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 THE AIM. 
 
 THE DUTIES, AND THE R 
 
 Fll 
 
 OF A 
 
 SCHOOLMASTER. 
 
 S.11 ':^t!bri:ss 
 
 DELIVERED TC 
 
 THE MASTERS OF ST. MARK'S SCHOOL, 
 
 REV. STEPHEx\ HAWTREY, A.M, 
 
 LONDON : 
 HAMILTON, ADAMS, ^t CO., PATERNOSTER ROV\' 
 
 1870. 
 
 One Shillino-.
 
 NOTICE. 
 
 The following Address, which was delivered to the Masters of 
 St. Mark's School on the 10th of November last, has been 
 printed with a two-fold object, beyond that of giving it to those 
 to whom it was addressed, — -fii'st, — To give parents informa- 
 tion relative to the school, to which they are invited to send 
 their children ; or, at least, to let them know what are the views 
 and purposes professed by the promoters of the school, before they 
 take the step of sending their sons to it ; secondly, — For the . 
 perusal of teachers, in the hope that the following pages may 
 afford to those into whose hands the tract may fall some of 
 the light, help, and encouragement which the writer feels that 
 he has invariably derived from the thoughts and observations 
 of Schoolmasters who were in earnest, and wrote or spoke from 
 their own experience. 
 
 S. H. 
 
 St. Mark's School, Windsor, 
 January^ 1870.
 
 ADDRESS 
 
 IHastcrs 0f ^t. IHaiiv's c^rbool; 
 
 My Brethren 
 
 I INVITE YOU to listen to the following 
 Address, not as though I was going to say any 
 new thing to you, or bring before you principles 
 with the working of which you are not already 
 acquainted. But as we are now inviting a new 
 class of parents to send their children to us, it 
 seems a suitable time to review the principles of 
 our St. Mark's training ; to refresh our recollection 
 of them, and to " stir up our minds by way of 
 remembrance, even though we know these things, 
 and are fully persuaded of them." 
 
 The axiom we start with is this, that the first aim 
 of Christian education is to aivahen the icish to do right 
 in the hearts of those entrusted to us. 
 
 If we fail here, our work is a failure. 
 
 And how is this end best attained ? From the 
 birthday of St. Mark's we have held that the way 
 to do this is to take an interest in our boys, — to 
 make them conscious of our sympathy and fellow- 
 feeling. 
 
 I will not allude now to our own experience. I 
 will speak rather of those with whom, as engaged in 
 
 A 2
 
 a kindred work, our school has brought us into 
 relation. 
 
 I mean those young men, laymen and clergymen, 
 who have brought their boys to us, or to whom we 
 have taken ours, in the interchange of friendly 
 visits. 
 
 You cannot have become acquainted with them, 
 conversed with and seen them in company with 
 the boys whose education they are superintending, 
 v/ithout feeling that the work they are doing must 
 and would tell on the next generation. 
 
 •Now, what is the characteristic feature common to 
 them all ? This : — that they heartily sympathize 
 vvitli their boys. Have you not observed again and 
 again the unfailing power of this principle to unlock 
 the heart ? 
 
 Do I seem to be using too strong words when 
 I say that under its influence suspicion, deceit,, 
 meanness, dulness, seem to be taken away, and to 
 be replaced by intelligence, candour, trustfulness,, 
 simplicity, and truth ? 
 
 And not only has this good understanding between, 
 the boys and their patrons this present charmingly 
 good effect ; not only is it the brightener of their 
 present lives : — It is laying the best foundation for 
 that wish to do right, — a life -long protection and 
 blessing, — to awaken which is the end of our work 
 as educators. 
 
 I will illustrate what I say by a touching story 
 which has lately come to my knowledge. 
 
 Our school has a kind and dear friend in one 
 whose name is well known in Limehouse, Blackwall, 
 Poplar, Bromley, and the other densely-populated 
 districts in the east of London. He is doing a 
 great educational work there. He is one of those 
 
 Ufuc Z
 
 of whom I spoke just llo^Y. He has often yisited 
 US, suiTOiiiided by a happy set of boys brought nj) 
 under his influence, and we have visited him. 
 
 In the spring of the present year, our friend, as a 
 diversion and reHef under a crushing blow whicli 
 had fallen on him, went to Canada to see after the 
 wellbeino- of some emio-rants he had been instru- 
 mental in sending out. "When he had fultilled this 
 task, he set himself to find out the whereabouts of 
 a young man, a former scholar, who some fouj* 
 years before, when he saw that the ship-building 
 trade was failing in Poplar, had had the good sense 
 to seek for work in Canada, instead of stopping to 
 get poorer and poorer at home. 
 
 Our friend learned that the lad was sixty miles up 
 the country working under a carpenter. No difficulty 
 in the way or trouble could stop him in his searcli 
 for his old scholar. Nor did he rest till he had 
 found him. When the young man raised his eyes 
 from his work, and fixed them on the kind coun- 
 tenance of his patron and friend, you may imagine 
 his emotion, and may enter into his feelings of sur- 
 prise and joy, that made him think it was a dream. 
 
 Now, we cannot think of these two, thus meeting 
 face to face in this far-away place, without feeling 
 that the spirit which prompted our friend to seek 
 out his old scholar in the woods of America is the 
 true spirit for an educator. And look at the lad 
 himself : does not his beaming countenance tell 
 unmistakeably that he carries with him wherever he 
 goes the strongest incentive to truth, honesty, 
 diligence, and good habits, in the consciousness of 
 the sympathy and interest still felt for him by one 
 whose image mingles with the happiest recollections 
 of his earlv bovhood ?
 
 But liow, it may be asked, is a method of dealing 
 with and influencing boys, which seems to depend 
 entirely on the character and feeling of the indi- 
 vidual teacher, to be secured to schools in per- 
 petuity ? 
 
 Is it possible to secure it ? Philosophical writers 
 of great eminence say that it is not possible. 
 
 Mr. J. Stuart Mill says deliberately, " It is beyond 
 the power of schools to educate morally or reli- 
 giously. Moral and religious education consists in 
 training the feelings and daily habits, and these are 
 in the main beyond the control of public education." 
 He adds: — "The only really effective religious 
 education is the parental, that of home and child- 
 hood." 
 
 M. Ernest Kenan writes in the same strain ; lie 
 says : — " La culture morale et intellectuelle de 
 riiomme, se compose de deux parties bien dis- 
 tinctes : d'uiie part, Vinstruction, I'acquisition d'un 
 certain nombre de connaissances positives ; d'autre 
 part, reducation, qui fait le galant homnie, I'honiiete 
 liomme, riiomme bien eleve. Or, de ces deux 
 clioses, il en est une, I'instruction que I'Etat pent 
 donner d'uiie faron eminente ; il en est une autre, 
 I'education, pour laquelle il ne pent pas grand'chose. 
 II fera son possible, il n'aboutira qu'a ces grands 
 interiiiits, ou I'enfant, separe de la famille, sequestre 
 du monde et de la societe de I'autre sexe, ne peut 
 acquerir ni distinction ni delicatesse. Cette purete, 
 cette delicatesse de conscience, base de toute solide 
 moralite, on I'enfant et le jeune liomme peuvent-ils 
 'apprendre ? Dans les livres, dans les leeons atten- 
 tivement ecoutees ? Oh ! nullement ces choses-la 
 s'apprennent dans ratmosphere oii Ton vit, dans 
 le milieu social od Ton est place ; elles s'apprennent
 
 l)ar la vie cle famille, non aiitreinent. L 'instruction 
 se donne en classe, an lyci-e, a I'ecole ; redncation 
 se reroit dans la maison paternelle ; les maitres, a 
 cet egard, c'est la mere, ce sont les soeiirs/'^ 
 
 I need not tell you that, if these were my views, I 
 should at once retire from, rather, that I should 
 never have undertaken, that work in which we are 
 engaged. If 1 did not think that vre could carry 
 on here the moral and religious culture hegun at 
 home, if I did not hope to restore our boys to 
 their homes not only with intellects more cultivated, 
 hut also with hearts more humanized and con- 
 sciences more quickened than when they were en- 
 trusted to us, I should never have invited their 
 parents to commit them to our care. 
 
