LIBRARY ANNEX '7'''4i7'!.'/.i'!liSA-&,'IISt/r%', CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY Cornell University Library arW38983 Home education : olin,anx 3 1924 031 757 283 Cornell University Library The original of tliis book is in tlie Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924031757283 HOME EDUCATION. HOME EDUCATION A COURSE OF LECTURES TO LADIES, DELIVERED IN BRADFORD, IN THE WINTER OF 1885-1886. BY CHARLOTTE M. MASON, S03XEII5IE LECTUREK OS" EDUCATION AND TEACHEK OP HUMAN PHYSIOLOGY AT THE BISHOP OTTER COLLEGE, CHICHESTER, LONDON: KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH & CO., 1, PATERNOSTER SQUARE. 1886. (tke rights of imnslation and of reproducHon are reserved.) INTRODUCTORY In proposing these lectures, my original notion was to popularize and amplify the valuable educational hints con- tained in some two or three chapters of Dr. Carpenter's "Mental Physiology;" but the subject is a wide one, and I have found it necessary to cover much ground untouched in that work. A complete or worthy treatment of " Home Education" within the limits of a single small volume is out of the question. My attempt is, to suggest a metliod of edMcation resting upon a basis of natural law : and to touch, ip this connection, upon the mother's duties to her children in the three stages of life during which they fall under her personal training, childhood, school-life, and young maiden- hood ; I say maidenhood, because the youth is, earlier than the girl, necessarily left to the education of circumstances, and his training falls less within the mother's province. Let me add, that, in venturing to speak on the subject of Home Education, I do so with the sincerest deference to mothers, believing that, in the words of a wise teacher of men, " the woman receives from the Spirit of God Himself the intuitions into the child's character, the capacity of appreciating its strength and its weakness, the faculty of calling forth the one and sustaining the other^ in which .Kes the mystery of education, apart from which all its rules vi INTEODtJOTORY. and measures are utterly vain and ineffectual." * But, just in proportion as a mother has this peculiar insight as regards her own children, she will, I think, feel her need of a know- ledge of the general principles of education, founded upon the nature and the needs of all children. And this know- ledge of the science of education, not the best of mothers will get from above ; seeing that we do not often receive as a gift that which we have the means of getting by our own efforts. Let me add one thing more : in the following lectures, my attempt is, to point out, not what is practicable, but what appears to me absolutely lest for the child from an educa- tional point of view. In hardly two households would the same plans be practicable ; but every mother may strike out a course for herself, including so much of what seems to her " the best " as her circumstances admit of. " What else am I for ? " said a wise mother with reference to her duties in the education of her children; but, unhappily, it is not every mother who is free to make the bringing up of her children her profession, that is,,, to give herself . up to it seriously, regularly, punctually, as a man .doep to the business by which he gets his living. I beg to offer my grateful thanksto William Dobie, Esq., M.D., of Eeighley, for the careful and able revision he has given to such parts of this work as rest on a physiological basis. May I, in concluding, draw the attention of the readerto the following suggestive remarks, bearing on education, -from the pen of a thoughtful writer on psychological subjects?- . C. M. M, Mahningham, September, 1886. * The Rev. F. D. Maurice. INTEODUOTORY. vii " The indisputaWe fact that education and medicine have hitherto followed their own empirical methods without much regard to the sciences, arises partly from the diiference between practice and theory, art and science; and partly from the urgency of practical application, which cannot await the final results of research, and their systematizati9n in abstract principles. The child has to be taught and the patient treated according to the means at hand ; tutor and physician must be guided by such light as he has ; he cannot wait until science has disentangled from the mass of mingled prejudice, precipitation, ignorance, and knowledge the true laws of mental and bodily life. All this is true. Never- theless, it is likewise true that both tutor and physician have been guided by the psychological and physiological conr ceptions current in their time, although supplementing these with empirical observations and traditional prejudices, and following the latter even when they were irreconcilable with the ascertained laws of science. The absurd notions respecting the nature of the mind, its simplicity, autonomy, independence of the organism, and its equality in all men, are clearly recognizable in the current practices of educators; just as, formerly, absurd notions respecting a vital principle, and -the nature of the entity named disease, directed medical practice, " Once recognize that education is an art which has its scientific basis in psychology, and the importance of having a rational and verifiable basis, rather than one that is un- verifiable, becomes obvious. Jn proportion, therefore, as psychology acquires scientific precision its influence on education will become beneficent, and thus also an improved viii INTEODtCTORY. physiology ■will lead to a better ai:t of medicine, without, in either case, removing the difficulties belonging to each practical application of abstract principles. A knowledge of the way in which faculties are evolved, impression^ organized, moral and scientific intuitions formed, habits established, and the structure no less than the furniture of the mind receives its individual character from the silent and incessant modifications of experience, will make parents and teachers keenly alive to the incalculable importance of the conditions under which the early years of the child are passed. Whoever has closely studied the evolution of 'the faculties will see the folly and the wickedness of leaving children to the care of ignorant servants and vulgar com- panions at a period when impressions are most indelible, — a period when, as we know, the germs of the future character are deposited-. If out of the same nursery, the same school- room, and what seems the same environment, children of the same parents are so markedly unlike in disposition, talents, tempers, it has to be considered that the original differences in their organisms give rise, even under the same circumstances, to a difference in an important element — the individual experiences. To gain some glimpse of the way in which intuitions are established and dispositions formed is the first task of parent and teacher." * * Or. H. Lewes, "Problems of Life and Mind " (« The Study of Psy- chology,"). 'CdNtBKTS. THE EDUCATION OF CHILDREN UNDEE NINE YEAES OF AGE. LECTURE I. SOME PEBLTMINAEY CONSIDEHATIONS. A method of education — The child's estate — Offending the children — Despising the children — Hindering the children — Conditions of healthy brain-activity — " The reign of law " in education . 1-30 LKCTUEE II. OUT-OF-DOOB LIFE FOK THE CHILDEEN. " Sight-seeing " — " PicUu-e-painting " — Flowers and trees — " Living creatures " — Keld-lore and naturalists' books — The child gets know- ledge by means of his senses — The child should be made familiar with natural objects — Out-of-door geography — The child and mother Nature — Out-of-door games, etc. — Walks in bad weather — The children require country air 31-66 LECTUEE III. "habit is TEN NATURES." The children have no self-compelling power — Wliat is "Nature"? — Habit may supplant "Nature '' — The laying down of lines of habit— The physiology of habit — The forming of a habit, " Shut the door after'you"— Infant "habits "—Physical exercises . . . 67-95 X CONTENTS. LECTURE IV. SOME HABITS OF MIND — SOME MOKAL HABITS. The habit of attention — -The habits of application, etc. — The habit of thinking — The habit of imagining — The habit of remembering — The habit of perfect execution — Some moral habits — Obedience — Truth- fulness — Sweet temper ,,..... 96-124 LECTURE V, LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OP EDUCATION. Kindergarten games and occupations — Reading — Writing — Arithmetic^ Natural philosophy — Geography — History — Grammar — Latin — French— Music 125-166 LECTURE VL THE WILL — THE CONSCIENCE — THE DIVINE LIFE IN THE CHILD. The will— The conscience— The Divine life in the child . , 167-197 THE HOME EDUCATION OP THE SCHOOLBOY AND SCHOOLGIRL. LECTURE VIL THE E5LATI.0NS pETWEEN ^CHOQL LIFE AND HOME LIFE— SCHOOL DIS- CIPLINE AND HOME TRAINING. School, a new experience — Examinations — The playground — School government— Girls' schools^Home training, physical— Home train- ing, intellectual— Home training, moral— The awkward age— Home training, religious— Home culture— Books—The art of reading aloud —The book for the evening lecture- Poetry ns a means of culture- Table-talk — -SIsthetic culture . . , , . . 199-246 CONTENTS. :xi THE TKAINING OF THE YOUNG MAIDENS AT HOME. LECTURE VIII. YOUKG MAIDENHOOD — THE FOEMATION OP CHAEACTEE AKB OPINIONS. Culture of character — Liberty and responsibility— Conduct — Pleasure and duty — Opinions — Pursuits and occupations — Objects in life — Value of special training 247-277 HOME EDUCATION", LECTUEE I. SOME PBBLIMINAEY CONSIDERATIONS. Not the least sign of tlie higher status they have gained is the growing desire for work that ohtains amongst educated women. The world wants the work of such women ; and, presently, as education becomes more general, we shall see all women with the capacity to work falling into the ranks of working women, with definite tasks, fixed hours, and for wages, the pleasure and honour of doing useful work if they are under no necessity to earn money. Now, that work which is of most importance to society is the bringing-up and instruction of the children — in the school, certainly, but far more in the home, because it is more than anything else the home influences brought to bear upon the child that determine the character and career of the future man or woman. It is a great thing to be a parent : there is no promotion, no dignity, to compare with it. The parents of but one child may be cherishing what shall prove a blessing to the world. But then, intrusted with such a charge, they are not free to say, " I may do as I will with mine own." The children are, in truth, to be regarded less as personal property than as public tnists, pitt into the hands of parents 2 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. I. that they make the very most of them for the good of society. And this responsibility is not equally divided between the parents : it is upon the mothers of the present that the future of the world depends, because it is the mothers who have the sole direction of the children's early, most impressible years. This is why we hear so frequently of great men who have had good mothers — that is, mothers who brought up their dhildren themselves and did not make over their gravest duty to indifferent persons. " The mother is qualified," says Pestalozzi, " and qualified by the Creator Himself, to become the principal agent in the development of her child ; . . . and what is demanded of her is — a thinldng love. . . . God has given to thy child all the faculties of our nature, but the grand point remains un- decided — how shall this heart, this head, these hands, be employed? to whose service shall they be dedicated? A question the answer to which involves a futurity of hap- piness or misery to a life so dear to thee. Maternal love is the first agent in education." * We are waking up to our duties, and in proportion as mothers become more highly educated and efficient, they will doubtless feel the more strongly that the education of their children, during the first seven or eight years of life, is an undertaking hardly to be intrusted to any hands but their own. And they will take it up as their profession— that is, with the diligence, regularity, and punctuality which men bestow on their professional labours. That the mother may know what she is about, may come thoroughly furnished to her work, she should have something more than a hearsay acquaintance with the theory of educa- tion, and with those conditions of the child's nature upon which such theory rests. " The training of children," says Mr. Herbert Spencer,— » B. H. Quick, M.A., "Essays ou Eduoatijnal Beformers," Leot. 1.] SOME PBELIMINAEY CONSIDEEATIONS. 3 " physical, moral, and intellectual, — is dreadfully defective. 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 intri- cate of problems is undertaken by those who have given scarcely a thought to the principle on which its solution depends ? For shoemaking or house-building, for the man- agement of a ship or of a locomotive engine, a long appren- ticeship 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 pre- paration whatever ? If not — if the process is, with one excep- tion, more complex than any in nature, and the task of ministering 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. . . . Some acquaintance with the first principles of physiology and the elementary truths of psychology is indispensable for the right bringing-up of children. . . . Here are the indis- putable facts : — that the development of children in mind and body follows certain laws ; that unless 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 completely conformed to can a perfect maturity be reached. Judge, then, whether all who may one day be {)arents should not strive with some anxiety to learn what these laws are." * A Meihod of Education. Never was it more necessary for parents to face for them selves this question of education in all its bearings. Hitherto, children have been brought up upon traditional methods * Herbert Spencer, " Education.'' 4 HOME EDUCATION. [Lbct. I. mainly. The experience of our ancestors, floating in a vast mimber of educational maxims, is handed on from lip to lip ; and few or many of these maxims form the educational code of every household. But we hardly take in how complete a revolution advanc- ing science is effecting in the theory of education. The traditions of the elders have been tried and found wanting ; it will be long before the axioms of the new school pass into common currency ; and, in the mean time, parents are thrown upon their own resources, and absolutely must weigh prin- ciples, and adopt a method, of education for themselves. For instance, according to the former code, a mother might use her slipper now and then, to good effect and with- out blame; but now, the person of the child is, whether rightly or wrongly, held sabred, and the infliction of pain for moral purposes is pretty generally disallowed. Again, the old rule for the children's table was, "the plainer the better, and let hunger bring sauce ; " now, the children's diet must be at least as nourishing and as varied as that of their elders ; and appetite, the craving for certain kinds of food, hitherto a vicious tendency to be repressed, is now within certain limitations the parents' most trustworthy guide in arranging a dietary for their children. That children should be trained to endure hardness, was a principle of the old regime, " I shall never make a sailor if I can't face the wind and rain," said a little fellow of five who was taken out on a bitter night to see a torchlight prOf cession; and, though shaking with cold, he declined the shelter of a shed. Nowadays, the shed is everything ; the children must not be permitted to suffer from fatigue or exposure. That children should do as they are bid, mind their books, and take pleasure as it offers when nothing stands in the way, sums up the old theory; now, the pleasures of the Lect. I.] SOME PEELIMINAEY CONSIDEEATIGKS. 5 children are apt to he made of more account tlian their duties. Formerly, they were brought up in subjection ; now, the elders give place, and the world is made for the children, English people rarely go so far as the parents of that story in " French Home Life," who arrived an hour late at a dinner-party, because they had been desired by their girl of three to undress and go to bed when she did, and were able to steal away only when the child was asleep. We do not go so far, but that is the direction in which we are moving ; and how far the new theories of education are wise and humane, the outcome of more widely spread physiological and psychological knowledge, and how far they just pander to the child-worship to which we are all succumbing, is not a question to be decided off-hand. At any rate, it is not too much to say that a parent who does not follow reasonably a method of education, fully thought out, fails — now, more than ever before — to fulfil the claims his children have upon him. Method implies two things — a way to an end, and step- by-step progress in that way. Further, the following of a method implies an idea, a mental image, of the end or object to be arrived at. What do you propose that education shall effect in and for your child? Again, method is natural; easy, yielding, unobtrusive, simple as the ways of Nature herself; yet, watchful, careful, all-pervading, all-compelling. Method, with the end of education in view, presses the most unlikely matters into service to bring about that end ; but with no more tiresome mechanism than the sun employs when it makes the winds to blow and the waters to flow only by shining. The parent who sees Ms way — that is the exact force of method — to educate his child, will make use of every circumstance of the child's life almost without inten- tion on his own part, so easy and spontaneous is a method of 6 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. I. education iDased upon Natural Law. Does the child eat or drink, does he come, or go, or play — all the time he is heing educated, though he is as little aware of it as he is of the act of breathing. There is always the danger that a method, a bond fide method, should degenerate into a. mere system. The Kindergarten Method, for instance, deserves the name, as having heen conceived and perfected by large-hearted educators to aid the many-sided evolution of the living, growing, most complex human being ; but what a miserable Wooden system does it become in the hands of ignorant practitioners ! A "system of education" is an alluring fg,ncy; more so, on some counts, than a method, because it is pledged to more definite calculable results. By means of a system certain developments may be brought about through the observance of given rules. Shorthand, dancing, how to pass examina- tions, how to become a good accountant, or a woman of society, may all be learned upon systems. System — the observing of rules until the habit of doing certain things, of behaving in certain ways, is confirmed, and, therefore, the art is acquired — is so successful in achiev- ing precise results that it is no wonder there should be endless attempts to straiten the whole field of education to the limits of a system. If a human being were a machine, education could do no more for him than to set him in action in prescribed ways, and the work of the educator would be, simply, to adopt a good working system or set of systems. But the educator has to deal with a self-acting, self- developing being, and his business is to guide, and assist in, the production of the latent good in that being, the dissipa- tion of the latent evil, the preparation of the child to take his place in the world at his best, with every capacity for good that is in him developed into a power. Leot. I.] SOME PBBLIMINAEY CONSIDERATIONS. 7 Thougli system is highly tiseful as an instrument of education, a " system of education " is mischievous, as pro- ducing only mechanical action instead of the vital growth and movement of a living being. It is worth while to point out the opposite characters of a system and a niethod, hecause parents let themselves be run away with often enough by some plausible "system," the object of which is to produce development in one direction — of the muscles, of the memory, of the reasoning faculty — and to rest content, as if that single development were a complete all-round education. This easy satisfaction arises from the sluggishness of human nature, to which any definite scheme is more agreeable than the constant watchfulness, the unfore- seen action, called for when the whole of a child's existence is to be used as the means of his education. But who is suiS- cient for an education so comprehensive, so incessant? A parent may be willing to undergo any definite labours for his child's sake ; but to be always catering for his behoof, always contriving that circumstances shall play upon him for his good, is the part of a god and not of a man ! A reasonable objection enough, if one looks upon education as an endless series of independent efforts, each to be thought out and acted out on the spur of the moment ; but the fact is, that a few broad essential principles cover the whole field, and, these once fully laid hold of, it is as easy and natural to act upon them as it is to act upon our knowledge of such facts as that fire burns and water flows. My endeavour in this and the following lectures will be to put these few fundamental principles before you in their practical bearing. Meantime, let us consider one or two preliminary questions. The Child's Estate. And, first, let us consider where and what the little being is who is intrusted to the care of human parents. A 8 HOME EDUCATION. thisci. I. tablet to be written upon ? A twig to be bent ? Wax to be moulded? Very likely; but be is much more — a being belonging to an altogether higher estate than ours, as it were, a prince committed to the fostering care of peasants. Hear Wordsworth's estimate of the child's estate : — " Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting : The sonl that rises with us, our life's star, Hath had elsewhere its setting. And Cometh from afar ; Not in entire forgetfulness. And not in utter nakedness. But trailing clouds of glory do we come From God, who is our home : Heaven lies about us in our infancy ! Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie Thy soul's immensity ; Thou beat philosopher, who yet dost keep Thy heritage ; thou eye among the blind. That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep. Haunted for ever by the eternal mind, — Mighty Prophet ! Seer blest ! On whom those truths do rest, Which we are toiling all our lives to find ; Thou, over whom thy immortality Broods like the day, a master o'er a slave, A presence which is not to be put by ; Thou little child, yet glorious in the might Of heaven-born freedom, on thy being's height, — and so on, through the whole of that great ode, which, next after the Bible, shows the deepest insight into what is pecu- liar to the children in their nature and estate. "Of such is the kingdom of heaven." "Except ye become as little children ye shall in no case enter the kingdom of heaven ? " " Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven ? And He called a little child, and set him in the midst." Here is the Leot. I.] SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS. 9 Divine estimate of the child's estate. It is worth while for parents to ponder every utterance in the Gospels about the children, divesting themselves of the notion that these say- ings belong, in the first place, to the grown-up people who have become as little children. What these profound sayings are, and how much they may mean, it is beyond us to discuss here ; only they appear to cover far more than Wordsworth claims for the children in his sublimest reach, — " Trailing clouds of glory do wo come From God, who is our home." It may surprise parents who have not given much attention to the subject to discover also a code of education in the Gospels, expressly laid down by Christ. It is summed up in three commandments, and all three have a negative character, as if the chief thing required of grown-up people is that they should do no sort of injury to the children : Talte heed that ye offend not — despise not — hinder not — one of these little ones. So run the three educational laws of the New Testament, which, when separately examined, appear to me to cover all the help we can give the children and all the harm we can save them from; that is, whatever is included in training up a child in the way he should go. Let us look upon these three great laws as prohibitive, in order to clear the ground for the consideration of a method of education ; for if we once settle with ourselves what we may not do, we are greatly helped to see what we may do, and must do. But, as a matter of fact, the positive is included in the negative, what we are bound to do for the child in what we are forbidden to do to his hurt. Offending the Children. The first and second of the Divine edicts appear to include our sins of commission and of omission against the 10 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. I. children : we offend them, when we do hy them that which we ought not to have done ; we despise them, when we leave undone those things which, for their sakes, we ought to have done. An offence, we know, is literally a stumbling- block, that which trips up the walker and causes him to fall. Mothers know what it is to clear the floor of every obstacle when a baby takes his unsteady little runs from chair to chair, from one pair of loving arms to another. The table- leg, the child's toy on the floor, which has caused a fall and a pitiful cry, is a thing to be deplored ; why did not somebody put it out of the way, so that the baby should- not stumble? But the little child is going out into the world, with uncertain tottering steps, in many directions. There are causes of stumbling not so easy to remove as an offending footstool ; and woe to him who causes the child to fall ! "Naughty babyl" says the mother; and the child's ej'es droop, and a flush rises over neck and brow. It is very wonderful ; very " funny,'' some people think, and say " Naughty baby ! " when the baby is sweetly good, to amuse themselves with the sight of the infant soul rising visibly before their eyes. But what does it mean, this display of feeling, conscience, in the child, before any human teaching can have reached him ? No less than this, that he is born a law-abiding being, with a sense of may, and must not, of right and wrong. That is how the children are sent into the world with the warning, " Take heed that ye offend not one of these little ones." And — this being so — who has not met big girls and boys, the children of right-minded parents, who yet do not know what must means, who are not moved by ougTit, whose hearts feel no stir at the solemn name of duty, who know no higher rule of life than " I want," and " I don't want," " I like," and " I don't like " ? Heaven Help parents and children when it has come to that ! Lect. I.J SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS. 11 But how has it been brought about that the babe, with an acute sense of right and wrong even when it can understand little of human speech, should grow into the boy or girl already proving "the curse of lawless heart"? By slow degrees, here a little and there a little, as all that is good or bad in character comes to pass. " Naughty ! " says the mother, again, when a little hand is thrust info the sugar-bowl ; and a pair of roguish eyes seek hers furtively, to measure, as they do unerringly, how far the little pilferer may go. It is very amusing; the mother " cannot help laughing ; " and — the little trespass is allowed to pass : and, what the poor mother has not thought of, an offence, a cause of stumbling, has been cast into the path of her two-years-old child. He has learned already that that which is " naughty " may yet be done with impunity, and he goes on improving his knowledge. It is needless to continue ; everybody knows the steps by which the mother's " no " comes to be disregarded, her refusal teased into consent. The child has learned to believe that he has nothing to overcome but his mother's disinclination — it she choose to let him do this and that, there is no reason why she should not, — he can make her choose to let him do the thing forbidden, and then he may do it. The next step in the argument is not too great for childish wits : if his mother does what she chooses, of course he will do what he chooses, if he can ; and henceforward the child's life becomes an endless struggle to get his own way, — a struggle in which a parent is pretty sure to be worsted, having many things to think of, while the child sticks persistently to the thing which has his fancy for the moment. Where is the beginning of this tangle, spoiling the lives of parent and child alike ? In this : that the mother began with no sufScient sense of duty; she thought herself free to allow and disallow, to say and unsay, at pleasure, as if the child were hers to do what she liked with. The 12 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. I. child has never discovered a background of mmt behind his mother's decisions ; he does not know that she must not let him break his sister's playthings, gorge himself with cake, spoil the pleasure of other people, because these things are not right. Let the child perceive that his parents are law-com- pelled as well as he, that they simply cannot allow him to do the things which have been forbidden, and he submits with the sweet meekness which belongs to his age. To give reasons to a child is usually out of place, and is a sacrifice of parental dignity ; but he is quick enough to read the " must " and " ought " which rule her, in his mother's face and manner, and in the fact that she is not to be moved from a resolution in any question of right and wrong. This, of allowing him in what is wrong, is only one of many ways in which the loving mother may offend her child. Through ignorance, or wilfulness, which is worse, she may not only allow wrong in him, but do wrong by him. She may cast a stumbling-block in the way of his physical life by giving him unwholesome food, letting him sleep and live in ill- ventilated rooms, — by disregarding any or every of the simple laws of health, ignorance of which is hardly to be excused in the face of the pains taken by scientific men to bring this necessary knowledge within the reach of every one. Almost as bad is the way the child's intellectual life may be wrecked at its outset by a round of dreary dawdling lessons in which definite progress is the last thing made or expected, and which, so far from educating in any true sense — that is, educing, drawing out, the faculties of the child, — stultify his wits in a way he never gets over. Many a little girl, especially, leaves the home school-room with a dis- taste for all manner of learning, an aversion to mental effort, which lasts her her lifetime, and that is why she grows up to read little but trashy novels, and to talk all day about her clothes. Lect. I.] SOME PEELIMINAEY CONSIDERATIONS. 13 And her affections — the movements of the outo^oino- tender child-heart — how are they treated? There are few- mothers who do not take pains to cherish the family affections ; hut when the child comes to have dealings with outsiders, do no worldly maxims and motives ever nip the huds of childish love ? Far worse than this happens when the child's love finds no natural outlets within her home — when she is the plain or the dull child of the family, and is left out in the cold, while the parents' affection is lavished on the rest. Of course she does not love her brothers and sisters, who mono- polise what should have heen hers too. And how is she to love her parents? Nobody knows the real anguish which many a child in the nursery suffers from this cause, nor how many lives are embittered and spoiled through the sup- pression of these childish affections. "My childhood was made miserable," a lady said to me a while ago, " by my mother's doting fondness for my little brother; there was not a day when she did not make me wretched by coming into the nursery to fondle and play with him, and all the time, she had not a word, nor a look, nor a smile for me, any more than if I had not been in the room. I have, never got over it ; she is very kind to me now, but I never feel quite natural with her. And how can we two, brother and sister, feel for each other as we should if we had grown up together in' love in the nursery ? " Despising the GMldren. Suppose that a mother may offend her child, how is it possible that she should despise him ? " Despise : to have a low opinion of, to undervalue," — thus the dictionary ; and, as a matter of fact, however much we may delight in them, we grown-up people have far too low an opinion of -children. If the mother did not undervalue her child, would she leave him to the society of an ignorant nursemaid during the early 14 HOME EDUCATION. [Lbot. I. years, when his whole nature is like the photographer's sensi- tive plate, receiving momently indelible impressions ? Not hut that his nurse is good for the child. Very likely it would not answer for educated people to have their children always about them. The constant society of his parents might be too stimulating for the child; and frequent change of thought, and the society of other people, make the mother all the fresher for her children. But they should have the best of their mother, her freshest brightest hours, while, at the same time, she is careful to choose her nurses wisely, train them carefully, and keep a vigilant eye upon all that goes on in the nursery. A good devoted mother is seldom with- out a good devoted nurse; all the same, it would be a boon to mothers if there were training-schools for nurses, where they should not only be instructed in their duties, but awakened to some sense of their great responsibility. Mere coarseness and rudeness in his nurse does the tender child lasting harm. Many a child leaves the nursery with his moral sense blunted, and with an alienation from his heavenly Father set up which may last his lifetime. For the child's moral touch is exceedingly quick ; he is all eyes and ears for the slightest act or word of unfairness, deception, shiftiness. His nurse says, " If you'll be a good boy, I won't tell," and the child learns that things may be concealed from his mother, who should be to him as God, knowing all his good and evil. And it is not as if the child noted the slips of his elders with aversion. He Jcnows better, it is true, but then he does not trust his own intuitions, he shapes his life on any pattern set before him, and with the fatal taint of human nature upon him, he is more ready to imitate a bad pattern than a good. Give him a nurse who is coarse, violent, and tricky, and before the child is able to speak plainly, he will have caught these dispositions. One of many ways in which parents are apt to have too Leot. I.] SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDBRATIOKS. 15 low an opinion of their childreu is in the matter of their faults. A little child shows some ugly trait — he is greedy, and gobbles up his sister's share of goodies as well as his own ; he is vindictive, ready to bite or fight the hand that offends him ; he tells a lie — no, he did not touch the sugar- bowl or the jam-pot. The mother puts off the evil day : she knows she must sometime reckon with the child for these offences, but iu the meantime she says, "Oh, it does not matter this time ; he is very little, and will know better by- and-by." To put the thing on no higher grounds, what happy days for herself and her children would the mother secure if she would keep watch at the place of the letting out of waters. If the mother settle it in her own mind that the child never does wrong without being aware of his wrongdoing, she will see that he is not too young to have his fault corrected or prevented. Deal with a child on his first offence, and a grieved look is enough to convict the little transgressor ; but let him go on until a habit of wrongdoing is formed, and the cure is a slow one, — then the mother has no chance until she has formed in him a contrary habit of well- doing. To laugh at ugly tempers and let them pass because , the child is small, is to sow the wind. Hindering the Children. The most fatal way of despising the child falls under the third educational law of the Gospels ; it is to overlook and make light of his natural relationship with Almighty God. " Suffer the little children to come unto Me," says the Saviour, as if that were the natural thing for the children to do, the thing they do when they are not hindered by their elders. And perhaps it is not too beautiful a thing to believe in this redeemed world, that, as the babe turns to his mother though he he has no power to say her name, as the flowers turn to the sun, so the hearts of the children turn to their 16 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. I, Saviour and God with unconscious delight and trust. Now listen to what goes on in many a nursery : " God does not love you, you naughty wicked boy ! " " He will send you to the bad wicked place,'' and so on ; and this all the practical teaching about the ways of his " almighty Lover " that the child gets! — never a word of how God does love and cherish the little children all day long, and fills their hours with delight. Add to this, listless perfunctory prayers, idle discussions of divine things in their presence, light use of holy words, few signs whereby the child can read that the things of God are more to his parenis than any things of the world, and the child is hindered, tacitly forbidden to " come unto Me," — and this, often, by parents who in the depths of their hearts desire nothing in comparison with God. The mischief lies in that same foolish undervaluing of the children, in the notion that the child can have no spiritual life until it please his elders to kindle the flame. Conditions of Healthy Brain- Activity, Having just glanced at the wide region of forbidden ground, we are prepared to consider what it is, definitely and positively, that the mother owes to her child under the name of Education. And, first of all, the more educable powers of the child — his intelligence, his will, his moral feelings — have their seat in the brain; that is to say, as the eye is the organ of sight, so is the brain, or some part of it, the organ of thought and will, of love and worship. Authorities differ as to how far it is possible to localise the functions of the brain ; but this at least seems pretty clear — that none of the functions of mind are performed without real activity in the mass of grey and white nervous matter named " the brain." Now, this is not a matter for the physiologist alone, but for every mother and father of a family ; because that Lect. I.] SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS. 17 wonderful iDraiii, by means of which we do our thinking, if it is to act healthily and in harmony with the healthful action of the members, should act only under such conditions of exercise, rest, and nutrition as secure health in every other part of the body. (a) Exercise. — Most of us have met with a few eccentric and a good many silly persons, concerning whom the question forces itself. Were these people born with less brain power than others? Probably not; but if they were allowed to grow up without the daily habit of appropriate moral and mental worJc, if they were allowed to dawdle through youth without regular and sustained efforts of thought or will, the result would be the same, and the brain, which should have been invigorated by daily exercise, has become flabby and feeble as a healthy arm would be after being carried for years in a sling. The large active brain is not content with entire idleness ; it strikes out lines for itself and works fit- fully, and the man or woman becomes eccentric, because wholesome mental effort, like moral, must be carried on under the discipline of rules. A shrewd writer suggests that mental indolence may have been in some measure the cause of those pitiable attacks of derangement and depres- sion from which poor Cowper suffered ; the making of grace^ ful verses when the " maggot bit " did not afford him the amount of mental labour necessary for his well-being. The outcome of which is — do not let the children pass a day without distinct efforts, intellectual, moral, volitional ; let them brace themselves to understand ; let them compel themselves to do and to bear; and let them do right at the sacrifice of ease or pleasure : and this for many highej? reasons, but, in the first and lowest place, that the mere physical organ of mind and will may grow vigorous with work. (h) Best, and Change of Occupation. — Just as important is c 18 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. I. it that the hrain should have due rest ; that is, should rest and work alternately. And here two considerations come into play. In the first place, when the brain is actively at work it is treated as is every other organ of the body in the same circumstances ; that is to say, a large additional supply of blood is attracted to the head for the nourishment of the organ which is spending its substance in hard work. Now, there is not an indefinite quantity of what we will for the moment call surplus blood in the vessels. The supply is regulated on the principle that only one set of organs shall be excessively active at one time — now the limbs, now the digestive organs, now the brain ; and all the blood in the body that can be spared goes to the support of those organs -which, for the time being, are in a state of labour. The child has just had his dinner, the meal of the day which most severely taxes his digestive organs : for as much as two or three hours after, much labour is going on in these organs, and the blood that can be spared from elsewhere is present to assist. Now, send the child out for a long walk immediately after dinner — the blood goes to the labouring extremities, and the food is left half digested ; give the child a regular course of such dinners and walks, and he will grow up a dyspeptic. Set him to his books after a heavy meal, and the case is as bad ; the blood which should have been assist- ing in the digestion of the meal goes to the labouring brain. It follows that the hours for lessons should be carefully chosen, after periods of mental rest — sleep or play for instance ^-and when there is no excessive activity in any other part of the system. Thus, the morning, both before and after breakfast (the digestion of which lighter meal is not a severe tax), is much the best time for lessons and every sort of mental "workj if the afternoon cannot be spared for Recreation, that is the time for mechanical tasks, such as needlework, drawing, practising; the children's wits are Lect. I.] SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS. 19 bright enough in the evening, but the drawback to evening work is, that the brain, once excited, is inclined to carry on its labours beyond bed time, and dreams, wakefulness, and uneasy sleep attend the poor child who has been at work until the last minute. If the elder children must work in the evening, they should have at least one or two pleasant social hours before they go to bed. " There is," says Huxley, " no satisfactory proof, at present, that the manifestation of any particular kind of mental faculty is especially allotted to, or connected with, the activity of any particular region of the cerebral hemi- spheres," — a dictum against the phrenologists, but coming to us on too high authority to be disputed. It is not possible to localise the faculties — to say you are cautious with this fraction of your brain, and music-loving with another ; but this much is certain, and is very important to the educator : the brain, or some portion of the brain, becomes exhausted when any given faculty is kept too long on the stretch. The child has been doing sums for some time, and is getting iinaccountably stupid : take away his slate and let him read history, and you find his wits fresh again. Imagination, which has had no part in the sums, is called into play by the history lesson, and the child brings a lively unexhausted faculty to his new work. School time-tables are usually drawn up with a view to give the several mental faculties of the child alternate rest and labour; but the secret of the weariness children often show in the home school-room is, that no such judicious change of lessons is contrived. (c) Nourishment. — ^Again, the brain cannot do its work well unless it be abundantly and suitably nourished ; some- body has made a calculation of how many ounces of brain went to the production of such a work — say " Paradise Lost," — how many to such another, and so on. Without going into mental arithmetic of this nature, we may say with safety, 20 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. 1. that every sort of intellectual activity wastes the tissues of the brain; a net- work of vessels supplies an enormous quantity of Wood to the hrain, to make up for this waste of material; and the vigour and health of the brain depend upon the quality and quantity of this blood-supply. Now, the quality of the blood is affected by three or four causes. In the first place, the blood is elaborated from the food ; the more nutritious and easy of digestion the food, the more vital will be the properties of the blood. The food must be varied, too, — a mixed diet, — because various ingre- dients are required to make up for the various waste in the tissues. The. children are shocking spendthrifts ; their end- less goings and comings, their restlessness, their energy, the very wagging of their tongues, all mean expenditure of sub- stance : the loss is not appreciable, but they lose something by every sudden sally, out of doors or within. No doubt the gain of power which results from exercise is more than com- pensation for the loss of substance ; but, all the same, this loss must be promptly made good. And not only is the body of the child more active, proportionably, than that of the man ; the child's brain as compared with the man's is in a perpetual flutter of endeavour. It is calculated that though the brain of a man weighs no more than a fortieth part of his body, yet a fifth or a sixth of his whole complement of blood goes to nourish this delicate and intensely active organ ; but, in the child's case, a considerably larger proportion of the blood that is in him is spent on the sustenance of his brain. And all the time, with these excessive demands upon him, the child has to grow ! not merely to make up for waste, but to produce new substance in brain and body. What is the obvious conclusion ? That the child must be well fed. Half the people of low vitality we come aojross are the victims of low-feeding during their childhood ; Lect. I.] SOME PEBLIMINABY CONSIDEEATIONS, 21 and that, lliore often because their parents were not- alive to their duty in this respect, than because they were not in a position to afford their children the diet necessary to their full physical and mental development. Eegular meals at unhrohen intervals — dinner, never more than five hours after breakfast; luncheon, unnecessary; animal food once certainly, in some lighter form, twice a day — are the suggestions of common-sense followed out in most well-regulated households. But it is not the food which is eaten, but the food which is digested that nourishes body and brain. And here so many considerations press that we can only glance at two or three of the most obvious. Everybody knows that children should not eat pastry, or pork, or fried meats, or cheese, or rich, highly flavoured food of any description; that pepper, mustard, and vinegar, sauces and spices, should be forbidden, with new bread, rich cakes, and jams, like plum or gooseberry, in which the leathery coat of the fruit is preserved ; that milk, or milk and water, and that not too warm, or cocoa, is the best drink for children, and that they should be trained not to drink until they have finished eating ; that fresh fruit at breakfast is invaluable; that, as serving the same end, oatmeal porridge and treacle, and the fat of toasted bacon, are valuable breakfast foods ; and that a glass of water, also, taken the last thing at night and the first thing in the morn- ing, is useful in promoting those regular habits on which much of the comfort of life depends. All this and much of the same kind it is needless to urge ; but again let me say, it is digested food that nourishes the system, and people are apt to forget how far mental and moral conditions affect the processes of digestion. The fact is, that the gastric juices which act as solvents to the viands are only secreted freely when the mind is in a cheerful and contented frame. If the child dislikes his dinner he swal- lows it, but the digestion of that distasteful meal is a 22 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. I. laborious much-impeded process : if the meal is eaten in silence, unrelieved by pleasant chat, the child loses much of the "good" of his dinner. Hence it is not a matter of pampering them at all, but a matter of health, of due nutrition, that the children should enjoy their food, and that their meals should be eaten in gladness ; though, by the way, joyful excitement is as mischievous as its opposite in destroying that even, cheerful tenor of mind favourable to the processes of digestion. No pains should be spared to make the hours of meeting round the family table the brightest hours of the day. This is supposing that the children are allowed to sit at table with their parents, and, if it is possible to let them do so at every meal excepting a late dinner, the advantage to the little people is incal- culable. Here is the parents' opportunity to train them in manners and in morals, to cement family love, and to accustom the children to habits — such as that of thorough mastication, for instance — as important on the score of health as on that of propriety. But, given pleasant surroundings and excellent food, and even then the requirements of these exacting little people are not fully met : plain as their food should be, they must have variety. A leg of mutton every Tuesday, the same cold on Wednesday, and hashed on Thursday, may be very good food; but the child who has this diet week after week is inadequately nourished, simply because he is tired of it. The mother should contrive a rotation for her children that will last at least a fortnight without the same dinner recurring twice. Pish, even if the chil- dren dine off it without meat to follow, is excellent as a change, the more so as it is rich in phosphorus — a valu- able brain food. The children's puddings deserve a good deal of consideration, because they do not commonly care for fatty foods, but prefer to derive the warmth of their Lect. I.] SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS. 23 bodies from the starch and sugar of their pnddings. But give them variety; do not let it be "everlasting tapioca." Even for tea and breakfast the wise mother does not say, " I always give my children so and so." They should not have anything "always;" every meal should have some little surprise. But is this the way, to make them think overmuch of what they shall eat and what they shall drink ? On the contrary, it is the underfed children who are greedy, and unfit to be trusted with any unusual delicacy. (d) Pure Air. — The quality of the blood depends almost as much on the air we breathe as on the food we eat : in the course of every two or three minutes, all the blood in the body passes through the endless ramifications of the lungs, for no other purpose than that, during the instant of its passage, it should be acted upon by the oxygen contained in the air which is drawn into the lungs in the act of breathing. But what can happen to the blood in the course of an exposure of so short duration ? Just this — the whole character, the very colour, of the blood is changed : it enters the lungs spoiled, no longer capable of sustaining life ; it leaves them, a pure and vital fluid. Now, observe, the blood is only fully oxygenated when the air contains its full pro- portion of oxygen, and every breathing and every burning object withdraws some oxygen from the air. Hence the importance of giving the children daily airings and abundant exercise of limb and lung in unvitiated, unimpoverished air. About out-of-door airings we shall have occasion'to speak more fully ; but indoor airings are truly as important, because, if the tissues are nourished upon impure blood for all the hours the child spends in the house, the mischief will not be mended in the shorter intervals spent out-of-doors. Put two or three breathing bodies, as well as fire and gas, into a room, and it is incredible how soon the air becomes vitiated, unless it be constantly renewed ; that is, unless the room be well 24 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. I. ventilated. We know what it is to come in out of the fresh air and oomplain that a room feels stuffy, but sit in the room a few minutes, and you get accustomed to its stuffiness ; the senses are no longer a safe guide. Therefore, regular pro- vision must bo made for the ventilation of rooms regardless of the feelings of their inmates : at least an inch of window open at the top, day and night, renders a room tolerably safe, because it allows of the escape of the vitiated air, which, being light, ascends, leaving room for the influx of colder fresher air by cracts and crannies in doors and floors. An open chimney is a useful, though not a sufSoient ventilator; it is needless to say that the stopping-up of chimneys in sleeping-rooms is suicidal. It is particularly important to accustom children to sleep with at least an inch of open window all through the year — as much more as you like in the summer. There is a popular notion that night air is un- wholesome; but if you reflect that wholesome air is that which contains its full complement of oxygen, and no more than its very small complement of carbonic acid gas, and that all burning objects — fire, furnace, gas-lamp — give forth carbonic acid gas and consume oxygen, you will see that night air is, in ordinary circumstances, more wholesome than day air, simply because there is a less exhaustive drain upon its vital gas. When the children are out of a room which they commonly occupy, day nursery or breakfast-room, then is the opportunity to air it thoroughly by throwing windows and doors wide open and producing a thorough draught. (e) Sunshine. — But it is not only air, and pure air, the children must have if their blood is to be of the " finest quality," as the advertisements have it. Quite healthy blood is exceedingly rich ia minute, red disklike bodies, known as "red corpuscles," which in favourable circum- stances are produced freely in the blood itself. Now, it is observed that people who live much in the sunshine are of a Leot. I.] SOME PEBLIMINAEY OONSIDEEATIONS. 25 ruddy countenance, that is, a great many of these red cor- puscles are present in their blood ; while the poor souls who live in cellars and sunless alleys have skins the colour of whitey-brown paper. Therefore, it is concluded that light and sunshine are favourable to the production of red cor- puscles in the blood ; and, therefore — to this next " therefore " is but a step for the mother — the children's rooms should be on the sunny side of the house, with a south aspect if possible. Indeed, the whole house should be kept light and bright for their sakes; trees and outbuildings that obstruct the sunshine and make the children's rooms dull should be removed without hesitation, (/) Free Perspiration. — Another point must be attended to, in order to secure that the brain be nourished by healthy blood. The blood receives and gets rid of the waste of the tissues, and one of the most important agents by means of which it does this necessary scavenger's work is the skin. Millions of invisible pores perforate the skin, each the mouth of a minute tube, and each such pore is employed without a moment's cessation, while the body is in health, in dis- charging perspiration — that is, the waste of the tissues — upon the skin. When the discharge is excessive, we are aware of moisture upon the skin ; but, aware of it or not, the discharge is always going on ; and, what is more, if it be checked, or if a considerable portion of the skin be glazed, so that it becomes impervious, death will result. This is why people die in consequence of scalds or burns which injure a large surface of the skin, although they do not touch any vital organ; multitudes of minute tubes which should carry off injurious matters from the blood are closed, and, though the remaining surface of the skin and the other excretory organs take extra work upon them, it is impossible to make good the loss of what may be called efficient drainage over a considerable area. Therefore, if the brain is to be 26 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. I. duly nourished, it is important to keep tlie whole surface of the skin in a condition to throw off freely the excretions of the Mood. Two considerations follow : of the first, the necessity of the daily bath, followed by vigorous rubbing of the skin, it is needless to say a word here. But possibly it is not so well understood that children should be clothed ' throughout in porous garments which admit of the instant passing off of the exhalations of the skin. Why did delicate women faint, or, at any rate, " feel faint," when it was the custom to go to church in sealskin coats ? Why do people who sleep under down, or even under silk or cotton quilts, frequently rise unrefreshed ? From the one cause : their coverings have impeded the passage of the insensible perspi- ration, and so have hindered the skin in its function of relieving the blood of impurities. It is surprising what a constant loss of vitality many people experience from no other cause than the unsuitable character of their clothing. The children cannot be better dressed throughout than in loosely woven woollen garments, flannels and serges, of varying thicknesses for summer and winter wear. Woollens have other advantages over cotton and linen materials besides that of being porous. Wool is a bad conductor, and therefore does not allow of the too free escape of the animal heat; and it is absorbent, and therefore relieves the skin of the clammy sensations which follow sensible perspiration. We should be better for it if we could make up our minds to sleep in wool, discarding linen or cotton in favour of sheets made of some lightly woven wooUeft material. We might say much on this one question — the due nutri- tion of the brain — upon which the very possibility of healthy education depends. But something will have been effected if the reason why of only two or three practical rules of health is made so plain that they cannot be evaded without a sense of law-breaking. Leot. I.] SOME PEBLIMINAEY CONSIDERATIONS, 27 I fear you may be inclined to think that I am not carrying out my programme, in talking for the most part about a few physiological matters — the lowest round of the educational ladder. The lowest round it may he, but yet it is the lowest round, the necessary step to all the rest. For it is not too much to say that, in our present state of being, intellectual, moral, even spiritual life and progress depend greatly upon physical conditions. That is to say, not that he who has a fine physique is necessarily a good and clever man; but that the good and clever man requires much animal substance to make up for the expenditure of tissue brought about in the exercise of his virtue and his intellect. Tor example, is it easier to be amiable, kindly, candid, with or without a headache or a fit of neuralgia ? " The Beign of Law " in Education. Besides, though this physical culture of the brain may be only the groundwork of education, the method of it indicates what should be the method of all education ; that is, orderly, regulated progress under the guidance of Law. The reason why education effects so much less than it should effect is just this — that in nine cases out of ten, sensible good parents trust too much to their common sense and their good intentions, forgetting that common sense must be at the pains to instruct itself in the nature of the case, and that well-intended efforts come to little if they are not carried on in obedience to divine laws, to be read in many cases, not in the Bible, but in the facts of life. It is a shame to believing people that many whose highest profession is that they do not know, and therefore do not believe, should produce more blameless lives, freer from flaws of temper, from the vice of selfishness, than do many sincerely religious people. It is a fact that will confront the children by-and- by, and one of which they will require an explanation ; and 28 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot, I. ■what is more, it is a fact that will have more weight, should it confront them in the person of a character which they cannot but esteem and love, than all the doctrinal teaching they have had in their lives. This appears to me the threaten- ing danger to that confessed dependence upon and allegi- ance to Almighty God which we recognize as religion — not the wickedness, but the goodness of a school which refuses ■ to admit any such dependence and allegiance. You will forgive me for touching upon this crucial question when I eay, that my sense of this danger is my only reason for venturing to invite you to listen to the little I have to say upon the subject of education, — my sense of the danger, and the assur- ance I feel that it is no such great danger after all, but one that mothers of the cultivated class are competent to deal with, and are precisely the only persons who can deal with it. As for this superior morality of some nonbelievers, sup- posing we grant it, what does it amount to? Just to this, that the universe of mind, as the universe of matter, is governed by unwritten laws of God ; that the child 'cannot blow soap bubbles or think his flitting thoughts otherwise than in obedience to divine laws ; that all safety, progress, and success in life come of obedience to law, to the laws of mental, moral, or physical science, or of that spiritual science which the Bible unfolds ; that it is possible to ascertain laws and keep laws without recognizing the Lawgiver, and that those who do ascertain and keep any divine law inherit the blessing due to obedience, whatever be their attitude towards the Lawgiver : just as the man who goes out into blazing sunshine is warmed, though he may shut his eyes and decline to see the sun. Conversely, that they who take no pains to study the principles which govern human actions and human thought miss the blessings of obedience to certain laws, though they may inherit the better blessings which come of acknowledged relationship v/ith the Lawgiver. Lect. I.] SOME PRELIMINAEY CONSIDERATIONS. 29 These last blessings are so unspeakably satisfying that often enough the believer who enjoys them wants no more. He opens his mouth and draws in his breath for the delight he has in the law, it is true ; but it is the law • of the spiritual life only. Towards the other laws of God which govern the universe he sometimes takes up an attitude of antagonism, almost of resistance, worthy of an infidel. It is nothing to him that he is fearfully and wonderfully made; he does not care to know how the brain works, nor how the more subtle essence we call mind evolves and develops in obedience to laws. There are pious minds to which a desire to look into these things savours of un- belief, as if it were to dishonour the Almighty to perceive that he carries on His glorious works by means of glorious laws. They will have to do with no laws excepting the laws of the kingdom of grace. In the mean time, the non- believer, who looks for no supernatural aids, lays himself out to discover and conform to all the laws which regulate natural life — physical, mental, moral ; all the laws of God, in fact, excepting those of the spiritual life which the believer appropriates as his peculiar inheritance. But these laws which are left to Esau are laws of God also, and the observance of them is attended with such blessings, that the children of the believers say, "Look, how is it that these who do not acknowledge the Law as of God are better than we who do ? " Now, believing parents have no right to lay up this crucial difficulty for their children. They have no right, for instance, to pray that their children may be made truthful, diligent, upright, and, at the same time, neglect to acquaint themselves with those principles of moral science the observ- ance of which will guide into truthfulness, diligence, and uprightness of character. For this, also, is the law of God. Observe, not into the knowledge of God, the thing worth 30 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. I. living for : no mental science, and no moral science, is pledged to reveal that. What I contend for is, that these sciences have their part to play in the education of the human race, and that the parent may not disregard them ■with impunity. My endeavour in the forthcoming lectures will he to sketch out roughly a method of education which, as resting upon a basis of natural law, may look, without presumption, to inherit the divine blessing. Any sketch I can offer in these few lectures must be very imperfect and very incomplete ; but a hint here and there may be enough to put intelligent mothers on the right lines of thinking with regard to the education of their children. Lect. II.] OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOE THE CHILDREN. 