Home education series

Home Education

1bome lEfcucatfon' Series

By CHARLOTTE M. MASON

Each Volume 3s. 6d. net

I. HOME EDUCATION.
II. PARENTS AND CHILDREN.

III. SCHOOL EDUCATION.

IV. "OURSELVES, OUR SOULS AND BODIES."

This volume is also published in two parts, 2s. net

each part.

V. SOME STUDIES IN THE FORMATION OF
CHARACTER.

KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRttBNER, & CO., LTD.

DRYDEN HOUSE
43 GERRARD STREET, LONDON, W.

*fbome BEmcatton' Series

VOLUME I.

Home Education

By

Charlotte M. Mason

FIFTH EDITION (Revised and Enlarged)
(Eighth and Ninth Thousand]

LONDON
KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO., LTD.

DRYDEN HOUSE, GERRARD STREET, W.
1906

The rights of translation and of reproduction are reserved

The Education of Children under
Nine Years of Age

" O maraviglia I che qual egli scelse

1'umile pianta, cotal si rinacque
Subitamente la onde la svelse."

We read in the Purgatorio, Canto I., how Virgil was directed
to prepare Dante for his difficult ascent :

' Va dunque, e fa che tu costui ricinghe
d'un giunco schietto, e che gli lavi il viso
si che ogni sucidume quindi stinghe :

Questa isoletta intorno ad imo ad irao,
laggiu, cola dove la batte 1'onda,
porta de" giunchi sopra il mollc limo.

Null" altra pianta, che facesse fronda
o indurasse, vi puote aver vita,
pero che alle percosse non seconda.

Venimmo poi in sul litro diserto,

Quivi mi cinse si come altrui piacque :
o maraviglia ! che qual egli scelse
1'umile pianta, cotal si rinacque

Subitamente la onde la svelse."

' Go, then, and see thou gird this one about
With a smooth rush, and that thou wash his face,
So that thou cleanse away all stain therefrom.

This little island round about its base,
Below there, yonder where the billow beats it,
Doth rushes bear upon its washy ooze ;
No other plant that putteth forth the leaf,
Or that doth indurate, can there have life,
Because it yieldeth not unto the shocks.

Then came we down upon the desert shore.

There he begirt me as the other pleased ;
O marvellous ! for even as he culled
The humble plant, such it sprang up again
Suddenly there where he uprooted it."

(LONGFELLOW'S TRANSLATION.)

Preface to the c Home Education'
Series

THE educational outlook is rather misty and
depressing both at home and abroad. That science
should be a staple of education, that the teaching of
Latin, of modern languages, ot mathematics, must be
reformed, that nature and handicrafts should be
pressed into service for the training of the eye and
hand, that boys and girls must learn to write English
and therefore must know something of history and
literature ; and, on the other hand, that education must
be made more technical and utilitarian — these, and
such as these, are the cries of expedience with which
we take the field. But we have no unifying principle,
no definite aim ; in fact, no philosophy of education.
As a stream can rise no higher than its source, so
it is probable that no educational effort can rise above
the whole scheme of thought which gives it birth ;
and perhaps this is the reason of all the ' fallings from
us, vanishings,' failures, and disappointments which
mark our educational records.

Those of us, who have spent many years in pursuing
the benign and elusive vision of Education, perceive

u

X PREFACE TO THE ' HOME EDUCATION ' SERIES

that her approaches are regulated by a law, and that
this law has yet to be evoked. We can discern its
outlines, but no more. We know that it is pervasive ;
there is no part of a child's home-life or school-work
which the law does not penetrate. It is illuminating,
too, showing the value, or lack of value, of a thousand
systems and expedients. It is not only a light, but a
measure, providing a standard whereby all things,
small and great, belonging to educational work must
be tested. The law is liberal, taking in whatsoever
things are true, honest, and of good report, and
offering no limitation or hindrance save where excess
should injure. And the path indicated by the law is
continuous and progressive, with no transition stage
from the cradle to the grave, except that maturity takes
up the regular self- direction to which immaturity
has been trained. We shall doubtless find, when we
apprehend the law, that certain German thinkers —
Kant, Herbart, Lotze, Froebel — are justified ; that,
as they say, it is ' necessary ' to believe in God ; that,
therefore, the knowledge of God is the principal know-
ledge, and the chief end of education. By one more
character shall we be able to recognise this perfect law
of educational liberty when it shall be made evident.
It has been said that 'The best idea which we can
form of absolute truth is that it is able to meet every
condition by which it can be tested.' This we shall
expect of our law — that it shall meet every test of
experiment and every test of rational investigation.
Not having received the tables of our law, we

PREFACE TO THE ' HOME EDUCATION ' SERIES xi

fall back upon Froebel or upon Herbart ; or, if
we belong to another School, upon Locke or
Spencer; but we are not satisfied. A discontent,
is it a divine discontent ? is upon us ; and assuredly
we should hail a workable, effectual philosophy
of education as a deliverance from much perplexity.
Before this great deliverance comes to us it is
probable that many tentative efforts will be put
forth, having more or less of the characters of a
philosophy ; notably, having a central idea, a body
of thought with various members working in vital
harmony.

Such a theory of education, which need not be
careful to call itself a system of psychology, must
be in harmony with the thought movements of the
age ; must regard education, not as a shut-off
compartment, but as being as much a part of life
as birth or growth, marriage or work ; and it must
leave the pupil attached to the world at many points
of contact. It is true that educationalists are already
eager to establish such contact in several directions,
but their efforts rest upon an axiom here and an
idea there, and there is no broad unifying basis of
thought to support the whole.

Fools rush in where angels fear to tread ; and the
hope that there may be many tentative efforts
towards a philosophy of education, and that all of
them will bring us nearer to the magnum opus,
encourages me to launch one such attempt. The
central thought, or rather body of thought, upon

xii PREFACE TO THE * HOME EDUCATION ' SERIES

which I found, is the somewhat obvious fact that the
child is a person with all the possibilities and powers
included in personality. Some of the members which
develop from this nucleus have been exploited from
time to time by educational thinkers, and exist vaguely
in the general common sense, a notion here, another
there. One thesis, which is, perhaps, new, that Educa-
tion is the Science of Relations, appears to me to solve
the question of a curriculum, as showing that the object
of education is to put a child in living touch with
as much as may be of the life of Nature and of
thought. Add to this one or two keys to self-
knowledge, and the educated youth goes forth with
some idea of self-management, with some pursuits,
and many vital interests. My excuse for venturing
to offer a solution, however tentative and passing,
to the problem of education is twofold. For between
thirty and forty years I have laboured without pause
to establish a working and philosophic theory of
education ; and in the next place, each article of
the educational faith I offer has been arrived at by
inductive processes ; and has, I think, been verified by
a long and wide series of experiments. It is, how-
ever, with sincere diffidence that I venture to offer
the results of this long labour ; because I know
that in this field there are many labourers far more
able and expert than I — the * angels ' who fear to
tread, so precarious is the footing!