 It is impossible indeed to over-estimate the value 
 both to parent and child of the parental relation, 
 and of the sense of parental responsibility. Nor 
 
 '■•' "The moral and intellectual tvaining of a man consists of 
 two perfectly distinct pai-ts. There is 1st, Instruction^ that is, 
 the acquisition of certain branches of knowledge ; and, 2ndly, there 
 is Education^ which makes a gentleman." [The French are obliged 
 to use a long perij)hrasis for this noble English word.] " Now, of 
 these two, there is one, instruction, which the State can give 
 superlatively vy-ell ; there is another, education, for which it can 
 do but little. The State will do its best, and the issue ^\dll be 
 those mighty boarding-houses, in which the child, separated from 
 his family, shut out from the Avorld, and from companionship 
 Avith those of the other sex, can acquire neither distinction nor 
 refinement. Purity, delicacy of conscience, the foundation of all 
 solid morality, Avhere shall a boy or youth learn this '? In books ? 
 In lessons attentively listened to 1 Oh, by no means : these 
 things are communicated through the atmosphere in which one 
 lives — are gathered in the social circle in which one is placed. 
 They are taught hyfaniily life, not othericise. It is in the class- 
 room, or at this or that school, that Instruction is given; but 
 Education is given only in the father's house, and the masters 
 who teach it are the mother, and the sisters."
 
 8 
 
 can one read without emotion this eloquent out- 
 burst of M. Eenan's, in which he asserts that the 
 family is the school in which humanity is to be 
 acquired. But granting that every household is 
 Eenan's ideal home, still it is obvious that the 
 conditions of society render it simply impossible 
 for fathers as a rule to undertake their sons' 
 education. Moreover, his idea of school is incarce- 
 ration in the ''grand interndt," with reference to 
 which he says, '' Une chose na jamais Sieve i^ersonne, 
 cest la caserne ;" — " One thing has never educated 
 anyone, that is the barrack." 
 
 And you who have read my reminiscences of a 
 French Eton will feel that I must concur with the 
 melancholy words in which he describes and deplores 
 the moral result of the French Lycee system. 
 
 '' Yoyez," he says, " le triste souvenir que gardent 
 souvent nos jeunes gens de ces annces qui doivent 
 etre les plus precieuses de leur vie. Yoyez combien 
 pen rapportent de cette vie d'internat des prin- 
 cipes solides de morale et ces instincts profonds 
 qui mettent I'liomme en quelque sorte dans I'heu- 
 reuse incapacite de mal faire. Une regie uni- 
 forme ne saurait produire d'individualites distin- 
 gu^es. L 'affection du maitre et des eleves est, 
 dans de telles combinaisons, presque impossible." ^•■ 
 
 Such is the picture of school-life drawn by one 
 who says schools cannot educate morally or reli- 
 
 ■■• " Mark tlie sad recollection wliicli our youths too often retain of 
 those years which ought to have been the most precious of their 
 lives. See how few of them carry away from this Ijoardiiig- 
 school-life solid principles of morality, — those deeply -seated in- 
 stincts which, in a sense, keep a man from doing wrong. A 
 uniform rule cannot produce eminent men, of individual cha- 
 racters ; affection between master and scholar is, uiidc^r such 
 circumstances, well-nigh impossible."
 
 9 
 
 gionsly. The question remains, are these mehm- 
 choly results — so melancholy that another ^Ynte^ 
 calls the education which produces them "homi- 
 cidal"^'^ — inherent of necessity in schools, or are they 
 the fruits of an imperfect system ? This is a 
 question that experience must ansYv'er. 
 
 I do not know whether you are acquainted with 
 the very interesting and suggestive description 
 given by Mr. Sidney Turner, of the " Colonic cKjriroh 
 (k Mcttrcnj.'' It is a reformatory for young offenders, 
 established by M. de Metz, a distinguishing feature 
 of which is that the inmates are divided into 
 families by the substantial distinction of separate 
 dwellings, each forming a home for its inmates. 
 
 Two, among other important results, were found 
 to follow from this dividing, and this faviih/ organi- 
 zation, of the boys. I quote from Mr. Turner's 
 report (1846) ; the italics and small capitals are his. 
 
 1st. The responsibility of the master is made far 
 more personal and individual. These forty boys the 
 number in eacli house^ are his especial charge. He 
 is answerable not for all the boys in general, but 
 for these in particular. Hence the masters are 
 led to exert themselves more definitely. An emula- 
 tion is created among them as to who shall show 
 the best moral and intellectual result from his 
 labour. 
 
 2ndly. The hoys and the master are much more closehj 
 connected, and a moee real influence, as icell as a more 
 KINDLY one is produced. By this daily association 
 confidence is generated, and a higher moral feeling 
 aroused and nourished. The boy feels that his 
 master is not a mere officer to watch him and 
 enforce discipline, or a mere instructor to teach 
 
 -;.- u L'Education Homicide," par Victor de Laprade.
 
 10 
 
 him, but is a relation, — a friend — to sympathize 
 with him and assist him.* 
 
 Now, though M. Renan may have no knowledge 
 of our English Public School system, it is sur- 
 prising that the great success of this institution of 
 M. de Metz (who may be called the father of the 
 modern reformatory system) did not give him a 
 clue to the modifications to be introduced into the 
 Lycee system of France, in order to give to those 
 schools a humanizing power. 
 
 But we Englishmen, on reading the account of 
 the organization of Mettray and its moral results, 
 find in it an actual description of ''Masters' Houses," 
 and the results of the " Tutorial Relation " in our 
 English Public School system. And we find, I may 
 add, that by the use of this very system, which was 
 tried with happy effect on French juvenile delinquents, 
 (that is, by dividing the school into separate house- 
 
 "' I have but to add that now, after a lapse of more than twenty 
 years, the same system is at work with the happiest effect in our 
 English Reformatory at Kedhill ; and I cannot forbear quoting a 
 statement of Mr. Sidney Turner's, stronger than any I should 
 have ventured to anticipate, but very important, because bearing 
 on that which we must be prepared to expect in ourselves and 
 others — deficiencies and imperfection in the teacher. He writes : 
 " Speaking from experience, I would say, that I would rather take 
 charge of 500 boys, distributed into twenty families of twenty- 
 five each, under twenty ordinary and comparatively uneducated 
 men, than of 200 collected together in one large establishment, 
 on the common aggregative system, though superintended by the 
 best-trained and most efficient master that could be obtained. 
 The personal relation Avhich connects the master and the boy 
 in one case, and the personal feeling that gradually grows up 
 between them, go far to compensate, in their moral oj^eration, 
 for the man's intellectual deficiencies ; while such instruction as 
 he can give, being given more individually, and with a more 
 kindly intimacy between the instructor and the pupil, sinks 
 deeper, and has a more lasting influence."
 
 11 
 
 holds,) the moral result of the English Public School 
 education is proverbially and emphatically, in every 
 particular, the very reverse of that bewailed in sad 
 accents by M. Kenan, as the result of the Lycee 
 system. 
 
 He says, the youths retain a sad recollection of 
 those years which ought to be the most precious 
 of their lives. With us the remembrance of their 
 school is often a life-long joy to English public- 
 school men. Again, he complains that they 
 leave school without sound moral principles and the 
 instincts that keep them from doing wrong. How 
 WTote the commanding officer of a distinguished 
 cavalry regiment in the Crimea to a master of an 
 English Public School? " Thank you for the boys 
 you send to us ; they seem always to have the 
 instinct to know what is the right thing to do, and 
 to do it." He adds : '' And they never get into 
 ungentlemanly scrapes." The rigid uniformity of the 
 French system, M. Renan says, is a bar to its jDro- 
 ducing eminent men showing individuality of cha- 
 racter. It is the free scope which the head of 
 each house' has, in accordance with his own views 
 and individual character, to guide and educate 
 his own pupils, that produces among them what M. 
 Renan calls ^^ individualites distingiiees." And whereas 
 the French system presents a " comhinaison " which, 
 he says, renders affection between the master and 
 scholar almost an impossibility, it is with us most' 
 rare, in fact an exceptional case, where a heartfelt 
 reciprocal regard does not bind togetber tutor and 
 pupil, not only while the pupil is at school, but on 
 throuoh life. 
 