31 LECTUEE II. OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOE THE CHILDREN. People who live in the country know the value of fresh air very well, and their children live out-of-doors, with intervals within for sleeping and eating. As to the latter, even country people do not make full use of their opportunities. On fine days, when it is warm enough to sit out with wraps, why should not tea and breakfast — everything but a hot dinner — be served out-of-doors? For we are an overwrought generation, running to nerves as a cabbage runs to seed ; and every hour spent in the open is a clear gain, tending to the increase of brain power and bodily vigour, and to the lengthening of life itself. They who know what it is to have fevered skin and throbbing brain delioiously soothed by the cool touch of the air are inclined to make a new rule of life, "Never be within doors when you can rightly be without." Besides the gain of an hour or two in the open air, there IB this to be considered : meals taken al fresco are usually joyous, and there is nothing like gladness for converting meat and drink into healthy blood and tissue. All the time, too, the children are storing up memories of a happy child- hood. Fifty years hence they will see the shadows of the boughs making patterns on the white tablecloth ; and sun- 32 HOME EDUCATION. [Leut. II. shine, children's laughter, hum of bees, and scent of flowers are being bottled up for after refreshment. But it is only the people who live, so to speak, in their own gardens who can make a practice of giving their children tea out-of-doors. For the rest of us, and the most of us, who live in towns or the suburbs of towns, that is included in the larger question — How much time daily in the open air should the children have ? and how is it possible to secure this for them? In this time of extraordinary pressure, educational and social, perhaps a mother's first duty to her children is to secure for them a quiet growing time, a full seven years of passive receptive life, the waking part of it spent for the most part out in the fresh air. And this, not for the gain in bodily health alone — body and soul, heart and mind, are nourished with food convenient for them when the children are let alone, let to live without friction and without stimulus amongst happy influences which incline them to be good. " I make a point," says a judicious mother, " of sending my children out, weather permitting, for an hour in the winter, and two hours a day in the summer months." That is well; but it is not enough. In the first place, do not send them ; if it is anyway possible, take them : for, although the children should be left much to themselves, there is a great deal to be done and a great deal to be pre- vented during these long hours in the open air. And long hours they should be ; not two, but four, five, or six hours they should have on every tolerably fine day, from April till October. " Impossible ! " says an over- wrought mother^ who sees her way to no more for her children than a daily hour or so on the pavements of the neighbouring London squares. Let me repeat, that I venture to suggest, not what is prac- ticable in any household, but what seems to me absolutely best for the children; and that, in the faith that mothers work Lect. II.] OUT-OF-D.0OE LIFE FOR THE OHILDEBN. 33 wonders once they are coavinoed that wonders are demanded of them. A journey of twenty minutes by rail or omnibus, and a luncheon basket, will make a day in the country pos- sible to most town-dwellers : and if one day, why not many, even every suitable -day ? Supposing we have got them, what is to be done with these golden hours, so that every one shall be delightful? They must be spent with some method, or the mother will be taxed and the children bored. There is a great deal to be accomplished in this large fraction of the children's day. They must be kept in a joyous temper all the time, or they will miss some of the strengthening and refreshing held in charge for them by the blessed air. They must be let alone, left to themselves a great deal, to take in what they can of the beauty of earth and heavens ; for of the evils of modern education few are worse than this — that the perpetual cackle of his elders leaves the poor child not a moment of time, nor an inch of space, wherein to wonder — and grow. At the same time, here is the mother's opportunity to train the seeing eye, the hearing ear, and to drop seeds of truth into the open soul of the child, which shall germinate, blossom, and bear fruit, without further help or knowledge of hers. Then, there is much to be got by perching in a tree or nestling in heather ; but muscular development comes of more active ways, and an hour or two should be spent in vigorous play; and last, and truly least, a lesson or two must be got in. Let us suppose mother and children arrived at some breezy open " wherein it seemeth always afternoon." In the first place, it is not her business to entertain the little people : there should be no story-books, no telling of tales, as little talk as possible, and that to some purpose. Who thinks to amuse children with tale or talk at a circus or a pantomime ? 4nd here is there not infinitely more displayed for their D 5i ■ HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. II. delectation? Our wise mother, arrived, first sends the children to let off their spirits in a wild scamper, with cry, halloo, and huUabulloo, and any extravagance that comes into their young heads. There is no distinction between big and little ; the latter love to follow in the wake of their elders, and, in lessons or play, to pick np and do according to their little might. As for the baby, he is in bliss : divested of his garments, he kicks and crawls, and clutches the grass, laughs soft baby laughter, and takes in his little knowledge of shapes and properties in his own wonderful fashion — clothed in a woollen gown, long and loose, which is none the worse for the worst usage it jnay get. " Sight-seeing." By-and-by, the others come back to their mother, and, while wits are fresh and eyes keen, she sends them off on an exploring expedition — Who can see the most, and tell the most, about yonder hillock or brook, hedge or copse. This is an exercise that delights the children, and may be endlessly varied, carried on in the spirit of a game, and yet with the exactness and carefulness of a lesson. " Find out all you can about that cottage at the foot of the hill ; but do not pry about too much." Soon they are back, and there is a crowd of excited faces, and a hubbub of tongues, and random observations are shot breathlessly into the mother's ear. " There are bee-hives." " We saw a lot of bees going into one." " There is a long garden." " Yes, and there are sunflowers in it." "And hen-and-chicken daisies and pansies." " And there's a great deal of a pretty blue flower with rough leaves, mother ; what do you sup- pose it is?" "Borage for the bees, most likely; they are very fond of it.'' " Oh, and there are apple and pear and plum trees on one side ; there's a little path up the middle, Lect, II.] OUT-OF-UOOE LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN. 35 you know." "On which hand-side are the fruit trees?" " The right — no, the left ; let me see, which is my thimble- hand ? Yes, it is the righthand side." " And there are potatoes and cabbages, and mint and things on the other side." " Where are the flowers, then ? " " Oh, they are just the borders, running down each side of the path." " But we have not told mother about that wonderful apple tree ; I should think there are a million apples on it, all ripe and rosy!" "A million, Tanny?" "Well, a great many, mother ; I don't know how many." And so on, indefinitely ; the mother getting by degrees a complete description of the cottage and its garden. This is all play to the children, but the mother is doing invaluable work ; she is training their powers of observation and expression, increasing their vocabulary and their range of ideas by giving them the name and the uses of an object at the right moment, — when they ask, "What is it?" and " What is it for ? " And she is training her children in truthful habits, by making them careful to see the fact and to state it exactly, without omission or exaggeration. The child who describes, "A tall tree, going up into a point, with rather large roundish leaves ; not a pleasant tree for shade, because the branches all go up," deserves to learn the name of the tree, and anything her- mother has to tell her about it. But the little bungler, who fails to make it clear whether he is describing an elm or a beech, should get no encouragement ;■ not a foot should his mother move to see his tree, no coaxing should draw her into talk about it, until, in despair, he goes off, and comes back with some more certain note — rough or smooth bark, rough or smooth leaves, T— then the mother considers, pronounces, and, full of glee, he carries her off to see for herself. By degrees the children will learn discriminatingly every feature of the landscapes with which they are familiar; and 36 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. II. think what a delightful possession for old age and middle life is a series of pictures imaged, feature by feature, in the sunny glow of a child's mind ! The miserable thing about the childish recollections of most persons is, that they are blurred, distorted, incomplete, no more pleasant to look upon than a fractured cup or a torn garment ; and the reason is, not that the old scenes are forgotten, but that they were never fully seen. At the time, there was no more than a hazy impression that such and such objects were present, and naturally, after the lapse of years, those features can rarely be recalled of which the child was not cognisant when he saw them before him. " Picture-painting." So exceedingly delightful is this faculty of taking mental photographs, exact images, of the " beauties of nature " we go about the world for the refreshment of seeing, that it is worth while to exercise children in another way towards this end, bearing in mind however, that they see the near and the minute, but can only be made with an effort to look at the wide and the distant. Get the children to look weU at some patch of landscape, and then to shut their eyes and call up the picture before them ; if any bit of it is blurred, they had better look again. When they have a perfect image before their eyes, let them say what they see. Thus ; " I see a pond ; it is shallow on my side, but deep on the other ; trees come to the water's edge on that side, and you can see their green leaves and branches so plainly in the water that you would think there was a wood underneath. Almost touching the trees in the water, is a bit of blue sky with a soft white cloud; and when you look up you see that same little cloud, but with a great deal of sky instead of a patch, because there are no trees up there. There are lovely Lect. II.] OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOE THE OHILDEEN. 37 yellow water-lilies round the far edge of the pond, and two or three of the big round leaves are turned up like sails. Near where I am standing three cows have come to drink, and one has got far into the water, nearly up to her neck," etc. This, too, is an exercise children delight in, but, as it Involves some strain on] the attention, it is fatiguing, and should only be employed now and then. It is, however, well worth while to give children the habit of getting a bit of landscape by heart in this way, because it is the effort of recalling and reproducing that is fatiguing; while the altogether pleasurable act of seeing, fully and in detail, is likely to be repeated unconsciously until it becomes a habit by the child who is required now and then to reproduce what he sees. At first the children will want a little help in the art of seeing. The mother will say, " Look at the reflection of the trees ! There might be a wood under the water. What do those standing-up leaves remind you of? " and so on, until the children have noticed the salient points of the scene. She will even herself learn off two or three scenes, and describe them with closed eyes for the children's amusement; and such little mimics are they, and at the same time so sym- pathetic, that any graceful fanciful touch which she throws into her descriptions will be reproduced with variations in theirs. The children will delight in this game of "picture- painting " all the more if the mother introduce it by de- scribing some great picture-gallery she has seen — pictures of mountains, of moors, of stormy seas, of ploughed fields, of little children at play, of an old woman knitting, — and goes on to say, that though she does not paint her pictures on Canvas and have them put in frames, she carries about with her just such a picture-gallery ; for whenever she sees any- thing lovely or interesting, she looks at it until she has the picture in her " mind's eye ; " and then she carries it away 38 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. II. with, ier, her own for ever, a picture " on view " just when she wants it. It would be difficult to overrate this hahit of seeing and storing as a means of after solace and refreshment. The busiest of us have holidays when we slip our necks out of the yoke and come face to face with nature, to be healed and blessed by — " The breathing balm, The silence and the calm Of mute insensate things." This immediate refreshment is open to everybody according to his measure ; but it is a mistake to suppose that everybody is able to carry away a refreshing image of that which gives him delight. Only a few can say with Wordsworth, of scenes they have visited — " Though absent long, These forms of beauty have not been to mo As is a landscape to a blind man's eye ; But oft, in lonely rooms, and 'mid the din Of towns and cities, I have owed to them, In hours of weariness, sensations sweet, Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart ; And passing even into my purer mind, With tranquil restoration." — And yet this is no high poetic gift which the rest of us must be content to admire, but a common reward for taking pains in the act of seeing which parents may do a great deal to confer upon their children. The mother must beware how she spoils the simplicitj'i the objective character of the child's enjoyment, by treating his little descriptions as feats of cleverness to be repeated to his father or to visitors ; she had better make a vow to suppress herself, " to say nothing to nobody," in his presence at any rate, though the child should show himself a born poet. Lect. n.] OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN. 39 Flowers and Trees. In the course of this " sight-seeing " and " picture-paint- ing," opportunities will occur to make the children familiar with rural ohjects and employments. If there are farm-lands within reach, they should know meadow and pasture, clover, turnip, and corn field, under every aspect, from the plough- ing of the land to the getting in of the crops. Milkwort, eyehright, rest-harrow, lady's-bedstraw, willow-herb, every wild flower that grows in their neighbourhood, they should know quite well; should be able to describe the leaf — its shape, size, growing from the root or from the stem ; the manner of flowering — a head of flowers, a single flower, a spike, etc. And, having made Ihe acquaintance of a wild- flower, so that they can never forget it or mistake it, they should examine the spot where they find it, so that they will know for the future in what sort of ground to look for such and such a flower. " We should find wild thyme here ! " " Oh, this is the very spot for marsh marigolds ; we must come here in the spring." If the mother is no great botanist, she will find Miss Ann Pratt's " Wild Flowers " (2 vols. S.P.C.K.) very useful, with its coloured pictures, like enough to identify the flowers by, common English names, and pleasant facts and fancies that the children delight in. To make collections of wild flowers for the several months, press them, and mount them neatly on squares of cartridge paper, with the English name, habitat, and date of finding of each, affords, at the same time, much happy occupation and much useful training. The children should be made early intimate with the trees, too; should pick out half a dozen trees, oak, elm, ash, beech, in their winter nakedness, and take these to bo their year-long friends. In the winter, they will observe the light tresses of the birch, the knotted arms of the oak. 40 HOME EDUCATIOK. [Leot. 11. the sturdy growth of the sycamore. They may wait to learn the names of the trees until the leaves come. By-and- by, as the spring advances, behold a general stiffening and look of life in the still bare branches; then the beautiful mystery of the leaf-buds, a nest of delicsite baby-leaves lying in downy warmth within many waterproof wrappings ; oak and elm, beech and birch, each with its own way of folding and packing its leaflets ; the ruby-budded lime, arid the ash, with its pretty stag's-foot of a bud, not green but black — " More black than asli-buds iu the front of March." But it is hard to keep pace with the wonders that unfold themselves in " the bountiful season, bland." There are the dangling catkins and the little ruby-red pistillate flowers of the hazel — clusters of flowers, both of them, two sorts on a single tree ; and the downy staminate catkins of the willow ; and the festive breaking out of all th? trees into lovely leafage ; the learning the patterns of the leaves as they come out, and the naming of the trees from this and other signs* Then the flowers come, each shut up tight in the dainty casket we call a bud, as cunningly wrapped as the leaves in their buds, but less carefully guarded, for these "sweet nurslings" delay their coming for the most part until earth has a warm bed to offer, and the sun a kindly welcome. "Suppose," says Leigh Hunt, — "suppose flowers them- selves were new ! Suppose they had just come into the world, a sweet reward for some new goodness. . . . Imagine what we should feel when we saw the first lateral stem bearing off from the main one,' and putting forth a leaf. How we should watch the leaf gradually unfolding its little graceful hand ; then another, then another ; then the main stalk rising and producing more ; then one of them giving indications of the astonishing novelty — a bud ! then this mysterious budi Lect. II.] OTJT-OF-DOOE LIFE FOR THE OHILBEEN. 41 gradually unfolding like the leaf, amazing us, enclianting us, almost alarming tis with delight, as if we knew not what enchantment were to ensue, till at length, in all its fairy heauty, and odorous voluptuousness, and mysterious elabora- tion of tender and living sculpture, shines forth the blushing flower." The flowers, it is true, are not new; but the children are;'' and it is the fault of their elders if every new flower they come upon is not to them a Picciola, a mystery of beauty to be watched from day to day with un- speakable awe and delight. Meanwhile, we have lost sight of those half-dozen forest- trees which the children have taken into a sort of comradeship for the year. Presently they have the delight of discovering that the great trees have flowers, too, flowers very often of the same hue as their leaves, and that some trees put off having their leaves until their flowers have come and gone. By-and- by there is the fruit, and the discovery that every tree — with exceptions which they need not learn yet — and every plant bears fruit, " fruit and seed after his kind." All this is stale knowledge to older people, but one of the secrets of the educator is to present nothing as stale knowledge, but to put himself in the position of the child, and wonder and admire with him ; for every common miracle which the child sees with his own eyes makes of him for the moment another Newton. It is a capital plan for the children to keep a calendar, — the first oak-leaf, the first tadpole, the first cowslip, the first catkin, the first ripe blackberries, where seen, and when. The next year, they will know when and where to look out for their favourites, and every year will be in a condition to add new observations. Think of the zest and interest, the object, which such a practice will give to daily walks and little excursions. There is hardly a day when some friend may not be expected to hold a first " At Home." 42 HOME EDUCATION. [Lbct. II. "Living Creatures," Then, as for the "living creatures," here is a field of unbounded interest and delight. The domesticated animals are soon taken into kindly fellowship by the, little people. Perhaps they live too far from the "real country" for squirrels and wild rabbits to be more to them than a dream of possible delights. But surely there is a pond within reach — by road or rail — where tadpoles may be caught, and carried home in a bottle, fed, and watched through all their changes — fins disappearing, tails getting shorter and shorter, until at last there is no tail at all, and a pretty pert little frog looks you in the face. Turn up any chance stone, and you may come upon a colony of ants. We have always known that it becomes us to consider their ways and be wise; but, now, think of all Sir John Lubbock has just told us to make that twelve-year-old ant of his acquaintance quite a personage. Then, there are the bees. Some of us may have heard Canon Farrar describe that lesson he was present at, on " How doth the little busy bee ; " — the teacher bright, but the children not responsive; they took no interest at all in little busy bees. He suspected the reason, and qiiestioning the class, found that not one of them had ever seen a bee. " Had never seen a bee ! Think for a moment," said he, " of how much that implies ; " and then we were moved by an eloquent picture of the sad child-life from which bees and birds and flowers are all shut out. But how many children are there who do not live in the slums of London, and yet are unable to distinguish a bee from a wasp, or even an humble- from a honey-bee ! The children should be encouraged to watch, patiently and quietly, until they learn something of the habits and history of bee, ant, wasp, spider, hairy caterpillar, dragon-fly, and what^ ever of larger growth comes in their way. " The creatures Lect. II.] OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN. 43 never have any habits while I am looking ! " a little girl in some story-book is made to complain : but that was her fault ; the bright keen eyes with which the children are blest were made to see, and see into, the doings of creatures too small for the unaided observation of older people. As for the horror which some children show of beetle, spider, worm, that is usually a trick picked up from grown-up people. Kingsley's children would run after their " daddy " with a "delicious worm," a "lovely toad," a "sweet beetle," carried tenderly in both hands. There are real antipathies not to be overcome, such as Kingsley's own horror of a spider ; but children who are accustomed to hold and admire caterpillars and beetles from their babyhood will not give way to affected horrors. The child who spends an hour in watching the ways of some new " grub " he has come upon will be a man of mark yet. Let all he finds out about it be entered in his diary — by his mother, if writing be a labour to him, — where he finds it, what it is doing, or seems to him to be doing ; its colour, shape, legs : some day he will come across the name of the creature, and will recognize the description of an old friend. Some children are born-naturalists, with a bent inherited, perhaps, from some unknown ancestor : but every child has a natural interest in the living things about him which it is the business of his parents to encourage ; for but few children are equal to holding their own in the face of public opinion, and if they see that the things which interest them are indifferent or disgusting to you, their pleasure in them vanishes, and that chapter in the book of nature is closed to them. It is likely that the "Natural History of Selborne" would never have been written had it not been that the naturalist's father used to take his boys on daily foraging expeditions, when not a moving or growing thing, not a pebble or a boulder within miles of Selborne escaped their eager examination. Audubon, the American ornithologist. 44 , HOME EDUCATION [Iject. U. is an'otlier instance of the effect of this kind of early training. " When I had hardly learned to walk," he saysj " and to articulate those first words always so endearing -to parents, the productions of nature that lay spread all around were constantly pointed out to me. . . . My father geneially accompanied my steps, procured birds and flowers for me, and pointed out the elegant movements of the former, the beauty and softness of their plumage, the manifestations of their pleasure, or their sense of danger, and the always perfect forms and splendid attire of the latter. He would' speak of the departure and return of the birds with the season, describe their haunts, and, more wonderful than allj their change of livery, thus exciting me to study them, and to raise my mind towards their great Creator." Town children may get a great deal of pleasure in watch- ing the ways of sparrows — knowing little birds and easily tamed by a dole of crumbs, — and their days out will bring them in the way of new acquaintances. The child who does not know the portly form and spotted breast of the thrush, the graceful flight of the swallow, the yellow bill of the blackbird, the gush of song which the skylark pours from above, is nearly as much to be pitied as those London children who " had never seen a bee." A pleasant acquaintance, easy to pick up, is the hairy-caterpillar. The moment to seize him is when he is seen shuiHing along the ground in a great hurry ; he is on the look-out for quiet quarters in which to lie up : put him in a box, then, and cover the box with net, through which you may watch his operations. Food does not matter — he has other things to attend to. By-and-by he spins a sort of white tent or hammock, into which he retires ; you may see through it and watch him, perhaps at the very moment when his skin splits asunder, leaving him, for months to come, an egg-shaped mass without any sign of life. At last the living thing within breaks out of this bundle, and there Leot. II.J OUT-OF-DOOE LIFE FOE THE CHILDEEN. 45 ifi is, the handsome tiger-moth, fluttering feeble wings against the net. Most children of six have had this taste of a naturalist's experience, and it is worth speaking of only fceoause, instead of being merely a harmless amusement, it is a valuable piece of education, of more use to the child than the reading of a whole book of natural history, or much geography and Latin. For the evil is that children get their knowledge of natural history, like all their knowledge, at second hand. Knowledge is poured into them, and, as Carlyle said of Coleridge's talk, " to be poured into like a bucket, whether you will or no, is not exhilarating to any soul." They are so sated with wonders that nothing surprises them, and they are so little used to see for themselves that nothing interests them. The cure for this hlase condition is, to let them alone for a bit, and then begin on new lines. Poor children, it is no fault of theirs if they are not as they were meant to be — little curious eager souls, all agog to explore so much of this wonderful world as they can get at as quite their first business in life. " He prayetli best who loveth best All things both great and small ; For the dear God who loveth ns, He made and loveth all." It would be well if all we persons in authority, parents and all who act for parents, could make up our minds that there is no sort of knowledge to be got in these early years so "valuable to the children as that which they get for them- selves of the world they live in. Let them once get touch with nature, and a habit is formed which will be a source of delight through life. We were all meant to be naturalists, each in his degree, and it is inexcusable to live in a world so full of the marvels of plant and animal life and to care for none of these things. 46 HOME EDUCATION, [Leot. It Consider, too, wliat an unequalled 'mental training the cHld-naturalist is getting for any study or calling under the sun — ^the powers of attention, of discrimination, of patient pursuit, growing with his growth, what will they -not fit him for ? Besides, life is so interesting to him that he has no time for the faults of temper that generally have their source in ennui; there is no reason why he should he peevish or sulky or obstinate when he is always kept well amused; "We say " he'' from force of habit, as speaking of the represen- tative sex, but truly that she should be thus conversant with nature is a matter of infinitely more importance to the little girl : she it is who is most tempted to indulge in ugly tempers (as child and woman) because time hangs heavy on her hands ; she, whose idler, more desultory habits of mind want the spur and the bridle of an earnest absorbing pursuit, whose feebler health demands to be braced by an out-of' door life full of healthy excitement. Moreover, it is to the girls, little and big, a most true kindness to lift them out of themselves and out of the. round of petty personal interests and emulations which too often hem in their lives ; and then; with whom but the girls must it rest to mould the generations yet to be born ? Field-lore and Naturalists' Books. Is it advisable, then, to teach the children the elements of natural science, of biology, botany, zoology? On the whole, no : the dissection even of a flower is painful to a sensitive child, and, during the first six or eight years of life, I would not teach them any botany w^hich should neces- sitate the pulling of flowers to bits ; much less should they be permitted to injure or destroy any (not noxious) form; of. animal life. Keverence for life, as a wonderful and awful gift from above, which a ruthless child may destroy but never can restore, is a lesson of first importance to the child : — Leot. II.] OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOB THE OHILDEBN. 47 " Let knowledge grow from more to more ; But more of reverence in us dwell." The child who sees his mother with reverent touch lift an early snowdrop to her lips, learns a higher lesson than the " print-books " can teach. Years hence, when the children are old enough to understand that science itself is in a sense sacred and demands some sacrifices, all the " common infor- mation " they have heen gathering until then, and the habits of observation they have acquired, will form a capital groundwork for a scientific education. In the mean time, let them consider the lilies of the field and the fowls of the air. For convenience in describing they should be able to name and distinguish petals, sepals, and so on ; and they should be encouraged to make such rough classifications as they can with their slight knowledge of both animal and vegetable forms. Plants with heart-shaped or spoon-shaped leaves, with whole or divided leaves ; leaves with criss-cross veins and leaves with straight veins ; bell-shaped flowers and cross- shaped flowers; flowers with three petals, with four, with five; trees which keep their leaves all the year, and trees which lose them in the autumn ; creatures with a backbone and creatures without ; creatures that eat grass and creatures that eat flesh, and so on. To make collections of leaves and flowers, pressed and mounted, and arranged according to their form, affords much pleasure, and, what is better, valuable training in the noticing of difierenoes and resemblances. Patterns for this sort of classification of leaves and flowers will be found in every little book of elementary botany. The power to classify, discriminate, distinguish between things that differ, in amongst the highest faculties of the human intellect, and no opportunity to cultivate it should be let slip ; but a classification got out of books, that the child does not make for himself and is not able to verify for him- self, cultivates no power but that of verbal memory, and a 48 HOME EDUCATION. ' ' [Leot. II. phrase or two of " Tamul " or other unknown tongue, learnt off, would serve that purpose just as well. The real use of naturalists' hooks at this stage is to give the child delightful glimpses into the world of wonders he lives in, to reveal the sorts of things to he seen by curious eyes, and fill him with desire to make discoveries for himself. The Eev. J. G-. Wood has written a dozen interesting little books, full of the infor- mation that children crave who have been brought up to care for natural objects, " Common Objects of the Country," "Porest Trees," "My Feathered Friends," "Homes without Hands," " Common Objects of the Seashore," and others as well known. Miss Arabella Buckley in " The Fairy Land of Science," and/' Life and Her Children," strikes a higher note; and writes very charmingly. Mr. J. E. Taylor's works, " Half Hours in the Green Lanes," " Greological Stories,'' " Flowers," are delightful and simple ; then there is Karr's "Tour round my Garden," and Frank Buckland's " Curiosities of Natural History," Sir John Lubbock's books, Kingsley's " Madam How and Lady Why," and plenty more, all pleasant reading, many of them written by scientific men, and yet requiring little or no scientific knowledge for their enjoyment. The mother cannot devote herself too much to this kind of reading, not only that she may read tit-bits to her children about matters they have come across, but that she may be able to answer their queries and direct their observation. And not only the mother, but any woman who is likely ever to spend an hour or two in the society of children should make herself mistress of this sort of information ; the children will adore her for knowing what they want to know, and who knows but she may .give its bent for life to some young mind destined to do great things for the world. Lect. II.] OUT-OF-DOOE LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN. 49 The Child gets Knowledge by Means of Ms Senses. Watch a child standing at gaze at some sight new to him — a plough at work, for instance, — and you will see he is as naturally occupied as is a babe at the breast; he is, in fact, taking in the intellectual food which the working faculty of his brain at this period requires. In his early years the child is all eyes ; he observes, or, more truly, he perceives, calling sight, touch, taste, smell, and hearing to his aid, that he may learn all that is discoverable by him about every nev/ thing that comes under his notice. Everybody knows how a baby fumbles over with soft little fingers, and carries to his mouth, and bangs that it may produce what sound there is in it, the spoon or doll which supercilious grown-up people give him to " keep him quiet." The child is at his lessons, and is learning all about it at a late utterly surprising to the physiologist, who considers how much is implied in the act of " seeing," for instance : that to the infant, as to the blind adult restored to sight, there is at first no difference between a flat picture and a solid body, — that the ideas of form and solidity are not obtained by sight at all, but are the judgments of experience. Then, think of the- vague passes in the air the little fist makes before it lays hold of the object of desire, and you see how he learns the whereabouts of things, having as yet no idea of direction. And why does he cry for the moon? Why does he crave' equally, a horse or a house-fly as an appropriate plaything ? Because far and near, large and small, are ideas he has yet to grasp. The child has truly a great deal to do before he is in a condition to " believe his own eyes ; " but nature teaches so gently, so gradually, so persistently, that he is never overdone, but goes on gathering little stores of knowledge about whatever comes before him. And this is the process the child should continue for the B 50 HOME EDUCATION. [Lbct. II, first few years of his life. Now is the storing time which should be spent in laying up images of things familiar. By- and-by, he will have to conceive of things he has never seen : how can he do it except by comparison with things he has seen and knows? By-and-by, he will be called upon to reflect, understand, reason; what material will he have, unless as he has a magazine of facts to go upon ? The child who has been made to observe how high in the heavens the sun is at noon on a summer's day, how low at noon on a day in midwinter, is able to conceive of the great heat of the tropics under a vertical sun, and to understand that the climate of a place depends greatly upon the mean height the sun reaches above the horizon. A great deal has been said lately about the danger of overpressure, of requiring too much mental work from a child of tender years. The danger exists, but lies, not in giving the child too much, but in giving him the wrong thing to do, the sort of work for which the present state of his mental development does not fit him. Who expects a boy in petti- coats to lift half a hundredweight ? But give the child the work nature intended for him, and the quantity he can get through with ease is practically unlimited. Whoever saw a child tired of seeing, of examining in his own way un- femiliar things ? This is the sort of mental nourishment for which he has an unbounded appetite, because it is that food of the mind on which, for the present, he is meant to grow. Now, how far is this craving for natural sustenance inet ? . In infant and kindergarten schools, by the object lesson, which is good so far as it goes, but is something like that bean a day on which the Frenchman fed his horse. The child at home has more new things brought under his notice, but with less method. Neither at home nor at school is much effort made to set before the child the abundant " feast ojf eyes" which his needs demand, I+ECT. II.] OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOE THE CHILDREN. 51 ,We older people, partly because of our matuver intellect, partly because of our defective education, get most of our knowledge through the medium of words. We set the child to learn in the same way, and find him dull and slow. Why ? because it is only with a few words in common use that he associates a definite meaning; all the rest are no more to him than the vocables of a foreign tongue. But set him face to face with a thing, and he is twenty times as quick as you are in knowing all about it ; knowledge of things flies to the mind of a child as steel filings to a magnet. Now, consider what a culpable waste of intellectual energy it is to shut up a child blessed with this inordinate capacity for seeing and knowing within the four walls of a house, or the dreary streets of a town. Or suppose that he is let run loose in the country where there is plenty to see, it is nearly as bad to let this great faculty of the child's dissipate itself in random observations for want of method and direction. There is no end to the store of common information, got in . such a way that it will never be forgotten, with which an intelligent child may furnish himself before he begins his school career. The boy who can tell you off- hand where to find each of the half-dozen most graceful birches, the three or four finest ash trees in the neigh- bourhood of his home, has chances in life a dozen to one compared with the lower slower intelligence that does not know an elm from an oak — not merely chances of success, but chances of a larger happier life, for it is curious how certain feelings are linked with the mere observation of nature and natural objects. "The eestJietic sense of the beautiful," says Dr. Carpenter, "of the sublime, of the harmonious, seems in its most elementary form to connect itself immediately with the Perceptions which arise out of the contact of our minds with external Nature ; " while he 52 HOME EDUCATION. [Lbct. II. quotes Dr. Morell, who says, still more forcibly, that, " All those who have shown a remarkable appreciation of form and beauty, date their first impressions from a period lying far behind the existence of definite ideas or verbal instruc- tion." Thus, we owe something to Mr. Evans for taking his little daughter Mary Anne with him on his long business drives among the pleasant Warwickshire lanes: the little girl stood up between her father's knees, seeing much and saying little ; and the outcome was the scenes of rural life in " Adam Bede," and " The Mill on the Floss." Wordsworth, reared amongst the mountains, becomes a very prophet of nature; while Tennyson draws endless imagery from the levels of the eastern counties where he was brought up. Little David Oopperfield was "a very observant child," " though," says he, " I think the memory of most of us can go farther back into such times than many of us suppose ; just as I believe the power of observation in numbers of very young children to be quite wonderful for its closeness and accuracy. Indeed, I think that most grown men who are remarkable in this respect, maj' with greater propriety be said not to have lost the faculty, than to have acquired it ; the rather, as I generally observe such men to retain a certain freshness-, and gentleness, and capacity of being pleased, which are also an inheritance they have preserved from their child- hood ; " — in which remark Dickens makes his hero talk sound philosophy as well as kindly sense. The Child should be made Familiar with Natural Objects. But what is the use of being " a very observant child," if you are not put in the way of things worth observing? And here is the difference between the streets of a town and the sights and sounds of the country. There is plenty to be seen in a town, and children accustomed to the ways of the Leot. II.] OUT-OP-POOE LIFE FOE THE OHILBRBN. 53 streets tecome nimble-witted enough. But the scraps of in- formation to be picked up in a town are isolated fragments ; they do not hang on to anything else, nor come to anything more ; the information may he convenient, but no one is the ■wiser for knowing on which side of the street is Smith's, and which turning leads to Thompson's shop. Now take up a natural object, it does not matter what, and you are study- ing one of a group, a member of a series ; whatever know- ledge you get about it is that much towards the science which includes all of its kind. Break off an elder twig in the spring ; yoii notice a ring of wood round a centre of pith, and there you have at a glance a distinguishing character of a great division of the vegetable world. You pick up a pebble. Its edges are perfectly smooth and rounded : why ? you ask. It is water-worn, weather-worn. And that little pebble brings you face to face with disintegration, the force to which, more than to any other, we owe the aspects of the world which we call picturesque — glen, ravine, valley, hill. It is not necessary that the child should be told anything about disintegration or dicotyledon, only that he should observe the wood and pith in the hazel twig, the pleasant roundness of the pebble ; by-and-by, he will learn the bear- ing of the facts with which he is already familiar — a very different thing from learning the reason why of facts which have never come under his notice. It is infinitely well worth the mother's while to take some pains every day to secure, in the first place, that her children spend hours daily amongst rural and natural objects, and, in the second place, to infuse into them, or rather, to cherish in them, the love of investigation. " I say it deliberately," says Kingsley, " as a student of society and of history : power will pass more and more into the hands of scientific men. They will rule, and they will act — cautiously, we may hope, and modestly, and charitably — 54 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. n. because in learning true knowledge they will have learnt also their own ignorance, and the vastness, the complexity, the mystery of nature. But they will he ahle to rule, they will be able to act, because they have taken the trouble to learn the facts and the laws of nature." ' But, to enable them to swim with the stream is the least of the benefits this early training should confer on the children ; a love of nature, implanted so early that it will seem to them hereafter to have been born in them, will enrich their lives with pure interests, absorbing pursuits, health and good humour. "I have seen," says the same writer, " the young man of fierce passions, and uncontrollable daring, expend healthily that energy which threatened daily to plunge him into recklessness, if not into sin, upon hunt- ing out and collecting, through rock and bay, snow and tempest, every bird and egg of the neighbouring forest. . . . I have seen the young London beauty, amid all the excite- ment and temptation of luxury and flatter)', with her heart pure, and her mind occupied in a boudoir full of shells and fossils, flowers and seaweeds, keeping herself unspotted from the world, by considering the lilies of the field, how they grow." Out-of-door Geography. After this long digression, intended to impress upon mothers the supreme importance of stirring up in "their children a love of nature and of natural objects — a deep- seated spring to send up pure waters into the driest places of after life — we must return to the mother whom we have left out-of-doors all this time, waiting to know what she is to do next. This pleasant earth of ours is not to be overlooked in the out-of-door education of the children. " How do you get time for so much ? " " Oh, I leave out subjects of no educational value ; I do not teach geography, for instance," Lect. II.] OUT-OF-DOOE LIFE FOR THE CHILDEEN. 55 said an advanced young theorist with all sorts of degrees. But the mother, who knows better, will find a hundred opportunities to teach geography hy the way : a duck-pond is a lake, or an inland sea ; any brooklet will serve to illus- trate the great rivers of the world ; a hillock grows into a mountain — an Alpine system ; a hazel-copse suggests the mighty forests of the Amazon; a reedy swamp, the rice" fields of China ; a field of ripe hay, the boundless prairies of the West; the pretty purple flowers of the common mallow is a text whereon to hang the cotton-fields of the Southern States : indeed, the whole field of pictorial geography — maps may wait" until by-and-by — may be covered in this way. And nqt only this; the children should be taught to observe the position of the sun in the heavens from hour to hour, and, by his position, to tell the time of day. Of course they will want to know why the sun is such an indefatigable traveller, and thereby hangs a wonderful tale, which they may as well learn in the " age of faith," of the relative sizes of sun and earth, and of the nature and movements of the latter. " Clouds and rain, snow and hail, winds and vapours, fulfilling His word" — are all every-day mysteries that the mother will be called upon to explain, faithfully, however simply. The Child and Mother Nature. Does so wide a programme alarm the mother ? Does she with dismay see herself talking through the whole of those five or six hours, and, even at that, not getting through a tithe of the teaching laid out for her? On the contrary, the less she says the better ; and, as for the quantity of educa- tional work to be got through, it is the fable of the anxious pendulum over again,: it is true, there are countless "ticks" to be ticked, but there will always be a second of time to tick in, and no more than a single tick is to be delivered 5(j HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. II. in any given second. The rapid little people will have played their play, whether of "sight-seeing" or "picture- painting," in a quarter of an hour or so : for the study of natural objects, an occasional " Look ! " an attentive exami- nation of the object on the mother's own part, a name given, a remark — a dozen words . long — made at the right moment, and the children have begun a new acquaintance which they will prosecute for themselves ; and not more than one or two such presentations should occur in a single day. Now, see how much leisure there is left 1 The mother's real difficulty will be to keep herself from much talk with the children, and to hinder them from occupying themselves with her. There are few things sweeter and more precious to the child than playful prattle with her mother; but one thing is better- — the communing with the larger mother, in order to which, the child and she should be left to them- selves. This is, truly, a delightful thing to watch: the mother reads her book or knits her sock, checking all attempts to make talk ; the child stares up into a tree, or down into a flower — doing nothing, thinking of nothing ; or leads a bird's life among the branches, or capers about in aimless ecstasy ; — quite foolish irrational doings, but, all the time, a fashioning is going on : Nature is doing Tier part, with the vow, — " This oliild I to myself -will take : She shall be mine, and I will make A lady of my own. " The floating clouds their state shall lend To her ; for her the willow bend ; Nor shall she fail to see E'en in the motions of the storm Grace that shall mould the maiden's form By silent sympathy. Lect. II.] OUT-OF-DOOB LIFE FOR THE CHILDEEN. 57 " The stars of midmglit shall be dear To her ; and she shall lean her ear In many a secret place Where rivulets dance their wayward round, And beauty born of murmuring sound Shall pass into her face. " And vital feelings of delight Shall rear her form to stately height, Her virgin bosom swell ; Such thoughts to Lucy I will give While she and I together live Here in this happy dell." * TKere is one tiling the mother will allow herself to do as interpreter between nature and the child, but that not oftener than once a week or once a month, and with look and gesture of delight rather than with ilow of improving words — she will point out to the child some touch of especial loveliness in colouring or grouping in the landscape or in the heavens. One other thing she will do, but very rarely, and with tender filial reverence (most likely she will say her prayers, and speak out of her prayer, for to touch on this ground with Tiard words is to wound the soul of the child) : she will point to some lovely flower or gracious tree, not only as a beautiful work, but a beautiful thought of God, in which we may believe He finds continual pleasure, and which He is pleased to see His human children rejoice in. Such a seed of sympathy with the Divine thought sown in the heart of the child is worth many of the sermons the man may listen to hereafter, much of the " divinity " he may read. Out-of-door Games, etc. The bright hours fly by ; and there is still at least one lesson on the programme, to say nothing of an hour or two for games in the afternoon. The thought of a lesson is unin- * Wordsworth. 58 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. IL viting, after the discussion of mnoli that is more interesting, and, truly, more important; but it need only be a little lesson, ten minutes long, and the slight break and the effort of attention will give the greater zest to the pleasure and leisure to follow. The daily French lessson is that which should not be omitted. That children should learn French orally, by listening to and repeating French words and phrases ; that they should begin so young that the difference of accent does not strike them, but they repeat the new French word all the same as if it were English and use it as freely ; that they should learn a few — two or three, five or six — new French words daily, and that, at the same time, the old words should be kept in use — are points to be considered more fully hereafter : in the mean time, it is so important to keep tongue and ear familiar with French vocables that not a lesson should be omitted. The French lesson may, however, be made to fit in with the spirit of the other out-of-door occupations; the half-dozen words may be the parts — ^leaves, branches, bark, trunk, of a tree, or the colours of the flowers, or the movements of bird, cloud, lamb, child ; in fact, the new French words should be but another form of expression for the ideas that for the time fill the child's mind. The afternoon's games, after luncheon, are an important part of the day's doings for the elder children, though the younger have probably worn themselves out by this time with the ceaseless restlessness by means of which nature provides for the due development of muscular tissue in them ; let them sleep in the sweet air, and awake refreshed. Mean- while, the elders play'; the more they run, and shout, and toss their arms, the more healthful is the play. And this is one reason why mothers should carry their children off to lonely places, where they may use their lungs to their hearts' content, without risk of annoying anybody. The muscular structure of the organs of voice is not enough considered; Leot. II.] OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN. 59 children love to indulge in cries and shouts and view halloos, and this " rude" and "noisy " play, with which their elders have not much patience, is no more than nature's way of providing for the due exercise of organs upon whose working power the health and happiness of the child's future largely depend. People talk of " weak lungs," " weak chest," " weak throat," but perhaps it does not occur to everybody that strong lungs and strong throat are commonly to be had on the same terms as a strong arm or wrist — by exercise, train- ing, use, work. Still; if the children can " give voice " musically, and move rhythmically to the sound of their own voices, so much the better. In this respect, French children are better oft" than English ; they dance and sing through a hundred roundelays — ^just such games no doubt, mimic marryings and buryings, as the children played at long ago, in the market-place of Jerusalem. Most likely before puritan innovations made us a staid and circumspect people English lads and lasses of all ages danced out little dramas on the village greens, accompanying themselves with the words and airs of just such rondes as the French children sing to-day. We have a few of them left still — to be heard at Sunday-school treats and other gather- ings of the children, — and they are well worth preserving : " There came three dukes a-riding, a-riding, a-riding," etc. ; " Oranges and lemons, say the bells of St. Clement's," etc. ; " Here we come gathering nuts in May," etc. ; " What has my poor prisoner done," etc. ; — and more, all set to delightful sing-song airs that the little feet trip to merrily, the more so for the pleasant titillation of the words — dukes, nuts, oranges, — who could not go to the tune of such ideas? The promoters of the kindergarten system have done much to revive games of this kind, but it is doubtful how far the prettiest plays, learnt in school and from a teacher, will take hold' of the children as do the games which have 60 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. II. been passed on from hand to hand through an endless chain of children, and are not to be found in the print-books at all. Cricket, tennis, and rounders are the games par excellenc/^i if the children are old enough to play them, both as giving free harmonious play to the muscles, and also as serving the highest moral purpose of games in bringing the children under the discipline of rules ; but the little family we have in view, all of them under nine, will hardly be up to scientific games. Eaces and chases, " tig," " follow my leader," and any romping game they may invent, will be more to their minds : still better are the hoop, the ball, the shuttlecock,, and the invaluable skipping-rope. For the rope, the very best use is for each child to skip with her own, throwing it hacJewards rather than forwards, so that the tendency of the movement is to expand the chest. Shuttlecock is a fine game, affording scope for ambition and emulation. Her biographer thinks it worth telling that Miss Austin could keep up in " cup and ball " over a hundred times, to the admiration of nephews and nieces ; in like manner, any feat in keeping up the shuttlecock might be noted down as a family event, so that the children maybe fired with ambition to excel in a game which affords most graceful and vigorous play to almost every muscle of the upper part of the body, and has this great recommendation, that it can be as well played within doors as without. Quite the best play is to keep up the shuttlecock with a battledore in each hand, so that the muscles on either side are brought equally into -play. But to " ordain " about children's games is an idle waste of words, for here fashion is as supreme and as arbitrary as in questions of bonnet or crinoline. Climbing is an amusement not much in favour with mothers; torn garments, bleeding knees, and boot-toes rubbed into holes, to say nothing of more serious risks, make a strong case against this form of delight. But, truly, the Lect. II.] OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN. 61 exercise is so admiraWe — the body being thrown into endless graceful postures which bring every muscle into play, — and the training in pluck, daring, and resource so invaluable, that it is a pity trees and cliffs and walls should be forbidden even to little girls. The mother may do a good deal to avert serious mishaps by accustoming the younger children to small feats of leaping and climbing, so that they learn at the same time courage and caution from their own experiences, and are less likely to follow the lead of too daring playmates. Later, the mother had best make up her mind to share the feelings of the hen that hatched a brood of ducklings, remembering that a little scream, a sharp and sudden " Come down instantly ! " " Tommy, you'll break your neck ! " gives the child a nervous shock, and is likely to cause the fall it was meant to hinder by startling Tommy out of all presence of mind. Even boating and swimming are not without the reach of town-bred children, in days when everybody goes for a summer outing to the neighbourhood of the sea, or of inland waters : and then, there are swimming-baths in most towns. It would be well if most children of seven were taught to swim, not only for the possible usefulness of the art, but as giving them an added means of motion, and, therefore, of delight. The havoc of clothes need not be great if the children are dressed for their little excursions, as they should be, in plainly made garments of some loosely woven woollen material, serge or flannel. Woollen has some advantages over cotton, and more over linen, as a clothing material; chiefly, that it is a bad conductor : that is to say, it does not allow the heat of the body too free an exit nor the heat of the sun too free an entrance. Therefore the child in M-oolle.n who has become heated in play does not suffer a chill from the sudden loss of this heat, as does the child in a linen garment ; also, he is cooler in the sunshine, and warmer in the shade. 62 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. II. Walks in Bad Weather. All we have said hitherto applies to the summer weather, which is, alas for us, a very limited and uncertain quantity in our part of the world. The question of out-of-door exercise in winter and in wet weather is really more im- portant; for who that could would not he abroad in the summer time? If the children are to have what is quite the best thing for them, they should be two or three hours every day in the open air all through the winter, say an hour and a half in the morning and as long in the after- noon. When frost and snow are on the ground they have very festive times, what with sliding, snow-balling, and snow-building. But even on the frequent days when it is dirty under foot and dull overhead the children should be kept interested and alert, so that the heart may do its work cheerfully, and a grateful glow be kept up throughout the body in spite of clouds and cold weather. All that has been said about " sight-seeing " and " picture-painting," the little French lesson, and observations to be noted in the family diary, belongs just as much to winter weather as to summer, and there is no end to the things to be seen and noted, They come across a big tree which they judge, from its build, to be an oak — down it goes in the diary ; and when the leaves are out, they come again to see if they are right. Many birds come into view the more freely in the cold weather that they are driven forth in search of food. " The cattle mourn in comers wtere the fence screena them," " The sun, with ruddy orb Ascending, fires the horizon." " Every herb and every si^iry blade Stretches a length of shadow o'er the field." " The sparrows peep, and quit the sheltering eaves." "' The redbreast warbles still, but is content Leot. II.] OUT-OF-DOOE LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN. 63 With slender notes, and more than half suppress'd ; Pleased with his solitude, and flitting light From spray to spray, where'er he rests he shakes From many a twig the pendent drops of ice That tinkle in the wither'd leaves below." There is no reason why the child's winter walk should not be as fertile in observations as the poet's : indeed, in, one way, it is possible to see the more in winter, because the things to be seen do not crowd each other out. Winter walks, too, whether in town or country, give great opportunities for cultivating the habit of attention, The famous conjuror, Eobert Houdin, relates in his auto- biography,* that he and his son would pass rapidly before a shop window, that of a toy-shop, for instance, and each cast an attentive glance upon it. A few steps further on, each drew paper and pencil from his pocket, and tried which could enumerate the greater number of the objects momentarily seen in passing. The boy surpassed his father in quickness of apprehension, being often able to write down forty objects, whilst his father could scarcely reach thirty ; yet, on their returning to verify his statement, the son was rarely found to have made a mistake. Here is a hint for a highly educational amusement for many a winter's walk. But what about the wet days ? The fact is, that rain. Unless of the heaviest, does the children no harm at all if they are suitably clothed. But every sort of waterproof gar- ment should be tabooed, because the texture which will not admit rain will not allow of the escape of the insensible perspiration, and one secret of health for people who have no organic disease is the prompt carrying off of the decayed and harmful matters discharged by the skin. The children should iave woollen rain-garments — made of coarse serge, for in- stance, — to be changed the moment they return from a walk, * Quoted in Dr. Carpenter's " Mental Physiology." 64 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. II. and then there is no risk of catching cold. This is the common sense of the matter. Wet cloths are put upon the head of a fever patient; by-and-hy the cloths dry, and are dipped again : what has become of the water ? It has evapo- rated, and, in evaporating, has carried off much heat from the fevered head. Now, that which eases the hot skin of fever is just the one thing to be avoided in ordinary circumstances. To be wet to the skin may do a child no more harm than a bath would do him, if the wet clothes do not dry upon him — that is, if the water does not evaporate, carrying off much heat from his body in the process. It is the loss of animal heat which is followed by " colds," and not the " wetting " which mothers are ready to deplore. Keep a child active and happy in the rain, and he gets nothing but good from his walk. The case is altered if the child has a cold already ; then active exercise might increase any inflammation already set up, I do not know whether it is more than a pretty fancy of Eichter's, that a spring shower is a sort of electric bath, and a very potent means of health ; certainly rain clears the atmosphere — a fact of considerable importance in and about large towns. But it is enough for our purpose to prove that the rain need do no harm ; for abundant daily exercise in the fresh air is of such vital importance to the children, that really nothing but sickness should keep them within doors. At the same time, children should never be allowed to sit or stand about in damp clothes ; and here is the use of water- proof rain-wraps — to keep them dry on short journeys to church, or school, or neighbour's house, where they cannot very well change their garments. The Children require Country Air. Every one knows that the breathing of air which has lost little of its due proportion of oxygen is the essential condition of vigorous life and of a fine physique : also, that whatever Lect. ir.] OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOE THE OHILDBEV. 