But, if only pour encourager les autres, I append a
short synopsis of the educational theory advanced

PREFACE TO THE ' HOME EDUCATION ' SERIES XlH

in 11

r

in the volumes of the ' Home Education Series/ The
tment is not methodic, but incidental ; here a little,
there a little, as seemed to me most likely to meet
the occasions of parents and teachers. I should add
that in the course of a number of years the various
essays have been prepared for the use of the Parents'
Educational Union in the hope that that Society
might witness for a more or less coherent body
of educational thought.

'* The consequence of truth is great ; therefore the
judgment of it must not be negligent."

WHICHCOTE.

1. Children are born persons.

2. They are not born either good or bad, but with
possibilities for good and evil.

3. The principles of authority on the one hand and
obedience on the other, are natural, necessary and
fundamental ; but —

4. These principles are limited by the respect due
to the personality of children, which must not be
encroached upon, whether by fear or love, suggestion
or influence, or undue play upon any one natural
des're.

5. Therefore we are limited to three educational
instruments — the atmosphere of environment, the
discipline of habit, and the presentation of living
ideas.

6. By the saying, EDUCATION IS AN ATMO-
SPHERE, it is not meant that a child should be
isolated in what may be called a 'child environment,'

xiv PREFACE TO THE ' HOME EDUCATION ' SERIES

especially adapted and prepared ; but that we should
take into account the educational value of his natural
home atmosphere, both as regards persons and things,
and should let him live freely among his proper
conditions. It stultifies a child to bring down his
world to the * child's ' level.

7. By EDUCATION IS A DISCIPLINE, is meant the
discipline of habits formed definitely and thoughtfully,
whether habits of mind or body. Physiologists tell
us of the adaptation of brain structure to habitual
lines of thought — i.e., to our habits.

8. In the saying that EDUCATION IS A LIFE, the
need of intellectual and moral as well as of physical
sustenance is implied. The mind feeds on ideas,
and therefore children should have a generous
curriculum.

9. But the mind is not a receptacle into which
ideas must be dropped, each idea adding to an
' apperception mass ' of its like, the theory upon
which the Herbartian doctrine of interest rests.

10. On the contrary, a child's mind is no mere
sac to hold ideas; but is rather, if the figure may
be allowed, a spiritual organism, with an appetite
for all knowledge. This is its proper diet, with
which it is prepared to deal, and which it can digest
and assimilate as the body does foodstuffs.

11. This difference is not a verbal quibble. The
Herbartian doctrine lays the stress of education —
the preparation of knowledge in enticing morsels,
presented in due order — upon the teacher. Children

PREFACE TO THE l HOME EDUCATION ' SERIES XV

taught upon this principle are in danger of receiving
much teaching with little knowledge ; and the
teacher's axiom is, c What a child learns matters less
than how he learns it.'

12. But, believing that the normal child has
powers of mind that fit him to deal with all
knowledge proper to him, we must give him a full
and generous curriculum ; taking care, only, that
the knowledge offered to him is vital — that is,
that facts are not presented without their informing
ideas. Out of this conception comes the principle
that,—

13. EDUCATION is THE SCIENCE OF RELATIONS;
that is, that a child has natural relations with a vast
number of things and thoughts : so we must train him
upon physical exercises, nature, handicrafts, science
and art, and upon many living books ; for we know
that our business is, not to teach him all about
anything, but to help him to make valid as many
as may be of —

'Those first-born affinities
That fit our new existence to existing things.'

14. There are also two secrets of moral and
intellectual self-management which should be offered
to children ; these we may call the Way of the Will
and the Way of the Reason.

15. The Way of the Will.— -Children should be
taught —

(a) To distinguish between ' I want ' and ' I will/

(b) That the way to will effectively is to turn our

XVI PREFACE TO THE ' HOME EDUCATION ' SERIES

thoughts from that which we desire but do
not will.

(c) That the best way to turn our thoughts is to

think of or do some quite different thing,
entertaining or interesting.

(d) That, after a little rest in this way, the will

returns to its work with new vigour.

(This adjunct of the will is familiar to us
as diversion, whose office it is to ease us for a
time from will effort, that we may * will ' again
with added power. The use of suggestion —
even self-suggestion — as an aid to the will, is
to be deprecated, as tending to stultify and
stereotype character. It would seem that
spontaneity is a condition of development,
and that human nature needs the discipline
of failure as well as of success.)

1 6. The Way of the Reason. — We should teach
children, too, not to ' lean ' (too confidently) ' unto
their own understanding,' because the function of
reason is, to give logical demonstration (a) of mathe-
matical truth ; and (b) of an initial idea, accepted by
the will. In the former case reason is, perhaps, an
infallible guide, but in the second it is not always
a safe one ; for whether that initial idea be right or
wrong, reason will confirm it by irrefragable proofs.

17. Therefore children should be taught, as they
become mature enough to understand such teaching,
that the chief responsibility which rests on them as
persons is the acceptance or rejection of initial ideas.

PREFACE TO THE ' HOME EDUCATION ' SERIES XVli

To help them in this choice we should give them
principles of conduct and a wide range of the
knowledge fitted for them.

These three principles (15, 16 and 17) should save
children from some of the loose thinking and heed-
less action which cause most of us to live at a lower
level than we need.

1 8. We should allow no separation to grow up
between the intellectual and ' spiritual ' life of chil-
dren ; but should teach them that the divine Spirit
has constant access to their spirits, and is their con-
tinual helper in all the interests, duties and joys
of life.

The l Home Education ' Series is so called from the
title of the first volume, and not as dealing, wholly
or principally, with ' Home ' as opposed to ' School '
education.

Preface to the Fourth Edition

MY attempt in the following volume is to suggest to
parents and teachers a method of education resting
upon a basis of natural law ; and to touch, in this
connection, upon a mother's duties to her children.
In venturing to speak on this latter subject, 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 lies the
mystery of education, apart from which all its rules 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 knowledge of the general principles of
education, founded upon the nature and the needs
of all children. And this knowledge 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.
I venture to hope that teachers of young children,

1 The Rev. F. D. Maurice.

PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION XIX

also, may find this volume of use. The period of a
child's life between his sixth and his ninth year should
be used to lay the basis of a liberal education, and of
the habit of reading for instruction. During these
years the child should enter upon the domain of
knowledge, in a good many directions, in a reposeful,
consecutive way, which is not to be attained through
the somewhat exciting medium of oral lessons. I
hope that teachers may find the approach (from a new
standpoint), to the hackneyed "subjects of instruction"
proper for little children at any rate interesting and
stimulating ; and possibly the methods which this
fresh standpoint indicates may prove suggestive and
helpful.

