about psychology. As might be 
 expected, the system is grievously at fault, alike in 
 matter and in manner. While the right class of 
 facts is withheld, the wrong class is forcibly admin- 
 istered in the wrong way and in the wrong order. 
 With that common limited idea of education which 
 confines it to knowledge gained from books, parents 
 thnist primers into the hands of their little ones 
 years too soon, to their great injury. Not recog- 
 nising the truth that the function of books is sup- 
 plementary — that they form an indirect means to 
 knowledge when direct means fail — a means of see- 
 ing through other men what you cannot see for 
 yourself ; they are eager to give second-hand facts 
 in place of first-hand facts. Not perceiving the 
 enonnous value of that spontaneous education 
 which goes on in early years — not perceiving that 
 a child's restless observation, instead of being ig- 
 nored or checked, should be diligently administered 
 to, and made as accurate and complete as possible ;
 
 IMPOETANCE OF PSYCHOLOGY. 61 
 
 tlicy insist on occupying its eyes and thoughts with 
 things that are, for the time being, incomprehensi- 
 ble and repugnant. Possessed by a superstition 
 wliieh worships the symbols of knowledge instead 
 of the knowledge itself, tliey do not see that only 
 when his acquaintance with the objects and processes 
 of the household, the streets, and the fields, is be- 
 coming tolerably exhaustive — only then should a 
 (•hild be introduced to the new sources of informa- 
 tion which books supply : and this, not only because 
 immediate cognition is of far greater value than 
 mediate cognition ; but also, because the words 
 contained in books can be rightly interpreted into 
 ideas, only in proportion to the antecedent experi- 
 ence of things.. Observe next, that this formal in- 
 struction, far too soon commenced, is carried on with 
 but little reference to the laws of mental develop- 
 ment. Intellectual progress is of necessity from the 
 concrete to the abstract. But regardless of this, 
 liighly abstract subjects, such as grammar, which 
 should come quite late, are begun quite earl}". Po' 
 litieal geography, dead and uninteresting to a child, 
 and which should be an appendage of sociological 
 studies, is commenced betimes ; while physical ge^ 
 ography, comprehensible and comparatively attract- 
 ive to a child, is in great part passed over, Nearly 
 every subject dealt with is arranged in abnoi-mal 
 order : definitions, and rules, and principles being 
 put first, instead of being disclosed, as they are in 
 the order of nature, through the study of cases. 
 And then, pervading the whole, is the vicious sya
 
 G'2 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH? 
 
 tern of rote learning — a system of sacrificing the 
 spirit to the letter. See the results. What with 
 perceptions unnaturally dulled hy early thwarting, 
 and a coerced attention to books — what with the 
 mental confusion produced by teaching subjects be- 
 fore they can be understood, and in each of them 
 srivinir creneralizations before the facts of which 
 these are the generalizations — what with making the 
 pupil a mere passive recipient of other's ideas, and 
 not in the least leading him to be an active inquirer 
 or self-instructor — and what with taxing the facul- 
 ties to excess ; there are very few minds that be- 
 come as efficient as they might be. Examinations 
 being once passed, books are laid aside ; the greater 
 part of what has been acquired, being unorganized, 
 soon drops out of recollection ; what remains is 
 mostly inert — the art of applying knowledge not 
 having been cultivated ; and there is but little 
 power either of accurate observation or independent 
 thinking. To all which add, that while much of 
 the information gained is of relatively small value, 
 an immense mass of information of transcendent 
 value is entirely passed over. 
 
 Thus we find the facts to be such as might have 
 been inferred r) /moi'i. The training of children — 
 l)hysical, moral, and intellectual — is dreadfully de- 
 fective. And in great measure it is so, because 
 parents are devoid of that knowledge by which this 
 training can alone be rightly guided. What is to be 
 expected when one of the most intricate of i)roblems 
 is undertaken by those who have given scarcely a
 
 TASK OF UNFOLDING A HUMAN BKING. G3 
 
 tliouglit to the principles on which its sohition 
 depends ? For shoe-making or house-building, for 
 the management of a ship or a locomotive-enginCj, 
 a long apprenticeship is needful. Is it, then, that 
 the unfolding of a human being in body and mind, 
 is so comparatively simple a process, that any one 
 may superintend and regulate it with no prepara- 
 tion whatever ? If not — if the process is with one 
 exception more complex than any in Xature, and. 
 the task of administering to it one of surpassing 
 difficulty ; is it not madness to make no provision 
 for such a task ? Better sacrifice accomplishments 
 than omit this all-essential instruction. When 
 a father, acting on false dogmas adopted, with- 
 out examination, has alienated his sons, driven them 
 into rebellion by his harsh treatment, ruined them, 
 and made himself miserable ; he might reflect that 
 the study of Ethology would have been worth pur- 
 suing, even at the cost of knowing nothing about 
 ^schylus. When a mother is mourning over a 
 first-born that has sunk under the sequelse of scarlet- 
 fever — when perhaps 9, candid medical man has 
 confirmed her suspicion that her child would have 
 recovered had not its system been enfeebled by 
 over-study — when she is prostrate under the pangs 
 of combined grief and remorse; it is but a small 
 consolation that she can read Dante in the originaL 
 Thus we see that for regulating the third great 
 division of human activities, a knowledge of the 
 laws of life is the one thing needful. Some ac- 
 quaintance with the first principles of physiology 
 4
 
 6-i "WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 and tlie elementary tniths of psychology is indis 
 peiisable for the right bringing n]) of cliildren. We 
 doubt not that this assertion -will by many be read 
 with a smile. Tliat parents in general should be 
 3xpected to acquire a hnowledge of subjects so 
 abstruse, "will seem to them an absurdity. And if 
 we proposed that an exhaustiye knowledge of these 
 subjects should be obtained by all fathers and 
 mothers, the absurdity would indeed be glaring 
 enough. But we do not. General principles only, 
 accompanied by such detailed illustrations as may 
 be needed to make them understood, would suffice. 
 And these might be readily taught — if not ration- 
 ally, then dogmatically. Be this as it may, how- 
 eyer, here are the indisputable facts : — that the 
 development of children in mind and body rigor- 
 ously obeys certain laws ; that nnless these laws are 
 in some degree conformed to by parents, death is 
 inevitable ; that unless they are in a great degree 
 conformed to, there must result serious physical and 
 mental defects ; and that only when they are com- 
 pletely conformed to, can a perfect maturity be 
 reached. Judge, then, whether all who may one 
 day be parents, should not strive w^th some anxiety 
 to learn what these laws are. 
 
 From the parental functions let us pass now to 
 the functions of the citizen. "We have here to in- 
 quire what knowledge best fits a man for the dis- 
 3hargn of these functions. It cannot be alleged, 
 ii3 in the last case, that the need for knowledge
 
 WOKTHLESSNESS OF OEDINAEY HISTORY. 65 
 
 fitting him for these functions is wholly overlooked ; 
 for our school courses contain certain studies which, 
 nominally at least, bear upon political and social 
 duties. Of these the only one that occupies a 
 prominent place is History. 
 
 But, as already more than once hinted, the his- 
 toric information commonly gi^'en is almost value- 
 less for purposes of guidance. Scarcely any of the 
 facts set down in our school-histories, and very few 
 even of those contained in the more elaborate works 
 written for adults, give any clue to the right prin- 
 ciples of political action. Tlie biographies of 
 monarchs (and our children commonly learn little 
 else) throw scarcely any light upon the science of 
 society. Familiarity with court intrigues, plots, 
 usurpations, or the like, and with all the personali- 
 ties accompanying them, aids very little in eluci- 
 dating the principles on which national welfare 
 depends. We read of some squabble for power, 
 that it led to a pitched battle ; that such and such 
 were the names of the generals and their leading 
 subordinates ; that they had each so many thousand 
 infantry and cavalry, and so many cannon ; that 
 they arranged their forces in this and that order ; 
 that they manoeuvred, attacked, and fell back in 
 certain ways : that at this part of the day such dis- 
 asters were sustained, and at that such advantage£ 
 gained ; that in one particular movement some 
 leading officer fell, while in another a certain regi- 
 ment was decimated ; that after all the changing 
 fortunes of the fight, the victory was gained by this
 
 66 WHAT KN'OWLEDGE 15 OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 or that army ; and that so many were killed and 
 wonnded on each side, and so many captured by 
 the conqnerors. And now. out of the accumulated 
 details which make up the narratire, say wliich it 
 Is that helps you in deciding on your conduct as a 
 citizen. Supposing even that you had diligently 
 read, not only " The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the 
 World,'' but accounts of all other battles that his- 
 tory mentions : how much more judicious would 
 your vote be at the next election i *• But these are 
 facts — interesting facts," you say. Without dotibt 
 they are facts ^such. at least, as are not wholly or 
 partially fictions) ; and to many they may be inter- 
 esting facts. But this by no means implies that 
 they are valuable. Factitious or morbid opinion 
 often gives seeminor value to things that have 
 scarcely any. A tulipomaniac will not part with a 
 choice bulb for its weight in gold. To another man 
 an ugly piece of cracked old china seems his most 
 desirable possession. And there are those who 
 give high prices for the relics of celebrated mur- 
 derers. Will it be contended that these tastes are 
 any measures of value in the things that gratify 
 them i If not. then it must be admitted that the 
 liking felt for certain classes of historical facts is 
 no proof of their worth ; and that we must test their 
 worth as we test the worth of other facts, by asking 
 to what uses they are applicable. Were some one 
 to tell you that your neighbours cat kittened yes- 
 terday, you would say the information was worth- 
 less. Fact though it might be. you wculd say it
 
 TRUE USES OF HISTORY. 67 
 
 was an utterly iiseless fact — a fact that could in no 
 way influence your actions in life — a fact that would 
 not help you in learning how to live completely. 
 Well, apply the same test to the great mass of his« 
 torical facts, and you will get the same resulto 
 They are facts from which no conclusions can be 
 drawn — unorganizahle facts ; and therefore facts 
 which can be of no service in establishing principles 
 of conduct, which is the chief use of facts. Kead 
 them, if you like, for amusement ; but do not flatter 
 yourself they are instructive. 
 
 That which constitutes History, properly so 
 called, is in great part omitted from works on the 
 subject. Only of late years have historians com- 
 menced giving us, in any considerable quantity, the 
 truly valuable information. As in past ages the 
 king was every thing and the people nothing ; so, 
 in past histories the doings of the king fill the entire 
 picture, to which the national life forms but an ob- 
 scure background. While only now, when the 
 welfare of nations rather than of rulers is becoming 
 the dominant idea, are historians beginning to oc- 
 cupy themselves with the phenomena of social 
 progress. That which it really concerns us to 
 know, is the natural history of society. We want 
 all facts which help us to understand how a nation 
 has grown and organized itself. Among these, let 
 us of course have an account of its government l 
 with as little as may be of gossip about the men 
 who officered it, and as much as possible about the 
 structure, principles, methods, prejudices, corrup-
 
 68 AVIIAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WOKJll? 
 
 tions, (fee, wliicli it exhibited : aiul let tliis account 
 not only include the nature and actions of the cen- 
 tral government, but also those of local governments, 
 down to their minutest ramifications. Let us of 
 course also have a parallel description of the eccle- 
 siastical government — its organization, its conduct, 
 its power, its relations to the State : and accompany- 
 ing this, the ceremonial, creed, and religious ideas 
 — not only those nominally believed, but those 
 really believed and acted upon. Let us at the same 
 time be informed of the control exercised by class 
 over class, as displayed in all social observances — 
 in titles, salutations, and forms of address. Let us 
 know, too, what were all the other customs which 
 regulated the popular life out of doors and in-doors : 
 including those which concern the relations of the 
 sexes, and the relations of parents to children. Tlie 
 superstitions, also, from the more important myths 
 down to the charms in common use, should be in- 
 dicated. Next should come a delineation of the 
 industrial system : showing to what extent the divi- 
 sion of labour was carried ; how trades were regu- 
 lated, "whether by caste, guilds, or otherwise ; what 
 was the connection between employers and em- 
 ployed ; what were the agencies for distributing 
 commodities, what were the means of communica- 
 tion ; w4iat was the circulating medium. Accom- 
 panying all which should come an account of the 
 industrial arts technically considered : stating th«? 
 processes in use, and the quality of the })rodu('ts. 
 Further, the intellectual condition of the nation in
 
 HISTORY A DESCRIPTIVE SOCIOLOGY. (^9 
 
 its various grades should be depicted : not only 
 with respect to the kind and amount of education, 
 but with respect to the progress made in science, 
 and the prevailing manner of thinking. The degree 
 of aesthetic culture, as displayed in architecture, 
 sculpture, painting, dress, music, poetry, and fic- 
 tion, should be described. Nor should there be 
 omitted a sketch of the daily lives of the people — • 
 their food, their homes, and their amusements. 
 And lastly, to connect the whole, should be ex- 
 hibited the morals, theoretical and practical, of all 
 classes : as indicated in their laws, habits, proverbs, 
 deeds. All these facts, given with as much brevity 
 as consists with clearness and accuracy, should be 
 so grouped and arranged that they may be compre- 
 hended in their ensemhle / and thus may be con- 
 templated as mutually dependent parts of one great 
 whole. The aim should be so to present them that 
 we may readily trace the consensus subsisting among 
 them ; with the view of learning what social phe- 
 nomena co-exist with what others. And then the 
 corresponding delineations of succeeding ages should 
 be so managed as to show us, as clearly as may be, 
 how each belief, institution, custom, and arrange- 
 ment was modified ; and how the consensus of 
 preceding structures and functions was developed 
 into the consensus of succeeding ones. Such alone 
 is the kind of information respecting past times, 
 which can be of service to the citizen for the regu- 
 lation of his conduct. The only history that is of 
 practical value, is what may be called Descriptive
 
 70 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WOETH ? 
 
 Sociologj. And the liigliest office wLich tlie his- 
 torian can discharge, is that of so narrating the 
 lives of nations, as to furnish materials for a Com' 
 parative Sociok\gy ; and for tlie subsequent deter- 
 mination of the ultimate laws to M'hich social ])lie- 
 nomena conform. 
 
 But now mark, that even supposing an adequate 
 stock of this truly valuable historical knowledge 
 has l)een acquired, it is of comparatively little use 
 witliout the key. And the key is to be found only 
 in Science. Without an acquaintance with the 
 general truths of biology and psychology, rational 
 interpretation of social phenomena is impossible. 
 Only in proportion as men obtain a certain rude, 
 empirical knowledge of human nature, are they 
 enabled to understand even tlie simplest facts of 
 social life : as, for instance, the relation between 
 supply and demand. And if not even the most 
 elementary truths of sociology can be reached until 
 some knowledge is obtained of how men generally 
 think, feel, and act under given circumstances ; 
 then it is manifest that there can be nothing like a 
 wide comprehension of sociology, unless through a 
 competent knowledge of man hi all his faculties, 
 bodily and mental. Consider the matter in the ab- 
 stract, and this conclusion is self-evident. Thus : — 
 Society is made up of individuals ; all that is done 
 in society is done by the combined actions of indi- 
 viduals ; and therefore, in individual actions only 
 can be found the solutions of social phenomena. 
 But the actions of individuals depend on the laws
 
 SCIENCE THE KEY TO HISTOKY. 71 
 
 of their natures ; and their actions cannot be under- 
 stood until these laws are understood. These laws, 
 however, when reduced to their simplest expres- 
 sion, are found to depend on the laws of body and 
 mind in general. Hence it necessarily follows, that 
 biology and psychology are indispensable as inter- 
 preters of sociology. Or, to state the conclusions 
 still more simply : — all social phenomena are phe- 
 nomena of life — are the most complex manifesta- 
 tions of life — are ultimately dependent on the laws 
 of life — and can be understood only when the laws 
 of life are understood. Thus, then, we see that for 
 the regulation of this fourth division of human ac- 
 tivities, we are, as before, dependent on Science. 
 Of the knowledge commonly imparted in educa- 
 tional courses, very little is of any service in guiding 
 a man in his conduct as a citizen. Only a small 
 part of the history he reads is of practical value ; 
 and of this small part he is not prepared to make 
 proper use. He commonly lacks not only the 
 materials for, but the very conception of, descriptive 
 sociology ; and he also lacks that kiiowledge of the 
 organic sciences, without which even descriptive 
 sociology can give him but little aid. 
 
 And now we come to that remaining division of 
 human life which includes the relaxations, pleasures, 
 and amusements filling leisure hours. After con- 
 sidering what training best fits for self-preservation, 
 for the obtainment of sustenance, for the discharge 
 of parental duties, and for the regulation of social
 
 72 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 and political conduct ; we have now to consider 
 what training Lest tits for the miscellaneous ends 
 not included in these — for the enjoyments of Xature, 
 of Literature, and of the Fine Arts, in all their 
 forms. Postponing them as we do to things that Lear 
 more vitally upon human welfare ; and Li'inging 
 everything, as we have, to the test of actual value ; 
 it will perhaps Le inferred that we are inclined to 
 slight these less essential things. I^o greater mis- 
 take could Le made, however. We yield to none 
 in the value we attach to aesthetic culture and its 
 pleasures. Without painting, sculpture, music, 
 poetry, and the emotions produced Ly natural 
 Leauty of every kind, life would lose half its charm. 
 So far from thinking that the training and gratifica- 
 tion of the tastes are unimportant, we Lelieve the 
 time will come when they will occuj)y a much 
 larger share of human life than now. When the 
 forces of Kature liaveLeen fully conquered toman's 
 use — when the means of pi'oduction have Leen 
 Lrought to perfection — when hiLour has Leen econ- 
 omized to the highest degree — when education has 
 been so systematized that a preparation for the more 
 essential activities may Le made with comparative 
 rapidity — and when, consequently, there is a great 
 increase of spare time ; then will the poetry, Loth 
 of Art and Nature, rightly fill a large space in the 
 jninds of all. 
 
 But it is one thing to admit that aesthetic cul- 
 ture is in a high degree conducive to human hap- 
 piness ; and another thing to admit that it is a
 
 KANK OF ESTHETIC CULT. KE. 73 
 
 fundamental requisite to human happiness. How- 
 ever important it may be, it must yield precedence 
 to those kinds of culture which bear more directly 
 upon the duties of life. As before hinted, literature 
 and the fine arts are made possible by those activi- 
 ties which make individual and social life possible ; 
 and manifestly, that which is made possible, must 
 be postponed to that which makes it possible. A 
 florist cultivates a plant for the sake of its flower ; 
 and regards the roots and leaves as of value, cliiefly 
 because they are instrumental in producing the 
 flower. But while, as an ultimate product, the 
 flower is the thinor to which evervtliing; else is 
 subordinate, the florist very well knows that the 
 root and leaves are inti'insically of greater impor- 
 tance ; because on them the evolution of the flower 
 depends. He bestows every care in rearing a healthy 
 plant ; and knows it would be folly if, in his anx- 
 iety to obtain the flower, he were to neglect the 
 plant. Similarly in the case before us. Architec- 
 ture, sculpture, painting, music, poetry, &c., may 
 be truly called the efliorescence of civilized life. 
 But even supposing them to be of such transcendent 
 worth as to subordinate the civilized life out of which 
 they grow (which can hardly be asserted), it will 
 still be admitted that the production of a healthy 
 civilized life must be the first consideration ; and 
 that the knowledge conducing to this must occupy 
 the highest place. 
 
 And here we see most distinctly the vice of our 
 educational system. It neglects the plaftt for the
 
 7-i WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 sake of the flower. In anxiety for elegance, it for- 
 gets substance. While it gives no knowledge con- 
 ducive to self-preservation — while of knowledge 
 that facilitates gaining a livelihood it gives but the 
 rudiments, and leaves the greater part to be picked 
 up any how in after life — while for the discharge 
 of parental functions it makes not the slightest pro- 
 rision — and while for the duties of citizenship it 
 prepares by imparting a mass of facts, most of 
 which are irrelevant, and the rest without a key ; 
 it is diligent in teaching every tking that adds to 
 refinement, polish, dclat. However fully we may 
 admit that extensive acquaintance with modern 
 languages is a valuable accomplishment, which, 
 through reading, conversation, and travel, aids in 
 giving a certain finish ; it by no means follows that 
 this result is rightly purchased at the cost of that 
 vitally important knowledge sacrificed to it. Sup- 
 posing it true that classical education conduces to 
 elegance and correctness of style ; it cannot be said 
 that elegance and correctness of style are com- 
 parable in importance to a familiarity with the 
 principles that should guide the rearing of children. 
 Grant that the taste may be greatly improved by 
 reading all the poetry written in extinct languages ; 
 yet it is not to be inferred that such improvement 
 of taste is equivalent in value to an acquaintance 
 with the laws of health. xYccomplishments, the fine 
 arts, helles-lettres^ and all those things which, as wo, 
 Bay, constitute tlie efflorescence of civilization, 
 Bhould be wholly subordinate to that knowledge
 
 SCIENCE UNDERLIES THE FINE ARTS. TO 
 
 and discipline in wliicli civilization rests. As they 
 occupy the leisure part of life, so should they occupy 
 the leisure part of education. 
 
 Recognising thus the true position of aesthetics, 
 and holdino; that while the cultivation of them 
 should form a part of education from its commence- 
 ment, such cultivation should be subsidiary ; we 
 have now to inquire what knowledge is of most use 
 to this end — what knowledge best fits for this 
 remaining sphere of activity. To this question the 
 answer is still the same as heretofore. Unexj)ected 
 as the assertion may be, it is nevertheless true, that 
 the highest Art of every kind is based upon Science 
 — that without Science there can be neither perfect 
 production nor full appreciation. Science, in that 
 limited technical acceptation current in society, 
 may not have been possessed by many artists of 
 high repute ; but acute observers as they have 
 been, they have always possessed a stock of those 
 empirical generalizations which constitute science 
 in its lowest phase ; and they have habitually fallen 
 far below perfection, partly because their generali- 
 zations were comparatively few and inaccurate. 
 That science necessarily underlies the fine arts, be- 
 comes manifest, d priori, when we remember that 
 art-products are all more or less representative of 
 objective or subjective phenomena ; that they can 
 be true only in proportion as they conform to the 
 laws of these phenomena ; and that before they can 
 thus conform the artist must know what these laws
 
 <0 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WOKTU 5 
 
 are. Tliat this a priori conclusion tallies with ex- 
 perience we shall soon see. 
 
 Youths preparing for the practice of sculpture, 
 have to acquaint themselves with the bones and 
 muscles of the human frame in tlieir distribution, 
 attachments, and movements. This is a portion 
 of science ; and it has been found needful to impart 
 it for the prevention of those many errors which 
 sculptors who do not possess it commit. For the 
 prevention of other mistakes, a knowledge of mechan- 
 ical principles is requisite ; and such knowledge not 
 being usually possessed, grave mechanical mistakes 
 are frequently made. Take an instance. For the 
 stability of a figure it is needful that the perpen- 
 dicular from the centre of gravity — " the line of 
 direction," as it is called — should fall within the 
 base of support ; and hence it happens, that when 
 a man assumes the attitude known as " standing at 
 ease," in which one leg is straightened and the 
 other relaxed, the line of direction falls within the 
 foot of the straightened leg. But sculptors unfa- 
 miliar with the theory of e(piilil)rium, not un- 
 commonly so represent this attitude, that the line 
 of direction falls midway between the feet. Igno- 
 rance of the laws of momentum leads to analogous 
 errors : as witness the admired Discobolus, which, 
 as it is posed, must inevitably fall forward the 
 moment the quoit is delivered. 
 
 In painting, the necessity for scientific knowl- 
 edge, empirical if not rational, is still more con- 
 spicuous. In what consists the grotesqueness of
 
 USES OF SCIENCE TO THE PAINTER. ii 
 
 Chinese pictures, unless in tlieir utter disregard of 
 the laws of appearances — in their absurd linear 
 perspective, and tlieir want of aerial perspective ? 
 In what are the drawings of a child so faulty, if not 
 in a similar absence of truth — an absence arising, 
 in great part, from ignorance of the way in which 
 the aspects of things vary with the conditions ? 
 Do but remember tlie books and lectures by which 
 students are instructed ; or consider the criticisms 
 of Ruskin ; or look at the doings of the Pre- 
 Raffaelites ; and you wall see that progress in 
 painting implies increasing knowledge of how 
 effects in ^Nature are produced, Tlie most diligent 
 observation, if not aided by science, fails to preserve 
 from error. Every painter will indorse the asser- 
 tion that unless it is known what appearances must 
 exist under given circumstances, they often will not 
 be perceived ; and to know what appearances must 
 exist, is, in so far, to understand the science of 
 appearances. From want of science Mr. J. Lewis^ 
 careful painter as he is, casts the shadow of a lattice- 
 window in sharply-defined lines upon an opposite 
 wall ; which he would not have done, had he been 
 familiar with the phenomena of penumbrse. From 
 want of science, Mr. Rosetti, catching sight of a 
 peculiar ii-idescence displayed by certain hairy 
 surfaces under particular lights (an iridescence 
 caused by the diflraction of light in passing the 
 hairs), commits the error of showing this iridescence 
 on surfaces and in positions where it could not 
 occur.
 
 78 "WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 To say tliat music, too, lias need of scientific aid 
 will seem still more surprising. Yet it is demon- 
 straLle that nnisic is but an idealization of the nat- 
 ural language of emotion ; and that consequently, 
 music must be good or bad according as it conforms 
 to the laws of this natural language. The various 
 inflections of voice which accompany feelings of 
 different kinds and intensities, have been shown to 
 be the germs out of which music is developed. It 
 has been further shown, that these inflections and 
 cadences are not accidental or arbitrary ; but that 
 they are determined by certain general principles 
 of vital action ; and that their expressiveness de- 
 pends on this. Whence it follows that musical 
 phrases and the melodies built of them, can be ef- 
 fective only when they are in harmony with these 
 general principles. It is difficult here properly to 
 illustrate this position. But perhaps it will suffice 
 to instance the swarms of worthless ballads that in- 
 fest drawing-rooms, as compositions which science 
 would forbid. They sin against science by setting 
 to music ideas that are not emotional enough to 
 prompt musical expression ; and they also sin 
 against science by using musical phrases that have 
 no natural relation to the ideas expressed : even 
 where these are emotional. Thej are bad because 
 they are untrue. And to say they are untrue, is to 
 say they are unscientific. 
 
 Even in poetry the same thing holds. Like 
 music, poetry has its root in those natural modes of 
 expression which accompany deep feeling. Its 
 
 I
 
 SCIENCE DEALS WITH MUSIC AND POETRY. 79 
 
 rliytlim, its strong and numerous metaphors, its hy- 
 perboles, its violent inversions, are simply exaggera- 
 tions of the traits of excited speech. To be good, 
 therefore, poetry must pay respect to those laws of 
 nervous action which excited speech obeys. In in* 
 tensifying and combining the traits of excited speech, 
 it must have due regard to proportion — must not 
 use its appliances without restriction ; but, where 
 the ideas are least emotional, must use the forms of 
 poetical expression sparingly ; must use them more 
 freely as the emotion rises ; and must carry them 
 all to their greatest extent only where the emotion 
 reaches a climax. Tlie entire contravention of these 
 principles results in bombast or doggerel. Tlie in- 
 sufficient respect for them is seen in didactic poetry. 
 And it is because they are rarely fully obeyed, that 
 w^e have so much poetry that is inartistic. 
 
 Not only is it that the artist, of whatever kind, 
 cannot produce a truthful work without he under- 
 stands the laws of the phenomena he represents ; 
 but it is that he must also understand how the 
 minds of sj^ectators or listeners will be affected by 
 the several peculiarities of his work — a question in 
 psychology. What impression any given art-prod- 
 uct generates, manifestly depends upon the mental 
 natures of those to whom it is presented ; and as all 
 mental natures have certain general principles in 
 common, tliere must result certain corresponding 
 general principles on which alone art-products can 
 be successfully framed. These general principles 
 cannot be fully understood and applied, unless tha
 
 80 -VVIIAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 artist sees liow they follow from tlie laws of mind. 
 To ask w^lietlier the composition of a picture is good, 
 is reallj to ask how the perceptions and feelings of 
 observers will be affected bv it. To ask whether a 
 drama is well constructed, is to ask whether its sit- 
 uations are so arranged as duly to consult the power 
 of attention of an audience, and duly to avoid over- 
 taxing any one class of feelings. Equally in arrang- 
 ing the leading divisions of a poem or fiction, and 
 in combining the words of a single sentence, the 
 goodness of the effect depends upon the skill with 
 which the mental energies and susceptibilities of 
 the reader are economized. Every artist-, in the 
 course of his education and after-life, accumulates a 
 stock of maxims by which his practice is regulated. 
 Trace such maxims to their roots, and you find they 
 inevitably lead you down to psychological princi- 
 ples. And only when the artist rationally under- 
 stands these psychological principles and their va- 
 rious corollaries, ' can he work in harmony with 
 them. 
 
 We do not for a moment believe that science 
 will make an artist. While we contend that the 
 leading laws both of objective and subjective phe- 
 nomena must be understood by him, we by no 
 means contend that knowledge of such laws will 
 serve in place of natural perception. Not only tlie 
 poet, but also the artist of every type, is born, not 
 made. AVhat we assert is, that innate faculty alone 
 will not suffice ; but must have the aid of organized 
 knowledge. Intuition will do much, but it will not
 
 SCIENCE NECESSARY TO APPRECIATE ART. 8i 
 
 do all. Only when Genius is married to Science 
 can the highest results be produced. 
 
 As we have above asserted, Science is necessary 
 not only for the most successful production, but 
 also for the full appreciation of the fine arts. In 
 what consists the greater ability of a man than of 
 a child to perceive the beauties of a picture ; unless 
 it is in his more extended knowledge of those truths 
 in nature or life which the picture renders ? How 
 happens the cultivated gentleman to enjoy a fine 
 poem so much more than a boor does ; if it is not 
 because his wider acquaintance with objects and ac- 
 tions enables him to see in the poem much that the 
 boor cannot see ? And if, as is here so obvious, 
 there must be some familiarity with the things rep- 
 resented, before the representation can be appreci- 
 ated ; then the representation can be completely 
 appreciated, only in proportion as the things repre- 
 sented are completely understood. The fact is, that 
 every additional truth which a work of art express- 
 es, gives an additional pleasure to the percipient 
 mind — a pleasure that is missed by those ignorant 
 of this truth. The more realities an artist indicates 
 in any given amount of work, the more faculties 
 does he appeal to ; the more numerous associated 
 ideas does he suggest ; the more gratification does 
 he aftord. But to receive this gratification the 
 spectator, listener, or reader, must know the reali- 
 ties whicli the artist has indicated ; and to know 
 these realities is to know so much science. 
 
 And now let us not overlook the further great
 
 82 ^VIIAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 fact, that not only docs science underlie sculpture, 
 painting, music, poetry, but that science is itself . 
 poetic. Tlie current opinion that science and poet- 
 ry are opjiosed is a delusion. It is doubtless true 
 that as states of consciousness, cognition and emo- 
 tion tend to exclude each other. And it is doubt- 
 less also true that an extreme activity of the reflect- 
 ive powers tends to deaden the feelings ; while an 
 extreme activity of the feelings tends to deaden the 
 reflective powers : in which sense, indeed, all orders 
 of activity are antagonistic to each other. But it 
 is not true that the facts of science are unpoetical ; 
 or that the cultivation of science is necessarily un- 
 friendly to the exercise of imagination or the love 
 of the beautiful. On the contrary science opens up 
 realms of poetry where to the unscientific all is a 
 blank. Those engaged in scientific researches con- 
 stantly show us that they realize not less vividly, 
 but more \'4vidly, than others, the poetry of their 
 subjects. Whoever will dip into Hugh Miller's 
 works on geology, or read Mr. LeM'es's " Seaside 
 Studies," will perceive that science excites poetry 
 rather than extinguishes it. And whoever will con- 
 template the life of Goethe will see that the poet 
 and the man of science can co-exist in equal activi- 
 ty. Is it not, indeed, an absurd and almost a sacri- 
 legious belief that the more a man studies Nature 
 the less he reveres it ? Think you that a drop of 
 water, which to the vulgar eye is but a drop of 
 water, loses anything in the eye of the physicist 
 who knows that its elements are held together by a
 
 SCIENCE ITSELF POETIC. 83 
 
 force which, if suddenly liberated, would produce a 
 flasli of lightning ? Think you that what is care- 
 lessly looked upon by the uninitiated as a mere 
 snow-flake, does not suggest higher associations to 
 one who has seen through a microscope the won- 
 drously varied and elegant forms of snow-crystals ? 
 Tliink you that the rounded rock marked with par- 
 allel scratches calls up as much poetry in an igno- 
 rant mind as in the mind of a geologist, who knows 
 that over this rock a glacier slid a million years 
 ago ? The truth is, that those who have never en- 
 tered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of 
 the poetry by which they are surrounded. Who- 
 ever has not in youth collected plants and insects, 
 knows not half the halo of interest which lanes and 
 hedge-rows can assume. Whoever has not sought 
 for fossils, has little idea of the poetical associations 
 that surround the places where imbedded treasures 
 were found. Whoever at the seaside has not had a 
 microscope and aquarium, has yet to learn what 
 the highest jjleasures of the seaside are. Sad, in- 
 deed, is it to see how men occupy themselves with 
 trivialities, and are indiiferent to the grandest phe- 
 nomena — care not to understand the architecture of 
 the Heavens, but are deeply interested in some con- 
 temptible controversy about the intrigues of Mary 
 Queen of Scots ! — are learnedly critical over a 
 Greek ode, and pass by without a glance that grand 
 epic written by the finger of God uiDon the strata of 
 the Earth ! 
 
 We find, then, that even for this remaining di'
 
 84 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 vision of human activities, scientific culture is the 
 1^ roper preparation. Wo find that aesthetics in gen- 
 eral are necessarily based upon scientific principles ; 
 nnd can be pursued with complete success only, 
 tlirouijh an acquaintance with these principles. We 
 find that for the criticism and due appreciation of 
 works of art, a knowledge of the constitution of 
 things, or in other words, a knowledge of science, is 
 requisite. And we not only find that science is the 
 handmaid to all forms of art and poetry, but that, 
 rightly regarded, science is itself poetic. 
 
 Tlius far our question has been, the worth of 
 knowledge of this or that kind for purposes of guid- 
 ance. AVe have now to judge the relative values 
 of different kinds of knowledge for purposes of 
 discipline. This division of our subject we are 
 obliged to treat with comparative brevity ; and 
 happily, no very lengthened treatment of it is need- 
 ed. Having found what is best for the one end, we 
 have by implication found what is best for the other. 
 We may be quite sure that the acquirement of those 
 classes of facts which are most useful for regulating 
 conduct, involves a mental exercise best fitted for 
 strengthening the faculties. It would be utterly 
 contrary to the beautiful economy of Nature, if one 
 kind of culture were needed for tlie gaining of in- 
 formation and another kind were needed as a men- 
 tal gymnastic. Everywhere throughout creation 
 we find faculties developed through the performance 
 of those functions which it is their office to per-
 
 STUDIKS BK.ST ADAPTED FOK DISCirLINK. 85 
 
 form ; not through the performance of artificial ex- 
 ercises devised to fit them for these functions. The 
 Red Indian acquires the swiftness and agility which 
 make him a successful hunter, by the actual pursuit 
 of animals ; and by the miscellaneous activities of 
 his life, he gains a better balance of physical powers 
 than gymnastics ever give. Tluxt skill in tracking 
 enemies and prey which he has reached by long 
 practice, implies a subtlety of perception far exceed- 
 ing anything produced by artificial training. And 
 similarly throughout. From the Bushman, whose 
 eye, wliicli being habitually employed in identify- 
 ing distant objects that are to be pursued or fled 
 from, has acquired a quite telescopic range, to the 
 accountant whose daily practice enables him to add 
 up several columns of figures simultaneously, we 
 find that the highest power of a faculty "results from 
 the discharge of those duties wdiich the conditions 
 of life require it to discharge. And we may be 
 certain, d priori, that the same law holds through- 
 out education. The education of most value for 
 guidance, must at the same time be the education 
 of most value for discipline. Let us consider the 
 evidence. 
 
 One advantage claimed for that devotion to 
 language-learning which forms so prominent a 
 feature in the ordinary curric^/him, is, that the 
 memory is thereby strengthened. And it is ap- 
 parently assumed that this is an advantage peculiar 
 to the study of words. But the truth is, that the 
 sciences afi'ord far wider fields for the exercise of
 
 8G ^v^AT knowledge is of most avoktii ? 
 
 memory. It is no sliglit task to remember all tlic 
 facts ascertained respcctini; onr solar system ; nuich 
 more to remember all that is known concerning the 
 structure of our galaxy. The new compounds 
 which chemistry daily accumulates, are so numer- 
 ous that few, save professors, know the names of 
 them all ; and to recollect the atomic constitutions 
 and affinities of all these compounds, is scarcely 
 possible without making chemistry the occupation 
 of life. In the enormous mass of phenomena pre- 
 sented by the Earth's crust, and in the still more 
 enormous mass of phenomena presented by the 
 fossils it contains, there is matter which it takes the 
 geological student years of ai)plication to master. 
 In each leading division of physics — sound, heat, 
 light, electricity — the facts are numerous enough 
 to alarm any one proposing to leani them all. 
 And when we pass to the organic sciences, the effort 
 of memory required becomes still greater. In hu- 
 man anatomy alone, the quantity of detail is so 
 great, that the young surgeon has commonly to get 
 it up half-a-dozen times before he can permanently 
 retain it. The number of species of plants which 
 botanists distinguish, amounts to some 320,000 ; 
 while the varied forms of animal life with which the 
 zoologist deals, are estimated at some two millions. 
 So vast is the accumulation of facts which men of 
 science have before them, that only by dividing 
 and subdividing their labours can they deal witli 
 it. To a complete knowledge of his own division, 
 each adds but a general knowledge of the rest.
 
 DISCIPLINE OF MEMORY AND JUDGMENT. 87 
 
 Surely, tlien, science, cultivated even to a very 
 moderate extent, affords adequate exercise for 
 memory. To say tlie very least, it involves quite 
 as good a training for this faculty as language does. 
 But now mark that while for the training of 
 mere memory, science is as good as, if not better 
 than, language ; it has an immense superiority in 
 the kind of memory it cultivates. In the acquire- 
 ment of a language, the connexions of ideas to he 
 established in the mind correspond to facts that are 
 in great measure accidental ; whereas, in the ac- 
 quirement of science, the connexions of ideas to lie 
 established in the mind correspond to facts that arc 
 mostly necessary. It is true that the relations of 
 words to their meaning is in one sense natural, and 
 that the genesis of these relations may be traced 
 back a certain distance ; though very rarely to 
 the beginning ; (to which let us add the remark 
 that the law^s of this genesis form a branch of mental 
 science — the science of philology.) But since it 
 will not be contended that in the acquisition of 
 languages, as ordinarily carried on, these natural 
 relations between words and their meanings are 
 habitually traced, and the laws regulating them 
 explained ; it must be admitted that they are com- 
 monly learned as fortuitous relations. On the othef 
 hand, the relations which science presents are causal 
 relations ; and, when properly taught, are under- 
 stood as such. Instead of being practically acci- 
 dental, they are necessary ; and as such, give exer- 
 cise to the reasoning faculties. While language
 
 88 VruXT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WOKTH ? 
 
 familiarizes with non-rational relations, science fa- 
 miliarizes with rational relations. AVhile the one 
 exercises memory only, the other exercises both 
 memory and understanding. 
 