 Nor is there in our English System any of that 
 melancholy incarceration within the walls of a "grand
 
 12 
 
 intcrndt," separation from parents, or seclusion from 
 the world, and from the other sex, of which Kenan 
 draws a luguhrions pictm-e. Instead of the school- 
 term lasting one nnhroken year, as in France, 
 three times a year our hoys return to their homes, 
 remaining each time long enough for the home- 
 associations to re-estahlish themselves — rather, I 
 should say, to perpetuate their full and valued in- 
 fluence ; and in addition to these regular returns 
 home, for some weeks at a time, most hoys break 
 the school-time by a couple of days' visit home; 
 they are encouraged to do so. Parents and sisters 
 visit the school on its festal days. There are, besides 
 all this, the perpetual home-letters from different 
 members of the boys' families; so that there is 
 positively no break in the continuity of their fami- 
 liarity with the home -life of the family, including 
 its incidents, associations, tone, and parental 
 councils. 
 
 Nor ought I to omit another very important bond 
 with home, viz., the confidential correspondence of 
 the tutor with his pupils' parents. The most valuable 
 tutors, I do not hesitate to say, have found corre- 
 spondence with a boy's home to be a moral lever of 
 the highest power and efficacy. 
 
 I will say no more on this subject, but merely 
 remark that what I have here said, in addition to 
 what I have stated in my evidence before the 
 Public School Commission, and in my '' Keminis- 
 cences of a French Eton," will explain to you why 
 it is that in making the requisite additions to 
 St. Mark's School, so as to offer it to parents of 
 limited means as a boarding-school for their sons, 
 I have aimed at assimilating it to the Public Schools 
 of England in this respect, that the boys coming
 
 13 
 
 to us as boarders are to be cliviclecl into liouseholds 
 in separate dwellings, each of wliicli will be under 
 the charge of one of you as its head. The com- 
 munication between yourselves and the parents 
 of your pupils I wish to be direct, and not 
 through me. 
 
 In reference to the houses now in course of erec- 
 tion for the school, you may observe that I have 
 given a separate bedroom to every boy. As you can 
 w^ell imagine, this has been a great effort. It is a 
 provision as yet, I should think, almost unknown in 
 schools where the terms are so moderate as with us. 
 It has been done after deliberate consideration, and 
 much inquiry and thought. 
 
 I think what ultimately fixed my determination 
 w^ere these w^ords : '' When thou prayest, enter into 
 thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray 
 to thy Father which is in secret." 
 
 No one, I felt, knew what was in man, and wdiat 
 were man's wants, as He did who spake those words, 
 and so I resolved that at any cost each of our boys 
 should have his closet, and a door to shut. We will 
 trust to the grace of God, and the wish on their 
 part to do right, for their putting their separate 
 rooms to good use. 
 
 But my sense of the importance of this provision 
 has, I confess, been strengthened by my observation 
 throughout the course of a long and close connexion 
 with Eton. 
 
 I venture to think that the most experienced and 
 efficient tutors in that school will say that their 
 visits to their pupils' rooms, and the conversations 
 they have had with them there, are far from being 
 their least valuable methods of influencing them for 
 good.
 
 14 
 
 Let me, then, ask you to encourage your boys to 
 take a pleasure in keeping their rooms neat, and 
 making them look pretty. I like to' see the photo- 
 graphs of fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, 
 adorning the wails. Mr. Erskine Clarke's sugges- 
 tions about giving suitable prints '* honoris causa," 
 will enable you to help your boys to beautify their 
 rooms. And let them anticipate an occasional 
 visit from you in their own rooms ; and when you 
 visit them, take a chair, sit down, and have a talk 
 with them on matters of mutual interest. 
 
 The foregoing observation suggests the question 
 of supervision. A certain supervision is obviously 
 necessary, but let it be open. Let your boys feel 
 that it is a fatherly supervision, meant as a co- 
 operative protection with themselves against them- 
 selves, and not the eye of a spy to detect faults, 
 that is on them. 
 
 One word about the play-ground. I look with 
 much hope to the large expanse surrounding our 
 school. Be often with the boys there ; show an 
 interest in, and join them in their sports. If you 
 expect their interest in the school, give them yours 
 heartily in the play-ground. 
 
 And now, having brought you to this point, and 
 laid before you my reasons for taking the Public 
 Schools of England as our model, I will turn to 
 wiiat is the main purpose of my Address — practical 
 suggestions for your own guidance. 
 
 It is a great charge I am committing to you ; but 
 the charge is committed to not untried hands. The 
 experience of many years' close connexion with you 
 satisfies me that you will so fulfil the duties de- 
 volving upon you as to win the confidence of parents,
 
 15 
 
 and the affection of the boys, who will be brought 
 into special relation with each of you. 
 
 Nor are you to suppose that in offering you some 
 words of counsel in reference to those duties, I 
 doubt your fulfilling them. I offer you counsel be- 
 cause I know that you would wish me, in committing 
 to you this great and solemn charge, to put you in 
 possession of those thoughts on the subject of 
 dealing with boys which a very long experience has 
 suggested to me. 
 
 Going back to our first axiom, I begin by saying, 
 always bear in mind that the great object to be 
 attained is to induce the boys to act of their own 
 accord on right principles ; and let this question 
 be the test by which you try the value and sound- 
 ness of your method of dealing with them on any 
 occasion : "Is it calculated to make them wish 
 themselves to do right ?" 
 
 Now, we are all, I suppose, agreed that the highest 
 and best moral training is that of a wise and affec- 
 tionate father, and that no associations and in- 
 fluences purify like those of a well-ordered home. 
 
 The first exhortation, then, that I would give you, 
 with a view to your own guidance, is to think over 
 the method of dealing with his sons which you have 
 observed to be exercised by the wisest and best 
 fathers that you have known in the course of your 
 life, — by those whose sons have turned out best. 
 Do this deliberately, and with the desire to learn 
 and to be guided. 
 
 Some of us may have been more fortunate than 
 others in the models we have had set before us. 
 Any success I may have had in training boys I 
 attribute very much to my good fortune in this 
 retpect. I should never have fully known the
 
 16 
 
 value, in a boy's moral development, of openness 
 with him, and confidence, and of respect mingled 
 with tenderness, if I had not had the opportmiity 
 of observing the habitual intercourse of very wise 
 and good fathers with their sons, and the moral 
 result of such intercourse. 
 
 And now let me say at once, in reference to our 
 relation to our boys, that we must be content to lind 
 that official, apart from personal, respect is a thing 
 very much of the past. 
 
 We are far removed from the day when the bush 
 wig and cocked hat struck awe into schoolboys. 
 The story of Dr. Busby asking king Charles to allow 
 him to keep on his hat while in his presence, 
 lest his scholars should think there was a greater 
 man than himself in the world, belongs to a past 
 age. 
 
 The nearness and intimacy between parents and 
 children, and between tutors and pupils, in the 
 present day, cuts at the root mere official respect. 
 
 I regret this the less, because in the awe inspired 
 by the pedagogue of the last age, I see less to 
 call out a desire to do right than in that feeling 
 which is freely accorded to us by our pupils if 
 we deserve it, — I mean sincere personal respect. 
 This we gain by truth in its different aspects of 
 sincerity, earnestness, and even-handed justice ; 
 by self-control ; by a readiness to take pains and 
 work for them, — all growing out of fellow-feehng 
 with them. 
 
 When St. Mark's School began, some three-and- 
 twenty years ago, I observed and mentioned, as a 
 o-reat blessino- to the school on its first start into- 
 existence, that our first master, Mr. C. Morgan, 
 whom we received from Mr. Coleridge, was so true
 
 I 
 
 17 
 
 and conscientious, that, however siiddenly any one 
 might enter the schooh'oom, he never had to recall 
 himself or change the posture of his hody. This I 
 spoke of at the time, because his habit was very 
 different from that of other national schoolmasters 
 with whom I had been acquainted. But I thank 
 God that the thought of making such a remark 
 would not enter into my mind now. I rejoice to say 
 this, only let it be our study and prayer to God that 
 the legacy of truth which his character and example 
 imparted to the school may never leave it. A cold 
 and severe man may to a certain extent be a value - 
 able master; without truth, and I may add, justice, 
 he is worth nothino-. 
 