The particular object of this volume, as a member
of the 'Home Education' Series, is to show the bearing
of the physiology of habit upon education ; why certain
physical, intellectual, and moral habits are a valuable
asset to a child, and what may be done towards the
formation of such habits. I beg to acknowledge my
indebtedness to Dr Carpenter's Mental Physiology for
valuable teaching on the subject of habits contained
in some two or three chapters of that work. Also, I
would renew my grateful thanks to those medical
friends who have given careful and able revision to
such parts of the work as rest on a physiological basis.

I should add that some twenty years ago (1885) the
greater part of this volume was delivered as ' Lectures
to Ladies,' in which form the papers were originally
published (1886) under the title which is still retained.

XX PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION

Lectures VII. and VIII. and the Appendix of the
original volume have been transferred from this to
other volumes of the Series. The whole has been very
carefully revised, and much new matter introduced,
especially in Part V., ' Lessons as Instruments of
Education,' which now offers a fairly complete intro-
duction to methods of teaching subjects fit for children
between the ages of six and nine.

The rest of the volume attempts to deal with the
whole of education from infancy until the ninth year

of life.

C. M. MASON.

SCALE How, AMBLESIDE,
1905.

Contents

PART I

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS

PAGE

Children are public trusts — Mothers owe 'a thinking love*
to their children — The training of children ' dreadfully
defective ' — How parents usually proceed .... I

I. A METHOD OF EDUCATION

Traditional methods of education— Method a way to an end —

A system easier than a method ...... 6

ii. THE CHILD'S ESTATE
The child in the midst — Code of education in the Gospels , . n

III. OFFENDING THE CHILDREN

Children are born law-abiding — They must perceive that their
governors are law-compelled — Parents may offend their
children by disregarding the laws of health — And of the
intellectual life— And of the moral life . . . . 13

IV. DESPISING THE CHILDREN

Children should have the best of their mothers— Nurse-
Children's faults are serious 17

V. HINDERING THE CHILDREN

A child's relationship with Almighty God— Nursery theology . 19

xxi

XX11 CONTENTS

VI. CONDITIONS OF HEALTHY BRAIN-ACTIVITY

All mind-labour means wear of brain— Exercise— Rest— Rest
after meals — Change of occupation — Nourishment — Certain
causes affect the quality of the blood— Concerning meals —
Talk at meals — Variety in meals — Air as important as
food — ' The children walk every day ' — Oxygen has its
limitations — Unchanged air — 'I feed Alice on beef tea' —
Wordsworth's Lucy — Indoor airings — Ventilation — Night
air wholesome — Sunshine —Free perspiration — Insensible
perspiration — Daily bath and porous garments . . 20

vii. 'THE REIGN OF LAW' IN EDUCATION

Common sense and good intentions — Law-abiding lives often
more blameless than pious lives — 'Mind' and 'matter*
equally governed by law — Antagonism to law shown by
some religious persons — Parents must acquaint themselves
with the principles of physiology and moral science . . 37

PART II

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN
I. GROWING TIME

Meals out of doors — For dwellers in towns and suburbs —

Possibilities of a day in the open — No story-books . . 42

ii. 'SIGHT-SEEING'

How to see — Educational uses of 'sight-seeing' — Discriminating

observation ......... 45

in. 'PICTURE-PAINTING'

Method of — Strain on the attention — Seeing fully and in detail

— A means of after solace and refreshment 48

IV. FLOWERS AND TREES

Children should know field crops — Field flowers and the life-
history of common plants — The study of trees — The seasons
should be followed — Leigh Hunt on flowers — Calendars —
Nature diaries 51

CONTENTS XX111

v. 'LIVING CREATURES'

PAGE

A field of interest and delight — Children should be encouraged
to watch — The force of public opinion in the home — What
town children can do — Nature knowledge the most im-
portant knowledge for young children — Mental training of
a child naturalist — Nature work especially valuable for girls 56

VI. FIELD-LORE AND NATURALISTS' BOOKS

Reverence for life — Rough classification at first hand — Uses of
'Naturalists" books — Mothers and teachers should know
about Nature 62

VII. THE CHILD GETS KNOWLEDGE BY MEANS OF HIS SENSES

Nature's teaching — Over-pressure — Object-lessons — A child learns
from things — The sense of beauty comes from early contact
with Nature — Most grown men lose the habit of observation 65

VIII. THE CHILD SHOULD BE MADE FAMILIAR WITH NATURAL OBJECTS

An ' observant child ' should be put in the way of things worth
observing — Every natural object a member of a series —
Power will pass more and more into the hands of scientific
men — Intimacy with Nature makes for personal well-being . 69

IX. OUT-OF-DOOR GEOGRAPHY

Small things may teach great — Pictorial geography — The
position of the sun — Clouds, rain, snow, and hail — Distance
— Direction — East and west — Practice in finding direction
— Compass drill — Boundaries— Plans— Local geography . 72

X. THE CHILD AND MOTHER NATURE

The mother must refrain from too much talk— Making a new

acquaintance — Two things permissible to the mother . . 78

XI. OUT-OF-DOOR GAMES

The French lesson — Noisy games — Rondes — Skipping-rope and

shuttlecock— Climbing— Clothing 80

xxiv CONTENTS

XII. WALKS IN BAD WEATHER

Winter walks as necessary as summer walks — Pleasures con-
nected with frost and snow — Winter observations — Habit
of attention — Wet weather tramps— Outer garments for —
Precautions 85

xni. 'RED INDIAN' LIFE
Scouting— 'Bird-stalking' 88

XIV. THE CHILDREN REQUIRE COUNTRY AIR

The essential proportion of oxygen — Excess of carbonic acid gas
— Unvitiated, unimpoverished air — Solar light — A physical
ideal for a child ......... 92

PART III

'HABIT is TEN NATURES'

I. EDUCATION BASED UPON NATURAL LAW

A healthy brain — Out-of-door life — Habit, the instrument by

which parents work 96

II. CHILDREN HAVE NO SELF-COMPELLING POWER

An educational cul-de-sac — Love, law, and religion as educational
forces — Why children are incapable of steady effort —
Young children should be saved the labour of decision . 98

in. WHAT is 'NATURE'?