 Observe next that a great snperiority of science 
 over language as a means of discipline, is, that it 
 cultivates the judgment. As, in a lecture on mental 
 education delivered at the Eoyal Institution, Pro- 
 fessor Faraday well remarks, the most common 
 intellectual fault is deficiency of judgment. He 
 contends that " society, speaking generally, is not 
 only ignorant as respects education of the judgment, 
 but it is also ignorant of its ignorance." And the 
 cause to which he ascribes this state is want of 
 scientific culture. The truth of his conclusion is 
 obvious. Correct judgment with regard to all 
 surrounding things, events, and consequences, be- 
 comes possible only through knowledge of the way 
 in which surroundiTig phenomena depend on each 
 other. Ko extent of acquaintance with the mean- 
 ings of words, can give the power of forming correct 
 inferences respecting causes and effects. Tlie con- 
 stant habit of drawing conclusions from data, and 
 then of verifying those conclusions by observation 
 and experiment, can alone give the power of judg- 
 ing correctl}". And that it necessitates this habit is 
 one of the immense advantages of science. 
 
 Not only, however, for intellectual discipline is 
 science the best ; but also for vioral discipline. 
 The learning of languages tends, if anything, further 
 to increase the already undue respect for authority.
 
 SCIENCE AFFORDS MOKAL DISCIPLINE. 80 
 
 Such and such are the meanings of these words, 
 says the teacher or the dictionary. So and so is 
 the rule in this case, says the grammar. By the 
 pupil these dicta are received as unquestionable. 
 His constant attitude of mind is that of submission 
 to dogmatic teaching. And a necessary result is a 
 tendency to accept without inquiry whatever is 
 established. Quite opposite is the attitude of min^ 
 generated by tlie cultivation of science. By science, 
 constant appeal is made to individual reason. Its 
 truths are not accepted upon authority alone ; but 
 all are at liberty to test them — ^nay, in many cases, 
 the pupil is required to think out his own conclu- 
 sions. Every step in a scientific investigation is sub- 
 mitted to his judgment. He is not asked io admit 
 it without seeing it to be true. And the trust in 
 his own powers thus produced, is further increased 
 by the constancy with which Xature justifies his 
 conclusions when they are correctly drawn. From 
 all which there flows that independence which is a 
 most valuable element in character. !N^or is this 
 the only moral benefit bequeathed by scientific 
 culture. "When carried on, as it should always be, 
 as much as possible under the form of independent 
 research, it exercises perseverance and sincerity. 
 As says Professor Tyudall of inductive inquiry, " it 
 requires patient industry, and an humble and con- 
 scientious acceptance of what Xature reveals. The 
 first condition of success is an honest receptivity 
 and a willingness to abandon all preconceived 
 notions, however cherished, if they be found to
 
 00 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 contradict the tnitli. Believe me, a self-renuncia- 
 tion which has something noble in it, and of which 
 the world never liears, is often enacted in the pi-ivate 
 experience of the true votary of science." 
 
 Lastly we have to assert — and the assertion will, 
 we doubt not, cause extreme surprise — that the 
 discipline of science is superior to that of our ordi- 
 nary education, because of the 7'eligicnis culture that 
 it gives. Of course we do not here use the words 
 scientific and religious in their ordinary limited 
 acceptations ; but in their widest and highest ac- 
 ceptations. Doubtless, to the superstitions that 
 pass under the name of religion, science is antago- 
 nistic ; but not to the essential religion which these 
 superstitions merely hide. Doubtless, too, in mucli 
 of the science that is current, there is a pervading 
 spirit of irreligion ; but not in that true science 
 whicli has passed beyond the superficial into the 
 profound. 
 
 " True science and true religion," says Professor Iluxley 
 at the close of a recent course of lectures, " are twin-sisters, 
 and the separation of either from the otlier is sure to prove 
 the death of both. Science prospers exactly in proportion as 
 it is I'eligious ; and religion flourishes in exact proportion to 
 the scientific depth and firmness of its basis. The great deeds 
 of philosophers have been less the fruit of their intellect than 
 of the direction of that intellect by an eminently religious tone 
 of mind. Truth has yielded herself rather to their patience, 
 their love, their single-heartedness, and their self-denial, than 
 to their logical acumen." 
 
 So far from science being irreligious, as many
 
 RELIGIOUS INFLUENCE OF SCIENCE. 91 
 
 think, tt is the neglect of science that is irreligious 
 — it is the refusal to study the suirounding creation 
 that is irreligious. Take a humhle simile. Sup- 
 jiose a writer were daily sahited with praises 
 couched in superlative language. Suppose the 
 wisdom, the grandeur, the beauty of his works, 
 were the constant topics of the eulogies addressed 
 to him. Suppose those who unceasingly uttered 
 these eulogies on his works were content with look- 
 ing at the outsides of them ; and had never opened 
 them, much less tried to understand them. What 
 value should we put upon their praises ? What 
 should we think of their sincerity ? Yet, compar- 
 ing small things to great, such is the conduct of 
 mankind in general, in reference to the Universe 
 and its Cause. Nay, it is worse, l^ot only do they 
 pass by without study, these things which they daily 
 proclaim to be so wonderful ; but very frequently 
 they condemn as mere triflers those who give time 
 to the observation of I^ature — they actually scorn 
 those who show any active interest in these marvels. 
 We repeat, then, that not science, but the neglect 
 of science, is irreligious. Devotion to science, is 
 a tacit worship — a tacit recognition of worth in the 
 things studied ; and by implication in their Cause. 
 It is not a mere lip-homage, but a homage ex- 
 pressed in actions — not a mere professed respect, 
 but a respect proved by the sacrifice of time, thought, 
 and labour. 
 
 Nor is it thus only that true science is essentially 
 religious. It is religious, too, inasmuch as it geiv
 
 92 -WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH? 
 
 erates a profound respect for, and an implicit faith 
 in, those uniform laws which underlie all things. 
 By accumulated experiences the man of science ac- 
 quires a thorough belief in the unclianging relations 
 of phenomena — in the invariable connexion of cause 
 and consequence — in the necessity of good or evil 
 results. Instead of the rewards and i)unishments 
 of traditional belief, which men vaguely hope they 
 may gain, or escape, spite of their disobedience ; 
 he finds that there are rewards and punishments in 
 the ordained constitution of things, and that the 
 evil results of disobedience are inevitable. He sees 
 that the laws to which we must submit are not 
 only inexorable but beneficent. He sees that in 
 virtue of these laws, the process of things is ever 
 towards a greater perfection and a higher happiness. 
 Hence he is led constantly to insist on these laws, 
 and is indignant when men disregard them. And 
 thus does he, by asserting the eternal principles 
 of things and the necessity of conforming to them, 
 prove himself intrinsically religious. 
 
 To all which add the further religious aspect of 
 science, that it alone can give us true conceptions 
 of ourselves and our relation to the mysteries of 
 existence. At the same time that it shows us all 
 which can be known, it shows us the limits beyond 
 which we can know nothing. Kot by dogmatic 
 assertion does it teach the inq)OS6ibility of compre- 
 hending the ultimate cause of things ; but it leads 
 US clearly to recognise this impossibility by bring- 
 ing us in every direction to boundaries we cannot
 
 TRANSCENDENT VxVLUE OF SCIENCE. 93 
 
 cross. It realizes to us in a vraj wliicli notliing 
 else can, the littleness of liuman intelligence in the 
 face of that which transcends human intelligence. 
 "While towards the traditions and authorities of men 
 its attitude may be proud, before the impenetrable 
 veil which hides the Absolute its attitude is humble 
 — a true pride and a true humility. Only the sin- 
 cere man of science (and by this title we do not 
 mean the mere calculator of distances, or analyser 
 of compounds, or labeller of species ; but him who 
 through lower truths seeks higher, and eventually 
 the highest) — only the genuine man of science, we 
 say, can truly know how utterly beyond, not only 
 liuman knowledge, but human conception, is the 
 Universal Power of which ISTature, and Life, and 
 Thought are manifestations. 
 
 We conclude, then, that for discipline, as well 
 as for guidance, science is of chiefest value. In 
 all its eifects, learning the meanings of things, 
 is better than learning the meanings of words. 
 Whether for intellectual, moral, or religious train- 
 ing, the study of surrounding phenomena is im- 
 mensely superior to the study of grammars and 
 lexicons. 
 
 Tlius to the question with which we set out — • 
 What knowledge is of most worth ? — the uniform 
 reply is — Science. Tliis is the verdict on all the 
 counts. For direct self-preservation, or the main- 
 tenance of life and health, the all-important knowl- 
 edge is — Science. For that indirect self-preservation
 
 94 WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST WORTH ? 
 
 wliicli wo call gaming a livcliliood, tlic knowledge 
 of greatest value is — Scienee. For the due dis- 
 charge of parental fimctions, the proper guidance 
 is to be found only in — Science, For that interpre- 
 tation of national life, past and present, without 
 which the citizen cannot rightly regulate his con- 
 duct, the indispensable key is — Science. Alike for 
 the most perfect production and highest enjoy- 
 ment of art in all its forms, the needful preparation 
 is still — Science. And for purposes of discipline 
 — intellectual, moral, religious — the most efficient 
 study is, once more — Science. The question which 
 at first seemed so perplexed, has become, in the 
 course of our inquiry, comparatively simple. We 
 have not to estimate the degrees of importance of 
 different orders of human activity, and different 
 studies as severally fitting us for them ; since we 
 find that the study of Science, in its . most compre- 
 hensive meaning, is the best preparation for all 
 these orders of activity. We have not to decide 
 between the claims of knowledge of great though 
 conventional value, and knowledge of less though 
 intrinsic value ; seeing that the knowledge which 
 we find to be of most value in all other respects, is 
 intrinsically most valuable : its worth is not de- 
 pendent u})on opinion, but is as fixed as is the rela- 
 tion of man to the surrounding world. Necessary 
 and eternal as are its truths, all Science concerns 
 all numkind for all time. Equally at present, and 
 in the remotest future, must it be of incalculable 
 importance for the regulation of their conduct, that
 
 STRANGE NEGLECT OF SCIENCE. 05 
 
 men should understand the science of life, physical, 
 mental, and social ; and that they should under- 
 stand all other science as a key to the science of 
 life. 
 
 And yet the knowledge which is of such tran- 
 scendent value is that which, in our age of boasted 
 education, receives the least attention. While this 
 which we call civilization could never have arisen 
 had it not been for science ; science forms scarcely 
 an a})preciable element in what men consider civi- 
 lized training. Though to the progress of science 
 we owe it, that millions find support where once 
 there was food only for thousands ; yet of these 
 millions but a few thousands pay any respect to 
 that which has made their existence possible. 
 Though this increasing knowledge of the proper- 
 ties and relations of things has not only enabled 
 wandering tribes to grow into pojDulous nations, 
 but has given to the countless members of those 
 populous nations comforts and pleasures which their 
 few naked ancestors never even conceived, or could 
 have believed, yet is this kind of knowledge only 
 now receiving a grudging recognition in our highest 
 educational institutions. To the slowly growing 
 acquaintance with the uniform co-existences and 
 sequences of phenomena — to the establishment of 
 invariable laws, we owe our emancipation from the 
 grossest superstitions. But for science we should be 
 still worshipping fetishes ; or, with hecatombs of 
 victims, propitiating diabolical deities. And yet 
 this science, wdiich, in place of the most degrading 
 6
 
 9G WHAT KNOWLEDGE IS OF MOST "WOR'IIJ ? 
 
 conceptions of tilings, lias given us some insight 
 into the grandeurs of creation, is written against in 
 our theologies and frowned upon from our pulpits. 
 Paraphrasing an Eastern fable, we may say that 
 in the family of knowledges, Science is the house- 
 hold drudge, who, in obscurity, hides unrecognised 
 perfections. To her has been committed all the 
 work ; by her skill, intelligence, and devotion, have 
 all the conveniences and gratifications been ob- 
 tained ; and while ceaselessly occupied ministering 
 to the rest, she has been kept in the background, 
 that her haughty sisters might flaunt their fri])- 
 peries in the eyes of the world. Tlie parallel holds 
 yet further. For we are fast coming to the deiimie- 
 ment^ when the positions will be changed ; and 
 while these haughty sisters sink into merited neg- 
 lect, Science, proclaimed as highest alike in worth 
 and beauty, will reign supreme.
 
 CHAl^ER n. 
 
 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 There cannot fail to be a relationship between 
 the successive systems of education, and the suc- 
 eessiv^e social states with which they have co-existed. 
 Having a common origin in the national mind, the 
 institutions of each epoch, whatever be their gpecial 
 functions, must have a family likeness. When men 
 received their creed and its interpretations from an 
 infallible authority deigning no explanations, it was 
 natural that the teaching of children should be 
 purely dogmatic. While " believe and ask no 
 questions " was the maxim of the Church, it was fitly 
 the maxim of the school. Conversely, now that 
 Protestantism has gained for adults a right of 
 private judgment and established the practice of 
 appealing to reason, there is harmony in the change 
 that has made juvenile instruction a process of ex- 
 position addressed to the understanding. Along 
 with j)olitical despotism, stern in its commands, 
 ruling by force of terror, visiting trifling crimes 
 with death, and implacable in its vengeance on the 
 disloyal, there necessarily grew up an academic 
 discipline similarly harsh — a discipline of multiplied 
 injunctions and blows for every breach of them — a
 
 98 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 discipline of unlimited autocracy iijjlickl by rods, 
 and ferules, and the black-hole. On the other hand, 
 the increase of political liberty, the abolition ot 
 law restricting individual action, and the ameliora- 
 tion of the criminal code, have been accompanied 
 by a kindred progress towards non-coercive educa- 
 tion : the pupil is hampered by fewer restraints, 
 and other means than punishments are used to gov- 
 ern him. In those ascetic days when men, acting 
 on the greatest misery principle, held that the more 
 gratifications they denied themselves the more vir- 
 tuous they were, they, as a matter of course, con- 
 sidered that the best education which most thwarted 
 the wishes of their children, and cut short all spon- 
 taneous activity with — " You mustn't do so." 
 While on the contrary, now that happiness is com- 
 ing to be regarded as a legitimate aim — now that 
 hours of labour are being shortened and popular 
 recreations provided, parents and teachers are be- 
 ginning to see that most childish desires may 
 rightly be gratified, that childish sports should be 
 encouraged, and that the tendencies of the growing 
 mind are not altogether so diabolical as was sup- 
 posed. The age in which all thought that trades 
 nmst be established by bounties and prohibitions ; 
 that manufacturers needed their materials and quali- 
 ties and prices to be prescribed ; and that the value 
 of money could be determined by law ; was an 
 age which unavoidably cherished the notions that 
 a child's- mind could be made to order ; that its 
 powers were to be imparted by the schoolmaster • 
 
 I 
 
 i
 
 AN ORDER OF MENTAL EVOLUTION. 99 
 
 tliat it was a receptacle into wliicli knowledge was 
 to l)e put and there built up after its teacher's ideal. 
 In this free-trade era, however, when we are learn- 
 ing that there is much more self- regul ation in things 
 tlian was supposed ; that labour, and commerce, 
 and agriculture, and navigation can do better with- 
 out management than with it ; that political gov- 
 ernments, to be efficient, must grow up from within 
 and not be imposed from without ; we are also 
 beginnng to see that there is a natnral process of 
 mental evolution which is not to be disturbed 
 without injury ; that we may not force on the un- 
 folding mind our artificial forms ; but that Psy- 
 chology, also, discloses to us a law of supply and 
 demand, to which, if we would not do harm, we 
 must conform. Thus alike in its oracular dogma- 
 tism, in its harsh discipline, in its multiplied restric- 
 tions, in its professed asceticism, and in its faith in 
 the devices of men, the old educational regime was 
 akin to the social systems with which it was con- 
 temporaneous ; and similarly, in the reverse of these 
 characteristics our luodern modes of culture corre- 
 spond to our more liberal religious and political 
 institutions. 
 
 But there remain further parallelisms to which 
 we have not yet adverted : that, namely, between 
 the j)i'Ocesses by which these respective changes 
 have been wrought out ; and that between the 
 several states of heterogeneous opinion to which 
 they have led. Some centuries ago there was 
 Uniformity of belief — religious, political, and edu'
 
 100 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 cational. All men -were llomanists, all were 
 Monarchists, all were disciples of Aristotle, and r.o 
 one thonglit of calling in question that grammar- 
 school routine nnder which all were brought up, 
 Tlie same agency has in each case replaced this 
 uniformity by a constantly increasing diversity. 
 Tliat tendency towards assertion of the individuality, 
 which, after contributing to produce the great 
 Protestant movement, has since gone on to produce 
 an ever-increasing number of sects — that tendency 
 which initiated political parties, and out of the two 
 primary ones has, in these modern days, evolved a 
 multiplicity to which every year adds — that ten- 
 dency which led to the Baconian rebellion against 
 the schools, and has since originated here and 
 abroad sundry new systems of thought — is a ten- 
 dency which, in education also, has caused division 
 and the accumulation of methods. As external 
 consequences of the same internal change, these 
 processes have necessarily been more or less simul- 
 taneous. Tlie decline of authority, whether papal, 
 philosophic, kingly, or tutorial, is essentially one 
 phenomenon ; in each of its aspects a leaning tow- 
 ards free action is seen alike in the working out of 
 the change itself, and in the new forms of theory 
 and practice to which the change has given birth. 
 
 While many will regret this multiplication of 
 schemes of juvenile culture, the catholic observer 
 will discern in it a means of ensuring the final estab- 
 lisliment of a rational system. Whatever may bo 
 thought of theological dissent, it is clear that dissent
 
 Till': TRANSITION STAGE OF INQUIRY. lOl 
 
 in education results in facilitating inquiry by tlie 
 division in labour. Were we in possession of tlio 
 true method, divergence from it would, of course, 
 be prejudicial ; but the true method having to be 
 found, the efforts of numerous independent seekers 
 carrying out their researches in different directions, 
 constitute a better agency for finding it than any 
 that could be devised. Each of them struck by 
 some new thought which probably contains more 
 or less of basis in facts — each of them zealous on 
 behalf of his plan, fertile in expedients to test 
 its correctness, and untiring in his efforts to make 
 known its success — each of them merciless in his 
 criticism on the rest — there cannot fail, by composi- 
 tion of forces, to be a gradual approximation of all 
 towards the right course. Whatever portion of the 
 normal method any one of them has discovered, 
 must, by the constant exhibition of its results, force 
 itself into adoption ; whatever wrong practices he 
 has joined with it must, by rej)eated experiment and 
 failure, be exploded. And by this aggregation of 
 truths and elimination of errors, there must eventu- 
 ally be developed a correct and complete body of 
 doctrine. Of the three phases through which human 
 opinion passes — the unanimity of the ignorant, the 
 disagreement of the inquiring, and the unanimity of 
 the wise — it is manifest that the second is the parent 
 of the third. They are not sequences in time only ; 
 they are sequences in causation. However impa* 
 tiently, therefore, we may witness the present con- 
 flict of educational systems, and however much we
 
 102 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 may regret its accompanying evils, we must recog* 
 nise it as a transition stage needful to be passed 
 tlirougli, and beneficent in its ultimate efi'ects. 
 
 Meanwhile may we not advantageously take 
 stock of our progress ? After fifty years of discus- 
 sion, experiment, and comparison of results, may 
 W3 not expect a few steps towards the goal to be 
 already made good ? Some old methods must by 
 this time have fallen out of use ; some new ones 
 must have become established ; and many others 
 must be in process of general abandonment or 
 adoption. Probably we may see in these various 
 changes, when put side by side, similar characteris- 
 tics — may find in them a common tendency ; and 
 so, by inference, may get a clue to the direction in 
 which experience is leading us, and gather hints 
 bow we may achieve yet further improvements. 
 Let us then, as a preliminary to a deeper considera- 
 tion of the matter, glance at the leading contrasts 
 between the education of the past and of the present. 
 
 Tlie suppression of every error is commonly 
 followed by a temporary ascendency of the contrary 
 one ; and it so happened, that after the ages when 
 physical development alone was aimed at^ there 
 came an age when culture of the mind was the.sole 
 solicitude — when children had lesson-books put be- 
 fore them at between two and three years old — when 
 school-hours were protracted, and the getting of 
 knowledire was thoui^ht the one thini):: needful. As, 
 further, it usually happens, that after one of these 
 reactions the next advance is acliieved by co-ordi-
 
 CrLTUKE OF THE WHOLE BEING. 103 
 
 hfl,tiHg the antagonist errors, and perceiving that they 
 are opposite sides of one truth ; so we are now com- 
 ing to the conviction that body and mind must both 
 be cared for, and the whole being unfolded. Tlie 
 forcing system has been in great measure given np, 
 and precocity is discouraged. People are begimiing 
 to see that the lirst requisite to success in life, is to 
 be a good animal. The best brain is found of little 
 service, if there be not enough vital energy to work 
 it ; and hence to obtain the one by sacrificing the 
 source of the other, is now considered a folly — a 
 folly which the eventual failure of juvenile prodigies 
 constantly illustrates. Thus we are discovering the 
 wisdom of the saying, that one secret in education 
 is " to know how wisely to lose time." 
 
 The once universal practice of learning by rote, 
 is daily falling more into discredit. All modern 
 authorities condemn the old mechanical way of 
 teaching the alphabet. The multiplication table is 
 now frequently taught experimentally. In the ac- 
 quirement of languages, the grammar-school plan 
 is being superseded by plans based on the spontane- 
 ous process followed by the child in gaining its 
 mother tongue. Describing the methods there used, 
 the " Reports on the Training School at Battersea " 
 say : — " The instruction in the whole preparatory 
 course is chiefly oral, and is illustrated as much as 
 possible by appeals to nature." And so throughout. 
 The rote-system, like other systems of its age, made 
 more of the forms and symbols than of the things 
 symbolized. To repeat the words correctly wa«»
 
 |04r INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 everything; to understand tlieir meaning nothing! 
 and thus the si)irit was sacrificed to the letter. It 
 is at length perceived, that in this case as in others, 
 such a result is not accidental but necessary — that 
 in proportion as there is attention to the signs, there 
 must be inattention to the things signified ; or that, 
 as Montaigne long ago said — Scavoir jpar ccBur rCest 
 pas sgavoir. 
 
 Along with rote-teaching, is declining also the 
 nearly allied teaching by rules. The particulars 
 first, and then the generalization, is the new method 
 — a method, as the Battersea School Keports re- 
 mark, which, though " the reverse of the method 
 usually followed which consists in giving the pupil 
 the rule first," is yet proved by experience to be 
 the right one. Itule-teaching is now condemned as 
 imparting a merely empirical knowledge — as pro- 
 ducing an appearance of understanding without the 
 reality. To give the net product of inquiry, with- 
 out the inquiry that leads to it, is fonnd to be both 
 enervating and inefficient. General truths to be of 
 due and permanent use, must be earned. " Easy 
 come easy go," is a saying as applicable to knowl- 
 edge as to wealth. While rules, lying isolated in 
 the mind — not joined to its otlier contents as out- 
 growths from them — are continually forgotten, the 
 principles which those rules express piecemeal, be- 
 come, when once reached by the understanding, 
 enduring possessions. While the rule-taught youth 
 is at sea when beyond his rules, the youth instructed 
 in principles solves a new case as readily as an old
 
 MISCHIEFS OF EULE-TEACHING. 105 
 
 one. Between a mind of rules and a mind of prin- 
 ciples, there exists a difference snch as that between 
 a confused heap of materials, and the same materials 
 organized into a complete whole, with all it^ parts 
 bound together. Of which types this last has not 
 onlj the advantage that its constituent parts are 
 better retained, but the much greater advantage, 
 that it forms an efficient agent for inquiry, for inde^ 
 pendent thought, for discovery — ends for which the 
 first is useless. Xor let it be supposed that this is 
 a simile only : it is the literal truth. The union of 
 facts into generalizations I's the organization of 
 knowledge, whether considered as an objective phe- 
 nomenon, or a subjective one : and the mental grasp 
 may be measured by the extent to which this or- 
 ganization is carried. 
 
 From the substitution of principles for rules, and 
 the necessarily co-ordinate practice of leaving ab- 
 stractions untaught until the mind has been famil- 
 iarized with the facts from which they are ab- 
 stracted, has resulted the postponement of some once 
 early studies to a late period. Tliis is exemplified 
 in the abandonment of that intensely stupid custom, 
 the teaching of grammar to children. As M. Mar- 
 cel says : — " It may without hesitation be affirmed 
 that grammar is not the stepping-stone, but the 
 finishing instrument." As Mr. Wyse argues : — 
 " Grammar and Syntax are a collection of laws and 
 rules. Rules are gathered from practice ; they are 
 the results of induction to which we come by long 
 observation and compai'ison of facts. It is, in fine,
 
 106 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 tlie science, the philosophy of language. In follow- 
 ing the process of nature, neither individuals nor 
 nations ever arrive at the science ^Vs^. A language 
 is spoken, and poetry written, many years before 
 either a grammar or prosody is even thought of. 
 Men did not wait till Aristotle had constructed his 
 logic, to reason. In short, as grammar was made 
 after language, so ought it to be taught after lan- 
 guage : an inference which all who recognise the 
 relationship between the evolution of the race and of 
 the individual, will see to be unavoidable. 
 
 Of new practices that have grown up during the 
 decline of these old ones, the most important is the 
 systematic culture of the powers of observation. 
 After long ages of blindness men are at last seeing 
 that the spontaneous activity of the observing fac- 
 ulties in children has a meaning and a use. What 
 was once thought mere purposeless action, or play, 
 or mischief, as the case might be, is now recog- 
 nised as the process of acquiring a knowledge on 
 which all after-knowledge is based. Hence the 
 well-conceived but ill-conducted system of ohject- 
 Icssons. Tlie saying of Bacon, that physics is the 
 mother of sciences, has come to have a meaning 
 in education. Without an accurate acquaintance 
 with the visible and tangible properties of things, 
 our conceptions must be erroneous, our inferences 
 fallacious, and our operations unsuccessful. " The 
 education of the senses neglected, all after education 
 partakes of a drowsiness, a haziness, an insufficiency 
 which it is impossible to cure." Indeed, if we con- 
 
 I
 
 TRAINING THE POWERS OF OBSERVATION. lOT 
 
 sider it, we shall find tliat exliaiistive observation is 
 an element in all great success. It is not to artists, 
 naturalists, and men of science only, that it is need- 
 ful ; it is not only that the skilful physician depends 
 on it for the correctness of his diagnosis, and that 
 to the good engineer it is so important that some 
 years in the workshop are prescribed for him ; but 
 we may see that the philosopher also is fundamen- 
 tally one who observes relationships of things which 
 others had overlooked, and that the poet, too, is one 
 who sees the fine facts in nature which all recognise 
 when pointed out, but did not before remark. Noth- 
 ing requires more to be insisted on than that vivid 
 and complete impressions are all essential. No 
 sound fabric of wisdom can be woven out of a rot- 
 ten raw-material. 
 
 While the old method of presenting truths in 
 the abstract has been falling out of use, there has 
 been a corresponding adoption of the new method 
 of presenting them in the concrete. Tlie rudimen- 
 tary facts of exact science are now being learnt by 
 direct intuition, as textures, and tastes, and colours 
 are learnt. Employing the ball-frame for first les- 
 sons in arithmetic exemplifies this. It is well illus- 
 trated, too, in Professor De Morgan's mode of ex- 
 plaining the decimal notation. M. Marcel, rightly 
 repudiating the old system of tables, teaches weiglits 
 and measures by referring to the actual yard and 
 foot, pound and ounce, gallon and quart ; and lets 
 the discovery of their relationships be experimental. 
 The use of geographical models and models of the
 
 108 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 regular bodies, &c. as introductory to geography 
 and geometry respectively, are facts of the same 
 class. Manifestly a common trait of these methods 
 is, that they carry each child's mind through a pro- 
 cess like that which the mind of humanity at large 
 has gone through. The truths of number, of form, 
 of relationship in position, were all originally drawn 
 from objects; and to present these truths to the 
 child in the concrete is to let him learn them as the 
 race learnt them. By and by, perhaps, it will be 
 seen that he cannot possibly learn them in any other 
 way ; for that if he is made to repeat them as ab- 
 stractions, the abstractions can have no meaning for 
 him, until he finds that they are simply statements 
 of what he intuitively discerns. 
 
 But of all the changes taking place, the most 
 significant is the growing desire to make the acquire- 
 ment of knowledge pleasurable rather than painful 
 — a desire based on the more or less distinct percep- 
 tion that at each age the intellectual action which 
 a child likes is a healthful one for it ; and con- 
 versely. There is a spreading opinion that the rise 
 of an appetite for any kind of knowledge implies 
 that the unfolding mind has become fit to assimilate 
 it, and needs it for the purposes of growth ; and 
 that on the other hand, the disgust felt towards any 
 kind of knowledge is a sign either that it is prema- 
 turely presented, or that it is presented in an indi- 
 gestible form. Hence the efforts to make early 
 education amusing, and all education interesting. 
 Hence the lectures on the value of play. Hence
 
 THE NATURAL METHOD PLEASURABLE. 109 
 
 the defence of nursery rhymes, and fairy tales. 
 Daily we more and more conform our plans to ju- 
 venile opinion. Does the child like this or that kind 
 of teaching ? does he take to it ? we constantly ask. 
 " His natural desire of variety should be indulged," 
 says M. Marcel ; " and the gratification of his curi- 
 osity should be combined with his improvement." 
 " Lessons," he again remarks, " should cease before 
 the child evinces symptoms of weariness." And so 
 with later education. Short breaks during school- 
 hours, excursions into the country, amusing lectures, 
 choral songs — in these and many like traits, the 
 change may be discerned. Asceticism is disapj)ear- 
 ing out of education as out of life ; and the usual 
 test of political legislation — its tendency to pi'omote 
 happiness — ^is beginning to be, in a great degree, 
 the test of legislation for the school and the nursery. 
 "What now is the common characteristic of these 
 several changes ? Is it not an increasing conformity 
 to the methods of nature ? The relinquishment of 
 early forcing against which nature ever rebels, and 
 the leaving of the iirst years for exercise of the 
 limbs and senses, show this. The superseding of 
 rote-learnt lessons by lessons orally and experimen- 
 tally given, like those of the field and play -ground, 
 shows this. The disuse of rule-teaching, and the 
 adoption of teaching by principles — that is, the 
 leaving of generalizations until there are particulars 
 to base them on — show this. The system of object- 
 lessons shows this. The teaching of the rudiments 
 of science in the concrete instead of the abstract,
 
 110 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 shows tliis. And above all, this tendency is sho^rn 
 in the variously directed efibrts to present knowl- 
 edge in attractive forms, and so to make the ac- 
 quirement of it pleasurable. For as it is the order 
 of nature in all creatures that the gratification ac- 
 companying the fulfilment of needful functions 
 serves as a stimulus to. their fulfilment — as during 
 the self-education of the young child, the delight 
 taken in the biting of corals, and the pulling to 
 pieces of toys, becomes the prompter to actions 
 which teach it the properties of matter ; it follows 
 that, in choosing the succession of subjects and the 
 modes of instruction which most interest the pupil, 
 we are fulfilling nature's behests, and adjusting our 
 proceedings to the laws of life. 
 
 Thus, then, we are on the highway towards the 
 doctrine long ago enunciated by Pestalozzi, that 
 alike in its order and its methods, education must 
 conform to the natural process of mental evolution 
 — that there is a certain sequence in which the facul- 
 ties spontaneously develop, and a certain kind of 
 knowledge which each requires during its develop- 
 ment ; and that it is for us to ascertain this sequence, 
 and supply this knowledge. All the improvements 
 above alluded to are partial applications of this 
 general principle. A nebulous jDerception of it 
 now prevails among teachers ; and it is daily more 
 insisted on in educational works. " The method of 
 nature is the archetype of all methods," says M. 
 Marcel. " The vital principle in the pursuit is to 
 enable the pupil rightly to instruct himself," writes
 
 ORDER OF EVOLUTION' OF THE FACULTIES. Ill 
 
 Mr. Wjse. Tlie more science familiarizes us with 
 the constitution of things the more do we see in 
 them an inherent self-sufficingness. A higher 
 knowledge tends continually to limit our interfer-. 
 ence with the processes of life. As in medicine tlie 
 old " heroic treatment " has given place to mild 
 treatment, and often no treatment save a normal re- 
 gimen — as we have found that it is not needful to 
 mould the bodies of babes by bandaging them in 
 papoose fashion or otherwise — as in gaols it is being 
 discovered that no cunningly devised discipline of 
 ours is so efficient in producing reformation as the 
 natural discipline, the making prisoners maintain 
 themselves by productive labour ; so in education 
 we are finding that success is to be achieved only 
 by rendering our measures subservient to that spon- 
 taneous unfolding which all minds go through in 
 their progress to maturity. 
 
 Of course, this fundamental principle of tuition, 
 that the arrangement of matter and method must 
 correspond with the order of evolution and mode 
 of activity of the faculties — a principle so obviously 
 true, that once stated it seems almost self-evident — 
 has never been wholly disregarded. Teachers have 
 unavoidably made their school-courses coincide with 
 it in some degree, for the simple reason that educa- 
 tion is possible only on that condition. Boys were 
 never taught the rule-of-three until after they had 
 learnt addition. Tliey were not set to write exer- 
 cises before they had got into their copy-books. 
 Conic sections have always been jireceded by Eu- 
 7
 
 112 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 did. But the error of the old methods consists in 
 tliis, that they do not recofjiiise in detail what they 
 are obliged to recognise in the general. Yet the 
 principle applies throughout. If from the time 
 when a child is aLle to conceive tM'o things as re- 
 lated in position, years must elapse before it can 
 form a true concept of the earth, as a sphere made 
 up of land and sea, covered with mountains, forests, 
 rivers, and cities, revolving on its axis, and sweep- 
 ing round the sun — if it gets from the one concept 
 to the other by degrees — if the intermediate concepts 
 which it forms are consecutively larger and more 
 complicated ; is it not manifest that there is a gen- 
 eral succession through which only it can pass ; 
 that each larger concept is made by the combina- 
 tion of smaller ones, and presupposes them ; and 
 that to present any of these compound concepts be- 
 fore the child is in possession of its constituent 
 ones, is only less absurd than to present the final 
 concept of the series before the initial one ? In the 
 mastering of every subject some course of increasing- 
 ly complex ideas has to be gone through. Tlie evo- 
 lution of the corresponding faculties consists in the 
 assimilation of these ; which, in any true sense, is 
 impossible without they are put into the mind in 
 the normal order. And when this order is not fol- 
 lowed, the result is, that they are received with 
 apathy or disgust ; and that unless the pupil is in- 
 telligent enough to eventually fill uj) the gaps him- 
 self, they lie in his memory as dead facts, capable 
 of beinof turned to little or no use.
 
 GUIDANCE NOT TO BE DISPENSED M'lTII. 110 
 
 " But wliy trouble ourselves about any curri- 
 culum at all i " it may be asked. " If it be true 
 that tlie mind like the body has a predetermined 
 course of evolution, — if it unfolds spontaneously — • 
 if its successive desires for this or that kind of in- 
 formation arise when these are severally required 
 for its nutrition, — if there thus exists in itself a 
 prompter to the right species of activity at the 
 right time ; why interfere in any way ? Why not 
 leave children vAolhj to the discipline of nature I — 
 why not remain quite passive and let them get 
 knowledge as they best can ? — why not be consistent 
 throughout ? " Tliis is an awkward looking ques- 
 tion. Plausibly implying as it does, that a system 
 of complete Zrm'6'<?2;/r«Ve is the logical outcome of 
 the doctrines set forth, it seems to furnish a disproof 
 of them by reductio ad absurdum. In truth, how- 
 ever, they do not, when rightly understood, commit 
 us to any such untenable position. A glance at 
 the physical analogies will clearly show this. It is 
 a general law of all life that the more complex the 
 organism to be produced, the longer the period 
 during which it is dependent on a parent organism 
 for food and protection. Tlio contrast between the 
 minute, rapidly-formed, and self-moving spore of a 
 conferva, and the slowly developed seed of a tree, 
 with its ]nultiplied envelopes and large stock of 
 nutriment laid by to nourish the germ during its 
 first stages of growth, illustrates this law in its 
 application to the vegetable world. Among animal 
 organisms we may trace it in a series of coii-
 
 11 4: INTELLECTUAL EDUCA'nON. 
 
 trasts from the monad whose spontaneously-divided 
 halves are as self-sufficing the moment after their 
 separation as was the original whole ; np to man, 
 whose off'spring not only passes through a protracted 
 gestation, and subsequently long depends on the 
 breast for sustenance ; but after that must have 
 its food artificially administered ; must, after it 
 has learned to feed itself, continne to have bread, 
 clothing, and shelter provided ; and does not acquire 
 the power of complete self-support nntil a time 
 varying from fifteen to twenty years after its birth. 
 Now this law applies to the mind as to the body. 
 For mental pabulum also, every higher creature, 
 and especially man, is at first dependent on adult 
 aid. Lacking the ability to move about, the babe 
 is as powerless to get materials on which to exer- 
 cise its perceptions as it is to get sujDplies for its 
 stomach. Unable to prepare its own food, it is in 
 like manner unable to reduce many kinds of knowl- 
 edge to a fit form for assimilation. Tlie language 
 through which all higher truths are to be gained it 
 wholly derives from those surrounding it. And 
 we see in such an example as the Wild Boy of 
 Aveyron, the arrest of development that results 
 when no help is received from parents and nurses. 
 Thus, in providing from day to day the right kind 
 of facts, prepared in the right manner, and giving 
 them in due abundance at appropriate intervals, 
 there is as much scope for active ministration to a 
 child's mind as to its body. In either case it is 
 the chief function of parents to see that die condi-
 
 PROVISION OF MENTAL NUTRIMENT. 115 
 
 tions requisite to growth are maintained. And, as 
 in supplying aliment, and clothing, and shelter, 
 they may fulfil this function without at all inter- 
 fering with the spontaneous development of the 
 limbs and viscera either in their order or mode ; so 
 they may supply sounds for imitation, objects for 
 examination, books for reading, problems for solu- 
 tion, and, if they use neither direct nor indirect 
 coercion, may do this without in any way disturb- 
 ing the normal process of mental evolution ; or 
 rather, may greatly facilitate that process. Hence 
 the admission of the doctrines enunciated does not, 
 as some might argue, involve the abandonment of 
 all teaching ; but leaves ample room for an active 
 and elaborate course of culture. 
 
 Passing from generalities to special considera- 
 tions it is to be ronarked that in practice, the Pes- 
 talozzinn system seems scarcely to have fulfilled the 
 promise of its theory. We hear of children not at 
 all interested in its lessons, — disgusted with them 
 rather ; and, so far as we can gather, the Pestaloz- 
 zian schools have not turned out any unusual pro- 
 portion of distinguished men, — if even they have 
 reached the average. We are not surprised at this. 
 The success of every appliance depends mainly upon 
 the intelligence with which it is used. It is a trite 
 remark, tJiat, having the choicest tools, an unskilful 
 artisan will botch his work ; and bad teachers will 
 fail even with the best methods. Indeed, the good- 
 ness of the method becomes in such case a cause of
 
 116 INTtLLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 failure ; as, to continue the simile, the perfection oi 
 the tool becomes in undisciplined hands a source of 
 imperfection in results. A simple, unchanging, 
 almost mechanical routine of tuition may be carried 
 out by the commonest intellects, •with such small 
 beneficial effect as it is capable of producing ; but 
 a complete system, — a system as heterogeneous in 
 its appliances as the mind in its faculties, — a system 
 proposing a special means for each special end, de- 
 mands for its right employment powers such as few 
 teachers possess. Tlie mistress of a dame-school can 
 hear spelling-lessons ; any hedge-schoolmaster can 
 drill boys in the multiplication-table ; but to teach 
 spelling rightly by using the powers of the letters 
 instead of their names, or to instruct in numerical 
 combinations by experimental synthesis, a modicum 
 of understanding is needful : and to pursue a like 
 rational course throughout the entire range of 
 studies, asks an amount of judgment, of invention, 
 of intellectual sympathy, of analytical faculty, 
 which we shall never see applied to it while the 
 tutorial office is held in such small esteem. The 
 true education is practicable only to the true philos- 
 opher. Judge, then, what prospect a philosophical 
 method now has of being acted out ! Knowing so 
 little as we yet do of Psychology, and ignorant as 
 our teachers are of that little, what chance has a 
 system which requires Psychology for its basis ? 
 