65 produces heat, whetlier it be animal heat, or the heat of fire, candle, gas-lamp, produces that heat at the expense of the oxygen contained in the atmosphere — a bank which is drawn upon by every breathing and burning object ; that, in situa- tions where much breathing and burning are going on, there is a terrible drain upon this vital gas ; that the drain may be so excessive that there is no longer sufficient oxygen in the air to support animal life, and death results ; that where the drain is less excessive but still great, animal life may be supported, and people live a flaccid feeble life in a state of low vitality. Also, we know, that every breathing and every burning object expels a hurtful gas — carbonic acid. A very small proportion of this gas is present in the purest atmospheric air, and in that small proportion it does no harm ; but increase that quantity by the action of furnaces, fires, living beings, gas-lamps, and the air is rendered unwholesome, just in proportion to the quantity of superfluous carbonic-acid gas it contains. If the quantity be excessive — as when many people are huddled together in a small unventilated room — speedy death by suffocation is the result. For th«Jse reasons, it is not possible to enjoy fulness of life in a town. For grown-up people the stimulus of town life does something to make up for the impurity of town air, as, on the other hand, country people too often forfeit their advantages through the habit of mental sluggishness they let themselves fall into : but, for the children — who not only breathe, but grow ; who require, proportionably, more oxygen than adults need for their vital processes — it is absolutely cruel not to give them very frequent, if not daily, copious draughts of unvitiated, unimpoverished air, tlie sort of air that can be had only remote from towns. But this is only one of the reasons why, fur health's sake alone, it is of the first importance to give the children long days in the open country. They want light, solar light, as F G8 -HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. II- well as air. Country people are ruddier than town folk, miners are sallow, so are the dwellers in cellars and in sun- less valleys. The reason is, that, to secure the ruddy glow of perfect health, certain changes must take place in the blood — the nature of which it would take too long to explain here, — and that these changes in the blood, the free production of what are called red corpuscles, appear to take place most favourably under the influence of abundant solar light. What is more, men of science are beginning to suspect that not only the coloured light Tajs of the solar spectrum, but the dark heat rays and the chemical rays minister to vitality in ways not yet fully understood. There was a charming picture in Punch some time ago, of two little boys airing their English-French on their mother's new maid; two noble little fellows, each straight as a dart, with no superfluous flesh, eyes well opened^ head erect, chest expanded, the whole body full of spring even in repose. It was worth looking at, if only as suggesting the sort of physique we delight to see in a child. No doubt the child inherits the most that he is iti this respect as in all others ; but this is what bringing-up may, with some limitations, efi'ect : — The child is born with certain natural tendencies, and, according to his bringing- up, each such tendency may run into a blemish of person or character, or into a cognate grace. Therefore, it is worth while to have even a physical ideal for onei's child ; not, for instance, to be run away with by the notion that a fat child is necessarily a fine child. The fat child can easily be pro- duced : but the bright eye, the open regard, the springing step ; the tones, clear as a bell ; the agile graceful movements that characterize the well-brought-up child, are the result, not of bodily well-being only, but of " mind and soul accord- ing well," of a quick, trained intelligence, and of a moral pature habituated to " the joy of self-gontrol." Leot. III.] " PIABIT IS TEN NATUEES." 67 LECTUEE III. "HABIT IS TEN NATUEES." You will have gathered already that what I desire to set hefore you is a method of education based upon natural law. In the first place, we considered some of the conditions to be observed with a view to keep the brain in healthy working order ; for it is upon the possession of an active, duly nourished brain that the possibility of a sound educa- tion depends. The lecture on Out-of-door Life, as developing the method of education, came second in order, because its. object was to show that the chief function of the child — his business in the world during the first six or seven years of his life — is to find out all he can, about whatever comes under his notice, by means of his five senses ; that he has an insatiable appetite for knowledge got in this way ; and that, therefore, the endeavour of his parents should be to put him in the way of making acquaintance freely with nature and natural objects ; that, in fact, the intellectual education of the young child should be the education of the perceptive faculties, because the first stages of mental development are marked by the extreme activity of these faculties ; and the wisdom of the educator is to follow the lead of nature in the evolution of the complete human being. The subject for to-day— a rather dry metaphysical one 68 HOME EDUCATION: [Lect. HI. — seems to me, all the same, to be very well worthy of your attention as striking the key-note of a reasonable method of education. " Habit is ten natures ! " If I could but make you see with my eyes how much this saying should mean totLe educator ! How habit, in the hands of the mother, is as his wheel to the potter, his knife to the carver — the instrument by means of which she turns out the design she has already conceived in her brain. It is unpleasant to speak of one's self, but if you will allow me, I should like to run over the steps by which I have been brought to look upon habit as the means whereby the parent may make almost anything he chooses of his child. That which has become the domi- nant idea of one person's life, if it be launched suddenly at another, conveys no very great depth or weight of mean- ing to the second person — he wants to get at it by degrees, to see the steps by which the other travelled. Therefore, I shall venture to show how I arrived at my present position, which is, that — The formation of habits is education, and Education is the formation of habits. The Children Jiave no Self-compelling Power. Some years ago, I was accustomed to hear, " Habit is TEN natures," delivered from the pulpit on at least one Sunday out of four. I had at the time just begun to keep school, and was young and enthusiastic in my work. It was to my mind a great thing to be a teacher; it was imj)OS- sible but that the schoolmistress should leave her stamp on the children. Hers was the fault if anything went wrong, if any child did badly in school or out of it. There was no degree of responsibility which youthful ardour was not equal to. But, all this zeal notwithstanding, the dis- appointing thing was, that nothing extraordinary happened. Leot. III.] " HABIT IS TEN NATURES." 69 The girls were good girls on the whole, because most of them were the children of parents who had themselves been brought up with some carej but it was plain that they behaved very much as " 'twas their nature to." The faults they had they kept; the virtiies they had were exercised just as fitfully as before. The good, meek little girl still told fibs. The bright generous child was incurably idle. In lessons it was the same thing : the dawdling child went on dawdling, the dull child became no brighter. It was very disappointing. The children, no doubt, " got on " — a little ; but there was every one of them with the makings in her of a noble character, of a fine mind, and where was the lever to lift each of these little worlds ? Such a lever there must be. This horse-in-a-mill round of geography and Erehch, history and sums, was no more than playing at education : for who remembers the scraps of knowledge he laboured over as a child ? and would not the application of a few hours in later life eflfect more than a year's drudgery at any one subject in childhood ? If education is to secure the step-by- step progress of the individual and the race, it must mean something over and above the daily plodding at small tasks which goes by the name. Looking for guidance to the literature of education, tho doctrines, of Pestalozzi and, still more, of Frobel were exceedingly helpful to me as showing the means to secure an orderly expansion of the child's faculties, and what is even more important, pointing out as they both do, that the cbild is, so to speak, an exotic which can flourish and expand only in a warm temperature of love and gentleness, regulated by even-handed law. At the same time^ religious teaching helped the children, gave them power and motives for continuous eifort, and raised their desires towards the best things. But with these great aids from without 'and from above, there was still the depressing sense of working 70 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. III. education in the dark : the advance made by the young people in moral, and even in intellectual power, was like that of a door on its hinges — a swing forward to-day and back again to-morrow, with little sensible progress from year to year beyond that of being able to do harder sums and read harder books. Consideration made the reason of the failure plain : there was a warm glow of goodness at the heart of every one of the children, but they were all incapable of steady effort because they had no strength of will, no power to make themselves do that which they knew they ought to do. Here, no doubt, come in the functions of parents and teachers; they should be able to make the child do that which he lacks the power to compel himself to. But it were poor training that should keep the child dependent upon personal influence. It is the business of education to find some way of supplementing that weakness of will which is the bane of most of us as well as of the children. Thai the effort of decision is the most exhausting effort of life, has been well said from the pulpit ; and if that remains true about ourselves, even when the decision is about trifling matters of going or coming, buying or not buying, it surely is not just to leave the children all the labour of an effort of will whenever they have to choose between the right and the wrong. What is " Nature " ? " Habit is ten natures," went on being proclaimed in my ears ; and at last it came home to me as a weighty saying, which might contain the educational " Open, Sesame ! " I was in quest of. In the first place, what is Nature, and what, precisely, is Habit? It is an astonishing thing, when we consider, what the child is, irrespective of race, country, or kindred, simply in Lect. III.] "HABIT IS TEN NATURES." 71 right of his birth as a human heing. That we all have the same instincts and appetites we are prepared to allow, but that the principles of action which govern all men everj^- where are primarily the same, is a little startling; that, for instance, the same desires stir in the breasts alike of savage and of sage; that the desire of knowledge, which shows itself in the child's curiosity about things and his eager use of his eyes, is equally active everywhere ; that the desire of society, which you may see in two babies presented to one another and all agog with glee and friendliness, is the cause, alike, of village communities amongst savage tribes and of the philosophical meetings of the learned ; that, everywhere is felt the desire of esteem — a wonderful power in the hands of the educator, making a word of praise or blame more powerful as a motive than any fear or hope of punishment or reward. And it is not only the same desires ; all people, every- where, have the same affections and passions which act ill the same way under similar provocation : joy and grief, love and resentment, benevolence, sympathy, fear, and much else, are common to all of us. So, too, of conscience, the sense of duty. ■ Dr. Livingstone mentions that the only addition he felt called upon to make to the moral code of certain of the Zambesi tribes (however little they observed their own law) was, that a man should not have more than one wife. " Evil speaking, lying, hatred, disobedience to parents, neglect of them," were all known to be sin by these dark peoples whom civilized or Christian teaching had never before reached. Not only is a sense of duty common to mankind, but the deeper consciousness of God, however vague such conscious- ness may be. And all this and much more goes to make up the most elemental notion of human nature. Then, heredity comes in, and here, if you please, is ten natures : who is to deal with the child who is resentful, or stubborn, or reckless. 72 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect, HI. because it is bom in bim, his mother's nature, or his grand- father's? Think of the trick of the eye, the action of the hand, repeated from father to son ; the peculiar character of the handwriting, traceable, as Miss Power Cobbo tells us is the case in her family, for instance, through five genera- tions ; the artistic temperament, the taste for music or draw- ing, running in families : kere you get nature with a twist, confirmed, sealed, riveted, utterly proof, you would say, against any attempt to alter it or modify. And, once more, physical conditions come in force. The puny feeble child and the sturdy urchin who never ails must necessarily differ from one another in the strength of their desires and emotions. What, then, with the natural desires, affections, and emotions common to the whole race, what with the ten- dencies which each family derives by descent, and those peculiarities which the individual owes to his own constitu- tion of body and brain,— human nature, the sum of all these, makes out for itself a strong case; so much so, that we are inclined to think, the best that can be done is ,to let it alone, let every child develop unhindered according to the elements of character and disposition that are in him. . This is precisely what half the parents in the world, and three- fourths of the teachers are content to do: and what is the consequence? That the world is making advances, but the progress is, for the most part, amongst the few whose parents have taken their education seriously in hand ; while the rest, who have been allowed to stay where they were, be no more, or no better than nature made them, act as a heavy drag : for indeed the fact is, that they do not stay where they were ; it is unchangeably true that the child who is not being constantly raised to a higher and a higher platfornj will sink to a lower and a lower. Wherefore, it is as much the parent's duty to educate his child into moral strength and Lect. III.] " HABIT IS TEN NATURES." 73 purpose and intellectual activity as it is to feed him. and clothe him ; and that, in spite of his nature, if it must be so. It is true that here and there circumstances step in and " mate a man " of the boy whose parents have failed to bring him under discipline ; but this is a fortuitous aid which the educator is no way warranted to count upon. I was beginning to see my way — not yet out of the psychological difficulty, which, so far as I was concerned, blocked the way to any real education ; but now I cojjld put my finger on the place, and that was something. Thus : — The will of the child is pitifully feeble, weaker in the children of the weak, stronger in the children of the strong, but hardly ever to be counted upon as a power in education. The nature of the child — his human nature — being the sum of what he is as a human being, and what he is in right of the stock he comes of, and what he is as the result of his own physical and mental constitution — this nature is incal- culably strong. The problem before the educator is to give the child control over his own nature, to enable him to hold himself in hand as much in regard to the traits we call good, as to those we call evil : — many a man makes shipwreck on the rock of what he grew up to think his characteristic virtue — his open-handedness, for instance. In looking for a solution of this problem, I do not under- value the divine grace — far otherwise ; but we do not always make enough of the fact that the divine grace is exerted on the lines of enlightened human effort ; that the parent, for instance, who takes the trouble to understand what he is about in educating his child, deserves, and assuredly gets, support from above ; and that Eebecoa, let us say, had no right to bring up her son to be " thou worm, Jacob," in the trust that divine grace would, speaking reverently, pull him through. Being a pious man, the son of pious parents, 74 HOME EDUOATIOK. [Lect. III. he was pulled througli, but his days, he complains at the end, were " few and evil." And indeed this is what too many Christian parents expect : they let a child grow free as the wild bramble, putting forth unchecked whatever is in him — thorn, coarse flower, insipid fruit, — trusting, they will tell you, that the grace of God will prune and dig and prop the wayward branches lying prone. And their trust is not always mis- placed; but the poor man endures anguish, is torn asunder in the process of recovery which his parents might have spared him had they trained the early shoots which should develop by-and-by into the charaeter of their child. Nature then, strong as it is, is not invincible; and at its best, nature is not to be permitted to ride rampant. Bit and bridle, hand and voice, will get the utmost of endeavour out of her if her training be taken in hand in time ; but let nature run wild, like the forest ponies, and not spur or whip will break her in, Sahit may supplant " Nature." " Habit is ten natures." If that be true, strong as nature is, habit is not only as strong, but tenfold as strong. Here then, have we a stronger than he, able to overcome this strong man armed ? But habit runs on the lines of nature : the cowardly child habitually lies that he may escape blame ; the loving child has a hundred endearing habits, the good- natured child has a habit of giving, the selfish child a habit of keeping. Habit, working thus according to nature, is simply nature in action, growing strong by exercise. But Habit, to be the lever to lift the child, must work contrary to Nature, or at any rate, independently of her. Directly we begin to look out for the working of habit on these lines, examples crowd upon us: there are the children trained in careful habits, who never soil their Lect. hi.] " HABIT IS TEN NATURES." 75 clothes; those trained in reticent habits, who never speak of what is done at home, and answer indiscreet questions with " I don't know ; " there are the children brought up in courteous habits, who make way for their elders with gentle grace, and more readily for the poor woman with the basket than for the well-dressed lady ; and there are children trained in grudging habits, who never offer to yield, or go, or do. Such habits as these, good, bad, or indifferent, are they natural to the children? No, but they are what their mothers have brought them up to ; and, as a matter of fact, there is nothing which a mother cannot bring her child up to, and there is hardly a mother anywhere who has not some two or three — crotchets sometimes, principles some- times — which her children never violate. So that it comes to this — given, a mother with liberal views on the subject of education, and she simply cannot help working her own views into her children's habits ; given, on the other hand, a mother whose final question is, " What will people say ? what will people think ? how will it look ? " and the children grow up with habits of seeming, and not of being ; they are content to appear well-dressed, well-mannered, and well-intentioned to outsiders, with very little effort after beauty, order, and goodness at home, and in each other's eyes. The extraordinary power of habit in forcing nature into new channels hardly requires illustration ; we have only to see a small boy at a circus riding two barebacked ponies with a foot on the back of each, or a pantomime fairy dancing on air, or a clown behaving like an india-rubber ball, or any of the thousand feats of skill and dexterity which we pay our shillings to see— mental feats as well as bodily, though, happily, these are the rarer— to be convinced that exactly anything may be accomplished by training. 76 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. III. tliat is, the cultivation of persistent habits. And this power of habit is not seen in human beings alone. The cat goes in search of her dinner always at the same time and to the same place — that is, if it is usual to feed her in one spot. Indeed, the habit of place is so much to the cat, that she will rather die of famine than forsate the house she is accustomed to. As for the dog, he is still more a " bundle of habits " than his master. Scatter crumbs for the sparrows at nine o'clock every morning, and at nine o'clock they will come for their breakfast, crumbs or no crumbs. Darwin inclines to think that the terror and avoidance shown towards man by the wild birds and lesser animals is simply a matter of trans- mitted hahifc ; he tells us how he landed upon certain of the Pacific islands where the birds had never seen man before, and they lighted upon him and flew about him with utter fearlessness. To come nearer home, what evidence of the mastery of habit is more sad and more overwhelming than the habits of the drunkard, for instance, persisted in^ in spite of reason, conscience, purpose, religionj every motive which should influence a thinking being ? All this is nothing new; we have always known that " use is spcond nature," and that " man is a bundle of habits." It was not the fact, but the application of the fact, and the physiology of habit, that were new and exceedingly valuable ideas to me, and I hope they may be of some use to you. It was new to me, for instance, to perceive that it rests with parents and teachers to lay down lines of habit on which the life of the child may run henceforth with little jolting or miscarriage, and may advance in the right direction with the minimum of effort. The Laying down of Lines of Habit. This relation of habit to human life— as the rails on which it runs to a locomotive — is perhaps the most suggestive Lect. hi.] " HABIT IS TEN NATURES." 77 and helpful to the educator; for just as it is on the whole easier for the locomotive to pursue its way on the rails than to take a disastrous run off them, so it is easier for the child to follow lines of habit carefully laid down than to run off these lines at his peril. It follows, that this business of laying down lines towards the unexplored country of the child's future is a very serious and responsible one for the parent. It rests with him to consider well the tracks over which the child should travel with profit and pleasure, and, along these tracks, to lay down lines so invitingly smooth and easy that the little traveller is going upon them at full speed without stopping to consider whether he chooses to go that way or not. But, supposing that the doing of a certain action a score or two of times in unbroken sequence forms a habit which it is as easy to follow as not ; that, persist still further in the habit ■ iviihout lapses, and it becomes second nature, quite difficult to shake off ; continue it further, through a course of years, and the habit has the strength of ten natures, you cannot break through it without doing real violence to yourself; — grant all this, and, also, that it is possible to form in the child the habit of doing and saying, even of thinking and feeling all that it is desirable he shoiild do or say, think or feel, and do you not take away the child's freewill, make a mere automaton of him by this excessive culture ? In the first place, whether you choose or no to take any trouble about the formation of his habits, it is halit, all the same, which will govern ninety-nine one-hundredths of the child's life : he is the mere automaton, you describe. As for the child's becoming the creature of habit, that is not left with the parent to determine; We are all mere creatures of habit. We think our accustomed thoiights, make our usual small talk, go through the trivial round, the common task, without any self-determining effort of will at all. If 78 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. Ill, it were not so— if we had to think, to deliberate, about each operation of the bath or the table— life would simply not be worth having; the perpetually repeated effort of decision would wear us out. But let us be thankful life is not thus laborious. For a hundred times we act or think, it is not necessary to choose, to will, say, more than once. And the little emergencies which compel an act of will will fall in the children's lives just about as frequently as in our own. These we cannot save them from, nor is it desirable that we should. What we can do for them is to secure that they have habits which shall lead them in ways of order, propriety, and virtue, instead of leaving their wheel of life to make ugly ruts in miry places. And then, even in emergencies, in every sudden difficulty and temptation that requires an act of will, why, conduct is still apt to run on the linos of the familiar habit. The boy who has been accustomed to find both profit and pleasure in his books does not fall easily into idle ways becaxise he is attracted by an idle schoolfellow. The girl who has been carefully trained to speak the exact truth simply does not think of a lie as a ready means of getting out of a scrape, coward as she may be. But this doctrine of habit, is it, after all, any more than an empirical treatment of the child's symptoms? Why should the doing of an act or the thinking of a thought, say,, a score of times in unbroken succession have any tendency to make the doing of that act or the thinking of that thought a part of the child's nature ? We may accept the doctrine as an act of faith resting on experience ; but if we. could dis- cover the raison d'etre of this enormous force of habit .it would, be possible to go to work on the laying down of habits with real purpose and method. Lect, III.J " HABIT IS TEN NATUEES." 79 The Physiology of Habit, A work of Dr. Carpenter's was perhaps the first which gave me the clue I was iu search of. In his " Mental Physiology " — a most interesting hook, by the way — he works out the analogy between mental and physical activity, and shows that the correspondence in effect is due to a corre- spondence in cause. Thus — to state roughly the doctrine of the school Dr. Carpenter represents— the tissues, as mus- cular tissue, for instance, undergo constant waste aitd as constant reparation. Certain modes of muscular action are natural to us, as walking, and standing erect ; other modes we acquire, as writing or dancing : hut the acquired mode of action becomes just as easy as the natural mode. Why? Because it is the law of the constantly grow-> ing tissues that they should form themselves according to the modes of action required of them. Thus the joints and muscles of the child's hand very soon accommodate themselves to the mode of action required of them in holding and guiding the pen. Observe, it is not that the child learns with his mind how to use his pen, in Spite of his muscles ; hut that the newly growing muscles themselves take form according to the action required of them. And here is the explanation of all the mountebank feats which appear simply impossible to the untrained looker-on. They are impossible to him, because his joints and muscles have not the same powers which have been produced in the mountebank by a process of early training. So much for mere bodily activities. And here we have the reason why children should learn. dancing, riding, swimming, calisthenics, every form of activity which requires a training of the muscles, at a very early age : the fact being, that muscles and joints have not nlerely to conform themselves to new uses, but to grow to a modified pat|terh ; and this 80 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. IU, growth and adaptation take place with the greatest facility in early youth. Of course, the man whose muscles have kept the habit of adaptation picks up new games, new muscular exercises, without very great labour* But teach a ploughman to write, and you see the enormous physical difSculty which unaccustomed muscles have in growing to any new sort of effort. Here we see how important it is to keep watch over the habits of enunciation, carriage of the head, and so on, which the child is forming hour by hour. The poke, the stoop, the indistinct utterance, is not a mere trick to be left off at pleasure " when he is older and knows better," but is all the time growing into him, becoming a part of himself; certain muscles are conforming themselves, growing to, certain kinds of misbehaviour. And to correct bad habits of speaking, for instance, it will not be enough for the child to intend to speak plainly and to try to speak plainly ; he will not be able to do so habitually until some degree of new growth has taken place in the organs of voice whilst he is making efforts to form the new habit. But, practically, everybody knows that the body, and every part of the body, accommodates itself very readily to the uses it is put to : we know that if a child accustom herself to stand on one foot, thus pushing up one shoulder, the habit will probably end in curvature of the spine ; that to permit drooping shoulders, and consequently, contracted chest, is to prepare the way for lung disease., The physical consequences of bad habits of this sort are so evident, that we cannot blind ourselves to the relation of cause and effect. What we are less prepared to admit is, that habits which do not appear to be in any sense physical — a flippant habit, a truthful habit, an orderly habit — should also malce their mark upon a physical tissue, and that it is to this physical effect the enormous strength of habit is probably due. Yet, when we LlicT. in.] "HABIT IS TEN NATURES." 81 coDsider that the hrain, the physical brain, is the exceedingly delicate organ by means of which we think and feel and desire, love, and hate, and worship, it is not surprising that that organ should be modified by the work it has to do ; to put the matter picturesquely, it is as if every familiar train of thought made a rut in the nervous substance of the brain into which the thoughts run lightly of their own accord, and out of which they can only be got by a great effort of will. Thiis, the mistress of the house knows that when her thoughts are free to take their own course, they run to cai'es of the house or the larder, to to-morrow's dinner or the winter's clothing ; that is, thought runs into the rut which has been, so to speak, worn for it by constant repetition. The mother's thoughts run on her children, the painter's on pictures, the poet's on poems ; those of the anxious head of the house on money cares, it may be, until in times of iinusual pressure, the thoughts beat, beat, beat, in that well- worn rut of ways and means, and decline to run in any other channel, till the poor man loses his reason, simply because he cannot get his thoughts out of that one channel made in the substance of his brain. And, indeed, " that way madness lies " for every one of us, in the persistent preying of any one train of thought upon the brain tissue. Pride, resentment, jealousy, an invention that a man has laboured over, an opinion he has conceived, any line of thought which he has no longer the power to divert, will endanger a man's sanity. If we love, hate, think, feel, worship, at the expense of actual physical effort on the part of the brain, and con-' sequent waste of tissue, how enormous must be the labour of that organ with which we, in fact, do everything, even many of those acts whose final execution falls to the hands or feet ! It is true : and to repair this excessive waste, the brain consumes the lion's share of the nourishment provided for the body. As we have already seen, fully a sixth or a G 82 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. Ill- iifth of all tho blootliii the body goes to repair the waste in the king's house; in. other words, new brain tissue is being constantly formed at a startlingly rapid rate : one wonders at what age the child has no longer any part left of that brain with which he was born. The new tissue repeats the old, but not quite' exactly. Just as a new muscular growth adapts itself to any new exercise required of it, so the new brain tissue is supposed to " grow to " any habit of thought in force during the 'time of growth — " thought " here including, of course, every exercise of mind and soul. " The cerebrum of man grows to the modes of thought in which it is habitually exercised," says an able physiologist : or, in the words of Dr. Carpenter, " Any sequence of mental action which has been frequently re- peated, tends to perpetuate itself; so that we find ourselves automatically prompted to t}iinh,feel, or do what we have been before accustomed to think, feel, or do, under like circum- stances, without any consciously formed purpose or anticipation of results. For there is no reason to regard the cerebrum as an exception to the general principle, that, whilst each part of the organism tends to form itself in accordance with the mode in which it is habitually exercised, this tendency will be specially strong in the nervous apparatus, in virtue of that incessant regeneration which is the very condition of its functional activity. It scarcely, indeed, admits of a doubt, that every state of ideational consciousness which is either very strong or is habitually repeated, leaves an organic im- pression on the cerebrum ; in virtue of which the same state may be reproduced at any future time in correspondence to a suggestion fitted to excite it." Or, to take Professor Huxley's way of putting the case,-^ " By the help of the brain We may acquire an infinity of artificial reflex actions, that is to say, an action may j-equire all our attention and all our volition for its first, Lect. III.] " HABIT IS TEN NATURES." 83 second, or thirfl performance, but by frequent repetition it becomes, in a manner, part of our organization, and is per- formed without volition, or even consciousness. " As every one knows, it takes a soldier a long time to learn his drill — for instance, to put himself into the attitude of ' attention ' at the instant the word of command is heard. But, after a time, the sound of the word gives rise to the act, whether the soldier be thinking of it or not. There is a story, which is credible enough, though it may not be true, of a practical joker, who, seeing a discharged veteran carrying home his dinner, suddenly called out ' Attention ! ' whereupon the man instantly brought his hands down, and lost his mutton and potatoes in the gutter. The drill had been thorough, and its effects had become embodied in the man's nervous structure. " The possibility of all education (of which military drill is only one particular form), is based upon the existence of this power which the nervous system possesses, of organizing conscious actions into more or less unconscious, or reflex, operations. It may be laid down as a rule, that if any two mental states be called up together, or in succession, with due frequency and vividness, the subsequent production of the one of them will sufiBce to call up the other, and that whether we desire it or not. " The object of intellectual education is to create such indissoluble associations of our ideas of things, in the order and relation in which they occur in nature ; that of a moral education is to unite as fixedly, the ideas of evil deeds with those of pain and degradation, and of good actions with those of pleasure and nobleness." But it is the reflex action of matter upon mind which is more directly important to the educator — the idea which we have put broadly under the figure of a rut. Given, that the constant direction of the thoughts produce a corresponding 84 HOME BDUOATION. ILect. III. set in tte molecular currents of the brain, the thoughts must continue to go with those currents until stronger currents be set up. What follows? Why, that the actual conformation of the child's brain depends upon the habits which the parents permit or encourage ; and that the habits of the child produce the character of the man, because, certain mental habitudes once set up, their nature is to go on for ever unless they should be displaced by other habits. Here is an end to the easy philosophy of, " It doesn't matter," " Oh, he'll grow out of it," "He'll know better by-and-by," "He's so young, what can we expect ? " and so on. Every day, every hour, the parents are either passively or actively forming those habits in their children upon which, more than upon anything else, future character and conduct depend. And here comes in the consideration of outside influence. Nine times out of ten we begin to do a thing because we see some one else do it; we go on doing it, and — there is the habit ! If it is so easy for ourselves to take up a new habit, it is tenfold as easy for the children : and this is the real difficulty in the matter of the education of habit. It is necessary that the mother be always on the alert to nip in the bud the bad habit her children may be in the act of picking up from servants or from other children. The Forming of a Halit — " Shut the Door after you." Except for this one drawback, the forming of habits in the children is no laborious task, for the reward goes hand in hand with the labour ; so much so, that it is like the laying out of a penny with the certainty of the immediate return of a pound. For a habit is a delight in itself; poor human nature is conscious of the ease that it is to repeat the doing of anything without effort ; and, therefore, the formation of a habit, the gradually lessening sense of effort in a given act. Lect. III.] " HABIT IS TEN NATURES." 85 is pleasurable. This is one of the rocks that mothers some- times split upon : they lose sight of the fact that a habit, even a good habit, becomes a real pleasure ; and when the child has really formed the habit of doing a certain thing, his mother imagines that the effort is as great to him as at first, that it is virtue in him to go on making this effort, and that he deserves, by way of reward, a little relaxation — -she will let him break through the now habit a few times, and then go on again. But it is not going on, it is beginning again, and beginning in the face of obstacles. The " little relaxation" she allowed her child meant the forming of another, contrary habit, which must be overcome before the child gets back to where he was before. As a matter of fact, this misguided sympathy on the part of mothers is the one thing that makes it a laborious undertaking to train a child in good habits ; for it is the nature of the child to take to habits as kindly as the infant takes to his mother's milk. For example, and to choose a habit of no great conse- quence except as a matter of consideration for others : the mother wishes her child to acquire the habit of shutting the door after him when he enters or leaves a room. Tact, watchfulness, and persistence are the qualities she must cultivate in herself, and, with these, she will be astonished at the readiness with which the child picks up the new habit. " Johnny," she says, in a bright friendly voice, " I want you to remember something with all your might : never go into or out of a room in which anybody is sitting without shut^ ting the door." " But if I forget, mother ? " " I will try to remind you." " But perhaps I shall be in a great hurry." " You must always make time to do that." . " But why, mother ? " 86 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. III. "Because it is not polite to the people in the room to make them tincomfortable." " But if I am going out again that very minute ? " " Still shut the door when you como in ; you can open it again to go out. Do you think you can remember ? " '' I'll try, mother." " Very well ; I shall watoh to see how few 'forgets ' you make." For two or three times Johnny remembers ; and then, he is o£f like a shot and halfway downstairs before his mother has time, to call him back. She does not cry out, " Johnny, come back and shut the door ! " because she knows that a summons of that kind is exasperating to big or little. She goes to the door, and calls pleasantly, " Johnny ! " Johnny has for- gotten all about the door; he wonders what his mother wants, and, stirred by curiosity, comes back, to find her seated and employed as before. She looks up, glances at the door, anid says, "I said I should try to remind you." "Oh, I forgot," says Johnny, put upon his honour ; and he shuts the door that time, and the next, and the next. But the little fellow really has not much power to recollect, and the mother will have to adopt various little devices to remind him'; but of two things she will be careful — that he never slips off without shutting the door, and that she never lets the matter be a cause of friction between herself and the child, taking the line of his friendly ally to help him against that bad memory of his. By-and-by, after, say, twenty shuttings of the door with never an omission, the habit begins to be formed ; Johnny shuts the door as a matter of course, and his mother watches him with delight come into a room, shut the door, take something off the table, and go out, again shutting the door. Now that Johnny always shuts the door, his mother's joy and triumph begin to be mixed with unreasonable pity. Leot. III.] " HABIT IS TEN NATUBES." 87 " Poor ohild," she says to herself, "it is very good of him to take so muoh pains about a little thing, just heoause he is bid ! " She thinks that, all the time, the child is making an effort for her sake i losing sight of the fact that the hahit has become easy and natural, that, in fact, Johnnie shuts the door without knowing that he does so. Now comes the cri tical moment. Some day, Johnny is so taken up with a new delight that the habit, not yet fully formed, loses its hold, and he is halfway downstairs before he thinks of the door. Then, he does think of it, with a little prick of conscience, strong enough, not to send hiin back, but to make him pause a moment to see if his mother will call him back. She has noticed the omission, and is saying to herself, " Poor little fellow, he has been very good about it this long time; I'll let him off this once." He, outside, fails to hear his mother's call, says to himself — fatal sentence ! " Oh, it doesn't matter," and trots off. Next time, he leaves the door open, but it is not a "forget." His mother calls him back in a rather feeble way. His quick ear catches the weakness of her tone, and, without coming back, he cries, " Oh, mother, I'm in such a hurrj'," and she says no more, but lets him off. Again, he rushes in, leaving the door wide open. " Johnny ! " — in a warning voice. " I'm going out again just in a minute, mother," and, after ton minutes rummaging, he does go out, and forgets to shut the door. The mother's mis-timed easiness has lost for her every foot of the ground she had gained. Infant " Eahits." (a) Cleanliness. — The whole group of habitudes, half physical and half moral, on which the propriety and comfort of everyday life depend, are received passively by the child ; that is, he does very little to form these habits himself but 88 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. HI. his brain receives impressions from what he sees about him ; and these impressions take form as his own very strongest and most lasting habits. Cleanliness, order, neatness, regularity, punctuality, are all branches of infant education. They should be about the child like the air he breathes, and he will take them in as unconsciously. It is hardly necessary to say a word about the necessity of delicate cleanliness in the nursery. The babies get their share of tubbing, and unlimited washing is done on their behalf; but, indeed, scrupulous as mothers of the cultured class are, a great deal rests. with the nurses, and it needs much watchfulness to secure that .there shall not he the faintest odour about the infant, or anything belonging to him, and that the nurseries be kept sweet and thoroughly aired. One great difficulty is that the nurses belong to a class io which an open window is an abomination : and another is, they do not know the harm of smells ; "they cannot see " a smell," and, therefore, it is not easy to persuade them that a smell is matter, microscopic particles which the child takes into him with every breath he draws. By the way, a very important bit of physical education for the child is to train in him a sensitive nose— nostrils which sniff out the least " stuffiness " in a room, or the faintest odour attached to clothes or furniture. The sense of smell appears to have been given us mainly as a sort of danger- signal to warn us of the presence of noxious matters ; yet many people appear to go through the world without a nose at all: and the fact tends to show that a quick sense of smell is a matter of education and habit. The habit is easily formed. Encourage the children to notice whether the room they enter " smells " quite fresh when they come in out of the open air ; to observe the difference between the air of the town and the fresher air beyond : and train them to perceive the faintest trace of pleasant or harmless odours. ^ Lect. III.] " HABIT IS TEN NATUEES." 89 To return to the nursery. It would he a great thing if the nurse could be impressed with the notion that the baby- is ubiquitous, and that he not only sees and knows everything, but will keep, for all his life, the mark of all he sees : — " If there's a hole in a' your coats, I pray ye, 'tent it ; A chiel's amang ye takin' notes. And, faith, he'll prent it : " — "prent it" on his own active brain, as a type for his future habits. Such a notion on the nurse's part might do some- thing to secure cleanliness that goes beyond that of clean aprons. One or two little bits of tidiness that nurses affect are not to be commended on the score of cleanliness : — the making up of the nursery beds early in the morning, and the folding up of the children's garments when they take them off at night. It is well to stretch a line across the day nursery at night, and hang the little garments out for an airing, to get rid of the insensible perspiration with which they have been laden during the day. Por the same reason, the beds and bed-clothes should be turned down to air for a couple of hours before they are made up. The nursery table, if there is one, should be kept as scrupulously nice as that of the dining-room. The child who sits down to a crumpled or spotted table-cloth, or uses a dis- coloured metal spoon, is degraded — by that much. The children, too, should be encouraged to nice cleanliness in their own persons. We have seen the dainty baby-hand stretched out to be washed ; it has got a smudge, and the child does not like it. May they be as particular when they are big enough to wash their own hands ! Not that they should be always clean and presentable ; children love to " mess about," and should have big pinafores for the purpose. They are all like that little French prince who scorned his birthday gifts, and entreated to be allowed to make dear Do HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. Ill, little mud pies with tte little boy in the gutter. Let them make their nmd pies freely ; hut, that over, they should be impatient to remove every trace of soil, and should do it themselves: Very young children may be taught to take care of their finger-nails, and to cleanse the comers of eyes and ears. As for sitting down to table with unwashed hands and unbrushed hair, that, of course, no decent child is allowed to do. They should be early provided with their own washing materials, and accustomed to find real pleasure in the b^th, and in attending to themselves. There is no reason why a child of five or six should not make himself thoroughly clean without all that torture of soap in the eyes and general pulling about and poking which children hate, and no wonder. Besides, the child is not getting the habit of the daily bath until he can take it for himself, and it is important that this habit should be formed before the reckless era of school-life begins. The operations of the bath afford the mother opportunities to give necessary teaching and training in habits of decency, and a sense of modesty. To let her young child live and grow in Eden-like simplicity is, perhaps, the most teniptirig and natural course to the mother. But, alas ! we do not live in the Garden, and it may be well that the child should he trained from the first to the conditions under which he is to live. To the youngest child, as to our first parents, there is that which is forbidden. In the age of unquestioning obedience, let him know that not all of his body does Almighty God allow him to speak of, think of, display, handle, except for purposes of cleanliness. This will be the easier to the mother if she speak of heart, lungs, etc., which; also, we are not allowed to look at or handle, but which have been so enclosed in walls of flesh and bone that we cannot get at them. That which is left open to us is so left, like that tree in the Garden of Eden, as a test of obedience ; Leot. III.] " HABIT IS TEN NATURES." 91 and, in the one case, as in the other, disobedience is attended with certain loss and ruin.- The sense of prohibition, of sin in disobedience, will be a wonderful safe-guard against the knowledge of evil to the child brought up in habits- of obedience ; and still more effective will be the sense of honour, of a charge to keep — the motive of the apostolic injunctions on this subject. Let the mother renew this charge with earnestness on the eve, say, of each birthday, giving the child to feel that by obedience in this matter he may glorify God loith Ms body; let her keep watch against every approach of evil ; and let her pray daily that each one of her children may be kept in purity for that day. To ignore the possibilities of evil in this kind is to expose the child to frightful risks. At the same time, be it remembered that words, which were meant to hinder, may themselves be the cause of evil, and that a life full of healthy interests and activities is amongst the surest preventives of secret vice. (&) Order. — What has been said about cleanliness applies as much to order — order in the nursery, and orderly habits in the nurse. One thing under this head : the nursery should not be made the hospital for the disabled or worn-out furniture of the house ; cracked cups, chipped plates, jugs and teapots with fractured spouts, should be banished. The children should be brought up to think that when once an article is made un- sightly by soil or fracture it is spoiled, and must be replaced : and this rule will prove really economical, for when children and servants find that things no longer "do," after some careless injury, they learn to be careful. But, in any case, it is a real detriment to the children to grow up using imjperfect and unsightly make-shifts. The pleasure grown-up people take in waiting on the children is really a fruitful source of mischief ; for instance, in this matter of orderly habits. Who does not know the litter the children leave to be cleared up after them a dozen 92 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. Ill, times a day, in nursery, garden, drawing-room, wherever the restless little feet carry them ? We are a hit sentimental about scattered toys and faded nosegays, a,nA all the tokens of the children's presence ; but the fact is, that the lawless habit of scattering should never have been allowed to grow upon the children. Everybody condemns the mother of a family whose drawers are chaotic, whose possessions are flung about heedlessly ; but at least some of the blame should be carried back to her mother. It is not as a woman that she has picked up a miserable habit which destroys the comfort, if not the happiness, of her home; the habit of disorder was allowed to grow upon her as a child, and her share of the blame is, that she has failed to cure herself. The child of two should be taught to get and to replace his playthings. Begin early. Let it be a pleasure to him, part of his play, to open his cupboard, and put back the doll or the horse each in its own place. Let him always put away his things as a matter of course, and it is surprising how soon a habit of order is formed, which will make it pleasant to the child to put away his toys, and irritating to him to see things in the wrong place. If parents would only see the morality of order, that order in the nursery becomes scrupulousness in after life, and that the training necessary to form the habit is no more, comparatively, than the occasional wind- ing of a clock, which ticks away then of its own accord and without trouble to itself, more pains would be taken to cultivate this important habit. (c) Neatness. — Neatness is akin to order, but is not quite the same thing ; it implies, not only " a place for everything, and everything in its place," but everything in a suitable place, so as to produce a good effect ; in fact, taste comes into play. The little girl must not only put her flowers in water, but arrange them prettily, and must not be put off with some rude kitchen mug or jug for them, or some hideous pink fiECT. III.] " HABIT IS TEN NATURES." 93 vase, but must have jar or vase graceful in form and harmonious in hue, though it be but a cheap trifle. In the same way, everything in the nursery should be "neat" — that is, pleasing and suitable; and the children should be encouraged to make neat and effective arrangements of their own little properties. Nothing vulgar in the way of print, picture-book, or toy should be admitted, — nothing to vitiate the child's taste or introduce a strain of commonness into his nature. On the other hand, it would be hard to estimate the refining elevating influence of one or two works of art, in however cheap a form. The importance of Begularify in infant education is be- ginning to bo pretty generally acknowledged. The young mother knows that she must put her baby to bed at the proper time, regardless of his cries, even if she leave him to cry two or three times, in order that, for the rest of his baby life, he may put himself sweetly to sleep in the dark with- out protest. But a good deal of nonsense is talked about the reason of the child's cries : he is supposed to want his mother, or his nurse, or his bottle, or the light, and to be " a knowing little fellow," according to his nurse, quite up to the fact that if he cries for these things he will got them. The fact is, the child has already formed a habit of wake- fulness or of feeding at improper times, and he is as uneasy at his habit being broken in upon as the cat is at a change of habitation ; when he submits happily to the new regula- tion, it is because the new habit is formed, and is, in its turn, the source of satisfaction. According to Dr. Carpenter, "Begularity should begin even with infant life, as to times of feeding, repose, etc. The bodily habit thus formed greatly helps to shape the mental habit at a later period. On the other hand, nothing tends more to generate a habit of self- indulgence than to feed a child, or to allow it to remain out of bed, at unseasonable times, merely because it cries. It is 94 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. m, -wonderful how soon tlie actions of a young infant (like these of a young dog or horse) come into harmony with systematic '. training ' judiciously exercised." The habit of regularity is as attractive to older children as to the infant. The days when the usual programme falls through are, we know, the days when the children are apt to be naughty. Physical Exercises. The subject of the natural training of eye and muscles, was taken up pretty fully in the lecture on " Out-of-door Life." I will only add, that to give the child pleasure in light and feasy motion— 'the sott of delight in the management of his own body that a good rider finds in managing ,his horse — dancing,- drill, calisthenics, some sort of judicious physical exercise should make part of every day's routine. Swedish drill is especially valuable, and many of the exercises are quite suitable for the nursery. Certain moiral qualities come into play in alert move- ments, eye-to-eye attention, prompt and intelligent replies ; but it often happens that good children fail in these points for want of physical training. Just let them go through the drill of good manners : let them rehearse little scenes in play, — Maiy, the lady asking the way to the market ; Harry, the boy who directs her, and so on. Let them go through a position drill — eyes right, hands still, heads up. They will invent a hundred situations, and the behaviour proper to each, and will treasure hints thrown in for their guidance. Encourage them to admire and take pride in light springing movements, and to eschew a heavy gait and clownish action of the limbs. The training of the ear and voice are exceedingly im- portant parts of physical culture. Drill the children in pure vowel sounds, in the enunciation of final consonants ; do not let them speak of " walkin' " and " talkin,' " of a " fi-ine da-ay," Lect. III.] " HABIT IS TEN NATURES." 95 " ni-ioe boy-oys." Drill tliem in pronouncing difficult words — " imperturbability," " ipecacuanha," " Antananarivo," — with sharp precision after a single hearing ; in producing the several sounds of each vowel ; and the sounds of the conso- nants toithout attendant vowels. French, taught ovally, is exceedingly valuable as affording training for both ear and voice. As for a musical training, it would be hard to say how much what passes for inherited musical taste and ability is the result of the constant hearing and producing of musical sounds, the habit of music, that the child of musical people grows up with. Mr. HuUah maintained that the art of singing is entirely a trained habit — that every child may be, and should be, trained to sing. Of course, transmitted habi't must be taken into account. It is a pity that the musical training most children get is of such a random character ; that they are not trained, for instance, by carefully graduated ear and voice exercises, to produce and distinguish musical tones and intervals. In conclusion, let me say that the education of habit is successful in so far as it enables the mother to let her children alone, not teasing them with perpetual commands and direc- tions—a running iire of Do and Don't; but letting them go their own way and grow, ha-ving first secured that they will go the right way, and grow to fruitful purpose. The gardener, it is true, " digs about and dungs," prunes and trains, Lis peach-tree : but that occupies a small fraction of the tree's life; all the rest of the time, the sweet airs and sunshine, the rains and dews, play about it and breathe upon it, get into its substance, and the result is — peaches. But let the gardener neglect hia part, and the peaches will be no better than sloes. 96 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. IV, LECTUEE IV. SOME HABITS OP MIND— SOME MORAL HABITS. Allow me to say once more, that I venture to speak upon subjects bearing on home education with the greatest de- ference to mothers; believing that, in virtue of their peculiar insight into the dispositions of their own children, they are blest with both knowledge and power in the management of them which lookers-on can only admire from afar. At the same time, there is such a thing as a science of education, Ihat does not come by intuition, in the knowledge of which it is possible to bring up a child entirely according to natural law — which is also Divine law, in the keeping of which there is great reward. We saw in the last lecture why Habit, for instance, is such a marvellous force in human life. I find this view of habit very encouraging, as giving a scientific reasonable- ness to the conclusions already reached by common experience. It is pleasant to know that, even in mature life, it is possible by a little persistent effort to acquire a desirable habit. It is good, if not pleasant, to know, also, with what fatal ease we can slip into bad habits. But the most comfortable thing in this view of habit is that it falls in with our natural love of an easy life. We are not unwilling to make efforts in the beginning, with the assurance that by-and-by things Leot. IV.] SOME HABITS OP MIND. 97 will go smoothly ; and this is just what habit is, in an extraordinary degree, pledged to eiFect. The mother who takes pains to endow her children with good habits secures for herself smooth and easy days ; while she who lets their habits take care of themselyes has a weary life of endless friction with the children. All day she is crying out, "Do this ! " and they do it not ; " Do that ! " and they do the other. " But," you say, " if habit is so powerful, whether to hinder or to help the child, it is fatiguing to think of all the habits the poor mother must aittend to. Is she never to be at ease with her children ? " Here, again, is an illustration of that fable of the anxious pendulum, overwhelmed with the thought of the number of ticks it must tick. But the ticks are to be delivered tick by tick, and there will always be a second of time to tick in. The mother devotes herself to the formation of one habit at a time, doing no more than keep watch over those already formed. If she be appalled by the thought of over- much labour, let her limit the number of good habits she will lay herself out to form. The child who starts in life with, say, twenty good habits, begins with a certain capital which he will lay out to endless profit as the years go on. The mother who is distrustful of her own power of steady effort may well take comfort in two facts. In the first place, she herself acquires the habit of training her children in a given habit, so that by-and-by it becomes, not only no trouble, but a pleasure to her. In the second place, the child's most fixed and dominant habits are those which the mother takes no pains about, but which the child picks up for himself through his close observation of all that is said and done, felt and thought in his home. We have already considered a group of half-physical habits — order, regularity, neatness — which the child imbibesj so to speak, in this way. But this is not all : habits of It 98 HOME EDUCATION. ILeot. IV. gentleness, courtesy, kindness, candonr,- respect for other people, or — habits quite other "than these, are inspired by the child as the very atmosphere of his home, the air he lives in •and must grow by. The Habit of Attention. Let us pass on, now, to the consideration of a group of mental habits which are affected by direct training rather than by example. First, we put the habit of Attention, because the highest intellectual gifts depend for their value upon the measure in which "their owner has cultivated the habit of attention, •To explain why this habit is of such supreme importance, •we must consider the operation of one or two of the laws of thought. But just recall, in the mean time, the fixity of attention with which the trained professional man— the lawyer, the doctor, the man of letters — listens to a round- about story, throws out the padding, seizes the facts, sees the bearing of every circumstance, and puts the case with new clearness and method; and contrast this with the wandering eye and random replies of the uneducated : and you see that, to differentiate people according to their power of attention is to employ a legitimate test. To consider, then, the nature and the functions of atten- lion. The mind — with the possible exception of the state of coma — is never idle ; ideas are for ever passing through the brain, by day and by night, sleeping or waking, mad or sane. We take a great deal too much upon ourselves when ■we suppose that we are the authors and intenders of the thoughts we think. The most we can do is to give direction to these trains of thought in the comparatively few moments "when we are regulating the thoughts of our hearts. We see jln dreams, the rapid dance of ideas through the brain during lighter sleep, how ideas follow one, another in a general way. Lect. IV.] SOME HABITS OP MIND. 99 In the wanderings of delirium, in the fancies of the mad, the inconsequent prattle of the child, and the hahble of the old man, we see the same thing, i.e. the law according to which ideas course through the mind when they are left to themselves. You talk to a child ahout glass — you wish to provoke a proper curiosity as to how glass is made and what are its uses. Not a hit of it ; he wanders off to Cinderella's glass slipper; then he tells you ahout his godmother whO gave him a boat ; then about the ship in which uncle Harry went to America ; then he wonders why you do not wear spectacles, leaving you to guess that uncle Harry did so, But the child's ramblings are not whimsical; they follow a law, the law of association of ideas, by which any idea presented to the mind recalls some other idea which has been at any time associated with it — as glass, and Cinderella's slipper : and that, again, some idea associated with it. Now this law of association of ideas is a good servant and a bad master. To have this aid in recalling the events of the past, the engagements of the present, is an infinite boon; but, to be at tho mercy of associations, to have no power to think of what we choose when we choose, but only as something " puts it in our head," is to be no better than an imbecile. A vigorous effort of will should enable us, at any time, to fix our thoughts. Yes; but a vigorous self-compelling, will is the flower of a developed character ; and, while the child has no character to speak of but only natural dis- position, who is to keep humming-tops out of a geography lesson, or a doll's sofa out of a French verb ? Here is the secret of the weariness of the home school-room — the children are thinking all the time about something else thaji their lessons ; or, rather, they are at the mercy of the thousand fancies that flit through their brains, each in the train of the last. " Oh, Miss Smith," said a little girl to her gover- 100 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. IV. ness, " there are so many things more interesting than lessons to think ahont ! " Where is the harm"? In this: not merely that the children are wasting time, though that is a pity ; hut that they are forming a desultory habit of mind, and reducing their own capacity for mental effort. Where is the help, then, if not in the will of the child ? In the hahit of attention, a habit to be cultivated even in the infant. A baby, notwithstanding his womJerful powers of observation, has no power of attention ; in a minute, the coveted plaything drops from listless little fingers, and the wandering glance lights upon some new joy. But even at this stage the habit of attention may be trained: the dis- carded plaything is picked up, and, with "Pretty!" and dumb show, the mother keeps the infant's eyes fixed for fully a couple of minutes — and this is his first " object-desson.'