All persons born with the same primary desires— And affections
— Content of the most elemental notion of human nature —
Nature plus heredity— -plus physical conditions — Human
nature the sum of certain attributes — The child must not be
left to his human nature — Problem before the educator —
Divine grace works on the lines of human effort — The trust
of parents must not be supine 100

IV. HABIT MAY SUPPLANT 'NATURE*

Habit runs on the lines of Nature — But habit may be a lever —
A mother forms her children's habits involuntarily — Habit
forces Nature into new channels — Parents and teachers
must lay down lines of habit ...... 105

CONTENTS XXV

V. THE LAYING DOWN OF LINES OF HABIT

PAGE

f Begin it, and the thing will be completed ' — Direction of lines
of habit — We think as we are accustomed to think — Habit
and free-will — Habit rules ninety-nine in a hundred of our
thoughts and acts — Habit powerful even where the will
decides 107

VI. THE PHYSIOLOGY OF HABIT

Growing tissues form themselves to modes of action — Therefore
children should learn dancing, swimming, etc., at an early
age — Moral and mental habits make their mark upon
physical tissues — Persistent trains of thought — Incessant
regeneration of brain tissue — Artificial reflex actions may
be acquired — Intellectual and moral education — Character
affected by modification of brain tissue — Outside influence . in

VII. THE FORMING OF A HABIT—' SHUT THE DOOR AFTER YOU '

' go gt ntxt twinge '—Habit a delight in itself— Tact, watchful-
ness, and persistence — Stages in the formation of a habit —
The dangerous stage . . . . . . . .119

VIII. INFANT ' HABITS '

Some branches of infant education — A sensitive nose — The baby is
ubiquitous — Personal cleanliness as an early habit— Modesty
and purity — The habit of obedience and the sense of honour
— Order essential — The child of two should put away his
playthings — Neatness akin to order — Regularity — Habits
of time and place 124

IX. PHYSICAL EXERCISES

Importance of daily — Drill in good manners — Training of the

ear and voice — The habit of music — Let children alone . 132

PART IV

SOME HABITS OF MIND— SOME MORAL HABITS

A science of education — Education in habit favours an easy life
— Training in habits becomes a habit — Habits inspired by
the home atmosphere . . . . . . . 1 35

XXVI CONTENTS

I. THE HABIT OF ATTENTION

PAGE

A mind at the mercy of associations — Wandering attention — The
habit of attention to be cultivated in the infant — Attention
to things, words a weariness — Lessons attractive — Time-
table, definite work in a given time — A natural reward —
Emulation — Affection as a motive — Attractiveness of
knowledge — What is attention? — Self-compelled attention
— The secret of over-pressure — The schoolboy's home-work
— Wholesome home treatment for ' mooning ' — Rewards and
punishments should be relative consequences of conduct —
Natural and educative consequences 137

II. THE HABITS OF APPLICATION, ETC.

Rapid mental effort — Zeal must be stimulated .... 149

III. THE HABIT OF THINKING

'A lion' — Operations included in thinking . . . .150

IV. THE HABIT OF IMAGINING

The sense of the incongruous — Commonplace tales ; tales of
imagination — Imagination and great conceptions — Imagina-
tion grows — Thinking conies by practice . . . . 151

V. THE HABIT OF REMEMBERING

Remembering and recollecting — A ' spurious ' memory —
Memory, a record in the brain substance — Made under
what conditions — Recollection and the law of association
— Every lesson must recall the last— No limit to the record-
ing power of the brain — But links of association a condition
of recollection 154

VI. THE HABIT OF PERFECT EXECUTION

The habit of turning out imperfect work — A child should

execute perfectly 159

VII. SOME MORAL HABITS

Obedience — The whole duty of a child — Obedience no accidental
duty — Children must have the desire to obey — Expect
obedience — Law ensures liberty 160

CONTENTS xxvii

VIII. TRUTHFULNESS, ETC.

PAGE

Three causes of lying — All vicious — Only one kind visited on
children — Accuracy of statement — Exaggeration and ludi-
crous embellishments — Reverence — Temper born in a child
— Not temper but tendency — Parents must correct tendency
by new habit of temper — Change the child's thoughts . . 164

PART V

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION
I. THE MATTER AND METHOD OF LESSONS

Parents must reflect on the subject-matter of instruction —
Home the best growing ground for young children —
Three questions for the mother — Children learn, to grow —
Doctoring of the material of knowledge — Children learn,
to get ideas — Ideas grow and produce after their kind —
Scott and Stephenson worked with ideas — Value of
dominant ideas — Lessons must furnish ideas — Children
learn, to get knowledge — Diluted knowledge— Dr Arnold's
knowledge as a child — Literature proper for children — Four
tests which should be applied to children's lessons— Rttsumt
of six points just considered 169

II. THE KINDERGARTEN AS A PLACE OF EDUCATION

The mother the best Kindergartnerin — The nursery need not
therefore be a kindergarten — Field of knowledge too
circumscribed — Training of a just eye and faithful hand —
'Sweetness and light ' in the kindergarten .... 178

III. FURTHER CONSIDERATIONS OF THE KINDERGARTEN

The childhood of Tolstoi— The Story of a Child— What we owe
toFroebel — Requirements of a person — Nature as an educator
— Danger of undervaluing children's intelligence — We all
like to be humoured — Teachers mediate too much — Danger
of personal magnetism — 'Kindergarten' a false analogy —
' Mother-games ' too strenuous for a child — The society of his
equals too stimulating for a child — Danger of supplanting
Nature — Importance of personal initiative — Parents and
teachers must sow opportunities — 'Only' children — The

XXV111 CONTENTS

child should be allowed some ordering of his life — Helen
Keller — Miss Sullivan on systems of education — The kinder-
garten in the United States— Mr Thistleton Mark on the
kindergarten— Dr Stanley Hall on the kindergarten . . 182

IV. READING

Time of teaching to read— Mrs Wesley's plan— The alphabet
— Word-making — Word-making with long vowels, etc. —
Early spelling— Reading at sight— The reading of prose —
Careful pronunciation — A year's work— Ordinary method . 199

V. THE FIRST READING LESSON

(Two mothers confer) 207

VI. READING BY SIGHT AND BY SOUND

Learning to read is hard work— Knowledge of arbitrary
symbols — These symbols should be interesting — Tommy's
first lesson — Steps — Reading sentences — Tommy's second
lesson — Unknown words — Like combinations have different
sounds — Moral training in reading lessons . . . .214

VII. RECITATION

' The children's art ' — Memorising 222

VIII. READING FOR OLDER CHILDREN

The habit of reading — Reading aloud — Limitation — Reading
to children — Questions on the subject-matter — Lesson-
books — Slipshod habits ; Inattention — Careless enunciation 226

IX. THE ART OF' NARRATING

Children narrate by nature — This power should be used in

their education — Method of lesson . . . . .231

X. WRITING

Perfect accomplishment— Printing— Steps in teaching — Text-
hand — A New Handwriting — How to use .... 233

CONTENTS XXIX

XI. TRANSCRIPTION

PAGE

Value of transcription — Children should transcribe favourite
passages — Small text-hand — Double-ruled lines — Position
in writing— Desks — Children's table 238