 Further hindrance and discouragement has arisen 
 from confounding the Pestalozzian principle with 
 the forms in which it has been embodied. Because
 
 PESTALOZZl's rRACTICE DEFECTIVr:. Ill 
 
 particular plans have not answered expectation, 
 discredit has been cast upon the doctrine associated 
 with them ; no inquiry being made whether these 
 plans truly conform to such doctrine. Judging as 
 usual by the concrete rather than the abstract, men 
 have blamed the theory for the bunglings of the 
 practice. It is as though Papin's futile attempt to 
 construct a steam-engine had been held to prove 
 that steam could not be used as a motive power. 
 Let it be constantly borne in mind that while right 
 in his fundamental ideas Pestalozzi was not there- 
 fore right in all his applications of them : and we 
 believe the fact to be that he was often wrong. As 
 described even by his admirers, Pestalozzi was a 
 man of partial intuitions, a man who had occasional 
 flashes of insight, rather than a man of systematic 
 thought. His first great success at Stantz was 
 achieved when he had no books or appliances of 
 ordinary teaching, and vrhen " the only object of 
 his attention was to find out at each moment what 
 instruction his children stood peculiarly in need of, 
 and what was the best manner of connecting it with 
 the knowledge they already possessed." Much of 
 his power was due, not to calmly reasoned-out plans 
 of culture, but to his profound sympathy, which 
 gave him an instinctive perception of childish needs 
 and difiiculties. He lacked the ability logically to 
 co-ordinate and develop the truths which he thus 
 from time to time laid hold of ; and had in great 
 measure to leave this to his assistants, Kruesi, Tob- 
 ler, Buss, Niederer, and Schmid. The result is that
 
 118 INTELLlXrUAL KDCCATION. 
 
 in their details his own phms, and those vicariously 
 devised, contain numerous crudities and incon- 
 sistencies. His nursery -method, described in " The 
 Mother's Manual," beginning as it does with a 
 nomenclature of the difl'erent parts of the body, and 
 proceeding next to specify their relative positions, 
 and next -their connexions, may be proved not at all 
 in accordance with the initial stages of mental evo- 
 lution. His process of teaching the mother tongue 
 by formal exercises in the meanings of words and 
 in the construction of sentences, is quite needless, 
 and must entail on the pupil loss of time, labour, 
 and happiness. His proposed mode of teaching 
 geography is utterly unpestalozzian. And often 
 where his plans are essentially sound they are either 
 incomplete or vitiated by some remnant of the old 
 regime. While, therefore, we would defend in its 
 entire extent the general doctrine which Pestalozzi 
 inauo-urated, we think m-eat evil likelv to result from 
 an uncritical reception of his specific devices. That 
 tendency which mankind constantly exhibit to 
 canonize the forms and practices along with which 
 any great truth has been bequeathed to them, — 
 their liability to prostrate their intellects before the 
 prophet, and swear by his every word, — their prone- 
 ness to mistake the clothing of the idea for the idea 
 itself; renders it needful to insist strongly upon 
 the distinction between the fundamental principle 
 of the Pestalozzian system, and the set of expedients 
 devised for its practice : and to suggest that while 
 the one may be considered as established, the other
 
 TRUTH OF THE PESTALOZZIAN IDEA, 119 
 
 is probably notbing but an achiinbration of tbe 
 normal course. Indeed, on looking at tbe state of 
 our knowledge we may be quite sure tliat tins is 
 the case. Before our educational methods can be 
 made to harmonize in character and arrangement 
 with the faculties in their mode and order of unfold- 
 ing, it is first needful that we ascertain with some 
 completeness how the faculties do unfold. At pres- 
 ent our knowledge of the matter extends only to 
 a few general notions. These general notions must 
 be developed in detail, — must be transformed into 
 a multitude of specific propositions, before we can 
 be said to possess that science on which the art of 
 education must be based. And then when we have 
 definitely made out in what succession, and in what 
 combinations the mental powers become active, it 
 remains to choose out of the many possible ways of 
 exercising each of them that w^hich best conforms 
 to its natural mode of action. Evidently, therefore, 
 it is not to be supposed that even our most advanced 
 modes of teachiug are the right ones, or nearly tli3 
 right ones. 
 
 Bearing in mind tlien this distinction between 
 tbe principle and the practicxi of Pestalozzi, and in- 
 ferring from the grounds assigned that the last must 
 necessarily be very detective, the reader will rate at 
 its true worth the dissatisfaction wnth the system 
 whicb some have expressed ; and will see that the 
 due realization of the Pestalozzian idea remains 
 to be achieved. Should he argue, however, from 
 what has just been said that no such realization is
 
 120 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 at present practicable, and tliat all effort ought to 
 be devoted to the preliiiiiiiary inquiry ; we reply, 
 that though it is not possilde for a scheme of culture 
 to be perfected either in matter or form until a ra- 
 tional Psychology has been established, it is possible, 
 with the aid of certain guiding principles, to make 
 empirical approximations towards a j^erfect scheme. 
 To prepare the way for further research we will 
 now specify these principles. Some of them have 
 already been more or less distinctly implied in the 
 foregoing pages ; but it will be well here to state 
 them all in logical order. 
 
 1. Tliat in education we should proceed from 
 the simple to the complex is a truth which has 
 always been to some extent acted upon ; not pro- 
 fessedly, indeed, nor by any means consistently. 
 The mind grows. Like all things that grow it pro- 
 gresses from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous ; 
 and a normal training system being an objective 
 counterpart of this subjective process, must exhibit 
 the like progression. Moreover, regarding it from 
 this point of view, we may see that this formula 
 has much wider applications than at first appears. 
 For its rationale involves not only that we should 
 proceed from the single to the combined in the 
 teaching of each branch of knowledge ; but that 
 we should do the like with knowledge as a whole. 
 As the mind, consisting at first of but few active 
 faculties ; has its later-completed faculties succes- 
 sively awakened, and ultimately comes to have all
 
 ORDEK OF MENTAL PROCEDURE. 121 
 
 its faculties in simultaneous action ; it follows that 
 our teaching should begin with but few subjects at 
 once, and successively adding to these, should finally 
 carry on all subjects abreast — that not only in its 
 details should education proceed from the simple to 
 the complex, but in its ensemble also. 
 
 2. To say that our lessons ought to start from 
 the concrete and end in the abstract, may be con- 
 sidered as in part a repetition of the foregoing, 
 Nevertheless it is a maxim that needs to be stated : 
 if with no other view, then with the view of shew- 
 ing in certain cases what are truly the simple and 
 the complex. For unfortunately there has been 
 much misunderstanding on this point. General 
 formulas which men have devised to express groui)s 
 of details, and which have severally simplified their 
 conceptions by uniting many facts into one fact, 
 they have supposed must simplify the conceptions 
 of the child also ; quite forgetting that a generali- 
 zation is simple only in comparison with the whole 
 mass of particular truths it comprehends — that it is 
 more complex than any one of these truths taken 
 singly — that only after many of these single truths 
 have been acquired does the generalization ease the 
 memory and help the reason — and that to the child 
 not possessing these single truths it is necessarily a 
 mystery. Thus confounding two kinds of simplifi- 
 cation, teachers have constantly erred by setting 
 out with " first principles " : a proceeding essen- 
 tially, though not apparently, at variance with the 
 primary rule ; which implies that the mind should
 
 122 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 be introduced to principles through the medium of 
 examples, and so sliould be led from the particular 
 to the general — from the concrete to the abstract. 
 
 3. The education of the child must accord both 
 in mode and arrangement with the education of 
 mankind as considered historically ; or in other 
 words, the genesis of knowledge in the individual 
 must follow the same course as the genesis of knowl- 
 edge in the race. To M. Comte we believe society 
 owes the enunciation of this doctrine — a doctrine 
 which we may accept Avithout conmiitting onrselves 
 to his theory of the genesis of knowledge, either in 
 its causes or its order. In support of this doctrine 
 two reasons may be assigned, either of them suffi- 
 cient to establish it. One is deducible from the 
 law of hereditary transmission as considered in its 
 wider consequences. For if it be true that men 
 exhibit likeness to ancestry both in aspect and char- 
 acter — if it be true that certain mental manifesta- 
 tions, as insanity, will occur in successive members of 
 the same family at the same age — if, passing from 
 individual cases in which the traits of many dead 
 ancestors mixing with those of a few living ones 
 greatly obscure the law, we turn to national types, 
 and remark how the contrasts between them are 
 persistent from age to age — if we remember that 
 these respective types came from a common stock, 
 and that hence the present marked differences be- 
 tween them must have arisen from the action of 
 modifying circumstances upon successive genera- 
 tions who severally transmitted the accumulated
 
 MENTAL GROWTH OF THE RACE. 123 
 
 effects to their descendants — if we find the differ- 
 ences to be now organic, so tliat the French child 
 grows into a French man even when brought up 
 among strangers — and if the general fact thus illus^ 
 trated is true of the whole nature, intellect inclusive ; 
 then it follows that if there be an order in Avhich 
 the human race has mastered its various kinds ot 
 knowledge, there will arise in every child an apti- 
 tude to acquire these kinds of knowledge in the 
 same order. So that even were the order intrinsi- 
 cally indifferent, it would facilitate education to 
 lead the individual mind through the steps traversed 
 by the general mind. But the order is not intrin- 
 sically indifferent ; and hence the fundamental rea- 
 son why education should be a repetition of civili- 
 sation in little. It is alike provable that the his- 
 torical sequence was, in its main outlines, a neces- 
 sary one ; and that the causes which determined it 
 apply to the child as to the race, Not to specify 
 these causes in detail, it will suffice here to point 
 out that as the mind of humanity placed in the 
 midst of phenomena and striving to comprehend 
 them, has, after endless comparisons, speculations, 
 •experiments, and theories, reached its present 
 knowledge of each subject by a specific route ; it 
 may rationally be inferred that the relationship be- 
 tween mind and phenomena is such as to prevent 
 this knowledge from being reached by any other 
 route ; and that as each child's mind stands in this 
 same relationsliip to jjhenomena, they can be acces- 
 sible to ii only through the same route. Hence in
 
 124 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 deciding upon the right method of education, an 
 inquiry into tlic metliod of civilisation will help to 
 guide us. 
 
 4. One of the conclusions to which such an in- 
 quiry leads is, that in each branch of instruction 
 we should proceed from the empirical to the rational. 
 A leading fact in human progress is, that every 
 science is evolved out of its corresponding art. It 
 results from the necessity we are under, both indi- 
 vidually and as a race, of reaching the abstract by 
 way of the concrete, that there must be practice and 
 an accruing experience with its empirical generali- 
 zations, before there can be science. Science is 
 organized knowledge ; and before knowledge can 
 be organized, some of it must first be possessed. 
 Every study, therefore, should have a purely exper- 
 imental introduction ; and only after an ample 
 fund of observations has been accumulated, should 
 reasoning begin. As illustrative applications of this 
 rule, we may instance the modern course of placing 
 grammar, not before language, but after it ; or the 
 ordinary custom of prefacing perspective by practi- 
 cal drawing. By and by further applications of it 
 will be indicated. 
 
 5. A second corollary from the foregoing gen- 
 eral principle, and one wliich cannot be too sti'enu- 
 ously insisted upon, is, that in education the process 
 of self-development should be encouraged to the 
 fullest extent. Children should be led to make 
 their o^vn investigations, and to draw their own in- 
 ferences. Tliey shouM be told as little as possible,
 
 PROGRESS BY SELF-INSTRUCTION. 125 
 
 and induced to discover as mncli as possible. Hu- 
 manity lias progressed solely by self-instruction ; 
 and that to achieve the best results^ each mind must 
 progress somewhat after the same fashion, is con- 
 tinually proved by the marked success of self-made 
 men. Those who have been brought up under the 
 ordinary school-drill, and have carried away with 
 them the idea that education is practicable only in 
 that style, will think it hopeless to make children 
 their own teachers. If, however, they will call to 
 mind that the all-important knowledge of surround- 
 ing objects which a child gets in its early years is 
 got without help — if they will remember that the 
 child is self-taught in the use of its mother tongue 
 — if they will estimate the amount of that experi- 
 ence of life, that out-of-school wisdom, which every 
 boy gathers for himself — if they will mark the 
 unusual intelligence of the uncared-for London 
 gamin^ as shewn in all the directions in which his 
 faculties have been tasked — if further, they will 
 think how many minds have struggled up unaided, 
 not only through the mysteries of our irrationally- 
 pianned curriculum, but through hosts of other ob- 
 stacles besides ; they will find it a not unreasonable 
 conclusion, that if the subjects be put before him in 
 right order and right form, any pupil of ordinary ca- 
 pacity will surmount his successive difficulties with 
 but little assistance. Who indeed can watch the 
 ceaseless observation, and inquiry, and inference go- 
 ing on in a child's mind, or listen to its acute remarks 
 on matters within the range of its faculties, without
 
 12G INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 perceiving tliat tliese powers wliich it manifests, if 
 brouglit to bear systematically Tipon any studies 
 witliin the same range^ would readily master them 
 without help ? This need f )r peri)etual telling is 
 the result of our stupidity, not of the child's. We 
 drag it away from the facts in which it is interested, 
 and which it is actively assimilating of itself; we 
 put before it facts far too complex for it to under- 
 stand, and therefore distasteful to it ; finding that 
 it will not voluntarily acquire these facts, we 
 thrust them into its mind by force of threats and 
 punishment ; by thus denying the knowledge it 
 craves, and cramming it with knowledge it cannot 
 digest, we produce a morbid state of its faculties, 
 and a consequent disgust for knowledge in general ; 
 and when, as a result partly of the stolid indolence 
 we have brought on, and partly of still continued un- 
 fitness in its studies, the child can understand noth- 
 ing without explanation, and becomes a mere passive 
 recipient of our instruction, we infer that education 
 must necessarily be carried on thus. Having by our 
 method induced helplessness, we straightway make 
 the helplessness a reason for our method. Clearly 
 tlien the experience of pedagogues cannot rationally 
 be quoted against the doctrine we are defending. And 
 whoever sees this will see that we may safely follow 
 tlie method of nature throughout — may, by a skilful 
 ministration, make the mind as self-developing in its 
 later stages as it is in its earlier ones ; and that only 
 by doing this can we produce the highest power and 
 activity.
 
 INSTINCTIVE DEMAND OF THE PLEA8URABLK. 127 
 
 6. As a final test by which to judge any plan 
 of culture, should come the question, — Does it create 
 a pleasurable excitement in the pupils? TV hen in 
 doubt whether a particular mode or arrangement ie 
 or is not more in harmony with tlie foregoing princi- 
 ples than some other, we may safely abide by this 
 criterion. Even when, as considered theoretically, 
 the proposed course seems the best, yet if it produce 
 no interest, or less interest than another course, we 
 should relinquish it ; for a child's intellectual in- 
 stincts are more trustworthy than our reasonings. 
 In respect to the knowing faculties, we may confi- 
 dently trust in the general law, that under normal 
 conditions, healthful action is pleasurable, while 
 action which gives pain is not healthful. Tliough 
 at present very incompletely conformed to by the 
 emotional nature, yet by the intellectual nature, or 
 at least by those parts of it which the child exhibits, 
 this law is almost wholly conformed to. The re- 
 pugnances to this and that study which vex the 
 ordinary teacher, are not innate, but result from 
 his unwise system. Fcllenberg says, " Experience 
 has taught me that indolence in young persons is so 
 directly opposite to their natural disposition to ac- 
 tivity, that unless it is the consequence of bad edu- 
 cation, it is almost invariably connected with some 
 constitutional defect." And the spontaneous activ 
 ity to which children are thus prone, is simply the 
 pursuit of those pleasures which the healthful exer- 
 cise of the faoulties gives. It is true that some of 
 the higher mental powers as yet but little developed 
 8
 
 128 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 in the race, and congenitally possessed in any con- 
 siderable degree only by tlie most advanced, are 
 indisposed to the amount of exertion re(piired of 
 them. But these, in virtue of their very complexity, 
 will, in a normal course of culture, come last into 
 exercise, and will therefore have no demands made 
 upon them until the pupil has arrived at an age when 
 ulterior motives can be brought into play, and an in- 
 direct pleasure made to counterbalance a direct dis- 
 pleasure. With all faculties lower than these, how- 
 ever, the direct gratification consequent on activity is 
 the normal stimulus ; and under good management 
 the only needful stimulus. "When we are obliged to 
 fall back upon some other, we must take the fact as 
 evidence that we are on the wrong track. Experience 
 is daily shewing with greater clearness that there is al- 
 ways a method to be found productive of interest — 
 even of delight ; and it ever turns out that this is the 
 method proved by all other tests to be the right one. 
 With most, these guiding principles will weigh 
 but little if left in this abstract form. Partly, there- 
 fore, to exemplify their application, and partly with 
 a view of making sundry specilic suggestions, we 
 propose now to pass from the theory of education 
 to the practice of it. 
 
 » 
 
 It was the opinion of Pestalozzi — an opinion 
 which has ever since his day l^een gaining ground 
 — that education of some kind should l>egin from 
 the cradle. AVhoever has watched with any dis- 
 cernment, the wide-eyed gaze of the infant at sur-
 
 IT BEGINS IN INFANCY. 129 
 
 rounding objects, knows very well that educa- 
 tion does begin thus early, whetlier we intend 
 it or not ; and that tliese fingerings and suckings 
 of every thing it can lay hold of, these open-mouthed 
 listenings to every sound, are the first steps in the 
 series which ends in the discovery of unseen planets, 
 the invention of calculating engines, the production 
 of great paintings, or the composition of sympho- 
 nies and operas. This activity of the faculties from 
 the very first being spontaneous and inevitable, the 
 question is whether we shall supply in due variety 
 the materials on which they may exercise them- 
 selves ; and to the question so put, none but an 
 affirmative answer can be given. As before said, 
 however, agreement with Pestalozzi's theory does 
 not involve agreement with his practice ; and here 
 occurs a case in point. Treating of instruction in 
 spelling he says : — 
 
 " The spelling-book ought, therefore, to contain all the 
 sounds of the language, and these ought to be taught iu every 
 family from the earliest infancy. The child who learns his 
 spelling-book ought to repeat them to the infant in the cradle, 
 before it is able to pronounce even one of them, so that they 
 may be deeply impressed upon its mind by frequent repeti- 
 tion." 
 
 Joining this with the suggestions for " a niirsery- 
 method," as set down in his " Mother's Manual," in 
 which he makes the names, positions, connexions, 
 numbers, properties, and uses of the limbs and body 
 his first lessons, it becomes clear that Pestalozzi's
 
 130 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 notions on early mental development were too crude 
 to enable him to devise judicious plans. Let us in- 
 quire into the course which Psychology dictates. 
 
 The earliest impressions which the mind can a.s- 
 similate, are those given to it by the undecom})osablo 
 sensations — resistance, light, sound, &c. Manifest- 
 ly decomposable states of consciousness cannot exist 
 before the states of consciousness out of which they 
 are composed. There can be no idea of form until 
 some familiarity with light in its gradations and 
 (jualities, or resistance in its different intensities, has 
 been acquired ; for, as has been long known, we rec- 
 ognize visible form by means of varieties of light, 
 and tangible form by means of varieties of resistance. 
 Similarly, no articulate sound is cognizable until 
 the inarticulate sounds which go to malce it up 
 have been learned. And thus must it be in every 
 other case. Following, therefore, the necessary law 
 of i3rogression from the simple to the complex, we 
 should provide for the infant a sufficiency of objects 
 presenting different degrees and kinds of resistance, 
 a sufficiency of objects reflecting different amounts 
 and qualities of light, and a sufficiency of sounds 
 contrasted in their loudness, their pitch and their 
 timbre. IIow fully this a priori conclusion is con- 
 firmed by infantile instincts all will see on being 
 reminded of the delight which every young child 
 has in biting its toys, in feeling its brother''s bright 
 jacket-buttons, and pulling papa's whiskers — how 
 absorded it becomes in gazing at any gaudily 
 painted object, to which it applies the word
 
 EAELY CULTURE OF THE SENSES. 131 
 
 " pretty," when it can pronounce it, wboll}'- in vir- 
 tue of the briglit colours — and how its face broadens 
 into a laugh at the tattlings of its nurse, the snap- 
 ping of a visitor's fingers, or any sound which it has 
 not before heard. Fortunately, the ordinary prac- 
 tices of the nursery fulfil these early requirements 
 of education to a considerable degree. Much, how- 
 ever, remains to be done ; and it is of more impor- 
 tance that it should be done than at first appears. 
 Every faculty during the period of its greatest ac- 
 tivity — the period in which it is spontaneously 
 evolving itself — is capable of receiving more vivid 
 impressions than at any other period. Moreover, 
 as these simplest elements must eventually be mas- 
 tered, and as the mastery of them whenever achieved 
 must take time, it becomes an economy of time to 
 occupy this first stage of childhood, during which 
 no other intellectual action is possible, in gaining a 
 complete familiarity with them in all their modifica- 
 tions. Add to which, that both temper and health 
 will be improved by the continual gratification re- 
 sulting from a due supply of these imj)ressions 
 which every child so greedily assimilates. SpacC; 
 could it be spared, might here be well filled by some 
 suggestions towards a more systematic ministration 
 to these simplest of the perceptions. But it must 
 suffice to point out that any such ministration ought 
 to be based upon the general truth that in the de- 
 velopment of every faculty, markedly contrasted im- 
 pressions are the first to be distinguished : that hence 
 sounds greatly diflfering in loudness and pitch, colours
 
 133 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 very remote from each other, and siihstaiioes widely 
 unlike in hardness or texture, should be the first sup- 
 plied ; and that in each case the progression must be 
 by slow degrees to impressions more nearly allied. 
 
 Passing on to object- lessons, which manifestly 
 form a natural continuation of this primary culture 
 of the senses, it is to be remarked, that the system 
 commonly pursued is wholly at variance with the 
 method of nature, as alike exhibited in infancy, in 
 adult life, and in the course of civilization. " Tlie 
 child," says M. Marcel, " must be shewn how all 
 the parts of an object are connected, ifec. ; " and the 
 various manuals of these object-lessons severally 
 contain lists of the facts which the child is to be 
 told respecting each of the things put before it. 
 Xow it needs but a glance at the daily life of the 
 infant to see that all the knowledge of things which 
 is gained before the acquirement of speech, is self- 
 gained — that the qualities of hardness and weight 
 associated with certain visual appearances, the pos- 
 session of particular forms and colours by particular 
 persons, the production of special sounds by animals 
 of special aspects, are phenomena which it observes 
 for itself. In manhood too, when there are no longer 
 teachers at hand, the observations and inferences 
 required for daily guidance, must be made un- 
 helped ; and success in life depends upon the accu- 
 racy and completeness with which they are made. 
 Is it probable then, that while the process displayed 
 in the evolution of humanity at large, is repeated 
 alike by the infant and the man, a reverse process
 
 THE child's demand FOK SYMPATHY. 133 
 
 must be followed during the period between infancy 
 and manhood ? and that too, even in so simple a 
 thing as learning the properties of objects ? Is it 
 not obvious, on the contrary, that one method must 
 be pursued throughout ? And is not nature perpet- 
 iiallj thrusting this method upon us, if we had but 
 the wit to see it, and the humility to adopt it ? 
 What can be more manifest than the desire of chil- 
 dren for intellectual sympathy ? Mark how the 
 infant sitting on your knee thrasts into your face 
 the toy it holds, that you too may look at it. See 
 when it makes a creak with its wet finger on the 
 table, how it turns and looks at you ; does it again, 
 and again looks at you ; thus saying as clearly as 
 it can — " Hear this new sound." Watch how the 
 elder children come into the room exclaiming — 
 " Mamma, see what a curious thing," " Mamma, 
 look at this," " Mamma, look at that ; " and would 
 continue the habit, did not the silly mamma tell 
 them not to tease her. Observe how, when out with 
 the nurse-maid, each little one runs up to her with 
 the new flower it has gathered, to show her how 
 pretty it is, and to get her also, to say it is pretty. 
 Listen to the eager volubility with which every up 
 chin describes any novelty he has been to see, if 
 only he can find some one who will attend with any 
 interest. Does not the induction lie on the surface ? 
 Is it not clear that we must conform our course tc 
 these intellectual instincts — that we must just sys- 
 tematize the natural process — that we must listen 
 to all the child has to teU us about each object, must
 
 134 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 induce it to say every thing it can tliink of about 
 such object, must occasionally draw its attention to 
 facts it has not yet observed, Mitli the view of lead- 
 ing it to notice them itself whenever they recur, 
 and must go on by and by to indicate or supply 
 new series of things for a like exhaustive examina- 
 tion ? See the way in which, on this method, the 
 intelligent mother conducts her lessons. Step by 
 step she familiarizes her little boy with the names 
 of the simpler attributes, hardness, softness, colour, 
 taste, size, &c., in doing which she finds him eagerly 
 help by bringing this to show her that it is red, aud 
 the other to make her feel that it is hard, as fast as 
 she gives him words for these properties. Each 
 additional property, as she draws his attention to it 
 in some fresh thing which he brings her, she takes 
 care to mention in connexion with those he already 
 knows ; so that by the natural tendency to imitate, 
 he may get into the habit of repeating them one 
 after another. Gradually as there occur cases in 
 which he omits to name one or more of the proper- 
 ties he has become acquainted with, she introduces 
 the practice of asking him whether there is not 
 something more that he can tell her about the thing 
 he has got. Probably he does not understand. 
 After letting him puzzle awhile she tells him ; per- 
 haps laughing at him a little for his failure. A few 
 recurrences of this and he perceives what is to be 
 done. "When next she says she knows something 
 more about the object than he has told her, his pride 
 2S roused ; he looks at it intently ; he thinks over
 
 TRUE METHOD OF OBJECT-LESSONS. 135 
 
 all that lie has heard ; and the problem being easy, 
 presently finds it out. He is full of glee at his suc- 
 cess, and she sympathizes with him. In common 
 with every child, he delights in the discovery of his 
 powers. He wishes for more victories, and goes in 
 quest of more things about M'hich to tell her. As 
 his faculties unfold she adds quality after quality to 
 his list : progressing from hardness and softness to 
 roughness and smoothness, from colour to polish, 
 from simple bodies to composite ones — thus con- 
 stantly complicating the problem as he gains com- 
 petence, constantly taxing his attention and memory 
 to a greater extent, constantly maintainmg his in- 
 terest by supplying him with new impressions such 
 as his mind can assimilate, and constantly gratifying 
 him by conquests over such small difficulties as he 
 can master. In doing this she is manifestly but 
 following out that spontaneous process that was 
 going on during a still earlier period — simply aiding 
 self-evolution ; and is aiding it in the mode sug- 
 gested by the boy's instinctive behavior to her. 
 Manifestly, too, the course she is pursuing is the one 
 best calculated to establish a habit of exhaustive 
 observation ; Avhich is the professed aim of these 
 lessons. To tell a child this and to show it the other, 
 is not to teach it how to observe, but to make it a mere 
 recipient of another's observations : a proceeding 
 which weakens rather than strengthens its powers of 
 self-instruction — which deprives it of the pleasures 
 resulting from successful activity — wliich presents 
 this all-attractive knowledge under the aspect of for-
 
 136 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 iiial tuition — and wliieli thus generates that indiffer- 
 ence and even disgust -with which tlicseohject-lessons 
 are not unfrequently regarded. On the other hand, 
 to pursue the course above described is simply to 
 guide the intellect to its appropriate food ; to join 
 'v^'ith the intellectual appetites their natural adjuncts 
 — amour prapre and the desire for sympathy ; to in- 
 duce by the union of all these an intensity of attention 
 which insures perceptions alike vivid and complete ; 
 and to habituate the mind from the beginning to that 
 practice of self-help M'hich it must ultimately follow. 
 Object-lessons should not only be earned on 
 after quite a different fashion from that commonly 
 pursued, but should be extended to a range of things 
 far wider, and continue to a period far later, than 
 now. They should not be limited to the contents 
 of the house ; but should include those of the fields 
 and the hedges, the quarry and the sea-shore. Tliey 
 should not cease with early childhood ; but shoidd 
 be so kept up during youth as insensibly to merge 
 into the investigations of the naturalist and the man 
 of science. Here again we have but to follow na- 
 ture's leadings. "Where can be seen an intenser de- 
 light than that of children picking up new flowers 
 and watching new insects, or hoarding pebbles and 
 shells ? And who is there but perceives that by 
 symjjathizing with them they may be led on to any 
 extent of inquiry into the qualities and structures 
 of these things ? Every botanist who has had chil- 
 dren with him in the woods and the lanes must have 
 noticed how eagerly they joined in his pursuits, how
 
 TRAINING THE OBSERVATION. 137 
 
 keenly tliej searched ont plants for liim, how in> 
 tently they watched whilst he examined them, how 
 they overwhelmed him with questions. The consist 
 ent follower of Bacon — the " servant and interpre- 
 ter of nature," will see that we ought modestly to 
 adopt the course of culture thus indicated. Having 
 gained due familiarity with the simpler properties 
 of inorganic objects, the child should by the same 
 process be led on to a like exhaustive examination 
 of the things it picks up in its daily walks — the less 
 complex facts they present being alone noticed at 
 first : in plants, the colour, number, and forms of 
 the petals and shapes of the stalks and leaves : in 
 insects, the numbers of the wings, legs, and anten- 
 nse, and their colours. As these become fully ap- 
 preciated and invariably observed, further facts may 
 be successively introduced : in the one case, the 
 numbers of stamens and pistils, the forms of the 
 flowers, whether radial or bilateral in symmetry, 
 the arrangement and character of the leaves, whether 
 opposite or alternate, stalked or sessile, smooth or 
 hairy, serrated, toothed, or crenate ; in the other, 
 the divisions of the body, the segments of the ab- 
 domen, the markings of the wings, tlie number of 
 joints in the legs, and the forms of the smaller or- 
 gans — the system pursued throughout being that of 
 making it the child's ambition to say respecting 
 everything it finds, all that can be said. Then when 
 a fit age has been reached, the means of preserving 
 these plants which have become so interesting in 
 virtue of the knowledge obtained of them, may as
 
 133 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 a great favour be supplied ; and eventually, as a 
 still greater favour, may also be supplied the appa- 
 ratus needful for keeping the larvse of our common 
 butterflies and moths through their transforn)ations 
 • — a practice which, as we can personally testify, 
 yields the highest gratification ; is continued with 
 ardour for years ; when joined with the formation 
 of an entomological collection, adds immense in- 
 terest to Saturday-afternoon rambles ; and forms an 
 admirable introduction to the study of physiology. 
 We are quite prepared to hear from many that 
 all this is throwing away time and energy ; and that 
 children would be much better occupied in writing 
 their copies or learning their pence-tables, and so 
 fitting themselves for the business of life. "We re- 
 gret that such crude ideas of what constitutes edu- 
 cation and such a narrow conception of utility, should 
 still be generally prevalent. Saying nothing on the 
 need for a systematic culture of the perceptions and 
 the value of the practices above inculcated as 
 subserving that need, we are prepared to defend 
 them even on the score of the knowledge gained. 
 If men are to be mere cits, mere porers over led- 
 gers, with no ideas beyond their trades — if it is well 
 that they should be as the cockney whose conception 
 of rural pleasures extends no further than sitting in 
 a tea-garden smoking pipes and drinking porter ; or 
 as the squire who thinks of woods as places for 
 shooting in, of uncultivated plants as nothing but 
 weeds, and who classifies animals into game, vermin, 
 fjid stock — then indeed it is needless for men to
 
 ENLARGED VIEWS OF ITS IMPORT. 139 
 
 learn Ariy tliing that does not directly help to re- 
 plenish the till and till the larder. But if there is a 
 more worthy aim for us than to be drudges — if there 
 are other uses in the things around us than their 
 power to bring money — if there are higher faculties 
 to be exercised than acquisitive and sensual ones — 
 if the pleasures which poetry and art and science 
 and philosophy can bring are of any moment — then 
 is it desirable that the instinctive inclination which 
 every child shows to observe natural beauties and 
 investigate natural phenomena should be encour- 
 aged. But this gross utilitarianism which is con- 
 tent to come into the world and quit it again with- 
 out knowing what kind of a world it is or what it 
 contains, may bo met on its own ground. It will 
 by and by be found that a knowledge of the laws 
 of life is more important than any other knowledge 
 whatever — that the laws of life include not only all 
 bodily and mental processes, but by implication all 
 the transactions of the house and the street, all com- 
 merce, all politics, all morals — and that therefore 
 without a due acquaintance with them neither per- 
 sonal nor social conduct can be rightly regulated. 
 It will eventually be seen too, that the laws of life 
 are essentially the same throughout the whole or- 
 ganic creation ; and further, that they cannot be 
 properly understood in their complex manifestations 
 until they have been studied in their simpler ones. 
 And when this is seen, it will be also seen that in 
 aiding the child to acquire the out-of-door informa- 
 tion for which it shews bo great an avidity, and in
 
 14:0 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 encouraging the acquisition of such information 
 tbroiigliout youth, we arc simply inducing it to store 
 up the raw material for future organization — the 
 facts that will one day bring home to it with due 
 force those great generalizations of science by which 
 actions may be rightly guided. 
 
 The spreading recognition of drawing as an 
 element of education, is one amongst many signs 
 of the more rational views on mental culture now 
 beginning to prevail. Once more it may be re- 
 marked that teachers are at length adopting the 
 course which nature has for ages been pressing upon 
 their notice. The spontaneous efforts made by chil- 
 dren to represent the men, houses, trees, and animals 
 around them — on a slate if they can get nothing 
 better, or with lead-pencil on paper, if they can beg 
 them — are familiar to all. To be shown through a 
 picture-book is one of their highest gratifications ; 
 and as usual, their strong imitative tendency pres- 
 ently generates in them the ambition to make 
 pictures themselves also. Tliis attempt to depict 
 the striking things they see is a further instinctive 
 exercise of the perceptions — a means whereby still 
 greater accuracy and completeness of observation 
 is induced. And alike by seeking to interest us in 
 their discoveries of the sensible properties of things, 
 and by their endeavours to draw, they solicit from 
 us just that kind of culture which they most need. 
 
 Had teachers been guided by nature's hints not 
 only in the making of drawing a j^art of education, 
 but in the choice of their modes of teaching it, they
 
 DRAWING — EAKLY USE OF COLOURS. 141 
 
 would have done still better than they have done. 
 What is it that the child first tries to represent ? 
 Tilings that are large, things that are attractive in 
 colour, things round which its pleasurable associa- 
 tions most cluster — human beings from whom it has 
 received so many emotions, cows and dogs which 
 interest by the many phenomena tliey present, 
 houses that are hourly visible and strike by their 
 size and contrast of parts. And which of all the 
 processes of representation gives it most delight ? 
 Colouring. Paper and pencil are good in default 
 of something better ; bat a box of paints and a 
 brush — these are the treasures. The drawing of 
 outlines immediately becomes secondary to colour- 
 ing — is gone through mainly with a view to the 
 colouring ; and if leave can be got to colour a book 
 of prints, how great is the favour ! ISTow, ridiculous 
 as such a position will seem to drawing-masters, 
 who postpone colouring and who teach form by a 
 dreary discipline of copying lines, we believe that 
 tlie course of culture thus indicated is the right one. 
 That priority of colour to form, which, as already 
 pointed out, has a psychological basis, and in virtue 
 of which psychological basis arises this strong pref- 
 erence in the child, should be recognized from the 
 very beginning ; and from the very beginning also 
 the things imitated should be real. Tliat greater 
 delight in colour which is not only conspicuous in 
 children but persists in most persons throughout 
 life, should be continuously employed as the natural 
 stimulus to the mastery of the comparatively diffi-
 
 142 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 cult and unattractive form — should be the prospeC' 
 tivc reward for the achievement of form. And 
 these instinctive attempts to represent interesting 
 actualities should be all along encouraged ; in the 
 conviction that as, by a widening experience, smaller 
 and more practicable objects become interesting, 
 they too will be attempted ; and that so a gradual 
 approximation will be made towards imitations hav- 
 ing some resemblance to the realities. Ko matter 
 how grotesque the shapes produced : no matter how 
 daubed and glaring the colours. Tlie question is 
 not whether the child is producing good drawings : 
 the question is, whether it is developing its faculties. 
 It has first to gain some command over its fingers, 
 some crude notions of likeness ; and this practice is 
 better than any other for these ends ; seeing that it 
 is the spontaneous and the interesting one. During 
 these early years, be it remembered, no formal 
 drawing-lessons are possible : shall wc therefore re- 
 press, or neglect to aid, these eflforts at self-culture? 
 or shall we encourage and guide them as normal 
 exercises of the perceptions and the powers of manip- 
 ulation ? If by the supply of cheap woodcuts to 
 be coloured, and simple contour-maps to have their 
 boundary lines tinted, we can not only pleasurably 
 draw out the faculty of colour, but can incidentally 
 produce some familiarity with the outlines of things 
 and countries, and some ability to move the brush 
 steadily ; and if by the sup])ly of temptingly-painted 
 objects we can keep up the instinctive practice of 
 making representations, however rough, it must
 
 ERRONEOUS METHOD IN DRAWING. 143 
 
 happen that by the time drawing is commonly 
 commenced there will exist a facility that would 
 else have been absent. Time will have been gained ; 
 and trouble both to teacher and pupil, saved. 
 
 From all that has been said, it may be readily 
 inferred that we wholly disapprove of the practice 
 of drawing from copies ; and still more so of that 
 formal discipline in making straight lines and curved 
 lines and compound lines, with which it is the 
 fashion of some teachers to begin. We regret to 
 find that the Society of Arts has recently, in its 
 series of manuals on " Rudimentary Art-Instruc- 
 tion," given its countenance to an elementary draw- 
 ing-book, which is the most vicious in principle that 
 we have seen. We refer to the " Outline from Out- 
 line, or from the Flat," by John Bell, sculptor. As 
 expressed in the prefatory note, this publication 
 proposes " to place before the student a simple, yet 
 logical mode of instruction ; " and to this end sets 
 out with a number of definitions thus : — 
 
 " A simple line in drawing is a thin mark drawn from one 
 point to another. 
 
 "Lines may be divided, as to their nature in drawing, into 
 two classes : — 
 
 " 1. Straight^ which are marks that go the shortest road 
 between two points, as A B. 
 
 "2. Or Curved^ which are marks which do not go the 
 shortest road between two points, as C D." 
 