- Later, as we have seen, the child is eager to see and handle every object that comes in his way. But watch him at his investigations : he flits from thing to thing with no more purpose than has a butterfly amongst the flowers, staying at nothing long enough to get the good out of it. It is the mother's part to supplement the child's quick observing faculty with the habit of attention. She must see to it that he does not flit from this to that, but looks long enough at one thing to get a real acquaintance with it. Is little Margaret fixing round eyes on a daisy she has plucked ? In a second, the daisy will be thrown away, and a pebble or a buttercup will charm the little maid. But the mother seizes the happy moment. She makes Margaret see that the daisy is a bright yellow eye with white eyelashes round it : that all the day long it lies there in the grass and looks up at the great sun, never blinking as Margaret would do, but keeping its eye wide open. And that is why i-t is called daisy, "day's eye," because its eye ■ is . always tECT. IV.] SOME HABITS OF MIND. 101 looking at the Bun which, makes the day. And what does Margaret think it does at night, when there is no sun ? It does what little hoys and girls do ; it just shuts up its eye with its white lashes tipped with pink, and goes to sleep till the sun comes again in the morning. By this time the daisy has hecome interesting to Margaret; she looks at it with big eyes after her mother has finished speaking, and then, very likely, cuddles it up to her breast or gives it a soft little kiss. Thus, the mother will contrive ways to invest every object in the child's world with interest and delight. But the tug of war begins with the lessons of the school-room. Even the child who" has gained the habit of attention to things, finds words a weariness. This is a turning-point in the child's life, and the moment for the mother's tact and vigilance. In the first place, never let the child dawdle over spelling-book or sum, sit dreaming with his book before him. When a child grows stupid over a lesson, it is time to put it away. Let him do another lesson as unlike the last as possible; and then go back with freshened wits to his unfinished task. If mother or governess have been unwary enough to let the child '' moon " over a lesson, she must just exert her wits to pull him through ; the lesson must be done, of course, but mtist be made bright and pleasant to the child. The teacher should have some knowledge of the principles of education ; should know what subjects are best fitted for the child considering his age, and how to make these subjects attractive ; should know, too, how to vary the lessons, so that each faculty of the child's mind should rest after effort, and some other faculty be called into play. She should know how to incite the child to effort through his desire of appro- bation, of excelling, of advancing, his desire of knowledge, his love of his parents, his sense of duty, in such a way that 102 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect: lY, no one set of motives be called unduly into play to the injury of the child's character. We shall have opportunities to enter into some of these points later ; meantime, let us look in at a home school-room managed upon sound principles. In the first place, there is a time-table, written out fairly, so that the child knows what he has to do and how long each lesson is to last. This idea of definite work to be finished in a given time is valuable to the child', not only as training him in habits of order, but in diligence ; he learns that one time is not " as good as another ; " that there is no right time left for what is not done in its: own time; and this knowledge alone does a great deal to secure the child's attention to his work. Again, the lessons are . short, seldom more than twenty minutes in length for children under eight; and this, for two or three reasons* The sense that there is not. miich time for his sums or his reading, keeps the child's wits on the alert and helps to fix his attention ; he has time to learn just so much of any one subject as it is good for him to take in at once : and, if the lessons be judiciously alternated — sums first, say, while the brain is quite fresh ; then writing, or reading — some more or less mechanical exercise, by way of a rest ; and so on, the programme varying a little from day to day, but the same principle throughout — a "thinking" lesson first, and a " pains^ taking " lesson to follow, — the child gets through his morning lessons without any sign of weariness, (a) MarJeg and Bewards. — Even with regular lessons and short lessons, a further stimulus is necessary to secure the attention of the child. His desire of approbation asks the stimulus, not only of a word of praise, but of some- thing in the shape of a reward to secure his utmost efforts. Now, rewards should be dealt out to the child upon prin- ciple : they should be the natural consequences of his good conduct. What is the natural consequence of work well Lect. IV.] SOME HABITS OP MIND. 103 and quickly done? is it not the enjoyment of ampler leisure? The boy is expected to do two right sums in. twenty minutes: he does them in ten minutes; the re- maining ten minutes are his own, fairly earned, in which, he should be free for a scamper in the garden, or any^ delight he chooses. His writing task is to produce six perfect m's : he writes six lines with only one good m in each, line; the time for the writing lesson is over and he has none for himself; or, he is able to point out six good m's in his first line, and he has the rest of the time to draw steatn-» boats and railway trains. This possibility of letting the, childreii occupy themselves variously in the few minutes they may gain at the end of each lesson is perhaps the chief compensation which the home school-room offers for the zest which the sympathy of numbers, and emulation, give to school work. As for emulation, a very potent means of exciting and holding the attention of the children, it is often objected that a desire to excel, to do better than others, implies an un- loving temper, which the educator should rather repress than cultivate. Good marks of some kind are usually the rewards of those who do best, and it is urged that these good marks are often the cause of ungenerous rivalry. Now, the fact is, the children are being trained to live in the world, and in the world we all do get good marks of one kind or other, prize, or praise, or both, according as we excel others, whether in football or tennis, or in picture- painting or poem- making. There are envyings and heart-burnings amongst those who come in second best ; so it has been from the beginning, and doubtless will be to the end. If the child is to go out into an emulous world, why, it may be well that he should be brought up in an emulous school. But here is where the mother's work comes in. . She can teach her child to be first without vanity, and to be last without bitterness ; 104 HOME EDUOATiOK. [Leot. IV; that is, she can bring him up in suoK a hearty out-going^ of love and sympathy, that joy in his brother's success takes the sting out of his own failure, and regret for his brother's failure leaves no room for self-glorification. Again, if a system of marks be used as a stimulus to attention and effort, the good marks should be given for conduct rather than for cleverness, that is, they should be within everybody's reach : every child may get his mark for punctuality, order, attention, diligence, obedience, gentleness ; and, therefore, marks of this kind may be given without danger of leaving a rankling sense of injustice in the breast of the child who fails. That he ought to work hard to please his parents who do so much for him, is a proper motive to bring before the child from time to time, but not too often ; if the mother trade on her child's feelings, if, "Do this or that to please mamma," "Do not grieve poor mamma," etc., be brought too frequently before the child as the reason for right doing, a sentimental relation will be set up which both parent and child will find embarrassing, the true motives of action will be obscured, and the child, unwilling to appear unloving, will end in being untrue. Of course, the most obvious means of quickening and holding the attention of the children lies in the attrac- tiveness of knowledge itself, and in the real appetite for knowledge with which they are endowed. But how success- ful faulty teachers are in curing the children of any desire to know, is to be seen in many a nursery and school-room. The next lecture, however, will give opportunity for a few words on this subject. It is evident that attention is no faculty of the mind; indeed, it is very doubtful how far the various operations of the mind should be described as "faculties" at all. Attention is hardly even an operation of the mind, but is simply the act by which the whole mental force is applied Lect. IV.] SOME HABITS OF MIND. 105 to the subject in hand. This act of bringing the whole mind to bear, may be trained into a habit at the will of the parent or teacher who attracts and holds the child's attention by means of a variety of motives. As the child gets older, he is taught to bring his own will to bear ; to make himself attend in spite of the most inviting suggestions from withotit. He should be taught to feel a certain triumph in compelling himself to fix his thoughts. Let him know what the real difficulty is, how it is the nature of his mind to be incessantly thinking, but how the thoughts, if left to themselves, will always run off from one thing to another, and that the struggle and the victory required of him is to iix his thoughts upon the task in hand. " You have done your duty" with a look of sympathy from his mother, is a reward for the child who has made this effort in the strength of his growing will. It is impossible to overstate the importance of this habit of attention. It is, to quote words of weight, " within the reach of every one, and should be made the primary object of all mental discipline ; " for, whatever the natural gifts of the child, it is only in so far as the habit of attention is cultivated in him that he is able to make use of them. If it were only as it saves wear and tear, a perpetual tussle between duty and inclination, it is worth while for the mother to lay herself out to secure that her child never does a lesson into which he does not put his heart. And that is no difficult undertaking ; the thing is, to be on the watch from the beginning against the formation of the contrary habit of inattention. A great deal has been said lately about overpressure, and we have glanced at one or two of the causes whose effects go by this name. But, truly, one of the most fertile causes of an overdone brain is a failure in the habit of attention, I suppose wo are all ready to- admit that it is not the things we do, but the things we fail 106 _ HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. IY. to do which fatigue us, with the sense of omission, with the worry of hurry in overtaking our tasks. And this is almost the only cause of failure in work in the case of the healthy schoolboy or schoolgirl : wandering wits hinder a lesson from being fully taken in at the right moment ; that lesson becomes a bugbear, continually wanted henceforth and never there ; and the sense of loss tries the young scholar more than would the attentive reception of a dozen such lessons. (6) The Schoolboy's Home-work, — In the matter of home^ work, the parents may still be of great use to their boys and girls after they begin to go to day-school : not in help-, ing them, that should not be necessary, but, let us suppose a case : — " Poor Annie does not finish her lessons till half- past; nine ; she really has so much to do ; " " Poor Tom is at his books till ten o'clock; we never see anything of the children in the evening," say the distressed parents ; and they let their children go on in a course which is abso- lutely ruinous both to bodily health and brain power. Now, the fault is very seldom in the lessons, but in the children ; they moon over their books, and a little wholesome home- treatment will cure them of that ailment. Allow them, at the utniost, an hour and a half for their home-work ; treat them tacitly as defaulters if they do not appear at the end of that time ; do not be betrayed into word or look of sym- pathy ; and the moment the time for lessons is over, let some delightful game or story-book be begun in the drawing-room. By-and-by they will find that it is possible to finish lessons in time to secure a pleasant evening afterwards, and the lessons will be much the better done for the fact that con- centrated attention has been bestowed on them. (c) The Discipline of Consequences. — In considering the means of securing attention, it has been necessary to refer to discipline — the dealing out of rewards and punishmentSi — a subject which every tyro of a nursemaid or nursery tECT. IV.] SOME HABITS OF MIND. 107. gOTemess feels lierself very competent to handle. But this, too, has. its scientific aspect: there is a law by which all rewards and punishments should be regulated : they should be the natural, or, at any rate, the relative consequences of conduct ; should imitate, as nearly as may be without injury to the child, the treatment which such and such conduct deserves and receives in after life. Miss Edgeworth, in her story of Eosamond, and the " Purple Jar," hits the right prin- ciple, though the incident is rather extravagant.. Little girls do not often pine for purple jars in chemists' windows ; but, that we should suffer for our wilfulness in getting what is un- necessary by doing without what is necessary, is precisely one of the lessons of life we all have to learn, and therefore is the right sort of lesson to teach a child. It is evident, that to administer rewards and punish-, ments on this principle requires patient consideration and steady determination on the mother's part. She must con- sider with herself what fault of disposition the child's misbehaviour springs from ; she must aim her punishment at that fault, and must brace herself to see her child suffer present loss for his lasting gain. Indeed, exceed- ingly little actual punishment is necessary where children are brought up with care, But this happens continually — the child who has done well gains some natural reward (like that ten minutes in the garden), which the child who has done less well forfeits ; and the mother must brace herself and her child to bear this loss ; if she equalize the two children, she commits a serious wrong, not against the child who has done well, but against the defaulter, whom she deliberately encourages to repeat his shortcoming. In placing her child under the discipline of consequences, the mother must use much tact and discretion. In many cases, the natural consequence of the child's fault is precisely that which it is her business to avert, while, at the same time. i08 HOME EDTJOATION. ILeot. IV; she looks aJbout for some consequence related to the fault which shall have an educative 'bea.ring on the' child: for in- stance, if a boy neglect his studies; the natural consequence is that he remains ignorant; the educatilie consequence is, that the work not done at the proper time shall be done in the defaulter's play-hours. The Sdbits of Application, etc. The habits of mental activity and of application are trained by the very means employed to cultivate that of attention. The child may plod diligently through his work who might be trained to rajpid mental effort. The teacher herself must be alert, must expect instant answers, quick thought, rapid work. The tortoise will lag behind the hare, but the tortoise must be trained to move, every day, a trifle quicker. Aim steadily at securing quickness of apprehension and execution, and that goes far towards getting it. So of application. The child must not be allowed to get into the mood in which he says, " Oh, I am so tired of sums," or " of history." His zeal must be stimulated ; there must always be a pleasing vista before him ; and steady, untiring application to work should be held up as honourable, while fitful, flagging attention and effort are scouted. The Habit of Thinking. The actual labour of the brain is known to psychologists under various names, and divided into various operations : let us call it thinking, which, for educational purposes, is sufSciently exact ; but, by " thinking," let us mean a real conscious effort of mind, and not the fancies that flit without effort through the. brain. This sort of thing, for instance, — an example quoted by the Archbishop of York in his " Laws of Thought:" — "When Captain Head was travelling across Lect. IV.] SOME HABITS OF MIND. 109 tlie pampas" of South America, tis guide one 3ay suddenly- stopped him, and, pointing high into the air, cried out, ' A lion ! ' Surprised at such an exclamation, accompanied with such an act, ho turned up his eyes, and with difficulty per- ceived, at an immeasurable height, a flight of condors, soar- ing in circles in a particular spot. Beneath this spot, far out of sight of himself or guide, lay the carcass of a horse, and over that carcass stood, as the guide well knew, a lion, whom the condors were eyeing with envy from their airy height. The signal of the birds was to him what the sight of the lion alone would have been to the traveller — a full assurance of its existence. Here was an act of thought which cost the thinker no trouble, which was as easy to him as to cast his eyes upward, yet which from us, unaccustomed to the subject, would require many steps ^nd some labour. The sight of the condors convinced him that there was some carcass or other; but as they kept wheeling far above it, instead of swooping down to their feast, he guessed that some beast had anticipated them. Was it a dog, or a jackal ? No ; the condors would not fear to drive away, or share with, either : it must be some large beast, and, as there were lions in the neighbourhood, he concluded that one was here." And all these steps of thought are summed up in the words " A lion." This is the sort of thing that the children should go through, more or less, in every lesson — a tracing of effect from cause, or of cause from effect ; a comparing of things to find out wherein they are alike, and wherein they differ ; a conclusion as to uses or consequences from certain premisses. The Habit of Imagining^ All their lessons will afford scope for some slight exercise of the children's thinking power, some more and some less, and the lessons must be judiciously alternated so that the 110 : HOME EDUCATION. [Lbct. IV. miore mechanical efforts succeed the more strictly intellectual, and that the pleasing exercise of the imagination, again, suc- ceed efforts of reason. By the way, it is a pity when the sense of the ludicrous is cultivated in children's books at the expense of better things. " Alice in Wonderland " is a deli- cious feast of absurdities, which none of us, old or young, could afford to spare; but it is doubtful whether the child who reads it has the delightful imaginings, the realizing of the unknown, with which he reads "The Swiss Family Eobinson." This point is worth considering in connection with Christmas books for the little people. Books of "comicalities " cultivate no power but the sense of the incongruous ; and though life is the more amusing for the possession of such a sense, when cultivated to excess it is apt to show itself in a flippant habit. "Diogenes and the Naughty Boys of Troy " is irresistible, but it is not the sort of thing the children will live over and over, and " play at " by the hour, as we have all played at Eobinson Crusoe finding the footprints. They must have " funny books," but do not give the children too much nonsense-reading. Stories, again, of the Christmas holidays of George and liucy, of the amusements, foibles, and virtues of children in their own condition of life, leave nothing to the imagination. The children know all about everything so well, that it never occurs to them to play at the situations in any one of these tales, or even to read it twice over. But let them have tales of the imagination, scenes laid in other lands and other times, heroic adventures, hairbreadth escapes, delicious fairy tales in which they are never roughly pulled up by the impossible — even where all is impossible, and they know it, and yet believe. And this, Inot for the children's amusement merely: it is not impossible that posterity may write us dbwn a generation blest with little imagination, and, by so far, the less capable of great conceptions and heroic efforts ; for it Lect. IV.] SOME HABITS OF MIND. Ill is only' as we have it in iis to let a person or a cause fill the whole stage of the mind, to the exclusion of self-ocoupation, that we are capable of large-hearted action on behalf of that person or cause. Our novelists say there is nothing left to imagine ; and that, therefore, a realistic description of things as they are is all that is open to them. But imagination is nothing if not creative, unless it see, not only what is apparent, but what is conceivable, and what is poetically fit in given circumstances. Now imagination does not descend,' full-grown, to take possession of an empty house; like every other power of the mind, it is the merest germ of a power to begin with, and grows by what it gets ; and childhood, the age of faith, is the time for its nourishing. The children should have the joy of living in far lands, in other persons, in other times — a delightful double existence ; and this joy they will find, for the most part, in their story-books. Their lessons, too, history and geography, should cultivate their conceptive powers. If the child do not live in the times of his history lesson, be not at home in the climes his geography book describes, whj-, these lessons will fail of their purpose. But let lessons do their best, and the picture-gallery of the imagination is poorly hung if the child have not found his way into the realms of fancy. How the children's various lessons should be handled so as to induce habits of thinking, we shall consider later j but, this for the present : thinking, like writing or skating, comes by practice. The child who never has thought, never does think, and probably never will think; for are there not people enough who go through the world without any deliberate exercise of their own wits ? The child must think, get at the reason- why of things for himself, every day of his life, and more each day than the day before. Children and parents both are given to invert this educational process. The child asks "Why?" and the parent answers, rather 112 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. IV. proud of this evidence of thonght in his child. There is some slight show of speculation even in wondering " Why ? " but it is the slightest and most superficial effort the thinking brain produces. Let the parent ask " Why ? " and the child produce the answer, if he can. After he has turned the matter over and over in his mind, there is no harm in telling him — and he will remember it — the reason why. Every walk should offer some knotty problem for the children to think out — • "Why does that leaf float on the water, and this pebble sink ? " and so on. The Habit of Bemembering. Memory is .the storehouse of whatever knowledge we possess. It is upon the fact of the stores lodged in the memory that we take rank as intelligent beings. The chil- dren learn in order that they .may remember. Much of what we have learned and experienced in childhood, and later, we cannot reproduce, and yet it has formed the groundwork of after-knowledge ; later notions and opinions have grown out of what we once learned and knew. That is our sunk capital, of which we enjoy the interest though we are unable to realize. Again, much that we have learned and expe- rienced is not only retained in the storehouse of mempry, but' is our available capital, we can reproduce, recollect upon demand. This memory which may be drawn upon by the act of recollection is our most valuable endowment. There is a third kind of spurious memory — facts and ideas floating in ^;he brain which yet make no part of it, and are exuded at a single effort ; as when a barrister produces all his knowledge of a case in his brief, and then forgets all about it; or when the school-boy " crams " for an examina- tion, writes down what he has thus learned, and, behold, it is gone from his gaze for ever : as Euskin puts it, " They cram to pass, and not to know ; they do pass, and they don't Leot. IV.] SOME HABITS OF MIND. 113 know," That the barrister, the physician, should he able thus to dismiss the case on ^vhiph he has ceased to be occupied, the publisher, the book he has rejected, is well for him, and this art of forgetting is not without its uses : but what of the, schoolboy who has little left after a year's work but his place in a class-list? To say anything adequate on the subject of memory is impossible here ; but let us try to answer two or three queries which present themselves on the surface. How do we come to " remember " at all ? How do we gain the power to utilize, remembered facts — that is, to recollect? And under what conditions is knowledge acquired that neither goes to the growth of brain and mind, nor is available on demand, but is lightly lodged in the brain for some short peiiod, and is. then evacuated at a single throw? You may remember being g.mused a few years ago by descriptions of a wonderful inven- tion — an instrument which should record spoken words, and should deliver, say, a century hence, speech or lecture in the very words, and in the very tones of the speaker. Such an instrument is that function of the brain called memory, whereby the impressions received by the brain are recorded mechanically — at least, such is the theory pretty generally received now by physiologists. That is, the mind takes cognizance of certain facts, and the nerve substance of the brain records that cognizance. Now, the questions arise, Under what conditions is. such an imprint of fact or event made upon the substance of the brain ? Is the record permanent ? And is the brain capable of receiving an indefinite number of such impres- sions ? It appears, both from common experience and from an infinite number of examples quoted by psychologists, that any object or idea which is regarded with attention, makes the sort of impression on the brain which is said to fix it in the memory. In other words, give an instant's I 114 • HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. IV. ■undivided attention to anything whatsoever, and that thing -will be remembered. In describing this effect, the common expression is accurate beyond its intention. We say, " Such and such a sight, or sound, or sensation, made a strong impression on me," And that is precisely v^hat has happened : arrest the attention upon any fact or incident,- a-nd that fact or incident is remembered; it is impressed, imprinted upon the brain substance. The inference is plain. You -want the child to remember? Then, secure his whole attention, the fixed gaze of his mind, as it were, upon the fact to be remembered ; then he will have it : by a sort of photographic process, that fact or idea is "taken" by his brain, and, when he is an old man, perhaps the memory of it will flash across him. But it is not enough to have a recollection flash across one incidentally ; we want to have the power of recall- ing at will : and, for this, something more is necessary than an occasional act of attention producing a solitary im- pression. Supposing, for instance, that by good teaching you secure the child's attention to the verb avoir, he will- remember it; that is to say, some infinitely slight growth of brain tissue will record and retain that one French verb. But one verb is nothing ; you want the child to learn French, and, for this, you must not only fix his attention upon each new lesson, but each must be so linked into the last that it is impossible for him to recall one without the other following in its train. The physical effect of such a method appears to be that each new growth of brain tissue is, so to speak, laid upon the last; that is, to put it half figuratively, a certain tract of the brain may be conceived of as being overlaid with Trench. This is to make a practical use of that law of association of ideas of which one would mot willingly become the sport ; and it is the neglect of this la-w which invalidates much good teaching. The teacher is Lect. IV.] SOME HABITS OF MIND. 115 content to produce a solitary impression whioli is only- recalled as it is acted upon by a ctance suggestion ; whereas he should forge the links of a chain to draw his bucket out of the well. Probably you have heard, or heard of, a Dr. Pick, who has grounded a really philosophical system of mnemonics on these two principles of attention and association. What- ever we may think of his application of it, the principle he asserts is the right one. Let every lesson gain the child's entire attention, and let each new lesson be so interlaced with the last that the one must recall the other ; that, again, recalls the one before it, that, the one before it, and so on to the beginning. But the " lightly come, lightly go " of a mere verbal memory follows no such rules. The child gets his exercise " by heart," says it off like a parrot, and, behold, it is gone; there is no record of it upon the brain at all. To secure such a record, there must be time, time for that full gaze of the mind we call attention, and for the growth of the 'brain tissue to the new idea. Given, these conditions, there appears to be no limit of quantity to the recording power of the brain. Except in this way : a girl learns French, and speaks it fairly well ; by the time she is a grandmother she has forgotten it entirely, has not a word left. When this is the case, her French has been disused ; she has not been in the habit of rSading, hearing, or speaking French from youth to age. Whereby it is evident that, to secure right of way to that record of French imprinted on her brain, the path should have been kept open by frequent goings and comings. To acquire any knowledge or power whatsoever, and then to leave it to grow rusty in a neglected corner of the brain, is practically useless. Where there is no chain of association to draw the bucket out of the well, it is all the same as if there were no water there. As to how to form these links, every subject will suggest a suitable method. The child has 116 HOME EDUCATION, [Lect. IV, a lesson about Switzerland to-day, and one about Holland to- morrow, and the one is linked to the other by the very fact that the two countries have hardly anything in common ; •yvhat the one has, the other has not. Again, the association will be of similarity, and not of contrast. In our own experience- we find that colours, places, sounds, odours recall persons or events J but links of this sensuous order can hardly be employed in education. The link between any two things must be found in the nature of the things associated. The Habit of Perfect Execution. " Throw perfection into all you do " is a counsel upon which a family may be brought up with great advantage. We English, as a nation, think too much of persons, and too little of things, work, execution. Our children are allowed to^ make their figures, or their letters, their stitches, their dolls' clothes, their small carpentry, anyhow, with the notion that they will do better by-and-by. Other nations — the Germans and the French, for instance — look at the question philoso- phically, and know that if the children get the habit of turn- ing out imperfect work, the men and women will undoubtedly keep that habit up. I remember being delighted with the work of a class of about forty children, of six and seven, in an elementary school at Heidelberg. They were doing a writing lesson, accompanied by a good deal of oral teaching from a master who wrote each word on the blackboard. By-and-by the slates were shown, and I did not observe one faulty or irregular letter on the whole forty slates. The same principle of " perfection " was to be discerned in the recent exhibitions of school- work held throughout France. No faulty work was shown, to be excused on the plea that it was the work of children. No work should be given to a child that he cannot execute ^erfectly,&iidi then, perfection should be required of him as a Leot. IV.] SOME MORAL HABITS. 117 matter of course. For instance, lie is set to do a copy of strokes, and is allowed to show a slateful at all sorts of slopes and all sorts of intervals : his moral sense is vitiated, his eye is injured. Set him six strokes to copy ; let him not bring a slateful, but six perfect strokes, at regulai* distances and at regular slopes. If he produces a faulty pair, get Mm to point out the fault, and persevere until he has produced his task ; if he does not do it to-day, let him go on to-morrow and the next day, and -when the six perfect strokes appear, let it be an occasion of triumph. So with the little tasks of painting, drawing, or construction he sets himself — let every- thing he does he well done. An unsteady house of cards is a thing to be ashamed of. Closely connected with this habit of " perfect work " is that of finishing whatever is taken in hand. The child should never be allowed to set his hand to a new undertaking until the last is finished. Some Moral Habits — Obedience. It is disappointing that, in order to cover the ground at all, we must treat those Moral Habits, which the mother owes it to her children to cultivate in them, in a slight and inade- quate way ; but the point to be borne in mind is that all that has been already said about the cultivation of habit applies with the greatest possible force to each of these Jiabits. (a) Obedience. — First, and infinitely the most important, is thB habit of obedience. Indeed, obedience is the whole duty of the child, and for this reason — every other duty of the child is fulfilled as a matter of obedience to his parents. Not only so : obedience is the whole duty of man — obedience to conscience, to law, to Divine direction. It has been well observed that each of the three recorded temptations of our Lord in the wilderness is a suggestion, not of an act of overt sin, but of an act of wilfulness — that state directly opposed 118 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. IV. to oliedienoe, and out of which springs all that foolishness which is bound up in the heart of a child. Now, if the parent realize that ohedietice is no mere accidental duty, the fulfilling of which is a matter that lies between himself and the child; but that he is the appointed agent to train the child up to the intelligent obedience of the self-compelling law-abiding human being; he will see that he has no right to forego the obedience of his child, and that every act of dis- obedience in the child is a direct condemnation of the parent. Also, he will see that the motive to the child's obedience is not the arbitrary one of, " Do this, or that, because I have said BO," but the motive of the apostolic injunction, " Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right." It is only in proportion as the will of the child is in the act of obedience, and he obeys because his sense of right makes him desire to obey in spite of temptations to disobedience — not of constraint, but willingly — that that habit has been formed which wUl, hereafter, enable the child to use the strength of his will against his inclinations when these prompt him to lawless courses. It is said that the children of parents who are most strict in exacting obedience often turn out ill; and that orphans and other poor waifs brought up under strict discipline only wait their opportunity to break out into licence. Exactly so ; because, in these cases, there is nq gradual training of the child in the habit of obedience ; no gradual enlisting of his will on the side of sweet service and a freewill offering of submission to the highest law : the poor children are simply bullied into submission to the mil, that is, the wilfulness, of another ; not at all, " for it is right I " only because it is convenient. The mother has no more sacred duty than that of training her infant to instant obedience. To do so is no diflScult taski the child is still "trailing clouds of glory . . . from God, who is iis home ; " the principle of obedience is within him, waiting Leot. IV.] SOMK MOEAL HABITS. 1 19 to be called into exercise. Theve is no need to rate the child, or threaten him, or use any manner of violence ; because the parent is invested with authority -which the child intuitively recognizes. It is enough to saj', " Do this," in a quiet autho- ritative' tone, and expect it to be done. The mother often enough loses her hold over her children because they detect in the tone of her voice that she does not expect them to obey her behests ; she does not think enough of her position ; has not sufficient confidence in her own authority. The mother's great stronghold is in the Jiabit of obedience. If she begin -by requiring that her children always obey her, why, they will alwaj's do so as a matter of course ; but let them once get the thin end of the wedge in, let them discover that they can do ' otherwise than obey, and a woful struggle begins, which commonly ends in the children doing that which is right in their own eyes. This is the sort of thing which is fatal : The children are in the drawing-room, and a caller is announced. " You must go upstairs now." " Oh, mother, dear, do let us stay in the window-corner ; we will be as quiet as mice ! " The mother is rather proud of her children's pretty maimers, and they stay. They are not quiet, of course ; but that is the least of the evils — they have succeeded in doing as they chose and not as they were bid, and they will not put their necks under the yoke again without a struggle. It is in little matters that the mother is Worsted. " Bed- time, Willie ! " " Oh, mamma, /itsi let me finish this; " and the mother yields, forgetting that the case in point is of no consequence — the thing that matters is that the child should be daily confirming a habit of obedience by the un- broken repetition of acts of obedience. It is astonishing how clever the child is in finding ways of evading the spirit while he observes the letter. " Mary, come in." " Yes, mamma ; " but her mother calls four times before Mary 120 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. IV. •comes. " Put away your bricks ; " and the bricks are put away witli slow, reluctant fingers. " You must always wash your hands when you hear the first bell." The child obeys for that once and no more. To avoid these displays of -wilfulness, the mother will insist from the first on an obedience which is prompt, cheerful, and lasting — save for lapses of memory on the child's part. Tardy, unwilling, occasional obedience is hardly worth the having: and it is greatly easier to give the child the Jiahit of perfect obedience by never allow- ing him in anything else, than it is to obtain this merely ■formal obedience by a constant exercise of authority. By- and-by, when he is old enough, take the child into con- fidence ; let him know what a noble thing it is to be able to make himself do, in a minute, and brightly, the very thing he would rather not do. To secure this habit of obedience, the mother must exercise great self-restraint; she must never give a command which she does not intend to see carried out to the full. And she must not lay upon her children burdens grievous to be borne of comuiand heaped upon com- mand. The children who are trained to perfect obedience may be trusted with a good deal of liberty : they receive a few directions which they know they must not disobey; and, for the rest, they are left to learn how to direct their •own actions, even at the cost of some small mishaps, and are not pestered with a perpetual fire of " Do this," and " Don't do that ! " (6) Truthfulness. — It is unnecessaiy to say a word, of the duty of Truthfulness ; but the training of the child in the habit of strict veracity is another matter, and one which requires delicate care and scrupulosity on the part of the mother. The vice of lying arises from three causes : care- lessness in ascertaining the truth, carelessness in stating the truth, and a deliberate intention to deceive. That all three Leot. IV.] SOME MORAL HABITS. 121 are vicious is evident from tlie fact that a man's cliaracter may be ruined by what is no more than a careless misstate- ment on the part of another : the speaker repeats a damaging remark without taking the trouble to sift it ; or he repeats what he has heard or seen with so little care to deliver the truth that his statement becomes no better than a lie. Now, of the three kinds of lying, it is only, as a matter of fact, the third which is severely visited upon the child ; the first and the second he is allowed in. He tells you he has seen " lots " of spotted dogs in the town — he has really seen two ; ■that " all the boys " are collecting crests — he knows of three who are doing so ; that " everybody" says Jones is a " sneak " — the fact is he has heard Brown say so. These departures from strict veracity are on matters of such slight importance that the mother is apt to let them pass as the " children's chatter ; " but, indeed, every such lapse is damaging to the child's sense of truth — a blade which easily loses its keenness of edge. The mother who trains her child to strict accuracy of statement about things small and great fortifies him against temptations to the grosser forms of lying ; he will not readily colour a tale to his own advantage, suppress facts, equivocate, when the statement of the simple fact has become a binding habit, and when he has not been allowed to form the contraiy vicious habit of playing fast and loose with words. Two forms of prevarication, very tempting to the child, will require great vigilance on the mother's part — that of exaggeration and that of clothing a story with ludicrous embellishments. However funny a circumstance may be as described by the child, the ruthless mother must strip the tale of everything over and above the naked truth : for, indeed, a reputation for facetiousness is dearly purchased by the loss of that dignity of character, in child or man, which accompanies the habit of strict veracity. It is possible to be humorous without any sacrifice of truth. 122 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. IV. As for reverence, consideration for others, respe&t for persons and property, I can only urge tlie importance of a sedulous cultivation of these moral qualities — the distinguishing marks of a refined nature— until they become the daily Jiabits of the child's life ; and the more, because a self-assertive, aggressive, self-seeking temper is but too characteristic of the times we live in. (e) Sweet Temper. — I am anxious, however, to say a few words on the habit of sweet tpmper. It is very customary to regard temper as constitutional, that which is born in you and is neither to be helped nor hindered. " Oh, she is a good- tempered little soul ; nothing puts her out ! " " Oh, he has his father's temper ; the least thing that goes contrary makes him fly into a passion," are the sorts of remarks we hear constantly. It is, no doubt, true that the children inherit a certain tendency to irascibility or to amiability, to fret- fulness, discontentment, peevishness, suUenness, murmuring, and impatience ; or to cheerfulness, trustfulness, good-humour, patience, and humility. It is also true that upon the pre- ponderance of any of these qualities^ upon temper, that is — the happiness or wretchedness of child and man depends, as well as the comfort or misery of the people who live with him. "We all know people possessed of integrity and of many excellent virtues who make themselves intolerable to their belongings. The root of the evil is, not that these people were born sullen, or peevish, or envious — that might have been mended ; but that they were permitted to grow up iu these dispositions. Here, if anywhere, the power of habit is invaluable : it rests with the parents to correct the original twist, all the more so if it is from them the child gets it, and to send their child into the world, blest with an even happy temper, inclined to make the best of things, to look on the bright side, to impute the best and kindest motives to others, and to make no extravagant claims on his own accountr-j- Leot. IV.] SOME MORAL HABITS. 123 fertile source of ugly tempers. And this, because the child is born with no more than certain tendencies. It is by force of habit that a tendency becomes a temper, and it rests with the mother to hinder the formation of ill-tempers, to force that of good tempers. Nor is it difS- cult to do this while the child's countenance is as an open book to his mother, and she reads the thoughts of his heart before he is aware of them himself. Kemembering that every envious, murmuring, discontented thought leaves a track in the very substance of the child's brain for such thoughts to run in again and again — that this track, this rut is ever widening and deepening with the traffic in ugly thoughts — the mother's care is to hinder at the outset the formation of any such track. She sees into her child's soul — sees the evil temper in the act of rising : now is her opportunity. Let her change the child's thoughts before ever the bad temper has had time to develop into conscious feeling, much less act: take him out of doors, send him to fetch or carry, tell him or show him something of interest, — in a word, give him something else to think about; but all in a natural way, and without letting the child perceive that he is being treated. As every fit of sullenness leaves place in the child's mind for another fit of sullenness to succeed it, so every such fit averted by the mother's tact tends to obliterate the evil traces of former sullen tempers. At the same time, the mother is careful to lay down a highway for the free course of all sweet and genial thoughts and feelings. I have been offering suggestions, not for a course of intellectual and moral "training, but only for the formation of certain habits which should be, as it were, the outworks of character. Even with this limited programme, I have left unnoticed many matters fully as important as those touched upon. In the presence of an embarrassment of riches, it has 124 HOME EDUCATION. [Lbct. IV. been necessary to adopt some principle of selection ; and I have thought it well to dwell upon considerations which do not appear to me to have their full weight with educated parents, rather than upon those which every thoughtful person recognizes the force of. lect. v.] lessons as instruments op education. 125 LECTUEE Y. lessons as instruments of education. It seems to me that we live in an age of pedagogy ; that we of the teaching profession are inclined to take too much upon ourselves, and that parents are ready to yield the responsibility of direction, as well as of actual instruction, more than is wholesome for the children. I am about to invite your attention to a subject, that mothers are accustomed to leave very much in the hands of schoolmaster or governess when they do not instruct their children them- selves — I mean the choice of subjects of instruction, and the way of handling those subjects. Teachers are the people who have, more than others, given themselves to the con- sideration of what a child should learn and how he should learn it ; but the parent, also, should have thought out this subject, and, even when he does not profess to teach his children, should have his own carefully formed opinions as to the subject-matter and the method of their intellectual education : and this, for the sake of the teacher as well as for that of the children. Nothing does more to give vitality and purpose to the work of the teacher than the certainty that the parents of his pupils go with him. Even when children go to schools taught by qualified persons, some insight on the part of fathers and mothers is useful as hindering the teacher from dropping into 126 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. V; professional grooves, valuing proficiency in this or that subject for its own sake, and not as it affects the children. But in the early days of the home school-room, it is iniquitous to leave the young governess, with little qualification beyond her native French or German, or scanty English, to chalk out a course for herself and her charges. That the children waste their time is the least of the evils that accrue : they are forming habits dead against intellectual effort; and, by-and-by, when they go to school, the lessons go over their heads, the work slips through their fingers, and their: powers of passive resistance baffie the most strenuous teachers. All the same, whatever be the advantages of Kindergarten or other schools for little children, the home school-room ought to be the best growing-ground for the child, say, until he enters on his ninth year. And, doubtless, it would be so, were the mother at liberty to devote herself to the instruc- tion of her children : but this she is seldom free to do ; she must have a governess, and the difficulty is to get a woman who is not only acquainted with the subjects she undertakes to teach, but who understands in some measure the nature of the child and the art and objects of education — a woman capable of making the very most of the children without waste of power or of time. Such a rara avis does not present herself in answer to every advertisement ; and, in default, the mother must undertake to train her governess, that is, she may supplement with her own insight the scanty know- ledge and experience of the young teacher. " I wish the children to be taught to read, thus and thus, becatise : " or, " to learn history in such a way, that the lessons may have such and such effects." Half an hour's talk of this kind with a sensilole governess, will secure a whole month's work for the children, so well, directed, that much is done in little time, and the widest possible margin secured for play and open-air exercise. Lect. v.] lessons as INSTRUMENTS OP EDUCATION. 127 But, if tlie mother is to inoculate the governess with her views as to the teaching of writing, French, geography, she must, herself, have definite views. She must ask herself seiiously, Why must the children learn at all ? What should they learn ? And, How should they learn it ? If she. take the trouble to find a definite and thoughtful answer to each of these three queries, she will he in a position to direct her children's studies ; and will, at the same time, he surprised to find that three-fourths of the time and labour ordinarily spent by the child at his lessons is lost time and wasted energy. Why must the child learn ? Why do we eat ? Is it not in order that the body may live and grow and be able to fulfil its functions ? Precisely eo, the mind must be sus- tained and developed by means of the food convenient for it, the mental pabulum of assimilated knowledge. Again, the body is developed, not only by means of proper sustenance, but by the appropriate exercise of each of its members. A young mother remarked to me the other day, that, before her marriage, she had such slender arms she never liked to exhibit them ; but a strong five-months old baby had cured her of that ; she could toss and lift him with ease, and could now show well-rounded arms with anybody : and, just as the limbs grow strong with exercise, so does intellectual effort with a given faculty of the mind make that faculty vigorous and capable. People are apt to overlook the fact that mind must have its aliment — we learn that we may Tcnow, not that wo may grow ; hence the parrot-like saying of lessees, the cramming of ill-digested facts for examinations, all the ways of taking in knowledge which the mind does riot assimilate. Specialists, on the other hand, are apt to attach too much importance to the several exercise of the mental faculties. We come across books on teaching, with lessons elaborately drawn up, in which certain work is assigned to the perceptive 128 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. V. faculties, certain work to the imagination, to the judgment,, and so on. This sort of doctoring of the materials of know- ledge is unnecessary for the healthy child, whose mind is papahle of self-direction, and of applying each faculty to its proper work upon the parcel of knowledge delivered to it. At this early stage, the subjects of instruction matter far less than the methods of teaching : almost any subject which, common sense points out as suitable for the instruction of children will afford exercise for all their powers, if properly presented. The child must learn, in the second place, in order that ideas may be freely sown in the fruitful soil of. his mind. '.' Idea, the image or picture formed by the mind of any thing- external, whether sensible or spiritual,"— so, the dictionary : therefore, if the business of teaching be to furnish the child with ideas, any teaching which does not leave him possessed of a new mental image has, by so far, missed its mark. Now, just think of the listless way in which the children too often drag through reading and tables, geography and sums, and you will see that it is a rare thing for any part of any lesson to flash upon them with the vividness which leaves a mental picture behind. It is not too much to say that a morning in which the child receives no new idea is a morning wasted, however closely the little student has been kept at his books. For the dictionary appears to me to fall short of the truth in its definition of the term idea. An idea is more than an image or a picture; it is, so to speak, a spiritual germ endowed with vital force — with power, that is, to grow, and to produce after its kind. It is the very nature of an idea to grow : as the vegetable germ secretes that it lives by, so, fairly implant an idea in the child's mind, and it will secrete its own food, grow, and bear fruit in the form of a succession of kindred ideas. We know from our own ex- perience, that, let our attention be forcibly drawn to some lECT. v.] LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION. 129 public eharaoter, some startling theory, and, for days after, we are continually hearing or reading matter which bearcs on this one subject ; just as if all the world were thinking about what occupies our thoughts : the fact being, that the new idea we have received is in the act of growth, and is reaching out after its appropriate food. This process of feeding goes on with even more avidity iu childhood, and the growth of an idea in the child is proportionably rapid. Scott got an idea, a whole grouj) of ideas, out of the Border tales and ballads, the folk-lore of the country side, on which his boyhood was nourished : his ideas grew, and brought forth-, and the Waverley novels were the fruit they bore. George Stephenson made little clay engines with his play- mate, Thomas Tholoway; by-and-by, when he was an engine-man, he was always watching his engine, cleaning it, studying it ; an engine was his dominant idea, and it developed into no less a thing than the locomotive. But how does this theory of the vital and fruitful charac- ter of ideas bear upon the education of the child ? In this way : give your child a single valuable idea and you have done more for his education than if you had laid upon his mind the burden of bushels of information : for the child who grows up with a few dominant ideas has his self-educa- tion provided for, his career marked out. In order for the reception of an idea, the mind must be in an attitude of eager attention, and how to secure that state we have considered elsewhere. One thing more : a single idea may be a possession so precious in itself, so fruitful, that the parent cannot fitly allow the child's selec- tion of ideas to be a matter of chance : his lessons should furnish him with such ideas as shall make for his further education. But it is not only to secure due intellectual growth and the furnishing of his mind with ideas, that the child must 130 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. V. leavn:tlie common notion — that lie learns for the sake of getting knowledge — is also a true one ; so much so, that no knowledge should be so precious as that gained in childhood, no later knowledge should he so clearly chronicled on the hrain, nor so useful as the foundation of that to follow. At the same time, the child's capacity for knowledge is very limited ; his mind is, in this respect at least, hut a little phial with a narrow neck ; and, therefore, it hehoves parent or teacher to pour in only of the best. But, poor children, they are too often badly used by their best friends in the matter of the sort of knowledge offered them. Grown-up people who are not mothers talk and think far more childishly than the child does in their efforts to approach his mind. If a child talk twaddle, it is because his elders are in the habit of talk- ing twaddle to him ; leave him to himself, and his remarks are wise and sensible so far as his small experience guides him. Mothers seldom talk down to their children ; they are too intimate with the little people, and have, therefore, too much respect for them : but professional teachers, whether the writers of books or the givers of lessons, are too apt to present a single drop of pure knowledge in a whole gallon of talk, imposing upon the child the labour of discerning the drop and of extracting it from ^he worthless flood. On the whole, the children who grow up amongst their elders and are not provided with what are called children's books at all fare the better on what they are able to glean for themselves from the literature of grown-up people. Thus, it is told of Dr. Arnold that, when he was three years old, he received a present from his father of Smollett's " History of England," as a reward for the accuracy with which he went through the stories connected with the portraits and pictures of the successive reigns — an amusement which probably laid the foundation of the great love for history which distin- guished him in after life. When occupying the professorial Lect. v.] lessons as INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION. 131 oTiair at Oxford, he made quotations, we are told, from Dr. Priestley's "Lectures on History," — verbally accurate quota- tions, we may believe, for such was the habit of his mind, besides, a child has little skill in recasting his matter — and that, though he had not had the book in his hands since he was a child of eight. No doubt he was an exceptional child ; and all I maintain is, that had his reading been the sort of diluted twaddle which is. commonly thrust upon children, it would have been impossible for him to cite passages a week, much less some two score years, after the reading. This sort of weak literature for the children, both in story and lesson books, is the result of a reactionary pro- cess. Not so long ago, the current impression was that the children had little understanding but prodigious memory for facts ; dates, numbers, rules, catechisms of knowledge, much information in small parcels, was supposed to be the fitting material for a child's education. We have changed all that, and put into the children's hands lesson-books with pretty pictures and easy talk, almost as good as story-books ; but we do not see that, after all, we are but giving the same little pills of knowledge in the form of a weak and copious solution. Teachers, and even parents who are careful enough about their children's diet, are so reckless as to the sort of mental aliment offered to them, that I am exceedingly anxious to secure your consideration for this, of the lessons and litera- ture proper for the little people. We SBe, then, that the children's lessons should provide material for their mental growth, should exercise the several faculties of their minds, should furnish them with fruitful ideas, and should afford them knowledge, really valuable for its own sake, accurate and interesting, of the kind that the child may recall as a man with profit and pleasure. Before applying these tests to the various subjects in which children are commonly instructed, may I remind you of two 132 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. V. 01- three points which I have endeavoured to establish in the former lectures : — (a) That the knowledge most valuable to the child .is that which he gets with his own eyes and ears and fingers (under direction) in the open air. (&) That the claims of the school-room should not be allowed to encroach on the child's right to long hours daily for exercise and investigation. (c) . That the child should be taken daily, if possible, to scenes — moor or meadow, park, common, or shore — where he may find new things to examine, and so add tO his store of real knowledge. That the child's observation should be directed to flower or boulder, bird or tree ; that, in fact, he should be employed in gathering the common information which is the basis of scientific knowledge. {d) That play, vigorous healthful play, is, in its turn, fully as important as lessons, as regards both bodily health and brain-power. (e) That the child, though under supervision, should be left much to himself — both, that he may go to work in his own way on the ideas he receives, and, also, that he may be the more open to natural influences. (/) That the happiness of the child is the condition of his progress; that his lessons should be made joyous, and that occasions of friction in the school-room are greatly to be avoided. Premising so much, let us now consider — What the chil- dren should learn, and how they should be taught. Kindergarten Games and Occupations. It is hardly necessary, here, to discuss the merits of the Kindergarten School. The success of such a school demands rare qualities in the teacher — high culture, some knowledge of psychology, of the art of education ; intense sympathy with lect. v.] lessons as insteuments of education. 133 the children, much tact, much common sense, much common information, much " joyousness of nature," and much govern- ing power; — in a word, the Kindergarten method is nicely contrived to bring the child en rapport with a superior in- telligence. Given such a superior being to conduct it, and the Kindergarten is beautiful — " 'tis like a little heaven below;'' but, put a commonplace woman in charge of such a school, and the charmingly devised gifts and games and occupations become so many instruments of wooden teaching. If the very essence of the Kindergarten method is personal influence, a sort; of spiritual mesmerism, it follows that the mother is naturally the hest Kindergdrtnerin ; for who so likely as she to have the needful tact, sympathy, common sense, culture ? Though every mother should be a Kindergdrtnerin, in the sense in which Froebel would employ the term, it does not follow that every nursery should be a regularly organized Kindergarten. Indeed, the machinery of the Kindergarten is no more than a device to insure the carrying out of certain educational principle's, and these it is the mother's business to get at, and work out according to Proebel's method — or her own. For instance, in the Kindergarten, the child's senses are carefully and progressively trained: he looks, listens, learns by touch; gets ideas of size, colour, form, number; is taught to copy faithfully, express exactly. And in this training of the senses, the child is made to. pursue the method the infant shapes for himself in his early studies of ring or ball. But it is possible that the child's marvellous power of obtaining knowledge by means of his senses may be under* valued ; that the field may be too circumscribed ; and that, during the first six Or seven years in which he might have become intimately acquainted with the properties and history of every natural object within his reach, he has obtained exact ideas, it is true — can distinguish a rhomboid from a 134 fiOMB EDUCATION. [Lect. Vi pentagon, a primary from a secondary colour, has learned to see so truly tliat he can copy what he sees in folded paper or woven straw, — hnt this, at the expense of much of that real knowledge of the external world which at no time of his life will he be so fitted to acquire. Therefore, while the exact exquisitely graduated trainingof the Kindergarten is greatlyto he coveted, the mother will endeavour to give it hy the way, and will hy no means let it stand for that wider training of the senses, to secure which for her children is a primary duty. Again, the child in the Kindergarten is set to such tasks only as he is competent to perform, and then, whatever he has to do, he is expected to do perfectly, I have seen a four- years old child blush and look as self-condemnedj because he had folded a slip of paper irregularly, as if found out in a false- hood. That was under the training of Fraulein Heerwart — a beautiful thing to behold. The Kindergarten "Occupa- tions " afford capital opportunities for training in this kind of faithfulness, and are the greatest boon in the world to schools ; but in the home a thousand such opportunities occur ; if only in such trifles as the straightening of a table- cover, or of a picture, the hanging of a towel, the packing of a parcel — every thoughtful mother invents a thousand ways of training in her child a just eye and a faithful hand. Nevertheless, as a means of methodical training, as well as of happy employment, the introduction of the games and occupations of the Kindergarten into the nursery cannot be too strongly recommended ; provided that the mother does not depend upon these, but makes all the child's occupations Subserve the purposes of his education. The child breathes an atmosphere of "sweetness and light" in the Kindergarten. You see the sturdy urchin of five stiffen his back and decline to be a jumping frog, and the Kindergdrtnerin comes with unruffled gentleness, takes him by the hand, and leads him out of the circle, — he is not treated Ljsot. v.] lessons as INSTRUMENTS OP EDUCATION. 