XII. SPELLING AND DICTATION

A fertile cause of bad spelling — The rationale of spelling —

Steps of a dictation lesson 240

XIII. COMPOSITION

George Osborne's essay — An educational futility — Lessons in
composition — Teaching that is a public danger — ' Composi-
tion ' comes by nature 243

XIV. BIBLE LESSONS

Children enjoy the Bible — Should know the Bible text — Essential
and accidental truth — Method of Bible lessons— Picture
illustrations — Bible recitations 247

XV. ARITHMETIC

Educative value of — Problems within the child's grasp —
Demonstrate — Problems — Notation — Weighing and measur-
ing— Arithmetic as a means of training — The ABC
Arithmetic — Preparation for mathematics .... 253

XVI. NATURAL PHILOSOPHY

A basis of facts — Eyes and no eyes — Principles — To be compre-
hended by children — As taught in a village school . . 264

XVII. GEOGRAPHY

Educational value of — As commonly taught — Geography should
be interesting — Mow to begin — What next — Maps— What
general knowledge a child of nine should have — Particular
knowledge— Definitions — Fundamental ideas — Meaning of
a map 27 1

XXX CONTENTS

XVIII. HISTORY

PAGE

A storehouse of ideas — 'Outlines' mischievous— So are most
history books written for children — Early history of a nation
best fitted for children — Some old Chronicles — Age of myths
—Plutarch's Lives— History books— Dates— Illustrations by
the children — ' Playing at ' history 279

XIX. GRAMMAR

Grammar a difficult study — Latin grammar — English grammar a

logical study — Two grammar lessons 295

XX. FRENCH.

M. Gouin's method— The ' Series '—How does the child learn ? . 300

XXI. PICTORIAL ART, ETC.

Study of pictures — Should be regular — A picture talk — Drawing
lessons— Children have 'Art' in them— Clay modelling—
The piano and singing — Handicrafts and drills . . . 307

PART VI

THE WILL — THE CONSCIENCE — THE DIVINE LIFE IN THE CHILD
I. THE WILL

Government of Mansoul — Executive power vested in the will —
What is the will ? — Persons may go through life without a
deliberate act of will — Character the result of conduct regu-
lated by will — Three functions of the will — A limitation of
the will disregarded by some novelists — Parents fall into
this metaphysical blunder — Wilfulness indicates want of will-
power—What is wilfulness? — The will has superior and
inferior functions — The will not a moral faculty — A disci-
plined will necessary to heroic Christian character — The sole
practical faculty of man — How the will operates — The way
of the will ; Incentives— Diversion— Change of thought —
The way of the will should be taught to children — Power of
will implies power of attention— Habit may frustrate the will
— Reasonable use of so effective an instrument — How to
strengthen the will — Habit of self-management — Education
of the will more important than of the intellect . . . 317

CONTENTS xxxi

II. THE CONSCIENCE

PAGE

Conscience is judge and law-giver — I am, I ought, I can, I will
— Inertness of parents not supplemented by Divine grace —
Conscience not an infallible guide — But a real power — That
spiritual sense whereby we know good and evil — A child's
conscience an undeveloped capability rather than a supreme
authority — The uninstructed conscience — The processes im-
plied in a ' conscientious ' decision — The instructed con-
science nearly always right — The good conscience of a child
— Children play with moral questions— The Bible the chief
source of moral ideas — Tales fix attention upon conduct —
Ignorance of a child's conscience — Instructing the conscience
— Kindness — The conscience made effective by discipline . 329

III. THE DIVINE LIFE IN THE CHILD

The c very pulse of the machine ' — Parents have some power to
enthrone the King — The functions and life of the soul — What
is the life of the soul ? — The parent must present the idea of
God to the soul of the child — Must not make blundering
efforts — God presented to the children as an exactor and
punisher — Parents must select inspiring ideas — We must
teach only what we know — Fitting and vital ideas — The
knowledge of God distinct from morality — The times and
the manner of religious instruction — The reading of the
Bible — Father and Giver — The essence of Christianity is
loyalty to a Person 34!

APPENDICES

A. LIST OF BOOKS 353

B. QUESTIONS FOR THE USE OF STUDENTS .... 357

C. THE EXAMINATION OF A CHILD OF SEVEN UPON A

TERM'S WORK ON THE LINES INDICATED IN THIS
VOLUME 387

D. THE EXAMINATION OF A CHILD OF NINE UPON A TERM'S

WORK 398

INDEX 420

Home Education

PART I

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS

NOT the least sign of the higher status they have
gained, is the growing desire for work that obtains
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 work-
ing 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.

Children are a Public Trust. — Now, that work
which is of most importance to society is the bring-
ing-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, entrusted with such a charge, they are not

I

2 HOME EDUCATION

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 trusts, put into the
hands of parents that they may make the very most
of them for the good of society. And this responsi-
bility is not equally divided between the parents : it
is upon the mothers of the present that the future of
the world depends, in even a greater degree than upon
the fathers, 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 children themselves, and did not
make over their gravest duty to indifferent persons.

Mothers owe ' a thinking love ' to their
Children. — " The mother is qualified," says Pesta-
lozzi, "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 thinking love. . . . God has given to thy child all
the faculties of our nature, but the grand point
remains undecided — 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 happiness or misery to
a life so dear to thee. Maternal love is the first
agent in education."

We are waking up to pur duties, and in propor-
tion as mothers become more highly educated and
efficient, they will doubtless feel the more strongly
that the education of their children during the first
six years of life is an undertaking hardly to be
entrusted to any hands but their own. And they
will take it up as their profession — that is, with the

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 3

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 education, and with those conditions of
the child's nature upon which such theory rests.

The Training of Children 'dreadfully de-
fective.'— "The training of children," says Mr
Herbert Spencer — "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 management of a ship or of a
locomotive engine, a long apprenticeship is needful.
Is it, then, that the unfolding of a human being in
body and mind is so comparatively simple a process
that any one may superintend and regulate it with
no preparation whatever? If not — if the process is,
with one exception, 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 accom-
plishments than omit this all-essential instruction. . . .
Some acquaintance with the first principles of physi-
ology and the elementary truths of psychology is
indispensable for the right bringing-up of children.
. . . Here are the indisputable facts : that the
development of children in mind and body follows
certain laws ; that unless these laws are in some

4 HOME EDUCATION

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 parents should not
strive with some anxiety to learn what these laws
are." 1

How Parents usually proceed. — The parent
begins instinctively by regarding his child as an
unwritten tablet, and is filled with great resolves as
to what he shall write thereon. By-and-by, traits
of disposition appear, the child has little ways of
his own ; and, at first, every new display of person-
ality is a delightful surprise. That the infant should
show pleasure at the sight of his father, that his
face should cloud in sympathy with his mother,
must always be wonderful to us. But the wonder
stales ; his parents are used to the fact by the time
the child shows himself a complete human being like
themselves, with affections, desires, powers ; taking to
his book, perhaps, as a duck to the water ; or to the
games which shall make a man of him. The notion
of doing all for the child with which the parents began
gradually recedes. So soon as he shows that he has
a way of his own he is encouraged to take it. Father
and mother have no greater delight than to watch the
individuality of their child unfold as a flower unfolds.
But Othello loses his occupation. The more the child
shapes his own course, the less do the parents find to
do, beyond feeding him with food convenient, whether
of love, or thought, or of bodily meat and drink. And

1 Herbert Spencer, Education. Some particulars of the books
referred to in this volume will be found in Appendix A.

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 5

here, we may notice, the parents need only supply;
the child knows well enough how to appropriate.
The parents' chief care is, that that which they supply
shall be wholesome and nourishing, whether in the
way of picture-books, lessons, playmates, bread and
milk, or mother's love. This is education as most
parents understand it, with more of meat, more of love,
more of culture, according to their kind and degree.
They let their children alone, allowing human nature
to develop on its own lines, modified by facts of
environment and descent.