 And so the introduction progresses to horizontal 
 lines, peri)endicular lines, oblique lines, angles of 
 9
 
 14:4: INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 the several kinds, and tlic variuns fii^ures wliieh 
 lines and ang-les make up. The work is, in short, a 
 grammar of i'urm, with exercises. And tl:ns the 
 system of commencing with a dry analysis of ele- 
 ments, which, in the teaching of language, has been 
 exploded, is to be re-instituted in the teaching of 
 drawing. The abstract is to be preliminary to the 
 concrete. Scientific conceptions are to precede em- 
 pirical experiences. That this is an invei'sion of the 
 normal order, we need scarcely repeat. It has been 
 well said concerning the custom of preuicing the 
 art of speaking any tongue by a drilling in the parts 
 of speech and their functions, that it is about as 
 reasonable as prefacing the art of walking by a 
 course of lessons on the bones, muscles, and nerves 
 of the legs ; and much the same thing may be said 
 of the proposal to preface the art of representing 
 objects by a nomenclature and definitions of the 
 lines which they yield on analysis. These techni- 
 calities are alike repulsive and needless. They ren- 
 der the study distasteful at the very outset ; and all 
 with the view of teaching that, which, in the course 
 of practice, will be learnt unconsciously. Just as 
 the child incidentally gathers the meanings of ordi- 
 nary words from the conversations going on aronnd 
 it, without the help of dictionaries ; so, from the 
 remarks on objects, j)ictures, and its own drawings, 
 will it presently acquire, not only without effort but 
 even pleasurably, those same scientific terms, Mhich, 
 if presented at first, are a mystery and a Aveariness. 
 If any dependence is to be placed upon the general
 
 EARLY LESSONS IN PERSPECTIVE. 145 
 
 principles of education that have been laid down, 
 the process of learning to draw should be through- 
 out continuous with those efforts of early childhood 
 described above, as so worthy of encouragemento 
 By the time that the voluntary practice thus ini- 
 tiated has given some steadiness of hand, and some 
 tolerable ideas of proportion, there will have arisen 
 a vague notion of body as presenting its three di- 
 mensions in perspective. And when, after sundry 
 abortive, Chinese-like attempts to render this ap- 
 pearance on paper, there has grown up a pretty clear 
 perception of the thing to be achieved, and a desire 
 to achieve it, a first lesson in empirical jDerspective 
 may be given by means of the apparatus occasion- 
 ally used in explaining perspective as a science. 
 Tliis sounds formidable ; but the experiment is both 
 comprehensive and interesting to any boy or girl 
 of ordinary intelligence. A plate of glass so framed 
 as to stand vertically on the table, being placed 
 before the pupil, and a book, or like simple object 
 laid on the other side of it, he is requested, whilst 
 keeping the eye in one position, to make ink dots 
 upon the glass, so that they may coincide with, or 
 hide the corners of this object. He is then told to 
 join these dots by lines ; on doing which he per- 
 ceives that the lines he makes hide, or coincide with, 
 the outlines of the oliject. And then on being asked 
 to put a sheet of paper on the other side of the glass, 
 he discovers that the lines he has thus drawn repre- 
 sent the object as he saw it. They not only look 
 like it, but he perceives that they must be like it,
 
 14^6 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 because he made them agree M'ith its outlines ; and 
 by removing the paper he can repeatedly convince 
 himself that they do agree with its outlines. The 
 fact is new and striking ; and serves him as an 
 experimental demonstration, that lines of certain 
 lengths, placed in certain directions on a plane, can 
 represent lines of other lengths, and having other 
 directions in space. Subsequently, by gradually 
 changing the position of the object, he may be led 
 to observe how some lines shorten and disapj^ear, 
 whilst others come into sight and lengthen. The 
 convergence of parallel lines, and, indeed, all the 
 leading facts of perspective may, from time to time, 
 be similarly illustrated to him. If he has been duly 
 accustomed to self-help, he will gladly, when it is 
 suggested, make the attempt to draw one of these out- 
 lines upon paper, by the eye only ; and it may soon 
 be made an exciting aim to produce, unassisted, a 
 representation, as like as he can, to one subsequently 
 sketched on the glass. Thus, without the unintelli- 
 gent, mechanical practice of copying other drawings, 
 but by a method at once simple and attractive — 
 rational, yet not abstract, a familiarity with the 
 linear appearances of things, and a faculty of ren- 
 dering them, may be, step by step, acquired. To 
 which advantages add these : — that even thus early 
 the pupil learns, almost unconsciously, the true 
 theory of a picture — namely, that it is a delineation 
 of objects as they appear when projected on a plane 
 placed between them and the eye ; and that when 
 he roaches a fit age for commencing scientilic pei^
 
 PRIMARY LESSONS IN GEOMETRY. 147 
 
 spective lie is already thoroughly acquainted with 
 the facts which form its logical basis. 
 
 As exhibiting a rational mode of communicating 
 primary conceptions in geometry, we cannot do 
 better than quote the following passage from Mr. 
 Wyse :— 
 
 " A child has been in the habit of using cubes for arithme- 
 tic ; let him use them aLso for the elements of geometry. I 
 ■would begin with solids, the reverse of the usual plan. It 
 saves all the difficulty of absurd definitions, and bad explana- 
 tions on points, lines, and surfaces, which are nothing but ab- 
 stractions. ... A cube presents many of the principal 
 elements of geometry ; it at once exhibits points, straight 
 lines, parallel lines, angles, parallelograms, &c., &c. These 
 cubes are divisible into various parts. The pupil has already 
 been familiarized with such divisions in numeration, and he 
 now proceeds to a comparison of their several parts, and of 
 the relation of these parts to each other. , . . From thence 
 he advances to globes, which furnish him with elementary 
 notions of the circle, of curves generally, &c., &c. 
 
 " Being tolerably familiar with solids, he may now sub- 
 stitute planes. The transition may be made very easy. Let 
 the cube, for instance, be cut into thin divisions, and placed 
 on paper ; he will then see as many plane rectangles as he 
 has divisions ; so with all the others. Globes may be treated 
 in the same manner ; he will thus see how surfaces really are 
 generated, and be enabled to abstract them with facility in 
 every solid. 
 
 " He has thus acquired the alphabet and reading of geom- 
 etry. He now proceeds to write it. 
 
 " The simplest operation, and therefore the first, is merely 
 to place these planes on a piece of paper, and pass the pencil 
 round them. "When this has been frequently done, the plane 
 may be put at a little distance, and the child required to copy 
 it, and so on."
 
 148 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 A stock of geometrical conceptions having been 
 obtained, in some sucb manner as tliis recom- 
 mended by Mr. Wyse, a farther step may, in conrse 
 of time, be taken, by introdncing the practice of 
 testing the correctness of all figures drawn by tlie 
 eye ; tlius alike exciting an ambition to make them 
 exact, and continually illustrating the difficulty of 
 fulfilling that ambition. Tliere can be little doubt 
 that geometry had its origin (as, indeed, the word 
 implies) in the methods discovered by artisans and 
 others, of making accurate measurement for the 
 foundations of buildings, areas of inclosures, and 
 the like ; and that its truths came to be treasured 
 up, merely with a view to their immediate utility. 
 They should be introduced to the pupil under anal- 
 ogous relationships. In the cutting out of pieces 
 for his card-houses, in the drawing of ornamental 
 diagrams for colouring, and in those various instruc- 
 tive occupations which an inventive teacher will 
 lead him into, he may be for a length of time ad- 
 vantageously left, like the primitive builder, to 
 tentative processes ; and will so gain an abundant 
 experience of the difficulty of achieving his aims 
 by the unaided senses. When, having meanwhile 
 undergone a valuable discipline of the perceptions, 
 he has reached a fit age for using a pair of compass- 
 es, he Avill, whilst duly appreciating these as ena- 
 bling him to verify his ocular guesses, be still hin- 
 dered by the difficulties of the approximative method. 
 In this stage he may be left for a further period : 
 partly as being yet too young for anything higher ;
 
 TRAINING TUE CONSTKUCTIVE POWERS. 149 
 
 partly Lecause it is desirable that he should be made 
 to feel still more strongly the Avaiit of systematic 
 eoiitriyances. If the acquisition of knowledge is to 
 be made continuously interesting ; and if, in the 
 early civilization of the child, as in the early ciyili- 
 zation of the race, science becomes attractiye only 
 as ministering to art ; it is manifest that the proper 
 preliminary to geometry is a long practice in those 
 constructive processes which geometry will facilitate. 
 Observe that here, too, nature points the way. Al- 
 most invariably, children show a strong propensity 
 to cut out things in paper, to make, to build — a 
 propensity which, if duly encouraged and directed, 
 will not only prepare the way for scientific concep- 
 tions, but will develop those powers of manipula- 
 tion in which most people are so deficient. 
 
 When the observing and inventive faculties 
 have attained the requisite power, the pupil may 
 be introduced to empirical geometry ; that is — 
 geometry dealing with methodical solutions, but 
 not with the demonstrations of them. Like all 
 other transitions in education, this should be made 
 not formally but incidentally ; and the relationship 
 to constructive art should still be maintained. To 
 make a tetrahedron in cardboard, like one given to 
 him, is a problem which will alike interest the 
 pupil, and serve as a convenient starting-point. In 
 attempting this, he finds it needful to draw four 
 equilateral triangles arranged in special positions. 
 Being unable in the absence of an exact method to 
 do this accurately he discovers on putting the tri-
 
 150 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 angles into their respective positions, that Le can 
 not make their sides fit, and that their angles do 
 not properly meet at the apex. He may now be 
 shown how by describing a couple of circles, each 
 of these triangles may be drawn with perfect cor- 
 rectness and without guessing ; and after his failure 
 he will duly value the information. Having thus 
 helped him to the solution of his first problem, 
 with the view of illustrating the nature of geomet- 
 rical methods, he is in future to be left altogether 
 to his own ingenuity in solving the questions put 
 to him. To bisect a line, to erect a perpendicular, 
 to describe a square, to bisect an angle, to draw a 
 line parallel to a given line, to describe a hexagon, 
 are jiroblems which a little patience will enable him 
 to find out. And from these he may be led on 
 step by step to questions of a more complex kind ; 
 all of which, under judicious management, he will 
 puzzle through unhelped. Doubtless, many of 
 those brought up under the old regime, will look 
 upon this assertion sceptically. We speak from 
 facts, however, and those neither few nor special. 
 We have seen a class of boys become so interested 
 in making out solutions to these problems, as to 
 look forward to their geometry -lesson as a chief 
 event of the week. Within the last month, we 
 have been told of one girls' school, in which some 
 of the young ladies voluntarily occupy themselves 
 with' geometrical questions out of school-hours ; and 
 of another, in which they not only do this, but in 
 which one of them is begging for problems to find
 
 HOW GEOMKTRY IS MADE ATTRACTIVE. 151 
 
 out during tlie holidays — botli wliicli facts we state 
 on the authority of the teacher. There could in- 
 deed be no stronger proofs than are thus afforded 
 of the practicability and the immense advantage of 
 self-development. A branch of knowledge which 
 as commonly taught is dry and even repulsive, 
 may, by following the method of nature, be made 
 extremely interesting and profoundly beneficial. 
 We say profoundly beneficial, because the effects 
 are not confined to the gaining of geometrical facts, 
 but often revolutionize the whole state of mind. 
 It has repeatedly occurred, that those who have 
 been stupefied by the ordinary school-drill — by its 
 abstract formulas, by its wearisome tasks, by its 
 cramming — have suddenly had their intellects 
 roused, by thus ceasing to make them passive 
 recipients, and inducing them to become active 
 discoverers. Tlie discouragement brought about 
 by bad teaching having been diminished by a little 
 sympathy, and sufficient perseverance induced to 
 achieve a first success, there arises a revulsion of 
 feeling affecting the whole nature. They no longer 
 find themselves incompetent ; they too can do 
 something. And gradually as success follows suc- 
 cess, the incubus of despair disappears, and they 
 attack the difficulties of their other studies with 
 a courage that insures conquest. 
 
 This empirical geometry which presents an end- 
 less series of problems, and should be continued 
 along with other studies for years, may throughout 
 be advantageously accompanied by those concrete
 
 152 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 applications of its principles which serve as its pre- 
 liminary. After the cube, the octahedron, and the 
 various forms of pyramid and prism have been 
 mastered, may come the more complex regular 
 bodies — the dodt^cahedron, and the icosahedron — 
 to construct which out of single pieces of cardboard 
 requires considerable ingenuity. From these, the 
 transition may naturally be made to such' modified 
 forms of the regular bodies as are met with in crys- 
 tals — the truncated cube, the cube with itsdiliedral 
 as well as its solid angles truncated, the octahedron 
 and the various prisms as similarly modified ; in 
 imitating which numerous forms assumed by differ- 
 ent metals and salts, an acquaintance with tlie 
 leading facts of mineralogy will be incidentally 
 gained. After long continuance in exercises of 
 this kind, rational geometry, as may be supposed, 
 presents no obstacles. Constantly habituated to 
 contemplate relationships of form and quantity, and 
 vaguely perceiving from time to time the necessity 
 of certain results as reached by certain means, the 
 pupil comes to regard the demonstrations of Eu- 
 clid as the missing supplements to his familiar 
 problems. His well-disciplined faculties enable 
 him easily to master its successive propositions, and 
 to appreciate their value ; and he has the occasional 
 gratification of finding some of his own methods 
 proved to be true. Tlius he enjoys what is to the 
 unprej)ared a dreary task. It only remains to add, 
 that his mind will presently arrive at a fit condition 
 for that most valuable of all exercises for the re*
 
 COURSE OF THE NATURAL METHOD. 153 
 
 flective faculties — the making of original demon- 
 strations. Such theorems as those appended to the 
 successive books of the Messrs. Chambers' Euclid, 
 will soon become practicable to him ; and in prov- 
 ing them the process of self-development will be 
 not intellectual only, but moral. 
 
 To continue much further these suggestions 
 would be to write a detailed treatise on education, 
 which we do not purpose. The foregoing outlines 
 of plans for exercising the perceptions in early 
 childhood for conducting object-lessons for teaching 
 drawing and geometry, must be considered as 
 roughly-sketched illustrations of the method dic- 
 tated by the general principles previously specified. 
 We believe that on examination they will be found 
 not only to progress from the simple to the complex, 
 from the concrete to the abstract, from the empirical 
 to the rational ; but to satisfy the further require- 
 ments that education shall be a repetition of civiliza- 
 tion in little, that it shall be as much as possible a 
 process of self-evolution, and that it shall be pleas- 
 urable. That there should be one type of method 
 capable of satisfying all these conditions, tends alike 
 to verify the conditions, and to prove that type of 
 method the right one. And when we add that this 
 method is the logical outcome of the tendency, 
 characterizing all modern systems of instruction — - 
 that it is Ijut an adoption in full of the method of 
 nature which they adopt partially — that it displays 
 this complete adoption of the method of nature, not 
 only by conforming to the above principles, but by
 
 154 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 following the suggestions wliicli the unfolding mind 
 itself gives, facilitating its spontaneous activities, 
 and so aiding tlie developments which nature is 
 busy with — when we add this, there seems abun- 
 dant reason to conclude, that the mode of procedure 
 above exemplified, closely approximates to the true 
 one. 
 
 A few paragraphs must be appended in further 
 inculcation of the two general principles, alike the 
 most important and the least attended to : we mean 
 the principle that throughout youth, as in early 
 childhood and in maturity, the process shall be one 
 of self-instruction ; and the obverse principle, that 
 the mental action induced by this process shall be 
 throughout intrinsically grateful. If progression from 
 simple to complex, and from concrete to abstract, be 
 considered the essential requirements as dictated by 
 abstract psychology, then do these requirements 
 that knowledge shall be self-mastered, and pleasur- 
 ably mastered, become the tests by which we may 
 judge whether the dictates of abstract psychology 
 are being fulfilled. K the first embody the leading 
 generalizations of the science of mental growth, the 
 last are the chief canons of the art of fostering men- 
 tal growth. For manifestly if the steps in our 
 curriculum are so arranged that they can be suc- 
 cessively ascended by the pupil himself with little 
 or no help, they must correspond with the stages 
 of evolution i*" his faculties ; and manifestly if the 
 Buccessive achievements of these steps are intriusi-
 
 ADVANTAGES OF SELF-EVOLU'HON. 155 
 
 cally gratifying to liim, it follows that they require 
 uo more than a normal exercise of his powers. 
 
 But the making education a process of self- 
 evolution has other advantages than this of keeping 
 our lessons in the right order. In the first place, it 
 guarantees a vividness and permanency of impres- 
 sion which the usual methods can never produce. 
 Any piece of knowledge which the pupil has him- 
 self accpiired, any problem which he has himself 
 solved, becomes by virtue of the conquest much 
 more thoroughly his than it could else be. Tlie 
 preliminary activity of mind which his success im- 
 plies, the concentration of thought necessary to it, 
 and the excitement consequent on his triumph, con- 
 spire to register all the facts in his memory in a 
 way that no mere information heard from a teacher, 
 or read in a school-book, can be registered. Even 
 if he fails, the tension to which his faculties have 
 been wound up insures his remembrance of the 
 solution when given to him, better than half a 
 dozen repetitions would. Observe again, that this 
 discipline necessitates a continuous organization of 
 the knowledge he acquires. It is in the very 
 nature of facts and inferences, assimilated in this 
 nonnal manner, that they successively become the 
 premisses of further conclusions, — the means of 
 solving still further questions. Tlie solution of 
 yesterday's problem helps the pupil in master- 
 ing to-day's. Thus the knowledge is turned into 
 faculty as soon as it is taken in, and forthwith aids 
 in the general function of thinking — does not lie
 
 156 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 merely written in the pages of an internal lil)rarv, 
 as when rote-learnt. Mark further, the impor- 
 tance of the moral culture which this constant self- 
 help involves. Courage in attacking difheulties, 
 patient concentration of the attention, perseverance 
 through failures — these are characteristics which 
 after-life specially requires ; and these are charac- 
 teristics which this system of making the mind 
 work for its food specially produces. That it is 
 thoroughly practicable to carry out instruction after 
 this fashion we can ourselves testify ; having been 
 in youth thus led to successively solve the com- 
 paratively complex problems of Persj)ective. And 
 that leading teachers have been gradually tending 
 in this direction is indicated alike in the saying of 
 Fellenberg, that " the individual, independent ac- 
 tivity of the pupil is of much greater importance 
 than the ordinary busy officiousness of many who 
 assume the office of educators ; " in the opinion 
 of Horace Mann, that " unfortunately education 
 amongst us at present consists too much in idling^ 
 not in training 'j'''' and in the remark of M. Marcel, 
 that " what the learner discovers by mental exer- 
 tion is better known than what is told to him.'' 
 
 Similarly with the correlative requirement, that 
 the method of culture pursued shall be one produc- 
 tive of an intrinsically happy activity, — an activity 
 not happy in virtue of extrinsic rewards to be ob- 
 tained, but in virtue of its own healthfulness. Con- 
 formity to this requirement not only guards us 
 against thwarting the normal process of evolution,
 
 PROMOTED BY PLEASURABLE FEELING. 157 
 
 but incidentally secures positive benefits of im- 
 portance. Unless we are to return to an ascetic 
 morality, the maintenance of youthful happiness 
 must be considered as in itself a worthy aim. Not 
 to dwell upon this, however, we go on to remark 
 that a pleasurable state of feeling is far more favour- 
 able to intellectual action than one of indifference 
 or disgust. Every one knows that things read, 
 heard, or seen with interest, are better remembered 
 than those read, heard, or seen with apathy. In 
 the one case the faculties appealed to are actively 
 occupied with the subject presented ; in the other 
 they are inactively occupied with it ; and the atten- 
 tion is continually drawn away after more attractive 
 thoughts. Hence the impressions are respectively 
 strong and weak. Moreover, the intellectual list- 
 lessness which a pupil's lack of interest in any study 
 involves, is further complicated by his anxiety, by 
 his fear of consequences, which distract his attention, 
 and increase the difficulty he finds in bringing his 
 faculties to bear upon these facts that are repugnant 
 to them. Clearly, therefore, the efliciency of any 
 intellectual action will, other things equal, be pro- 
 portionate to the gratification with which it is per- 
 formed. 
 
 It should be considered also, that impor- 
 tant moral consequences depend upon the habitual 
 pleasure or pain which daily lessons produce. Ko 
 one can compare the faces and manners of two l)oys 
 — the one made happy by mastering interesting 
 Bubjects, and the other made miserable by disgust
 
 158 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 with his studies, by consequent faihire, by cold 
 looks, by tlireats, by punishment — without seeiug 
 that the disposition of the one is being benefited, 
 and that of the other greatly injured. Whoever 
 has marked the effect of intellectual success upon 
 the mind, and the power of the mind over tlie 
 body, will see that in the one case both temper and 
 health are favourably affected ; whilst in the other 
 there is danger of permanent moroseness, of per- 
 manent timidity, and even of permanent constitu- 
 tional depression. To all which considerations we 
 must add the further one, that the relationship be- 
 tween teachers and their pupils is, other things 
 equal, rendered friendly and influential, or antag- 
 onistic and powerless, according as the system of 
 culture produces liap})iness or misery. Human 
 beings are at the mercy of their associated ideas. 
 A daily minister of pain cannot fail to be regarded 
 with a secret dislike, and if he causes no emotions 
 but painful ones, will inevitably be hated. Con- 
 versely, he who constantly aids children to their 
 ends, hourly provides them with the satisfactions 
 of conquest, hourly encourages them through their 
 difiiculties and sympathizes in their successes, can- 
 not fail to be liked ; nay, if his behaviour is con- 
 sistent throughout, must be loved. And when we 
 remember how efficient and benign is the control 
 of a master who is felt to be a friend, when com- 
 pared with the control of one who is looked upon 
 with aversion, or at best indifference, we may infer 
 that the indirect advantages of conducting educa-
 
 SELF-CULTCRE SELF-PEKPETUATING 159 
 
 tion on the happiness principle do not fall far short 
 of the direct ones. To all who question the possi- 
 bility of acting out the system here advocated, we 
 reply as before, that not only does theory point to 
 it, but experience commends it. To the many ver- 
 dicts of distinguished teachers who since Pestalozzi's 
 time have testified this, may be here added that of 
 Professor Pillans, who asserts that " where young 
 people are taught as they ought to be, they are 
 quite as happy in school as at play, seldom less 
 delighted, nay, often more, with the well-directed 
 exercise of their mental energies, than with that of 
 tlieir muscular powers." 
 
 As suggesting a final reason for making educa- 
 tion a process of self-instruction, and by conse- 
 quence a process of pleasurable instruction, we may 
 advert to the fact that, in proportion as it is made 
 so, is there a probability that education will not 
 cease when school-days end. As long as the ac- 
 quisition of knowledge is rendered habitually re- 
 pugnant, so long will there be a prevailing tendency 
 to discontinue it when free from the coercion of 
 parents and masters. And when the aequisitiou of 
 knowledge has been rendered habitually gratifying, 
 then will there be as prevailing a tendency to con- 
 tinue, without superintendence, that same self-culture 
 previously carried on under superintendence. These 
 results are inevitable. While the laws of mental 
 association remain true — while men dislike the 
 things and places that suggest painful recollec- 
 tions, and delight in those which call to mind by- 
 
 J.0
 
 iGO INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 
 
 gone pleasures — ^painful lessons will make knowl« 
 edge repulsive, and pleasurable lessons will make it 
 attractive. Tlie men to whom in boyliood informa- 
 tion came in dreary tasks along with threats of 
 punishment, and who were never led into habits of 
 independent inquiry, are unlikely to be students in 
 after years ; while those to whom it came in the 
 natural forms, at the proper times, and who remem- 
 ber its facts as not only interesting in themselves, 
 but as the occasions of a long series of gratifying 
 successes, are likely to continue through life that 
 self-instruction commenced in youth.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 MORAL EDLX'ATION. 
 
 Straj^gely enough, tlie most glaring defect in 
 our programmes of education is entirely overlooked. 
 While much is being done in the detailed improve- 
 ment of our systems in respect both of matter and 
 manner, the most pressing desideratum has not yet 
 been even recognised as a desideratum. To prepare 
 the young for the duties of life is tacitly admitted 
 by all to be the end which parents and school- 
 masters should have in view ; and happily the value 
 of the things taught, and the goodness of the meth- 
 od followed in teaching them, are now ostensibly 
 judged by their fitness to this end. The propriety 
 of substituting for an exclusively classical training 
 a trainino; in which the modern lanfi::uai>:es shall 
 have a share, is argued on this ground. The neces- 
 sity of increasing the amount of science is urged 
 for like reasons. But though some care is taken to 
 fit youth of both sexes for society and citizenship-, 
 no care whatever is taken to fit them for the still 
 more important position they will ultimately have 
 to fill — the position of parents. While it is seen 
 tliat for the purpose of gaining a livelihood, an 
 elaborate preparation is needed, it appears to bo
 
 1G2 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 tliouglit that for the bringing up of children, no 
 preparation whatever is needed. While many years 
 are spent by a boy in gaining knowledge, of which 
 the chief value is that it constitutes ' the education 
 of a gentleman ; ' and while many years are spent 
 by a girl in those decorative acquirements which 
 fit her for evening parties ; not an hour is spent by 
 either of them in preparation for that gravest of all 
 responsibilities — the management of a family. Is 
 it that this responsibility is but a remote contin- 
 gency ? On the contrary, it is certain to devolve 
 on nine out of ten. Is it that the discharge of 
 it is easy ? Certainly not : of all functions which 
 the adult has to fulfil this is the most diflicult. Is 
 it that each may be trusted by self-instruction to fit 
 himself, or herself, for the oifice of parent ? Ko : 
 not only is the need for such self-instruction unrecog- 
 nised, but the complexity of the subject renders it 
 the one of all others in which self-instruction is least 
 likely to succeed. No rational plea can be put for- 
 ward for leaving the Art of Education out of our 
 curriculum. Whether as bearing upon the happi- 
 ness of parents themselves, or whether as afi'ecting 
 the characters and lives of their children and re- 
 mote descendants, we must admit that a knowledge 
 of the right methods of juvenile culture, physical, 
 intellectual, and moral, is a knowledge second to 
 none in importance. This topic should occupy the 
 highest and last place in the course of instruction 
 passed through by each man and woman. As 
 physical maturity is marked by the ability to prO'
 
 NEGLECT OF THE SUBJECT. 163 
 
 diice offspring, so mental maturity is marked by the 
 ability to train those offspring. Tlie subject vjfiich 
 involves all other subjects^ and therefore the subject 
 in which the education of every one should culminate^ 
 is the Theory and Practice of Education. 
 
 In tlie absence of this preparation, the manage- 
 ment of children, and more especially the moral 
 management, is lamentably bad. Parents either 
 never think about the matter at all, or else their 
 conclusions are crude and inconsistent. Li most 
 cases, and especially on the part of mothers, the 
 treatment adopted on every occasion is that which 
 the impulse of the moment prompts : it springs not 
 from any reasoned-out conviction as to what will 
 most conduce to the child's welfare, but merely ex- 
 presses the passing parental feelings, whether good 
 or ill ; and varies from hour to hour as these feel- 
 ings vary. Or if these blind dictates of passion 
 are supplemented by any definite doctrines and 
 methods, they are those that liave been handed 
 down from the past, or those suggested by the re- 
 membrances of childliood, or those adopted from 
 nurses and servants — methods devised not by the 
 enlightenment, but by the ignorance of the time. 
 Commenting on the chaotic state of opinion and 
 practice relative to family government, Richter 
 writes : — 
 
 " If the secret variances of a large class of ordinary fathers 
 were brought to light, and laid down as a plan of studies, and 
 reading catalogued for a moral education, they would run 
 Mjmewhat after this fashion : — In the first hour ' pure morality
 
 164: MOKAL EDUCATION. 
 
 must be read to the child, either by myself or the tutor ; ' in 
 the second, ' mixed morality, or that which may he applied tn 
 one's own advantage ; ' in the third, ' do you not see that your 
 father does so and so ? ' in the fourth, ' you are little, and this 
 is only fit for grown-up ])eople ; ' in the fifth, ' the chief matter 
 is that you should succeed in the world, and become some- 
 thing in the state ; ' in the sixth, ' not the temporary, but 
 the eternal, determines the worth of a man ; ' in the seventh, 
 ' therefore rather suffer injustice, and be kind ; ' in the eighth, 
 ' but defend yourself bravely if any one attack you ; ' in the 
 ninth, ' do not make a noise, dear child ; ' in the tenth, ' a boy 
 must not sit so quiet ; ' in the eleventh, ' you must obey your 
 parents better ; ' in the twelfth, ' and educate yourself.' So 
 by the liourly change of his principles, the father conceals 
 their untenableness and onesidedness. As for his wife, she is 
 neither like him, nor yet like that harlequin who came on to 
 the stage with a bundle of papers under each arm, and an- 
 swered to the inquiry, what he had under his right arm, 
 'orders,' and to what he had under his left arm, 'counter- 
 orders.' But the mother might be much better compared to a 
 giant Briareus, who had a hundred arms, and a bundle of 
 papers under each." 
 
 Tliis state of things is not to be readily changed. 
 Generations ninst pass before any great amelioration 
 of it can be expected. Like political constitutions, 
 educational systems are not made, but grow ; and 
 within brief periods growth is insensible. Slow, 
 however, as must be any improvement, even that 
 improvement implies the use of means j and among 
 the means is discussion. 
 
 We are not among those who believe in Lord 
 Palmerston's dogma, that " all children are born
 
 ITS LIMITS AND DIFFICULTIES. 1C5 
 
 good." On tlio whole, the opposite dogma, unten- 
 able as it is, seems to us less wide of the truth. 
 Kor do we agree with those who think that, by 
 skilful discipline, children may be made altogether 
 what they should be. Contrariwise, we are satisfied 
 that though imperfections of nature may be di- 
 minished by wise management, they cannot be re- 
 moved by it. The notion that an ideal humanity 
 might be forthwith produced by a perfect system 
 of education, is near akin to that shadowed forth in 
 the poems of Shelley, that would mankind give up 
 their old institutions, ])rejudices, and errors, all the 
 evils in the world would at once disappear : neither 
 notion being acceptable to such as have dispassion- 
 ately studied human affairs. 
 
 Not that we are without sympathy with those 
 who entertain these too sanguine hopes. Enthu- 
 siasm, pushed even to fanaticism, is a useful motive- 
 power — perhaps an indispensable one. It is clear 
 that the ardent politician would never undergo the 
 labours and make the sacrifices he does, did he not 
 believe that the reform he fights for is the one thing 
 needful. But for his conviction that drunkenness 
 is the root of almost all social evils, the teetotaller 
 would agitate far less energetically. In philan- 
 thropy as in other things great advantage results 
 from division of labour ; and that there may be 
 division of labour, each class of philanthropists 
 must be more or less subordinated to its function — 
 must have an exaggerated faith in its work. Hence, 
 of those who regard education, intellectual or moral,
 
 166 MOKAL EDUCATION. 
 
 as the panacea, we may sav that their undue ex- 
 pectations are not without use ; and that perliaps it 
 is part of the beneiicent order of things that their 
 confidence cannot be shaken. 
 
 Even were it true, however, that by some pos- 
 sible system of moral government children could 
 be moulded into the desired form ; and even could 
 every parent be duly indoctrinated with this sys- 
 tem ; we should still be far from achieving the 
 object in view. It is forgotten that the carrying 
 out of any such system presupposes, on the part of 
 adults, a degree of intelligence, of goodness, of self- 
 control, possessed by no one. Tlie great error made 
 by those who discuss questions of juvenile disci- 
 pline, is in ascribing all the faults and difficulties 
 to the children, and none to the parents. The 
 current assumption resi^ecting family government, 
 as respecting national government, is, that the 
 virtues are with the rulers and the vices with 
 the ruled. Judging by educational theories, men 
 and women are entirely transfigured in the do- 
 mestic relation. The citizens we do business with, 
 the people we meet in the world, we all know to be 
 very imperfect creatures. In the daily scandals, in 
 the quarrels of friends, in bankruptcy disclosures, 
 in lawsuits, in police reports, we have constantly 
 thrust before us the pervading selfishness, dishon- 
 esty, brutality. Yet when we criticise nursery 
 management, and canvass the misbehaviour of ju- 
 veniles, we habitually take for granted that these 
 culpable men and women are free from moral de-
 
 DEFICIENCIES OF PARENTS. 167 
 
 /inquencj in the treatment of tlieir offspring ! So 
 far is this from the truth, that we do not hesitate to 
 say that to parental misconduct is traceable a great 
 part of the domestic disorder commonly ascribed to 
 the perversity of children. We do not assert this 
 of the more sympathetic and self restrained, among 
 whom we hope most of our readers may be classed, 
 but we assert it of the mass. What kind of moral 
 discipline is to be expected from a mother who, 
 time after time, angrily shakes her infant because 
 it will not suckle her, which we once saw a mother 
 do ? How niucli love of justice and generosity is 
 likely to be instilled by a father- who, on having his 
 attention drawn by his child's scream to the fact 
 that its finger is jarnnicd between the window sash 
 and the sill, forthwith begins to beat the child in- 
 stead of releasing it ? Yet that there are snch 
 fathers is testified to us by an eye-witness. Or, to 
 take a still stronger case, also vouched for by direct 
 testimony — what are the educational prospects of 
 the boy who, on being taken home with a dislocated 
 thigh, is saluted with a castigation ? It is true that 
 these are extreme instances — instances exhibiting 
 in human beings tliat blind instinct which impels 
 brutes to destroy the weakly and injured of their 
 own race. But extreme though they are, they 
 t}^ify feelings and conduct daily observable in 
 many families. Who has not repeatedly seen a 
 child slapped by nurse or parent for a fretfulness 
 probably resulting from bodily derangement ? Who, 
 when watching a mother snatch up a fallen littlo
 
 168 MORAL EDUCATION, 
 
 one, has not often traced, Loth in the rough man- 
 ner and in the sharply-uttered exclamation — ' You 
 stupid little thing ! ' — an irascibility foretelling 
 endless future squabbles ? Is there not in the harsh 
 tones in -which a father bids his children be quiet, 
 evidence of a deficient fellow-feeling with them ? 
 Are not the constant, and often quite needless, 
 thwartings that the 3'oung experience — the injunc- 
 tions to sit still, which an active child cannot obey 
 without sufi'ering great nervous irritation, the com- 
 mands not to look out of the window when travel- 
 ling by railway, which on a child of any intelli- 
 gence entails serious deprivation — are not these 
 thwartings, we ask, signs of a terrible lack of sym- 
 pathy ? The truth is, that the difliculties of moral 
 education are necessarily of dual origin — necessar- 
 ily result from the combined faults of parents and 
 children. If hereditary transmission is a law of 
 nature, as every naturalist knows it to be, and as 
 our daily remarks and current proverbs admit it to 
 be ; then on the average of cases, the defects of 
 children mirror the defects of their parents ; — on the 
 average of cases, we say, because, complicated as 
 the results are by the transmitted traits of remoter 
 ancestors, the correspondence is not special but 
 only general. And if, on the average of cases, this 
 inheritance of defects exists, then the evil passions 
 which parents have to check in their children imply 
 like evil passions in themselves : hidden, it may be, 
 from the public eye ;or perhaps obscured by other 
 feelings ; but still there. Evidently, therefore, the
 
 MUST DEPEND UPON GENERAL IMPROVEMENT. 169 
 
 geoeral practice of any ideal system of discipline is 
 hopeless : parents are not good enough. 
 
 Moreover, even were there methods by which 
 the desired end could be at once effected, and even 
 had fathers and mothers sufficient insight, sym- 
 pathy, and self-command to employ these methods 
 consistently, it might still be contended that it 
 would be of no use to reform family discipline faster 
 than other things are reformed. What is it that 
 we aim to do ? Is it not that education of what- 
 ever kind has for its proximate end to prepare a 
 child for the business of life — to produce a citizen 
 who, at the same time that he is well conducted, is 
 also able to make his way in the world ? And does 
 not making his way in the world (by which we 
 mean, not the acquirement of wealth, but of the 
 means requisite for properly bringing up a family) 
 — does not this imply a certain iitness for the world 
 as it now is ? And if by any system of culture an 
 ideal human being could be produced, is it not 
 doubtful whether he would be ht for the world as 
 it now is ? May we not, on the contrary, suspect 
 tliat his too keen sense of rectitude, and too elevated 
 standard of conduct, would make life alike intoler- 
 able and impossible ? And however admirable the 
 results might be, considered individually, would it 
 not be self-defeating in so far as society and poster- 
 ity are concerned ? It may, we think, be argued 
 with much reason, that as in a nation so in a fam- 
 ily, the kind of government is, on the whole, about 
 as good as the general state of human nature per-
 
 170 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 mits it to be. It may be said that in the one ease, 
 as in the other, the average character of the people 
 determines the quality of the control exercised. It 
 may be inferred that in both cases amelioration of 
 the average character leads to an amelioration of 
 system ; and further, that were it possible to ame- 
 liorate the system ■without the average character 
 being first ameliorated, evil, rather than good, 
 would follow. It may be urged that such degree 
 of harshness as children now experience from their 
 parents and teachers, is but a preparation for that 
 greater harshness which they will meet with on 
 entering the world ; and that were it possible for 
 parents and teachers to behave towards them with 
 perfect equity and entire sympathy, it would but 
 intensify the sufferings which the selfishness of men 
 must, in after life, inflict on them.* 
 
 * This is the plea put in by some for the rough treatment ex- 
 perienced by boys at our public schools ; where, as it is said, they 
 are introduced to a miniature world whose imperfections and hard- 
 ships prepare them for those of the real world : and it must be 
 admitted that the plea has some force. But it is a very insuflScient 
 plea. For whereas domestic and school discipline, though they 
 should not be very much better than the discipline of adult life, 
 should at any rate bo somewhat better; the discipline which boys 
 m'^et with at Eton, Winchester, Harrow, &c., is much worse than 
 that of adult life — much more unjust, cruel, brutal. Instead of being 
 an aid to human progress, which all culture should be, the culture 
 ©f our public schools, by accustoming boys to a despotic form of 
 government and an intercourse regulated by brute force, tends to fit 
 them for a lower state of society than that which exists. And 
 chiefly recruited as our legislature is from among those who are 
 brought up at these schools, this barbarizing influence becomes a 
 serious hindrance to national progress.
 
 LIMITED BY THE STATE OF SOCIETY 171 
 
 " But does not this prove too much ? " some one 
 will ask. " If no system of moral culture can forth- 
 with make children altogether what they should 
 be ; if, even were there a system that would do 
 this, existing parents are too imperfect to carry it 
 out ; and if even could such a system be success- 
 fully caried out, its results would be disastrously 
 incongruous with the present state of society ; does 
 it not follow that a reform in the system now in 
 use is neither practicable nor desirable ? " No. It 
 merely follows that reform in domestic government 
 must go on, pari passu, "with other reforms. It 
 merely follows that methods of discipline neither 
 can be nor should be ameliorated, except hy instal- 
 ments. It merely follows that the dictates of ab- 
 stract rectitude will, in practice, inevitably be sub- 
 ordinated by the present state of human nature — 
 by the imperfections alike of children, of parents, 
 and of society ; and can only be better fulfilled as 
 the general character becomes better. 
 
 " At any rate, then," may rejoin our critic, " it 
 is clearly nseless to set up any ideal standard of 
 family discipline. Tliere can be no advantage in 
 elaborating and recommending methods that are in 
 advance of the time." Again "we must contend for 
 the contrary. Just as in the case of political gov- 
 ernment, though pure rectitude may be at present 
 impracticable, it is requisite to know where the 
 right lies, so that the changes we make may be 
 Urtjoards the right instead of aicay from it ; so in 
 the case of domestic government, an ideal must be
 
 172 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 upheld, that there may be gradual approximations 
 to it. We need fear no evil consequences from the 
 maintenance of such an ideal. On the average the 
 constitutional conservatism of mankind is always 
 strong enough to prevent a too rapid change. So 
 admirable are the arrangements of things that until 
 men have grown up to the level of a higher belief, 
 they cannot receive it : nominally, they may hold 
 it, but not virtually. And even when the truth 
 gets recognised, the obstacles to conformity with it 
 are so persistent as to outlive the patience of phi- 
 lanthropists and even philosophers. We may be 
 quite sure, therefore, that the many difficulties 
 standing in the way of a normal government of 
 children, will always put an adequate check upon 
 the efforts to realize it. 
 