135 as an offender, only he does not clioose to do as others do, therefore he is not wanted there : the next time, he is quite content to he a frog. Here we have the principle for the discipline of the nursery. Do not treat the child's small contumacy too seriously; do not assume that he is being naughty : just leave him out when he is not prepared to act in harmony with the rest. Avoid friction ; and, above all, do not let him disturb the moral atmosphere : in all gentleness and serenity, remove him from the company of the others; when he is being what nurses call " tiresome." Once more, the Kindergarten takes account of the joyous- ness of the child's nature : he is allowed full and free ex- pression for the glee that is in him, without the " rampaging " which follows if he is left to himself to find an outlet for his exuberant life. This union of joy and gentleness is the very temper to be cultivated in the nursery. The boisterous be- haviour sometimes allowed in children is unnecessary — within doors at any rate ; but even a momentary absence of sunshine on the faces of her children will be a graver cause of uneasiness to the mother. On the whole, we may say that the principles which should govern Kindergarten teach- ing are precisely those in which every thoughtful mother endeavours to bring up her family ; while the practices of the Kindergarten, being only very admirable ways, amongst others, of carrying out these principles, may be adopted so far as they fit in conveniently with the mother's general scheme for the education of her family. To consider, now, the subjects which lend themselves most readily to the education of the child : — Beading. Beading presents itself first, although it is open to disr cussion whether the child should acquire the art uncon- sciously, from his infancy upwards, or whether the effort 136 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. V.. should be deferred until he is, say, seven, and' th'eu made with vigour. In a valuable letter, addressed to her son John, we have the way of teaching to read adopted by that ■pattern mother, the mother of the Wesleys :^— " None of them was taught to: read till five years old, except Kezzy, in whose case I was overruled ; and she was move years in learning than any of the rest had been months. The way of teaching was this : the day before a child began to learn, the house was set in order, every one's work appointed them, and a charge given that no one should come into the •room from nine to twelve, or from two to five, which were our school hours. One day was allowed the child wherein to learn its letters, and each of them did in that time know all its letters, great and small, except Molly and Nancy, who were a day and a half before they knew them perfectly, for which I then thought them very dull; but the -reason why I thought them so was because the rest learned them so readily ; and your brother Samuel, who was the first child I ever taught, learned the alphabet in a few hours. He was five years old the 10th of February ; the next day he began ■to learn, and, as soon as he knew the letters, began at the first chapter of Genesis. He was taught to spell the first verse, then to read it over and over until he could read it off- hand without hesitation ; so on, to the second verse, etc., till he took ten verses for a lesson, which he quickly did. Easter fell low that year, and by Whitsuntide he could read a chapter very well ; for he read continually, and- had such a prodigious memory that I cannot remember to have told him the same word twice. What was yet stranger, any word he had learnt in Lis lesson he knew wherever he saw it, either in his Bible or any other book, by which means he learned very soon to read an English author well." * It is much to be wished that thoughtful mothers wouW * Sonthey's " Life of 'Wesley." lect. v.] lessons ab instruments of education. 137 more often keep account of tlie methods they employ with their children, with some defiuite note of the success of this or that plan. Many thoughtful persons consider that to learn to read a language so full of anomalies and difficulties as our own is a task which should not be imposed too soon on the childish mind. But, as a matter of fact, few of us can recollect how or when we learned to read : for all we know, it came by nature, like the art of running ; and not only so, but often ■mothers of the educated classes do not know how their children learned to read. " Oh, he taught himself," is all the account his mother can give of little Dick's proficiency. Whereby it is pjain, that this notion of the extreme difficulty of learning to read is begotten by the elders rather than by the children. There would be no little books entitled " Eeading withdut Tears," if tears were not sometimes shed over the reading lesson ; but, really, when that is the case, the fault rests with the teacher. " : . As for his letters, the child usually teaches himself. He has his box of ivory letters, and picks out p for pud- ding, b for blackbird, h for horse, big and little, and knows them both. But the learning of the alphabet should be made a means of cultivating the child's observation : he should be made to see what he looks at. Make big B in the air, and let him name it ; then let him make round O, and crooked S, and T for Tommy, and you name the letters as the little finger forms them with unsteady strokes in the air. To make the small letters thus from memory is a work of more art, and requires more careful observa- tion on the child's part. A tray of sand is useful at this stage. The child draws his finger boldly through the sand, and then puts a back to his D ; and, behold, his first essay in making a straight line and a curve. But the devices for making the learning of the "ABC" interesting are endless. 138 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. V. There is no occasion to hiii-ry the cLild : let him learn one form at a time, and know it so well that he can pick out the d's, say, big and little, in a page of large print; Let him say d for duck, dog, doll, thus : d — uck, d—og, prolonging the sound of the initial consonant, and at last sounding d alone, not dee, hut d\ the mere sound of the consonant separated as far as possible from the following vowel. Let the child alone, and he will learn the alphabet for himself : but few mothers can resist the pleasure of teach- ing it; and there is no reason why they should, for this kind of learning is no more than play to the child, and if the alphabet be taught to the little student, his appreciation of both form and sound will be cultivated. When should he begin? Whenever his box of letters begins to interest him. The baby of two will often be able to name half a dozen letters ; and there is nothing against it so long as th6 finding and naming of letters is a game to him. But he must not be urged, required to show off, teased to find letters when his heart is set on other play. The first exercises in the making of words will be just as pleasant to the child. Exercises treated as a game, which yet teach the powers of the letters, will be better to begin with than actual sentences. Take up two of his letters and make the syllable " at : " tell him it is the word we use when we say " at home," " at school." Then, put 6 to " at " — hat ; c to " at " — cat ; fat, hat, mat, sat, rat, and so on. First, let the child say what the word becomes with each initial consonant ; then let him add the right consonant to " at," in order to make hat, pat, cat. Let the syllables all be actual words which he knows. Set the words in a row, and let him read them off. Do this with the short-vowel sounds in combination with each of the consonants, and the child will learn to read off dozens of words of three letters, and will master the short-vowel sounds with initial and final •Lect. v.] lessons as instruments op education. 139 consonants witliout efifoit. Before long, he will do the lesson for himself. " How many words can you make with ' en ' and another letter, with ' od ' and another letter ? " etc. Do not hurry him. When this sort of exercise becomes so easy that it is no longer interesting, let the long sounds of the vowels be learnt in the same way : use the same syllables as before with a final e ; thus, " at " becomes " ate," and we get late, pate, rate, etc. The child may be told that a in " rate " is long a ; a in " rat," is^ sTiort a. He will make the new sets of words with much facility, helped by the experience he gained in the former lessons. Then the same sort of thing with final "ng" — "ing," " ang," " ong," " ung ; " as ring, fang, long, sung : initial " th," as then, that: final " th," as with, pith, hath, lath, and so on, through endless combinations, which will suggest themselves. This is not reading, but it is preparing the ground for reading ; words will be no longer unfamiliar perplexing objects, when the child meets with them in a line of print. Eequire him to pronounce the words he makes with such finish and distinctness, that he can himself hear and count the sounds in a given word: Accustom him from the first to shut his eyes and spell the word he has made. This is important; reading is not spelling, nor is it necessary to spell in order to read well : but the good speller is the child whose eye is quick enough to take in the letters which com- pose it, in the act of reading off a word : And this is a habit to be acquired from the first : accustom him to see the letters in the word, and he will do so without effort. If words were always made on a given pattern in English, if the same letters always represented the same sounds, learning to read would be an easy matter ; for the child would soon acquire the few elements of which all words would, in that case, be composed. But many of our 140 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. V. English words is, eacli, a law Unto itself: there is nothing for it, hut the child must learn to know them at sight; he must recognize "which," precisely as he recognizes "B," hecause he has seen it before, heen made to look at it with interest, BO tbat the pattern of the word is stamped on his retentive hrain. This process should go on side by side with the other — the learning of the powers of the letters ;; for the more variety you can throw into his reading lesson's, the more will the child enjoy them. Lessons in word-making help the child to take intelligent interest in words; but his progress in the art of reading depends chiefly on the "reading at sight" lessons. ' The teacher must be content to proceed very slowly, securing the ground under her feet as she goes. Say-^ "Twinkle, twinkle, little star. How I wonder what you are," is the first lesson: just those two lines. Eead the passage for the child, very slowly, sweetly, with just expression, so that it is pleasant to him to listen to. Point to each word as you read. Then, point to "twinkle," " wonder," " star," " what," — and expect the child to pronounce each word in the verse taken promiscuously; then, when he shows that he knows each word by itself, and not before, let him read the two lines with clear enunciation and expression: insist from the first on clear beautiful reading, and do not let the child fall into a dreary monotone, no more pleasant to himself than to his listener. Of course, by this time, he is able to say the two lines; and let him say them clearly and beautifully. In his after lessons he will learn the rest of the little poem. At this stage, his reading lessons must advance so slowly that he may just as well learn his reading exercises, both prose and poetry, as recitation lessons. Little poems Lect. v.] lessons as INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION. 141 suitable to be learned in this way will suggest themselves at once ; but perhaps prose is better, on the whole, as offer- ing more of the words in every day use, of Saxon origin, and of anomalous spelling. Short fables, and such graceful simple prose as we have in Mrs. Gatty's "Parables from Nature," and, still better, in Mrs.^ Barbauld's prose-poems, are very suitable. Even for their earliest reading lessons' it is unnecessary to put twaddle into the hands of the children. But we have not yet finished the reading lesson on " Twinkle, twinkle, little star." The child should hunt through two or three pages of good clear type, for " little," "star," "you," "are," each of the words he has learned, until the word he knows looks out upon him like the face of a friend in a crowd of strangers, and he is able to pounce upon it anywhere. Lest he grOw weary of the search, the teacher should guide the child, unawares, to the line or paragraph where the word he wants occurs. Already the child has accumulated a little capital; he knows eight or ten words so well that he will recognize them anywhercj and the lesson has occupied probably, ten- minutes. The next " reading at sight " lesson will begin - with a hunt for the familiar words, and tlien — " Up above the world' so Mgh, Like a diamond in the sky," should be gone through in the same way. As spelling is simply the art of seeing, seeing the letters in a w^Drd as we see the features of a face — say to the child,. " Can you spell gliy ? " — or any of the shorter words. He is put on his mettle, and if he fail this time, be sure he will be able to spell the word when you ask him next : but do not let him learn to spell or even say the letters aloud with the word before him. As for understanding what they read, the children will 142 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. V, be full of bright intelligent remarks and questions, and will take this part of the lesson into their own hands ; indeed, the teacher will have to be on her guard not to let them carry her away from the subject. The little people will probably have to be pulled up on the score of pronunciation. They must render " high," " sky," " like," " world," with delicate precision ; " diamond," they will no doubt wish to hurry over, and say as " di'mond," just as they will reduce " history " to " histry." But here ia another advantage of slow and steady progress — the saying of each word receives due attention, and the child is trained in the habit of careful enunciation. Every day increases the number of words he is able to read at sight, and the morfr words he knows already, the longer his reading lesson becomes in order to afford the ten or a dozen new words which he should master every day. " But what a snail's progress ! " you are inclined to say. Not so slow, after all : the child will thus learn, without appreciable labour, from two to three thousand words in the course of a year : in other words, he will learn to read, for the mastery of this number of words will carry him with comfort through most of the books that fall in his way. Now compare the steady progress and constant interest and liveliness of such lessons with the deadly weariness of the ordinary reading lesson. The child blunders through a page or two in a dreary monotone, without expression, with imperfect enunciation. He comes to a word he does not know, and he spells it ; that throws no light on the subject, and he is told the word ; he repeats it, bat as he has made no mental effort to secure the word, the next time he meets with it ihe same process is gone through. The reading lesson for that day comes to an end. The child has been miserably bored, and has not acquired one new word. Eventuall}', he learns to read, somehow, by mere dint of Lect. v.] lessons as INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION. 143 repetition ; but, consider what an abuse of the child's in- telligence is a system of teaching which makes him undergo daily labour with little or no result, and gives him a distaste for books before he has learned to use them. Writing. I can only offer a few hints on the teaching of writing, though much might be said. First, as was said before, let the child accomplish something perfectly in every lesson — a stroke, a pothook, a letter. Let the writing lesson be short, not to last more than five or ten minutes. Ease in writing comes by practice ; but that must be secured later. In the mean time, the thing to be avoided is the habit of careless work — humpy m's, angular o's. Let the stroke be learned first ; then, the pothook ; then, the letters of which the pothook is an element — n, m, v, w, r, A, p, y ; then o, and letters of which the curve is an element — a, c, g, e, x, s, q; then looped and irregular letters — 6, I, f, t, etc. One letter to be perfectly formed in a day, and, the next day, the same elemental forms repeated in another letter, until it becomes familiar. By-and-by, copies, three or four of the letters they have learned grouped into a word — " man," " aunt ; " the lesson to be, the production of the written word once without a single fault in any letter. At this stage the slate is better than paper, as it is well that the child should rub out and rub out until his own eye is satisfied with the word or letter he has written. Of the further stages, little need be said. Secure that the child begins by making perfect letters and is never allowed to make faulty ones, and the rest he will do for himself; as for " a good hand," do not hurry him ; his " hand- writing " will come by-and-by, out of the character that is in him ; but, as a child, he cannot be said, strictly speaking, to have character. Set good copies .before him, ^nd see that 1-14 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. V. he -imitates his model dutifully :. the writing lesson heing, not so many lines, or " a copy,"— that is, a page of writing,— but a single line which is as exactly as possible a copy of the line set. The child may have to write several lines before, he succeeds in producing this. If he write in books with copperplate headlines, dis- crimination should be exercised in the choice of these j in many of them the writing is atrocious, and the letters are adorned with flourishes which increase the pupil's labour but by no means improve his style. One word more, do- not hurry' the child into " small hand ; " it is unnecessary that he should labour much over what is called " large- hand," but "text-hand," the medium size, should be con- tinued until he makes the letters with ease. It is much easier for the child to get into an irregular scribble by way of " smalUhand," than to get out of it again. In this, as in everything else, the care of the educator must be given, not only to the formation of good, but to the prevention of bad- habits. Arithmetic. Of all his early studies, perhaps none is more important to the child as a means of education than that of arithmetic. That he should do sums is of comparatively small import- ance ; but the developing of those faculties which " summing " calls into play is a great part of education; so much so, that the advocates, of mathematics and of language as instruments of education have, until recently, divided the field pretty equally between them. The practical value of arithmetic to persons in every class of life goes v^ithout remark. But the use of the study in practical life is the least of its uses. The chief value of arithmetic, like that of the higher mathematics, lies in the training it affords to the reasoning powers, and in the Jject. v.] lessons as instruments op education, lio habits of insiglit, readiness, accuracy, intellectual truthful- ness it engenders. There is no one subject in which good teaching effects more, as there is none in which slovenly teaching has more mischievous results. Multiplication does not produce the " right answer," so the boy tries division ; that again fails, but subtraction may get him out of the bog. There is no must be to him ; he does not see that one process, and one process only, can give the required result. Now, a child who does not know what rule to apply to a simple- problem, within his grasp, has been ill-taught from the first, although he may produce slatefuls of quite right sums in multiplication or long division. How is this insight, this exercise of the reasoning faculty, to be secured ? Engage the child upon little problems within his comprehension from the first, rather than upon set sums. The young governess delights to set a noble " long division sum,"— 953,783,465-;-873— which shall fill the child's slate, and keep him occupied for a good half-hour ; and when it is finished, and the child is finished, too, done up with the unprofitable labour, the sum is not right after all ; the two last figures in the quotient are wrong, and the remainder is false. But he cannot do it again— he must not be dis- couraged by being told it is wrong; so "nearly right " is the verdict, a judgment inadmissible in arithmetic. Instead of this laborious task, which gives no scope for mental effort, and in which he goes to sea at last from sheer want of attention, say to him ;-^ " Mr. Jones sent six hundred and seven, and Mr. Stevens eight hundred and nineteen apples, to be divided amongst the twenty-seven boys at school on Monday. How many apples apiece did they get ? " Here he must ask himself certain questions. " How many apples altogether ? How shall I find out ? Then, I must divide the apples into twenty-seven heaps to find out each L J 46 HOME EDUCATION, [Legt. V. ■boy's share." Tliat is.to say, the child perceives what rules he must apply to get the required information. He is interested; the work goes on briskly; the sum is done in no time, and is probably right because the attention of the child is concentrated on his work. Care must be taken to give the child such problems as he can work, but yet which are difficult enough to cause him some little mental effort. The next point is to demonstrate everything demon- fitrable. The child may learn the multiplication-table and do a subtraction sum without any insight into the rationale of either. He may even become a good arithmetician, apply- ing rules aptly, without seeing the reason of them; hut arithmetic becomes an elementary mathematical training only in so far as the reason why of every process is clear to the child. 2 -|- 2 = 4, is a self-evident fact, admit- ting of little derhonstration ; but 4 X 7 = 28 , may be proved. He has a bag of beans ; places four rows with seven beans in a row ; adds the rows, thus, 7 and 7 are 14, and 7 are 21, and 7 are 28 ; how many sevens in 28 ? 4. Therefore it is right to say 4x7 = 28; and the child sees that multiplication is only a short way of doing addition. A bag of beans, counters, or buttons should be used in all the early arithmetic lessons, and the child should be able to work with these freely, and even to add, subtract, mul- tiply, and divide mentally, without the aid of buttons or beans, before he is set to "do sums" on his slate. He may arrange an addition table with his beans, thtis — o o o =3 beans o o o o = 4 „ oo ooo = 5 „ and be exercised upon it until he can tell, first without Counting, and then Without looking at thp beans, that 2+7 =: 9, etc, ' - •Leot. v.] lessons as instetjments of education. 147 Thus witli 3, 4, 5, — each of the digits : as he learns each line of his addition table, he is exercised npbn imaginary objects, " 4 apples and 9 apples," " 4 nuts and 6 nuts," etc. ; and lastly, with abstract numbers — 6+5, 6 + 8. A subtraction table is worked out simultaneously with the addition table. As he works out each line of additions, he goes over the same ground, only taking away one bean, or two beans, instead of adding, until he is able to answer quite readily, 2 from 7 ? 2 from 5 ? After working out each line of addition or subtraction, he may put it on his slate with the proper signs, that is, if he have learned to make figures. It will be found that it requires a much greater mental effort on the child's part to grasp the idea of subtraction, than that of addition, and the teacher must be content to go slowly — ■ one finger from four fingers, one nut from three nuts, and so forth, until the child knows what he is about. When the child can add and subtract numbers pretty freely up to twenty, the multiplication and division tables may be worked out with beans, as far as 6 X 12 j that is, " twice 6 are 12 " will be ascertained by means of two rows of beans, six beans in a row. When the child can say readily, without even a glance at his beans, 2x8 = 16, 2x7 = 14, etc., he will take 4, 6, 8, i 0, 1 2 beans, and divide them into groups of two : then, how many twos in 10, in 1 2, in 20 ? And so on, with each line of the multiplication table that he works out. Now he is ready for more ambitious problems : thus, "A boy had twice ten apples; how many heaps of 4 could he make?" He will be able to work with promiscuous numbers, as 7 + 5 — 3. If he must use beans to get his answer, let him ; but encourage him to work with imaginary beans, as a step towards working with abstract numbers. Carefully graduated teaching and daily mental effort on the child's part at this early stage, may be the means of developing real 148 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. V. mathematicar power, and will certainly promote tlie habits of concentration" and mental effort. Wlien the child is able to work pretty freely with small numbers, a serious difficulty must be faced, upon his thorough mastery of which will depend his apprehension of arithmetic as a science ; in other words, will depend the educational value of all the sums he may henceforth do. He must be made to understand our system of notation. Here, as before, it is best to begin with the concrete : let the child get the idea of ten units in one ten after he has mastered the more easily demonstrable idea of twelve pence in one shilling. Let him have a heap of pennies, say fifty : point out the inconvenience of carrying such weighty money to shop. Lighter money is used — shillings. How many pennies is a shilling worth ? How many shillings, then, might he havfe for his fifty pennies ? He divides them into heaps of twelve, and finds that he has four such heaps, and two pennies over ; that is to say, fifty pence are four shillings and twopence. I buy ten pounds of biscuits at fivepence a pound ; they cost fifty pence, but the shopman gives me a bill for is.. 2d. : show the child how put down ; the pennies, which are worth least, to the right; the shillings, which are worth more, tp the left. "When the child is able to work freely with shillings and pence, and to understand that 2 in the Tight-hand column of figures is pence, 2 in the left-hand column shillings, introduce him to the notion of tens and units, being content to work very gi-adually. Tell him of uncivilized peoples who can only count so far as five^-who say " five-five beasts in the forest," "five-five fish in the river," when they wish to express an immense number. We can count so far that we might count all day long for jears without coming to the end of the numbers we might name, but, after all, we have very few numbers to count with, and very few figures to express them leot. v.] lessons as insteuments of education, 149 by. We liave but nine figures and a nought : we take tliS first figure and the nouglit to express another number, ten ; but, after that, we must begin again until we get two tens, then, again, till we reach three tens, and so on. We call two tens, twenty, three tens, thirty, because "ty" (tig) means ten. But if I see figure 4, how am I to know whether it means four tens or four ones? By a very simple plan. The tens have a place of their own ; if you see figure 6 in the ten-place, you know it means sixty. The tens are always put behind the units : wlien you see two figures standing side by side, thus, " 55," the left-hand figure stands for so many tens ; that is, the second 5 stands for ten times as many as the first. Let the child work with tens and units only until he have mastered the idea of the tenfold value of the second figure to the left, and would laugh at the folly of writing 7 in the second column of figures, knowing that thereby it becomes seventy. Then he is ready for the same sort of drill in hundreds, and picks up the new idea readily if the principle have been made clear to him, that each remove to the left means a tenfold increase in the value of a number. Meantime, " set " him no sums. Let him never work with figures the notation of which is beyond him, and when he comes to " carry " in an addition or multiplication sum, let him not say he carries " two," or " three," but " two tens," or " three hundreds," as the case may be. If the child do not get the ground under his feet at this stage, he works arithmetic ever after by rule of thumb. On the same principle, let him learn " weights and measures " by measuring and weighing; let him have scales and weights, sand or rice, paper and twine, and weigh, and do up, in perfectly made parcels, ounces, pounds, etc. The parcels, though they are not arithmetic, are educative, 150 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. V.. and afford considerable exercise of judgment as well, as. of neatness, deftness, and quickness. In like manner, let him. work with foot-rule and yard measure, and draw up his tables for liimself. Let him not only measure aiid weigh, everything about him that admits, of such treatment, but let him use his judgment on questions of measure and weight. How many yards long is the table-cloth.? how many feet long and broad a mag, or .picture ? What does he suppose a book weighs, that is to go by parcel post? The sort of readiness to be gained thus is valuable in the affairs of life, and, if only for that reason, should be cultivated :in the child. While engaged in measuring and weighing conorete quantities, the child is prepared to take in his first idea of a " fraction,'' half a pound, a quarter of a yard, etc. Arithmetic is valuable as a means of training the child in habits of strict accuracy, but the ingenuity which makes this exact' science a means of fostering slipshod habits of mind, a disregard of truth, and common honesty, is worthy of admi- ration I The copying, prompting, telling, helping over diffi- culties, working with an eye to the answer which he knows, that are allowed in the arithmetic lesson under an inferior teacher, are enough to vitiate any child : and quite as bad as these is the habit of allowing that a sum is nearly right, two figures wrong, and so on, and letting the child work it over again. Pronounce a sum wrong, or right — it can- not be something between the two. That which is lorony must remain wrong : the child must not be let run away with the notion that wrong can be mended into right. The future is before him : he may get the next sum right, and the wise governess will make it her business to see that he does, and that he starts with new hope. But the wrong sum must just be let alone. Therefore his progress must be care- fully graduated ; but there is no subject in which the teacher has a more delightful consciousness of drawing out from day Leot. v.] lessons as INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION. 151 to day new power in the oMld. Do not offer Mm a crutch : it is in his own power he must go. Give him short sums, in words rather than in figures, and excite in him the enthusiasm which produces concentrated attention and rapid work. Let his arithmetic lesson he to the child a daily exercise in clear thinking and rapid careful execution, and his mental growth will be as obvious as the sprouting of seedlings in the spring. Natural Philosophy. Of the teaching of Natural Philosophy, I will only re- mind you of what was said in the second lecture of this series — that there is no part of a child's education more important than that he should lay, by his own observation, a wide basis of facts towards scientific knowledge in the future. He must live hours daily in the open air, and, as far as possible, in the country ; must look and touch and listen ; must be quick to note, consciously, every peculiarity of habit or structure, in beast, bird, or insect ; the manner of growth and fructification of every plant. He must be accus- tomed to ask why — Why does the wind blow ? Why does the river flow ? Why is a leaf-bud sticky ? And do not hurry to answer his questions for him ; let him think his difficulties out as far as his small experience will carry him. Above all, when you come to the rescue, let it not be in the " out and dried" formula of some miserable little text-book; let him have all the insight available, and you will find that, on many scientific questions the xhild may be brought at once to the level of modern thought. Do not embarrass the child with too much scientific nomenclature. If he discover for himself (helped, perhaps, by a leading question or two), by comparing an oyster and his cat, that some animals have backbones and some have not,, it is less im- 152 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. V. portant that lie should learn the terms vertehrate and in- vertebrate than that he should class the animals he meets with according to this difference. The method of this sort of instraction Is shown in " Evenings at Home," where " Eyes and No-eyes " go for a walk. No-eyes comes home bored ; he has seen nothing, been interested in nothing : while Ej-es is all agog to discuss a hundred things that have interested him. As I have already tried to point out, to get this sort of instruction for himself is simply the nature of the child : the business of the parent is to aiford him abundant and varied oppor- tunities, and to direct his observations, so that, knowing little of the principles of scientific classification, he is, unconsciously, furnishing himself with the materials for such ■■ classification. It is needless to repeat what has already been said on this subject, but, indeed, the future of the man or woman depends very largely on the store of real knowledge gathered, and the habits of intelligent observation acquired by the child. " Think you," says Mr. Herbert Spencer, "that the rounded rock marked with parallel scratches calls up as much poetry in an ignorant mind as in the mind of the geologist, who knows that over this rock a glacier slid a million of years ago ? The truth is, that thofe who have never entered on scientific pursuits are blind to most 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." Oeography. Geography is, to my mind, a subject of high educational value. And this, not because it affords the means of scientific training. Geography does present its problems, and these of the most interesting, and does afford materials for classi- leot. v.] lessons as insteuments of education. 153 fication ; but it is physical geography only which falls within the definition of a science, and even that is rather a com- pendinm of the results of several sciences than a science itself. But the peculiar value of geography lies in its fit-, ness to nourish the mind with ideas, and to furnish the imagination with pictures. Herein lies the educational value of geography. Now, how is the subject commonly taught? The child learns the names of the capital cities of Europe, or of the rivers of England, or of the mountain chains of Scotland, from some miserable little text-book, with length in miles, and height in feet, and population, finding the names on his map or not, according as his teacher is more or less up to her work. Poor little fellow ! the lesson is hard work to him ; but, as far as education goes — that is, the developing of the faculties, the furnishing of the mind, — he would be better employed in watching the progress of a fly across the window-pane. But, you will say, geography has a further use than this strictly educative one ; everybody wants the sort of informa- tion which the geography lesson should afford. That is true, and is to be borne in mind in the school-room ; the child's geography lesson should furnish just the sort of information which grown-up people care to possess. Now, do think how unreasonable we are in this matter; nothing will persuade us to read a book of travel unless it be interesting, graphic, with a spice of personal adventure. Even when we are going about with " Murray" in hand, we skip the dry facts and figures, and read the suggestive pictorial scraps; these are the sorts of things we like to know, and remember with ease. But none of this pleasant padding for the poor child, if you please ; do not let him have little pictorial sentences that he may dream over ; facts and names and figures — these are the pabulum for him ! But, you say, this sort of knowledge, though it may be 15 ± HOME EDUCATION, [Leot. V. a labour to tte .cliild to acquire it, is useful, in after life. Not a bit of it ; and for this reason — it bas, never been really- received by tbe brain at all ; has never got further ' than that floating nebula of mere verbal ^memory which we. have already had occasion to speak of. Most of us have, gone through a .good deal of. drudgery in the way of" geography" lessons, but how much do we remember ? Just the pleasant bi ts we heard from travelled friends, about the Ehine, or Paris, or Venice, or bits from " The Voyages of Captain Cook," or other pleasant tales of travel and adventure. We begin to see the lines we must go upon in teaching geography : for. educative purposes, the child must learn such geography, and in such a way, tbat his mind shall thereby be stored with ideas, his imagination with images ; for practical purposes, he must learn such geography only as, the nature of his mind considered, he will be able to remember j in other words, he must learn what interests him. The educative and the practical run in one groove, and the geography lesson becomes the most charming occupation of the child's day. But, how to begin. In the first place, the child gets his rudimentary notions of geography as he gets his first notions of natural science, in those long, hours out-of-doors which we have already seen the importance of. A pool fed by a mere cutting in the fields will explain the nature of a lake, will carry the child to the lovely lakes of the Alps, to Livingstone's great African lake, in which he delighted to see his children "paidling" — "his own children '- paidling ' in his vown lake." In this connection will come in a great deal of pleasant talk about places, " pictorial gee-: graphy," until the child knows by name and nature the great livers and mountains, the deserts and plains, the cities and countries of the world. At the same time, he gets his first notions of a map from a rude sketch, a mere few lines and dots,, done with pencil and paper, Or, better still, with a stick Leot. v.] lessons as INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION. 155 in the sand or gravel. " This crooied line is the EHne.; but you must imagine the rafts, and the island with the Mouse Tower, and the Nuns' Island, and the rest. Here are the hills, with the castles on the top — now on this side, now on that. This dot is Cologne," etc. Especially,, let these talks cover all -the home scenery and interests you . aio acquainted with, so that, hy-and-hy, when he looks at the map of England, he finds a score of familiar names which suggest landscapes to him — places where " mother has been," — the woody flowery islets of the Thames ; the smooth Sussex downs, delightful to run and roll upon, with soft carpet of tUrf and nodding harebells ; the Tork or Devon moors, with bilberries and heather; — and always give him a rough sketch-map of the route you took in a given journey. What next? Intimate knowledge, with the fullest de- tails, of any country or region of the world, any county or district of his own country.. It is not necessary, that he should learn at this stage what is called the " geography " of the countries of Europe, the continents of the world — mere strings of names for the most part : he may learn these, but it is tolerably certain that he will not remember them. But let him be at home in any single region ; let him see, with the mind's eye, the people at their work and at their play, the flowers and fruits in their seasons, the beasts, each in its habitat; and let him see all sympathetically, that is, let him follow the adventures of a traveller ; — and he knows more, is better furnished with ideas, than if he had learnt all the names on all the maps. The "way" of this kind of teaching is very simple and obvious : read to him or read for him, that is, read bit by bit, and tell as you read, Hartwig's " Tropical World," the same author's " Polar World," Livingstone's "Missionary Travels," Miss Bia-d's " Unbeaten Tracts in Japan " — in fact, any interesting, well- 156 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. V. written book of travel. It may be. necessary to leave out a good deal, but every illustrative anecdote, every bit of description, is so much towards the child's education. Here, as elsewhere, the question is not how many things does he know, but how much does he know about each thing. Maps must be carefully used in this kind of work; a sketch map following the traveller's progress, to be com- pared finally with a more complete map of the region ; and the teacher will exact a description of such and such a town, and such and such a district, marked on the map, by way of testing and confirming the child's exact knowledge. In this way, too, he gets intelligent notions • of physical geography ; in the course of his reading, he falls in with a description of a volcano, a glacier, a canon, a hurricane ; he hears all about, and asks and learns the how and the why of such phenomena at the moment when his interest is excited. In other words, he learns as his elders elect to learn for themselves, though they rarely allow the children to tread in paths so pleasant. Supposing that between the child's fifth and his ninth year, a dozen well-chosen standard books of travel have been read with him in this way, he has gained distinct ideas of the landscape and productions and the manners of the people of every great region of the world ; has laid up a store of reliable, valuable knowledge, that will last his life? time ; and, besides, has done something to acquire a taste for books and the habit of reading. Such books as Lady Brassey's " Voyage in the Sunbeam " should be avoided, as covering too much ground, and likely to breed some confusion of ideas. History. Much that has been said about the teaching of geography applies equally to that of history. Here, too, is a subject Leot. v.1 lessons as instruments of education. 157 which should be to'the child an inexhaustible Store-house of ideas, should enrich the chambers of -his House Beautiful -with a thousand tableaux, pathetic and hei'oic, and should form in him, insensibly, principles whereby he will hereafter judge of the behaviour of nations, and will rule his own conduct as one of a nation. This is what the study of history should do for the child ; but what is he to get out of the miserable little chronicle of feuds, battles, and death, which is presented to him byway of "a reign"— all the more repellent because it bristles with dates? As for the dates, they never come right ; the tens and units he can get, but the centuries will go astray ; and how is he to put the right events in the right reign, when, to him, one king differs from another only in number, one period from another only in date ? But he blunders through with it; reads, in his pleasant, chatty little history book, all the reigns of all the kings, from William the Conqueror to William IV., and back to the dim days of British rule. And with what result ? This : that, possibly, no way of warping the judg- ment of the child, of filling him with crude notions, narrow prejudices, is more successful than that of carrying him through some such course of English history ; and all the more so, if his little text book be moral or religious in tone, and undertakes to point the moral as well as to record the fact. Moral teaching falls, no doubt, within the province of history ; but the one small volume which the child uses affords no scope for the fair and reasonable discussion upon which moral decisions should be based, nor is the child old enough to be put into the judicial attitude which such a decision supposes. The fatal mistake is in the notion that he must learn " outlines," or, a baby edition of the whole history of England, or of Rome, just as he must cover the geography of all the world. Let him, on the contrary, linger pleasantly over 15§ HOME EDUCATION. ttiEOT. V the history of a single man, a short period, until he thinks the thoughts of that man, is at home in the ways of that period. Though he is reading and thinking of the life-time of a single man, he is really getting intimately acquainted ■with the history of a whole nation for a whole age. Let him spend a year of happy intimacy with Alfred, "the truth- teller," with the Conqueror, with Eichard and Saladin, or, with Henry V., Shakespeare's Henry V., and his victorious army. Let him know the great people and -the common people, the ways of the court and of the crowd. Let him know what other nations were doing while we at home were doing thus and thus. If he come to think that the people of another age were truer, larger-hearted, simpler- minded than ourselves, that the people of some other land were, at one time, at any rate, better than we, why, so much the better for him. For the matter for this intelligent teaching of history, eschew, in the first place, nearly all history books written expressly for children ; and, in the next place, all com- pendiums, outlines, abstracts, whatsoever. For the abstracts, Considering what part the study of history is fitted to play in the education of the child, there is not a word to be said in their favour : and as for what are called children's books, the children of educated parents are able to understand history written with literary power, and are not attracted by the twaddle of reading-made-easy little history books. Given; judicious skipping, and a good deal of the free para- phrasing mothers are so ready at, and the children may he takeji through the first few volumes of a well-written, illustrated, popular history of England, say so far as the Tudors. In the course of such reading, a good deal of questioning into them and questioning out of them will be necessary, both to secure their attention, and to fix the facts. This is the least that should be done ; but, better than this, Lect. v.] lessons as INSTEUMBNf S OB* EDUCATION. 159 would bo fuller information, more graphic details about two or three early epochs. The early history of a nation is far better fitted than its later records for the study of children ; because the story moves on a few broad, simple lines ; while statesmanship, so far as it exists, is no more than the efforts of a resourceful mind to cope with circumstances. Mr. Freeman has provided delightful early English history for children ; but is it not on the whole better to take them straight to the fountain- head, where possible ? In these early years, while there are no examinations ahead, and the children may yet go leisurely, let them get the spirit of history into them by reading, at least, one old " Chronicle," written by a man who saw and knew something of what he wrote about, and did not get it at second-hand. These old books are easier and pleasanter reading than most modern works on history, because the writers know little of the "dignity of history;" they purl along pleasantly as a forest brook, tell you "all about it," stir your heart with the story of a great event, amuse you with pageants and shows, make you intimate with the great people, and friendly with the lowly. They are just the right thing for the children whose eager souls want to get at the living people behind the words of the history book, oaring nothing at all about progress, or statutes, or about anything but the persons, for whose action history is, to the child's mind, no more than a convenient stage. A child who has been carried through a single old chronicler in this way, has a better foundation for an historical training than if he knew all the dates and names and facts that ever were crammed for examination. First in order of time, and full of the most captivating reading, is the " Ecclesiastical History of England," of the Venerable Bede, who, writing of himself, so early as the seventh century, says, " It was always sweet to me to learn, 160 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. V: to teach, and to write." "He has left lis," says Professor Morley, " a history of the early years of England, succincti yet often warm with life ; business-like, and yet child-like in its tone ; at once practical and spiritual, simply just, and the work of a true scholar, breathing love to God and man. We owe to Bede alone the knowledge of much that is most interesting in our early history." William of Malmesbury (twelfth century") says of Bede, " that almost all knowledge of past events was buried in the same grave with him ; " and he is no bad judge, for, in his " Chronicles of the Kings of England," he himself is considered to have carried to perfec- tion the art of chronicle-making. He is especially vivid and graphic about contemporary events— the story of the dreary civil war of Stephen and Matilda. Meantime, there is Asser, who writes the life of Alfred, whose friend and fellow- worker he is. " It seems to me right," he says, " to explain a little more fully what I have heard from my lord Alfred." He tells us how, " When I had come into his presence at the royal vill, called Leonaford, I was honourably received by him, and remained that time with him at his court about eight months, during which I read to him whatever books he liked, and such as he had at hand ; for this is his most usual custom, both night and day, amid his many other occupations of mind and body, either himself to read books,, or to listen whilst others read them." When he was not present to see for himself, as at the battle of Ashdown, Asser takes pains to get the testimony of eye-witnesses. " But Alfred, as we have been told by those who were present and would not tell an untruth, marched up promptly with his men to give them battle ; for King Ethelred remained a long time in his tent in prayer." Then there are " Chronicles of the Crusades," contemporary narratives of the crusades of Eichard Coeur de Lion, by Eichard of Devizes, and Geoffrey de Vinsany, and of the crusade of Saint Louis, by Lord John de Joinville. xect. v.] lessons as insteuments op education. 161 It is needless to extend the list ; one such old chronicle in a year, or the suitable bits of one such chronicle, and the child's imagination is aglow, his mind is teeming with ideas ; he has had speech of those who have themselves seen and heard : and the matter-of-fact way in which the old monks tell their tales is exactly what children prefer. Afterwards, yon may put any dull outlines into their hands, and they will make history for themselves. But every nation has its heroic age before authentic history begins : there were giants in the land in those days, and the child wants to know about them. He has every right to revel in such classic myths as we possess as a nation ; and to land him in a company of painted savages, by way of giving him his first introduction to his people, is a little hard ; it is to make his vision of the past harsh and bald as a Chinese painting. But what is to be done ? If we ever had an Homeric age, have we not, being a practical people, lost all record thereof? Here is another debt that we owe to those old monkish chroniclers : the echoes of some dim, rich past had come down to, at any rate, the twelfth century : they fell upon the ear of a Welsh priest, one Geoffrey of Monmouth ; and, while William of Malmes- bury was writing his admirable " History of the Kings of Eng- land," what does Geoffrey do but weave the traditions of the people into an orderly " History of the British Kings," reach- ing back all the way to King Brut, the giandson of iErieas. How he came to know about kings that no other historian had heard of, is a matter he is a little roguish about ; he got it all, he says, out of " that book in the British lan- guage, which Walter, Archdeacon of Oxford, brought out of Brittany." Be that as it may, here we read of Gorboduc, King Lear, Merlin, Uther Pendragon, and, best of all, of King Arthur, the writer making " the little finger of his Arthur stouter than the back of Alexander the Great." Here is, M 162 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. V, indeed, a treasure-trove which the children should be made free of ten years before they come to read the " Idylls of the King." Some caution must, however, he exercised in reading Geoffrey of Monmouth, His tales of marvel are delightful ; but when he quits the marvellous and romances freely about historical facts and personages, he becomes a bewildering guide. Many of these " chronicles," written in Latin by the monks, are to be had in readable English ; the only caution to be observed is, that the mother should run her eye over the pages before she reads them aloud.* Froissart, again, most delightful of chroniclers, himself tame about the court of Queen Philippa, when he chose to be in England — from whom else should the child get the ptory of the French wars ? And so of as much else as there is time for; the principle being, that, wherever practic- able, the child should get his first notions of a given period, not from the modern historian, the commentator and reviewer, but from the original sources of history, the writings of contemporaries. The mother must, however, exercise dis- crimination in her choice of early " Chronicles," as all are not equally reliable. In the same way, readings from Plutarch's " Lives " will afford the best preparation for the study of Grecian or .Eoman history. " Alexander the Great" is something more than a name to the child who reads this sort of thing : — "When the horse Bucephalus was offered in sale to JPhilip, at the price of thirteen talents (= £2618 15*.), the king, with the prince and many others, went into the field to see some trial made of him. The horse appeared very vicious and unmanageable, and was so far from suffering * Bohn's Antiquarian Library (5s. a volume) includes Bede, William of Malmesbury, Dr. Giles's " Six Old Englbh Chronicles," — Asser and Geoffrey of Monmouth being tvfo of them, — " Chronicles of the Cru- 8aders,"_ etc. Lect. v.] lessons as INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION. 163 himself to be mounted, that he would not bear to be spoken to, but turned fiercely upon all the grooms. Philip was displeased at their bringing him so wild and ungovernable a horse, and bade them take him away. But Alexander, who had observed him well, said, ' What a horse are they losing for want of skill and spirit to manage him ! ' "Philip at first took no notice of this: but, upon the prince's often repeating the same expression, and showing gi-eat uneasiness, he said, ' Young man, you find fault with your elders as if you knew more than they, or could manage the horse better.' " ' And I certainly could,' answered the prince. " ' If you should not be able to ride him, what forfeiture will you submit to for your rashness ? ' " ' I will' pay the price of the horse.' "Upon this all the company laughed; but the king and prince agreeing as to the forfeiture, Alexander ran to the horse, and laj'ing hold on the bridle, turned him to the sun, for he had observed, it seems, that the shadow which fell before the horse, and continually moved as he moved, greatly disturbed him. While his fierceness and fury lasted, he kept speaking to him softly and stroking him ; after which he gently let fall his mantle, leaped lightly upon his back, and got his seat very safe. Then, without pulling the reins too hard, or using either whip or spur, he set him agoing. As soon as he perceived his uneasiness abated, and that he wanted only to run, he put him in a full gallop, and pushed him on both with the voice and spur. " Philip and all his court were in great distress for him at first, and a profound silence took place ; but when the prince had turned him and brought him safe back, they all received him with loud exclamations, except his father, who wept for joy, and, kissing him, said, ' Seek another kingdom, my son, that may be worthy of thy abilities, for Macedonia is too small for thee." ' 164 HOME EDUCATION, [Leot. V. Here, again, even in a translation, we get the sort of vivid graphic presentation whioh makes " history " as real to the child as are the adventures of Robinson Crusoe. To sum up, to know what there is to he known about even one short period is far better for the children than to know the '"outlines" of all history. And, in the second place, children are quite able to take in intelligent ideas in intelligent language, and should by no means be excluded from the best that is written on the period they are about. Grammar, Of Orammar, Latin and English, I shall say very little here. In the first place, grammar, being a study of words, and not of things, is by no means attractive to the child, nor should he be hurried into it. English grammar, again, depending as it does on the position and logical connection of words, is peculiarly hard for him to grasp. In this re- spect, the Latin grammar is easier ; a change in the form, the shape of the word, to denote case, is what the child can see with his bodily eye, and, therefore, is plainer to him than the abstract ideas of nominative and objective case as we have them in English. Therefore, if he learns no more at this early stage than two declensions and a verb or two, it is well he should learn thus much, if only to help him to see what English grammar would be at when it speaks of a change in case or mood, yet shows no change in the form of the word. Again, because English grammar is a logical study, and deals with sentences and the positions that words occupy in them, rather than with words, and what they are in their own right, it is better that the child should begin with the sentence, and not with the parts of speech; should learn a little of what is called analysis of sentences, before he learns to parse : should learn to divide simple sentences into the Lect. v.] LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION. 165 thing we speak of, and what we say about it — " The cat— sits on the hearth " — before he is lost in the fog of person, mood, and part of speech'. French stands on another footing altogether, and should he acquired as English is, not as a grammar, but as a living speech. To train the ear to distinguish and the lips to pro- duce the French vocables is a valuable part of the education of the senses, and one which can hardly be undertaken too soon. Again, all educated persons should be able to speak French. Sir Lyon Playfair, speaking recently at a conference of French masters, lamented feelingly our degeneracy in this respect, and instanced the grammar school of Perth, to show that in a Scotch school in the sixteenth century the hoja were required to speak Latin during school hours, and French at all other times. There is hardly another civilized nation so dull in acquiring foreign tongues as we, English, of the present time ; but, probably, the fault lies rather in the way we set about the study, than in any natural incapacity for languages. As regards French, for instance, our difficulties are twofold — the want of a vocabulary, and a certain awkwardness in producing unfamiliar sounds. It is evident that both these hindrances should be removed in early childhood. The child should never see French words in print until he has learned to say them with as much ease and readiness as if they were English. The desire to give printed combinations of letters the sounds they would bear in English words is the real cause of our national difficulty in pronouncing French. Again, the child's vocabulary should increase steadily, say, at the rate of half a dozen words a day. Think of fifteen hundred words in a year ! The child who has that number of words, and knows how to apply them, can speak French. Of course, his teacher will take care, that, in giving words, she gives idioms also, and that, as he learns new words, they are put 166 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. Y. into sentences and leept iri use from day to day. A note-book in which she enters the child's new words and sentences will easily enahle the teacher to do this. The young child has no- foolish shame ahout saying French words, he pronounces them as simply as if they were English ; but it is very im- portant that he should acquire a pure accent from the first. It is not often advisable that young English children should be put into the hands of a French governess or nurse, but would it not be possible for half a dozen families, say, to engage a French lady, who would give half an hour daily to each family ? This long chapter must be brought to a close, with the disappointing sense that subjects of importance in the child's education have been left out of count, and that no one subject has been adequately treated. Certain subjects of peculiar educational value, music and drawing, for instance, I have said nothing about, partly for want of space, and, partly, because if the mother have not Sir Joshua Eeynolds's " that 1 " in her, hints from an outsider will hot produce the art-feeling which is the condition, of success in this sort of teaching. Let the children learn from the first under artists, lovers of their work : it is a serious mistake to let the child lay the foundation of whatever he may do in the future under ill-qualified mechanical teachers, who kindle in him none of the enthusiasm which is the life of art. May I hope, in concluding this short review of^tho feubjects proper for the child's intellectual education, that enough has been said to show the necessity of grave con- sideration on the mother's part before she allows promiscuous little lesson books to be put into the hands of her children, or trusts ill-qualified persons to strike out methods of teach- ing for themselves. Lect. VI.] THE WILL. 167 LECTURE VI. THE WILL— THE CONSOIENOE— THE DIVINE LIFE IN THE CHILD. The Will. We have, now, to consider a subject of unspeakable Import- ance to every being called upon to sustain a reasonable life • here, with the hope of the fuller life hereafter. . I mean, the government of the kingdom of Mansoul. Every child who lives long enough in the world is invested, by degrees, with this high function, and it is the part of his parents to instruct him in his duties and to practise him in his tasks. Now, the government of this kingdom of Mansoul is, like that of some other well-ordered States, carried on in three chambers, each chamber with its own functions, exercised, not by a multi- tude of counsellors, but by a single minister. In the outer of the three chambers, sits the Will. Like that Eoman centurion, he has soldiers under him : he says to this man. Go, and he goeth ; to another. Come, and he cometh ; to a third. Do this, and he doeth it. In other words, the executive power is vested in the Will. If the Will have the habit of authority, if it deliver its mandates in the tone that constrains obedience, the kingdom is, at any rate, at unity with itself. If the will be feeble, of uncertain counsels, poor Mansoul is torn with disorder and rebellion. 