 Let me nov/ speak of self-control ; and, first, 
 the subduing that vrhicli is always ready to rise — 
 '• temper." There are two modes in which temper 
 is tried. First, vrhen boys are naughty ; some 
 masters are liable to be thrown off their balance 
 by boys' naughtiness, and to exhibit before them 
 signs that they have lost their temper. This is 
 most unfortunate. Such masters lose the control 
 of their boys, and yet they often deserve their 
 esteem and regard. The excitability which makes 
 them lose their temper is often associated with 
 earnestness and affection, and high intellectual 
 and moral qualities. The best advice a friend could 
 give to such is, '' Principiis ohsta." Be sensible of 
 the weakness, and keep guard against it. If a 
 master liable to be tried in this way has once 
 succeeded during a struggle with boys' naughtiness 
 in controUing his temper, he will find the control 
 of it easier the next time ; and he may be comforted 
 with the assurance that many a man has become a 
 valuable master who has had to fight hard with his 
 temper.
 
 18 
 
 The other mode in which temper is tried is hy a 
 boy's stupidity. To give way to temper in this case 
 is more inexcusable, for the trial is not by any 
 means as great as in the former case. As soon as 
 you are conscious that temper is mixing itself with 
 the earnestness with which you may be teaching 
 and unfolding an explanation to inapprehensive 
 boys, pause, and take up the thread of what you 
 were saying quietly. Do not let yourself be deceived 
 into the belief that the vigour and pointedness of 
 your explanatory words are the sign of earnestness 
 when they are the sign of temper. Think of the 
 trial your vehemence must be to the poor boys. 
 Pause, I say, and draw up from the bottom of your 
 heart consideration, patience, and fellow-feeling, 
 and begin again gently and kindly. 
 
 Another sign of self-control which a master has 
 daily the opportunity of exhibiting is punctualily. An 
 eminent Eton master used to say, " The brighest 
 jewel in a schoolmaster's crown is punctuality. 
 
 I cannot think that any school exists, from the 
 lowest National School upwards, where efficient 
 teaching and valuable training can be found apart 
 from rigorous punctuality. 
 
 When present, last Christmas, at the distribution 
 of prizes in that admirable school in the east of 
 London, under the management of the friend I have 
 already alluded to, I felt that he was describing a 
 main element of the success of the school when he 
 said in the presence of the boys, their teachers, and 
 their parents, assembled together, — " Every morn- 
 ing, as the hand of the school-clock comes on the 
 five minutes to nine, the school-doors are closed, and 
 prayer begins." 
 
 Eeflect, a want of punctuality in ourselves is sure
 
 19 
 
 to be reproduced in our scholars with exaggeration ; 
 so that it is an evil which, if once introduced, is 
 always deepening and growing wider. 
 
 I recollect hearing a schoolmaster once say, *' The 
 boys have no right to count on my being late ; they are 
 bound to be ready to go with me into school whenever 
 I arrive." Now, this is an utterly WTong principle, 
 and to be eschewed. We are to make the boys under 
 our charge good, not in spite of our irregularities and 
 imperfections, but by our controlling ourselves, by 
 taking care and using effort to remove from our ow^n 
 practice anything that may be a stumbling-block 
 to them. 
 
 The time when the pedagogue was so great and 
 mighty a personage, and so far removed from his 
 scholars, that in their estimation he never could 
 do wrong, is passed away. The boys are near enough 
 to us, and quite intelligent enough to know that 
 there is no justifiable excuse for a want of punc- 
 tuality in ourselves. They are, on the other hand, 
 near enough to us to be benefited by seeing that 
 we are dissatisfied with ourselves if v/e are not 
 punctual, and that we try to correct ourselves and 
 control ourselves for duty's sake, and for their sakes 
 also for whose training w^e are responsible. 
 
 I cannot dismiss this part of my observations 
 without thanking you personally for your uniform 
 punctuality. I am ready to confess that I have 
 learned much from you on this head. I have made 
 the foregoing observations because I wish that those 
 who join us hereafter may know the value we set on 
 punctuality. 
 
 Closely allied to self-control as a means of ac- 
 quiring our scholars' respect, and so gaining an 
 influence over them, are the painstaking and care
 
 20 
 
 with which we do our work. Boys are quick in 
 discovering the existence or the want of conscien- 
 tiousness in a master, and the discovery cannot he 
 made without its having an effect for good or for 
 evil upon themselves. 
 
 Besides, they should never take pains with their 
 work without the encouragement of knowing that 
 we perceive it, and value them for it. On the other 
 hand, they are entitled to the protection against 
 carelessness of knowing that it will not he un- 
 observed. 
 
 Let your boys be present in your thoughts when 
 they are absent from you. Suppose some or all of 
 them to be stopped by a difficulty, and that you 
 have once and again tried to get them over it without 
 success. When you return to the subject, let them 
 feel that you have been thinking of them in the 
 mean time, and of their difficulty. Let them find that 
 you are ready, hopefully ready, with some fresh 
 explanation ; that you have thought of some new 
 route by which you may lead them over it, some 
 new device by which they may be helped and 
 encouraged to grapple with it. 
 
 What can be more encouraging to a boy, what 
 surer way can there be to his heart, than for him to 
 know that when he is dismissed from your presence, 
 he is not dismissed from your thoughts, — that 
 you are still thinking of his troubles and difficulties, 
 and considering how you may help him out of 
 them ? 
 
 Most clearly did our Great Example show His 
 knowledge of, and His sympathy with, this instinct 
 of the human heart, when to give effect to those, 
 His gracious words on leaving His disciples, ''Let 
 not your heart be troubled," He added, ''In my
 
 21 
 
 Father's house are many mansions. I <fo to iveparc a 
 place for you.'' 
 
 Beyond this, to be accessible to indiyidual boys 
 out of regular school-hours, to be ready to work 
 with them if they need it, to go beyond the letter of 
 the bond, greatly increases a master's power and 
 influence. 
 
 Who shall say how much moral good it does to a 
 son, how much filial loyalty it awakens in him, 
 that his father works for him. Now, in relation to 
 our pupils, there is no means of giving an impres- 
 sion for good on a ground similar to this unless we 
 are willing to go beyond the line of obligation and 
 duty, and are ready to encroach on our own 
 legitimate time, in order to give them help and 
 encouragement. 
 
 But I ask you to take this extra pains, not with 
 your bright, clever, and industrious boys ; these are 
 the darlings of our age. They are their school's 
 glory. Their names in gold adorn their school- 
 room's wall. They are mentioned with honour by 
 Queen's Ministers and distinguished Members of 
 Parhament at the close of speeches on Middle 
 Class Education. Plans are devised to lift them up 
 from one grade of school to a higher ; and, finally, 
 the different Colleges of both Universities vie with 
 each other in offering them the attraction of minor 
 scholarships and exhibitions to induce them to 
 become members of their body. 
 
 I do not say a word against all this. It is mani- 
 festly right and legitimate that boys of ability and 
 industry should be rewarded. Their success and 
 advancement will stimulate other '^ clever " boys to 
 be industrious also. 
 
 But fully enough is done for them ; they may
 
 22 
 
 safely be left to themselves, and tliey will be all the 
 better for it. 
 
 Those for whom I plead are the boys below, and 
 not above, the average. It is to the weak that I 
 invite you to give help and encouragement. It is by 
 taking these by the hand that a master's highest 
 praise — the praise of having awakened in his boys 
 the wish to do right — is best attained. 
 
 It is so obviously a master's interest to bring on 
 his best boys, that extra pains taken with them will 
 have no moral effect on the school ; but if he takes a 
 weak boy by the hand, if he patiently works with 
 him, smoothing his difficulties, and encouraging 
 him to use effort, and to hope, he will thereby be 
 acquiring an influence for good over his whole 
 school. There is a generous impulse in boys' nature. 
 They sympathize with a master that holds out a 
 helping hand to the weakest of their companions. 
 They see that it is not for personal distinction and 
 advantage that he does this, but for the good of 
 the boy. To the particular boys who by such kindly 
 consideration and help have been raised to a higher 
 intellectual and moral level than they would other- 
 wise have reached, there is no saying what good 
 has been done. I know an instance in which, after 
 much patience and painstaking on the part of the 
 master, the boy failed. "When his fate was known, 
 he hurried to his master's room, and, with a burst 
 of emotion he could not restrain, he let out that 
 it was the disappointment of the master, after all 
 the pains he had taken with him, that mainly 
 troubled him. 
 