 With these preliminary explanations, let us go 
 on to consider the true aims and methods of moral 
 education — moral education, strictly so called, we 
 mean ; for we do not j^ropose to enter upon the 
 question of religious education as an aid to the 
 education exclusively moral. Tliis we omit as a 
 topic better dealt with separately. After a few 
 pages devoted to the settlement of general prin- 
 ciples, during the perusal of which we bespeak the 
 reader's patience, we shall aim by illustrations to 
 make clear the right methods of parental behaviour 
 in the hourly occurring difficulties of family gov- 
 ernment. 
 
 When a child falls, or runs its head against the
 
 THE METHOD OF NATURE. 173 
 
 table, it suffers a pain, the remembrance of wMcb 
 tends to make it more careful for the future ; and 
 by an occasional repetition of like experiences, it is 
 eventually disciplined into a proper guidance of its 
 movements. If it lays hold of the fire-bars, thrusts 
 its linger into the candle-flame, or sj)ills boiling 
 water on any part of its skin, the resulting burn 
 or scald is a lesson not easily forgotten. So deep 
 an impression is produced by one or two such 
 events, that afterwards no persuasion will induce it 
 again to disregard the laws of its constitution in 
 these ways. 
 
 Now in these and like cases, oSTature illustrates 
 to us in the simplest way, the true theory and 
 practice of moral discipline — a theory and practice 
 which, however much they may seem to the super- 
 ficial like those commonly received, we shall find on 
 examination to differ from them very widely. 
 
 Observe, in the first place, that in bodily in- 
 juries and their penalties we have misconduct and 
 its consequences reduced to their simplest forms. 
 Though, according to tlieir popular acceptations, 
 right and wrony are words scarcely applicable to 
 actions that have none but direct bodily effects ; 
 yet whoever considers the matter will see that such 
 actions must be as much classifiable under these 
 heads as any other actions. From whatever basis 
 they start, all theories of morality agree in con- 
 sidering that conduct whose total results, immediate 
 and remote, are beneficial, is good conduct ; while 
 conduct whose total results, immediate and remote
 
 174 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 are injurious, is bad conduct. The liappiness or 
 misery caused by it are tlie ultimate standards by 
 ■wbicli all men judge of behaviour. We consider 
 drunkenness wrong because of the physical degen- 
 eracy and accompanying moral evils entailed on 
 the transgressor and his dependents. Did theft 
 uniforndy give pleasure both to taker and loser, we 
 should not find it in our catalogue of sins. "Were 
 it conceivable that benevolent actions multiplied 
 human pains, we should condemn them — should 
 not consider them benevolent. It needs but to 
 read the first newspaj)er leader, or listen to any 
 conversation touching social affairs, to see that acts 
 of parliament, political movements, philanthropic 
 agitations, in common with the doings of individ- 
 uals, are judged by their anticipated results in 
 multiplying the pleasures or pains of men. And if 
 on looking on all secondary superinduced ideas, we 
 find these to be our ultimate tests of right and 
 wrong, we cannot refuse to class purely physical 
 actions as right or wrong according to the beneficial 
 or detrimental results they produce. 
 
 Kote, in the second place, the character of the 
 punishments by which these physical transgressions 
 are prevented. Punishments, we call them, in the 
 absence of a better word ; for they are not punish- 
 ments in the literal sense. They are not artificial 
 and unnecessary inflictior.s of pain ; but are simply 
 the beneficent checks to actions that are essentially 
 at variance with bodily welfare — checks in the ab- 
 sence of which life would quickly be destroyed by
 
 THE CHILD ACTS AND NATURE EEACTS. 1V5 
 
 bodily injuries. It is the peculiarity of these pen- 
 alties, if we must so call them, that they are noth- 
 ing more than the unavoidable consequences of the 
 deeds which they follow : they are nothing more 
 than the inevitable reactions entailed by the child's 
 actions. 
 
 Let it be further borne in mind that these pain- 
 ful reactions are proportionate to the degree in 
 which the organic laws have been transgressed. A 
 slight accident brings a slight pain, a more serious 
 one, a greater pain. When a child tumbles over 
 the door-step, it is not ordained that it shall sufler 
 in excess of the amount necessary, with the view 
 of making it still more cautious than the necessary 
 suffering will make it. But from its daily expe- 
 rience it is left to learn the greater or less penalties 
 of greater or less errors ; and to behave accord- 
 ingly. 
 
 And then mark, lastly, that these natural reac- 
 tions which follow the child's wrong actions, are 
 constant, direct, unhesitating, and not to be es- 
 caped. No threats : but a silent, rigorous perform- 
 ance. If a child runs a pin into its finger, pain 
 follows. If it does it again, there is again the same 
 result : and so on perpetually. In all its dealings 
 with surrounding inorganic nature it finds this un- 
 swerving persistence, which listens to no excuse, 
 and from which there is no appeal ; and very soon 
 recognising this stern though beneficent discipline, 
 it becomes extremely careful not to transgress. 
 
 Still more sio-nificant will these cceneral truths 
 
 11
 
 176 MOKAL EDUCATION. 
 
 a])pcar, wlien we reracinber tliat they hold tlirough- 
 out adult life as well as throughout infantine life. 
 It is by an experimentally-gained knowledge of the 
 natural consequences, that men and women are 
 checked when they go wrong. After home educa- 
 tion has ceased, and when there are no longer par- 
 ents and teachers to forbid this or that kind of 
 conduct, there comes into play a discipline like that 
 by which the young child is taught its first lessons 
 in self-guidance. K the youth entering upon the 
 business of life idles away his time and fulfils slowly 
 or unskilfully the duties entrusted to him, there by- 
 and-bye follows the natural penalty : he is dis- 
 charged, and left to suffer for awhile the eyils of 
 relatiye poyerty. On the unpunetual man, fjiiling 
 alike his appointments of business and pleasure, 
 there continually fall the consequent inconveniences, 
 losses, and deprivations. Tlie avaricious tradesman 
 who charges too high a rate of profit, loses his cus- 
 tomers, and so is checked in his greediness. Di- 
 minishing practice teaches the inattentive doctor to 
 bestow more trouble on his patients. The too 
 credulous creditor and the over-sanguine specula- 
 tor alike learn by the difficulties which rashness 
 entails on them, the necessity of being more cau- 
 tious in their engagements. And so throughout 
 the life of every citizen. In the' quotatit^n so often 
 made apropos of these cases — " Tlie burnt child 
 dreads the fire " — we see not only that the analogy 
 between this social discipline and Xature's early 
 discipline of infants is universally recognised ; but
 
 nature's method with adults. 177 
 
 we also see an implied conviction that this disci- 
 pline is of the most efficient kind. Nay more, this 
 conviction is not only implied, but distinctly stated* 
 .Every one has heard othoi-s confess that only by 
 '' dearly bought experience " had they been induced 
 io give np some bad or foolish course of conduct 
 fonnerly pursued. Every one has heard, in the 
 criticisms passed on the doings of this spendthrift 
 or the other speculator, the remark that advice was 
 useless, and that nothing but " bitter experience " 
 would produce any effect : nothing, that is, but 
 suffering the unavoidable consequences. And if 
 further proof be needed that the penalty of the 
 natural reaction is not only the most efficient, but 
 that no humanly-devised penalty can replace it, we 
 have such further proof in the notorious ill-success 
 of our various penal systems. Out of the many 
 methods of criminal discipline that have been pro- 
 posed and legally enforced, none have answered the 
 expectations of their advocates. Not only have 
 artificial punishments failed to produce reformation, 
 but they have in many cases increased the criminal- 
 ity. The only successful reformatories are those 
 privately-established ones which have approximated 
 their regime to the method of Nature — which have 
 done little more than administer the natural conse- 
 quences of criminal conduct : the natural conse° 
 quences being, that by imprisonment or other re= 
 straint, the criminal shall have his liberty of action 
 diminished as much as is needful for the safety of 
 eociety ; and that he shall be made to maintain hinr
 
 XT8 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 self while living under this restraint. Tlius we see 
 not only that the discipline by which the young child 
 is so successfully taught to regulate its movements 
 is also the discipline by which the great mass of 
 adults are kept in order, and more or less improved ; 
 but that the discipline humanly-devised for the 
 worst adults, fails when it diverges from this divine- 
 ly-ordained discipline, and begins to succeed when 
 it approximates to it. 
 
 Have we not here, then, the guiding principle 
 of moral education ? Must we not infer that the 
 system so beneficent in its effects, alike during in- 
 fancy and maturity, will be equally beneficent 
 throughout youth ? Can any one believe that the 
 method which answers so well in the first and the 
 last divisions of life will not answer in the inter- 
 mediate division ? Is it not manifest that as " min- 
 isters and interpreters of Kature " it is the function 
 of parents to see that their children habitually ex- 
 perience the true consequences of their conduct — 
 the natural reactions : neither warding them ofi", 
 nor intensifying them, nor putting artificial conse- 
 quences in place of them ? No unprejudiced reader 
 will hesitate in his assent. 
 
 Probably, however, not a few will contend that 
 already most parents do this — that the punisiiments 
 they inflict are, in the majority of cases, the true 
 consequences of ill-conduct — that parental anger, 
 renting itself in harsh words and deeds, is the re- 
 sult of a child's trans<j;ression — and that, in tlie
 
 BAD SYSTEMS MAY BE RELATIVELY GOOD. 179 
 
 Buffering, physical or moral, which the child is 
 subject to, it experiences the natural reaction of its 
 misbehaviour. Along with much error this asser- 
 tion, doubtless, contains some truth. It is unques- 
 tionable that the displeasure of fathers and mothers 
 is a true consequence of juvenile delinquency ; and 
 that the manifestation of it is a normal check upon 
 such delinquency. It is unquestionable that the 
 scoldings, and threats, and blows, which a passion- 
 ate parent visits on offending little ones, are effects 
 actually produced in such a parent by their of- 
 fences ; and so are, in some sort, to be considered 
 as among the natural reactions of their wrong ac- 
 tions. And we are by no means prepared to say 
 that these modes of treatment are not relatively 
 right — right, that is, in relation to the uncontrol- 
 lable cliildren of ill-controlled adults ; and right in 
 relation to a state of society in which such ill-con- 
 trolled adults make up the mass of the people. As 
 already suggested, educational systems, like politi- 
 cal and other institutions, are generally as good as 
 the state of human nature permits. The barbarous 
 children of barbarous parents are probably only to 
 be restrained by the barbarous methods which such 
 parents spontaneously employ ; while submission 
 to these barbarous methods is perhaps the best prep- 
 aration such children can have for the barbarous 
 society in which they are presently to play a part. 
 Conversely, the civilized members of a civilized 
 society will spontaneously manifest their dis])leas- 
 ure in less violent ways — will spontaneously uae
 
 ISO MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 milder measures : measures strong enough for their 
 better-natured children. Tlius it is doubtless true 
 that, in so far as the expression of parental feeling 
 is concerned, the principle of the natural reaction 
 is always more or less followed. The system of 
 domestic government ever gravitates towards its 
 right form. 
 
 But now observe two important facts. In the 
 first place, observe that, in states of rapid transition 
 like ours, which witness a long-drawn battle be- 
 tween old and new theories and old and new prac- 
 tices, the educational methods in use are apt to 
 be considerably out of harmony with the times. 
 In deference to dogmas fit only for the ages that 
 uttered them, many parents inflict punishments 
 that do violence to their own feelings, and so visit 
 on their children -jmnatural reactions ; while other 
 parents, enthusiastic in their hopes of immediate 
 perfection, rush to the opposite extreme. And then 
 observe, in the second place, that the discipline on 
 which we are insisting is not so much the expe- 
 rience of parental approbation or disapprobation, 
 which, in most cases, is only a secondary conse- 
 quence of a child's conduct ; but it is the experience 
 of those results which would naturally flow from 
 the conduct in the absence of parental opinion or 
 interference. Tlie truly instructive and salutary 
 consequences are not those inflicted by parents 
 when they take upon themselves to be Kature's 
 proxies ; but they are those inflicted by Nature 
 herself. We will endeavour to make this distinc-
 
 THE NOEilAL SYSTEM LLLUSTRATED. 181 
 
 tion clear hj a few illustrations, wliicli, while they 
 show what we mean by natural reactions as con- 
 trasted with artificial ones, will alford some directly 
 practical suggestions. 
 
 In every family where there are young children 
 there almost daily occur cases of what mothers and 
 servants call " making a litter." A child has had 
 out its box of toys, and leaves them scattered about 
 the floor. Or a handful of flowers, brought in from 
 a morning walk, is presently seen disj)ersed over 
 tables and chairs. Or a little girl, making doll's- 
 clothes, disfigures the room with shreds. In most 
 cases the trouble of rectifying this disorder falls 
 anywhere but in the right place : if in the nursery, 
 the nurse herself, with many grumblings about 
 " tiresome little things," &c., undertakes the task ; 
 if below stairs, the task usually devolves either on 
 one of the elder children or on the housemaid ; the 
 transgi-essor being visited with nothing more than 
 a scolding. In this very simple case, however, 
 there are many parents wise enough to follow out, 
 more or less consistently, the normal course — that 
 of making the child itself collect the toys or shreds. 
 The labour of putting things in order is the true 
 consequence of having put them in disorder. Every 
 trader in his oflSce, every wife in her household, 
 has daily experience of this fact. And if education 
 be a preparation for the business of life, then every 
 child should also, from the beginning, have daily 
 experience of this fact. If the natural penalty be 
 met by any refractory behaviour (which it may
 
 182 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 perhaps be where the general system of moral dis- 
 cipliue previously j^ursued has been bad), then the 
 proper course is to let the child feel the ulterior re- 
 action consequent on its disobedience. Having re- 
 fused or neglected to jiick up and put away the 
 things it has scattered about, and having thereby 
 entailed the trouble of doing this on some one else, 
 the child should, on subsequent occasions, be denied 
 the means of giving this trouble. "When next it 
 petitions for its toy-box, the reply of its mannna 
 should be — "Tlie last time you had your toys you 
 left them lying on the floor, and Jane had to pick 
 them up. Jane is too busy to pick up every day 
 the things you leave about ; and I cannot do it 
 myself. So that, as you will not put away your 
 toys when you have done with them, I cannot let 
 you have them." Tliis is obviously a natural con- 
 sequence, neither increased nor lessened ; and must 
 be so recognised by a child. The penalty comes, 
 too, at the moment when it is most keenly felt. A 
 new-born desire is balked at the moment of antici- 
 pated gratification ; and the strong impression so 
 produced can scarcely fail to have an effect on the 
 future conduct : an effect which, by consistent rep- 
 etition, will do whatever can be done in curing 
 the fault. Add to which, that, by this method, a 
 child is early taught the lesson which cannot be 
 leanit too soon, that in this world of ours pleasures 
 are rightly to be obtahied only by labour. 
 
 Take another case. Not long since we had fre- 
 quently to listen to the reprimands visited on a
 
 THE NORMAL SYSTEM ILLUSTRATED. 183 
 
 little girl who was scarcely ever ready in time for 
 the daily walk. Of eager disposition, and apt to 
 become thoroughly absorbed in the occupation of 
 the moment, Constance never thought of putting 
 on her things until the rest were ready. Tlie gov- 
 erness and the other children had almost invariably 
 to wait ;. and from the mamma there almost in- 
 variably came the same scolding. Utterly as this 
 system failed it never occurred to the mamma to 
 let Constance experience the natural penalty. Nor, 
 indeed, would she try it when it was suggested to 
 her. In the world the penalty of being behind 
 time is the loss of some advantage that would else 
 have been gained : the train is gone ; or the steam- 
 boat is just leaving its moorings ; or the best things 
 in the market are sold ; or all the good seats in 
 the concert-room are filled. And every one, in 
 cases perpetually occurring, may see that it is the 
 prospective deprivations entailed by being too late 
 which prevent people from being too late. Is not 
 the inference obvious ? Should not these prospec- 
 tive deprivations control the child's conduct also ? 
 If Constance is not ready at the appointed time, the 
 natural result is that of being left behind, and losing 
 her walk. And no one can, we think, doubt that 
 after having once or twice remained at home while 
 the rest were enjoying themselves in the fields, and 
 after having felt that this loss of a nmch-prized 
 gratification was solely due to want of promptitude, 
 some amendment would take place. At any rate, 
 the measure would be more efi'ective than that per'
 
 lS4r MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 petiial scolding wliicli ends only in producing cal' 
 lousness. 
 
 Again, when children, witli more than nsnal 
 carelessness, break or lose the things given to them, 
 the natural penalty — the penalty which makes 
 grown-up persons more careful — is the consequent 
 inconvenience. Tlie want of the lost or damaged 
 article, and the cost of supplying its place, are the 
 experiences by which men and women are disci- 
 plined in these matters ; and the experience of chil- 
 dren should be as much as possible assimilated to 
 theirs. We do not refer to that early period at 
 which toys are pulled to pieces in the process of 
 learning their physical properties, and at which the 
 results of carelessness cannot be understood ; but to 
 a later period, Avhen the meaning and advantages 
 of property are perceived. "When a boy, old 
 enough to possess a penknife, uses it so roughly as 
 to snap the blade, or leaves it in the grass by some 
 hedge-side, where he was cutting a stick, a thought- 
 less parent, or some indulgent relative, will com- 
 monly forthwith buy him another; not seeing that, 
 by doing this, a valuable lesson is lost. In such a 
 case, a father may properly explain that penknives 
 cost money, and that to get money requires laboui- ; 
 that he cannot afford to purchase new penknives for 
 one who loses or breaks them ; and that until he 
 sees evidence of greater carefulness he must decline 
 to make good the loss. A ])arallel discipline may 
 be used as a means of checking extravagance. 
 
 These few familiar instances, here chosen be
 
 ADVANTAGES OF THE NORMAL SYSTEM. 1S5 
 
 cause of the simplicity witli which they illustrate 
 our point, will make clear to every one the distinc- 
 tion between those natural penalties which we con- 
 tend are the truly efficient ones, and those artificial 
 penalties which parents commonly substitute for 
 them. Before going on to exhibit the higher and 
 subtler applications of this principle, let us note its 
 many and great superiorities over tlie principle, or 
 rather the empirical practice, which prevails in 
 most families. 
 
 In the first place, right conceptions of cause and 
 effect are early formed ; and by frequent and con- 
 sistent experience are eventually rendered definite 
 and complete. Proper conduct in life is much 
 better guaranteed when the good and evil conse- 
 quences of actions are rationally understood, than 
 when they are merely believed on authority. A 
 child who finds that disorderliness entails the sub- 
 sequent trouble of putting things in order, or who 
 misses a gratification from dilatoriness, or whose 
 want of care is followed by the loss or breakage of 
 some much-prized possession, not onjy experiences 
 a keenly -felt consequence, but gains a knowledge 
 of causation : both the one and the other being 
 just like those which adult life will bring. Where- 
 as a child who in such cases receives some repri- 
 mand or some factitious penalty, not only expe- 
 riences a consequence for which it often cares very 
 little, but lacks that instruction resjiecting the es- 
 sential natures of good and evil conduct, which it 
 would else have gathered. It is a vice of the com-
 
 186 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 men system of artificial rewards aud punishments, 
 long since noticed by the clear-sighted, that by sub- 
 stituting for the natural results of misbehaviour 
 certain threatened tasks or castigations, it produce? 
 a radically wrong standard of moral guidance. 
 Having throughout uifancy and boyhood alwa^'g 
 regarded parental or tutorial displeasure as the re- 
 sult of a forbidden action, the youth has gained an 
 established association of ideas between such action 
 and such displeasure, as cause and effect ; and con- 
 sequently when parents and tutors have abdicated* 
 and their displeasure is not to be feared, the re- 
 straint on a forbidden action is in great measure re- 
 moved : the true restraints, the natural reactions, 
 liaving yet to be learnt by sad experience. A? 
 writes one who has had personal knowledge of thie 
 shortsighted system : — " Young men let loose from 
 school, particularly those whose parents have neg- 
 lected to exert their influence, plunge into every 
 description of extravagance ; they know no rule 
 of action — they are ignorant of the reasons for 
 moral conduct — they have no foundation to rest 
 upon — and until they have been severely disciplined 
 by the world are extremely dangerous members of 
 society." 
 
 Another great advantage of this natural system 
 of discipline is, that it is a system of pure justice; 
 and will be recognised by every child as such. 
 Whoso suffers nothing more than the evil which 
 obviously follows naturally from his own misbe- 
 haviour, is much less likely to think himself wrongly
 
 ADVANTAGES OF THE NOEMAL SYSTEM. 187 
 
 h eated than if he siiiFers an evil artificially inflicted 
 on him ; and this will be true of children as of 
 men. Take the case of a boy who is habitually reck- 
 less of his clothes — scrambles through hedges with- 
 out caution, or is utterly regardless of mud. If he 
 is beaten, or sent to bed, he is apt to regard him- 
 self as ill-used ; and his mind is more likely to be 
 occupied by thinking over his injuries than repent- 
 ing of his transgressions. But suppose he is re- 
 quired to rectify as far as he can the harm he has 
 done — to clean off the mud with wliich he has cov- 
 ered himself, or to mend the tear as well as he can. 
 Will he not feel that the evil is one of his own pro- 
 ducing ? "Will he not while paying this penalty be 
 continuously conscious of the connexion between it 
 and its cause ? And will he not, spite his irrita- 
 tion, recognise more or less clearly tlie justice of the 
 arrangement ? If several lessons of this kind fail 
 to produce amendment — if suits of clothes are pre- 
 maturely spoiled — if pursuing this same system of 
 discipline a father declines to spend money for new 
 ones until the ordinary time has elapsed — and if 
 meanwhile, there occur occasions on Avhich, having 
 no decent clothes to go in, the boy is debarred from 
 joining the rest of the family on holiday excursions 
 and fete days, it is manifest that while he will 
 keenly feel the punishment, lie can scarcely fail to 
 trace the chain of causation, and to perceive that 
 his own carelessness is the origin of it ; and seeing 
 this, he will not have that same sense of injustice
 
 1S8 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 as when there is no obvious connexion between the 
 transgression and its penalty. 
 
 Again, the tempers botli of parents and children 
 are much less liable to be ruffled under this system 
 than under the ordinary system. Instead of letting 
 children experience the painful results which natu- 
 rally follow from wrong conduct, the usual course 
 pursued by parents is to inflict themselves certain 
 other painful results. A double mischief arises 
 from this. Making, as they do, multiplied family 
 laws ; and identifying their own supremacy and dig- 
 nity with the maintenance of these laws ; it liap- 
 pens that every transgression comes to be regard- 
 ed as an oflfence against themselves, and a cause 
 of anger on their part. Add to which the further 
 irritations which result from taking upon them- 
 selves, in the shape of extra labour or cost, those 
 evil consequences which should have been allowed 
 to fall on the wrong-doers. Similarly with the 
 children. Penalties which the necessary reaction of 
 things brings round upon them— -penalties which 
 are inflicted by impersonal agency, produce an irri- 
 tation that is comparatively slight and transient ; 
 whereas, penalties which are voluntarily inflicted 
 by a parent, and are afterwards remembered as 
 caused by him or her, produce an irritation both 
 greater and more continued. Just consider how 
 disastrous would be the result if this empii-ical 
 method were pursued from the beginning. Sup 
 pose it were possible for parents to take upon them- 
 selves the physical sufferings entailed on their chil-
 
 EVILS OF AKTIFICIAL rUNISIlMENT. 189 
 
 dren by ignorance and awkwardness ; and that 
 wliile bearing these evil consequences thej visited 
 on their children certain other evil consequences, 
 with the view of teaching them the impropriety of 
 tlieir conduct. Suj^pose that when a child, who 
 had been forbidden to meddle with the kettle, spilt 
 some boiling water on its foot, the mother vicari- 
 ously assumed the scald and gave a blow in place 
 of it ; and similarly in all other cases. Would not 
 the daily mishaps be sources of far more anger than 
 now ? Would there not be chronic ill-temper on 
 both sides ? Yet an exactly parallel policy is pur- 
 sued in after years. A father who punishes his boy 
 for carelessly or wilfully breaking a sister's toy, and 
 then himself pays for a new toy, does substantially 
 this same thing — inflicts an artiiicial penalty on the 
 transgressor, and takes the natural penalty on him- 
 self : his own feelings and those of the transgressor 
 being alike needlessly irritated. If he simply re- 
 quired restitution to be made, he would produce far 
 less heartburning. If he told the boy that a new 
 toy must be bought at his, the boy's, cost, and that 
 his supply of pocket-money must be withheld to 
 the needful extent, there would be much less cause 
 for ebullition of temper on either side ; while in the 
 deprivation afterwards felt, the boy would expe- 
 rience the equitable and salutary consequence. In 
 brief, the system of discipline by natural reactions 
 is less injurious to temper, alike because it is per- 
 ceived on both sides to be nothing more than pure 
 justice, and because it more or less substitutes the
 
 190 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 impersonal agency of nature for tlie personal agency 
 of parents. 
 
 Whence also follows the manifest corollary, that 
 r.nder this system the parental and lilial relation 
 will be a more friendly, and therefore a more in- 
 fluential one. "Whether in parent or child, anger, 
 however caused, and to whomsoever directed, is 
 more or less detrimental. But anger in a parent 
 towards a child, and in a child towards a parent, is 
 especially detrimental ; because it weakens that 
 bond of sympathy which is essential to a benefi- 
 cent control. In virtue of the general law of asso- 
 ciation of ideas, it inevitably results, both in young 
 and old, that dislike is contracted towards things 
 which in our experience are habitually connected 
 with disagreeable feelings. Or where attachment 
 originally existed, it is weakened, or destroyed, or 
 turned into repugnance, according to the quantity 
 of painful impressions received. Parental wi-ath, 
 with its accompanying reprimands and castigations, 
 cannot fail, if often repeated, to produce filial alien- 
 ation ; while the resentment and sulkiness of chil- 
 dren cannot fail to weaken the afiection felt for 
 them, and may even end in destroying it. Hence 
 the numerous cases in which parents (and especially 
 fathers, who are commonly deputed to express the 
 anger and inflict the punishment) are regarded with 
 indifl'erence, if not with aversion ; and hence the 
 equally numerous cases in which children are looked 
 upon as inflictions. Seeing, then, as all must do, 
 Uiat estrangement of this kind is fatal to a sulutary
 
 PENAL DISCIPLINE OF NATUKE. 191 
 
 moral culture, it follows that parents cannot be too 
 solicitous in avoiding occasions of direct antagon- 
 ism with their children — occasions of personal re- 
 sentment. And therefore they cannot too anxiously 
 avail themselves of this discipline of natural conse- 
 quences — this system of letting the penalty be iii- 
 flicted by the laws of things ; which, by saving the 
 parent from the function of a penal agent, prevents 
 these mutual exasperations and estrangements. 
 
 Thus we see that this method of moral culture 
 by experience of the normal reactions, which is the 
 divinely-ordained method alike for infancy and for 
 adult life, is equally applicable during the inter- 
 mediate childliood and youth. And among the ad- 
 vantages of this method we see — First. Tliat it 
 gives that rational comprehension of right and 
 wrong conduct which results from actual experience 
 of the good and bad consequences caused by them. 
 Second. That the child, suffering nothing more 
 than the painful effects brought upon it by its own 
 wrong actions, must recognise more or less clearly 
 the justice of the penalties. Third. That, recog- 
 nising the justice of the penalties, and receiving 
 those penalties through the working of things, 
 rather than at the hands of an individual, its temper 
 will be less disturbed ; while the parent occupying 
 the comparatively passive position of taking care 
 that the natural penalties are felt, will preserve a 
 comparative equanimity. And Fourth. That mu- 
 tual exasperation being thus in great measure pre- 
 vented, a much happier, and a more influential 
 12
 
 192 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 state of feeling, will exist between parent and 
 cliild. 
 
 " But what is to be done with more serious mis- 
 conduct ? " some will ask. " How is this plan to be 
 carried out when a petty theft has been committed ? 
 or when a lie has been told ? or when some younger 
 brother or sister has been ill-used ? " 
 
 Before replying to these questions, let us con- 
 sider the bearings of a few illustrative facts. 
 
 Living in the family of his brother-in-law, a 
 friend of ours had undertaken the education of his 
 little nephew and niece. This he had conducted, 
 more perhaps from natural sympathy than from 
 reasoned-out conclusions, in the spirit of the method 
 above set forth. The two children were in doors 
 his pupils and out of doors his companions. They 
 daily joined him in walks and botanizing excur- 
 sions, eagerly sought out plants for him, looked on 
 while he examined and identified them, and in this 
 and other ways were ever gaining both pleasure and 
 instruction in his society. In short, morally con- 
 sidered, he stood to them much more in the position 
 of parent than either their father or mother did. 
 Describing to us the results of this policy, he gave, 
 among other instances, the following. One even- 
 ing, having need for some article lying in another 
 part of the house, he asked his nephew to fetch it 
 for him. Deeply interested as the boy was in some 
 amusement of the moment, he, contrary to his 
 wont, either exhibited great reluctance or refused,
 
 FRIENDSHIP BETWEEN PAKENTS AND CHILDREN. 193 
 
 we forget which. His uncle, disapproving of a 
 coercive course fetched it himself ; merely exhibit- 
 ing by his manner the annoyance this ill-behaviour 
 gave him. And when, later in the evening, the 
 boy made overtures for the usual play, they were 
 gravely repelled — the uncle manifested just that 
 coldness of feeling naturally produced in hijn, and 
 so let the boy experience the necessary consequences 
 of his conduct. Next morning at the usual time 
 for rising, our friend heard a new voice outside the 
 door, and in walked his little nephew with the hot 
 water ; and then the boy, peering about the room 
 to see what else could be done, exclaimed, " Oh ! 
 you want your boots," and forthwith rushed down 
 stairs to fetch them. In this and other ways he 
 showed a true penitence for his misconduct ; he en- 
 deavoured by unusual services to make up for the 
 service he had refused ; his higher feelings had of 
 themselves conquered his lower ones, and acquired 
 strength by the conquest ; and he valued more than 
 before the friendship he thus regained. 
 
 This gentleman is now himself a father ; acts on 
 the same system ; and finds it answer completely. 
 He makes himself thoroughly his children's friend. 
 The evening is longed for by them because he will 
 be at home ; and they especially enjoy the Sunday 
 because he is with them all day. Thus possessing 
 their perfect confidence and afiection, he finds that 
 the simple display of his approbation or disapproba- 
 tion gives him abundant power of control. If, on 
 his return home, he hears that one of his boys has
 
 19 J: MORAL EDUCA'nON. 
 
 been naughty, lie behaves towards liira with that 
 comparative coldness which the consciousness of the 
 boy's misconduct naturally produces ; and he finds 
 this a most efficient punishment. The mere with- 
 holding of the usual caresses, is a source of the 
 keenest distress — produces a much more prolonged 
 fit of crying than a beating would do. And the 
 dread of this purely moral penalty is, he says, ever 
 present during his absence : so much so, that fre- 
 quently during the day his children inquire of their 
 mamma how they have behaved, and whether the 
 report will be good. Recently, the eldest, an ac- 
 tive urchin of five, in one of those bursts of animal 
 spirits common in healthy children, committed sun- 
 dry extravagances during his mamma s absence — 
 cut off" part of his brother's hair and wounded him- 
 self with a razor taken from his father's dressing- 
 case. Hearing of these occurrences on his return, 
 the father did not speak to the boy either that 
 night or next morning. Not only was the tribula- 
 tion great, but the subsequent eff'ect was, that when, 
 a few days after, the mamma was about to go out, 
 she was earnestly entreated by the boy not to do 
 60 ; and on inquiry, it appeared his fear was that 
 he might again transgress in her absence. 
 
 We have introduced these facts before replying 
 to the question — " What is to be done with the 
 graver offences ? "for the purpose of first exhibiting 
 the relation that may and ought to be established 
 between parents and children ; for on the existence 
 of this relation depends the successful treatment of
 
 CHILDREN REGARD PARENTS AS FRIEND-ENEMIES. 1G5 
 
 these graver offences. And as a further prelimi* 
 nary, we must now point out that the establisliment 
 of this relation will result from adopting the sys- 
 tem we advocate. Already we have shown that 
 by letting a child experience simply the painful 
 reactions of its own wrong actions, a parent in great 
 measure avoids assuming the attitude of an enemy, 
 and escapes being regarded as one ; but it still re- 
 mains to be shown that where this course has been 
 consistently pursued from the beginning, a strong 
 feeling of active friendship will be generated. 
 
 At present, mothers and fathers are mostly con- 
 sidered by their offspring as friend -enemies. De- 
 termined as their impressions inevitably are by the 
 treatment they receive ; and oscillating as that 
 treatment does between bribery and thwarting, be- 
 tween petting and scolding, between gentleness and 
 castigation ; children necessarily acquire contlicting 
 beliefs respecting the parental character. A mother 
 commonly thinks it quite sufficient to tell her little 
 boy that she is his best friend ; and assuming that 
 he is in duty bound to believe her, concludes that 
 he will forthwith do so. " It is all for your good ; " 
 " I know what is proper for you better than you do 
 yourself ; " " You are not old enough to understand 
 it now, but when you grow up you will thank, 
 rae for doing what I do ; " — these, and like asser- 
 tions, are daily reiterated. Meanwhile the boy is 
 daily suffering positive penalties ; and is hourly 
 forbidden to do this, that, and the other, which he 
 was anxious to do. By words he hears that his
 
 196 MOKAL EDUCATION. 
 
 happiness is the end in view ; but from tlie accom^ 
 panying deeds lie habitually receives more or less 
 pain. Utterly incompetent as he is to understand 
 that future which his mother has in view, or how 
 this treatment conduces to the happiness of that fu- 
 ture, he judges by such results as he feels ; and 
 finding these results any thing but pleasurable, he 
 becomes sceptical respecting these professions of 
 friendship. And is it not folly to expect any other 
 issue ? Must not the child judge by such evidence 
 as lie has got ? and does not this evidence seem to 
 warrant his conclusion ? The mother would reason 
 in just the same way if similarly placed. If, in the 
 circle of her acquaintance, she found some one who 
 was constantly thwarting her wishes, uttering sharp 
 reprimands, and occasionally inflicting actual pen- 
 alties on her, she would pay but little attention to 
 any professions of anxiety for her welfare which 
 accompanied these acts. Why, then, does she sup- 
 pose that her boy will conclude otherwise ? 
 
 But now observe how diiferent will be the re- 
 sults if the system we contend for be consistently 
 pursued — if the mother not only avoids becoming 
 the instrument of punishment, but plays tlie part 
 of a friend, by warning her boy of the punishments 
 which Is'ature will inflict. Take a case ; and that 
 it may illustrate the mode in which this policy is 
 to be early initiated, let it be one of the simplest 
 cases. Suppose that, prompted b}^ the experi- 
 mental spirit so conspicuous in children, whose 
 proceedings instinctively conform to the inductive
 
 COURSE OF THE DISCRIMINATING MOTHER. 197 
 
 method of inquiry — suppose that so prompted the 
 child is amusing himself by lighting pieces of pa- 
 per in the candle and watching them burn. If his 
 mother is of the ordinary uureflective stamp, she 
 will either, on the plea of keeping the child " out 
 of mischief," or from fear that he will burn himself, 
 command him to desist ; and in case of non-com- 
 pliance will snatch the paper from him. On the 
 other hand, should he be so fortunate as to have a 
 mother of sufficient rationality, who knows that 
 this interest with which the child is watching the 
 paper burn results fi-om a healthy inquisitiv^eness, 
 without which he woiild never have emerged out 
 of infantine stupidity, and who is also wise enough 
 to consider the moral results of interference, she 
 will reason thus : — " If I put a stop to this I shall 
 prevent the acquirement of a certain amount of 
 knowledge. It is true that I may save the child 
 from a burn ; but what then? He is sure to burn 
 himself sometime ; and it is quite essential to his 
 safety in life that he should learn by experience the 
 properties of flame. Moreover, if I forbid him 
 from running this present risk, he is sure hereafter 
 to run the same or a greater risk when no one is 
 present to prevent hira ; whereas, if he should have 
 any accident now that I am by, I can save him 
 from any great injury; add to which the advan- 
 tage that he will have in future some dread of fire, 
 and will be less likely to burn himself to death, or 
 set the house in a flame when others are absent. 
 Furthermore, were I to make him desist, I should
 
 198 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 thwart him in the pursuit of what is in itself a 
 purely harmless, and indeed, instructive gratifica- 
 tion ; and he would be sure to regard me with 
 more or less ill-feelh)g. Ignorant as lie is of the 
 pain from which I would save him, and feeling 
 only the pain of a balked desire, he could not fail 
 to look upon me as the cause of that pain. To save 
 liim from a hurt which he cannot conceive, and 
 which has therefore no existence for him, I inflict 
 upon him a hurt wdiich he feels keenly enough ; 
 and so become, from his point of view, a minister 
 of evil. My best course then, is simply to warn 
 him of the danger, and to be ready to prevent any 
 serious damage." And following out this conclu- 
 sion, she says to the child — " I fear you -will hurt 
 yourself if you do that." Suppose, now, that the 
 child perseveres, as he will very probably do ; and 
 suppose that he ends by burning himself. What 
 are the results ? In the first place he has gained 
 an experience which he must gain eventually, and 
 which, for his own safety he cannot gain too soon. 
 And in the second place, he has found that his 
 mother's disapproval or warning was meant for his 
 welfare : he has a further positive experience of her 
 benevolence — a further reason for placing confi- 
 dence in her judgment and her kindness — a further 
 reason for loving her. 
 
 Of course, in those occasional hazards where 
 there is a risk of broken limbs or other serious 
 bodily injury, forcible prevention is called for. 
 But leaving out these exireme cases, the system
 
 CniLDKEN MUST LEARN BY EXPERIENCE. 199 
 
 pursaed should be not that of guarding a child 
 ngainst the small dangers into which it daily runs, 
 but tliat of advising and warning it against them. 
 And by consistently pursuing this course, a much 
 stronger filial affection will be generated than com- 
 monly exists. If here, as elsewhere, the discipline 
 of the natural reactions. is allowed to come into 
 play — if in all those out-of-door scramblings and 
 in-door experiments, by which children are liable 
 to hurt themselves, they are allowed to persevere, 
 subject only to dissuasion more or less earnest ac- 
 cording to the risk, there cannot fail to arise an 
 ever-increasing faith in the parental friendship and 
 guidance. Not only, as before shown, does the 
 adoption of this principle enable fathers and moth- 
 ers to avoid the chief part of that odium which at- 
 taches to the infliction of positive punishment; but, 
 as we here see, it enables them further to avoid the 
 odium that attaches to constant thwartings ; and 
 even to turn each of those incidents which com- 
 monly cause squabbles, into a means of strength- 
 ening the mutual -good feeling. Instead of being 
 told in words, which deeds seem to contradict, that 
 their parents are theii best friends, children will 
 learn this truth by a consistent dail}; experience ; 
 and so learning it, will acquire a degree of trust 
 and attachment which nothing else can give. 
 
 And now having indicated the much more sym- 
 pathetic relation which must result from the habit- 
 ual use of this method, let us return to the quea-
 
 200 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 tion above put — IIow is this method to be applied 
 to the graver otfences ? 
 