1B8~ HOME EDUCATiOiir. [Leot. VI. What is tlie Will ? I do not know ; it would appear an ultimate fact, not admitting of definition : but there are few subjects on which those who have the education of children in their hands make more injurious mistakes ; and, there- fore, it is worth while to consider, as we may, what are the functions of the will, and what are its limitations. In the first place, the will does not necessarily come into play in any of the aspects in which we have hitherto con- sidered the child. He may reflect and imagine; bestirred by the desire of knowledge, of power, of distinction ; may love and esteem ; may form habits of attention, obedience, dili- gence, sloth, involuntarily — that is, without ever intending, purposing, willing these things for himself. So far is this true, that there are people who live through their lives ■without an act of deliberate will : amiable, easy-going people, on the one hand, hedged in by favouring circumstances ; and poor souls, on the other, whom circumstances have not saved, •who have drifted from their moorings, and are hardly to be named by those they belong to. . Great intellectual powers Tjy no means imply a controlling will. We read how Coleridge had to be taken care of, because he had so little power of willing. His thoughts were as little under his own volition as his actions, and the fine talk people went to hear was no more than an endless pouring forth of ideas con- nected by no other link than that of association ; though, so fine was his mind, that his ideas flowed methodically — of their own accord,: so to speak. It is not necessary to say a word about the dignity and force of character which a confirmed will gives to its possessor. In fact, character is the result of conduct regulated by will. We say. So-and-so has a great deal of character, such another is without character; and we might express the fact equally by saying, So-and-so has a vigorous will, such another has no force of will. . We all know of lives, rich in gifts and Lect. VI.] . THE WILL. 169 graces, whicli liave been wrecked for tlie lack of a determin- ing will. The will is the controller of the passions and emotions, the director of the desires, the ruler of the appetites. But, observe, the passions, the desires, the appetites, are there already, and the will gathers force and vigour only as it is exercised in the repression and direction of these : for, though the win appears to be of purely spiritual nature, yet it be- haves like any member of the body in this — that it becomes vigorous and capable in proportion as it is duly nourished and fitly employed. The villain of a novel, it is true, is, or, rather used to be, an interesting person, because he was always endowed with a powerful will, which acted, not in controlling his violent passions, but in aiding and abetting them : the result was a diabolical being out of the common way of nature. And no wonder, for, according to natural law, the faculty which does not fulfil its own functions is punished by loss of power; if it does not cease to be, it becomes as though it were not : and the will, being placed in the seat of authority, has no power to carry its forces over to the mob — the disorder would be too fearful, just as when the executive powers of a State are seized upon by a riotous mob, and there are shootings in the highways and hangings from the lanterns, infinite confusion everywhere. I am anxious to bring before you this limitation of the will to its own proper functions, because parents often enough fall into the very metaphysical blunder we have seen in the novel-writer. They admire a vigorous will, and rightly. They know that if their child is to make his mark in the world it must be by force of will. What follows ? The baby screams himself into fits for a forbidden plaything, and the mother says, " He has such a strong will." The little fellow of three stands roaring in the street, and will neither go hither nor thither with his nurse, because " he has such a 170 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. VI. strong will." He will rule the sports of tlie nursery, will monopolize his sisters' playthings, all because of this " strong will." Now we come to a divergence of opinion : on the one hand, the parents decide that, whatever the con- sequence, the child's will is not to he broken, so all his vagaries must go unchecked : on the other, the decision is, that the child's will must he broken at all hazards, and the poor little being is subjected to a dreary round of punish- ment and repression. But, all the time, nobody perceives that it is the mere want of will that is the matter with the child. He is in a state of absolute " wilfulness," — the rather unfortunate word we use to describe the state in which the will has no con- trolling power ; willeasness, if there were such a word, would describe this state more truly- Now, this confusion in the minds of many persons, between the state of wilfulness and that of being dominated by will, leads to mischievous results, even where wilfulness is not fostered nor the child unduly- repressed : it leads to the neglect of the due cultivation' and training of the will, that almost divine faculty, upon the development of which every other gift, be it beauty or genius, strength or skill, depends for its value. What, then, is wilfulness, if it is not an exercise of will? Simply this : remove bit and bridle — that is, the control of the will — from the appetites, the desires, the emotions, and the child who has mounted his hobby, be it resentment, jealousy, desire of power, desire of property, is another Mazeppa, borne along with the speed of the swift and the strength of the strong, and with no power at all to help himself. Appe- tite, passion, there is no limit to their power and their per- sistence if the appointed check be removed : and it is this impetus of appetite or of passion, this apparent determination to go in one way and no other, which is called wilfulness and mistaken for an exercise of will. Whereas the determination Leot. VI.] THE WILL. 171 is only apparent ; the child is, in fact, hurried along without resistance, because that opposing force which should give balance to his character is undeveloped and untrained. The will has its superior and its inferior, what may be called its moral and its mechanical functions ; and that will which, for want of practice, has grown flaccid and feeble in the exercise of its higher functions may yet be able for the ordering of such matters as going or coming, sitting or standing, speaking or refraining from speech. Again, though it is impossible to attain moral excellence of character without the agency of a vigorous will, the will itself is not a moral faculty, and a man may attain great strength of will in consequence of continued efforts in the repression or direction of his appetites or desires, and yet be an unworthy man ; that is, he may be keeping himself in order from unworthy motives, for the sake of appearances, for his own interest, even for the injury of another. Once again, though a disciplined will is not a necessary condition of the Christian life, it is necessary to the develop- ment of the heroic Christian character. A Gordon, a Have- lock, a Florence Nightingale, a Saint Paul, could not be other than a person of vigorous will. In this respect, as in all others, Christianity reaches the feeblest souls. There is a wonderful Guido " Magdalen " in the Louvre, with a mouth which has plainly never been set to any resolve, for good or ill — a lower face moulded by the helpless following of the inclination of the moment ; but you look up to the eyes, which are raised to meet the gaze of eyes not shown in the picture, and the countenance is transfigured, the whole face is aglow with a passion of service, love, and self-surrender. All this the Divine grace may accomplish in weak Mwwilling souls ; and then they will do what they can ; but their power of service is limited by their past. Not so the child of the Christian mother, whose highest desire is to train him for 172 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. VI. the Christian life. When he wakes to the consciousaess of Whose he is and Whom he serves, she would have him ready for that high service, with every faculty in training — a man of war from his youth ; above all with an effective will, to will and to do of His good pleasure. Before we consider how to train this "sole practical faculty of man," we must know how the will operates — how it manages the ordering of all that is done and thought in the kingdom of Mansoul. " Can't you make yourself do what you wish to do ? " says Guy, in the " Heir of Eedcliffe," to poor Charlie Edmonston, who has never been in the habit of making himself do anything. There are those, no doubt, who have not even arrived at wishing, but most of us desire to do well ; what we want to know is, how to make ourselves do what we desire. And here is the line which divides the effective from the non-effective people, the great from the small, the good from the well-intentioned and respectable ; it is in proportion as a man has self-controlling, self-compel- ling power that he is able to do, even of his own pleasure ; that he can depend upon himself, and be sure of his own action in emergencies. Now, how does this autocrat of the bosom behave? Is it with a stern " Thou shalt," " Thou shalt not," that the subject man is coerced into obedience ? By no means. Is it by a plausible show of reasons, mustering of motives? Not this either. Since Mr. John Stuart Mill taught us that " all that man does, or can do, with matter '' is to " move one thing to or from another," we need not be surprised if great moral results are brought about by what eeem inadequate means; and a little bit of nursery ex- perience will show better than much talking what is possible to the will. A baby falls, gets a bad bump, and cries piteously. The experienced nurse does not " kiss the place to make it well," or show any pity for the child's trouble — Lect. VI.] THE WILL. 173 that woTild make matters worse; tlie more she pities, the more he sohs. She hastens to '' change his thoughts," so she says ; she carries him to the window to see the horses, gives him his pet picture book, his dearest toy, and the child pulls himself up in the middle of a sob, though he is really badly hurt. Now, this, of the knowing nurse, is precisely the part the will plays towards the man. It is by force of will that a man can '' change his thoughts," transfer his attention from one subject of thought to another, and that, with a shock of mental force that he is distinctly conscious of. And this is enough to save a man and to make a man, this power of making himself think only of those things which he has beforehand decided that it is good to think upon. His thoughts are wandering on forbidden pleasures to the hindrance of his work ; he pulls himself up, and deliberately fixes his attention on those incentives which have most power to make him work, the leisure and pleasure which follow honest labour, the duty which binds him to the fulfilling of his task. His thoughts run in the groove he wills them to run in, and work is no longer an effort. Again, some slight affront has called up a flood of resentful feeling : So-and-so should not have done it, he had no right, it was mean, and so on through all the hard things we are ready enough to say in our hearts of an offender against our amour propre. But the man under the control of his own Will does not allow this to go on : he does not fight it out with himself, and say, " This is very wrong in me. So-and-so is not so much to blame, after all." He is not ready for that yet; but he just compels himself to think of something else — the last book he has read, the next letter he must write, anything interesting enough to divert his thoughts. When he allows himself to go back to the cause of offence, behold, all rancour is gone, and he is able to look at the matter with the coolness of a third person. And this is true, not only of the risings of resentment, but of 174 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VI. every temptation that besets the flesh and spirit. Again, the sameness of his duties, the weariness of doing the same thing over and over, fills him with disgust and despondency, and he relaxes his efforts ;^but not if he be a man under the power of his own will, because he simply does not allow him- self in idle discontent ; it is always within his power to give himself something pleasant, something outside of himself to think of, and he does so ; and, given, what we call a " happy frame of mind," no work is laborious. It is something to Itnow what to do with ourselves when we are beset, and the knowledge of this way of the will is so far the secret of a happy life that it is well worth imparting to the children. Are you cross ? Change your thoughts. Are you tired of trying ? Change your thoughts. Are you craving for things you are not to have? Change your thoughts ; there is a power within j'ou, your own will, which will enable you to turn your attention from thoughts that make you unhappy and wrong, to thoughts that make you happy and right. And this is the exceedingly simple way in which the will acts ; this is the sole secret of the power over himself which the strong man wields — ^he can compel himself to think of what he chooses, and will not allow himself in thoughts that breed mischief. But you perceive that, though the will is all-powerful within certain limits, these are but narrow limits after all. Much must ^o before and along with a vigorous will if it is to be a power in the ruling of conduct. For instance, the man must have acquired the habit of attention, the great import- ance of which we have already considered. There are bird- witted people, who have no power of thinking connectedly for five minutes under any pressure, from within or from without. If they have never been trained to apply the whole of their mental faculties to a given subject, why, no energy of will, supposing they had it, which is impossible, could Leot. VI.] THE WILL. 175 make them think steadily thoughts of their own choosing or of any one else's. Here is how the parts of the intellectual fabric dovetail : power of will implies power of attention ; and before the parent can begin to train the will of the child, he must have begun to form in him the habit of attention. Again, we have already considered the fatal facility in evil, the impulse towards good, which habit gives. Habit is either the ally or the opponent, too often the frus- trator of the will. The unhappy drunkard does will with what strength there is in him ; he turns away the eyes of his mind from beholding his snare ; he plies himself assidu- ously with other thoughts : but, alas, his thoughts will only run in the accustomed groove of desire, and habit is too strong for his feeble will. We all know something of this struggle between habit and will in less vital matters. Who is without some dilatory, procrastinating, in some way tire- some habit, which is in almost daily struggle with the rectified will ? But I have already said so much about the duty of parents to ease the way of their children by laying down for them the lines of helpful habits, that it is un- necessary to say a word more here of habit as an ally or hinderer of the will. And, once more, only the man of cultivated reason is capable of being ruled by a well-directed will. If his under- standing does not show good cause why he should do some solid reading every day, why he should cling to the faith of his fathers, why he should take up his duties as a citizen, the movements of his will will be feeble and fluctuating, and very barren of results. And, indeed, worse may happen ; he may take up some wrong-headed, or even vicious notion, and work a great deal of mischief by what he feels to be a virtuous effort of will. The parent may venture to place the power of will in the hands of his child, only in so far as he trains him to make a reasonable use of so effective an instrument. 176 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VI. One other limitation of the will we shall consider presently : but, supposing the parent take pains that the child shall be in a fit state to use his will, how is he to strengthen that will, so that, by-and-by, the child may employ it to control his own life by. We have spoken already of the importance of training the child in the habit of obedience. Now, obedience is valuable only in so far as it helps the child towards making himself do that which he knows he ought to do. Every effort of obedience which does not give him a sense of conquest over his own inclinations, helps to enslave him, and he will resent the loss of his liberty by running into licence when he can. That is the secret of the miscarrying of many strictly brought up children. But invite his co-operation, let him heartily intend and purpose to do the thing he is bidden, and then it is his own will that is compelling him, and not yours; he has begun the oreatest effort, the highest accomplishment of human life — the mahing, the compelling of himself. Let him know what he is about, let him enjoy a sense of triumph, and of your congratulation, whenever he fetches his thoughts back to his tiresome sum, whenever he makes his hands finish what they have begun, whenever he throws the black dog off his back, and produces a smile from a clouded face. Then, as was said before, let him know the secret of willing ; let him know that, by an effort of will, he can turn his thoughts to the thing he wants to think of — his lessons, his prayers, his work, and away from the thing he should not think of; — that, in fact, he can be such a brave, strong little fellow, he can malte himself think of what he likes ; and let him try little experiments ; — that, if he once gets his thougJits right, the rest will take care of itself: he will be sure to do right then ; — that, if he feels cross, naughty thoughts coming upon him, the plan is, to think hard about something else, something nice — his next birthday, what he means to do when Lbot. VI.] THE CONSCIENCE. 177 he is a man. Not all this at once, of course ; but line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little, and there a little, as opportunity offers. Let him get into the habit of managing himself, controlling himself, and it is astonishing how much self-compelling power quite a young child will exhibit. " Eestrain yourself, Tommy," I once heard a wise aunt say to a boy of four, and Tommy restrained himself, though he was making a terrible hullabaloo about some small trouble. All this time, the will of the child is being both trained and strengthened ; he is learning how and when to use his will, and it is becoming every day more -vigorous and capable. Let me add one or two wise thoughts from Dr. Morell's " Introduction to Mental Philosophy : " *' The education of the will is really of far greater importance, as shaping the destiny of the individual, than that of the intellect. . . . Theory and doctrine, and inculcation of laws and proposi' tions, will never of themselves lead to the uniform habit of right action. It is by doing, that we learn to do ; by over- coming, that we learn to overcome ; and every right act which we cause to spring out of pure principles, whether by authority, precept, or example, will have a greater weight in the formation of character than all the theory in the world." The Conscience, But the will by no means carries on the government of the kingdom of Mansoul single-handed. True, the will wields the executive power ; it is only by willinq we are enabled to do ; but there is a higher power behind, whose mandate the will does no more than express. Conscience sits supreme in the inner chamber. Conscience is the lawgiver^ and utters the " Thou shalt " and the " Thou shalt not " whereon the will takes action ; the judge, too, before whom the offending soul is summoned; and from the "Thou ait the man," of conscience, there is no appeal. 178 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. VI. "I am, I ought, I can, I will"— these are the steps of that ladder of St. Augustine, whereby we — " Bise on stepping stonea, Of our dead selves to higher things." " I am "-^we have the power of knowing ourselves. " I ought " — we have within us- a moral judge, to whom we feel ourselves subject, and who points out and requires of us our duty. " I can " — we are conscious of power to do that which we perceive we ought to do. " I will " — we determine to exercise that power with a volition which is in itself a step in the execution of that which we will. Here is a beautiful and perfect chain, and the wonder is, that, so exquisitely constituted as he is for right'doing, error should be even possible to man. But of the sorrowful mysteries of sin and temptation it is not my place to speak here ; you will see that it is because of the sad possibilities of ruin and loss, which lie about. every human life, that I am pressing upon mothers the duty of saving their children by the means put into their hands. Perhaps it is not too much to say, that ninety- nine out of a hundred lost lives lie at the door of parents who took no pains to deliver their children from sloth, from sensual appetites, from wilfulness, no pains to fortify them with the liahits of a good life. We live in a redeemed world, and infinite grace and help from above attend every rightly directed effort in the.training of the children ; but I do not see much ground for hoping that divine grace will step in as a substitute for any and every faculty we choose to leave undeveloped or misdirected. In the physical world, we do not expect miracles to make ■up for our neglect of the use of means ; the rickety body, the misshapen limb, which the child has to thank his parents for, remain with him through life, however much else he may have to thank God for; and a feeble. will, bad habits, Leot. VI.] THE CONSOIBNOE. 179 an uninstmcted conscience, stick by many a Christian man through his life, hecause his parents failed in their duty to him, and he has not had force enough in himself to supply their omission. In this matter of conscience, for instance, the laisser-faire habit of his parents is the cause of real Wrong and injury to many a child. The parents are thankful to believe that their child is born with a conscience ; they hope his conduct may be ruled thereby : and the rest they leave — the child and his conscience may settle it between them. Now this is to suppose, either that a fuU-gi'own conscience is born into an infant body, or that it grows, like the hair and the limbs, with the growth of the body, and is not subject to conditions of spiritual development proper to itself. In other words, it is to suppose that conscience is an infallible guide — a delusion people cling to, in spite of common sense and of every-day experience of the wrong-headed things men do from con- scientious motives. The vagaries of the uninstructed con- science are so familiar as to have given rise to populat proverbs : " Honour among thieves," " To strain out a gnat and swallow a camel," point to cases of misguided conscience ; while "The wish is father to the thought," "None is so blind as he who won't see," point to the still more common cases, in which a man knowingly tricks his conscience into acquiescence. Then, if conscience be not an infallible guide, — if it pass blindfold by heinous offences, and come down heavily upon some mere quibble, tithing mint, rue, and all manner of herbs, and neg] ecting the weightier matters of the law, — if conscience be liable to be bamboozled, persuaded into calling evil good, and good evil, when Desire is the special pleader before the bar, where is its use — this broken reed ? Is this stern, lawgiver of the breast no more, after all, than a fiction of the brain ? Is your conscience no more than what you happen 180 HOME EDUCATION. [Lbot. VI. to think about your own actions and those of other people? On the contrary, these aberrations of conscience are perhaps the strongest proof that it exists as a real power. As Adam Smith has well said, " the supreme authority of conscience is felt and tacitly acknowledged by the worst, no less than by the best of men ; for even they who have thrown off all hypocrisy with the world, are at pains to conceal their real character from their own eyes." What conscience is, how far it lies in the feelings, how far in the reason, how far it is independent of both, are obscure questions which it is not necessary for practical purposes to settle : but this much is evident — that conscience is as essential a part of human nature as are the affections and the reason ; and that conscience is that spiritual sense whereby we have knowledge of good and evil. The six months' old child who cannot yet speak exhibits the workings of conscience; a reproving look will make him drop his eyes and hide his face. But, observe, the mother may thus cover him with confusion by way of an experiment when the child is all sweetness, and the poor little untutored conscience rises- all the same, and condemns him on the word of another. Facts like this afford a glimpse of the appalling respon- sibility that lies upon parents. The child comes into the world with a moral faculty, a delicate organ whereby he discerns the flavour of good and evil, and, at the same time, has a perception of delight in the good — in himself or others, ■ — of loathing and abhorrence of the evil. But, poor little child, he is like a navigator who does not know how to box his compass. He is born to love the good, and to hate the evil, but he has no real knowledge of what is good and what is evil ; what intuitions he has, he puts no faith in, but yields himself in simplicity to the steering of others. The wonder that Almighty God can endure so far to leave the very making of an immortal being in the hands of human Lect. VI.] THE OONSCIENOE. 181 parents, is only matohed by the wonder that human parents can accept this divine trust with hardly a thought of its significance. Looking, then, upon conscience in the child rather as an undeveloped capability than as a supreme authority, the question is, how is this nascent lord of the life to be educated up to its high functions of informing the will, and decreeing the conduct ? I'or, though the ill-taught conscience may make fatal blunders, and a man may carry slaughter amongst the faithful because his conscience bids ; yet, on the other hand, no man ever attained a godly, righteous, and sober life except as he was ruled by a good conscience — a conscience with not only the capacity to discern good and evil, but trained to perceive the qiialities of the two. Many a man may have the great delicacy of taste which should qualify him for a tea-taster, but it is only as he has trained experience in the qualities of teas that his nice taste is valuable to his em- ployers and a source of income to himself. As with that of the will, so with the education of the conscience — it depends upon much that has gone before. Refinement of conscience cannot co-exist with ignorance. The untutored savage has his scruples that we cannot enter into : we cannot understand to this day how it was that the horrors of the Indian Mutiny arose from the mere suspicion that a mixture of hogs' lard and beef fat had been dealt out to the Sepoys, wherewith to grease the locks of their muskets. Those scruples which are beyond the range of our ideas we call superstitions or prejudices, and are un- willing to look upon conduct as conscientious — even when prompted by the uninstructed conscience —unless^ in so far as it is reasonable and right in itself. Therefore, it is plain that, before conscience is in a position to pronounce its verdict on the facts of a given case, the culti- vated reason must review the pros and cons ; the practised 182 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. VI. judgment must balance these, deciding which have the greater weight. Attention must hring all the powers of the mind to bear on the question ; habits of right action must carry the feelings, must make right-doing seem the easier and the pleasanter. In the meantime, desire is clamorous : but con- science, the unbiassed judge, duly informed in full court of the merits of the case, decides for the right. The will carries out the verdict of conscience ; and the man whose conduct is uniformly moulded upon the verdicts of conscience is the conscientious man, of whose actions and opinions you may be sure beforehand. But life is not long enough for such lengthy process ; a thousand things have to be decided off- hand, and then what becomes of these elaborate proceedings ? That is just the advantage of an instructed conscience backed by a trained intelligence : the judge is always sitting ; the counsel always on the spot. Here is, indeed, a high motive for the all round training of the child's intelligence — he wants the highest culture you can give him, backed by carefully formed habits, in order that he may have a conscience always alerf, supported by every power of the mind ; and such a conscience is the very flower of a noble life. The instructed conscience may claim to be, if not infallible, at any rate nearly always right. It is not generally mature until the man is mature j young people, however right-minded and earnest, are apt to err, chiefly because they fix their attention too much upon some one duty, some one theory of life, at the expense of much besides. But even the child, with the growing conscience and the growing powers, is able to say, " No, I can't ; it would not be right;" "Yes, I wUl; for it is right." And, once able to give either of these answers to the solicitations that assail him, the child is able to live : for the rest, the develop- ment, and what may be called the adjustment of conscience will keep pace with his intellectual growth. But, allowing Lect. VI. THE CONSCIENCE. 183 that a great deal of various discipline must go to secure that final eifloresoence of a good conscience, what is to be done hy way of training the conscience itself, quickening the spiritual taste so that the least soupgon of evil is detected and rejected ? There is no part of education more nice and delicate than this, nor any in which grown-up people are more apt to blunder. Every one knows how tiresome it is to discuss any nice moral question with children ; how they quibble, suggest a hundred ingenious explanations or evasions, fail to be shocked or to admire in the right places, in fact, play with the whole question ; or, what is more tiresome still, are severe and righteous overmuch, and " deal damnation round" with a great deal of heartiness and goodwill. Sensible parents are often distressed at this want of conscience in the children : but they are not greatly in fault ; the mature conscience demands to be backed up by the mature intellect, and the children have neither the one nor the other. Dis- cussions of the kind should be put down ; the children should not be encouraged to give their opinions on questions of right and wrong, and little books should not be put into their hands which pronounce authoritatively upon conduct. It would be well if the reticence of the Bible in this respect were observed by the writers of children's books, whether of story or history. The child hears the history of Joseph (with reservations) read from the Bible, which rarely offers comment or explanation. He does not need to be told what was "naughty" and what was "good;" there is no need to press home the teaching, or the Bible were written in vain, and good and bad actions carry no witness with them. Let all the circumstances of the daily Bible reading — the consecutive reading, from the first chapter of Genesis onwards with necessary omissions — be delightful to the child ; let him be in his mother's room, in his mother's arms; let that 184 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. VI. quarter of an hour bo one of sweet leisure and sober gladness, the cMld's whole interest being allowed to go to the story without distracting moral considerations ; and then, the less talk the better; the story will sink in, and bring its own teaching, a little now, and more every year as he is able to bear it. One such story will be in him a constantly growing, fructifying moral idea. The Bible (the fitting parts of it, that is) first and su- preme ; but any true picture of life, whether a tale of golden deeds or of faulty and struggling human life, brings aliment to the growing conscience. The child gets into the habit of fixing his attention on conduct ; actions are weighed by him, at first, by their consequences, but, by de'grees, his conscience acquires discriminating power, and such and such behaviour is bad or good to him whatever its consequences. And this silent growth of the moral faculty takes place all the more surely if the distraction of chatter on the subject is avoided j for a thousand small movements of vanity and curiosity and mere love of talk are easily called into play, and these take off the attention from the moral idea which should be con- veyed to the conscience. It is very important, again, that the child should not be'' allowed to condemn the conduct of the people about him. Whether he is right or wrong in his verdict is not the question ; the habit of bestowing blame will certainly blunt his conscience, deaden his sensibility to the injunction, " Judge not, that ye be not judged." But the child's own conduct : surely he may be called upon to look into that ? His conduct, including his words, yes; but his motives, no; nothiDg must be done to induce the evil habit of introspection. Also, in setting the child to consider his ways, regard must be had to the extreme ignorance of tho childish conscience, a degree of ignorance puzzling to grown-up people when they chance to discover it, which is not ofteuj for the children, notwithstanding their Leot. VI.] THE CONSCIENCE. 185 endless chatter and their friendly loving ways, live very much to themselves. They commit serious offences against truth, modesty, love, and do not know that they have done wrong, while some absurd feather-weight of transgression oppresses their souls. Children will bite and hurt one another viciously, commit petty thefts, do such shocking things that their parents fear they must have very bad natures : it is not necessarily so ; it is simply that the untaught conscience sees no clear boundary line between right and wrong, and is as apt to err on the one side as the other. I once saw a dying child of twelve who was wearing herself out with her great distress, because she feared she had committed " the un- pardonable sin," so she said (how she picked up the phrase, nobody knew) ; and that was — that she had been saying her prayers without even kneeling up in bed ! The ignorance of the children about the commonest matters of right and wrong is really pathetic ; and yet they are too often treated as if they knew all about it, because " they have conscience," as if conscience were any more than a spiritual organ, waiting for development and direction ! That the children do wrong knowingly is another matter, and requires, alas, no proving ; all I am pressing for is, the real need there exists to instruct them in their duty — and this, not at haphazard, but regularly and progressively. Kindness, for instance, is, let us say, the subject of instruction this week. There is one of the talks with their mother that the children love — a short talk is best — about kindness. Kindness is love, showing itself in act and word, look and manner. A well of love, shut up and hidden in a little boy's heart, does not do anybody much good ; the love must bubble up as a spring, flow out in a stream, and then it is kindness. Then will follow short daily talks about kind ways, to brothers and sisters, to playmates, to parents, to grown-up friends, to servants, to people in pain and trouble, to dumb 186 HOME EDUCATION, [Lect. VI. creatures, to people we do not see but yet can think about — all in distress, the heathen. Give the children one thought at a time, and every time, some lovely example of loving- kindness that will iire their hearts with the desire to do likewise. Take our Lord's parable of the " Good Samaritan " for a model of instruction in morals. Let tale and talk make the children emulous of virtue, and then give them the " Go and do likewise," the law. Having presented to them the idea of hindness, in many aspects, end with the law : Be kind, or, "Be kindly affectioned one to another." Let them know that this is the law of God for children and for grown- up people. Now, conscience is instructed, the feelings are enlisted on the side of duty, and if the child is brought up, it is for breaking the law of kindness, a law that he knows of, that his conscience convicts him in the break- ing. Do not give children deterrent examples of error, because of the sad proclivities of human nature, but always tell them of beautiful " Golden Deeds," small and great, that shall stir them as trumpet-calls to the battle of life. Be courteous, be candid, be grateful, be considerate, be true, — there are aspects of duty enough to occupy the atten- tion of mother and child for every day of the child-life ; and, all the time, the idea of duty is being formed and con- science is being educated and developed. At the same time, the mother exercises the friendly vigilance of a guardian angel, being watchful, not to catch the child tripping, but to guide him into the acting out of the duty she has already made lovely in his eyes ; for it is only as we do, that we learn to do, and become strong in the doing. As she instructs her child in duty, she teaches him to listen to the voice of conscience as to the voice of God— a "Do this," or "Do it not," within the breast — to be obeyed with full assurance. It is objected, that we are making infallible, not the Leox. VI.] THE DIVINE LIFE IN THE CHILD. 187 divinely implanted conscience, but that same conscience made effective by discipline. It is even so ; in every depart- ment of life, physical or spiritual, human effort appears to be the condition of the Divine energizing ; there must be a stretching forth of the withered arm before it receives strength; and we have every reason to believe that the instructed conscience, being faithfully followed, is divinely illuminated. The Divine Life in the Child. It is evident we have not yet reached — " The very pulse of tlie raacliiue." Habits, feeling, reason, conscience — we have followed these into the inmost recesses of the child's life ; each acts upon the other, but what acts upon the last : what acts upon them, all ? " It is," says a writer who has searched into the deep things of God — " it is a King that our spirits cry for, to guide them, discipline them, unite them to each other : to give them a victory over them.selves, a victory over the world. It is a Priest that our spirits cry for, to lift them above themselves to their God and Father, — to make them partakers of His nature, fellow-workers in carrying out His purposes. Christ's Sacrifice is the one authentic testimony that He is both the Priest and King of men." * Conscience, we have seen, is effective only as it is moved from within, from that innermost chamber of Mansoul, that Holy of Holies, the secrets of which are only known to the High-priest, who " needed not that any man should tell Him, for He knew what was in man." It is necessary, however, that we should gather up crumbs of fact and inference, and set in order such knowledge as we have ; for the keys even of this innermost chamber are placed in the hands of parents, * Maurice, " Sermons on Sacrifice.'' 188 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. YI. and it is a great deal in their power to enthrone the King, to induct the Priest, that every human spirit cries for. We take it for granted in common speech that every soul is a " living soul," a fully developed full-grown soul ; but the language of the Bible and that of general experience seem to point to startling conclusions. It has been said of a great poet — with how much justice is not the question here — that if we could suppose any human being to be made without a soul, he was such an abortive attempt : for, while he had reason, imagination, passions, all the appetites and desires of an intelligent being, he appeared , to exercise not one of the functions of the soul. Now, what are these functions, the suspension of which calls the very existence of a" man's soul in question ? We must go back to the axiom of Augustine — " the soul of man is for God, as G-od is for the soul." The soul has one appetite, for the things of God ; breathes one air, the breath, the Spirit of God ; has one desire, for the knowledge of God ; one only joy, in the face of God. " I want to live in the Light of a Countenance which never ceases to smile upon me " * is the language of the soul. The direct action of the soul is all Godward, with a reflex action towards men. The speech of the soul is prayer and praise, the right hand of the soul is faith, the light of the soul is love, the love of God shed abroad upon it. Observe, these are the functions, this, the life of the soul, the only functions, the only life it can have : if it have not these, it has no power to turn aside and find the " life of its hand " elsewhere. As the conscience, the will, the reason, is a mere germ, utterly ineffective till it be nourished with its proper food, exercised in its proper functions, — so of the soul ; and its chamber is empty, with cobwebbed doors and clouded windows, until it awake to its proper life : not quite empty, though, for there is the germ, the nascent soul ; and the * " Christmas Day, and other Sermons." Lect. VI.] THE DIVINE LIFE IN THE CHILD. 189 awaking into life takes place, sometimes with the sudden shook, the gracious miracle which we call conversion ; some- times, when the parents so will, the soul of the child expands with a gentle sweet growth and gradual unfolding as of a flower. There are torpid souls, which are yet alive ; there are feeble, sickly souls, which are yet alive ; and there are souls which no movement Godward ever quickens. This life of the soul, what is it ? Communicated life, as when one lights a torch at the fire ? Perhaps ; but it is something more intimate, more unspeakable : " I am the Life ; " " In Him was life, and the life was the light of men ; " '' Abide in Me and I in you." The truth is too ineffable to be uttered in any words but those given to us. But it means this at least, that the living soul does not abide alone in its place ; that that place becomes the temple of the living God. " Surely the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not. How dreadful is this place ! " But this holy mystery, this union and communion of God and the soul, how may human parents presume to meddle with it? What can they do? How can they pro- mote it ? and is there not every risk that they may lay rude hands upon the ark ? In the first place, it does not rest with the parent to choose whether he will or will not attempt to quicken and nourish this Divine life in his child. To dp so is his bounden duty and service. If he neglect or fail in this, I am not sure that it matters much that he has fulfilled his duties in the physical, moral, and mental culture of his child, except in so far as the child is the fitter for the Divine service should the Divine life be awakened in him. But what can the parent do ? Just this, and no more : he can present the idea of God to the soul of the child ^ Here, as through- out His universe. Almighty God works by apparently in- adequate means. Who would say that a bee can produce apple trees ? Yet a bee flies from an apple tree laden with 190 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. VI. the pollen, of its flowers: this it unwittingly deposits on the stigmas of the flowers of the next tree it comes to. The bee goes, but the pollen remains, but with all the length of the style between it and the immature ovule below. That does not matter ; the ovule has no power to reach the pollen grain, but the latter sends forth a slender tube, within the tube of the style ; the ovule is reached ; behold, then, the fruit, with its seed, and, if you like, future apple trees ! Accept the parable : the parent is little better in this matter than the witless bee ; it is his part to deposit, so to speak, within reach of the soul of the child, some fruitful idea of God ; the immature soul makes no effort towards that idea, but the living Word reaches down, touches the soul, and — there is life; growth and beauty, flower and fruit. I venture to ask you to look, for once, at these Divine mysteries from the same philosophical standpoint we have taken up in regarding all the faculties and functions of the child, partly, because it is instructive to see how the myste- ries of the religious life appear when it is looked at from without its own sphere, partly, because I wished to rise by unbroken steps to the supreme function of the parent in the education of his child. Tor here the similitude of the- bee and the apple tree fails. The parent must not make blun- dering, witless efforts : as this is the highest duty imposed upon him, it is also the most delicate ; and he will have infinite need of faith and prayer, tact and discretion, humi- lity, gentleness, love, and sound judgment, if he would present his child to God, and the thought of God to the soul of his child. "If we think of God as an exactor and not a giver," it has been well said, " exactors and not givers shall we become." Yet is not this the light in which God is most commonly set before the children — a Pharaoh demanding his tale of bricks, bricks of good behaviour and right-doing. Do Leot. VI.] THE DIVINE LIFE IN THE CHILD. 191 not parents deliberately present God as an exactor, to back up the feebleness of their own government ; and do they not freely utter, on the part of God, threats they would be un- willing to utter on their own part ? Again, what child has not heard from his nurse this, delivered with much energy, " God does not love you, you naughty boy ! He will send you to the bad place ! " And these two thoughts of God, as an exactor and a punisher, make up, often enough, all the idea the poor child gets of his leather in heaven. What fruit can come of this but aversion, the turning away of the child from the face of his Father ? What if, instead, were given to him the thought well expressed in the words, " The all-forgiving gentleness of God." These are but two of many deterrent thoughts of God com- monly presented to the tender soul; and the mother who realizes that the heart of her child may be irrevocably turned against God by the ideas of Him imbibed in the nursery, will feel the necessity of grave and careful thought, and definite resolve, as to what teaching her child shall receive on this momentous subject. She will most likely forbid any mention of the Divine Name to the children, except by their parents, explaining, at the same time, that she does so because she cares so much that her children should get none but.right thoughts on this great matter. It is better that the children should receive a few vital ideas, that their souls may grow upon, than a great deal of indefinite teaching. How to select these few quickening .thoughts of the infinite God? The selection is not so difficult to make as would appear at first sight. In the first place, we must teach that which we know, know by the life of the soul; not with any mere knowledge of the mind. Now, of the vast mass of the doctrines and the precepts of religion, we shall find that there are only a few vital truths that we have so taken into our being that we live upon them — this person, 192 HOME EDUCATION. [Lbot. VI. these ; that person, those ; some of us, not more than a single one. One or more, these are the truths we must teach the children, because these will come straight out of our hearts with the enthusiasm of conviction which rarely fails to carry its own idea into the spiritual life of another. There is no more fruitful source of what it is hardly too much to call infant infidelity than the unreal dead words which are poured upon the children about the best things, with an artificial solemnity of tone and manner intended to make up for the want of living meaning in the words. Let the parent who only knows one thing from above teach his child that one ; more will come to him by the time the child is ready for more. Again, there are some ideas of the spiritual life more proper than others to the life and needs of the child. Thus, Christ the_ Joy-giver is more to him than Christ the Consoler. Again, there are some few ideas which are as the daily bread of the soul, without which life and growth are impos- sible. All other teaching may be deferred until the child's needs bring him to it ; but whoever sends his child out into life without these vital ideas of the spiritual life, sends him forth with a dormant soul, however wellrinstructed he may be in theology. Again, the knowledge of God is distinct from morality, or, what the children call " being good," though " being good " follows from that knowledge. But let these come in their right order. Do not bepreach the child to weariness about " being good " as what he owes to God, without letting in upon him first a little of that knowledge which shall make him good. We are no longer suffering from an embarrassment of liohes ; these limitations shut out so much of the ordinary teaching about Divine things that the question becomes xather, What shall we teach ? than. How shall we choose ? Leot. VI.] THE DIVINE LIFE IN THE CHILD. 193 The next considerations tliat will press upon the mother are the times, and the manner, of this teaching in the things of God. It is better that these teachings be rare and precious than too frequent and slightly valued ; better, not at all, than that the child should he surfeited with the mere sight of spiritual food, rudely served. At the same time, he must be built up in the faith, and his lessons must be regular and -progressive ; and here everything depends upon the tact of the mother. Spiritual teaching, like the wafted odour of flowers, should depend on which way the wind blows. Every now and then there occurs a holy moment, felt to be holy by mother and child, when the two are together — that is the moment for some deeply felt and softly spoken word about God, such as the occasion gives rise to. Tew words need be said, no exhortation at all; just the flash of conviction from the soul of the mother to the soul of the childi Is " Our Father" the thought thus laid upon the child's soul? There will be, perhaps no more than £t sj'mpathetic meeting of eyes hereafter, between mother and child, over a thousand sho-wings forth of "Our Father's" love; but the idea is -growing, becoming part of the child's spiritual life. This is all : no routine of spiritual teaching ; a dread of many words which are apt to smother the fire of the sacred life ; much self-restraint shown in the allowing of seeming oppor- tunities to pass ; and, all the time, earnest purpose of heart, and a definite scheme for the building up of the child in the faith. It need not be added that, to make another use of our Lord's words, "this kind cometh forth only by prayer." It is as the mother gets wisdom liberally from above, that she will be enabled for this Divine task. A word about the reading of the Bible.! I think we make a mistake in burying the text under ovit endless comments and applications. Also, I doubt if the picking out of individual verses, and grinding these into the child 194 HOBIE EDUCATION. [Lect. VI. until they cease to have any meaning for him, is anything hut a hindrance to the spiritual life. The Word is full of vital force, capable of applying itself. A seedj light as thistle-down^ -wafted into the child's soul, will take root downwards and bear fruit upwards. What is required of us is, that we should implant a love of the Word ; that the most delightful moments of the child's day should be those in which his mother reads for him with sweet sympathy and holy gladness in voice and eyes, the beautiful stories of the Bible ; and, now and then, in the reading will occur one of those convictions, passing from the soul of the mother to the soul of the child, in which is the life of the Spirit. Let the child grow so that — " New thoughts of God, new hopes of heaven," are a joy to him, too,^— things to be counted first amongst the blessings of a day. Above all, do not read the Bible at the child ; do not let any words of the Scriptures be occasions for gibbeting his faults. It is the office of the Holy Ghost to convince of sin ; and He is able to use the Word for this purpose without risk of that hardening of the heart in which our clumsy dealings too often result. The matter for this teaching of Divine things will come •out of every mother's own convictions. I will attempt to speak of only one or two of those vital truths on which the spiritual life must sustain itself. " Our rather, who is in heaven," is perhaps the first idea of God which the mother will present to her child-^Father and Giver, straight from whom comes all the gladness of every day. " What a happy birthday our Father has given tp my little boy ! " " The flowers are coming again ; our Father has taken care of the life of the plants all through the winter cold ! " " Listen to that skylark ! It is a wonder how our Father can put so much joy into the heart of ojie liftl? Lect. VI.] THE DIVINE LIFE IN THE. CHILD. 195 bird." " Thank God for making my little girl so happy and merry ! " Out of this thought comes prayer, the free utterance of the child's heart, more often in thanks for the little joys of the day counted up than in desire, just yet. The words do not matter ; any simple form the child can understand will do ; the rising Godward of the child-heart is the true prayer. Out of this thought, too, comes duty — the glad acknowledgment of the debt of service and obedience to a Parent so gracious aad benign — not One who exacts service at the sword's point, as it were, but One whom His children run to obey. Christ, our King. Here is a thought to unseal the fountains of love and loyalty, the treasures of faith and imagination, bound up in the child. The very essence of Christianity is personal loyalty, passionate loyalty to our adorable Chief. We have laid other foundations — regeneration, sacraments, justification, works, faith, the Bible— any one of which, how- ever necessary to salvation in its due place and proportion, may become a religion about Christ and without Christ. And now a time of sifting has come upon us, and thoughtful people decline to know anything about our religious systems ; they write down all our orthodox beliefs as things not hnow' able. Perhaps this may be because, in thinking much of our salvation, we have put out of sight our King, the Divine fact which no soul of man to whom it is presented can ignore. In the idea of Christ is life; let the thought of. Him once get touch of the soul, and it rises up, a living power, independent of all formularies of the brain. Let us save Christianity for our children by bringing them into allegiance to Christ, the King. How ? How did the old Cavaliers bring up sons and daughters in passionate loyalty and reverence for not too worthy princes ? Their own hearts were full of it ; their lips spake it ; their acts proclaimed it ; the style of their clothes, the ring of their voices, the carriage of their heads — all was one 196 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. YI. proclamation of fcoundless devotion to their king and. his cause. That civil war, whatever else it did, or missed doing, left a parable for Christian people. If a Stuart prince cotild command such measure of loyalty, what shall we say of " the Chief amongst ten thousand, the altogether lovely '\2 Jesus, our Saviour: here is a thought to be hrought tenderly before the child in the moments of misery that follow wrong-doing. "My poor little boy, you have been very naughty to-day ! Could you not help it ? " " No, mother," with sobs. " No, I suppose not ; hut there is a way of help." And then the mother tells her child how the Lord Jesus is our Saviour, because He saves us from our sins. It is matter of question when the child should first learn the " Story of the Cross.'' One thinks it- would he very delight- ful to begin with Moses and the prophets ; to go through the Old Testament history, tracing the gradual unfolding of the work and character of the Messiah ; and then, when their minds are full of the expectation of the Jews, to bring before them the mystery of the hirth in Bethlehem, tha humiliation of the Cross. But perhaps no gain in freshness of presentation would make up to the children for having grown up with the associations of Calvary and Bethlehem always present to their minds. One thing in this connection : it is not well to allow the children in a careless familiarity with -the Name of Jesus, or in the use of hymns whose tone is not reverent. " Ye call Me Master and Lord ; and ye say well, for so I am." The indwelling of Christ is a thought particularly fit for the children, because their large faith does not stumble at the mystery, their imagination leaps readily to the marvel, that the King Himself should inhabit a little child's heart. *' How am I to know He is come, mother ? " " When you are quite gentle, sweet, and happy, it is because Christ is within,— =i Lect. VI.] THE DIVINE LIFE IN THE CHILD. 19? " And when He comes, He makes your face so fair, Your friends are glad, and say, ' The King is there.' " I will not attempt to indicate any more of the vital truths which the Christian mother will present to her child ; having patience nntil they blossom and bear, and his soul is as a very fruitful garden which the Lord hath blessed. But, once more, " This kind cometh forth only by prayer." THE HOME EDUCATION OF THE SCHOOLBOY AND SCHOOLGIEL. ■^rif LECTURE VII. THE RELATIONS BETWEEN SCHOOL LIEE AND HOME LIFE —SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TRAINING. School, a neie Experience. When the cbild goes to school a new life begins for him ; and not only so, but no change that may come to him afterwards will be in the same sense a new life. And for this reason : socially speaking, two lives are possible to us — private and public life ; we live as members of a family and as members of a commonwealth. Hitherto the child has lived in the family ; his duties have all been pretty plain, and his affec- tion pretty feiirly bestowed. Of course he loves and- obeys his parents, more or less, and is fond of his brothers and sisters: — there is no choice for him ; and the law of the family and the love of the family follow him when he is allowed to mix with the outside world. " Mother says " is his law, " Father told me " his supreme authority. But when he goes to school all that is changed : though he is still loving and dutiful towards those at home, other things have come in, and the child looks upon the world from a new standpoint,. Parents may think; when they send their children to school, that the masters or mistresses and the studies are the points to be considered : that the children go to learn, i.e. to learn out of books, and that the heads of the 202 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VII. sohool are, for the time being, in the place of parents to the children. How far this may be true depends on another factor, sometimes left out of count, namely the " All the boys " and " All the girls " of schoolboy and schoolgirl phrase. The wise parent, in selecting a school for his child, is not satisfied to examine the syllabus and to know that the masters bear a high character ; he sends out feelers to test the direction of pihlic opinion in the school : if public opinion set with a strong current towards order, effort, virtue, that is the school for him ; his boy, he is assured, once entered there, will be carried'along towards the right. No doubt there will be a few turbulent spirits " in every considerable school, and lawlessness is contagious, but the thing to find out is, how far the lead of the scapegraces is followed by the rest. But the direction of " public opinion," it is said, rests with the master. Not altogether : he will do his best to get it on his side ; but he may be, like Dr. Arnold, of Eughy, years before' he succeeds, and that, though he niay have everythihg in his own character to fit him for the office of schoolmaster. We know how little to be depended upon is public opinioii in the world ; far more, in the little world of school, it veers with every shifting of the wind, just because boys and girls are less reasonable, more emotional, than men and women. Yet, little as it is to be depended upon, this vox popuK within the school governs the school, and the masters are nowhere except as they get it on their side. Now, this fact shows the real constitution and government of the school : the family is a limited monarchy, with sovereign parents; the school is a republic, with an elected president. Of course the master inay hold his post in spite of the boys, but hie authority and influence, the real matters in question, he only holds so far as they go with hini; that is, so far as they elect him to administer their afiiairs, Leot. VII.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TRAINING. 203 Now, we see why it is that the child finds himself in a new and very stimulating element when he goes to school. For the first time, he has to find his footing amongst his equals. At home, he has seldom had more than one equal, and that his friend — the brother or sister next him in age- Here, he has a whole class of his fellows, some stronger, some weaker, than himself, working with him, shoulder to shoulder, running neck and neck with him in lessons and games. It is very exciting and delightful. The new hoy catches the tone of the school : if the hoys work, he works ; if they dawdle, he dawdles, — unless he have been exceptionally well brought up. Happily, it is not too much to say that, as a a rule, schoolboys and schoolgirls do work, in these days. School opinion is on the side of order and effort ; and this for several reasons. It is not that the young people are better or more diligent than young people used to be, but more powerful incentives are put before them ; in fact, the motives to work are stronger than the motives to idle. Examinations. The tJniversities' Local Examinations, and those of other public examining bodies, have effected a great change in the feeling of middle-class schools, both public and private, in this respect : it is possible to almost any boy or girl to get a distinction worth having, and enough care to make the effort to carry the rest along. Work is the oi'der of the day : the desire of distinction, a strong spirit of emulation, stimulated by marks and prizes, do the work of government, and the teachers have little difficulty, except with the few rebellious spirits who decline to go the way of the others. This looks so well on the face of it, that we ask. Is there nothing to set on the other side ? But this much, at least, must be allowed by both utilitarian and moralist — that the habit of work, the power of work, rapidity in work, the set 204 HOME EDUOATIOK. [Lect. VIE of tKe wiirt'o a given task, are "tEe "making" of man and ■jvoman ; tliat the boy who has done the definite work necessary to pass a given examination is, other things heing equal, worth twenty per cent, more than he who has not heen ahle to pull up his forces. But these " other things " must be looted into. Is the hoy who prepares for a public examination — we are not speaking of prizes open only to a few, such as scholarships at the Universities, but of examina- tions where success is open to all who are up to a certain reasonable standard — is the boy who goes in for one of these in any respect at a disadvantage compared with him who does not ? Here comes in for consideration the question of " over- pressure," a possibility — too serious to be passed over without investigation — which parents naturally dread more for theii' girls than their boys. In the first place, work, regular disciplinary exercise, is so entirely wholesome for the brain, that girls, even more than boys, should be the "better for definite work with a given object. It cannot be too strongly put that, as a matter of health, growing girls cannot aifibrd to be Idle, mentally ; it is just as pernicious that they should dawdle through their lessors 'as that they should lounge through the day. There is no more effectual check to the tendency to hysteria aind other iiervous maladies common to growing girls than the habit of steady brain-* work. But, then, it must be work under conditions : fit quantities at fit times, with abundant leisure for exercise and recreation. Now, the question is. Is it possible to prepare for an examination, say the Cambridge Local Examination, Junior or Senior,' under these conditions? For a girl of average intelligence, who has been fairly well taught up to her thirteenth year, it certainly is. It is not the steady work during the year that produces the symptoms of " brain-fag," lect. vii.] school discipline and home training. 205 but the few weeks of cram at the end, the struggle to. go over the work of the year in a month or so, the excessive strain on the attention, the prolonged hours of study at the expense of play. This is, indeed, overpressure, and does havm. But it is unnecessary, because, as a matter of fact, it is useless ; a name, or a date, a lucky shot or two, is all that comes of this senseless " grind." It is seldom that this kind of thing is done at the instance of teachers — the pupils invent the necessity for themselves and go to work blindly ; and, therefore, parents can the more easily put it down, especially in day schools. It rests with them to say that their children shall go in for any examination, public or private, only on condition that little extra time be spent in study previous to the examination. Again, it is possible to reduce or increase the number of subjects — one language or more, one science or more — according to the power of the pupiL And, with these two precautions, there is no reason why the preparation for a public examination should do more than give the pupil a year's definite and wholesome work. The next, point to be considered is the qualify of the work. There is no doubt that definite work, on a well-con- sidered programme, with a given object in view, is a clear gain, leading to definiteness of purpose and concentration of effort and attention, the qualities that go to make a successful man. But what is to be said for the style of teaching, the method of study, encouraged by this system of school work organized with a view to public ; examinations ? and with what is it to be compared ? And, in the first place, is it not assuming too much to suppose that these examina- tions do tell very greatly on the general work of middle- class schools ? The Times, the other day, spoke within the mark in saying that the Universities had entirely revolu- tionized the system of education in secondary schools by their " Local Examinations." It is not as if the regulations 206 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. VII. of the examining bodies affected only the few candidates; the whole of the first division of the school is worked upon the syllabus adopted; the second, the third, down to the lowest division, is worked towards that syllabus : that is, every pupil in the school gets the sort of teaching that will tell when his time comes to be examined; and, so soon as the work of the school begins to take hold of the child, he is making efforts towards this grand result. Nor did the Times say too much in praise of the impulse these examinations have given to secondary education, nor of the practical sterling value of the work obtained. It is a rare thing, now, to meet with a school of any standing which does not do thorough work, commonly tested by the fact that it sends in candidates for some examination. One hears of schools which obtain telling results by a system of cram, of no educative worth at all ; but, as a whole, . middle-class schools have reached a fair average level — few are much better or much worse than the rest. It used not to be so ; a school was a place of real education or of miserable sham, according to the character of its head : but now, a scheme of work is prescribed; any man can see it carried out by assistants, if not by himself, and then his school is as good as another. In a word, the standing of a school no longer depends altogether upon force of character and organ» izing power in its principal. This levelizing tendency of our school routine has its disadvantages: it is not easy to produce individuality in either school or pupil under the present conditions. Indi- viduality, character, culture, — public examinations, and a system of school work based on such examinations, must necessarily strike at the head of these. For what is it possible to examine upon, when the same examination is held simultaneously all over the empire — what the pupil tMnJea, or what he Jinows, what he has seen down in black tEOT. VII.