Nothing could be better for the child than this
' masterly inactivity,' so far as it goes. It is well he
should be let grow and helped to grow according to
his nature ; and so long as the parents do not step in
to spoil him, much good and no very evident harm
comes of letting him alone. But this philosophy of
' let him be/ while it covers a part, does not cover the
serious part of the parents' calling ; does not touch
the strenuous incessant efforts upon lines of law which
go to the producing of a human being at his best.

Nothing is trivial that concerns a child ; his foolish-
seeming words and ways are pregnant with meaning
for the wise. It is in the infinitely little we must
study the infinitely great ; and the vast possibilities,
and the right direction of education, are indicated in
the open book of the little child's thoughts.

A generation ago, a great teacher amongst us never
wearied of reiterating that in the Divine plan " the
family is the unit of the nation " : not the individual,
but the family. There is a great deal of teaching in
the phrase, but this lies on the surface ; the whole is
greater than the part, the whole contains the part,
owns the part, orders the part ; and this being so, the

6 HOME EDUCATION

children are the property of the nation, to be brought
up for the nation as is best for the nation, and not
according to the whim of individual parents. The
law is for the punishment of evil-doers, for the praise
of them that do well ; so, practically, parents have
very free play; but it is as well we should remember
that the children are a national trust whose bringing-
up is the concern of all — even of those unmarried and
childless persons whose part in the game is the rather
dreary one of * looking on.'

I. — A METHOD OF EDUCATION

Traditional Methods of Education. — Never was
it more necessary for parents to face for themselves
this question of education in all its bearings.
Hitherto, children have been brought up upon
traditional methods mainly. The experience of our
ancestors, floating in a vast number 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
advancing science is effecting in the theory of educa-
tion. 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 meantime, parents are thrown upon their own
resources, and absolutely must weigh principles, 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 without blame ; but now, the person of
the child is, whether rightly or wrongly, held sacred,

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 7

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 limita-
tions 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 Bailor 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 procession ; 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 children are apt to be made of
more account than 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

8 HOME EDUCATION

humane, the outcome of more widely spread physio-
logical 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 educa-
tion, fully thought out, fails — now, more than ever
before — to fulfil the claims his children have upon
him.

Method a Way to an End. — 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 educa-
tion 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 his 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 intention on his own
part, so easy and spontaneous is a method of educa-
tion based upon Natural Law. Does the child eat
or drink, does he come, or go, or play — all the time
he is being 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

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 9

Method, for instance, deserves the name, as having
been conceived and perfected by large-hearted edu-
cators 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 easier than a Method. — A ' system of
education ' is an alluring fancy ; 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 examinations, 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 achieving 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 dissipation 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.

Though system is highly useful as an instrument of

TO HOME EDUCATION

education, a 'system of education' is mischievous, as
producing only mechanical action instead of the vital
growth and movement of a living being.

It is worth while to point out the differing char-
acters of a system and a method, because 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 agree-
able than the constant watchfulness, the unforeseen
action, called for when the whole of a child's exist-
ence is to be used as the means of his education.
But who is sufficient for an education so compre-
hensive, 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 edu-
cation 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 chapters will be to put
these few fundamental principles before you in their
practical bearing. Meantime, let us consider one or
two preliminary questions.

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS II

II. — THE CHILDS ESTATE

The Child in the Midst. — And first, let us con-
sider where and what the little being is who is entrusted
to the care of human parents. A tablet to be written
upon ? A twig to be bent ? Wax to be moulded ?
Very likely ; but he is much more — a being belong-
ing 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 soul 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 best 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, whicn,
next after the Bible, shows the deepest insight into

12 HOME EDUCATION

what is peculiar to the children in their nature and
estate. " Of such is the kingdom of heaven." " Ex-
cept 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 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 sayings 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 we come
From God, who is our home."

Code of Education in the Gospels. —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 re-
quired of grown-up people is that they should do no
sort of injury to the children : Take heed that ye
01 ] KND «0/— 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

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 13

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.

HI. — OFFENDING THE CHILDREN

Offences. — The first and second of the Divine
edicts appear to include our sins of commission and
of omission against the children: we offend them,
when we do by 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 !

Children are born Law-abiding.—' Naughty
baby ! ' says the mother ; and the child's eyes droop,
and a flush rises over neck and brow. It is very

14 HOME EDUCATION

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 ought, 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!
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 into the sugar-bowl ; and
a pair of roguish eyes seeks hers furtively, to measure,
as they do unerringly, how far the little pilferer may
It is very amusing ; the mother ' cannot help
':ing'; 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-year-old child. He has learned
already that that which is ' naughty ' may yet be done

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 1$

with impunity, and he goes on improving his know-
ledge. 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; if 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.

They must perceive that their Governors are
Law-compelled. — Where is the beginning of this
tangle, spoiling the lives of parent and child alike?
In this: that the mother began with no sufficient
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 child has
never discovered a background of must 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-compelled 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

1 6 HOME EDUCATION

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 on any question of right
and wrong.

Parents may Offend their Children by Disre-
garding the Laws of Health. — 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.

And of the Intellectual Life. — 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, stultify his wits in a way he never gets
over. Many a little girl, especially, leaves the home
schoolroom with a distaste for all manner of learning,
an aversion to mental effort, which lasts her her life-
time, and that is why she grows up to read little but
trashy novels, and to talk all day about her clothes.

And of the Moral Life. — And her affections— the
movements of the outgoing tender child-heart — how
are they treated? There are few mothers who do
not take pains to cherish the family affections; but
when the child comes to have dealings with outsiders,

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS I/

do no worldly maxims and motives ever nip the buds
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 monopolise
what should have been 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 suppression 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 ? "

IV. — DESPISING THE CHILDREN

Children should have the best of their Mothers.
— 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

2

1 8 HOME EDUCATION

society of an ignorant nursemaid during the early
years when his whole nature is, like the photographer's
sensitive plate, receiving momently indelible impres-
sions ? Not but 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 stimulat-
ing 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.