 Xote, in the first ph\ce, tliat these graver of- 
 fences are likely to be both less frequent and less 
 grave under the regimewQ have described than un- 
 der the ordinary regime. The perpetual ill-behav- 
 iour of many children is itself the consequence of 
 that chronic irritation in which they are kept by 
 bad management. The state of isolation and an- 
 tagonism produced by frequent punishment, neces- 
 sarily deadens the sympathies ; necessarily, there- 
 fore, opens the way to those transgressions which 
 the sympathies should check. That harsh treat- 
 ment which children of the same family inflict on 
 each other is often, in great measure, a reflex of the 
 harsh treatment they receive from adults — partly 
 suggested by direct example, and parth' generated 
 by the ill-temper and the tendency to vicarious re- 
 taliation, which follow chastisements and scoldinocs. 
 It cannot be questioned that the greater activity oi 
 the affections and happier state of feeling, main- 
 tained in children by the discipline we have de- 
 scribed, must prevent their sins against each other 
 from being either so great or so frequent. More- 
 over, the sti^l more reprehensible oflfences, as lies 
 and petty thefts, will, by the same causes, be di- 
 minished. Domestic estrangement is a fruitful 
 source of such transgressions. It is a law of human 
 nature, visible enough to all who observe, that 
 those who are debarred the higher gratiflcations 
 fall back upon the lower ; those who have no sym-
 
 ITIEATMENT OF GRAVE OFFENCES. 201 
 
 pathetic pleasures seek selfish ones ; and hence, 
 conversely, the maintenance of happier relations 
 between parents and children is calculated to di- 
 minish the number of those offences of which self- 
 ishness is the origin. 
 
 AVhen, however, such offences are committed, 
 as they will occasionally be even under the best 
 system, the discipline of consequences may still be 
 resorted to ; and if there exist that bond of confi- 
 dence and affection which we have described, this 
 discipline will be found efficient. For what are 
 the natural consequences, say, of a theft? They 
 are of two kinds — direct and indirect. The direct 
 consequence, as dictated by pure equity, is that of 
 making restitution. An absolutely just ruler (and 
 every parent should aim to be one) will demand 
 that, wherever it is possible, a wu'ong act shall be 
 undone by a right one : and in the case of theft 
 this implies either the restoration of the thing 
 stolen, or, if it is consumed, then the giving of an 
 equivalent : which, in the case of a child, may be 
 effected out of its pocket-money. The indirect and 
 more serious consequence is the grave displeasure 
 of parents — a consequence which inevitably follows 
 among all peoples sufficiently civilized to regard 
 theft as a crime ; and the manifestation of this dis- 
 pleasure is, in this instance, the most severe of the 
 natural reactions produced by the wrong action. 
 " But," it will be said, " the m.anifestation of parental 
 displeasure, either in words or blows, is the ordi- 
 nary course in these cases : the method leads here
 
 202 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 to nothing new." Yeiy true. Already we have 
 admitted that, in some directions, this method is 
 spontaneously jDursued. Already we have shown 
 that there is a more or less manifest tendency for 
 educational systems to gravitate towards the true 
 system. And here we may remark, as before, that 
 the intensity of this natural reaction will, in the 
 beneficent order of things, adjust itself to the re- 
 quirements — that this parental displeasure will 
 vent itself in violent measures during compara- 
 tively barbarous times, when the children are also 
 comparatively barbarous; and will express itself 
 less cruelly in those more advanced social states in 
 which, by implication, the children are amenable 
 to milder treatment. But what it chiefly concerns 
 us here to observe is, that the manifestation of 
 strong parental displeasure, produced by one of 
 these graver oflPences, will be potent for good just 
 in proportion to the warmth of the attachment ex- 
 isting between parent and child. Just in propor- 
 tion as the discipline of the natural consequences 
 has been consistently pursued in other cases, will 
 it be eificient in this case. Proof is within the ex- 
 perience of all, if they will look for it. 
 
 For does not every man know that when he has 
 offended another person, the amount of genuine re- 
 gret he feels (of course, leaving worldly considera- 
 tions out of the question) varies with the degree of 
 sympathy he has for that person ? Is he not con- 
 Bcious that when the person offended stands to him 
 in the position of an enemy, the having given him 
 
 I
 
 EFFECTS OF TRUE SYMPATHY AND FRIENDSHIP. 203 
 
 annoyance is apt to be a source ratlier of secret 
 satisfaction than of sorrow ? Does he not remem- 
 ber that where nrabrage has been taken by some 
 total stranger, he has felt much less concern than 
 he would have done had such umbrage been taken 
 by one with whom he was intimate ? While, con- 
 versely, has not the anger of an admired and cher- 
 ished friend been regarded by him as a serious 
 misfortune, long and keenly regretted? Clearly, 
 then, the effects of parental displeasure upon chil- 
 dren must similarly depend upon the pre-existing 
 relationship. Where there is an established alien- 
 ation, the feeling of a child who has transgressed 
 is a purely selfish fear of the evil consequences 
 likely to fall upon it in the shape of physical pen- 
 alties or deprivations ; and after these evil conse* 
 quences have been inflicted, there are aroused an 
 antagonism and dislike which are morally inju- 
 rious, and tend further to increase the alienation. 
 On the contrary, where there exists a warm filial af- 
 fection produced by a consistent parental friendship 
 — a friendship not dogmatically asserted as an excuse 
 for punishments and denials, but daily exhibited in 
 ways that a child can comprehend — a friendship 
 which avoids needless thwartings, which warns 
 against impending evil consequences, and which 
 sympathizes with juvenile pursuits — there the state 
 of mind caused by parental displeasure will not 
 only be salutary as a check to future misconduct 
 of like kind, but will also be intrinsically salutar}'. 
 The moral pain consequent upon having, for the
 
 204 MOEAL EDUCATION. 
 
 time "being, lost so loved a friend, will stand in 
 place of the physical pain usually inflicted ; and 
 ■•,vhere this attachment exists, will prove equally, if 
 not more, eflficient. While instead of the fear and 
 vindictiveness excited by the one course, there will 
 be excited by the other more or less of sym]:»athy 
 with parental sorrow, a genuine regret for having 
 caused it, and a desire, by some atonement, to re- 
 establish the habitual friendly relationship. In- 
 stead of bringing into play those purely egoistic 
 feelings whose predominance is the cause of crimi- 
 nal acts, there will be brought into play those altru- 
 istic feelings which check criminal acts. Thus the 
 discipline of the natural consequences is applicable 
 to grave as well as trivial faults ; and the practice 
 of it conduces not simply to the repression, but to 
 the eradication of such faults. 
 
 In brief, the truth is that savageness begets 
 savageness, and gentleness begets gentleness. Chil- 
 dren who are unsympathetically treated become 
 relatively unsympathetic; whereas treating them 
 with due fellow-feeling is a means of cultivating 
 their fellow-feeling. "With family governments as 
 with political ones, a harsh despotism itself gene- 
 rates a great part of the crimes it has to repress ; 
 while conversely a mild and liberal rule not only 
 avoids many causes of dissension, but so amelio- 
 rates the tone of feeling as to diminish the ten- 
 dency to transgression. As John Locke long since 
 remarked, " Great severity of punishment does but 
 very little good, nay, great harm, in education \
 
 LOCKE ON THE EFFECTS OF CHASTISEMENT. 205 
 
 and I believe it will be found that, cwteris paribus^ 
 those children who have been most chastised sel- 
 dom make the best men." In confirmation of whicli 
 opinion we may cite the fact not long since made 
 public by Mr, Kogers, Chaplain of the Pentonville 
 Prison, that those juvenile criminals who have 
 been whipped are those who most frequently return 
 to prison. On the other hand, as exhibiting the 
 beneficial efi'ects of a kinder treatment, Ave will in- 
 stance the fact stated to us by a French lady, in 
 whose house we recently staid in Paris. Apologiz- 
 ing for the disturbance daily caused by a little boy 
 who was unmanageable both at home and at school, 
 she expressed her fear that there was no remedy 
 save that which had succeeded in the case of an 
 elder brother ; namely, sending him to an English 
 school. She explained that at various schools in 
 Paris this elder brother had proved utterly untract- 
 able ; that in despair they had followed the advice 
 to send him to England ; and that on his return 
 home he was as good as he had before been bad. 
 And this remarkable change she ascribed entirely 
 to the comparative mildness of the English disci- 
 pline. 
 
 After this exposition of principles, our remaining 
 space may best be occupied by a few of the chief 
 maxims and rules deducible from them; and with 
 a view to brevity we will put these in a more or 
 less hortatory form. 
 
 Do not expect from a child any great amount of 
 moral goodness. During early years every civil-
 
 20G MOKAL EDUCATION. 
 
 ized man passes through that phase of character 
 exhibited by the barbarous race t'roin uhich he is 
 descended. As the child's features — flat nose, for- 
 ward-opening nostrils, large lips, wide-apart eyes, 
 absent frontal sinus, &c. — resemble for a time those 
 of the savage, so, too, do his instincts. Hence the 
 tendencies to cruelty, to thieving, to lying, so gen- 
 eral among children — tendencies which, even with- 
 out the aid of discipline, will become more or less 
 modified just as the features do. The popular idea 
 that children are " innocent," while it may be true 
 in so far as it refers to evil hioivledge, is totally 
 false in so far as it refers to evil impulses, as half 
 an hour's observation in the nursery will prove to 
 any one. Boys when left to themselves, as at a 
 public school, treat each other far more brutally 
 than men do ; and were they left to themselves at 
 an earlier age their brutality would be still more 
 conspicuous. 
 
 Not only is it unwise to set up a high standard 
 for juvenile good conduct, but it is even unwise to 
 use very urgent incitements to such good conduct. 
 Already most people recognise the detrimental re- 
 sults of intellectual precocity ; but there remains 
 to be recognised the truth that there is a moral 
 precocity which is also detrimental. Our higher 
 moral faculties, like our higher intellectual ones, 
 are comparatively complex. By consequence they 
 arc both comparatively late in their evolution. 
 And with the one as with the other, a very early 
 activity produced by stimulation will be at the ex-
 
 SLOW EVOLUTION OF THE MORAL FACULTIES, 207 
 
 pense of the fatnre cliaracter. Hence the not nn- 
 common fact that those who during chiklhood were 
 instanced as models of juvenile goodness, by-and-by 
 undergo some disastrous and seemingly inexplica- 
 ble change, and end by being not above but below 
 par ; while relatively exemplary men are often the 
 issue of a childhood by no means so promising. 
 
 Be content, therefore, with moderate measures 
 and moderate results. Constantly bear in mind 
 the fact that a higher morality, like a higher intelli- 
 gence, must be reached by a slow growth ; and 
 you will then have more patience with those imper- 
 fections of nature which your child hourly displays. 
 You will be less prone to that constant scolding, 
 and threatening, and forbidding, by which many 
 parents induce a chronic domestic irritation, in the 
 foolish hope that they will thus make their chil- 
 dren what they should be. 
 
 This comparatively liberal form of domestic 
 government, which does not seek despotically to 
 regulate all the details of a child's conduct, neces- 
 sarily results from the system for which we have 
 been contending. Satisfy yourself with seeing that 
 your child always suffers the natural consequences 
 of his actions, and you will avoid that excess of 
 control in which so many parents err. Leave him 
 wherever you can to the discipline of experience, 
 and you will so save him from that hothouse virtue 
 which over-regulation produces in yielding natures, 
 or that demoralizing antagonism which it produces 
 in independent ones, 
 13
 
 208 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 By aiming in all cases to administer tlie natuial 
 reactions to your child's actions, you will put an 
 advantageous check upon your own temper. The 
 method of moral education pursued by many, we 
 fear by most, parents, is little else than that of 
 venting their anger in the way that first suggests 
 itself. The slaps, and rough shakings, and sharp 
 words, with which a mother commonly visits her 
 oflspring's small offences (many of them not of- 
 fences considered intrinsically), are ver}^ generally 
 but the manifestations of her own ili-controlled 
 feelings — result much more from the promptings of 
 those feelings than from a wish to benefit the 
 oftenders. While they are injurious to her own 
 character, these ebullitions tend, b}' alienating her 
 children and by decreasing their respect for her, to 
 diminish her influence over them. But by pausing 
 in each case of transgression to consider what is 
 the natural consequence, and how that natural con- 
 sequence may best be brought home to the trans- 
 gressor, some little time is necessarily'- obtained for 
 the mastery of yourself; the mere blind anger first 
 aroused in you settles down into a less vehement 
 feeling, and one not so likely to mislead you. 
 
 Do not, however, seek to behave as an utterly 
 passionless instrument. Remember that besides 
 the natural consequences of your child's conduct 
 which the woi'king of things tends to bring round 
 on him, your own approbation or disapprobation is 
 also a natural consequence, and one of the ordained 
 agencies for guidino: him. The error which w©
 
 CAUTIOUS USE OF PARENTAL DISPLEASURE. 209 
 
 have been combating is that of siLbstituting parental 
 displeasure and its «,rtiliciul penalties, for the pen- 
 alties which nature has established. But while it 
 should not be substituted for these natural penalties, 
 it by no means follows that it should not, in some 
 form, accompany them. The secondary kind of 
 punishment should not usurp the place of the 
 primary kind ; but, in moderation, it may rightly 
 supplement the primary kind. Such amount of dis- 
 approval, or sorrow, or indignation, as you feel, 
 should be expressed in words or manner or other- 
 wise ; subject, of course, to the approval of your 
 judgment. The degree and kind of feeling jjro- 
 duced in you will necessarily depend upon your 
 own character, and it is therefore useless to say it 
 should be this or that. All that can be recom- 
 mended is, that you should aim to modify the feel- 
 ing into that which vou believe ought to be enter- 
 tained. Beware, however, of the two extremes; 
 not only in respect of the intensity, but in respect 
 of the duration of your displeasure. On the one 
 hand, anxiously avoid that weak impulsiveness, so 
 general among mothers, which scolds and forgives 
 almost in the same breath. On the other hand, do 
 not unduly continue to show estrangement of feel- 
 ing, lest you accustom your child to do without 
 your friendship, and so lose your influence over 
 him. The moral reactions called forth from you by 
 your child's actions, you should as much as possi- 
 ble assimilate to those which you conceive would 
 be called forth from a parent of perfect nature.
 
 210 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 Be sparing of commands. Command only in 
 tliose cases in wliicli other means are inai^itlicable, 
 or have failed. " In frequent orders the parents' 
 advantage is more considered than the child's," 
 says Richter. As in primitive societies a breach 
 of law is punished, not so much because it is in- 
 trinsically wrong as because it is a disregard of the 
 king's authority — a rebellion against him ; so in 
 many families, the penalty visited on a transgressor 
 proceeds less from reprobation of the offence than 
 from anger at the disobedience. Listen to the ordi- 
 nary speeches — " How dare you disobey me? " " I 
 tell you I'll make you do it, sir." " I'll soon teach 
 you who is master " — and then consider what the 
 words, the tone, and the manner imply. A deter- 
 mination to subjugate is much more conspicuous in 
 them than an anxiety for the cliild's welfare. For 
 the time being the attitude of mind differs but little 
 from that of the despot bent on punishing a recalci- 
 trant subject. The right-feeling parent, however, 
 like the philanthropic legislator, will not rejoice in 
 coercion, but will rejoice in dispensing with coercion, 
 lie will do without law in all cases where other 
 modes of regulating conduct can be successfully em- 
 ])loyed ; and he will regret the having recourse to 
 law when it is necessary. As Richter remarks — 
 "The best rule in politics is said to be '';pas trop 
 ijouverner : '' it is also true in education." And in 
 spontaneous conformity with this maxim, parents 
 whose lust of dominion is restrained by a true sense 
 of duty, will aim to make their children control
 
 WISE PENALTIES, BUT INEVITABLE. 211 
 
 themselves wherever it is possible, and will fall back 
 upon absolutism only as a last resort. 
 
 But whenever you do command, command with 
 decision and consistency. If the case is one which 
 really cannot be otherwise dealt with, then issue 
 your fiat, and having issued it, never afterwards 
 swerve from it. Consider well beforehand what 
 you are going to do ; weigh all the consequences ; 
 think whether your firmness of purpose will be 
 sufficient ; and then, if you finally make the law, 
 enforce it uniformly at whatever cost. Let your 
 penalties be like the penalties inflicted by inani- 
 mate nature — inevitable. The hot cinder burns a 
 child the first time he seizes it ; it burns him the 
 second time ; it burns him the third time ; it burns 
 him every time ; and he very soon learns not to 
 touch the hot cinder. If you are equally consist- 
 ent — if the consequences which you tell your child 
 will follow certain acts, follow with like uniformity, 
 he .will soon come to respect your laws as he does 
 those of Nature. And this respect once established 
 will prevent endless domestic evils. Of errors in 
 education one of the worst is that of inconsistency. 
 As in a community, crimes multiply when there is 
 no certain administration of justice ; so in a fami- 
 ly, an immense increase of transgressions results 
 from a hesitating or irregular infliction of penal- 
 ties. A weak mother, who perpetually threatens 
 and rarely performs — who makes rules in haste and 
 repents of them at leisure — who treats the same 
 oifence now with severity and now with leniency,
 
 212 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 according as the passing humour dictates, is laying 
 lip miseries both for herself and her children. She 
 is making herself contemptible- in their eyes ; she 
 is setting them an example of uncontrolled feel- 
 ings ; she is encouraging tiiem to transgress by the 
 prospect of probable impunity ; she is entailing 
 endless squabbles and accompanying damage to 
 her own temper and the tempers of her little ones ; 
 she is reducing their minds to a moral chaos, which 
 after-years of bitter experience will with difficulty 
 bring into order. Better even a barbarous form of 
 domestic government carried out consistently, than 
 a humane one inconsistently carried out. Again 
 we say, avoid coercive measures wdienever it is 
 possible to do so ; but when you find despotism 
 really necessary, be despotic in good earnest. 
 
 Bear constantly in mind the truth that the aim 
 of your discipline should be to produce a self-gov- 
 erning being ; not to produce a being to be gov- 
 erned Jjy others. Were your children fated to pass 
 their lives as slaves, you could not too much accus- 
 tom them to slavery during their childhood ; but 
 as they are bj^-and-by to be free men, with no one 
 to control their daily conduct, you cannot too much 
 accustom them to self-control while they are still 
 under your eye. This it is which makes the sys- 
 tem of discipline by natural consequences, so espe- 
 cially appropriate to the social state which we in 
 England have now reached. Under early, tyran- 
 nical forms of society, when one of the chief evils 
 the citizen had to fear was the anger of his supc
 
 PBOGKESSIVE NEED OF SELF-GOVERNMENT. 213 
 
 riors, it "was well that during cliildhood parental 
 vengeance should be a predominant means of gov- 
 ernment. But now that the citizen has little to 
 fear from any one — now that the good or evil which 
 he experiences throughout life is mainly that which 
 in the nature of things results from his own con- 
 duct, it is desirable that from his first years he 
 should begin to learn, experimentally, the good or 
 evil consequences which naturally follow this or 
 that conduct. Aim, therefore, to diminish the 
 amount of parental government as fast as you can 
 substitute for it in your child's mind that self-gov- 
 ernment arising from a foresight of results. In in- 
 fancy a considerable amount of absolutism is ne- 
 cessary. A three-year old urchin playing with an 
 open razor, cannot be allowed to learn by thib dis- 
 cipline of consequences ; for the consequences may, 
 in such a case, be too serious. But as intelligence 
 increases, the number of instances calling for per- 
 emptory interference may be, and should be, di- 
 minished ; with the view of gradually ending them 
 as maturity is approached. All periods of transi- 
 tion are dangerous ; and the most dangerous is the 
 transition from the restraint of the family circle to 
 the non-restraint of the world. Hence the impor 
 tance of pursuing the policy we advocate ; which, 
 alike by cultivating a child's faculty of self-restraint, 
 by continually increasing the degree in which it ia 
 left to its self-constraint, and by so bringing it, step 
 by step, to a state of unaided self-restraint, obliter- 
 ates the ordinary sudden and hazardous change.
 
 214 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 from externally-governed youth to internall^'-gov- 
 erned maturity. Let the history of your domestic 
 rule typity, in little, the history of our political 
 rule : at the outset, autocratic control, where con- 
 trol is really needful ; by-and-by an incipient con- 
 stitutionalism, in which the liberty of the subject 
 gains some express recognition ; successive exten- 
 sions of this liberty of the subject ; gradually end- 
 ing in parental abdication. 
 
 Do not regret the exhibition of considerable 
 self-will on the part of your children. It is the 
 correlative of that diminished coerciveness so con- 
 spicuous in modern education. The greater ten- 
 dency to assert freedom of action on the one side, 
 corresponds to the smaller tendency to tyrannize on 
 the other. They both indicate an approach to the 
 system of discipline we contend for, under which 
 children will be more and more led to rule them- 
 selves by the experience of natural consequences ; 
 and they are both the accompaniments of our moi-e 
 advanced social state. The independent English 
 boy is the father of the independent English man ; 
 and you cannot have the last without the first. 
 German teachers say that they had rather manage 
 a dozen German boys than one English one. Shall 
 \ve, therefore, wish that our boys had the managea- 
 bleness of the German ones, and with it the sub- 
 missiveness and political serfdom of adult Ger- 
 mans? Or shall we not rather tolerate in our boys 
 those feelings which nuike them free men, and 
 modify our methods accordingly?
 
 NECESSITY OF PARENTAL DISCKIMINATION. 215 
 
 Lastly, always remember that to educate rightly 
 is not a simple and easy thing, bnt a complex and 
 extremely difficult thing : the hardest task which 
 devolves upon adult life. The rough and ready 
 style of domestic government is indeed practicable 
 by the meanest and most uncultivated intellects. 
 Slaps and sharp words are penalties that suggest 
 themselves alike to the least reclaimed barbarian 
 and the most stolid peasant. Even brutes can use 
 tliis method of discipline; as you may see in the 
 growl and half-bite with which a bitch will check 
 a too-exigeant puppy. But if you would carry out 
 with success a rational and civilized system, you 
 must be prepared for considerable mental exertion 
 — for some study, some ingenuity, some patience, 
 some self-control. You will have habitually to 
 trace the consequences of conduct — to consider 
 what are the results which in adult life follow 
 certain kind of acts ; and then you will have to 
 devise methods by which parallel results shall be 
 entailed on the parallel acts of your children. 
 You will daily be called upon to analyze the mo- 
 tives of juvenile conduct: you must distinguish 
 between acts that are really good and those which, 
 though externally simulating them, proceed from 
 inferior impulses ; while you must be ever on your 
 guard against the cruel mistake not unfrequently 
 made, of translating neutral acts into transgres- 
 sions, or ascribing worse feelings than were enter- 
 tained. You must more or less modify your method 
 to suit the disposition of each child ; and must bo
 
 216 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 prepared to make further modifications as each 
 cliikl's disposition enters on a new phase. Your 
 faith will often be taxed to maintain the requisite 
 perseverance in a course which seems to produce 
 little or no effect. Especially if you are dealing 
 "with children who have been wrongly treated, you 
 must be prepared for a lengthened trial of patience 
 before succeeding with better methods ; seeing that 
 that which is not easy even where a right state of 
 feeling has been established from the beginning, 
 becomes doubly difficult when a wrong state of 
 feeling has to be set right. Xot only will you have 
 constantly to analyze the motives of your children, 
 but you will have to analyze your own motives — 
 to discriminate between those internal suggestions 
 springing from a true parental solicitude, and those 
 which spring from your own selfishness, from your 
 love of ease, from your lust of dominion. And 
 then, more trying still, you will have not only to 
 detect, but to curb these baser impulses. In brief, 
 you will have to carry on your higher education at 
 the same time that you are educating your chil- 
 dren. Intellectually you must cultivate to good 
 purpose that most complex of subjects — human na- 
 ture and its laws, as exhibited in your children, in 
 yourself, and in the world. Morally, you must 
 keep in constant exercise 3'our higher feelings, and 
 restrain your lower. It is a truth yet remaining to 
 be recognised, that the last stage in the mental de- 
 velopment of each man and woman is to be reached 
 only through the proper discharge of the parental
 
 THE HIGH DISCIPLINE OF PARENTHOOD. 217 
 
 duties. And when this truth is recognised, it will 
 be seen how admirable is the ordination in virtue 
 of which human beings are led by their strongest 
 affections to subject themselves to a discipline 
 which they would else elude. 
 
 While some will probably regard this concep- 
 tion of education as it should be, with doubt and 
 discouragement, others will, we think, perceive in 
 the exalted ideal which it involves, evidence of its 
 truth. That it cannot be realized by the impulsive, 
 the unsympathetic, and the short-sighted, but de- 
 mands the higher attributes of human nature, they 
 will see to be evidence of its fitness for the more 
 advanced states of humanity. Though it calls for 
 much labour and self-sacrifice, they will see that 
 it promises an abundant return of liappiness, im- 
 mediate and remote. They will see that while in 
 its injurious eflects on both parent and child a bad 
 system is twice cursed, a good system is twice 
 blessed — it blesses him that trains and him that's 
 trained. 
 
 It will be seen that we have said nothing in 
 this Chapter about the transcendental distinction 
 between right and wrong, of which wise men know 
 so little, and children nothing. All thinkers are 
 agreed that we may find the criterion of right in 
 the effect of actions, if we do not find the rule 
 there ; and that is sufficient for the purpose we 
 have had in view. Nor have we introduced the 
 religious element. We have confined our inquiries
 
 218 MORAL EDUCATION. 
 
 to a nearer, and a much more neglected field, 
 though a very important one. Our readers may 
 supplement our thoughts in any way they please ; 
 we are only concerned tliat they should be accepted 
 as far as they go.
 
 C II AFTER IV. 
 
 PHYSICAL EDUCATION, 
 
 Equally at the squire's table after the with- 
 drawal of the ladies, at the farmers' market-ordi- 
 nary, and at the village ale-house, the topic which, 
 after the political question of the day, excites per- 
 haps the most general interest, is the management 
 of animals. Riding home from hunting, the con- 
 versation is pretty sure to gravitate towards horse- 
 breeding, and pedigrees, and comments on this or 
 that ' good point ; ' while a day on the moors is 
 very unlikely to pass without something being said 
 on the treatment of dogs. When crossing the 
 fields together from church, the tenants of adjacent 
 farms are apt to pass from criticisms on the ser- 
 mon to criticisms on the weather, the crops, and 
 the stock ; and thence to slide into discussions on 
 the various kinds of fodder and their feeding quali- 
 ties. Hodge and Giles, after comparing notes over 
 their respective pig-styes, show by their remarks 
 that they have been more or less observant of their 
 masters' beasts and sheep ; and of the effects pro- 
 duced on them by this or that kind of treatment. 
 Nor is it only among the rural population that the 
 regulations of the kennel, the stable, the cow-shed,
 
 220 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 and tlie slieep-peu, are favourite subjects. In 
 towns, too, the numerous artisans wlio keep dogs, 
 the young men wlio are rich enough to now and 
 then indulge their sporting tendencies, and tlieir 
 more staid seniors who talk over agricultural pro- 
 gress or read Mr. Mechi's annual reports and Mr. 
 Caii'd's letters to the Times^ form, when added to- 
 gether, a large portion of the inhabitants. Take 
 the adult males throughout the kingdom, and a 
 great majority will be found to show some interest 
 in the breeding, rearing, or training of animals, of 
 one kind or other. 
 
 But, during after-dinner conversations, or at 
 other times of like intercourse, who hears anything 
 said about the rearing of children ? AVhen the 
 country gentleman has paid his daily visit to the 
 stable, and personally inspected the condition and 
 treatment of his horses ; when he lias glanced at 
 his minor live stock, and given directions about 
 them; how often does he go up to the nursery and 
 examine into its dietary, its hours, its ventilation? 
 On his library shelves may be found White's Fai'- 
 riery^ Stephen's Booh of the Farin^ Nimrod oii the 
 Condition of Hunters ', and with the contents of 
 these he is more or less familiar ; but how many 
 books has he read on the management of infancy 
 and childhood ? The fattening properties of oil- 
 cake, the relative values of hay and chopped straw, 
 the dangers of unlimited clover, are points on 
 which ever}' landlord, farmer, and peasant has 
 Bome knowledge ; but what proportion of them
 
 IMPKOVEMEXT OF LNFEKIOR ANDIALS. 221 
 
 know much about tlic qualities of the food they 
 give tlieir children, and its fitness to the constitu- 
 tional needs of growing boys and girls ? Perhaps 
 the business interests of these classes will be as- 
 signed as accounting for this anomaly. The explana- 
 tion is inadequate, however ; seeing that the same 
 contrast holds more or less among other classes. 
 Of a score of townspeople few, if any, would 
 prove ignorant of the fact that it is undesirable to 
 work a liorse soon after it has eaten ; and yet, of 
 this same score, supposing them all to be fathers, 
 probably not one would be found who had consid- 
 ered whether the time elapsing between his chil- 
 dren's dinner and their resumption of lessons was 
 sufiicient. Indeed, on cross-examination, nearly 
 every man would disclose the latent opinion that 
 the regimen of the nursery was no concern of his. 
 " Oh, I leave all those things to the women," would 
 probably be the reply. And in most cases the tone 
 and manner of this reply would convey the impli- 
 cation, til at such cares are not consistent with mas- 
 culine dignity. 
 
 Consider the fact from any but the conventional 
 point of view, and it will seem strange that while 
 the raising of first-rate bullocks is an occupation 
 on which men of education willingly bestow much 
 time, inquir}'-, and thought, the bringing up of fine 
 human beings is an occupation tacitly voted un- 
 worthy of their attention. Mammas M'ho have 
 been taught little but languages, music, and accom- 
 plishments, aided by nurses full of antiquated pre-
 
 222 nirsicAL education. 
 
 judices, are held competent regulators of the food, 
 clothing, and exercise of children. Meanwhile tlie 
 fathers read books and periodicals, attend agricul- 
 tural meetings, try experiments, and engage in dis- 
 cussions, all with the view of discovering how to 
 fatten prize pigs ! Infinite pains will be taken to 
 produce a racer that shall win the Derby : none to 
 produce a modern athlete. Had Gulliver narrated 
 of the Laputans that the men vied with each other 
 in learning how best to rear the otFspring of other 
 creatures, and were careless of learning how best 
 to rear their own offspring, he would have paral- 
 leled any of the other absurdities he ascribes to 
 them. 
 
 The matter is a serious one, however. Ludi- 
 crous as is the antithesis, the fact it expresses is not 
 less disastrous. As remarks a suggestive writer, 
 the first requisite to success in life is " to be a good 
 animal ;" and to be a nation of good animals is tho 
 first condition to national prosperity. Not only is 
 it that the event of a war often turns on the strength 
 and hardiness of soldiers ; but it is that the con- 
 tests of commerce are in part determined by the 
 bodily endurance of producers. Thus far we have 
 found no reason to fear trials of strength with other 
 races in either of these fields. But there are not 
 wanting signs that our powers will presently be 
 taxed to the uttermost. Already under the keen 
 competition of modern life, the application required 
 of almost every one is such as few can bear with' 
 out more or less injury. Already thousands break
 
 SCHOOL OF " MUSCULAR CiliaSTIAXITY." 223 
 
 down under the high pressure they are subject to. 
 If this pressure continues to increase, as it seems 
 likely to do, it will try severely all but the sound- 
 est constitutions. Hence it is becoming of especial 
 importance that the training of children should be 
 so carried on, as not only to fit them mentally for 
 the struggle before them, but also to make them 
 physically fit to bear its excessive wear and tear. 
 
 Happily the matter is beginning to attract at- 
 tention. The writings of Mr. Kingsley indicate a 
 reaction against over-culture ; carried, as reactions 
 usually are, somewhat too far. Occasional letters 
 and leaders in the newspapers have shown an 
 awakening interest in physical training. And the 
 formation of a school, significantly nicknamed that 
 of " muscular Christianity," implies a growing 
 opinion that our present methods of bringing up 
 children do not sufliciently regard the welfare of the 
 body. The topic is evidently ripe for discussion. 
 
 To conform the regimen of the nursery and the 
 school to the established truths of modern science 
 — this is the desideratum. It is time that the ben- 
 efits which our sheep and oxen have for years past 
 derived from the investigations of the laboratory, 
 should be participated in by our children. With- 
 out calling in question the great importance of 
 horse-training and pig-feeding, we would suggest 
 that, as the rearing of well-grown men and women 
 is also of some moment, the conclusions indicated 
 by theory, and endorsed by practice, ought to bo 
 
 acted on in the last case as in the first. Probably 
 U
 
 22-1: niYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 not a few will be startled — ^perliaps offended — by 
 this collocation of ideas. But it is a fact not to be 
 disputed, and to which we bad best reconcile our- 
 selves, that man is subject to the same organic 
 laws as inferior creatures. No anatomist, no phys- 
 iologist, no chemist, will for a moment hesitate to 
 assert, that the general principles which rule over 
 the vital processes in animals equally rule over the 
 vital processes in man. And a candid admission 
 of this fact is not without its reward : namely, that 
 the truths established by observation and experi- 
 ment on brutes, become more or less available for 
 human guidance. Rudimentary as is the Science 
 of Life, it has already attained to certain funda- 
 mental principles underlying the development of 
 all organisms, the human included. That which 
 lias now to be done, and that which we shall en- 
 deavour in some measure to do, is to show the 
 bearing of these fundamental principles upon the 
 physical training of childhood and youth. 
 
 The rhythmical tendency which is traceable in 
 all departments of social life — which is illustrated 
 in the access of despotism after revolution, or, among 
 ourselves, in the alternation of reforming epochs and 
 conservative epochs — which, after a dissolute age, 
 brings an age of asceticism, and conversely — which, 
 in commerce, produces the regularly recurring in- 
 flations and panics — which carries the devotees of 
 fashion from one absurd extreme to the opposite 
 one ; — this rhythmical tendency affects also our
 
 DIETARY EEACTIONS. 225 
 
 table-habits, and by implication, the dietary of the 
 young. After a period distinguished by hard drink- 
 ing and hard eating, has come a period of compara- 
 tive sobriety, which, in teetotalism and vegetarian- 
 ism, exhibits extreme forms of its protest against the 
 riotous living of the past. And along with this 
 change in the regimen of adults, has come a paral- 
 lel change in the regimen for boys and girls. In 
 past generations, the belief was, that the more a 
 child could be induced to eat, the better ; and even 
 now, among farmers and in remote districts, where 
 traditional ideas most linger, parents may be found 
 who tempt their children to gorge themselves. But 
 among the educated classes, who chiefly display this 
 reaction towards abstemiousness, there may be seen 
 a decided leaning to the under-feeding, rather than 
 the overfeeding, of children. Indeed their disgust 
 for bygone animalism, is more clearly shown in the 
 treatment of their oftspring than in the treatment 
 of themselves ; seeing that while their disguised 
 asceticism is, in so far as their personal conduct is 
 concerned, kept in check by their appetites, it has 
 full play in legislating for juveniles. 
 
 That over-feeding and under-feeding are both 
 bad, is a truism. Of the two, however, the last is 
 tlie worst. As writes a high authority, '^ the effects 
 of casual repletion are less prejudicial, and more 
 easily corrected, than those of inanition." * Add 
 to which, that where there has been no injudicious 
 interference, repletion will seldom occur. " Excess 
 
 * Cyclopedia of Practical Medicine.
 
 22G ruTSiCAL edlcation. 
 
 is tliG vice rather of adults than of the young, who 
 are rarely eitlier gourmands or epicures, unless 
 through the fault of those who rear them." * This 
 system of restriction which many parents think so 
 necessary, is based upon very inadequate observa- 
 tion, and very erroneous reasoning. There is an 
 over-legislation in the nursery, as well as an over- 
 legislation in the State ; and one of the most injuri- 
 ous forms of it is this limitation in the quantity of 
 food. 
 
 " But are children to be allowed to surfeit them- 
 selves? Shall they be suffered to take their fill ot 
 dainties and make themselves ill, as they certainly 
 will do? " As thus put, the question admits of but 
 one reply. But as thns put, it assumes the point at 
 issue. We contend tliat, as appetite is a good guide 
 to all the lower creation — as it is a good guide to 
 the infant — as it is a good guide to the invalid — as 
 it is a good guide to the differently-placed races of 
 men, and as it is a good guide for every adult who 
 leads a healthful life ; it may safely be inferred that 
 it is a good guide for childhood. It would be 
 strange indeed were it here alone untrustworthy. 
 
 Probably not a few will read this reply with 
 some impatience ; being able, as they think, to cite 
 facts totally at variance with it. It will appear 
 absurd if we deny the relevancy of these facts; and 
 yet the paradox is quite defensible. The truth is, 
 that the instances of excess which such persons 
 have in mind, are usually the consequences of tlie 
 
 * Cyclopcedia of Practical Mcdkina.
 
 GUIDANCE OF ArPETITE IN CHILDHOOD. 227 
 
 restrictive system they seem to justify. They are 
 the sensual reactions caused by a more or less asce- 
 tic regimen. They illustrate on a small scale that 
 commonly remarked fact, that those who during 
 youth have been subject to the most rigorous dis- 
 cipline, are apt afterwards to rush into the wildest 
 extravagances. They are analogous to those fright' 
 ful phenomena, once not uncommon in convents, 
 where nuns suddenly lapsed from the extremest 
 austerities into an almost demoniac wickedness. 
 They simply exhibit the uncontrollable vehemence 
 of a long-denied desire. Consider the ordinary 
 tastes and the ordinary treatment of children. The 
 love of sweets is conspicuous and almost universal 
 among them. Probably ninety -nine people in a 
 hundred, presume that there is nothing more in this 
 than gratification of the palate ; and that, in com- 
 mon with other sensual desires, it should be dis- 
 couraged. The physiologist, however, whose dis- 
 coveries lead him to an ever-increasing reverence 
 for the arrangements of things, will suspect that 
 there is something more in this love of sweets than 
 the current hypothesis suj^poses ; and a little in- 
 quiry confirms the suspicion. Any work on organic 
 chemistry shows that sugar plays an important part 
 in the vital processes. Both saccharine and fatty 
 matters are eventually oxidized in the body; and 
 there is an accompanying evolution of heat. Sugar 
 is the form to which sundry other compounds have 
 to be reduced before they are available as heat- 
 making food ; and XkA'S, formation of sugar is carried
 
 228 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 on in the body. Not only is Htarcli changed into 
 sugar in the course of digestion, but it has been 
 proved by M. Claude Bernard that the liver is a 
 factory in which other constituents of food are trans- 
 formed into sugar. Now, when to the fact that 
 children have a marked desire for this valuable 
 heat-food, we join the fact that they have usually a 
 marked dislike to that food which gives out the 
 greatest amount of heat during its oxidation (name- 
 ly, fat), we shall see strong reason for thinking that 
 excess of the one compensates for defect of the other 
 — that the organism demands more sugar because 
 it cannot deal with much fet. Again, children are 
 usually very fond of vegetable acids. Fruits of all 
 kinds are their delight ; and, in the absence of any- 
 thing better, they will devour unripe gooseberries and 
 the sourest of crabs. JSTow, not only are vegetable 
 acids, in common with mineral ones, very gooil 
 tonics, and beneficial as such when taken in modera- 
 tion ; but they have, when administered in their 
 natural forms, other advantages. " Kipe fruit," 
 says Dr. Andrew Combe, " is more freely given on 
 the Continent than in this country ; and, particularly 
 when the bowels act imperfectly, it is often very 
 useful." See, then, the discord between the instinc- 
 tive wants of children and their habitual treatment. 
 Here are two dominant desires, which there is good 
 reason to believe express certain needs of the juve- 
 nile constitution ; and not only are they ignored in 
 the nursery regimen, but there is a general ten- 
 dency to forbid the gratification of them. Bread'
 
 KE8TEICTED DIET TKOVOKES EXCESS. 220 
 
 and-inilk in the morning, tea and bread-and-butter 
 at night, or some dietary equally insipid, is rigidly 
 adhered to ; and any ministration to the palate is 
 thought not only needless but wrong. What is the 
 necessary consequence ? When, on fete-days there 
 is an unlimited access to good things — when a gift 
 of pocket-money brings the contents of the confec- 
 tioner's window within reach, or when by some 
 accident the free run of a fruit-garden is obtained ; 
 then the long-denied, and therefore intense, desires 
 lead to great excesses. There is an impromptu 
 carnival, caused not only by the release from past 
 restraints, but also by the consciousness that a long 
 Lent will begin on the morrow. And then, when 
 the evils of repletion display themselves, it is 
 argued that children must not be loft to the guid- 
 ance of their appetites ! These disastrous results of 
 artificial restrictions, are themselves cited as prov- 
 ino; the need for further restrictions ! We contend, 
 therefore, that the reasoning commonly used to 
 justify this system of interference is vicious. We 
 contend that, were children allowed daily to par- 
 take of these more sapid edibles, for which there is 
 a physiological requirement, they would rarely ex- 
 ceed, as they now mostly do A'hen they have the 
 opportunity : were fruit, as Dr. Combe recommends, 
 " to constitute a part of the regular food " (given, as 
 he advises, not between meals, but along with 
 them), there would be none of that craving which 
 prompts the devouring of such fruits as crabs and 
 sloes. And similarly in other cases.
 