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TRAINING. 207 and white? The latter, plainly, for it would be unfair to allow examiner or examinee any latitude of opinion in a. matter that conceriis so many. Therefore, facts, examinable matter, is the mental pabulum of the school life. If the master be given to discursive teaching, he pulls himself up, and sticks to facts ; it is only upon matters of fact that it is possible to examine, and, therefore, it is upon his power of receiving, retaining, classifying, and reproducing facts that the pupil's success depends. There is no doubt that this fact-lore is an invaluable possession, and ig the sort of know- ledge which .is power. But it is not culture ; it does not, necessarily, produce a cultivated mind, the habits of reading and reflectioii : — " A primrose by the river's brim A yellow primrose is to liim. And it is nothing more" — he, being the boy brought up with a view to successful examinations, and who has not found for himself a way to . get out of the groove of his work. Again, the routine of school work becomes, at the same time, so mechanical and so incessant, there is so much hurry to get over the ground, so little leisure, so little opportunity for the master to bring himself en rapport with his pupil, to feel, as it were, the moulding of the boy's character under his fingers, that there is no space for the more delicate moral training, the refining touch, which a man of superior parts should bestow upon his pupil. The work, the routine itself, afifords bracing moral training. Diligence, exactness, persistence, steady concentrated effort, are not to be despised ; but something more is wanted, not easy to define, to be got only in sympathetic intercourse with our betters, morally and mentally, and this something is being pushed out in the press of work. 208 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VII. Wliat is to be said then? Give up examinations, and let teacters and taught -dawdle on in the old vague way ? By no means : too much would he lost. Let the children go to schools as they now are, hut withdraw them from examination? No, for the training schools offer now all hinges more or less upon the examinations, and if you do hot get that, you get nothing in its place* But the thing is, to look the matter in the face : take the good the schools provide, and be thankful ; take count of what they do not provide, and see that any culture or moral training which the schools fail to offer is to be had in the home. The Playgrou/nd. This parental duty is the more to be insisted on, because school life is so exigeant that the modern schoolboy or girl is nearly as much given up by parents as was the Spartan child of whom the State took possession.. The boys and girls away at school are treated very much as visitors while at home, made much, of at first, and then, before the long holidays are over, found slightly in the way ; but it is not often that the parents take them under training as they do the young children who have not yet left the parent iwing. The day school should offer the advantage of keeping the children constantly under home influence: but does it do so ? As a matter of fact, are not the children so much occupied with school tasks, and their leisure taken up with school companions and .school interests, that the parents gradually lose hold of them ? Then, the young people set up a code of their own : " Oh, nobody does so ! " " Nobody thinks BO 1 " " All the boys " or " all the girls " say so and so, is supposed to settle most matters of discussion. And the worst of it is, many parents, with th6 diffidence of good people, are ready to believe that their childi-en get something ■Lect. vu.] school discipline and home TEAINING. 209 better at soliool than they have power to give, that, in fact, all proper and suitable training is given there, and they just make a merit of not interfering. This absorption in school life is the more complete be- cause the young people are, for the time, conscious of no want which the school does not supply. Worh and jplay, given these in due proportion and of the fitting kind, and life is delightful : and nowhere in the world are work and play so well balanced as in the school — the boys' school, at any rate ; it is less easy to make provision for the play of girls. Parents prize the discipline of the play- ground almost as much as that of the school-room ; and rightly so ; not only for the unequalled physical training that the games afibrd ; but for the " pluck," the " endurance, foresight, strength, and skill," the obedience to law, the deference to authority, the readiness to give place to the best man, the self-reliance, the faithfulness to each otber, even in a bad cause, cultivated by means of the school games, with their laws, their captains, their contests, their rivalries. And what finer training could the boys have for a world in which pluck and temper win the prizes ? One is half inclined to regret that the games of the girls, even when they adopt the very games of the boys, can hardly be taken in such terrible earnest, and, therefore, do not exercise the same discipline : but, up to the present time at any rate, life does not offer such rough after usage to the girls as to the boys, and, therefore, the same training to hardihood is not called for. The influence which these organizations for play have on the characters of boys is not to be measured. Athletic and, at the same time, thoughtful young masters perceive that, if they are to influence the boys, it must be as they are able to make a good figure in the playground, and thereby show that they are in sympathy with the prime interests of a boy's life« So of friendships, comradeships, p 210 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect, VII. it is in the playground the boy finds his ideal of manly excellence, the example he sets himself to follow. School Government. The playground does invaluahle work, and has mnch to do with the making of what is best and most oharacteristio in Englishmen ; but, indeed, the training of the playground, as that of the school-room, is incomplete. The fact is, that the discipline of school-room and playground alike is largely carried on by stimulating and balancing, one against another, those desires which are common to us all as human beings — the desires of power, of society, of esteem, of knowledge, of mere animal activity, of excelling the rest, of work, or action, even avarice — the desire of wealth. Here is a formidable list ; and it is quite possible, by playing upon and adjusting these natural desires, to govern a human being so that he may make a respectable figure in the world while yet he has little sense of duty, feeble affections, and dispositions left to run wild, wanting the culture which should train mere disposition into character. Now, this way of governing * human being through his desires is the easiest in the world. The nurse knows it very well ; his desire of praise, or play, or lollipops leaves something always in her hands wherewith to reward the child's good behaviour. When attempts are made to stimulate people en masse, it is through their desires. They want work or play or power, money or land, and whoever plays upon any one of these desires gets the popular ear. Because this government through the desires is the easiest kind of government, it is the most common, in the school as elsewhere ; prizes, praise, place, success, distinction, whether in games or examinations, these are enough to keep a school going with such vigour, such ecMt, that nobody is conscious of the want of other springs of action,. AH these desires are right in tljemselves, within certain LiscT. VII.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TBAINING. 211 limits, and we may believe they were implanted in us as gpurs to progress ; the man who has no desire of wealth, no ambition, does not help himself and the world forward as does he who has these desires. Again, in the school, the desires are, on the whole, well regulated, one brought into play against another, and the result is, such sturdy qualities, sterling. virtues, as " make a man" of the boy brought under school discipline. The weak place is, that boys and girls are treated too much " in the rough," without regard to the particular tendencies in each which require repression, or direction, or encouragemeftt. The vain girl is made vainer, the diffident is snubbed ; there is no time to hand a crutch to the lame, to pick up the stumbling. All must keep the pace or drop out of the race. Then, it is astonishing how crude may be the character, how unformed the principles, how undeveloped the affections towards country, kindred, or kind, after a successful school career: the reason being, that the principle of government through the desires has left these things out of count. There are schools and schools; schools where mental discipline of the highest kind is combined with conscientious development of the character of the individual boy, and with such spiritual insight and teaching as help him into the better life : but such schools are not to be found in every street, and parents would do well not to takq it for granted that it is one of these their boy attends : better, to take the school for what it is worth, thankful for the training it does afford; to look its deficiencies in the face, and take pains to supply by means of home training what the school fails to give. Girls' Schools. Girls are, on the whole, worse off than boys, as regards what they get out of school life. There is an ' element 212 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. Vlt of g&herOsity, of free and friendly " give and take " in boys' games which is wanting to the girls. Beautiful and lasting girl friendships are formed in most schools, but girls do not always do each other good; perhaps because they are more delicate, nervous, and, consequently, irritable, by organization than the boys, they often enough contrive to get the worst and not the best out of each other. They have not the common bond which the boys find in their games, and their alliances rest upon talk, which too often turns into gossip, possibly into unwholesome gossip. A girl of fine, pure, noble character is like salt which seasons a whole school, and such girls are, happily, plentiful enough ; but it is well parents should bear the other possibility in mind, that their daughter may be thrown amongst girls, not vicious, but with nothing in them, who will bring her down to their commonplace level. Because girls, constitutionally sensitive, are open to the small envyings, jealousies, "cliquishness," which hinder them from getting all the good they should of each other's society, they are the more dependent on the character of their head, and on their opportunities of getting touch with her. If she be a woman of clear and vigorous mind, high principles, and elevated character, it is astonishing how all that is lovely in the feminine character is drawn towards her as by a magnet, and the girls about her mould themselves, each according to her own nature, and yet each after the' type of the mistress, the " sympathy of numbers " spumng them on towards virtue, and each — " Emulously rapid in the race." Given, to adapt words used in describing Dr. Lant Carpenter as a schoolmaster, a woman with a power of " commanding the reverence and reconstituting the wills " of her pupils, of " great and varied intellectual power, with profound sense of right pervading the whole life and conversation, with the JjECt. VII.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TEAINING. 213 insight derived from a thorough and affectionate sympathy with (girl) nature," and she- will "daily achieve triumphs which most teachers would helievd impossible ; " ahove all, this will be true if she succeed in putting into the hands of her pupils the key to the spiritual life. Such a woman gets all that is beautiful in girl-nature on her side — its enthusiasm, humility, deference, devotion : love works wonders, and the parents see their daughter growing under their eyes into the perfect woman that every mother longs to see in her child. But schoolmistresses, as schoolmasters, of this type are rare ; and, indeed, it is as well they are, for if the parents' highest functions are to be fulfilled by outsiders, what is left for father and mother to do ? Parents v/ill, no doubt, take care to place their daughters under generally estimable women; and, having done that, they will estimate the train- ing the school affords at its value, and endeavour to sup- plement it at home. How great the value of school discipline is to girls, they can appreciate who have had experience of the vagueness, inaccuracy, want of application, desultoriness, want of conscience about their work, dawdling habits — of young women brought up at home under the care of gover- nesses. Of course there are exceptions, governesses and governesses, and girls often fare well when their fathers have a hand in their education; but, for habits of work, power of work, conscientious endeavour in her work, the faithful schoolgirl is, as a rule, far before the girl who has not undergone school discipline. Home Training-:-Physical. It is not necessary to discuss here the respective merits of large and small schools, of day and boarding schools.. We may assume at once that the discipline of the school is so 214 HOME EDUCATION, [Leo*. Vli. valuable that tte toy or girl w'iio grows up without it is at a disadvantage through life ; while, at the same time, the training of the school is so far defective that, left to itself, it turns out very imperfect, inadequate human heings. The point for our consideration is» that the duty of the parents to educate their child is by no means at an end when he enters upon school life ; because it rests with them to supplement what is weak or wanting in the training of the schooL Now, as hitherto, education has a fourfold bearing — on the body, the mind, the moral, and the spiritual nature of the pupil. As far as physical education goes, the parent who has boys at school may sit at his ease ; they are as 6sh in the water, in the native element of that well-regulated animal activity which should train them up towards a vigorous, capable, and alert manhood. The schoolboy is so well off in the matter of physical training, that the rest of the world may envy him. But the schoolgirl is less fortunate ; her chief dependence is upon dancing and calisthenics j and some of the severer kinds of gymnastics cannot be attempted without risk by girls in their " teens." Little provision is made in their case, as in that of the boys, for thorough abandoment io games as part of the business of life. If they have tennis courts, only a few can play ; if they have playgrounds, the games are haphazard affairs, and the girls are not encouraged to a healthful exercise of their lungs. Day schools can seldom undertake to make full provision for the physical de- velopment of girls, and, therefore, that duty falls back upon the parents. Skipping-rope, shuttle-cock, rounders, cricket, tennis, archery, cannot be too much encouraged. Long country walks with an object, say the getting of botanical specimens, should be promoted, on at least two days in a week., Every. day, two or three hours in the open air should be secured, and, when that is not possible, on Account, of ■L-ECT. VII.l SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TBAINING. 215 tile weatliier, the evening should end with a carpet dance, or with good romping games. Where is the time to come from ? That is a question requir- ing serious consideration on the part of mothers, on whose good management it must depend if their children are to grow uj) with that sense of leisure which should he a prerogative of youth. For it is very true that the time of the girls is too fully occupied, and it is only by careful mapping out that enough growing-time can he secured for them. Say their waking-day is fourteen hours long, from seven in the morning till nine at night : something like five hours will he spent in the school-room-^goings and comings count for open-air exer- cise, though not of the hest ; from an hour to an hour and a half will be required for home work, " preparations ; " an hour, at least, for "practice" on the piano; two hours for meals, an hour for dressing, etc. ; now, three hours and a half is all that is left upon the closest calculation ; and two hours and a half of this should be given up without stint to tho girls' physical culture and amusement* The younger children, who have fewer or no home-tasks, and take less time for practising, will have the more for play* But if the schoolgirl is to get two or three hours intact, she will owe it to the mother's firmness as much as to her good management. In the first place, that the school tasks be done, and done well, in the assigned time, should be a most fixed law. The young people will main- tain that it is impossible; but let the mother insist: she will thereby cultivate the habit of attention, the very key to success in every pursuit, as well as secure for her chil- dren's enjoyment the time they would dissipate if left to themselves. It seldom happens that home work is given which should occupy more than an hour to an hour and a half, and a longer time is spent in the habit of mental dawdling — a real wasting of brain substance. It is a mistake 216 HOME EDUCATION, [Lect. VH. to suppose that efforts in this- dire.oti;QO run. counter tp the intention of the teachers ; on tlie contraTy, the greatest impedim.ent they meet with is that mental inertness in the children which will rather dawdle for an hour over a t^sk than brace the attention for five minutes' steady efifprt. rirmness on the mother's part in enforcing promptness — in the taking off and putting on of outdoor cJ.othes, etc., — and punctuality at meals, and in not allowing one occupation to overlap another, secures many a half-hour of pleasant leisure for the young people, and has the double advantage of making them feel themselves under a firm home rule,- Home Trainings-Intellectual. The intellectual tvaining of the young people must be left, in the main, to the school authorities. It is useless to remark further upon the subjects or the methods of study ; the schoolmaster settles all that, and h&, as we have seen, is greatly influenced by the lines laid down by certain examining bodies. Even where the teaching of the school is not satisfactory, there is little to be done : there is neither time nor opportunity for anj' other direct mental training ; and to attempt it, or to criticize unfavourably the working of the school, has a bad eifect on the pupil — ^he learns to undervalue what his school has to give him, but gets nothing else. But though parents can, and should, do nothing counter to the teachers, they may do much by playing into ■their hands. It is important that parents should, so far as possible, keep up with their -children, should know where they are and hew they are getting on in their studies, should look into their books, give an eye to their written work, be ready with an opinion, a hint, a word of encouragement. They may feel and show hearty interest in the matter of their children's studies, and, when the subject is less dry than the declension lect. vii.] school discipline and home teaining. 217 of a Latin noun, may throw side lights upon it bymaking it matter of table-talk. And this for a double reason, — both as holding up the hands of the sphoolmaster, and as strengthening their own. Parents do not always con- sider how far a word of interest from them goes to convert the dead words of a lesson into a living idea, never to be lost ; and there is no excuse left for getting rusty in these days of many books. The schoolmaster reaps the benefit of such efforts — his task is lightened ; he has to teach boys capable of responding : but of more consequence is it that the parents themselves keep their place as heads of the family. They keep the respect of their children; for once a boy begins 'to look down on the intellectual status of his parents, the entire honour and deference he owes them are at an end. Any pains taken to keep ahead should be repaid by the glow of honest pride the young people feel at every proof of intellectual power in their parents. Home Training — Moral, (a) Honour towards Parents. — This brings us to the con- sideration of that education in morals which the young people must get at home, or not at all. The chief of their duties, that which should be kept always before the young, is the duty they owe to their parents : from this stem, all other duties, to kindred, commonwealth, and neighbours, branch out: and more, they only perceive their obligations to Almighty God in proportion as they know what they owe to their human parents. Now, parents do not always think wisely on this subject. There is a feeling abroad, that the behaviour of a child to his parent is a matter between those two alone ; that if the parent choose to absolve his child from any close confidence, from obedience, respectful demeauour, — that is his business ; he has as much right to do so, as the slave-owner has to 218 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. VII. inanumit his slaves. At the same time, two other notions prevail,— that the Idndest and hesfr thing parents can do hy their children is to give them " a good time,'* &g the Americans put it ; and, that the children of these days are so much in advance of anything that went before them, that it is rather ahsurd to keep them in subordination to parents not half so clever as themselves. The outcome of these three popular fallacies is, that many parents give up the strict government of their children at a very early age— > so soon, that is, as the school steps in to take possession: lax discipline, imperfect confidence, free and easy manner.s, the habit of doing that which is right in their own eyes, are permitted to grow up. That schoolboys and girls should be thus thrown lipoil their own government is a blow to the interests of society, and a great loss to themselves — the loss of that careful moral training which it is the bounden duty of their parents to afford, throughout school life at any rate, and through the two or three years that follow it. The problem is, how to maintain due parental dignity, to repress any- thing like a "hail, fellow, well met" style of address, and yet to keep up the flow of affectionate intimacy, con- fidence, and friendly playfulness. Now, here is the secret of home government — put the child into the attitude of a receiver, the parent into that of an imparter, not merely of physical cave and comfort, but of a careful and regular training for the responsibilities of life, and the rest comes easy. The difficulty is, that many parents find it hard to maintain this superiority to their children as the latter advance in age and set up other standards than those of home. They possibly feel themselves less clever, less worthy, than some others with whom their children come in contact : they are too honest to assume a dignity to which they doubt their right, so they step down from the rostrum, and stand lect.vil] school discipline and home teaining. 219 on the same level as their children, willing to owe to affection and good nature the consideration which is their lawful due. Very likely such parents are not less, but more worthy than the persons they give place to: hut that is not the question ; they are invested with an official dignity ; it is in virtue of their office, not of personal character, that they are and must remain superior to their children, until these become of an age to be parents in their turn. And parents are invested with this dignity, that they may be in a position to instruct their children in the art of living, Now, ofSce in itself adds dignity irrespective of personal character; so much so, that the judge, the bishop, who does not sustain his post with becoming dignity has nothing to show for himself. So of the parent; if he forego the respectful demeanour of his children, he might as well have disgraced himself before their eyes ; for, in the one case as the other, he loses his power to instruct them in the art and science of living, which is his very raison d'etre in the divine economy. If parents put it to themselves that their relation to their children is not an accident, but is a real office which they have been appointed to fill, they would find it easier to assume the dignity of persons called upon to represent a greater than themselves. The parent who feels that he has a Power behind him,— that he is, strictly, no more than the agent of Almighty God appointed to bring the children under the divine government, does not behave with levity and weakness; and hol-ls his due position in the family as a trust which he has no right to give up. And now, given, the parents in their due position as heads of the family, and all the duties and affections which belong to the family flow out from that one principle as light from a sun. The parents are able to show continual 220 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VII. tenderness and friendliness towards their cbildren, without partiality and without weak indulgence. They expect, and therefore get, faithful and ready ohedience. Their children trust them entirely, and therefore bestow confidence, and look for counsel; and, of course, treat their parents with due honour and respect. There is a spurious dignity, which sometimes brings the parental character into discredit: a selfish and arbitrary parent requires much from, and gives little to, his childi-en, treating them de haut en has; and the children rebel, setting up their claims in opposition to those of their parents. But cases of this kind do not touch the point. Pew children resist the authority of a parent who con- sistently and lovingly acts as the agent of a higher authority. He is all the more a sovereign because he is recognized as a deputy sovereign. But there are times when the " relations are strained ; " and, of these, the moment when the child feels himself con- sciously a member of the school republic is one of the most trying. Now all the tact of the parents is called into play. Now, more than ever, is it necessary that the child should bo aware of the home authority, just that he may know how he stands, and how much he is free to give to the school. " Oh, mither, mither ! why gar ye no' mah' me do it?" was the cry of a poor ne'er-do-weel Scotch laddie who had fallen into_ disgrace through neglect of his work; and that is just what every schoolboy or schoolgirl has a right to say who does not feel the pressure of a firm hand at home during the period of school life. They have a right to turn round and reproach their parents for almost any failure in probity or power in after life. But no mere assertion of authority will do : it is the old story of the sun and the wind and the traveller's cloak. It is in the force of almighty gentleness that parents are supreme : not feebleness, not inertness, there is no strength in these ; but purposeful, determined gentleness. Lect. Vll.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TRAINING. 221 which carries its point only, " for it is right." " The servant of God must not strive," was not written for bishops and pastors alone, but is the secret of strength for every " bishop," or overlooker, of a household. (&) Gratitude towards Parents. — The parent will find that, for the sake of his child, tasks of some delicacy fall to him, which would be almost impossible as between man and man, and even in the relations of parent and child require tact and discrimination. For instance, he must foster gratitude iu his child. There is nothing left to be said for the ungrateful person : even amongst the ancients, ingratitude was held heinous : and yet, what in the world is more natural than to take benefits as matters of course, our own due, and the duty of those who bestow them? We think so highly of our own deservings, are so unready to put ourselves in the place of another and see at what cost he is kind, that, certainly, gratitude is not to be held a wild fruit native to the soil of the human heart. Now, no one can ever owe so much to any living soul as to devoted parents ; and, if the man is to experience the holy emotion of gratitude, it is as these same parents cultivate in him the delightful sense of their love and their never-failing kindness. It is a pity — but so it is^the children are so obtuse that they think no more of their parents' kindness as a personal matter than they do of sunshine or flowers, or any other pleasant thing in life. A mother sits up till midnight darning stockings for her boys ; she says nothing about it, and the boys put their stockings on, scarcely ' knowing whether they are in holes or not. But, " how hateful to be always reminding the children of such things, with a ' There now, see how I've had to work for you ! I hope the time will come when you will do as much for me.' " Hateful, indeed ; and most mischievous ; that sort of thing not only irritates the hearer, but cancels the debt. But, gentle rallying on 222 HOME EDUCATION, [Lect. VII> *' those great holes -whrch kept mother -up till midnight,'' with a " Nerer mind, my boy ; you know work for you i^ pleasure to your mother " — sinks deep ; and the boy is not worth his salt who, after that^ does not mean to buy Iii^ mother silks and satins, gold and jewels, "when I'm a man ! " If ever it is necessary to pinch, to do without things for the children's sake, let them know it : but do not re- proach them with it ; do not treat it as a hardship, but as a pleasure, for their sakes. That- is, it is lawful for parents to bring their good deeds before their children as a child offers a flower to his mother, as a show of love, but not as a demand for service, For gratitude is nothing else but a movement of love, and only love kindles love. (c) Kindness and Courtesy . — So, of the other manifestations of love — kindness, courtesy, friendliness; these the parents must get from their children, not upon demand, but as love constraineth them. Make occasions for services, efforts, offerings ; let the children feel that their kindness is a power in the lives of their parents. I know of a girl upon whom it dawned for the first time, when she was far in her " teens," that she had any power to gratify her mother. Do not let the little common courtesies and attentions of daily life slip^ the placing of a chair, the standing aside or falling behind at proper times, the attentive eye at table, the attentive ear and ready response to question or direction. Let the young people feel that the omission of these things causes pain to loving hearts, that the doing of them is as cheering as the sunshine ; and if they forget sometimes, it will only be that they forget, not that they are unwilling, or look upon the amenities of life as " all bosh ! " Again, let there be a continuous flow of friendliness, jgraciousness, the pleasantness of eye and lip, between parent and child, Let the- boy perceive that a bright eye-rto-eye "Good morning, mother," is gladness to her, and that a cold IhEct. YII.] school DISClPLlJjE AND HOME TEAlNiNG. 223 greeting with averted face is like a cloud between his mother and the sun. Parents are inclined to drop these things because they are unwilling to take even their own children by the throat, with a " Pay me that thou owest ; " but that is not the way to look at the matter ; it is not a personal question at all. Wordsworth has a deeply suggestive little poem illustrating what I mean : — " There is a change — and I am poor ; Your love hath been, nor long ago, A fountain at my fond heart's door, Whose only business was to flow ; And flow it did ; not taking heed Of its own bounty, or my need. " What happy moments did I count ! Blest was I then, all bliss above ! Now, for this consecrated fount Of muimuring, sparkling, living love. What have I— shall I dare to tell ? A comfortless and hidden Well. " A well of love — it may be deep ; I trust it is, — and never dry ; What matter ? if the waters sleep In silence and obscurity. Such change, and at the very door Of my fond heart, hath made me poor." There is, in the heart of every child, a fountain of love, " Whose only business is to flow ; " and this it is the part of the parents to keep unsealed, un- choked, and flowing forth perennially in the appointed chan^ nels of kindness; friendliness, courtesy, gratitude, obedience, service. Keep the fountain flowing, and it will gladden not only the parents, towards whom is the first rush of the current, but all about them and beyond them — the family, the household, friends, kindred, school-fellows, neighbours, 224 ttOMlil EDUCATION. [Leot. VII. the needy, tlie world, so far as it can reach. But let the spring be choked in its rise, in its natural outlet towards parents, and the chances are, it is lost, a mere buried well of love. How is the fountain to be kept aflow? Partly by this method of the poet's " Complaint'' Let son and daughter perceive the gladness which every outgoing of their love produces — the cloud that falls on the parent's heart When the love of the child is restrained. Natural reticence and pride incline us to take the " bounty " of the children's love for granted, and to make no sign of the pain caused by their thoughtless omissions. But these barriers of reserve should be broken down for the sake of the children, and they should be permitted to see, so far as possible, what is in the hearts of their parents towards them. And this, because no educa- tion tells so much, Godward or manward, as this education of the power of loving. Another point to be borne in mind is, that love grows, not by what it gets, but by what it gives. Therefore, the young people must not get out of the habit of rendering services of love. There is danger of confounding mere affection, a more or less animal emotion, showing itself in coaxing and fondling, in " Mother, darling," " Father, dear," and — no more, with love, which, however affectionate it be in word and gesture, does not rest in these, but must exhibit itself in service. The little children are demonstrative, ready to give and take caresses, " loving " in their ways ; but the boys and girls have, partly out of gaucherie, partly from a growing instinct of reticence, changed all that. They want at this awkward stage of life a great deal of tact and tender- ness at the hands of their parents, and the channels of service, friendliness, and obedience must be kept visibly open for the love which -^Ul no longer flow in endearments. Lect. VII.l SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TRAINING. 225 The Awkward Age. Indeed this, of the growing boy or girl, is not only an awkward, but a critical stage of life. For the first time, the young people are greatly occupied with the notion of their own rights : their duties are nowhere. Not what they owe, but what is due to them, it is, that oppresses their minds. " It's a shame," " It's not fair," " It's too bad," are muttered in secret, when no one ventures to murmur aloud, — and this, with aggravating unreasonableness, and a " one- sidedness " "which grown-up people can hardly understand. But this tiresome behaviour does not arise from any moral twist in the young people ; they really have more right than reason on their side: their claims might often be yielded, if there were none but themselves to consider. "What they want is, to have their eyes opened that they may see the rights of others as clearly as their own ; and their reason culti- vated, that they may have power to weigh the one against the other. This aggressiveness is not mere naughtiness. They must be met on their own ground. Care must be taken not to offend their exaggerated sense of justice as to all that affects themselves. They must get the immunities they can fairly claim ; and their parents must be at the trouble to convince them, with good humour, when they are clearly in the wrong. In the mean time the state of feeling must be dealt with which would lead a boy to say, " I shan't," if he dared. He must be reached through his affections: the very feelings .which make him offensive when centred upon himself, are beautiful and virtuous when they flow in the channels of justice and benevolence towards others. And this is a change not only possible, but easy and pleasant for parents to bring about. The feelings are there already ; the strong sense of justice ; and the love, which has become exaggerated self-love Q 226 ,■ HOME EDUCATION. [Lmc*. VII; only because the attention has been allowed to fix upon self and its claims to the exclusion of others. It rests with the parent to turn the attention from, self to other people, and the affections will flow in that direction to whichi the attention is turned. For instance, let the young people feel that the happiness of home is a trust which every member of it has in charge^; that the child who sits down to table with a sullen face, destroys for the time the happiness of his whole family, just as a hand's-breadth held close to the eyes . will shut out the whole light of the sun. What is it that makes the happiness of every day ; great treats, great successes, great delights ? No, but constant friendly looks and tones in those about us, their interest and help in our pursuits, their service and pity when we are in difSoulty and trouble. No home can be happy if a single member of it allow himself in ugly tempers and behaviour. By degrees, great sensitive^ ness to the moral atmosphere of the. home will be a<;quired ; the happiness of a single day will come to be regarded as a costly vase which any clumsy touch may overthrow. Now, the attention is taken off self and its claims, and fixed upon brother and sister, father and mother, servants and neighbours ; so slight a thing as a friendly look can add to the happiness of every one of these. Affection flows naturally towards those to whom we can give happiness. A boy who feels himself of little account in his family will give all his heart to his dog ; he is necessary to Puck's happiness at any rate ; and, as for the dog, — " I think it is wrong to let children have dogs. It spoils them for mankind," says the late Lord Lytton. Let the boy have his dog, but let him know, to how many others even a pleasant word from him gives happiness for the moment. Benevolence, the delight in giving happiness, is a stream which swells as it flows. The boy who finds he really can make a difference Lect. VII.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TRAINING. 227 to his home, is on the look-out for chances. A hint as to what father or sister would like is not thrown away. Considerate obliging behaviour is no hardship to him when he is not " bothered " into it, but produces it of his own free will. Like begets like. The kindliness he shows is returned to him, and, by him, returned again, full measure, pressed down, and running over. He looks, not on his own things, but on the things of others. His lore of justice shows in the demand of "fair play" for others now: he will not hear others spoken ill of in their absence, will not assign unworthy motives, or accuse another easily of unworthy conduct ; he is just to the conduct, the character, the reputation of others. He puts himself involuntarily in the place of the other, and judges as he would be judged. " Teach me to feel another's woe, To hide the faults I see ; That mercy I to others show, That mercy show to me," — is his unformed, unconscious prayer. His benevolence, again, his kindness, will reach, not only to the distresses of others, but will show itself in forbearance towards tiresome tempers, in magnanimity in the forgiveness of injuries. His habits of kind and friendly behaviour will, by degrees, develop into principles of action ; until, at last, his character is established, and he comes to be known as a just and virtuous man. Towards this great result, the parents can do little more than keep the channels open, and direct the streams ; draw the attention of their son to the needs and the claims of others, and point out to him from time to time the ways in which he holds the happiness of others in his hands. It is needless to say how a selfish or worldly maxim thrown in — " Take care of yourself," " Jjook after your own interests," " Give tit for tat,"— may obstruct the channel or choke the spring. Does, then, the whole of moral training 228 HOME EDUCATIOK. [Lect. VII. resolve itself into the culture of the affections ? Even so ; it is no new thing to us to learn that — " As every rainbow hue is light, So every grace is love." Home Training — Religious. With regard to the training of the young in the religious life, I am chiefly anxious to call your attention to the power and heauty of a holy youth. We are content, in this matter, with too low a standard for the children as for ourselves, looking for less than that which many a beautiful child attains in his degree — a life, " holy, harmless, undeflled, separate from sinners : " — " Who aimeth at a star. Shoots higher, far. Than he who means a tree." For the few practical hints I shall venture to offer, they are in this, as in other matters of education, only what thoughtful mothers already carry out. In the first place, " every word of God " is the food of the spiritual life ; and these words come to us most freely in the moments we set apart in which to recollect ourselves, read, say our prayers. Such moments in the lives of young people are apt to be furtive and hurried ; it is well to secure for them the necessary leisure — a quiet twenty minutes, say, — and that, eaily in the evening ; for the fag end of the day is not the best time for its most serious affairs. I have known happy results where it is the habit of the young people to retire for a little while, when their wits are fresh, and before the work or play of the evening has begun. Again, the Christian life should be a progressive life. The boy should not be allowed to feel himself like a door on its hinges, always swinging over the same ground. New and Lbct. VII.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TEAINING. 229 definite aims, thoiiglits, sTibjects of prayer, should be set before him week by weet, that " something attempted, some- thing done," may give him courage ; and that, suppose he is harassed by failure, he may try in. a new direction with new hope. Even those who do not belong to the Church of England would find her Sunday collects, epistles, and gospels helpful, as giving the young people something definite to think about, week by week. We can hardly hope in this life to grow up to all there is in those weekly portions, but the youngest Christian finds enough to go on with, and has the reposing sense of being led, step by step, in his heaven- ward progress. I am not suggesting this as a substitute for wider reading of the Bible, only as a definite thought, purpose, and prayer for every week as it comes, in addition to whatever other prayers general or special needs may call for. The bringing of the thought of the collect and its accompanying scriptures home will afford occasion for a few earnest words, week by week, not to be readily forgotten. And this in itself is a gain, for we all experience some difficulty in speaking of the best things to the people we live amongst, especially to the young people. Only one point more — a word as to the manner of keeping Sunday in the family. Do not let the young people feel themselves straitened by narrow . views : give them freely the broad principle that what is right on Saturday is right on Sunday — right, but not in all things convenient ; the Sunday- has pursuits of its own ; and we are no more willing to give up any part of it to the grind of the common business or the common pleasures of life, than the schoolboy is to give up a holiday to the grind of school-work. Even for selfish reasons of health and comfort, we cannot afford to give up the repose to body, mind, and spirit which we owe to the change of thought and occupations the day brings. Having made the principle of Sunday-keeping plain. 230 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VII. make the practice pleasant. Let it he a joyous day — every- body in "Ms best temper and gentlest manners. Put anxious cares aside on Sunday, for tlie children's sakes ; and if there be no " vain deluding mirth," let there be gaiety of heart and talk. Let the day be full of its own special interests and amusements. An hour's reading aloud, from Sunday to Si;inday, of a work of real power or interest, might add to the interest of Sunday afternoon ; and this family reading should supply a pleasant intellectual stimulus. A little poetry may well be got in ; there is time to digest it on Sunday; not only George Herbert, Vaughan, Keble, but any poet who feeds the heart with wise thoughts, and does not too much disturb the peace of the day with the stir of life and passion. The point in the Sunday readings arid occupations is, to keep the heart at peace and the mind alive and receptive, open to any holy impression which may come from above, it may be in the fields or by the fireside. It is not that we are to be seeking, making efforts all day long, in church and out of it. We may rest altogether, in body and spirit; on condition that we do not become en- grossed, that we keep ourselves open to the influences which fall in unexpected ways. This thought determines the choice of the Sunday story-book. Any pure, thoughtful study of character, earnest picture of life, will do to carry our thoughts upward, though tbe Divine Name be not mentioned ; but tales full of affairs and adventures, or tales of passion, are hardly to be chosen. It is unadvisable to put twaddling " goody-goody " story- books into the hands of the young people : a revulsion of taste will come, and then the weakness of this sort of litera- ture will be laid to the charge of religion. Music in the family is the greatest help towards making Sunday pleasant ; but here, again, it is, perhaps, well to avoid music which L]BCT. VII.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TRAINING. 231 carries associations of passioni and unrest. There can, how- ever, he little difficulty in making a suitable choice, when it is hardly too much tp say that the greatest works of the greatest masters are consecrated to the service of religion. " The liberal soul deviseth liberal things," is a safe rule once the principle is recognized, the purpose and meaning of the Sunday rest. I venture to enter so fully into this subject because the question of Sunday observances is one which comes up to be settled between the parents and every growing-up family. Home Cultwre — Books. Although any attempt at intellectual training must be abandoned by the parents when once their children have gone to school, intellectual culture is a different matter, and this the young people must get at home, or nowhere. By this sort of culture we mean, not so much the getting of knowledge, nor even getting the power to learn, but the cultivation of the power to appreciate, to enjoy, whatever is just, true, and beautiful in thought and expression. For instance, one man reads — ■ "... He lay along, Under an oak, whose antique root peeps out Upon the brook that brawls along this wood ; To the which place a poor sequester'd stag, That from the hunter's aim had ta'en a hurt. Did come to languish ; " — and gets no more out of it than the four facts of the reclining man, the oak, the brook, and the wounded stag. Another reads, and gets these and something over — a delicious mental image, and a sense of exquisite pleasure in the putting of the thought, the mere ordering of the words. N ow, the second has, other things being equal, a hundred-fold the means of happiness which the first enjo;^s ; he has a sixth sense, a new 232 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VIT. inlet of pleasure, -which adds enjoyment to every hour of his life. If people are to live in order to get rich, rather than to enjoy satisfaction in the living, they can do very well without intellectual culture ; hut if we are to make the most of life as the days go on, then it is a duty to put this power of getting enjoyment into the hands of the children. They must be educated up to it. Some children, by right of descent, take to books as ducks to the water ; but delight in a fine thought, well set, does not come by nature. More- over, it is not the sort of thing that the training of the schools commonly aims at ; to turn out men and women with enough exact knowledge for the occasions of life, and with wits on the alert for chances of promotion, that is what most schools pretend to, and, indeed, do accomplish. The con- tention of scholars is, that a classical education does more, turns out men with intellects cultivated and trained, awake to every refinement of thought, and ready for action. But the press and hurry of our times and the clamour for useful knowledge are driving classical culture out of the field ; and parents will have to make up their minds, not only that they must supplement the moral training of the school, but must supply the intellectual culture, without which knowledge may be power, but is not pleasure, nor the means of pleasure. There is little opportunity to give this culture to the boy taken up with his school and its interests ; the more reason, therefore, to make the most of the little : for when the boy leaves school, he is in a measure set — his thoughts will not readily run in new channels. The business of the parent is to keep open right-of-way to the pleasant places provided for the jaded brain. Pew things help more in this than a family habit of reading aloud. Even a dry book is readable when everybody listens, while a work of power and interest becomes delightful when eye meets eye at the telling bits* To read " The Newcomes " to yourself ' is like sitting down to a Lect. VII.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TEAINING. 233 solitary feast of strawberries and cream; every page has that in it ■which demands to be shared. There are few stronger family bonds than this habit of devoting an occasional hour to reading alond, on winter evenings, at any rate. The practice is pleasant at the time, and pleasant in the retrospect : giving occasion for much bright talk, merry and wise, and quickening family aifection by means of intellectual sympathy. Indeed, the wonder is that any family should neglect such a simple means of pure enjoyment, and of moral, as well as intellectual culture. But this, of reading aloud, is not a practice to be taken up and laid down at pleasure. Let the habit drop, and it is difficult to take it up again, because every one has, in the mean time, struck a vein of intellectual entertainment for himself — trashy stuff, it may be, — which makes him an unwilling listener to the family " book." No ; let an hour's reading aloud be a part of the winter " evening at home " — on one or two evenings a week, at any rate — and everybody will loot forward to it as a hungry boy looks for his dinner. The Art of Seading Aloud. If reading is to be pleasant to the listeners, the reading itself must be distinct, easy, and sympathetic. And here is something more which parents must do for their children themselves, for nobody else will get them into the habit of reading for the pleasure of other people from the moment when they can read fluently at all. After indistinct and careless enunciation, perhaps the two most trying faults in a reader are, the slowness which does not see what is coming next, and stumbles over the new clause, and the habit of gasping, like a fish out of water, several times in the course of a sentence. The last fault is easy of cure : " Never breathe through the lips, but always through the nostrils in reading," is 234 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VII. a safe rule : if %h.e lips be closed in tlie act of taking breath, enougli air is inhaled, to inflate the lungs, and supply " breath " to the reader ; if an undue supply is taken in by mouth and nostrils both, the inconvenience is caused which relieves itself in gasps. The stumbling reader spoils his book from sheer want of attention. He should train himself to look on, to be always a line in advance, so that he may be ready for what is comiag. Faults in euunciation should be dealt with one by one. For instance, one week, the reader takes pains to secure the " d " in " and ; " the other letters will take care of themselves, and the less they are heard, the better. Indeed, if the final consonants are secured, d, t, and ng, especially, the reading will be distinct and finished. Another advantage of the family lecture is, that it enables f arents to detect and correct provincialisms ; and however anxious we may be, on historical grounds, to preserve dialect, few people desire to preserve it in the persons of their own children. For the rest, practice makes perfect. Let every^ body take his night or his week for reading, with the certainty that the pleasure of the whole family depends on his reading well. The Booh for the Evening Lecture. To attempt a list of books suitable for the family lecture would be as hopeless as it is unnecessary ; but it is possible to discuss the principles on which the selection should, be made. In the first place, to get information is not the object of the family reading, but to make the young people ac- quainted with the flavour of, to give them a taste for a real " booh " — tbat is, roughly speaking, a work of so much literary merit, that it should be read and valued for the sake of ^that alone, whatever its subject-matter. This rule makes a clean sweep of the literature to be Lect. VII.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TRAINING. 235 found in nine houses out of ten — twaddling story-books, funny or " good ; " worthless novels ; second-rate writing, whether in works of history or of general literature ; compen- diums, abstracts, short sketches of great lives, useful infor- mation in whatever form. None of these should be admitted to the evening lecture, and, indeed, the less they are read at all, the better. A good encyclopedia is an invaluable store- house of facts, and should be made use of to elucidate every difficulty that occurs in general reading ; and information got in this way, at the moment it is wanted, is remembered : but it is a mistake to read for information only. Next, the book must be interesting ; amusing or pathetic, as may be, but not too profound : the young people have been grinding all day, and now they want relaxation. One is sorry for girls and boys who do not hear the Waverley novels read at home ; nothing afterwards can make up for the delight of growing up in the company of Peveril of the Peak, Meg Merrilies, Oldbuck, the Master of Eavenshoe, Caleb Balderstone, and the rest : and every page is a training in righteous living and gentlemanlike feeling. But novels are not the only resource ; well-written books of travel are always charming; and, better than anything, good biographies of interesting people : not any of the single-volume series of "Eminent" persons, but a big two-volume book that gives you time to become at home with your man. Important historical works had better be reserved for holiday reading, but historial and literary essays by men of letters afford very delightful reading. There is no hurry. The evening reading is not task work. It is not important that many books should be read ; but it is important that only good books should be read, and read with such ease and pleasant leisure that they become to the hearers so much mental property for life. The introduction to a great author should be made a 236 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. VII. matter of some ceremony. I clo not know whether a first introduction to Euskin, for instance, is the cause of such real emotion now as it was to intelligent young people of my generation ; but the " Crown of Wild Olives " still, prohably, marks a literary epoch for most young readers. One other point: it is hopeless and unnecessary to attempt to keep up with current literature. Hereafter, it may be necessary to make some struggle to keep abreast of the new books as they pour from the press; but let the leisure of youth be spent upon " standard " authors, that have lived through, at least, twenty years of praise and blame. Poetry as a Means of Culture. Poetry takes first rank as a means of intellectual culture. Some one says that we ought to see a good picture, hear good music, and read some good poetry every day ; and, certainly, a little poetry should form part of the evening lecture. " Collections " of poems are to be eschewed ; but some one poet should have at least a year to himself, that he may have time to do what is in him towards cultivating the seeing eye, the hearing ear, the generous heart. Scott, of course, here as before, opens the ball, if only for the chivalry, the youthful enthusiasm of his verse. Then there is always a stirring story in the poem, a recommenda- tion to the young reader, Cowper, who does not tell many stories, is read with pleasure by boys and girls almost as soon as they begin to care for Scott ; the careful, truthful word-painting of " The Task," unobscured by poetic fancies, appears to suit the matter-of-fact young mind. Then, it is pleasant to know poetry which there are frequent oppor- tunities of verifying : — " Now from the roost, or from the neigWring pale, Come trooping, at the housewife's well-known call. The feather'd tribes domestic : " — Leot. VII.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TRAINING. 237 ■who tliat has ever heen in the country has not seen that ? Goldsmith, and some others, take their places beside Cowper, to bo read or not, as occasion offers. It is doubtful if Milton, sublime as he is, is so serviceable for the culture of the "un- learned and ignorant " as are some less distinguished poets ; he gets out of reach, into regions of scholarship and fancy, where these fail to follow. Nevertheless, Milton must be duly read : the effort to follow his " high themes " is culture in itself. And yet " Christopher North " is right ; good music and fine poetry need not be understood to be enjoyed : — " Together both, ere the high lawns appear'd Under the opening eye-lida of the morn, We drove a-fleld, and both together heard What time the gray-fly winds her sultry horn, Battening our flocks with the fresh dews of night. Oft till the star, that rose at evening bright, Toward heaven's descent had sloped his westering wheel ; " — the youth who carries about with him such melodious cadence will not readily be taken with tinsel. The epithets of " Lycidas " alone are an education of the poetic sense. Many of us will feel that Wordsworth is the poet to read, and grow thereby. He, almost more than any other English poet of the century, has proved himself a power, and a power for good, making for whatever is true, pure, simple, teachable ; for what is super-sensuous, at any rate, if not spiritual. The adventures of Una and her tardy, finally victorious knight afford great food for the imagination, lofty teaching, and fine culture of the poetic sense. It is a misfortune to grow up without having read and dreamt over the " Faerie Queen." There is no space to glance at even the few poets, each of whom should have his share in the work of cultivating the min(J. After the ploughing and harrowing, the seed will be 238 HOME EDUCATION. [LectI VII. appropriated by a process of natural selection ; this poet will draw disciples here, that, elsewhere : but it is the part of parents to bring tKe minds of their children under the influence of the highest, purest poetic thought we have. As for Cole- ridge, Keats, Shelley, and others of the " lords of language," it may be well to let them wait this same process of selection. And Shakespeare ? He, indeed, is not to be classed, and timed, and treated as one amongst others, — he, who might well be the daily bread of the intellectual life ; Shakespeare is not to be studied in a year ; he is to be read continuously throughout life, from ten years old and onwards. But a child of ten cannot understand Shakespeare. No ; but can a man of fifty ? Is not our great poet rathei: an ample feast of which every one takeB according to his needs, and leaves what he has no stomach for ? A little girl of nine said to me the other day that she had only read one play of Shake- speare's through, and that was " A Midsummer Night's Dream." She did not understand the play, of course, but she must have found enough to amuse and interest her. How would it be to have a monthly reading of Shakespeare ■ — a play, to bo read in character, and continued for two. or three evenings until it is finished ? The Shakespeare evenings would come to be looked on as a family /esto; and the plaj's, read again and again, year after year, would yield more at each reading, and would leave behind in the end rich deposits of wisdom. It is unnecessary to say a word about the great contem- porary poets, Browning, Tennyson, and whoever else stands out from the crowd ; each will secure his own following of young disciples from amongst those who have had the poetic taste developed; and to develop this appreciative power,, rather than to direct its use, is the business of the parents. So much for the evening readings, which will in them- selves carry on the intellectual culture we have in view: Lect. Vn.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TEAINIXG. 23& given, the right book, family sympathy in the reading of it, and easy talk ahout it, and the rest will take care of itself. The evening readings should be entertaining, and not of a kind to demand severe mental efifort ; but the long holidays are too long for mere intellectual dawdling. Every Christmas and summer vacation should be marked by the family reading of some great work of literary renown, whether of history, or, purely, of helles lettres. The dailj' reading and discussion of one such work will give meaning and coherence to the history " grind " of the school, will keep up a state of mental activity, and will add zest to the general play and leisure of the holidays. Yet, be it confessed, that, in the matter of reading, this sort of spoon-feeding is not the best thing, after all. Far better would it be that the young people should seek out their own pastures, the parents doing no more than keep a judicious eye upon their rovings. But, the fact is, young people are so taken up with living, that, as a rule, they do not read nowadays : and it is possible that a course of spoon- meat may help them over an era of feeble digestive power, and put them in the way of finding their proper intellectual nourishment. Tahle-talh. The character of the family reading will affect that of the talk ; but, considering how little parents see of young people once entered on their school career, it is worth while to say a few words of the table-talk which affords parents their best opportunity of influencing the opinions of the young. Every one is agreed that animated table-talk is a condition of health. No one excuses the churlish temper which allows a member of a family to sit down absorbed in his own reflec- tions, and with hardly a word for his neighbours. But conver- sation at table is something more than a means of amusement 240 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. Vn. and refreshment. The career of many a young person has turned upon some chance remark made at the home table. Do hut watch the eagerness with which the young catch up every remark made by their elders on public affairs, books, men, and you will see they are really trying to construct a chart to steer by ; they want to know what to do, it is true, but they also want to know what to think about everything. Parents sometimes forget that it is their duty to give their children grounds for sound opinions upon many questions which concern us as human beings and as citizens ; and then they are scandalized when the young folk air audacious views picked up from some advanced light of their own age and standing. But they will have views : the right to have and to hold an opinion is one of those points on which the youth makes a stand. A few parents are unjust in this matter. It is not only the right, but the duty, of the growing intelligence to consider the facts that come before it, and to form con- clusions; and the assumption that parents have a right to think for their children, and pass on their own views un- modified upon literature and art, manners and morals, is exceedingly trying to the young ; the headstrong resent it openly, the easy-going avoid discussion, and take their own way. But, it is said, the young are in no condition to form sound opinions: they have neither the knowledge nor the experience which should guide them. That is true, and they know it, and hang on the lips of their elders for what may help them to adjust their views of life. Here is the oppor- tunity of parents : the young people will not take ready- made opinions, therefore suppress yours ; put the facts before them in the fairest, fullest light, and leave them to their own conclusions. The more you withhold your opinions, the more anxious they are to get at them. People are, for them, sharply divided into good and bad; actions are vicious o^ Leot. VII.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TRAINING. 