 I will not dismiss this subject without saying, that 
 to your readiness to help boys out of school-hours, 
 which I have myself observed, and have learned from
 
 23 
 
 parents, I attribute not a little of that influence which 
 you have gained over your scholars. 
 
 I now come to another point in ^Yhich your in- 
 stincts have, I am glad to see, suggested to you 
 the right course to follow. It is this — the studiously 
 avoiding any approach to the satirical and caustic in 
 your intercourse with your boys. I am very glad to 
 observe that you never snub them or set them 
 down. 
 
 Some masters seem to be very much tempted to 
 be caustic with their scholars ; they seem to relish 
 an opportunity of setting them down ; and even, in 
 some cases, I might almost say, to be on the look 
 out for such an opportunity as an exercise for their 
 wit : and without going so far as this, many 
 masters, and valuable ones, will think that they have 
 achieved a success if they have put down a 
 bumptious boy with a good snub. 
 
 But this is wrong, if our aim is to make our boys 
 wish to do right. If a master is genuine and 
 earnest with a pupil, and sympathizes with him, 
 the boy will not be conceited. Bumptiousness is 
 taken out of him far more effectually by sincerity 
 and fellow-feeling than by making him wince under 
 a sharp snub. 
 
 Let us learn from the practice of fathers. Some 
 do not think it amiss to use irony with their sons, 
 and will occasionally snub them ; others treat their 
 boys invariably with sincerity and respect, and are 
 scrupulously careful not to wound their feelings. 
 Have you ever noticed which method turns out the 
 best sons ? 
 
 I confess to have learned a great lesson from one 
 who, for wisdom and goodness, is (alas, that while I 
 write these words, I should have to ssiju-as) second to
 
 24 
 
 no one that I have ever known upon earth. After 
 twenty years of faiHng health, he has been taken to 
 his rest. His intellect has been described, by those 
 best able to judge, as piercing. At times, following- 
 out a train of deep thought, he may have reached 
 the very confines of human knowledge, and his mind, 
 peering into the darkness beyond, may have been 
 grappling with problems which have yet to be 
 solved. At other times, jaded by the weakness of a 
 body too frail for the intellect within, he may have 
 been resting. So at times he might sit silent 
 and abstracted, not apparently heeding common con- 
 versation or noticing passing occurrences. But at 
 any time, under any circumstances, should one of his 
 sons approach him, he would be all attention to him. 
 He would give his full mind to the matter of 
 the inquiry, whether it were great or small ; and 
 with mingled respect, consideration, and earnest 
 love, he would enter into his case, resolve his 
 difficulty, or direct his conduct. What has been 
 the moral effect of his intercourse with his sons, I 
 will not venture to say. 
 
 But on this important point — I may say vital in 
 reference to our great aim of leading our boys to 
 wish to do right — we have guidance beyond all 
 earthly example. It is granted to us to know how 
 the Word, Who was made flesh, and dwelt among 
 us, dealt with those whom He was educating to the 
 higher life of Christianity. Here we have an in- 
 fallible Guide. 
 
 Now, it is most observable that our Lord was 
 invariably sincere in addressing all who approached 
 Him. The provocations which He received to reply 
 with scorn or irony were endless, but though the 
 question or observation addressed to Him may have
 
 lio 
 
 displayed injustice, liypocrisy, coarseness, imperti- 
 nence, flippancy, self-pretension, weakness — His 
 reply was always sincere, we may say affectingly so. 
 I will give you a few instances of what I mean. 
 When the Pharisee who desired that He would eat 
 meat with Him said, '' This man, if he had been a 
 prophet, would have known who and what manner of 
 woman this is that toucheth Him, for she is a sinner," 
 He replied, ^' Simon, I have somewhat to say unto 
 thee. There was a certain creditor who had two 
 debtors. The one owed five hundred pence and the 
 other fifty ; and when they had nothing to pay, he 
 frankly forgave them both. Tell me, therefore, which 
 will love him most?" When they murmured and 
 said, " This man receiveth sinners and eateth with 
 them," His answer is, '' What man of you having an 
 hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave 
 the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after 
 that vv'hich is lost, until he find it ? " &:c. Master, they 
 said, ill guile, we know that thou art true, and teachest 
 the way of God in truth ; what thinkest thou, is it 
 lawful to give tribute to Caesar, or not ? Jesus per- 
 ceived their wickedness, and said, ^' Why tempt ye me, 
 ye hypocrites ? " Yet He proceeds, with entire sin- 
 cerity, to say, '' Show me the tribute-money," and 
 gives a real and instructive answer to the question. 
 To the Sadducees' coarse and impertinent inquiry — 
 " Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife shall 
 she be, for the seven had her to wife ?" His reply is, 
 "Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures, neither the 
 power of God;" and He proceeds to give them also 
 trae and sincere teaching in reference to the resur- 
 rection, and confirms the doctrine with a weio-htv 
 
 argument. 
 
 A lawyer asked Him a question, tempting Him :
 
 26 
 
 ^^ Master, whicli is the great commandment in the 
 law ? " The answer of Jesus is perfectly genuine : 
 '' Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, 
 and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This 
 is the first and great commandment, and the second 
 is like unto it : Thou shalt love thy neighbour as 
 thyself." 
 
 To the self-justifying and flippant question, ''And 
 who is my neighbour ? " the answer is — ''A certain 
 man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell 
 among thieves, which stripped him of his raiment, 
 and wounded him, and departed leaving him half 
 dead. And by chance there came a certain priest 
 that way, and likewise a Levite, vdio passed by on 
 the other side. But a certain Samaritan, as he 
 journeyed, came where he was ; and v/hen he saw 
 him, he had compassion on him, and went to him, 
 and bound up his wounds. Which now of these 
 three thinkest thou was neighbour to him that fell 
 among the thieves ?" 
 
 To the request — ''Lord, grant that these my two 
 sons may sit the one on thy right hand, and the 
 other on thy left, when thou comest in thy king- 
 dom," His reply is, " Can ye drink of the cup that 
 I drink of?" They say, "We can." "Ye shall, 
 indeed," He adds, " drink of the cup that I drink of; 
 but to sit on my right hand, and on my left, is not 
 mine to give ; but it shall be given to them for 
 whom it is prepared of my Father." No doubt we 
 feel that there is a depth in this answer which we 
 cannot fathom. But of this there can be no doubt, 
 that there is no tinge of irony in His answer to a 
 request that moved the indignation of the ten, but 
 that, on the contrary, it is eminently sincere and 
 genuine.
 
 27 
 
 You recollect, doubtless, Peter's observation and 
 question, when the rich young ruler went away 
 grieved, because he had great possessions, not having 
 faith and courage to part with them and follow Jesus. 
 *' Lo, we have left ah," said Peter, " and follov»'ed 
 thee; what shall we, therefore, have?" I appeal 
 to you, is there not, in this observation, just that 
 tinge of self-complacency, mixed, I grant, with 
 simplicity, to which we should naturally feel disposed 
 to give a rebuff? Now, mark the Lord's reply: 
 *' Verily, I say unto you. That ye which have followed 
 me, in the regeneration when the Son of man shall sit 
 on the throne of His glory, ye, also, shall sit upon 
 twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel." 
 
 I will give you one more instance. In their last 
 walk through Galilee, the Lord took His disciples, 
 and told them that He was about to be delivered unto 
 the Gentiles, and that they would scourge Him and 
 put Him to death, and that, on the third day. He 
 should rise again. Upon this, they disputed, by the 
 way, which of them should be greatest. Now, mark 
 how the Lord received this ; how He acted. Weigh 
 all the words — realize the whole picture. "And He 
 came to Capernaum, and, being in the house. He 
 sat down, and called the twelve, and saith unto them, 
 If any desire to be first, the same shall be (i. e., let 
 him make himself, Mark x. 44, 45 j the last of all, 
 the servant of all. And He took a child, and set him 
 in the midst of them ; and when He had taken him 
 in His arms. He said unto them, Whosoever shaU 
 receive one of such children in my name, receiveth 
 me, and whosoever receiveth me receiveth not me, 
 but Him that sent me." 
 