 230 niYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 Not only is it that the dj^^'ion reasons for trust- 
 ing the appetites of children are so strong ; and 
 that the reasons assigned for distrusting them are 
 invalid ; but it is that no other guidance is worthy 
 of any confidence. What is the value of this pa- 
 rental judgment, set up as an alternative regulator? 
 When to "Oliver ashing for more," the mamma or 
 the governess replies in the negative, on what data 
 does she proceed ? She thinks he has had enough. 
 But where are her grounds for so thinking? Has 
 she some secret understanding with the boy's 
 stomach — some clairvoyant power enabling her to 
 discern the needs of his body ? If not, how can she 
 safely decide ? Does she not know that the demand 
 of the system for food is determined by numerous 
 and involved causes — varies with the temperature, 
 with the hygrometric state of the air, with the elec- 
 tric state of the air — varies also according to the 
 exercise taken, acccn-ding to the kind and quality of 
 food eaten at the last meal, and according to the 
 rapidity with which the last meal was digested ? 
 How can she calculate the result of such a combina- 
 tion of causes ? As we heard said by the father of 
 a tive-years-old boy, who stands a head taller than 
 most of his age, and is proportionately robust, rosy, 
 and active : — " I can see no artificial standard by 
 which to mete out his food. If I say, ' this much is 
 enough,' it is a mere guess ; and the guess is as like- 
 ly to be wrong as riglit. Consequently, having no 
 faith in guesses, I let him eat his fill." And cer- 
 tainly, any one judging of his policy by its efi'ects,
 
 NATDKE AND LNSTmCT TO BE TRUSTED. 231 
 
 would be constrained to admit its wisdom. In truth, 
 this confidence, with which most parents take upon 
 tliemselves to legislate for the stomachs of their 
 children, proves their unacquaintance with the 
 principles of physiology : if they knew more, thej 
 would he more modest. " The pride of science is 
 luimble when compared with the pride of igno- 
 rance." If any one would learn how little faith is to 
 be placed in human judgments, and how much in 
 the pre-established arrangements of things, let him 
 compare the rashness of the inexperienced physician 
 with the caution of the most advanced ; or let him 
 dip into Sir John Forbes' work, On Nature and Art 
 in the Cure of Disease ; and he will then see that, 
 in proportion as men gain a greater knowledge of 
 the laws of life, they come to have less confidence 
 in themselves, and more in Nature. 
 
 Turning from the cpiestion oi quantity of food to 
 that of quality^ we may discern tlie same ascetic 
 tendency. Not simply a more or less restricted 
 diet, but a comparatively low diet, is thought 
 proper for children. Tlie current opinion is, that 
 they should have but little animal food. Among 
 the less wealthy classes, economy seems to have 
 dictated this opinion — the wish has been father to 
 tlie thought. Parents not afibrding to buy much 
 meat, and liking meat themselves, answer the peti- 
 tions of juveniles with — "Meat is not good for little 
 boys and girls ;" and this, at first, probably nothing 
 but a convenient excuse, has by repetition grown 
 into an article of faith. While the classes with
 
 232 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 Avliom cost is not a consideration, have been swujed 
 partly by tlie example of the .majority, partly by 
 the influence of nurses drawn from the lower classes, 
 and in some measure by the reaction against past 
 animalism. 
 
 If, however, we inquire for the basis of this 
 opinion, we find little or none. It is a dogma re- 
 peated and received without proof, like that which, 
 for thousands of years, insisted on the necessity of 
 swaddling-clothes. It may indeed be true that, to 
 the young child's stomach, not yet endowed with 
 much muscular power, meat, which requires con- 
 siderable trituration before it can be made into 
 chyme, is an unfit aliment. But this objection 
 does not tell against animal food from which the 
 fibrous part has been extracted ; nor does it apply 
 when, after the lapse of two or three years, consid^ 
 erable muscular vigour has been acquired. And 
 while the evidence in support of this dogma, par- 
 tially valid in the case of very young children, is 
 not valid in the case of older children, who arC; 
 nevertheless, ordinarily treated in conformity with 
 the dogma, the adverse evidence is abundant and 
 conclusive. The verdict of science is exactly oppo- 
 site to the popular opinion. We have put the ques- 
 tion to two of our leading physicians, and to sev- 
 eral of the most distinguished physiologists, and 
 they uniformly agree in the conclusion, that chil- 
 dren should have a diet not less nutritive, but, if 
 anything, 7nore nutritive than that of adults. 
 
 The grounds for this conclusion are obvious, and
 
 CHILDREN EKQUIRE A NUTRITIVE DIET. 233 
 
 the reasoning simple. It needs but to compare 
 the vital processes of a man with those of a boy, to 
 see at once that the demand for sustenance is rela- 
 tively greater in the boy than in the man. What 
 are the ends for which a man requires food ? Each 
 day his body undergoes more or less wear — wear 
 through muscular exertion, wear of the nervous 
 system through mental actions, wear of the viscera 
 in carrying on the functions of life ; and the tissue 
 thus wasted has to be renewed. Each day, too, by 
 perpetual radiation, his body loses a large amount 
 of heat ; and as, for the continuance of the vital 
 actions, the temperature of the body must be main- 
 tained, tills loss has to be compensated by a con- 
 stant production of heat : to which end certain con- 
 stituents of the food are unceasingly undergoing 
 oxidation. To make up for the day's waste, and to 
 supply fuel for the day's expenditure of heat, are, 
 then, the sole pui-poses for which the adult requires 
 food. Consider, now, the case of the boy. He, 
 too, wastes the substance of his body by action ; 
 and it needs but to note his restless activity to see 
 that, in proportion to his bulk, he probably wastes 
 as much as a man. He, too, loses heat by radia- 
 tion ; and, as his body exposes a greater surface in 
 proportion to its mass than does that of a man, and 
 therefore loses heat more rapidly, the quantity of 
 heat-food he requires is, bulk for bulk, greater than 
 that required by a man. So that even had the boy 
 no other vital processes to carry on than the man 
 has, he would need, relatively to his size, a some
 
 234 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 wliat larger supply of luitriment. But, besides re- 
 pairing his body and maintaining its heat, the boy 
 lias to make new tissue — to grow. After waste 
 and thermal loss have been provided for, such sur- 
 plus of nutriment as remains, goes to the further 
 building up of the frame ; and only in virtue of this 
 surplus is normal growth possible — the growth that 
 sometimes takes place in the absence of such sur- 
 plus, causing a manifest prostration consequent up- 
 on defective repair. IIow peremptory is the de- 
 mand of the unfolding oi'ganism for materials, is 
 seen alike in that " school-boy hunger,"- which 
 after-life rarely parallels in intensity, and in the 
 comparatively quick return of appetite. And if 
 there needs further evidence of this extra necessity 
 for nutriment, we have it in the fact that, during 
 the famines following shipwrecks and other disas- 
 ters, the children are the iirst to die. 
 
 This relatively greater need for nutriment be- 
 ing admitted, as it must perforce be, the question 
 that remains is — shall we meet it by giving an ex- 
 cessive cpiantity of what may be called dilute 
 food, or a more moderate quantity of concentrated 
 food ? The nutriment obtainable from a given 
 weight of meat is obtainable only from a larger 
 weight of bread, or from a still larger weight of 
 potatoes, and so on. To fulfil the requirement, 
 the quantity must be increased as the nutritiveness 
 is diminished. Shall we, then, respond to the ex- 
 tra wants of the growing child by giving an ade- 
 quate quantity of food as good as that of adults ?
 
 ECONOMISING THE LABOUR OF DIGESTION. 235 
 
 Or, regardless of the fact that its stomach has to 
 dispose of a relatively larger quantity even of this 
 good food, shall we further tax it by giving an in- 
 I'erior food in still greater quantity? 
 
 The answer is tolerably obvious. The more 
 the labour of digestion can be ecoTiomised, tlie 
 more energy is left for the purposes of growth and 
 action. The functions of the stomach and intes 
 tines cannot be performed without a large supply 
 of blood and nervous power ; and in the compara- 
 tive lassitude that follows a hearty meal, every 
 adult has proof that this supply of blood and nerv- 
 ous power is at the expense of the system at large. 
 If the requisite nutriment is furnished by a great 
 quantity of innutritions food, more work is entailed 
 on the viscera than when it is furnished by a 
 moderate quantity of nutritious food. This extra 
 work is so much sheer loss — a loss which in chil- 
 dren shows itself either in diminished energy^ or in 
 smaller growth, or in both. The inference is, then, 
 that they should have a diet which combines, as 
 much as possible, nutritiveness and digestibility. 
 
 It is doubtless true that boys and girls may be 
 brought up upon an exclusively, or almost exclu- 
 sively, vegetable diet. Among the upper classes 
 are to be found children to whom comparatively 
 little meat is given; and who, nevertheless, grow 
 and appear in good health. Animal food is scarce- 
 ly tasted by the offspring of labouring people ; and 
 yet they reach a healthy maturity. But these 
 Beemingly adverse facts have by no means the
 
 23G PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 weight commonly supposed. In the first place, it 
 does not follow that those who in early years 
 flourish on bread and potatoes, will eventually 
 reach a fine development ; and a comparison be- 
 tween the agricultural labourers and the gentry, in 
 England, or between the middle and lower classes 
 in France, is by no means in favour of vegetable 
 feeders. In the second place, the question is not 
 only a question of hulk^ but also a question of 
 quality. A soft, flabl)y flesh makes as good a show 
 as a firm one ; but though to the careless eye, a 
 child of full, flaccid tissue may apj)ear the equal 
 of one whose flbres are well toned, a trial of 
 strength will prove the difference. Obesity in adults 
 is often a sign of feebleness. Men lose weight in 
 training. And lience the appearance of these Iom-- 
 fed children is by no means conclusive. In the 
 third place, not only size, but energy has to be con- 
 sidered. Between children of the meat-eating 
 classes and those of the bread-and-potato-eating 
 classes, there is a marked contrast in this respect. 
 Both in mental and physical vivacity the low-fed 
 peasant-boy is greatly inferior to the better-fed son 
 of a gentleman. 
 
 If we compare different classes of animals, or 
 diflPerent races of men, or the same animals or men 
 when differently fed, we find still more distinct 
 proof that the degree of energy essentlalhj depends 
 on the nutritiveness of the food. 
 
 In a cow, subsisting on so innutritive a food as 
 grass, we see that the immense quantity required
 
 EFFECTS OF CONCENTKATED FOOD. 237 
 
 to he eaten necessitates an enormous digestive sys- 
 tem ; that the limbs, small in comparison with the 
 body, are burdened by its weight ; that in carrying 
 about this heavy body and digesting this excessive 
 quantity of food, a great amount of force is ex- 
 pended ; and tliat, having but little energy remain- 
 ing, the creature is sluggish. Compare with the 
 cow a horse — an animal of nearly allied structure, 
 but adapted to a more concentrated food. Here 
 we see that the body, and more especially its ab- 
 dominal region, bears a much smaller ratio to the 
 limbs ; that the powers are not taxed by the sup- 
 port of such massive viscera, nor the digestion of 
 so bulky a food ; and that, as a consequence, there 
 is great locomotive energy and considerable vivaci- 
 ty. If, again, we contrast the stolid inactivity of 
 the graminivorous sheep with the liveliness of the 
 dog, subsisting upon flesh or farinaceous food, or a 
 mixture of the two, we see a diflerence similar in 
 kind, but still greater in degree. And after walk- 
 ing through the Zoological Gardens, and noting the 
 restlessness with which the carnivorous animals 
 pace up and down their cages, it needs but to re- 
 member that none of the herbivorous animals 
 habitually display this superfluous energy, to see 
 how clear is the relation between conceiitration of 
 food and degree of activity. 
 
 That these diflerences are not directly consequent 
 upon diflerences of constitution, as some may argue ; 
 but are directly consequent upon diflerences in the 
 food which the creatures are constituted to subsist
 
 5^38 niYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 on ; is proved by the fact, that they are observable 
 between different divisions of the same species. 
 Take the case of mankind. The Australians, Bush- 
 men, and others of the lowest savages who live on 
 roots and berries, varied by larv[e of insects and 
 the like meagre fare, are comparatively pnny in 
 stature, have large abdomens, soft and undeveloped 
 muscles, and are quite unable to cope with Euro- 
 peans, either in a struggle or in prolonged exertion. 
 Count up the wild races who are well grown, 
 strong and active, as the KaflSrs, !North- American 
 Indians, and Patagonians, and you find them large 
 consumers of flesh. The ill-fed Hindoo goes down 
 before the Englishman fed on more nutritive food ; 
 to whom he is as inferior in mental as in physical 
 energy. And generally, we think, the history of 
 the world shows that the well-fed races have been 
 the energetic and dominant races. 
 
 Still stronger, however, becomes the argument, 
 when we find tliat the same individual animal be- 
 comes capable of more or less exertion according 
 as its food is more or less nutritious. This has 
 been clearly demonstrated in the case of the horse. 
 Though flesh may be gained by a grazing horse;, 
 strength is lost; as putting him to hard work 
 proves. "The consequence of turning horses out 
 to grass is relaxation of the muscular system." 
 " Grass is a very good preparation for a bullock for 
 Smithfield market, but a very bad one for a hunt- 
 er." It was well known of old that, after passing 
 the summer months in the fields, hunters required
 
 DIET INFLUENCES ENERGY. 239 
 
 some months of stable-feeding before becoming able 
 to follow the hounds ; and that thej did not get in- 
 to good condition until the beginning of the next 
 spring. And the modern practice is that insisted 
 on by Mr. Apperley — "Never to give a hunter 
 what is called ' a summer's run at grass,' and, ex- 
 cept under particular and very favourable circum- 
 stances, never to turn him out at all." That is to 
 say, never give him poor food : great energy and 
 endurance are to be obtained only by the continu- 
 ous use of very nutritive food. So true is this that, 
 as proved by Mr. Apperley, prolonged high-feed- 
 ing will enable a middling horse to equal, in his 
 performances, a first-rate horse fed in the ordinary 
 way. To which various evidences add the familiar 
 fact that, when a horse is required to do double 
 duty, it is tlie practice to give him beans — a food 
 containing a larger proportion of nitrogenous, or 
 flesh-making material, than his habitual oats. 
 
 Once more, in the case of individual men tl)c 
 truth has been illustrated with equal, or still great- 
 er, clearness. We do not refer to men in training 
 for feats of strength, whose regimen, however, 
 thoroughly conforms to the doctrine. We refer to 
 the experience of railway contractors and their 
 labourers. It has been for years past a well-estab- 
 lished fact that the English navvy, eating largely 
 of flesh, is far more efficient than a Continental 
 navvy living on a less nutritive food : so much more 
 efficient, that English contractors for Continental 
 railways have habitually taken their labourers with 
 15
 
 240 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 tliein. That difference of diet and not difference of 
 race caused tliis superiority, lias been of late dis- 
 tinctly shown. For it has turned out, that when 
 the Continental navvies live in the same style as 
 :theu' English competitors, they presently rise, more 
 or less nearly, to a par with them in efficiency. To 
 which fact let us here add the converge one, to which 
 w^e can give personal testimony based upon six 
 months' experience of vegetarianism, that abstinence 
 from meat entails diminished energy of both body 
 and mind. 
 
 Do not these various evidences distinctly en- 
 dorse our argument respecting the feeding of chil- 
 dren ? Do they not imply that, even supposing the 
 same stature and bulk to be attained on an innutri- 
 tive as on a nutritive diet, the quality of tissue is 
 greatly inferior ? Do they not establish the posi- 
 tion that, where energy as well as growth has to be 
 maintained, it can only be done by high feeding ? 
 Do they not confirm the a p7'io7'i conclusion that, 
 though a child of whom little is expected in the 
 M'ay of bodily or mental activity, may tln-ive tolera- 
 bly well on farinaceous substances, a child who is 
 daily required, not only to form the due amount of 
 new tissue, but to supply the waste consequent on 
 great muscular action, and the further waste con- 
 sequent on hard exercise of brain, must live on sub- 
 stances containing a larger ratio of nutritive matter ? 
 And is it not an obvious corollary, that denial of 
 this better food will be at the expense either of 
 growth, or of bodily activity, or of mental activity;
 
 children's diet should bb varied. 24:1 
 
 as constitution and circinnstances may determine ? 
 We believe no logical intellect will question it. To 
 think otherwise is to entertain in a disguised form 
 the old fallacy of the perpetual-motion schemers — 
 that it is possible to get power out of nothing. 
 
 Before leaving the question of food, a few words 
 must be said on another requisite — variety. In this 
 respect the dietary of the young is very faulty. If 
 not, like our soldiers, condemned to " twenty years 
 of boiled beef," our children have mostly to bear a 
 monotony which, though less extreme and less last- 
 ing, is quite as clearly at variance with the laws of 
 health. At dinner, it is true, they usually have food 
 that is more or less mixed, and that is changed day 
 by day. But week after week, month after month, 
 year after year, comes the same breakfast of bread- 
 and-milk, or, it may be, oatmeal porridge. And 
 with like persistence the day is closed, perhaps with 
 a second edition of the bread-and-milk, perhaps 
 wnth tea and bread-and-butter. 
 
 This practice is opposed to the dictates of physi- 
 ology. The satiety produced by an often-re])eated 
 dish, and the gratification caused by one long a 
 stranger to the palate, are 7iot meaningless, as many 
 carelessly assume ; but they are the incentives to a 
 wliolesome diversity of diet, It is a fact, establish- 
 ed by numerous experiments, that there is scarcely 
 any one food, however good, which supplies in due 
 proportions or right forms all the elements required 
 for carrying on the vital processes in a normal man- 
 ner : from whence it is to be inferred that frequent
 
 242 PHYSICAL EDrCATIOX. 
 
 change of food is desirable to balance the snpply of 
 all the elements. It is a further fact, ■well known 
 to physiologists, that the enjoyrnent given by a 
 much-liked food is a nervous stimulus, which, by 
 increasing the action of the heart and so propelling 
 the blood with increased vigour, aids in the sub- 
 sequent digestion. And these truths are in har- 
 mony with the maxims of modern cattle-feeding, 
 which dictate a rotation of diet. 
 
 Not only, however, is periodic change of food 
 very desirable ; but, for the same reasons, it is very 
 desirable that a mixture of food should be taken at 
 each meal. The better balance of ingredients, and 
 the greater nervous stimulation, are advantages 
 which hold here as before. If facts are asked for, 
 we may name as one, the comparative ease with 
 which the stomach disposes of a French dinner, 
 enormous in quantity but extremely varied in ma- 
 terial. Few will contend that an equal weight of 
 one kind of food, however well cooked, could be 
 digested with as much facility. If any desire 
 further facts, they may find them in every modern 
 book on the management of animals. Animals 
 thrive best when each meal is made up of several 
 things. And indeed, among men of science the truth 
 has been long ago established. The experiments of 
 Goss and Stark " afford the most decisive proof of 
 the advantage, or rather the necessity, of a mixture of 
 substances, in order to produce the compound which 
 is tlie best adapted for the action of the stomach." * 
 
 * CyclopcEilia of Anatomy and PJnjsiology.
 
 CAUTION IN CHANGING DIET. 213 
 
 Should any object, as probably many will, tliat 
 a rotating dietary for children, and one which also 
 requires a mixture of food at each meal, would en- 
 tail too much trouble ; we reply, that no trouble is 
 thought too great which conduces to the mental 
 development of children, and that for their future 
 welfare, good bodily development is equally impor- 
 tant. Moreover, it seems alike sad and strange that 
 a trouble which is cheerfully taken in the fattening 
 of pigs, should be thought too great in the rearing 
 of children. 
 
 One more paragraph, with the view of warning 
 those who may propose to adopt the regimen indi- 
 cated. The change must not be made suddenly ; 
 for continued low-feeding so enfeebles the system, 
 as to disable it from at once dealing with a high 
 diet. Deficient nutrition is itself a cause of dyspep- 
 sia. This is true even of animals. "When calves 
 are fed wntli skimmed milk, or whey, or other poor 
 food, they are liable to indigestion." * Hence, 
 therefore, where the energies are low, the transition 
 to a generous diet must be gradual : each incre- 
 ment of strength gained, justifying a further increase 
 of nutriment. Further, it should always be borne 
 in mind that the concentration, of nutriment may 
 be carried too far. A bulk sufficient to fill the 
 stomach is one requisite of a proper meal ; and this 
 requisite negatives a diet deficient in those waste 
 matters which give adequate mass. Though the 
 size of the digestive organs is less in the well-fed 
 
 * Morton's Cyclopcedia of Agricullure.
 
 244- PHY.SIC.\L EDUCATIOJ^. 
 
 civilized races than in the ill-fed savage ones ; and, 
 though their size may eventually diminish stiil 
 further ; yet, for the time heing, the bulk of the in- 
 gesta must be determined by the existing capacity. 
 But, paying due regard to these two qualifications 
 our conclusions are — that the food of children 
 should be highly nutritive ; that it should be varied 
 at each meal and at successive meals ; and that it 
 should be abundant. 
 
 With clothing as with food, the established ten- 
 dency is towards an improper scantiness. Here, 
 too, asceticism peeps out. There is a current theory, 
 vaguely entertained, if not put into a definite 
 formula, that the sensations are to be disregard- 
 ed. They do not exist for our guidance, but to 
 mislead us, seems to be the prevalent belief reduced 
 to its naked form. It is a grave error : we are 
 much more beneficently constituted. It is not 
 obedience to the sensations, but disobedience to 
 them, which is the habitual cause of bodily evils- 
 It is not the eating when hungry, but the eating in 
 the absence of appetite, which is bad. It is not the 
 drinking when thirsty, but the continuing to drink 
 when thirst has ceased, that is the vice. Harm re- 
 sults not from breathing that fresh air which every 
 healthy person enjoys ; but from continuing to 
 breathe foul air, spite of the protest of the lungs. 
 Harm results not from taking that active exercise 
 which, as every child shows us, nature strongly 
 prompts ; but from a persistent disregard of nature's
 
 OBEDIENCE TO THE THYSICAL CONSCIENCE. 245 
 
 promptings. Not that mental activ'itj wliich is 
 spontaneous and enjoyable does the mischief; but 
 that which is persevered in after a hot or acliiiig 
 head commands desistance. IS^ot that bodily exer- 
 tion which is pleasant or indiiferent, does injiirv ; 
 but that which is continued wlien exhaustion forbids. 
 It is true that, in those who have long led unhealtliy 
 lives, the sensations are not trustworthy guides. 
 People who have for years been almost constant- 
 ly in-doors, who have exercised their brains very 
 much, and their bodies scarcely at all, who in eating 
 have obeyed their clocks without consulting their 
 stomachs, may very likely be misled by their 
 vitiated feelings. But their abnormal state is itself 
 the result of transgressing their feelings. Had they 
 from childhood up never disobeyed what we may 
 term the physical conscience, it would not have been 
 seared, but would have remained a faithful monitor. 
 Among the sensations serving for our gui(!aiico 
 are those of heat and cold; and a clothing for chil- 
 dren which does not carefully consult these sensa- 
 tions is to be condemned. The common notion 
 about "hardening" is a grievous delusion. Chil- 
 dren are not unfrequently " hardened " out of the 
 world ; and those M'ho survive, permanently sulfer 
 either in growth or constitution. " Their delicate 
 appearance furnishes ample indication of the mis- 
 chief thus produced, and their frequent attacks of 
 illness'might prove a warning even to unreflecting 
 parents," says Dr. Combe. The reasoning on which 
 this hardening theory rests is extremely superficial.
 
 246 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 Wealthy parents, seeing little peasant boys and 
 girls playing about in the open air only half-clothed, 
 and joining with this fact the general healthiness of 
 labouring people, draw the unwarrantable conclu- 
 sion that the healthiness is the result of the expo= 
 sure, and resolve to keep their own offspring scan- 
 tily covered! It is forgotten that these urchins 
 who gambol upon village-greens are in many re- 
 spects favourably circumstanced — that their days 
 are spent in almost perpetual play ; that they are 
 always breathing fresh air ; and that their systems 
 are not disturbed by over-taxed brains. For aught 
 that appears to the contrary, their good health may 
 be maintained, not in consequence of, but in spite 
 of, their deficient clothing. This alternative con- 
 clusion we believe to be the true one ; and that an 
 inevitable detriment results from the needless loss 
 of animal heat to which they are subject. 
 
 For when, the constitution being sound enough 
 to bear it, exposure does produce hardness, it does 
 so at the expense of growth. This truth is display- 
 ed alike in animals and in man. The Shetland 
 pony bears greater inclemencies than the horses of 
 the south, but is dwarfed. Highland sheep and 
 cattle, living in a colder climate, are stunted in 
 comparison with English breeds. In both the arc- 
 tic and antarctic regions the human race falls 
 much below its ordinary height: the Laphmder 
 and Esquimaux are very short ; and the TeiTa del 
 Fuegians, who go naked in a cold latitude, are de- 
 ecribcd by Darwin as so stunted and hideous, that
 
 rEOlECnON FKOM COLD. 247 
 
 *' one can hardly make one's self believe they are 
 fellow-creatures." 
 
 Science clearly explains this dwarfishness pro- 
 duced by great abstraction of heat : showing that, 
 food and other things being equal, it unavoidably 
 results. For, as before pointed out, to make up for 
 that cooling by radiation which the body is con- 
 stantly undergoing, there must be a constant oxida- 
 tion of certain matters which form part of the food. 
 And in proportion as the thermal loss is great, must 
 the quantity of these matters required for oxidation 
 be great. But the power of the digestive organs is 
 limited. Hence it follows, that when they have to 
 prepare a large quantity of this material needful 
 for maintaining the temperature, they can prepare 
 but a small quantity of the material which goes to 
 build up the frame. Excessive expenditure for fuel 
 entails diminished means for other purposes : where- 
 fore there necessarily results a body small in size, 
 or inferior in texture, or both. 
 
 Hence the great importance of clothing. As 
 Liebig says : — " Our clothing is, in reference to the 
 temperature of the body, merely an equivalent for 
 a certain amount of food." By diminishing the 
 loss of heat, it diminishes the amount of fuel need- 
 ful for maintaining the heat ; and when the stom- 
 ach has less to do in preparing fuel, it can do more 
 in preparing other materials. This deduction is 
 entirely confirmed by the experience of those who 
 manage animals. Cold can be borne by animals 
 only at an expense of fat, or muscle, or growth, as
 
 248 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 the case may be. " If fattening cattle are exposed 
 to a low temperature, either their progress must be 
 retarded, or a great additional expenditure of food 
 incurred." * Mr. Apperley insists strongly that, to 
 bring hunters into good condition, it is necessary 
 that the stable should be kept warm. And among 
 those who rear racers, it is an established doctrine 
 that exposure is to be avoided. 
 
 The scientific truth thus illustrated by ethnolo-> 
 gy. and recognised by agriculturists and sportsmen, 
 applies with double force to children. In propor- 
 tion to their smallness and the rapidity of their 
 growth is the injury from cold great. In France, 
 new-born infants often die in winter from being 
 carried to the office of the maire for registration. 
 "M. Quetelet has pointed out, that in Belgium two 
 infants die in January for one that dies in July." 
 And in Russia the infavit mortality is something 
 enormous. Even when near maturity, the unde- 
 veloped frame is comparatively unable to bear ex- 
 posure : as witness the quickness with Avhich 
 voung soldiers succumb in a trvino^ campaii^n. 
 The rationale is obvious. We have already ad- 
 verted to the fact that, in consequence of the vary- 
 ing relation between surface and bulk, a child loses 
 a relatively larger amount of heat than an adult; 
 and here we must point out that the disadvantage 
 under which the child thus labours is verj- great. 
 Lehmann says : — " If the carbonic acid excreted by 
 children or young animals is calculated for an 
 * Morton's Cydojxzdia of Agriculture.
 
 EVILS INFLICTED BY SCANTY CLOTHING. 249 
 
 equal bodily weight, it results tliat children pro- 
 duce nearly twice as much acid as adults." Now 
 the quantity of carbonic acid given off varies with 
 tolerable accuracy as the quantity of heat j^roduced. 
 And thus we see that in chiklren the system, even 
 when not placed at a disadvantage, is called upon 
 to provide nearly double the proportion of material 
 for generating heat. 
 
 See, then, the extreme folly of clothing the 
 young scantily. What father, full-grown though 
 he is, losing heat less rapidly as he does, and hav- 
 ing no physiological necessity but to supply the 
 waste of each day — what father, we ask, would 
 think it salutary to go about with bare legs, bare 
 arms, and bare neck? Yet this tax upon the S3"S- 
 tem, from which he would shrink, lie inflicts upon 
 his little ones, who are so much less able to bear 
 it! or, if he does not inflict it, sees it inflicted with- 
 out protest. Let him remember that every ounce 
 of nutriment needlessly expended for the mainte- 
 nance of temperature, is so much deducted from 
 the nutriment going to build up the frame and 
 maintain the energies ; and that even when colds, 
 congestions, or other consequent disorders are 
 escaped, diminished growth or less perfect struc- 
 ture is inevitable. 
 
 " The rule is, therefore, not to dress in an inva- 
 riable way in all cases, but to put on clothing in 
 kind and quantity sufficient in the individual case 
 to protect the hod y effectually from an abiding sensa- 
 tion of cold, however slight^ This rule, the impor-
 
 250 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 tance of which Dr. Combe indicates by the italics, 
 is one in wliich men of science and practitioners 
 agree. We have met with none competent to form 
 a judgment on the matter, who do not strongly con- 
 demn the exposure of children's limbs. If there is 
 one point above otliers in which "pestilent custom" 
 should be ignored, it is this. 
 
 Lamentable, indeed, is it to see mothers serious- 
 \y damaging the constitutions of their children out 
 of compliance with an irrational fasliion. It is bad 
 enough that they should themselves conform to 
 every folly which our Gallic neighbours please to 
 initiate ; but that they should clothe their children 
 in any mountebank dress which Z,e petit Courtlier 
 des Dames indicates, regardless of its insufficiency 
 and nnfitness, is monstrous. Discomfort, more or 
 less great, is inflicted ; freqnent disorders are en- 
 tailed ; growth is checked or stamina undermined ; 
 premature death not uncommonly caused ; and all 
 because it is thought needful to make frocks of a 
 size and material dictated by French caprice. Not 
 only is it that for the sake of conformity, mothers 
 thus punish and injure their little ones by scanti- 
 ness of covering; but it is that from an allied 
 motive they impose a style of dress which forbids 
 healthful activity. To please the eye, colours and 
 fabrics are chosen totally unfit to bear that rough 
 usage which unrestrained play involves; and then 
 to prevent damage the unrestrained play is inter- 
 dicted. "Get up this moment: you will soil your 
 clean frock," is the mandate issued to some urchin
 
 MATERNAL FOLLY IN DEESSIXG CIIILDKEN. 2')1 
 
 creeping about on the floor. " Come back : you 
 will dirty your stockings," calls out the governess 
 to one of her charges, who has left the footpath to 
 scramble up a bank. Thus is the evil doubled. 
 That they may come up to their mamma's stand- 
 ard of prettiness, and be admired by her visitors, 
 children must have habiliments deficient in quanti- 
 ty and unfit in texture ; and tliat these easily- 
 damaged habiliments may be kept clean and unin- 
 jured, the i-estless activity, so natural and needful 
 for the young, is more or less restrained. The ex- 
 ercise which becomes doubly requisite when the 
 clothing is insnfiScient, is cut short, lest it should 
 deface the clothinor. Would that the terrible cruel- 
 ty of this system could be seen by those who main- 
 tain it. We do not hesitate to say that, through 
 enfeebled health, defective energies, and conse- 
 quent non-success in life, thousands are annually 
 doomed to unhappiness by this unscrupulous regard 
 for appearances : even when they are not, by early 
 death, literally sacrificed to the Moloch of maternal 
 vanity. We are reluctant to counsel strong meas- 
 ures, but really the evils are so great as to justif}-, 
 or even to demand, a peremptory interference on 
 the part of fothers. 
 
 Our conclusions are, then — that, while the cloth- 
 ing of children should never be in such excess as 
 to create oppressive warmth, it should always be 
 sufiicient to prevent any general feeling of cold ; "^ 
 
 * It is needful to remark that children whose legs and arms 
 hare been from the beginning habitually without covering, cease to
 
 L'.JZ PHYSICAL P^DUCATION. 
 
 tliat, instead of the flimsy cotton, linen, or mixed 
 fabrics commonly used, it should be made of some 
 cjood non-conductor, such as coarse woollen cloth ; 
 that it should be so strong as to receive little dam- 
 age from the hard wear and tear which childish 
 sports will give it ; and that its colours should be 
 such as will not soon suffer from use and exposure. 
 
 To the importance of bodily exercise most peo- 
 ple are in some degree awake. Perhaps less needs 
 saying on this requisite of physical education than 
 on most others : at any rate, in so far as boys are 
 concerned. Public schools and private schools 
 alike furnish tolerably adequate playgrounds ; and 
 tliere is usually a fair share of time for out-of-door 
 games, and a recognition of them as needful. In 
 this, if in no other direction, it seems admitted that 
 the natural promptings of boyish instinct may ad- 
 vantageously be followed ; and, indeed, in the 
 modern practice of breaking the prolonged morning 
 and afternoon's lessons by a few minutes' open-air 
 recreation, we see an increasing tendency to con- 
 form school regulations to the bodily sensations of 
 the i^upils. Here, then, little needs to be said in 
 the way of expostulation or suggestion. 
 
 be conscious that the exposed surfaces are cold ; just as by use we 
 liave all ceased to be conscious that our faces are cold, even when 
 out of doors. But though in such children the sensations no longer 
 protest, it does not follow that the system escapes injury; anymore 
 than it follows that the Fuegian is undamaged by exposure, because 
 he bears with indiftcrcncc the melting of the falling snow on his 
 naked body.
 
 GIRLS HAVE NOT ENOUGH EXERCISE. 253 
 
 But we have been obliged to qualify this ad- 
 mission by inserting the clause " in so far as boys 
 are concerned." Unfortunately, the fact is quite 
 otherwise in the case of girls. It chances, some- 
 what strangely, that we have daily opportunity of 
 drawing a comparison. We have both a boy's and 
 a girl's school within view ; and the contrast be- 
 tween them is remarkable. In the one case, nearly 
 the whole of a large garden is turned into an open, 
 gravelled space, atfording ample scope for games, 
 and supplied with j)oles and horizontal bars for 
 gj^mnastic exercises. Every day before breakfast, 
 again towards eleven o'clock, again at mid-day, 
 again in the afternoon, and once more after school 
 is over, the neighbourhood is awakened by a chorus 
 of shouts and laughter as the boys rush out to play ; 
 and for as long as they remain, both eyes and ears 
 give proof that they are absorbed in that enjoyable 
 activity which makes the pulse bound and ensures 
 the healthful activity of every organ. How unlike 
 is the picture offered by the "Establishment for 
 Young Ladies"! Until the fact was pointed out, 
 we actually did not know that we had a girPs 
 school as close to us as the school for boys. The 
 garden, equally large with the other, affords no 
 sign wliatever of any provision for juvenile recrea- 
 tion; but is entirely laid out with prim grassplots, 
 gravel-walks, shrubs, and flowers, after the usual 
 suburban style. During five months we have not 
 once had our attention drawn to th.e premises by a 
 shout or a laugh. Occasionally girls may be ob'
 
 254 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 served sauntering along the jjatlis Avitli their lesson- 
 books in their hands, or else walking arm-in-arm. 
 Once, indeed, we saw one chase another round the 
 garden ; but, with this exception, nothing like 
 vigorous exertion has been visible. 
 
 Why this astonishing difference ? Is it that the 
 constitution of a girl differs so entirely from that 
 of a boy as not to need these active exercises? Is 
 it that a girl has none of the promptings to vocifer- 
 ous play by which boys are impelled ? Or is it 
 that, while in boys these promptings are to be re- 
 garded as securing that bodily activity without 
 which there cannot be adequate development, to 
 their sisters nature has given them for no purpose 
 whatever — unless it be for the vexation of school- 
 mistresses ? Perhaps, however, we mistake the 
 aim of those who train the gentler sex. We have 
 a vague suspicion that to produce a rohus,tj)/ii/sique 
 is thought undesirable ; that rude health and 
 abundant vigour are considered somewhat plebe- 
 ian ; that a certain delicacy, a strength not compe- 
 tent to more than a mile or two's walk, an appetite 
 fastidious and easily satisfied, joined with that ti- 
 midity which commonly accompanies feebleness, 
 are held more lady-like. We do not expect that 
 any would distinctly avow this ; but we fancy the 
 governess-mind is haunted by an ideal young lady 
 bearing not a little resemblance to this type. If 
 60, it must be admitted that the established system 
 is admirabl}^ calculated to realize this ideal. But 
 to suppose that such is the ideal of the opposite
 
 THE HORROR OF THE SCIIOOL-MISTKESS, 255 
 
 eex is a profound mistake. That men are not com- 
 monly drawn towards masculine women, is doubt- 
 less true. That such relative weakness as calls for 
 the protection of superior strength is an element 
 of attraction, we quite admit. But the difierence 
 to whicli the feelings thus respond is the natural, 
 pre-established difference, which will assert itself 
 without artificial appliances. And when, by artifi- 
 cial appliances, the degree of this diflierence is in- 
 creased, it becomes an element of repulsion rather 
 than attraction. 
 