'Nurse.' — 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
sense 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,
lie knows 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
e, violent, and tricky, and before the child is
able to speak plainly he will have caught
dispositions.

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 19

Children's Faults are Serious. — One of many
ways in which parents are apt to have too low an
opinion of their children 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 those offences, but in 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 wrong-doing, she will see that he is not too
young to have his fault corrected or prevented. Deal
with a child on \\isfirst offence, and a grieved look is
enough to convict the little transgressor ; but let him
go on until a habit of wrong-doing 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.

V. — HINDERING THE CHILDREN

A Child's Relationship with Almighty God. —
The most fatal way of despising the child falls under
the third educational law of the Gospels ; it is to over-
look and make light of his natural relationship with
Almighty God. "Suffer the little children to come

20 HOME EDUCATION

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 has no power to say her name, as the flowers turn
to the sun, so the hearts of the children turn to their
Saviour and God with unconscious delight and trust.

Nursery Theology. — 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 is 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 fill 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 parents 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 com-
parison 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
ciders to kindle the flame.

VI. — CONDITIONS OF HEALTHY BRAIN-ACTIVITY

Having just glanced at the wide region of for-
bidden ground, we are prepared to consider what it
is, definitely and positively, that the mother owes to
her child under the name of Education.

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 21

All Mind Labour means Wear of Brain. —
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 wonderful brain, 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.

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 work, 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 fitfully, and the man or
woman becomes eccentric, because wholesome mental
effort, like moral, must be carried on under the

22 HOME EDUCATION

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 depression from which poor Cowper suffered ;
the making of graceful 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 and pleasure :
and this for many higher reasons, but, in the first and
lowest place, that the mere physical organ of mind
and will may grow vigorous with work.

Rest. — Just as important is it that the brain
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 inde-
finite 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.

Rest after Meals. — The child has just had his
dinner, the meal of the day which most severely taxes

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 23

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
assisting 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, 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 work ; if the whole
afternoon cannot be spared for out-of-door recreation,
that is the time for mechanical tasks such as needle-
work, drawing, practising ; the children's wits are
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,
a id 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 ; but,
indeed, we owe it to the children to abolish evening
' preparation.'

Change of Occupation. — " There is," says Huxley,
" no satisfactory proof at present, that the manifes-

24 HOME EDUCATION

tation of any particular kind of mental faculty is
especially allotted to, or connected with, the activity
of any particular region of the cerebral hemispheres,"
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 function has been exercised too long. The
child has been doing sums for some time, and is
getting unaccountably 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 power to his
new work. School time-tables are usually drawn up
with a view to give the brain of the child variety
of work ; but the secret of the weariness children
often show in the home schoolroom is, that no such
judicious change of lessons is contrived.

Nourishment. — Again, the brain cannot do its work
will unless it be abundantly and suitably nourished ;
somebody 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 that every sort of intellectual
activity wastes the tissues of the brain ; a network
of vessels supplies an enormous quantity of blood to
the organ, 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.

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 2$

Certain Causes affect the Quality of the
Blood. — 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 ingredients are
required to make up for the various waste in the
tissues. The children are shocking spendthrifts ;
their endless goings and comings, their restlessness,
their energy, the very wagging of their tongues, all
mean expenditure of substance : 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, proportion-
ably, 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
laiger 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.

Concerning Meals.— What is the obvious con-
clusion ? That the child must be well fed. Half the
people of low vitality we come across are the victims
of low-feeding during their childhood ; and that more

26 HOME EDUCATION

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. Regular
meals at, usually, unbroken intervals — dinner, never
more than five hours after breakfast ; luncheon, un-
necessary ; 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 morning, is useful in pro-
moting those regular habits on which much of the
comfort of life depends.

Talk at Meals. — 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

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 27

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 dislike
his dinner, he swallows it, but the digestion of that
distasteful meal is a laborious, much-impeded process :
if the meal be 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 destroy-
ing 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 the same 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 incalculable. 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.

Variety in Meals. — But, given pleasant surround-
ings 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 Wed-
nesday, 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

28 HOME EDUCATION

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. Fish, especially if the
children dine off it without meat to follow, is excellent
as a change, the more so as it is rich in phosphorus
— a valuable 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 bodies from the starch and sugar
of their puddings. 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 drink ?
On the contrary, it is the underfed children who are
greedy, and unfit to be trusted with any unusual
delicacy.

Air as important as Food.— 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 iully oxygenated when the air

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 29

contains its full proportion of oxygen, and every
breathing and every burning object withdraws some
oxygen from the atmosphere. Hence the import-
ance of giving the children daily airings and abundant
exercise of limb and lung in unvitiated, unimpover-
ished air.

The Children Walk every Day.— ' The children
walk every day ; they are never out less than an
hour when the weather is suitable.' That is better
than nothing ; so is this : — An East London school-
mistress notices the pale looks of one of her best
girls. " Have you had any dinner, Nellie ? " " Ye-es "
(with hesitation). " What have you had ? " " Mother
gave Jessie and me a halfpenny to buy our dinners,
and we bought a haporth of aniseed drops — they
go further than bread " — with an appeal in her eyes
against possible censure for extravagance. Children
do not develop at their best upon aniseed drops for
dinner, nor upon an hour's ' constitutional ' daily.
Possibly science will bring home to us more and
more the fact that animal life, pent under cover, is
supported under artificial conditions, just as is plant
life in a glass house. Here is where most Continental
nations have the advantage over us ; they keep up
the habit of out-of-door life ; and as a consequence,
tne average Frenchman, German, Italian, Bulgarian,
is more joyous, more simple, and more hardy than the
average Englishman. Climate? Did not Charles II.
— and he knew — declare for the climate of England
because you could be abroad " more hours in the day
and more days in the year" in England than "in any
other country"? We lose sight of the fact that we
are not like that historical personage who " lived
upon nothing but victuals and drink." "You can't

30 HOME EDUCATION

live upon air ! " we say to the invalid who can't eat.
No ; we cannot live upon air ; but, if we must choose
among the three sustain.ers of life, air will support
us the longest. We know all about it ; we are deadly
weary of the subject ; let but the tail of your eye
catch ' oxygenation ' on a page, and the well-trained
organ skips that paragraph of its own accord. No
need to tell Macaulay's schoolboy, or anybody else,
how the blood of the body is brought to the lungs
and there spread about in a huge extent of innumer-
able ' pipes ' that it may be exposed momentarily to
the oxygen in the air ; how the air is made to blow
upon the blood, so spread out in readiness, by the
bellows-like action of breathing ; how the air pene-
trates the very thin walls of the pipes ; and then, behold,
a magical (or chemical) transmutation ; the worthless
sewage of the system becomes on the instant the
rich vivifying fluid whose function it is to build up
the tissues of muscle and nerve. And the Prospero
that wears the cloak? Oxygen, his name; and the
marvel that he effects within us some fifteen times in
the course of a minute is possibly without parallel
in the whole array of marvels which we ' tot up '
with easy familiarity, setting down ' life,' and carrying
— a cypher !