 These instances which I have adduced will be 
 sufficient to place before you this marked and
 
 28 
 
 uniform characteristic of our Lord's manner of 
 dealing with men, especially with those whom He 
 was educating to he pillars in His Church. It is 
 surely a characteristic which should be observed, 
 studied, weighed, with thought and prayer by all, 
 parents or tutors, who have the moral training of 
 youth in their hands. 
 
 It will be readily seen that all the foregoing points 
 to which I have drawn your attention — and their 
 number might be increased — are only various indica- 
 tions of inwardly felt sympathy. 
 
 If this is wanting, no rules will supply its place ; 
 if it is present, the natural instinct will do much to 
 indicate the right method. 
 
 Should the thought occur to any that all this 
 thought and self-abnegation, this considerateness, 
 and, shall I say, tenderness, are more than can be 
 looked for in a schoolmaster, I reply, suppose the 
 result of all this interest, fellow-feeling, and careful- 
 ness is to engender in a pupil a spirit of responsive- 
 ness, a wish to do right, — and about its having this 
 result I have no doubt, — then is not the tutor's life, 
 as by magic, changed from one of mistrust, anxiety, 
 vexation, and perhaps misery, into one of confidence, 
 peace, hope, and delight ? 
 
 Contrast for a moment the two systems in their 
 reaction on the teachers. On the one side is a 
 master who stands on his authority, rules without 
 sympathy, and is perhaps punctilious, impatient, 
 unbending. What is the effect of this system ? It 
 produces resistance and distrust. The master and 
 his scholars are often in hot water ; perhaps he is 
 vehement, and they are defiant ; they do not under- 
 stand each other ; their normal attitude is antago- 
 nistic ; they meet without pleasure, they separate
 
 29 
 
 without good will. If we follow such a master into 
 his study, what are his thoughts ? That this is a 
 weary life ; poverty, like a hard master, may chain 
 him down to his profession, hut he would gladly 
 give it up for any other employment as profit ahle. 
 Nor would the hitterness of his thoughts he relieved 
 by the too true reflection, that an intercourse, which 
 he finds wearisome, if not a misery to himself, is an 
 injury to his pupil. 
 
 Now look at the other side, — a master who has 
 by wise methods led his scholars to wish to do right, 
 and to value his good opinion, who has not shirked 
 care and effort that he mioiit do so. I will not 
 describe how peaceful and happy the hfe of such an 
 one is. I will tell you a story in point while it is 
 fresh in my memory. It might be paralleled by 
 hundreds of similar instances. I will only premise 
 that the story is unvarnished and true in all its 
 minute circumstances. 
 
 A schoolmaster met the mother of one of his boys 
 in the street. He did not immediately recognise 
 her, but she accosted him. "I ask pardon," she 
 said, "for stopping you in the street. lam Mrs. 
 '-'- "•- '■'-, mother of little '■■• ''■' ■•'■ (naming a boy of eleven 
 or twelve years old in his school). He is," she 
 continued, *' getting on very well at school, he is 
 making great progress in his learning ; but he does 
 not think of helping me at home. I work very hard 
 in order to keep him at school. Will you speak a 
 word to him ?" 
 
 The master took an opportunity of speaking to the 
 boy when they were alone : he began thus : — Harry, 
 shall I tell you a story about '' ''■' '■', who was at our 
 school ? His mother was a widow. She lived in 
 .=;: ::= =;: (naming a back lane in the town), and worked
 
 30 
 
 very hard to keep him at school. He was a very 
 good boy, and got on wonderfully well. He has 
 since risen to a high position, high for him, at a 
 distance from here. He mixes now with gentlemen 
 very much as their equal. Some people in a posi- 
 tion like his might be tempted to forget their poor 
 mother, but he has not done so. Not only has he 
 helped to maintain her by what he earned, but now 
 that he has got a house of his own, he has sent for 
 his mother to come and live with him, and to be the 
 head of his house. I saw her when she was going 
 oft ; she could not help crying when she thought of 
 her son. 
 
 While the master is telling this story, the boy's 
 cheeks flush, his eyes get suffused, gradually his 
 head sinks down, and he bursts into tears. 
 
 There, says the schoolmaster, I will not say another 
 word to you, at least only this one. If I should come 
 across your mother, and she should say to me, 
 *' My boy is a great comfort to me, he is good and 
 helpful," it will make me very happy. 
 
 They part. The little boy, on leaving the room, 
 turns round, and, looking up earnestly into his 
 master's face, says, " Thank you, sir!" 
 
 Compare now the reflections of this tutor when 
 left alone with those of the other. Compare their 
 lives, and say, do not the hope, the peace, the joy 
 of the latter repay a hundred-fold the care he may 
 have taken to be, in dealing with his pupils, ^' sincere 
 and without offence," by which words I mean what I 
 suppose St. Paul meant, earnest and true with them, 
 and careful to put no stumbling-block in their way ? 
 
 But how in reference to the pupil ? Will it be 
 said that all this forethought on the tutor's part, 
 this consideration, this delicacy of treatment, is over
 
 31 
 
 doing it ? ^yill enervate the pupil, and rob liim of 
 the mascuhne strength that one associates with an 
 English schoolboy ? Will it be said that he ought to 
 be left more to himself ; that, if he is bumptious, 
 he ought to be snubbed ; if disobedient, he ought to 
 be whipped ; that he ought to find out things for 
 himself, and fight his own way ? 
 
 I hope, my brethren, you can and do draw a clear 
 line of distinction between softness, which is odious, 
 and the careful and considerate treatment which I 
 speak of. In the New Testament the distinction is 
 made perfectly clear. 
 
 First, with regard to Him who is the central 
 object of every Christian's thoughts. While every 
 word and act of His breathed love, compassion, 
 consideration, tenderness ineffable, every one must 
 feel that the beauty, completeness, and majesty of 
 the picture of Him presented to us in the Gospels is 
 never marred by the shade of any approach to what 
 the instincts He has given us recoil from, softness. 
 
 And passing to one of whom we may speak more 
 freely, St. Paul, the greatest educator, I suppose, 
 among men. Neither, in his case, is there a shadow 
 of softness in his method of dealing with his converts 
 and follovN'ers ; while, at the same time, his human 
 sympathy, his fellow-feeling with them, is bound- 
 less. And he never disguises it — he is not shy of 
 being what we should call demonstrative, of letting 
 his converts freely into the state of his heart towards 
 them. He opens to them, as it were, the recesses 
 of his heart, and allows them to see that they are 
 there enfolded in his best affections. 
 
 If he is sharply rebuking them for grievous faults, 
 he cannot get through his words of rebuke without 
 breaking out into such words as these : '^ I write not
 
 32 
 
 these things to shame you, but, as my beloved sons, 
 I warn you. For though ye have ten thousand 
 instructors in Christ, yet have ye not many fathers. 
 For in Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the 
 Gospel, wherefore I beseech you be followers of me. 
 For this cause have I sent unto you Timotheus, who 
 is my beloved son, and faithful in the Lord, v\dio 
 shall bring you into remembrance of my ways." 
 
 It is impossible not to feel the deep and tender- 
 hearted sympathy of these words, but there is no 
 softness in them. 
 
 Take another instance. " Touching the ministry 
 to the saints," he writes, "I kuow the forwardness 
 of your minds, for which I boast of you to them of 
 Macedonia, that Achaia was ready a year ago. Yet 
 have I sent the brethren in this behalf, that, as I 
 said, ye should be ready : lest haply if they of 
 Macedonia come v/ith me, and find you unprepared, 
 we (that we say not, ye) should be ashamed of this 
 same confident boasting." 
 