 " Then girls should be allowed to run wild — to 
 become as rude as boys, and grow up into romps 
 and hoydens ! " exclaims some defender of the pro- 
 prieties. This, we presume, is the ever-present 
 dread of schoolmistresses. It appears, on inquiry, 
 that at " Establishments for Young Ladies " noisy 
 play like that daily indulged in by boys, is a punish- 
 able offence ; and it is to be inferred that this noisy 
 play is forbidden, lest unlady-like habits should 
 be formed. The fear is quite groundless, however- 
 For if the sportive activity allowed to boys docs 
 not prevent them from growing up into gentlemen ; 
 why should a like sportive activity allowed to 
 girls prevent them from growing up into ladies ? 
 Rough as may have been their accustomed play- 
 ground frolics, youtlis who have left school do not 
 indulge in leapfrog in the street, or marbles in tlie 
 drawing-room. Abandoning their jackets, they 
 abandon at the same time boyish games ; and dis- 
 play an anxiety — often a ludicrous anxiety — to 
 
 IG
 
 256 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 avoid whatever is not manly. If now, on arriving 
 at the due age, this feeling of masculine dignity 
 puts so efficient a restraint on the romping sports 
 of boyhood, will not the feeling of feminine mod- 
 esty, gradually strengthening as maturity is ap- 
 proached, 23iit an efficient restraint on the like 
 sports of girlhood ? Have not Avomen even a 
 greater regard for appearances than men ? and will 
 there not consequently arise in them even a stronger 
 check to M'hatever is rough or boisterous ? How 
 absurd is the supposition that the womanly in- 
 stincts would not assert themselves but for the rig- 
 orous discipline of schoolmistresses ! 
 
 In this, as in other cases, to remedy the evils of 
 one artificiality, another artificiality has been intro- 
 duced. The natural spontaneous exercise having 
 been forbidden, and the bad consequences of no 
 exercise having become conspicuous, there has 
 been adopted a system of factitious exercise — gym- 
 nastics. That this is better than nothing we ad- 
 mit ; but that it is an adequate substitute for play 
 we deny. The defects are both positive and nega- 
 tive. In the first place, these formal, muscular 
 motions, necessarily much less varied than those 
 accompanying juvenile sports, do not secure so 
 equable a distribution of action to all parts of the 
 body ; whence it results that the exertion, falling 
 on special parts, produces fatigue sooner- than it 
 would else have done : add to which, that, if con- 
 stantly repeated, this exertion of special parts leads 
 to a disproportionate development. Again, the
 
 PLAY BETTER THAN GTiLNASTICS. 257 
 
 quantity of exercise thus taken will be deficient, 
 not only in consequence of uneven distribution, but 
 it will be further deficient in consequence of lack 
 of interest. Even when not made repulsive, aa 
 they sometimes are, by assuming the shape of ap- 
 pointed lessons, these monotonous movements are 
 sure to become wearisome, from the absence of 
 amusement. Competition, it is true, serves as a 
 stimulus ; but it is not a lasting stimulus, like that 
 enjoyment w4iich accompanies varied play. Not 
 only, however, are gymnastics inferior in respect 
 of the quantity of muscular exertion which they 
 secure ; they are still more inferior in respect of 
 the quality. This comparative want of enjoyment 
 to which we have just referred as a cause of early 
 desistance from artificial exercises, is also a cause 
 of inferiority in the effects they produce on the 
 system. The common assumption that so long as 
 the amount of bodily action is the same, it matters 
 not whether it be pleasurable or otherwise, is a 
 grave mistake. An agreeable mental excitement 
 has a highly invigorating influence. See the ef- 
 fect produced upon an invalid by good news, or by 
 the visit of an old friend. Mark how careful med- 
 ical men are to recommend lively society to debili- 
 tated patients. Remember how beneficial to the 
 health is the gratification produced by change of 
 scene. The truth is that happiness is the most 
 powerful of tonics. By accelerating the circulation 
 of the blood, it facilitates the performance of every 
 function i and so tends alike to increase health
 
 258 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 M'lien it exists, and to restore it when it has been 
 lost. Hence the essential superiority of play to 
 gymnastics. The extreme interest felt by children 
 in their games, and the riotous glee with wliich 
 they carry on their rougher frolics, are of as much 
 importance as the accompanying exertion. And 
 as not supplying these mental stimuli, gymnastics 
 must be fundamentally defective. 
 
 Granting then, as we do, that formal exercises 
 of the limbs are better than nothing — granting, 
 further, that they may be used with advantage as 
 supplementary aids ; we yet contend that such 
 formal exercises can never supjjly the place of the 
 exercises prompted b}' nature. For girls, as well 
 as boys, the sportive activities to which the in- 
 stincts impel, are essential to bodily welfare. 
 Whoever forbids them, forbids the divinely-ap- 
 pointed means to pliysical development. 
 
 A topic still remains — one perhaps more ur- 
 gently demanding consideration than any of the 
 foregoing. It is asserted by not a few, that among 
 the educated classes the younger adults and tliose 
 who are verging upon maturity are, on the avei'- 
 age, neither so well grown nor so strong as their 
 seniors. When first m'c lieard this assertion, we 
 were inclined to disregard it as one of the many 
 manifestations of the old tendency to exalt the past 
 at the expense of the present. Calling to mind the 
 facts that, as measured by ancient armour, modern 
 men are proved to be larger than ancient men, and
 
 PHYSICAL DEGENERACY. 250 
 
 tliat the tables of mortality show no diminution, 
 but rather an increase In the duration of life, we 
 paid little attention to what seemed a groundless 
 belief. Detailed observation, however, has greatly 
 shaken our opinion. Omitting from the compari- 
 son the labouring classes, we have noticed a niajor- 
 ify of cases in which the cliildren do not reach the 
 stature of their parents ; and, in massiveness, mak- 
 ing due allowance for difference of age, there seems 
 a like inferioriiy. In health, the contrast appears 
 still greater. Met; of past generations, living riot- 
 ously as they did, could bear much more than men 
 of the present generation, who live soberly, can 
 bear. Though they drank hard, kept irregular 
 hours, were regardless of fresh air, and tiiought lit- 
 tle of cleanliness, our recent ancestors were capa- 
 ble of jjrolonged application without injury, even 
 to a ripe old age : witness the annals of the bench 
 and the bar. Yet we who think much about our 
 bodily welfare ; who eat with moderation, and do 
 not drink to excess ; who attend to ventilation, and 
 use frequent ablutions ; who make annual excur- 
 sions, and have the benefit of greater medical 
 knowledge ; — we are continually breaking down 
 under our work. Paying considerable attention to 
 the laws of health, we seem to be weaker than 
 our grandfathers who, in many respects, defied tlie 
 laws of health. And, judging from the appear- 
 ance and frequent ailments of the rising generation, 
 they are likely to be even less robust than our- 
 selves.
 
 260 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 What is the meaning of this ? Is it that past 
 over-feeding, aHke of adults and juveniles, was less 
 injurious than the under-feeding to which we have 
 adverted as now so general ? Is it that the defi- 
 cient clothing which this delusive hardening theory 
 has encouraged, is to blame ? Is it that the greater 
 or less discouragement of juvenile sports, in defer- 
 ence to a false refinement, is the cause ? From our 
 reasonings it may be inferred that each of these 
 has probably" had a share in producing the evil. 
 But there has been yet another detrimental in- 
 fluence at work, perhaps more potent than any of 
 the others : we mean — excess of mental applica- 
 tion. 
 
 On old and young, the pressure of modern life 
 puts a still-increasing strain. In all businesses and 
 professions, intenser competition taxes the energies 
 and abilities of every adult ; and, with the view of 
 better fitting the young to hold their place under 
 this intenser competition, they are subject to a more 
 severe discipline than heretofore. The damage is 
 thus doubled. Fathers, who find not only that they 
 are run hard by their multiplying competitors, but 
 that, while labouring under this disadvantage, they 
 have to maintain a more expensive style of living, 
 are all the year round obliged to work early and 
 late, taking little exercise and getting but short 
 holidays. The constitutions, shaken by this long 
 continued over-application, tlie}^ bequeath to their 
 children. And then these comparativelj" feeble 
 children, predisposed as they are to break down
 
 MISCHIEFS OF OVER- APPLICATION. 2G1 
 
 even under an ordinaiy strain upon their energies, 
 are required to go through a curriculum much 
 more extended than that prescribed for the unen- 
 feebled children of past generations. 
 
 That disastrous consequences must result from 
 this cumulative transgression might be predicted 
 with certainty ; and that they do result, every ob- 
 servant person knows. Go where yon will, and 
 before long there come under your notice cases of 
 children, or youths, of either sex, more or less in- 
 jured by undue study. Here, to recover from a 
 state of debility thus produced, a year's rustica- 
 tion has been found necessary. Tliere yon find a 
 chronic congestion of the brain, that has already 
 lasted many months, and threatens to last much 
 longer. Now you hear of a fever that resulted from 
 the over-excitement in some way brought on at 
 school. And, again, the instance is that of a youth 
 who has already had once to desist fromhis studies, 
 and who, since he has returned to them, is frequent- 
 ly taken out of his class in a fainting fit. We state 
 facts — facts that have not been sought for, but have 
 been thrust upon our observation during the last 
 two years : and that, too, within a very limited 
 range. Nor have M-e by any means exhausted the 
 list. Quite recently we had the opportunity of 
 marking how the evil becomes hereditary : the case 
 being that of a lady of robust parentage, whose sys- 
 tem was so injured by the regime of a Scotch board- 
 ino:-school, where she was under-fed and over-work-
 
 262 niVSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 etl, that she invariably suffers from vertigo on rising 
 in the morning; and whose children, inheriting this 
 enfeebled brain, are several of them nnable to bear 
 even a moderate amount of study without headache 
 or giddiness. At the present time we have daily 
 under our eyes, a young lady whose system has 
 been damaged for life by the college-course tlii'ough 
 which she has passed. Taxed as she was to such 
 an extent that she had no energy left for exercise, 
 she is, now that she has finished her education, a 
 constant complainant. Appetite small and very 
 capricious, mostly refusing meat ; extremities per- 
 petually cold, even when the weather is warm ; a 
 feebleness which forbids anything but the slowest 
 walking, and that only for a short time ; palpitation 
 on going up stairs ; greatly impaired vision — these, 
 joined with checked growth and lax tissue, are 
 among the results entailed. And to her case we 
 may add that of her friend and fellow-student ; who 
 is similarly w-eak ; who is liable to faint even under 
 the excitement of a quiet party of friends ; and who 
 has at length been obliged by her medical attend- 
 ant to desist from study entirely. 
 
 If injuries so conspicuous are thus frequent, how 
 very general must be the smaller and inconspicu- 
 ous injuries. To one case w^here positive illness is 
 directly traceable to over-application, there are 
 probably at least half-a-dozen cases where the evil 
 is unobtrusive and slowly accumulating — cases 
 where there is frequent derangement of the func-
 
 MISCHIEFS OF OVEK-APPLICATION. 263 
 
 tions, attributed to this or that special cause, or to 
 constitutional delicacy ; cases where there is retar- 
 dation and premature arrest of bodily growth ; 
 cases where a latent tendency to consumption is 
 brought out and established ; cases where a predis- 
 position is given to that now common cerebral dis- 
 order brought on by the hard work of adult life. 
 How commonly constitutions are thus undermined, 
 will be clear to all who, after noting the frequent 
 ailments of hard-worked professional and mercantile 
 men, will reflect on the disastrous effects which 
 undue application must produce upon the unde- 
 veloped systems of the young. The young are com- 
 petent to bear neither as much hardship, nor as 
 much physical exertion, nor as much mental exer- 
 tion, as the full grown. Judge, then, if the full 
 grown so manifestly suffer from the excessive mental 
 exertion required of them, how great must be the 
 damage wliich a mental exertion, often equally ex- 
 cessive, inflicts upon the young ! 
 
 Indeed, when we examine the merciless school- 
 drill to which many children are subjected, the 
 wonder is, not that it does great injury, but that it 
 can be borne at all. Take the instance given by 
 Sir John Forbes from personal knowledge ; and 
 which he asserts, after much inquiry, to be an 
 average sample of the middle-class girl's-school sys- 
 tem throughout England. Omitting the detailed 
 divisions of time, we quote the summary of the 
 twenty-four hours.
 
 2Ui PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 In bed 9 hours (tiic joungcr 10) 
 
 In school, at their studies and 
 
 tasks 9 " 
 
 In school, or in the liouso, the 
 
 older at optional studies or 
 
 the work, younger at play . . oi " (the younger 2h) 
 
 At meals H " 
 
 Exercise in the open air, in the 
 
 shape of a formal walk, often 
 
 with lesson books in hand, and 
 
 even this only when the wea- 
 ther is fine at the appointed 
 
 time 1 " 
 
 24 
 
 And what are the results of this "astonndnig 
 regimen," as Sir John Forbes terms it? Of course 
 feebleness, pallor, want of s])irits, general ill-health. 
 But he describes something more. This utter dis- 
 regard of physical welfare, out of extreme anxiety 
 to cultivate the mind — this prolonged exercise of 
 the brain and deficient exercise of the limbs, — he 
 found to be habitually followed, not only by dis- 
 ordered functions but by malformation. He says : 
 — " We lately visited, in a large toAvn, a boarding- 
 school containing forty girls ; and we learnt, on 
 close and accurate inquiry, that there was not one 
 of the girls who had been at the school two years 
 (and the majority had been as long) that was not 
 more or less crooked ! " * 
 
 It may be that since 1833, when this was written, 
 some improvement has taken place. We hope it 
 
 * Cyclopcedia of Practical Medicine, vol. i. pp. CC7, 098.
 
 TIME DEVOTED TO STUDY. 265 
 
 has. But that the system is still common — nay, 
 that it is in some cases carried even to a greater 
 extreme than ever ; we can personally testify. We 
 recently went over a training college for yonng 
 men : one of those instituted of late years for the 
 purpose of supplying schools with well-disciplined 
 teachers. Here, under official supervision, where 
 something better than the judgment of pri\'ate 
 schoolmistresses might have been looked for, we 
 found the daily routine to be as follows : — 
 
 At 6 o'clock the students are called, 
 " 7 to 8 studies, 
 
 " 8 to 9 scripture reading, prayers, and breakfast, 
 " 9 to 12 studies, 
 '' 12 to IJ leisure, nominally devoted to walking or other 
 
 exercise, but often s[)ent in stndj^, 
 '• 1:^ to 2 dinner, the meal commonly occup3ing twenty 
 
 minutes, 
 " 2 to 5 studies, 
 " 5 to G tea and relaxation, 
 " 6 to 8i studies, 
 " 8^ to 9| private studies in preparing lessons for the next 
 
 " 10 to bed. 
 
 Thus, out of the twenty-four hours, eight are de- 
 voted to sleep ; four and a quarter are occupied in 
 dressing, prayers, meals, and the brief periods of 
 rest accompanying them ; ten and a half are given 
 to study ; and one and a quarter to exercise, which 
 is optional and often avoided. Not only, however, 
 is it that the ten and a half hours of recognised 
 study are freqnently increased to eleven and a half
 
 26G PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 by devoting to books the time set apart for exercise ; 
 but some of the students who are not quick in learn- 
 ing, get up at four o'clock in the morning to prepare 
 their lessons ; and are actually encouraged by their 
 teachers to do this ! The course to be passed 
 through in a given time is so extensive ; the teach- 
 ers, whose credit is at stake in getting their pupils 
 well through the examinations, are so urgent; and 
 the difficulty of satisfying the requirements is so 
 great; that pupils are not uncommonly induced to 
 spend twelve and thirteen hours a day in mental 
 labour ! 
 
 It needs no prophet to see that the bodily injury 
 inflicted must be great. As we were told by one 
 of the inmates, those who arrive with fresh com- 
 plexions quickly become blanched. Illness is fre- 
 quent : there are always some on the sick-list. Fail- 
 ure of appetite and indigestion are very common. Di- 
 arrhoea is a prevalent disorder : not mieommonly a 
 third of the whole number of students suffering 
 under it at the same time. Headache is generally 
 complained of; and b\' some is borne almost daily 
 for months. While a certain percentage break 
 down entirely and go away. 
 
 That this should be the regimen of what is in 
 some sort a model institution, established and super- 
 intended by the embodied enlightenment of the 
 aere, is a startlinsj; fact. That the severe examina- 
 tions, joined with the short period assigned for prep- 
 aration, should practically compel recourse to a 
 system which inevitably undermines the health of
 
 DANGERS OF OVER -EDUCATION. 2C7 
 
 all who pass through it, is proof, if not of cruelty, 
 then of woful ignorance. 
 
 Doubtless the case is in a great degree excep- 
 tional — perhaps to be paralleled only in other insti' 
 tutions of the same class. But that cases so extreme 
 should exist at all, indicates pretty clearly how 
 great is the extent to which the minds of the rising 
 generation are overtasked. Expressing as they do 
 the ideas of the educated community, these training 
 colleges, even in the absence of all other evidence, 
 would conclusively imply a prevailing tendency to 
 an unduly urgent system of culture. 
 
 It seems strange that there should be so little 
 consciousness of the dangers of over-education dur- 
 ing youth, when there is so general a consciousness 
 of the dangers of over-education during childhood. 
 Most parents are more or less aware of the evil 
 consequences that follow infant precocity. In every 
 society may be heard reprobation of those who too 
 early stimulate the minds of their little ones. And 
 the dread of this early stimulation is great in pro- 
 portion as there is adequate knowledge of the 
 effects : witness the implied opinion of one of our 
 most distinguished professors of physiology, who 
 told us that he did not intend his little boy to learn 
 any lessons until he was eight years old. But 
 while to all it is a familiar truth that a forced 
 development of intelligence in childhood entails 
 disastrous results — either physical feebleness, or 
 ultimate stupidity, or early death — it appears not 
 to be perceived that throughout youth the same
 
 2C8 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 truth holds. Yet it is certain that it must do so. 
 There is a given order in whicli, and a given rate 
 at which, the faculties unfold. If the course of 
 education conforms itself to that order and rate, 
 well. If not — if the higher faculties are early taxed 
 by presenting an order of knowledge more complex 
 and abstract than can be readily assimilated ; or if, 
 by excess of culture, the intellect in general is 
 developed to a degree bej^ond that whicli is natural _ 
 
 to the age; the abnormal result so produced will m 
 
 inevitably be accompanied by some equivalent, or 
 more than equivalent, evih 
 
 For ligature is a strict accountant ; and if you 
 demand of lier in one direction more than she is 
 prepared to lay out, she balances the account by 
 making a deduction elsewhere. If you M-ill let her 
 follow her own course, taking care to supply, in 
 right quantities and kinds, the raw materials of 
 bodily and mental growth required at each age, she 
 will eventually produce an individual more or less 
 evenly developed. If, however, you insist on pre- 
 mature or undue growth of any one part, she will, 
 with more or less protest, concede the point ; but 
 that she may do your extra work, she must leave 
 some of her more important work undone. Let it 
 never be forgotten that the amount of vital energy 
 which the body at any moment possesses is limited ; 
 and that, being limited, it is impossible to get from 
 it more than a fixed quantity of results. In a child 
 or youth the demands upon this vital energy are 
 various and ni-gent. As before pointed out, the
 
 VARIOUS DRAUGHTS UPON THE ENERGY. 269 
 
 V aste consequent on the day's bodily exercise has 
 to be repaired ; the wear of brain entailed by the 
 day's study has to be made good ; a certain addi- 
 tional growth of body has to be provided for ; and 
 also a certain additional growth of brain : add to 
 which the amount of energy absorbed in the diges- 
 tion of the large quantity of food required for meet- 
 ing these many demands. Now, that to div^ert an 
 excess of energ}" into any one of these channels if* 
 to abstract it from the others, is not only manifest 
 d 2>'i'iQrl ; but may be shown a foderiori from the 
 experience of every one. Every one knows, for in- 
 stance, that the digestion of a heavy meal makes 
 such a demand on the system as to produce lassi- 
 tude of mind and body, ending not unt'requently in 
 sleep. Every one knows, too, that excess of bodily 
 exercise diminishes the power of thought — that the 
 temporary prostration following any sudden exer- 
 tion, or the fatigue produced by a thirty miles' 
 walk, is accompanied by a disinclination to mental 
 effort ; that, after a month's pedestrian tour, the 
 mental inertia is snch that some days are required 
 to overcome it ; and that in peasants who spend their 
 lives in muscular labour the activity of mind is very 
 small. Again, it is a truth familiar to all that dur- 
 ing those fits of extreme rapid growth which s'::ne- 
 times occur in childhood, the great abstraction of 
 energy is shown in the attendant prostration, bodily 
 and mental. Once more, the facts that violent 
 muscular exertion after eating will stop digestion, 
 and that children who are early put to hard labour
 
 270 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 become stunted, similarly exhibit the antagonism 
 — similarly imply that excess of activity in one 
 direction involves deficiency of it in other direc- 
 tions. Now, the law which is thus manifest in ex- 
 treme cases holds in all cases. These injurious ab- 
 stractions of energy as certainly take i)lace when 
 the undue demands are slight and constant, as 
 when they are great and sudden. Hence, if in 
 youth, the expenditure in mental labour exceeds 
 that which nature had provided for ; the expendi- 
 ture for other purposes falls below what it should 
 have Ijeen : and evils of one kind or other are inev- 
 itably entailed. Let us briefly consider these evils. 
 Supposing the over-activity of brain not to be 
 extreme, but to exceed the normal activity only in 
 a moderate degree, there will be nothing more than 
 some slight reaction on the development of the 
 body : the stature falling a little below that which 
 it would else have reached ; or the bulk being less 
 than it would have been ; or the (piality of tissue 
 being not so good. One or more of these effects 
 must necessarily occur. The extra quantity of 
 blood supplied to the brain, not only during the 
 period of mental exertion, but during the subse- 
 quent period in which the waste of cerebral sub- 
 stance is being made good, is blood that would else 
 have been circulating through the limbs and vis- 
 cera; and the amount of growth or repair for which 
 that blood would have supplied materials, is lost. 
 This physical reaction being certain, the question 
 is, whether the gain resulting from the extra cul-
 
 ANTAGONISM OF GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT. 271 
 
 ture is equivalent to the loss ? — whether defect of 
 bodily growth, or the want of that structural per- 
 fection M'hich gives high vigour and endurance, 
 is compensated for by the additional knowledge 
 gained ? 
 
 ^Vhen the excess of mental exertion is greater, 
 there follow results far more serious; telling not 
 0!ily against bodily perfection, but against the 
 perfection of the brain itself. It is a physiological 
 law, first pointed out by M. Isidore St. Hilaire, and 
 to which attention has been drawn by Mr. Lewes 
 in his essay on Dwarfs and Giants^ that there is 
 an antagonism between growth and development. 
 By growth, as used in this antithetical sense, is to 
 be understood increase of size ; by development, 
 increase of structure. And the law is, that great 
 activity in either of these processes involves retar- 
 dation or arrest of the other. A familiar illustra- 
 tion is furnished by the cases of the caterpillar and 
 the chrysalis. In the caterpillar there is extremely 
 rapid augmentation of bulk ; but the structure is 
 scarcely at all more complex when the caterpillar 
 is full-grown than when it is small. In the chrj-sa- 
 lis the bulk does not increase ; on the contrary, 
 weight is lost during this stage of the creature's 
 life ; but the elaboration of a more complex struc- 
 ture goes on with great activity. The antagonism, 
 here so clear, is less traceable in higher creatures, 
 becUuse the two processes are carried on together. 
 But we see it pretty well illustrated among our- 
 selves by contrasting the sexes. A girl develops 
 17
 
 272 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 in body and mind rapidly, and ceases to grow com- 
 paratively early. A boy's bodily and mental de- 
 velopment is slower, and his growth greater. At 
 the age when the one is mature, finished, and hav- 
 ing all faculties in full play, the other, whose vital 
 energies have been more directed towards increase 
 of size, is relatively incomplete in structure ; and 
 shows it in a comparative awkwardness, bodily and 
 mental. Now this law is true not only of the 
 organism as a whole, but of each separate part. 
 The abnormally rapid advance of any part in re- 
 spect of structure involves premature arrest of its 
 growth; and this happens with the organ of the 
 mind as certainly as with any other oi-gan. The 
 brain, which during early years is relatively large 
 in mass but imperfect in structure will, if required 
 to perform its functions with undue activity, under- 
 go a structural advance greater than is appropriate 
 to the age ; but the ultimate eflfect will be a falling 
 short of the size and power that would else have 
 been attained. And this is a part cause — probably 
 the chief cause — why precocious children, and 
 youths who up to a certain time were carrying all 
 before them, so often stop short and disappoint the 
 high hopes of their parents. 
 
 But these results of over-education, disastrous 
 as they are, are perhaps less disastrous than the re- 
 sults produced upon the health — the undermined 
 constitution, the enfeebled energies, the morbid 
 feelings. Eecent discoveries in physiology have 
 shown how immense is the influence of the brain
 
 DISTUKBING EFFECTS OF CEREBKAL EXCITEMENT. 273 
 
 over the functions of the body. The digestion of 
 the food, the circulation of the blood, and through 
 these all other organic processes, are profoundly 
 afiected by cerebral excitement. "Whoever has 
 seen repeated, as we have, the experiment first per- 
 formed by Weber, showing the consequence of 
 irritating the vagus nerve which connects the brain 
 with the viscera — whoever has seen the action of 
 the heart suddenly arrested by the irrital 'on of this 
 nerve; slowly recommencing when the irritation is 
 suspended ; and again arrested the moment it is re- 
 newed ; will have a vivid conception of the depress' 
 ing influence which an over-wrought brain exer- 
 cises on the body. The effects thus physiologically 
 explained, are indeed exemplified in ordinary ex- 
 perience. There is no one but has felt the palpita- 
 tion accompanying hope, fear, anger, joy — no one 
 but has observed how laboured becomes the action 
 of the heart when these feelings are very violent. 
 And though there are many who have never them 
 selves suffered that extreme emotional excitement 
 whicli is followed by arrest of the heart's action 
 and fainting; yet every one knows them to be 
 cause and effect. It is a familiar fact, too, that dis- 
 turbance of the stomach is entailed by mental ex- 
 citement exceeding a certain intensity. Loss of 
 appetite is a common result alike of very pleasura- 
 ble and very painful states of mind. When the 
 event producing a pleasurable or painful state of 
 mind occurs shortly after a meal, it not unfrequent- 
 ly happens either that the stomach rejects what has
 
 274 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 been eaten, or digests it with great difficulty and 
 under prolonged protest. And as every one who 
 taxes his brain much can testify, even purely intel- 
 lectual action will, when excessive, produce analo- 
 gous efiects. Now the relation between brain and 
 body which is so manifest in these extreme cases, 
 holds equally in ordinaiy, less-marked cases. Just 
 as tliese violent but temporary cerebral excitements 
 produce violent but temporary disturbances of the 
 viscera ; so do the less violent but chronic cerebral 
 excitements, produce less violent but chronic visce- 
 ral disturbances. This is not 8im})ly an inference 
 — it is a truth to which every medical man can 
 bear Avitness ; and it is one to which a long and sad 
 experience enables us to give personal testimony. 
 Various degrees and forms of bodily derangement, 
 often taking years of enforced idleness to set par- 
 tially right, result from this prolonged overexertion 
 of mind. Sometimes the heart is chiefly affected : 
 habitual palpitations; a pulse much enfeebled," 
 and very generally a diminution in the number of 
 beats from seventy-two to sixty, or even fewer. 
 Sometimes the conspicuous disorder is of the stom- 
 ach : a d3"spepsia which makes life a burden, and 
 is amenable to no remedy but time. In many cases 
 both heart and stomach are implicated. Mostly 
 the sleep is short and broken. And very generally 
 there is more or less mental depression. 
 
 Consider, then, how great must be the damage 
 inflicted by undue mental excitement on children 
 ?vnd youths. More or less of this constitutional dis-
 
 DANGEROUS EFFECTS OF OVER STUDY. 275 
 
 turbance will inevitably follow an exertion of brain 
 beyond that which nature had provided for ; and 
 when not so excessive as to produce absolute illness, 
 is sure to entail a slowly accumulating degeneracy 
 oi physique. With a small and fastidious appetite, 
 an imperfect digestion, and an enfeebled circula- 
 tion, how can the developing body flourish? Tlie 
 due performance of every vital process depends 
 on the adequate supply of good blood. "Without 
 enough good blood, no gland can secrete properly, 
 no viscus can fully discharge its office. Without 
 enough good blood, no nerve, muscle, membrane, 
 or other tissue can be efficiently repaired. With- 
 out enough good blood, growth will neither bo 
 sound nor sufficients Judge, then, how bad must 
 be the consecpiences when to a growing body th3 
 weakened stomach supplies blood that is deficient 
 in quantity and poor in quality; while the debili- 
 tated heart propels this poor and scanty blood with 
 unnatural slowness. 
 
 And if, as all who candidly investigate the mat- 
 ter must admit, physical degeneracy is a conse- 
 quence of excessive study, how grave is the con- 
 demnation to be passed upon this cramming sys- 
 tem above exemplified. It is a terrible mistake, 
 from whatever point of view regarded. It is a 
 mistake in so far as the mere acquirement of knowl- 
 edge is concerned : for it is notorious that the 
 mind, like the body, cannot assimilate beyond a 
 certain rate ; and if you ply it with facts faster 
 than it can assimilate them, they are very soon re-
 
 276 niYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 jected again : tliey do not become permanently 
 built into the intellectual fabric ; but fall out of 
 recollection after the passing of the examination 
 for which they were got up. It is a mistake, too, 
 because it tends to make study distasteful. Either 
 through the painful associations produced by cease- 
 less mental toil, or through the abnormal state of 
 brain it leaves behind, it often generates an aver- 
 sion to books ; and, instead of that subsequent self- 
 culture induced by a rational education, there 
 comes a continued retrogression. It is a mistake, 
 also, inasmuch as it assumes that the acquisition of 
 knowledge is everything ; and forgets that a much 
 more important matter is the organization of knowl- 
 edge, for which time and spontaneous thinking are 
 requisite. Just as Humboldt remarks respecting 
 the progress of intelligence in general, that " the 
 interpretation of nature is obscured when the de- 
 scription languishes under too great an accumula- 
 tion of insulated facts;" so it maybe remarked, 
 respecting the progress of individual intelligence, 
 that the mind is overburdened and hampered by 
 an excess of ill-digested information. It is not the 
 knowledge stored up as intellectual fat M-hich is of 
 value ; but that which is turned into intellectual 
 muscle. But the mistake is still deeper. Even 
 were the system good as a system of intellectual 
 training, which it is not, it would still be bad, be- 
 cause, as we have shown, it is fatal to that vigour 
 oi 2)hysique which is needful to make intellectual 
 draining available in the struggle of life. Those
 
 THE PKICELESS BLESSING OF HEALTH. 27T 
 
 who, in eagerness to cultivate tlieir pupils' minds, 
 are reckless of their bodies, do not remember that 
 success in the world depends much more upon en- 
 ergy than upon information ; and that a policy 
 which in cramming with information undermines 
 energy, is self-defeating. The strong will and un- 
 tiring activity which result from abundant animal 
 vigour, go far to compensate even for great defects 
 of education ; and when joined with that quite ad- 
 equate education which may be obtained without 
 sacrificing health, they ensure an easy victory over 
 competitors enfeebled by excessive study: prodi- 
 gies of learning though they may be. A compara- 
 tively small and ill-made engine, worked at high- 
 pressure, will do more than a larger and well-fin- 
 ished one worked at low-pressure. What folly is 
 it, then, while finishing the engine, so to damage 
 the boiler that it will not generate steam ! Once 
 'more, the system is a mistake, as involving a false 
 estimate of welfare in life. Even supposing it 
 were a means to worldly success, instead of a means 
 to worldly failure, yet, in the entailed ill-health, it 
 would inflict a more than equivalent curse. What 
 boots it to have attained wealth, if the wealth is 
 accompanied by ceaseless ailments ? What is the 
 worth of distinction, if it has brought hypochon- 
 dria with it ? Surely none needs telling that a good 
 digestion, a bounding pulse, and high spirits are 
 elements of happiness which no external advan- 
 tages can outbalance. Chronic bodil}'- disorder 
 casts a gloom over the brightest prospects ; while
 
 278 PHYSICAL EDCCATIOX. 
 
 the vivacity of strong health gilds even inisfortuiie. 
 We contend, then, that this over-education is vi- 
 cious in every M'ay — vicious, as giving kno"\vledge 
 that will soon be forgotten ; vicious, as producing 
 a disgust for knowledge ; vicious, as neglecting 
 th&,t organization of knowledge which is mo)'e ini- 
 }3ortant than its acquisition ; vicious, as weakening 
 or destroying that energy, without M-hicli a trained 
 intellect is useless ; vicious, as entailing that ill- 
 health for which even success would not compen- 
 sate, and which makes failure doubly bitter. 
 
 On women the eflects of this forcing system 
 are, if possible, even more injurious than on men. 
 Being in great measure debarred from those vigor- 
 ous and enjoyable exercises of body by which boys 
 mitigate the evils of excessive study, girls feed 
 these evils in their full intensity. Hence, the 
 much smaller proportion of them who grow up 
 well made and healthy. In the pale, angular, flat- 
 chested young ladies, so abundant in London djaw- 
 ing-rooms, we see the effect of merciless a})plica- 
 tion, unrelieved by youthful sports ; and this phj-s- 
 ical degeneracy exhibited by them, hinders their 
 welfare far more than their many accomplishmentd 
 aid it. Mammas anxious to make their daughters 
 attractive, could scarcely choose a course more fatal 
 than this, which sacrifices the body to the mind. 
 Either they disregard the tastes of the opposite 
 sex, or else their conception of those tastes is erro- 
 neous. Men care comparatively little for erudition 
 in women ; but very much for physical beauty, and
 
 ELEMENTS OF FEMININE A'lTR ACTION. 279 
 
 goodnature, and sound sense. How man}' con^ 
 quests does the blue-stocking make tlirougli her ex- 
 tensive knowledge of history ? What man ever 
 fell in love with a woman because she understood 
 Italian ? Where is the Edwin who was brouf'-ht tc 
 Angelina's feet by her German ? But rosy cheeks 
 and laughing eyes are great attractions. A finely 
 rounded figure draws admiring glances. The live- 
 liness and good humour that overflowing htaltli 
 produces, go a great way towards establishing at- 
 tachments. Every one knows cases where bodily 
 perfections, in the absence of all other recommer.- 
 dations, have incited a passion that carried all be- 
 fore it ; but scarcely any one can point to a case 
 where mere intellectual acquirements, apart from 
 moral or physical attributes, have aroused such a 
 feeling. The truth is that, out of the many ele- 
 ments uniting in various proportions to produce in 
 a man's breast that complex emotion which we call 
 love, the strongest are those produced by physical 
 attractions ; the next in order of strength are those 
 produced by moral attractions ; the weakest are 
 those produced by intellectual attractions ; and 
 even these are dependent much less upon acquired 
 knowledge than on natural faculty — quickness, wit, 
 insight. If any think the assertion a derogatory 
 one, and inveigh against the masculine character 
 for being thus swayed ; we reply that they little 
 know what they say when they thus call in ques- 
 tion the Divine ordinations. Even were there no 
 obvious meaning in the arrangement, we might be
 
 280 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 sure tliat fonie important end was subserved. But 
 tlie meaning is quite obvious to those who exam- 
 ine. It needs but to remember that one of Na. 
 ture's ends, or rather her supreme end, is the wel- 
 fare of posterit}^ — it needs but to remember that, 
 in so far as jDOsterity are concerned, a cultivated 
 intelligence based upon a bad j9/*2/«/^?/e is of little 
 worth, seeing that its descendants will die out in a 
 generation or two — it needs but to bear in mind 
 that a good physique^ however poor the accompa- 
 nying mental endowments, is worth preserving, be- 
 causCj throughout future generations, the mental 
 endowments may be indetinitely developed — it 
 needs but to contemplate these truths, to see how 
 important is the balance of instincts above de- 
 scribed. But, purpose apart, the instincts being 
 thus balanced, it is a fatal folly to persist in a sys- 
 tem which undermines a gii-l's constitution that it 
 may overload her memory. Educate as highly as 
 possible — the higher the better — providing no bod- 
 ily injury is entailed (and we may remark, in pass- 
 ing, that a high standard might be so reached were 
 the parrot-faculty cultivated less, and the human 
 faculty more, and M-ere the discipline extended 
 over that now wasted period between leaving school 
 and being married). But to educate in such man- 
 ner, or to such extent, as to prodnce physical de- 
 generacy, is to defeat the chief end for which the 
 toil and cost and anxiety are submitted to. By 
 subjecting their daughters to this high-pressure 
 system, parents frequently ruin their prospects in
 
 EKK0K8 OF THE PREVALENT SYSTEM, 281 
 
 life. Not only do they inflict on them enfeebled 
 health, with all its pains and disabilities and gloom,* 
 but very often they actually doom them to celibacy. 
 
 Our general conclusion is, then, that the ordi- 
 nary treatment of children is, in various ways, se- 
 riously prejudicial. It errs in deficient feeding; 
 in deficient clothing ; in deficient exercise (among 
 girls at least); and in excessive mental application. 
 Considering the regime as a whole, its tendency is 
 too exacting : it asks too much and gives too little. 
 In the extent to which it taxes the vital energies, 
 it makes the juvenile life much more like the adult 
 life than it sliould be. It overlooks the truth that, 
 as in the foetus the entire vitality is expended in 
 the direction of growth — as in the infant, the ex- 
 penditure of vitality in growth is so great as to 
 leave extremely little for either physical or mental 
 action ; so throughout childhood and youth growth 
 is the dominant requirement to which all others 
 must be subordinated : a requirement which dic- 
 tates the giving of much and the taking away of 
 little — a requirement which, therefore, restricts the 
 exertion of body and mind to a degree proportion- 
 ate to the rapidity of growth — a requirement which 
 permits the mental and physical activities to in- 
 crease only as fast as the rate of growth diminisheSo 
 
 Kegarded from another point of view, this high- 
 pressure education manifestly results from our pass- 
 ing phase of civilization. In primitive times, when 
 aggression and defence were the leading social ac*
 
 282 PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 
 
 tivities, bodily vigour with its accompanying conr- 
 age were the desiderata ; and then education was 
 almost wholly physical : mental cultivation was lit- 
 tle cared for, and indeed, as in our own feudal ages, 
 was often treated with contempt. But now that 
 our state is relatively peaceful — now that muscular 
 power is of use for little else than manual labour, 
 W'hile social success of nearly every kind de- 
 pends very much on mental power ; our education 
 has become almost exclusively mental. Instead 
 of respecting the bod}' and ignoring the mind, 
 we now resjDCct the mind and ignore the body. 
 Both these attitudes are wrong. We do not yet 
 sufficiently realize the truth that as, in this life of 
 ours, the physical underlies the mental, the mental 
 must not be developed at the expense of the physi- 
 cal. The ancient and modern conceptions must ho 
 combined. 
 
 Perhaps nothing will so much hasten the time 
 when body and mind will both be adequately' cared 
 for, as a diffusion of the belief that the preserva- 
 tion of health is a duty, tew seem conscious that 
 there is such a thing as physical morality. Men's 
 habitual words and acts imply the idea that they 
 are at liberty to treat their bodies as they please. 
 Disorders entailed by disobedience to ^Nature's dic- 
 tates, they regard simply as grievances : not as the 
 effects of a conduct more or less flagitious. Thougli 
 the evil consequences inflicted on their depend 
 ents, and on future generations, are often as great 
 as those caused by crime j yet they do not think
 
 PHYSICAL IMMORALITIES AND SINS. 283 
 
 fhemselves in any degree criminal. It is true, that, 
 in the case of drunkenness, the viciousness of a 
 ])urely bodily transgression is recognised ; but none 
 appear to infer that, if this bodily transgression is 
 vicious, so too is every bodily transgression. The 
 fact is, that all breaches of the laws of health are 
 2)hysical snis. A¥hen this is generally seen, then, 
 and perhaps not till then, will the physical training 
 of the young receive all the attention it deserves. 
 
 THE END.
 
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