241 virtuous ; events come as blessings or misfortunes. They have not arrived at the " years that hring the philosophic mind ; " they are inclined to be severe, and have no notion of a middle view. Now, this period in the life of a boy or girl, when he or she feelfi the necessity of having an opinion upon every subject under the sun, is a critical one — a turning-point, for better or worse, in the lives of many young people ; and, for this reason, they mil find somewhere the confidant who is to mould their opinions for them. Many a mother can put her finger on the moment when her boy or girl came under the influence of So-and-so, and took to giddy or godless courses. The culture of judgment in the crude mind of the youth is one of the most delicate tasks imposed on the parent. He must not be arbitrary, as we have seen. He must not be negligent. He must not be didactic ; the young cannot stand preaching. He should be liberal, gentle, just, inclined to take large kindly views, to praise rather than to blame, but un- compromising on questions of principle, quick to put his finger on the blot, ready to forgive, but not to excuse ; and, at the same time, ready to allow virtues to the man who exhibits one vice. This last is important ; the young, with their sharp demarcations, when they find themselves in his company, discover that the devil is not so black as he was painted, and, forthwith, conclude that he is a very good fellow, and that the bad things said of him are mere slanders. This is the natural history of half the ruinous companion- ships young people form. If, on the contrary, they come forth armed with this sort of opinion, — " So-and-so is a forward girl ; she is really honest and good-natured, but her lawless- ness makes her an undesirable companion," — the case is altered; the girl has had fair play; and no further drawings are felt towards her companionship. 242 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VII. Allowing that it rests with the parents to give their children grounds for sound opinions on men and movements, books and events, when are they to get opportunity for this sort of culture? Whenever they fall into talk with, or in the presence of, their children ; but especially at table — other opportunities come by chance, but this is to be relied on, I was once spending an evening in company with a wise and learned man, and had much delightful talk until he unfor- tunately said, " I jotted down so-and-so as a subject of conver- sation ; " that spoiled it : but, indeed, it is very well worth while for parents to lay themselves out for conversation with their children, and to store up from day to day a few subjects of general interest; only they must not reveal the "jotting down." If the parents come to table with preoccupied minds, th« young people either remain silent, or get the talk into their own hands ; in whieh case, it is either the " shop " of school and playground, or the " Who danced witli whom, and who is like to wed," of a more advanced age. This is the opportunity to keep the young people informed upon the topics of the day, — who has made a weighty speech ; who has written a book, what its merits and defects ; what wars and rumours of wars are there ; who has painted a good picture, and what the characteristics of his style. The Times newspaper and a good weekly or monthly review will furnish material for talk every day in the week. The father who opens the talk need not be afraid he will Lave to sustain a monologue ; indeed, he had better avoid prosing ; iand nothing is more delightful than the eager way the children toss the ball to and fro. They want to know the ins and outs of everything, recollect something which illus- trates the point, and inevitably comer the thing talked about for investigation— is it "right," or "wrong," "good," Lect. VII.] SCHOOI, DISCIPLINE AND HOME TRAINING. 243 or "iDad;" while the parents display their taot in leading their children to form jnst opinions withont laying down the law for them. The boys and girls are engaged with the past, both in their school work and their home reading, and any effort to bring them abreast of the times is gratifying to them ; and it has a vivifying effect on their studies. ^Esthetic Culture. In venturing to discuss the means of aesthetic culture, I feel that to formulate canons of taste is the same sort of thing as to draw up rules of conscience ; that is, to attempt to do for other people what every one must do for himself. It may be vicious to have a flower pattern on our carpet, and correct to have such a pattern on our curtains ; but, if so, the perception of the fact must be the result of growth under culture. If it come to us as an edict of fashion that we adorn our rooms with bulrushes and peacocks' feathers, that we use geometrical forms in decorative art, rather than natural forms conventionally treated, that we affect sage-green and terra-cotta,- — however good may be the effect of room or person, there is little taste displayed in either. For taste is the very flower, the most delicate expression of individual! t}'', in a person who has grown up amidst objects lovely and befitting, and has been exercised in the habit of discrimination. Here we get a hint as to what may and what may not be done by way of cultivating the aesthetic sense in young people. So far as possible, let their surroundings be brought together on a principle of natural selection, not at haphazard, and not in obedience to fashion. Bear in mind, and let them often hear discussed and see applied, the three or four general principles which fit all occasions of building, decorating, furnishing, dressing: the thing must be fit for its purpose ; must harmonize with 244 HOME EDUCATION, [Lect. VII. both the persons and the things about it ; and, these points considered, must be as lovely as may be in form, texture, and colour ; one point more — it is better to have too little than too much. The child who is accustomed to see a vase banished, a chintz chosen, on some such principles as these, involuntarily exercises discriminating power : feels the jiar of inharmonious colouring, rejects a bed-room water-jug all angles, for one with flowing curves, and knows what he is about. It may not be possible to surround him with objects of art, nor is it necessary : but, certainly, he need not live amongst ugly and discordant objects ; for a blank is always better than the wrong thing.* It is a pity that, in pictures and music, we are inclined to form " collections," just as in poetry. Let us eschew collections. Every painter, every composer, worth the name, has a few master ideas, which he works out, not in, a single piece, but here a little and there a little, in a series of studies. If we accept the work of the artist as a mere external decoration, why, a little of one and a little of another does very well; but if we accept the man as a teacher who is to have a refining, elevating effect upon our coarser nature^ we must study his lessons in sequence so far as we have opportunity. A house with one or two engravings from Turner in one room, from Landseer in another, from "Wilkie's pictures in a third, would be a real school of art for the child : he would have some little opportunity of studying, line byline, three masters at least, of comparing their styles, getting their characteristics by heart, perceiving * " NotMng can be a work of art which is not useful, that is to say, which does not minister to the body when well under the command of the mind, or which does not amuse, soothe, or elevate the mind in a healthy state. What tons upon tons of unutterable rubbish, pretending to be works of art in some degree, would this maxim clear out of our London houses." — William Mobeis. Lect. Vn.] SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AND HOME TEAINING. 245 what they mean to say by their pictures, and how they express their meaning. And here is a sound foundation for art-education, w'hioh should perhaps, for most of us, consist rather in drawing out the power to appreciate than the power to produce. At the same time, give the young one or two good water-colour sketches to grow upon, to show them what to see in landscape. It is not, however, always possihle to choose pictures according to any such plan ; hut in default of more, it is something to get so thoroughly acquainted with even a good engraving of any one picture that the image of it retained by the brain is almost as distinct as the picture itself. All that the parents can do is to secure that the picture be looked at; the refining influence, the art-culture, goes on inde- pendently of effort from without. The important thing is, not to vitiate the boy's taste ; better to have a single work of art in the house upon which his ideas form themselves than to have "^very wall covered with daubs. That the young people must commonly wait for opportunities afforded by picture-galleries to learn how the brush can catch the very spirit and meaning of nature, is not so great a loss as it would seem at first sight. The study of landiscape should, perhaps, prepare them for that of pictures : no one can appre- ciate the moist solid freshness of the newly ploughed earth in Eosa Bonheur's pictures who has not himself been struck by the look of the clods just turned up by the plough. But, on the other hand, what is to be said to this, from " Fra Lippo Lippi " ? — " Don't you mark, ■we're made so that we love First when we see them painted, things we have passed Perhaps a hundred times, nor cared to see : And so they are better painted — better to us, Which is the same thing. Art was given for that — God uses us to help each other so, 246 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. VII. Lending our minds out. Have you noticed now Your cullion's hanging face 1 A bit of chalk, And, trust me, but you should though. How much more If I drew higher things with the same truth! That were to take the prior's pulpit-place — Interpret God to all of you 1 " Pictures or landscape, all the parents can do is to put their children in the way of seeing, and, by a suggestive word, get them to look. The eye is trained by seeing, but also by instruction ; and I need hardly call your attention to Mr. Euskin's " Modern Painters," as the book which makes art-education possible to outsiders. If culture flows in through the eye, how much more through the ear, the organ of that blessed sixth sense which appears to be distributed amongst us with partial favour. A great deal of time and a good deal of money is commonly spent to secure to the young people the power of performing indifferently upon an instrument; nor is even an indifferent performance to be despised : but it is not always borne in mind that to listen with discriminating delight is as educa- tive and as " happy-making " as to produce ; and that this power might, probably, be developed in everybody, if only as much pains were spent in the cultivation of the musical sense as upon that of the musical faculty. Let the young people hear good music as often as possible, and that, under instruction. It is a pity we like our music, as our pictures and our poetry, mixed, so that there are few opportunities of going through, as a listener, a course of the works of a single composer. But this is to be aimed at for the young people ; let them study as far as possible under one master until they have received some of his teaching and know his style. THE TEAINING OF THE YOUNG MAIDENS AT HOME. LECTURE Vm. YOUNG- MAIDENHOOD— THE FOEMATION OP CHAEAOTER AND OPINIONS. " For life in general there is but one decree. Youth is a blunder." — Disraeli.- The idea of staj'ing at home " for good " is delightful to the schoolgirl, and her parents look forward with equal pleasure to having their daughter about them in her bright fresh youth. If the young girl be docile and gentle, and ready to fall into the relation of pupil-friend to her parents, and if they be wise and kind enough to put themselves in the place of their daughter, and realize how much teaching and counsel she still requires of them, the relation is a very sweet one. If, on the other hand, the parents are content to let their young daughter shake down into her place with the notion that all they have to do now is to give her a fair share of whatever " home " offers, the relation is found embarrassing, both by the girl and her parents. Her maiden sweetness notwithstanding, the parents are disappointed to find their daughter so little formed. She is not an interesting companion at present, poor child ! Her talk is full of " oh's," " well's," "you know's." She has many unreasoning enthusiasms and aversions, and these are her opinions, such 250 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. VIII. as they are. She has brought some little knowledge out of the school-room, but this appears to do little towards giving her soundness of judgment. Her affections are as lawless as her opinions : all the emotional sentiment in her is bestowed on some outsider, girl or woman friend, most likely, while the people who have claims on her are overlooked royally. So of her moral sense : duties she acknowledges, and will move heaven and earth to fulfil them — overstrained loyalty to a friend, excessive religious observances, perhaps ; while she is comically blind to duty as her elders see it ; has small scruples about dis- obedience, evasions, even deliberate fibs. She could do great things in a great cause, so she thinks, but the trivial round, the common task, afford, her occasions of stumbling. She likes to talk about herself — what she feels, thinks, purposes, and her talk is pathetic, as showing how far she is in the dark as to the nature of the self about which her thoughts are playing curiously. And this is a thoroughly nice girl, a girl who will make something of herself at last, even if left to her own devices, but whom a little friendly help may save from much blundering and sadness. There are girls of another pattern, who have no enthu- siasms-bother than a new dress excites ; who do not " gush," have no exaggerated notions of duty or affection, but look upon the world as a place wherein they are to Jiave and to get, but not, save under compulsion, to do, to hear, and to give : these three, which make up the ideal of a noble life, have no part in their thoughts. Girls of this sort are easier to get on with than the others, because they have marked out a line for themselves, and know what they are about ; but there is no principle of growth in such natures. Then, there are maidens so sweet that, like the lilies of the field, they seem in need of no human culture. But the average nice girl, who leaves school with her education Lbct. Vni.] MAIDENHOOD, 251 " finislied," so she thinks, and is yet in a crude, unformed state, what is to be done with her ? The very insufficiency of her young daughter appeals as strongly to the mother as does the helplessness of her infant. The schools have not finished, but begun the education of the girl, and now she has come home to be taught how to make the best of herself, and how she is to succeed in life, — for that is the problem before her. The girl who has been brought up at home, under her mother's eye, is, in this respect, in very much the same case as the schoolgirl ; she, too, has yet to learn to live. Eich or poor, married or single, it is not upon these that the success of a woman's life depends. Many a rich woman, whose children run over her, whose husband slights her, knows sorrowfully that she has made a failure of life : while many a poor woman is a queen in her own house, or is " made much of " in a house that is not hers. The woman who has herself well in hand, who thinks her own thoughts, reserves her judgments, considers her speech, controls her actions, she is the woman who succeeds in life, with a success to be measured by her powers of heart, brain, and soul. Culture of Character. (a) By Instruction. — A woman's success in life depends on what force of character is in her ; and character is to be got, like any other power, by dint of precept and practice : therefore, show the girl what she is, what she is not, how she is to become what she is not, and give her free scope to act and think for herself. What she is, is an exceedingly interesting study to the young girl, and open discussion on this subject helps her out of foolish and morbid feeling. She is full of vague self-consciousness, watching curiously the thoughts and emotions within her — an extraordinary spectacle to her inexperienced mind, leading her to the secret convic- 252 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. \tU. tion that she is some great one, or, at any rate, is peculiar, different from the people about her. Hence arises much mau- vaise Jionte, shyness, awkwardness ; she feels herself the ugly duckling, unappreciated by the waddling ducks about her. She is clumsy enough at present, and is ready to own it ; but wait a bit, until the full-grown swan appear, and then they will see ! Now, this stage of self-consciousness, and ignorant much-doubting self-exaltation, this " awkward age," as people call it, is common to all thoughtful girls who have the wit to perceive that there is more in them than meets the eye, but have not begun to concern themselves about what may or may not be in other people. It is a moral complaint, in which the girl requires treatment and tender nursing — only of a moral kind^as truly as she did when she had measles. If left to herself, she may become captious, morbid, hysterical ; the years in which the foundations of sound character should be laid are wasted; and many a peevish, ' jealous, exacting woman owes the shipwreck of her life to the fact that nobody in her youth taught her to think reasonably of herself and of other people. It is only a few who founder ; many girls are graciously saved : but this does not make it the less imperative on the mother to see her child safely through the troublous days of her early youth. The best physio for the girl is a course of moral and mental science ; not necessarily a profound course, but just enough to let her see where she is : that her noble dream of doing something great or good bj'-and-by — for which achieveniept she is ready to claim credit beforehand —is shared, in one form or other, by every human being; for that the desire of power, the desire of goodness, are common to us all : that the generous impulse, which makes her stand up for her absent friend, and say fierce things in her behalf, is no cause Leot. viii.] maidenhood. 253 for elation and a sense of superior virtue, for it is but a movement of those affections of benevolence and justice which are implanted in every human breast. By the time the girl has discovered how much of her is common to all the world, she will be prepared to look with less admiring wonder at her secret self, and with more respect upon other people. For it is not that she has been guilty of foolish pride : she has simply been filled with honest and puzzled wonder at the fine things she has discovered in human nature as seen in herself. All her fault has been the pardonable mistake of thinking herself an exceptional person ; for how is it possible that the people about her should have so much in them and so little come of it ? Let her know that she is quite right about herself — that she has within her the possibilities she dreams of, and more ; but, that, so have others, and that, upon what she makes of herself, not upon what is in her, judgment will be passed. It is true that a life of stirring action and great respon- sibility is the readiest means of developing character — better or worse : but not one woman in a thousand leads such a life ; and then, not until she has reached maturity. Put into the hands of the girl the means of doing for herself what only exceptional circumstances will do for her ; teach her, that is, the principles and methods of seZ/-culture, seeing that you cannot undertake to provide for her the culture of circum- stances. To point out these principles and methods in detail would be to go over the ground we have attempted to cover in the former lectures. By the time the girl has some in- sight into the nature of those appetites, affections, emotions, desires, which are the springs of human action; into the extraordinary power of habit, which, though acquired by us, and not born in us, has more compelling force than any or all of the inborn principles of action; into the imperious character of the will, which rules the man, and yet is to be 251 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VIII. ruled and trained by the man; into the functions of con- science, and into the conditions of the spiritual life, — by the time she has some practical, if only fragmentary notions on these great subjects, she may be led to consider her own nature and disposition with profit. So far from encouraging the habit of morbid introspection, such a practical dealing with herself is the very best cure for it. She no longer compares herself with herself, and judges herself by herself; but, knowing what are the endowments and what the risks proper to human nature, she is able to think soberly of, and to deal prudently with herself, and is in a position to value the counsels of her mother. (6) By Training in Practical Affairs. — These counsels come to her aid in the small practical affairs of life, as telling her, not what she must do, but the principles on which she should act. Thus ; — she goes to the draper's ; looks at this stuff, at that, at the other; now she will have this, now the other ; no, neither will do : and at last, she turns to her mother in despair, and says, " You choose." That will not do : that is, by so much, a failure in life. Her mother takes her to task. .Before she goes "shopping," she must use her reason, and that rapidly, to lay down the principles on which she is to choose her dress,^it is to be pretty, becoming, suitable for the occasions on which it is to be worn, in harmony with what else is worn with it. Now, she goes to the shop ; is able to describe definitely what she wants ; to say " No," instantly to the wrong thing, " Yes," to the right ; judgment is prompt to decide upon the grounds already laid down by reason : and, what is more, the will steps in'to make the decision final, not allowing so much as a twinge of after-regret for that " sweet thing " which she did not buy. Tor the sake of cultivating decision of character, even a leap in the dark like that of Sydney Smith's little maid, Bunch, when she . chose, quick as thought, between Lect.. VIII.] MAIDENHOOD. 255 venison and wild duck, having never tasted either, is to be preferred to the endless dilly-dallying, deliberation, taking of advice here and there, in which the lives of some women are passed — to the trial of their friends. Again, she is given to dawdling : a letter, some slight household task, " lasts out ; " an hour is spent on what should be done in fifteen minutes. Want of attention is, probably, the failing her mother comes down upon. Manj^ a mother of energetic character brings up for herself a dawdling daughter, for this reason — the mother is so " managing," so ready to settle the employments and amusements of every- body about her, that th« girl's only chance of getting a few minutes at her own disposal is to dawdle ; and this leads to small deceptions, furtive readings of story-books, any of the subterfuges of the weak in dealing with the strong. The mother's task in dealing with her growing daughter is one of extreme delicacy. It is only as her daughter's ally and confidante she can be of use to her now. She will keep herself in the background, declining to take the task of self- direction out of her daughter's hands. She will watch for opportunities to give word or look of encouragement to every growing grace. She will deal with failings with a gentle hand, remembering that even failures in veracity or integrity, distressing as they are, arise usually from the verj"- moral weakness which she is setting herself to strengthen. On discovering such fault, the mother will not cover her daughter with shame; the distress she feels, she will show, but so that the girl perceives her mother is sharing her sorrow, and sorrowing for her sake. What is the root of the error? No due sense of the sanctity of truth, an undue fear of oonse^ quences, chiefly of loss of esteem. The girl is betrayed into, a deliberate lie : she has not, she says, written such and such a letter, said such and such words ; — you knowing, all the time, that she has done this thing. Deal gently with her : 256 HOME EDUCATION. [Lbot. VIII. slie is no longer a child to be punished or "disgraced" at her parents'' pleasure; it is before her own conscience she must stand or fall now. But do not let her alone with the hopeless sense that there is no more to be done for her. Ee- member that conscience and intellect are still immature, that will is feeble. Give her simple sincere teaching in the nature of truth. Let her know what truth is — the simple statement of facts as they are: that all our spoken words deal with facts, and that, therefore, the obligation of truth is laid upon them all. We should never open our lips with- out speaking the truth. That even a jest which misleads another is a lie. That perfect truthfulness, in thought, speech, and act, is an obligation laid upon us by God. That the duty is binding, not only with regard to our frietids, but towards every one with whom we hold speech. . The Christian mother will add deeper teaching about the Truth from Whom all truth proceeds. She will caution her daughter as to the need of self-recoUectedness in speech. She says she is " quite well, thank you," when she has a head- ache ; that she " will be done in a minute," when the minute means half an hour: these departures from fact slip out without thought — therefore, think first, and speak after. But such trifles surely do not matter ? if so, who may cast a stone ? Most of us might mend our ways in this matter ; but every guard sbe can place upon herself is of real value to the girl with an inadequate sense of truth, as a means of training herself in the truthful habits which go to form a truthful character. Then, train her by trusting her. Believe her always; give her opportunities to condemn herself in speaking the truth, and her courage will answer the demand upon it. A bare enumeration of the duties which truthfulness comprehends, of the vices which are different forms of lying, is helpful and instructive. The heart rises and resolves upon 'Leot. VIII.] . MAIDENHOOD. 'S'S? the mere heanng iha,t veracity is that truthfulness in common talk which is careful to state the least important fact as it is ; that simplicity tells its tale without regard to self, without any thought of showing self to advantage in the telling ; that sincerity tells the whole truth purely, however much it might be to the speaker's advantage to keep any part back) that frankness is the habit of ' speaking of our own aifairs openly and freely^^a duty we owe to the people we live amongst; thsit fidelity, the keeping of our trusts, in great things and small, belongs to the truthful character. Liberty and Bes^onsihiUty. " With household motions light and free, And steps of virgin liberty,"— says Wordsworth of the girl who was to become that " perfect woman." Now, it sometimes happens that the mothers who take most pains to make their daughters deft and capable in " household motions," forget the " steps of virgin liberty." If the girl is to become a free woman with the courage of her opinions, she must grow up to the habit of liberty— not licence, but liberty, for the use of which she is open to be called to account. Let her distribute her time as she'likesj but count her tale of bricks ; let her choose books for her own reading,"but know what she chooses ; let her choose her own companions, but put before her the principles on which to choose, and the home duties which should prevent their having too much of her time; Let her have the spending of money, — first, a small albwahce out of which certain necessary expenses must come, as well as spendings for her pleasure, and a reserve for. gifts and alms ; and, as soon as she can be trusted with it, an allowance large enough to dress herself out of, —that she may learn prudence by doing without necessaries when she wastes on fancies. One reason why sh&- should 258 HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. VIII. have the "spending of her own allowance is,' that she may learn early the delight and the cost of giving, and may grow up in the habit of appropriating a fixed part of her little income to the help of the needy. The care of her own health is another responsibility which should be made over to the young maiden. She cannot learn too soon that good health is not only a blessing, but a duty ; that we may all take means to secure more or less vigorous health, and that we are criminal in so far as we fail to make use of these means. Any little book on the laws of health will put her in possession of the few simple principles of hygiene: — the daily bath, attended with much friction of the skin ; regular and sufficient exercise in the open air ; the vigorous use of all the limbs ; exercise of moderation in diet and in sleep j the free admission of fresh air to the bed^room ; the due airing of the under-clothing taken off at night ; the necessity for active habits, for regular and hard, but not eScessive brain- work ; the resolute repression of ugly tempers and unbecoming thoughts, — all of these are con- ditions of a sound mind in a sound body. And for keeping ourselves in this delightful state of fexistence we are all more or less responsible. The girl who eats too much, or eats what does not suit her, and is laid up with a bilious attack ; the girl who sits for hours poring over a novel, to the damage of her eyes, her brain, and her general nervous system, is guilty of a lesser fault of the nature of Suicide. We are all apt, especially in youth, to overlook our accountability in the matter of health, and to think we may do what we like with our own ; but, indeed, no offences are more inevitably and severely punished by the action of tiatnral law than the neglect of the common principles of hygiene. " Thine own friend and thy father's friend forsake fact." The responsibility of keeping up courteous and kindly Leot. VIII.] MAIDENHOOD. 259 relations by letter, call, or little attentions, with near and distant neighbours and friends is wholesome for the young people, and is a training in that general kindliness of spirit which the ardour of their particular affections sometimes causes them to fail in. Conduct. T^hBconduct of a well brought-upgirl — that is, her behaviour in various circumstances — will, on the whole, take care of itself. But in this, as in greater matters, — " More harm is -wrouglit through want of thought, Than e'er through want of heart ; " and the mother will find opportunities to bring before her daughter the necessity for circumspection, relicenoe, self- control, the duty of consideration for others. Conduct at home is regulated by such plain principles of duty that we need do no more than say a word as to the proprieties of life which should be kept up in the home circle as in any other society : behaviour which would be unbecoming in any drawing-room is unbecoming in that of home. In the street, the concert-room, the shop, in whatever public places she frequents, the young maiden has a distinct role, and must give a little study to her part. It will not do for her to go through the world with open mouth, wide-gazing eyes, head turned to this side and that, heedless tongue, like a child at a fair. But should not the girl behave naturally in public as in private ? Alas ! the fact is, that none of us, not even the little children, can afford to behave quite naturally, except in so far as use has become second nature to us in the acquired art of conducting ourselves becomingly. Noblesse oblige : maidenly dignity requires the modest eye, the quiet, retiring mien, subdued tones, reticence in regard to emotions of wonder, pleasure, interest, the expression of which might 266 HOME EDUCAtlON. [LtCT. Vlir. make the yoiing girl a spectacle in the public streets — that is, might cause a passer-by to look at her a second time. For, excepting the children, there is nothing so interesting to be seen in public places as the. young maidens apptbaehing womatihood. They cannot fail to attract attention, but they owe it to themselves not to lay themselves open to this atten- tion. One claim, however, the public, in the shape of the casual passer-by, certainly has j he has a right to a gentle, not repellent, if retiring, expression of countenance, and to courtesy, even deference, of tone and manner in any chance encounter ; and this, even more if he be in the garb of a working man than if in that of a gentleman. It is worth while to bear in mind the " Madam, respect the burden," with which Napoleon Bonaparte moved out of the path of a char- coal carrier. This propriety of behaviour is mincing affec- tation if it be no more than a manner put on with the girl's out-of-door garments : it must be the outcome of what her mother has brought her up to think that she owes to herself and to other people ; and from few btit her mother can a girl acquire this mark of a gentlewoman. How to conduct herself in society is a question of enor- mous interest to the maiden making her debut. The subject is so large as to have called forth a literature of its own ; but the principle lies in a nutshell. In society, as in the streets and public places, the girl whose mother has caused her to comprehend the respect due to herself, and the respect duo to other people, will not make any grave faux pas. She goes into a room persuaded that she has claims upon the respect and consideration of whoever she may meet there ; and she moves with ease, talks with quiet confidence, pos- sesses herself in repose of manner. She is persuaded .that her rights in this respect are not a matter of successful rivalry, but that each person in the room has equal claims Lect. Yin.] MAIDENHOOD. 261 upon ier courtesy and upon that of every other ; and that her entertainers for the time being are entitled to peculiar deference. She will preserve self-possession and self-respect in intercourse with those who are socially her superiors, and will behave with deference to her inferiors. So of her intercourse with gentlemen : due self-respect and due respect for them will cause her to conduct herself with the simpli- city, courtesy, and ease which she shows in her intercourse with women. In fact, these two principles will carry her with dignity and grace through all social occasions and in all social relations. And how is the mother to enhance her daughter's self- respect? Is she to tell her, never so indirectly, that she is clever, pretty, charming, that no one can fail to admire her ? If she do, her daughter may, not impossibly, become a forward young woman. No ; she must put forward none but common claims. Because she is a woman, because she is a lady, because she is a guest, a fellow-guest, because she is a stranger, or because she is a friend — these, and such as these, are incon- testable claims upon the courteous attention of every person she meets in society. One quietly confident in such claims as these seldom experiences a rebuff. Whatever she may receive or give, over and above, on the score oi personal merit, settles itself; but the thing to be established in a girl's mind is a due sense of the claims she has and of the claims she must yield. Pleasure and Duty. We come now to consider a perplexing question which comes up for settlement upon the closeof a girl's school career. Two rival claimants upon her time and interest are in the field — pleasure and duty; the question is, what is to be allowed to each, and how far may they clash. Kindhearted parents who find that their daughter is continually wanted for picnic or tennis, ball or concert, for morning lounge or evening 262- HOME EDUCATION. [Lect. VIII.: party, withdraw the claims of duty, and leave the field to giddy pleasure. They say, " Poor child, she will never have a second youth. Every dog must have its day. We have been young ourselves; let her have a ' good time' and 'enjoy her- self while she can.' If we hold her hack from taking her pleasure, she will only crave for it the more ; let her have a stirfeit — she will settle down the more readily to a quiet life afterwards," and so on. But before they launch their daughter — " Youth at the prow, and Pleasure at the helm,'' it behoves parents to look into the matter. In the first place, the result, the gain, of the girl's whole education hitherto 'is at stake. She might as well have been allowed to play ever since she was born as to play uninterruptedly now. For the gain of her education is not the amount of geography, science, and Trench that she knows ; she will forget these soon enough unless well-trodden tracks be kept up to the brain-growth marking these acquirements. But the solid gain education has brought her lies in the powers and habits of attention, persistent effort, intellectual and moral endea- vour, it has educed. Now, habits which are allowed to fall into disuse are all the same as though they had never been formed; powers not exercised grow feeble and are lost. The ground which has been gained in half a dozen years may be lost in a single one. And here we have the reason why many girls who have received what is called a good educa- tion read nothing weightier than a novel, are not intelligent companions, and show little power of moral effort. As for settling down by-and-by, that is not the question : if she is to recover the ground lost, she must begin all over again, and at an age when it is far more difficult to acquire habits and develop powers than in childhood. Again, the taste for parties of pleasure, for what may be called organized Lect. VIIL] - MAIDENHOOD, 263- amusement, is an ever-growing taste, and dislodges tlie haibit of taking pleasure in the evening reading, the fireside games with the children, the home music, the chat with friendly neighbours, the thousand delights that home should afford. For— " Pleasure is spread througli the earth In stray gifts, to be claim'd by whoever shall find." And not the least evil of incessant party-going and pleasure- seeking is, that it blinds people to the nature and conditions of pleasure : pure and true pleasure is of impromptu occur- rence, a stray gift, to be found, not sought ; it is just a thing to happen upon by the way. What, then, of those parents who take the opposite line, — ordain that their daughters shall stay at home and help their mothers ? They did not run after pleasure, and neither shall their girls ; they had home duties to attend to when they were young, and so shall their daughters, for " no good comes of gadding about." Well, to turn the tables, it is well these should remember that you cannot put an old head on young shoulders ; that young things will frolic, whether they be kittens or lambs or maidens; that what becomes deliberate pleasure-seeking in older people, comes to the girls as — " Stray gifts to be claimed by whoever shall find ; " that parties of pleasure are delightful just because they give the girls opportunities of meeting their kind, other young people, in whom they rejoice, " as 'tis their nature to." Prospero was not sufficient for Miranda. Birds of a feather flock together, and, the young to the young. The thing, then, is, to draw the line wisely. Either ex- treme is mischievous. The girl must have definite duties on which pleasure schemes are rarely allowed to encroach — a rule, for going out once, twice, a week ?— certain evenings 264 HOjaE EDUCATION. [Lect. yiii, xeserved for hoine pleasures, the raorningsforr regular occupa- tions and duties, and, so far as the unfortunate habits of society allow, eyening amusements avoided which sppil, the following morning. But to suggest rules on this subject •would be presumptuous : every mother ordains for her.own daughters, remembering how— '' All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy ; AU play and no work makes Jack a mere toy," ■Opinions. Let us turn to a question too often overlooked in the bringing up of girls. A girl may have opinions upon questions of figure and style, fashion and furniture, but who cares what she, thinks about public men and questions, books and events ? All the same, what she thinks is of con- sequence to the world ; even if she is not to be the mother of future fathers and mothers, she will make her mark somehow. , , , The young maiden shoiild have a general and a special preparation towards the forming of just opinions. I'or, the first, she ghoiald be made to use her common sense upon the questions that occur. "What do you think of so-and-so ? " says the mother, making a little wholesome fun if her thinkings be foolish. But the special preparation requires more thought. What are the :subjects upon which thinking persons generally must have opinions? It- is upon these the girl should be qualified to judge,, • - In the first place, her success in life will depend greatly upon the relations with other, people into which she lets, her- self be drawn; She must have some knowledge of character, Jiutnan motives ; and, therefore, as much as for the sake of her own development, every girl ought to, go through some easy course of moral philosophy. We know how easily a girl. is Lect. VIII.] MAIDENHOOD. 265 carried away by plausible ways of putting things, until she may find herself bound to a worthless friend or unworthy lover. And what is the poor girl to do if she have nothing to oppose to — " Oh, everybody thinks so now ! " " That's a mere old-world grandmother's notion of propriety; " "A man's first duty is tojook after himself, and it stands to reason that if everybody does that, nobody need trouble himself about other people." Again, women should know something of the principles of political economy. How many ladies are ready to decide oflf-hand that " it would be good for trade if an earthquake shook down all the houses in London ; " that, " if all the land- owners in England excused their tenants paying rent, bread would be cheaper; " or, that " the wealth of England would have been increased if the country had contained gold mines, instead of our iron and coal ; " in fact, to fall into any one of the little traps which Mrs. Pawcett sets for the unwary, in her " Political Economy for Beginners," — which is, by the way, an interesting little work, and the girl who studies it with thoughtful attention will be in a position to form sensible opinions on some of those questions of the day which come up to be dealt with, not as matters of opinion, but as causes, powerful to set class against class. It would be for the welfare of the country if educated women iiad just ideas on subjects of this nature, not only that they should share the interests of husbands and brothers, but in order that they should see, and keep before the gentlemen of their families, the other side of questions which the press of affairs would incline the latter to look at from a personal standpoint. Possibly, a mission is devolving upon educated women. A mediator is wanted between labour and capital, not only to persuade the master to endure in gentleness, but to open the eyes of the men to the difficulties and responsibilities of the masters; and this mediator, the lady, with her tact. 266 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VHI, sympathy, and quick intuitions, is fitted to teoome, if she ■will take pains to get the necessary knowledge. Not that she need step out of her proper sphere to meddle with public matters ; only that she should qualify herself to speak an understanding and kindly word on these subjects, to the wife, if not to the husband, in her cottage visitiaga. A single sentence, showing a mastery of the subject in question, spoken in one cottage, may go far to turn the tide of feeling in a whole community of work-people. Women have been clamorous for their rights, and men have, on the whole, been generous and gentle in meeting their demands. So much has been granted, that we have no right to claim immunities which belong to the seclusion of the harem. We are not free to say, " Oh, these things are beyond me ; I leave such questions to the gentlemen." It is not impossible that, in the course of Providence, women have of late been brought so much to the front, that they may be in a condition to play the part of mediators in these times of dangerous alienation between class and class. That we are in the early stages of a revolution, is patent to thinking persons ; and whether this revolution is to be bloodless, un- marked by the horrors which have attended others we know of, rests, more than they think for^ with the women of Eng- land. It is time for them, at any rate, to away with the frivolous temper which " cares for none of these things." Nor is a social revolution the only one pending : there is a horror of great darkness abroad ; Christianity is on its trial ; and, more than that, the most elementary belief in, and worship of. Almighty God. The judgment to come, the Resurrection of the body, the life everlasting,— these funda- mental articles of a Christian's faith have come to be pooh- poohed in influential circles; and this, not amongst profane persons and ungodly livers — far otherwise. And how are the young girls to be prepared to meet this Leot. VIII.] MAIDENHOOD. 267- religious crisis ? In the first place, it is unwise to keep tliem in the dark as to the anxioiis questions stirring. Their zeal and love will be quickened by the knowledge that once again Christianity and infidelity are in the way to be brought into agonizing conflict at our doors. But let their zeal be according to knowledge. Lay the fijundations of their faith. It matters less that the lines between Church and Dissent, or between High and Low and Broad Church, be well defined, than that they should know fully in Whom they have believed, and what are the grounds of their belief. Put earnest, intellectual works into their hands. Let them feel the necessity of bracing up every power of mind they have to gain comprehension of the breadth and the depth of the truths they are called to believe. Let them not grow up with the notion that Christian literature consists of emotional appeals, but that intellect, mind, is on the other side. Supply them with books of calibre to give the intellect something to grapple with — an important consideration, for the danger is, that young people, in whom the spiritual life is not yet awakened, should feel themselves superior to the vaunted simplicity of Christianity. One more point : let them not run away with the fallacy that no one is responsible for what he believes, but only for what he does. Try this principle for a moment by applying it to our social relations — say, that no man is bound to believe in the fidelity of his wife, in the dutifulness of his child, in the common integrity of the people he has dealings with — and the whole framework of society is broken up. For, indeed, our whole system, commercial and social, is nothing else than a system of credit, kept up by ther unbounded faith man reposes in man. That every now and then there is hue and cry after a defaulter, is only one way of proving how true are men in general to the trusts reposed in them. Does a countryman hide away his sovereigns in an old stocking 268 HOME EDUCATION. [Ljici, VIII. because he puts -no faith in, banks? He is laughed at as a inis,er,. Will he have nothing to do with his neighbours- because he is mistrustful of them ? He is a mieanthro^pe, onlj fit, to live by himself. And, if the man who does not place due and necessary faith in his fellows, however jnuoh his trust have been abused, is an outcast, what is to be said of him who lifts up his face to Almighty God, his Maker, Father, Breserver, Eedeemer, pole intimate JPriend, and ever- present Judge, and says, "I do not believe, because I can neither see nor understand " ? I am not going out of my way to speak strongly as to the iiecessity of taking a firm stand here. For the sake of the children yet to be bom, let the girls be brought up in abhorrence and dread of this black offence of unbelief. On points not vital, let them think gently and tolerantly, having a firm grasp of the truth as they hold it themselves, but leaving others to choose their ways of approach and service. But on questions that trench on the being, nature, and work of Almighty God, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and our relatiqns of love and service, to wards Him, there is no room for toleration of adverse opinions. As- for proofs, this is no question for proof. Evety pulse that beats in the universe is, if we will have it so, a witness fpr God, being inexplicable ■without, Him ; but who goes about to prove that the sun is shining ? At the same time, such works as Paley's "Natural Theology," possibly,, and Butler's "Analogy," most certainly, have their use,, if only as showing how many plausible arguments have long ago been answered. TursvAts and Occupations. We have left little space to glance at the pursuits and occupations proper for young women at home,. It is becoming rather usual on the continent for the schools to instruct young Leot. Vlli.] MAIDENHOOD, 569 ladies in the duties of household economy — an invasion, perhaps, of the mother's province. Every woman should understand, and know how to perform, every duty of cooking or cleaning, mending or making, proper to a house ; and a regular, practical course of training under her mother's eye might well occupy an hour or two of the girl's morning. May I suggest the great use and value of a household book, in which the young housekeeper notes down exactly how to do everything, from the scouring of a floor to the making of an omelette, either as she has done it herself, or has watched it heing done, with the little special " wrinkles " that every household gathers. Such an "Enquire Within" should be invaluable hereafter, as containing personal experiences, and should enable her to speak with authority to cook or house- maid who " Never see it done like that, mum." The ordering of dinners, setting of tables, entire management, for a short time, of the affairs of a house, will all have place in this training in domestic economy. Where there is still a nursery, the home daughter has a great advantage, for the right regulation of the nursery in all that pertains tocleanliness, ventilation, brightness, health, happiness, is a science in itself ; and where there is no longer one at home, it is worth while for her to get some practical knowledge of details at the hands of a friend who has a well-regulated nursery. As for sewing, every woman should know how to cut out and make all garments for herself and her children up to a full-grown dress, and it is worth while -to learn how to cut out and make even that scientifically; so here is another art in which the young lady at home must needs serve her apprenticeship. At the same time, an hour's brisk needlework in the day is as much as should commonly be expected of her, for while almost every other sort of household occupation affords healthful muscular action, to sit long at Jier needle is not good for a young girl. 2?0 HOME EDUOATiON. [Lect; Vlti. Besides, she has not unlimited time to sew ; her education has only been begun, so far, and inust be kept up, and she must acquire habits of intellectual effort on her own account. She should have an hour or two in the morning for solid read- ing. English literature is almost an untrodden field to her ; she has much history to read— ancient, mediaeval, modern, — all of which would be read the more profitably in the light of current history. She has learnt to read French and German, and now is her time to get some acquaintance with French and German literature. It will probably be found necessary to taboo novels, even the best, except on occasion of a bad cold, or toothache, or for an idle half-hour after dinner. It is very helpful to read with a commonplace book, or reading- -diary, wherein to put down any striking thought in your author, or your own impression of the work, or of any part of it ; but not summaries of facts. Such a diary, carefully kept through life, should be exceedingly interesting, as containing the intellectual history of the writer j besides, we never forget the book that we have made extracts from, and have taken the trouble to write a short review of. Two or three hours of the afternoon should be given to vigorous out-of-door exercise, to a long country walk, if not to tennis. The walk is interesting in proportion as it has an object, and here the student of botany has a great advantage. At almost every season there is. something to be got in some out-of-the-way spot, to make up the collection of specimens illustrating an order. The girl who is neither a botanist nor an artist may find an object for her walk in the catching of some aspect of nature, some bit of landscape, to describe in writing. The little literary effort should be both profitable and pleasant, and such a record should be a pleasant possession in after days. It is evident that the young lady at home has so much in hand, without taking social claiinj! into consideration,, that Lect. VIII.] MAIDENHOOD. 271 slie can have no time for dawdling, and, indeed, will have to make a time-taWe for herself, and map out her day care- fully, to get as much into it as she wishes. The pursuits we have indicated are all, more or less, with a view to self-culture ; but they will become both more pro- fitable and more pleasant if they can be proposed to the young girl as labours of love and service. Household duties and needlework will, of course, be helpful in the home ; but all her occupations, and especially her mnsic, even her walks and reading, can be laid under contribution for the family good. Sunday-schbol teaching, cottage visiting, some sort of regular, painstaking, even laborious effort, for the ignorant, the distressed, should be a part of every girl's life, a duty not to be put aside lightly for other claims. For it is only in doing that we learn to do ; through service, that we learn to serve : and it is more and more felt that a life of service is the Christian, and even the womanly ideal life. We shall notice, later, the importance of qualifying a girl, by means of definite training, for a particular line of service — for teaching, or nursing, or for general work in a parish, for instance ; but in default of such training, as giving her an object in life apart from social success, the mother may do much to make " Ich dien " the motto of her daughter's life, marking out some special line of helpfulness into which she may throw her youthful energy. " Aboil Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase) Awoke one night from a deep trance of peace, And saw within the moonlight of his room, Making it rich and like a lily in bloom, An angel writing in a book of gold. Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold, And to the presence in the room he said, — ' What writest thou ? ' The vision raised his head, And in a voice, made all of sweet accord, Anawer'd, ' The names of all who love the Lord ! ' 272 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VIII. ' And is rniue one ? ' Ben Adhem asked. ' ' Nay, not so,' Beplied the angel. Abou spoke more low, But cheerful stEl,— 'I pray thee, then, Write me as one who loves his fellow-men.' The angel wrote and vanish'd. The next night He came again, with a great wakening light, And show'd the names whom love of God had bless'd. And lo ! Ben Adhem's led the rest." " Write me as one who loves his fellow-men ! " is, indeed, the cry of the earnest-minded amongst ourselves; and to qualify her for some definite line of service, in the workhouse, the infirmary, amongst the blind or the inute, to give her some object in life beyond herself, and having no bearing on her own advancement, is, perhaps, the kindest and wisest thing the mother can do for her daughter. Ohj'eets in Life — Value of Special Training. This consideration brings us to a question sufficiently puzzling to the heads of households : What is to be done with the girls ? About the boys there is less difficulty — they go to college, or they go to learn their profession ; they are set to work at once, to prepare for that " opening " which, it is hoped, will introduce them to a profitable career. Suppose a girl leaves school in her eighteenth year ; — her eldest sister being already at home for good, her mother's right hand, and so much identified with all the interests of the family that her career is marked out. The sense of leisure and irresponsibility is delightful at first, and every girl should have a taste of it, just as a grocer is said to give his new apprentices the run of the shop, that they may long no more for figs and raisins. She plays tennis, goes to dances, is allowed to go as much into society as her parents can con- veniently arrange for. In her leisure, she paints plaques, makes ma'a-amS lace, practises a little, reads a little French Lect. VIII.] MAIDENHOOD. 273 and a good many novels. Her mother assigns liar some domestic duties, whicli she fulfils with more or less care; hut these are seldom important enough to call forth all her energy and will. Perhaps she is to sew for the family ; hut, then, the stress of work comes only now and then, in spurts, when everybody helps, and to he regularly and laboriously employed as a sempstress would be intolerable to a girl of spirit and education. She is not exactly idle ; her occupa- tions spread fairly well over the day, though they might all he easily crushed into the spare hour or two of a busy woman ; she enjoys a good deal of leisure and pleasure, and her parents look on good-naturedly, glad that she should have her day. For a few months, perhaps for a year or two, this is delightful ; but, in a year or two, life becomes a burden. To dance with the same people, to play in the same set, to make or listen to the same talk month after month, becomes in- tolerable. But then, it is objected, she has her home work, and additional duties can easily be made for her. Not so easily ; the mother of the family clings to her own duties, having discovered that, of the two delights of life, work — the duties of our calling — is to be preferred to play. Besides, the girl wants more than work — she wants a career: she wants work that depends upon her, that cannot be done without her, and the doing of which will bring her honour, and, possibly, pay. Let her " improve her mind," you say ? It is hardly the tendency of modem education to make girls in love with knowledge for its own sake, and what they do for their own sakes is too fitful and desultory to yield much profit or pleasure, unless the old spur is applied — the hope of distinction in some public examination. Now, what is the poor girl to do under this craving for a career, which is natural to every adult human being, woman as much as man ? Hard things are said of the " girl of the T 274 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VIII. period ; " but she deserves more consideration than she gets. People do not allow that she has erred because there has been no such outlet for her energy as her nature demands. There is, practically, one career open to the young woman of the upper and middle classes. She must wait until the prince comes by and — ^throws the handkerchief. The girl with more energy and ambition than modesty and breeding sees her opportunity here. What if that foolish prince should throw the handkerchief to the wrong maiden, and leave her out in the cold, with nothing to do, .nothing to look forward to all the rest of her life ? The thing is not to be thought of; she will make it her business to let him know where his favours should fall. And then begins a career indeed, a " hunt," people call it, exhibiting a very ugly phase of yOung womanhood, on which there is no occasion to dwell. The well broughtrup girl will hardly own to herself that she dreams of this best of all careers for a woman, that of wifehood and motherhood. Maidenliness will not let her put it before her as the thing she lives in hope of. Indeed, it is not so; her fate in this respect depends so entirely- on the mood of some other, that it is impossible for her to allow herself in serious, anticipation, though maiden meditation may dwell innocently upon Borneo and Juliet and their kind. Except for these sweet fancies, half illicit in the eyes of many a pure-minded girl, and not too wholesome, the future is a Wank ; she is in real need of something beyond — " Human nature's daily food," of common duties, pleasures, home affections. It is watodZ for the human brood, as for every other, to leave the parent nest; and when the due time comes, and the overgrown nestling has not taken flight, it is but a comfortless bird. The girl wants a career, a distinct path of life for her own feet to tread, quite as much as does the boy. But the girl Lect. VIII.] MAIDENHOOD. 275 ■will be provided for, it is said, while the hoy muist be made able to support himself and a family by his labour of head or hands. That is not the point : people are beginning to find out that happiness depends fully as much upon work as on wages. It is work, work of her very own, that thei girl wants ; and to keep her at home waiting for a career which may come to her or may not, but which it is hardly becoming in her to look forward to, is, to say the least of it, not quite fair. The weak girl mopes and grows hysterical; the strong- minded girl strikes out erratic lines for herself; the good girl makes the most of such employments as are especially hers, but often with great cravings for more definite, recog- nized work. The worst of it is, these homebred daughters are not being fitted to fill a place in this work-a-day world, at any future time. Already, amateur work is at a discount ; nobody is wanted to do work she has not been specially trained for. Here seems to me to be the answer to the per- plexing question, What is to be done with a family of grown-up daughters ? It is not enough that they learn a little cooking, a little dress-making, a little clear-starching. Every one of them should have a thorough recognized training for some art or profession whereby she may earn her living, doing work useful to the world, and interesting and delightful to herself, as all skilled labour of head or -hands is. It appears to me that parents owe this to their girls as much as to their boys. And valuable training in many branches of woman's work is to be had, at so low a charge as hardly to cost more than would keep a lady fittingly at home. Whether the young lady make use of her training, and practise the art she has acquired, depends upon circumstances, and — the handkerchief ! But in no case is the training thrown away. To say nothing of the special aptitude she has acquired, she has increased in personal weight, force of character, and 276 HOME EDUCATION. [Leot. VIII.' fitness for any work. It is not necessary to specify the lines for which, women may qualify by thorough training- — art, music, teaching, nursing, loftier careers for the more ambitious and better educated ; but may I say a word for teaching in elementary schools — a lowly labour of quite immeasurable usefulness ? I fear you may think of that fox who left his tail in a trap, and advised all the foxes he met to cut off theirs — "so pleasant," says he, "to be without the incumbrance of a tail ! " But, indeed, I do not speak without book on this subject, having had opportunities of learning the views of many ladies who have placed themselves iinder training, partly as feeling the need of the discipline it affords, and partly out of a great craving to take some active recognized share in the work of the world. The mistress of a house and mother of a family is — unless she be a lawless, self-indulgent woman — under a discipline of circumstances which should bring out whatever is strong and lovely in the female character ; but in the case of grown-up daughters at home, the difficulty parents labour under is just that of keeping up wholesome discipline. They cannot be for ever struggling against the dawdling, procrastinating, self-indulgent habits girls will fall into when not under the stimulus of pressing duties ; for parents must needs admit their grown-up daughters to a friendly footing which makes an over-strict government out of the question. The young women want scope, and they want the discipline of work, their own work, for which they alone are responsible; not of home tasks, which may be done or left undone, or which are sure to be done by somebody if the right person neglect her duty. A year or two of home life, in the interval between school and such training as I propose,, is very desirable, both that parents may enjoy their daughters, and the daughters their homes, and also that parents may LteoT. VIII.] Maidenhood. 277 have an opportunity of dealing with the crude characters the girls bring home irom school. But with work of their own in view, the girls will live under the stimulus of a definite future, their present work being to make the very- best of themselves with a view to that future. Here is a motive for effort, and the important thing is, to keep up the habit of effort, intellectual, moral, spiritual, bodily. Forgive me if I make use of this opportunity to press home what may seem to you a one-sided view of an impor- tant question. You will allow that I am by no means alone in the view I advocate ; seeing that many enlightened men are causing their daughters to undergo as regular a profes- sional training as their sons, not because their means are inadequate to portion the girls, but because they feel it a duty to open a career of usefulness to these as much as to the boys of their families. Besides, I know of no other way of answering the question. What is to be done with the girls ? A family of grown-up daughters at home are simply in the way. They are in an anomalous position, with no scope to produce the best that is in them ; and, unless they have an unusually wisely ordered home, some deterioration in character is almost a necessary consequence of the life they lead. THE END. PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES. 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