 You v>^ill recognise that these expressions, over- 
 flowing as they are with sympathy, are in harmony 
 with his teaching, "everywhere in every church." 
 I put them before you that freshly and pointedly you 
 may feel this characteristic of the greatest teacher 
 among men, viz., that he has his converts in his 
 heart, and that he is not afraid to let them know 
 that they are there ; but throughout there is no 
 shadow of softness. Now, this surely is the secret 
 of his power ; and what was the result of this his 
 method of dealing with them ? It was thus that he 
 educated them to perform acts of the highest 
 heroism, to fight manfully, to endure hardness and 
 affliction, to quit themselves li'ie men, to resist unto 
 death striving against sin.
 
 This is liis method, and this is the result of his 
 teaching. And ^vhe^e shall a Christian schoolmaster 
 look for instruction and guidance hut to the New 
 Testament ? and if in gentleness and sympathy we 
 are at our hest immeasurahly helow the line marked 
 hy the Lord and His holy Apostles, we cannot as 
 Christian schoolmasters he overdoing it. 
 
 Do not mistake me, and imagine that I am putting 
 a human affection in the place of spiritual grace. 
 St. Paul did not, and let us tread in his steps. Let 
 us present to our scholars, as worthy aims, self- 
 aunegation, self-rule, self-help. Let us animate 
 them hy the highest and most constraining motives 
 — those which St. Paul l)i-ought to hear on his con- 
 verts and our catechism supplies us with. 
 
 Let this he done without softness, hut with the 
 heartiest sympathy ; let our pupils see iiinl feel that 
 v/u care for them ; and let the roughness and the 
 hardness which they will have to meet with come to 
 them from other quarters (they will come from many 
 quarters), hut not from us whose work it is to train 
 them not for this life only, hut for eternal life. 
 
 Leaving, however, for the present the teaching 
 and the examples of Holy Scripture, let us come 
 down to a story of modern life. Let me once more 
 name our friend whose example I have employed 
 more than once to illustrate my views. 
 
 The young men whom he has formed hy his 
 teaching and companionship are now to he found in 
 the dockyards and engineering works, the offices and 
 shops in eastern districts of London. 
 
 AVe have seen some of them here from time to 
 time ; you have with me noticed their frank and 
 joyous countenances ; we know they are good sons 
 and valuable workmen. Now, how do these young
 
 u 
 
 men spend their evenings, their leisure time ? They 
 have their chib-room ; and while other young men of 
 their class too often seek their enjoyment in low 
 music-halls, dancing-rooms, inferior theatres, and 
 other places of evening resort, they have their 
 rational recreations, or improving studies and pur- 
 suits. On a Sunday, they have their classes in the 
 Sunday-school ; and, in addition to this, they have 
 requested their patron and friend to concur in their 
 gathering the ragged children of the street for a 
 night-school, under their teaching and management, 
 to be held on Sundays and evenings when they are 
 not learning in their own classes. And thus they 
 are doing for others, more destitute than themselves, 
 a good work which they feel was done, by others, 
 lor them. Now, if self-rule is the measure of true 
 heroism (Prov. xvi. 32), are not these the indications 
 of real manliness ; and with such results before us, 
 why should we fear the method of training which 
 has produced them ? 
 
 I will turn now to another view of our subject, and 
 suggest a special ground for dealing with boys in a 
 way that shall lead them to wish to do right. 
 
 You are aware that a system has grown among 
 us, within the memory of us all, which was not only 
 instituted with the best motive^ but has been 
 successful in calling forth much work and effort; 
 its influence has penetrated and quickened into in- 
 tellectual activity whole schools. I mean the *' com- 
 petitive system " which meets us on every side. The 
 Home and Indian Governments, the Horse Guards, 
 the two Universities, their several Colleges, the 
 Public Schools, mercantile lirins, and munificent 
 individuals, have all taken it up, and offer enviable 
 and lucrative appointments, or honourable and most
 
 I 
 
 35 
 
 coveted distinctions, to those who shall be successful 
 in competitive examinations. It is not sm-prising 
 that so great an incentive has acted with very great 
 effect. But it is by no means an unmixed good 
 that, almost from childhood, this competitive system 
 should be perpetually brought to bear on our boys, 
 giving them the habit of putting a money value on 
 their exertions. 
 
 We cannot get out of the reach of this stimulus, 
 for then we must go out of the world. Kor is it to 
 be wished ; but I do wish that the keen desire for 
 personal distinction and gain which it excites should 
 be largely mingled with the more healthy, boy-like 
 feeling of delight in giving satisfaction to teachers. 
 
 I think I must have told you before now an 
 anecdote of Bishop Abraham, which made an in- 
 delible impression on me. On the occasion of his 
 meeting his colleagues for the last time, when, after 
 a noble service at Eton, he was about to resign his 
 mastership there, and leave us for mission v,ork in 
 New Zealand, he made an address, in tht' course 
 of which, reviewing his Eton career, he told us, 
 that, when a boy in the lower part of the school, he 
 had not been diligent or given to work, but that 
 once on a time he took it into his head to try to do 
 a good copy of verses. When he showed it up in 
 school to the present Provost of Kings, he watched 
 his countenance, and saw that he was reading the 
 exercise with interest ; he perceived a smile creep- 
 ing over his countenance. When he had finished 
 reading it over, he laid it down with the words, 
 " Thanh you ! " The bishop told us that he went 
 skipping off with a new sensation : the thought of 
 giving satisfaction to his master in school was a 
 new and happy feeling, and with it came the reso- 
 
 c 2
 
 lutioii to try and do good exercises for the time to 
 come. It was a kind of epoch in his Hfe. 
 
 Now, to this healthy, hoy-hke feehng of happiness 
 in giving a master satisfaction, I look as a vahiable 
 corrective of what evil there is in the competitive 
 system, — a diluent of that keen thirst for personal 
 distinction which in its concentrated form is poison. 
 
 Thus we come round once more to the leading 
 principle with which we began — gain the hearts of 
 your scholars ; win them to your side. If you wish 
 to be a blessing to them, lead them to wish to do 
 right themselves. 
 
 With regard to the studies by which we shall draw 
 out the mental faculties of our scholars, I have 
 nothing to add to what I have already said in 
 '^ The Narrative Essay on a Liberal Education." 
 
 It cannot be too earnestly impressed on teachers 
 that our primary duty is not to impart knowledge, 
 but to teach our pupils how to learn. 
 
 The mental faculties must be cultivated. The 
 brain must undergo an operation analogous to that 
 which the soil undergoes in the operation of plough- 
 ing, digging, harrowing. Now, universal experience 
 and tradition tell us that the study of the structure 
 of language and of geometrical reasoning are the 
 most effectual mental plough and harrow. They 
 are to be valued, primarily, not because the gram- 
 matical study of one language makes the acquisition 
 of other languages more easy ; not because an appre- 
 ciation of geometrical reasoning is the first and tirm 
 tread of that intellectual ladder which leads up, step 
 by step, to all the heights of scientific investigation 
 and discovery ; but because these two studies act 
 inimitably as mental plough and harrow, and, if
 
 i:)roi3erly used, are valuable from the first hour that 
 they are employed. AYlien they have done their 
 work, the brain is prepared, like properly-prepared 
 soil, to receive, and to cause to grow and bear fruit, 
 whatever intellectual seeds may be thrown in. 
 
 Whether any other study will, like these, cultivate 
 the mental faculties, and give them power to take 
 in, digest, and assimilate knowledge, and to grow 
 thereby, is a question to be answered by expe- 
 rience. 
 
 Of this one thing I am persuaded, that every man 
 really eminent in any branch of physical science 
 would say that if the intellect is to be cultivated by 
 the study of such a branch of science, its principles 
 must be examined, studied, and followed out with 
 patience, care, and labour ; and that it is an entire 
 mistake in education — if there is not time to be- 
 come an accomplished, or, at least, a fair linguist 
 and geometrician — to say leave geometry and lan- 
 guage altogether, and, instead, learn some of the 
 facts of physical science. 
 
 I must refer you to page 25 of the '' Narrative 
 Essay," for my opinion of the effect of putting the 
 acquisition of scraps of scientific and miscellaneous 
 knowledge in the place of intellectual training ; and, 
 indeed, to the "Essay" generally, I refer you for 
 the further investigation of this thoroughly import- 
 ant question ; as, also, for an exposition of a method 
 of teaching Euclid, by which it may speedily be made 
 interesting and most valuable. 
 
 When once our mental diggers and harrowers have 
 done their work, you will bear witness of my hearty 
 desh-e to afford our boys every opportunity for 
 widening the range of their knowledge. But first 
 they must, from personal experience, have learned
 
 38 
 the value of the apophthegm, '^ non multa, sed miil- 
 
 I now approach the coiichision — the Schoohiias- 
 ter's Kewarcl. To you I need say Httle on this head. 
 Your own experience, I rejoice to think, will have 
 told you what it is. I trust, too, that few will have 
 read through this Address without already antici- 
 pating what I may have to say on this subject : — 
 
 The account of the friends I spoke of surrounded 
 by bands of bright, happy, ingenuous, loyal-hearted 
 boys : — The meeting, full of emotion, between the 
 patron and his former scholar in the woods of Ame- 
 rica : — The story of the little boy and his mother :— 
 The energy of young men, emerging from youth 
 into early manhood, in seeking to reclaim and raise the 
 poor outcast children of the street, by bestowing on 
 them the care and love which were bestowed upon 
 themselves, and have made them what they are : — 
 These various incidents have already pointed out 
 the real reward of the Schoolmaster. 
 
 '•' Should any one feel drawn towards the modern view of 
 placing varied information Ijefore mental culture and solid study, 
 I recommend them to read a treatise by M. Victor de Laprade, 
 entitled, Le Baccalaurtat et les etudes Classiques. He writes with 
 a thorough grip of his subject, and there is a rich vein of humour 
 mingled with deep pathos running through his book which makes 
 it quite irresistible. The going into many subjects, he says, 
 causes the steady and improving study of an author to be " rem- 
 placce par I'abrutissante etude des manueUy Elsewhere, after 
 speaking of the study of history, he says, " Songez que 1' ecolier 
 de quinze ans est astreint de plus au latin, au grec, a une langue 
 vivante,' a la geometrie, a Tarithmetique, a I'algebre, a la physique, 
 a la chimie, a la cosmographie, a, I'histoire nature] le, a la philoso- 
 phie, a I'histoire de la philosophic et, depuis M. Duruy, a la i^oli- 
 tiqvie contemporaine ! Quelle encyclopedic ou plutot quel eijou- 
 vantable chaos ! Nos his en sortent ahiTris, biases, ennuyes 
 dcgoiites a tout jamais de Tetudc.
 
 39 
 
 It is the reward that was St. Paul's joy when he 
 wrote : — " Need we letters of commendation from 
 you ? Ye are our epistle, written in our hearts, 
 known and read of all men." And again, " The seal 
 of mine apostleship are ye in the Lord." 
 
 We know the happiness of finding that our hoys 
 carry from us into the world a moral tone, an 
 intelligence, and an aptitude for work, wdiich make 
 them grow into the esteem of their employers, and 
 work their way into positions of trust and responsi- 
 bility. We know the joy of finding that in after life 
 they continue true and loyal in heart, and that when 
 scattered abroad, either at home, or in the colonies, 
 or with their regiments, or at sea, they still find 
 pleasure in holding intercourse with those who 
 taught and influenced them. 
 
 We can sympathize with our friend Mr. E. H. 
 Currie, that friend so often alluded to in this Address, 
 on his receiving from his old scholars, now settled 
 in America and elsewhere, letters which tell him 
 that they are seeking their happiness in trying to 
 reproduce round themselves, as a fresh nucleus, 
 something of that school system to which they 
 look back as having given its character to their 
 life. 
 
 Of these and similar sources of joy to the school- 
 master I will not speak further, but will close my 
 remarks by naming one result of giving to the 
 children of the working class a thorough liberal 
 education, a result unexpected by all, but, as I think, 
 eminently satisfactory. To the result I speak of, we 
 have not, to my knowledge, as yet, met a single 
 exception. 
 
 You can well believe that when I began to give a 
 liberal education — an education that might be given
 
 40 
 
 to the sons of gentlemen — to children of the working 
 class, I was met on one side with some such warning 
 as this : '^ Take care what you are doing. These boys 
 to whom you are giving the training, the feeling, and 
 the instincts of gentlemen, will not be able to bear 
 the ignorance and inferior tone of their own homes. 
 Thus you will be breaking up the concord of families, 
 and unsettling society." On the other side, there 
 were those who said, ** Go on nevertheless ; give to 
 every one the opportunity of rising. Let those who 
 have the capacity and ambition to do so rise from 
 one rank to another. It is the spirit and life of our 
 country that they should." 
 
 Now, the uniform and remarkable fact which our 
 experience has brought to light is this, that, while 
 the boys have been thoroughly educated, and have 
 gained the knowledge, the tone of mind, and the 
 instincts of gentlemen, in no one instance has either 
 of these anticipated results followed. 
 
 The boys, as they were advancing in mental 
 cultivation and right feeling, have gradually and 
 insensibly raised with themselves the tone and feel- 
 ing of those about them ; so that no severance, no 
 breaking of the family tie, has ever occurred. And 
 in the exceptional cases where some sad habit may 
 have been a bar to the parents' rising to a higher 
 moral level, it is not severance that has followed, 
 but'quite the contrary, sorrow, thought, help, concern, 
 shielding on the part of the sons, more touching far 
 than their raising them with themselves. 
 
 Even those who have been by a combination of 
 fortunate circumstances most raised, are, to a man, 
 loyal to their own homes. Though the opening and 
 opportunity may have been before them of leaving 
 their own, and stepping into a new rank, they have
 
 ■il 
 
 not taken the step. In that especial act of hfe which, 
 more than any other, fixes a person's position in life, 
 the choice of a wife, the thought never seems to have 
 entered into the minds of any of them to look else- 
 where than among the friends of their own family. 
 Not one of them has ever '' married a wife that would 
 look down upon their own mother." They have 
 well and wdsely chosen good and sensible girls, who 
 could appreciate them, and w^ere prepared to rise in 
 moral tone with them. By their education they elevate 
 and refine their own rank ; they do not leave it. 
 
 Now, this has been our unvarying experience, and 
 it has so important a hearing on the wdiole question 
 of education, that I name it emphatically. 
 
 My own opinion, after years of watchful observa- 
 tion, is this : — that the real solid learning, the hard 
 intellectual work our boys have been taken through, 
 joined with the moral influences wdiich have been 
 brought to bear on them through their youth, has 
 given a breadth, a solidity, and a firmness to their 
 minds, — together with a tone of sobriety, man- 
 liness, and good sense, to their characters, — and, 
 withal, the feeling that w ork is their duty, and the 
 true road to credit and respectability : — and that 
 thus it is that they are protected against those 
 petty aspirations, and the self-seeking graspings at 
 distinction which are a snare to those whose educa- 
 tion has been less solid, less liberal. 
 
 This I can safely say, that the watching this 
 result of our system of training, with all its accom- 
 paniments, has been to me for years a source of 
 unmingled satisfaction, — the more so, from viewing 
 it in relation to the bearing of sound and Christian 
 education on the social system of our country. 
 
 I have but to add that, if we have found that a
 
 42 
 
 liberal education has given to boys in a humble 
 condition riffht and true instincts, the instincts of 
 gentlemen, — for if those above named are not the 
 instincts of gentlemen, I do not know what are, — 
 let us go on in hope, and build on the same founda- 
 tion when we deal, as we shall now do, with boys of 
 a higher class ; amongst others with the sons of 
 our dear old St. Mark's boys, who are able and 
 ready to do for their children more than their 
 parents were able to do for them. 
 
 As a last word, my brethren, I will express a hope 
 that I may yet for some few years be at your side, 
 and by my counsel and support aid you in that 
 development of our work on which you are entering. 
 But, as all things human are uncertain, I am glad 
 to have put in writing the foregoing thoughts, the 
 result of a long experience. I will print what I have 
 said, and give it to you with a view ''to put you 
 ahvays in remembrance of these things, though 
 ye know them, and be established in the present 
 
 truth." ''• The next three verses of St. Peter you 
 
 can add, when the occasion for them shall arise. 
 
 '' 2 Pet. i. 12. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 Mabt S. Rickekbt, Printer, 4a, Walbrook, Mansion House. E. C,
 
 
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