Oxygen has its Limitations. — We know all about
it ;' what we forget, perhaps, is, that even oxygen has
its limitation : nothing can act but where it is, and,
waste attends work, hold true for this vital gas as
for other matters. Fire and lamp and breathing
beings are all consumers of the oxygen which sustains
them. What follows ? Why, that this element, which
is present in the ratio of twenty-three parts to the
hundred in pure air, is subject to an enormous drain

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 31

within the four walls of a house, where the air is more
or less stationary. I am not speaking just now of
the vitiation of the air — only of the drain upon its
life-sustaining element. Think, again, of the heavy
drain upon the oxygen which must support the multi-
tudinous fires and many breathing beings congregated
in a large town ! ' What follows ? ' is a strictly vital
question. Man can enjoy the full measure of vigorous
joyous existence possible to him only when his blood
is fully aerated ; and this takes place when the air he
inhales contains its full complement of oxygen. Is it
too much to say that vitality is reduced, other things
being equal, in proportion as persons are house-
dwellers rather than open-air dwellers? The im-
poverished air sustains life at a low and feeble level ;
wherefore, in the great towns, stature dwindles,
the chest contracts, men hardly live to see their
children's children. True, we must needs have
houses for shelter from the weather by day and for
rest at night ; but in proportion as we cease to make
our houses ' comfortable,' as we regard them merely
as necessary shelters when we cannot be out of
doors, shall we enjoy to the full the vigorous vitality
possible to us.

Unchanged Air. — Parents of pale-faced town
children, think of these things ! The gutter children
who feed on the pickings of the streets are better off
(and healthier looking) in this one respect than your
cherished darlings, because they have more of the first
essential of life — air. There is some circulation of air
even in the slums of the city, and the child who spends
its days in the streets is better supplied with oxygen
than he who spends most of his hours in the
unchanged air of a spacious apartment. But it is not

32 HOME EDUCATION

the air of the streets the children want. It is the
delicious life-giving air of the country. The outlay of
the children in living is enormously in excess of the
outlay of the adult. The endless activity of the child,
while it develops muscle, is kept up at the expense
of very great waste of tissue. It is the blood which
carries material for the reparation of this loss. The
child must grow, every part of him, and it is the
blood which brings material for the building up of
new tissues. Again, we know that the brain is, out
of all proportion to its size, the great consumer
of the blood supply, but the brain of the child, what
with its eager activity, what with its twofold growth,
is insatiable in its demands !

'I feed Alice on beef tea.' — ' I feed Alice on beef
tea, cod-liver oil, and all sorts of nourishing things ;
but it's very disheartening, the child doesn't gain
flesh ! ' It is probable that Alice breathes for twenty-
two of the twenty-four hours the impoverished and
more or less vitiated air pent within the four walls
of a house. The child is practically starving ; for the
food she eats is very imperfectly and inadequately
converted into the aerated blood that feeds the tissues
of the body.

And if she is suffering from bodily inanition, what
about the eager, active, curious, hungering mind of
the little girl ? ( Oh, she has her lessons regularly
every day.' Probably : but' lessons which deal with
words, only the signs of things, are not what the
child wants. There is no knowledge so appropriate
to the early years of a child as that of the name and
look and behaviour in situ of every natural object
he can get at. " He hath so done His marvellous
works that they ought to be had in remembrance."

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 33

"Three years she grew in sun and shower,
Then Nature said, ' A lovelier flower

On earth was never sown :
This child I to myself will take :
She shall be mine, and I will make

A lady of my own.

" ' She shall be sportive as the fawn,
That wild with glee across the lawn

Or up the mountain springs ;
And hers shall be the breathing balm,
And hers the silence and the calm

Of mute, insensate things.

" ' The stars of midnight 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.' "

Indoor Airings. — About out-of-door airings we
shall have occasion to speak more fully ; but indoor
airings are truly as important, because, if the tissues
be 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 ventilated. We know
what it is to come in out of the fresh air and complain
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.

Ventilation. — Therefore, regular provision must
be made for the ventilation of rooms regardless of the

3

34 HOME EDUCATION

feelings of their inmates : at least an inch of window
open at the top, day and night, renders a room toler-
ably 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 cracks and
crannies in doors and floors. An open chimney is a
useful, though not a sufficient, ventilator ; it is
needless to say that the stopping-up of chimneys
in sleeping-rooms is suicidal. It is particularly im-
portant to accustom children to sleep with an inch
or two, or more, of open window all through the year
—as much more as you like in the summer.

Night Air Wholesome. — There is a popular
notion that night air is unwholesome ; 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 j;as. When the chil-
dren 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.

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 in minute, red disc-
like bodies, known as red corpuscles, which in favour-
able circumstances are produced freely in the blood
itself. Now, it is ohs'Tvcd that people who live much
in the sunshine are of a ruddy countenance — that is, a

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 35

great many of these red corpuscles are present in
their blood ; while the poor souls who live in cellars
and sunless alleys have skins the colour of whity-
brown paper. Therefore, it is concluded that light
and sunshine are favourable to the production of red
corpuscles 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 at-
tended 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 many-folded tube, and each such pore
is employed without a moment's cessation, while the
body is in health, in discharging perspiration — that
is, the waste of the tissues — upon the skin.

Insensible Perspiration. — 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 con-
siderable 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

36 HOME EDUCATION

the blood are closed, and, though the remaining sur-
face 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 duly nourished, it is important to keep the
whole surface of the skin in a condition to throw off
freely the excretions of the blood.

Daily Bath and Porous Garments. — Two con-
siderations follow : of the first, the necessity for 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 un refreshed ? From the one cause :
their coverings have impeded the passage of the
insensible perspiration, 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 sensa-

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 37

tions which follow sensible perspiration. We should
be the 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 woollen material.

We might say much on this one question, the due
nutrition 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.

I fear the reader may be inclined to think that I
am inviting his attention for the most part to a few
physiological matters — the lowest round of the educa-
tional ladder. The lowest round it may be, 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 pre-
sent 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. For example, is it easier to be
amiable, kindly, candid, with or without a headache
or an attack of neuralgia ?

VII. — 'THE REIGN OF LAW ' IN EDUCATION

Common Sense and Good Intentions. — Besides,
though this physical culture of the brain may be
only the groundwork of education, the method of it

38 HOME EDUCATION

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 often, 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.

Law-abiding Lives often more blameless than
Pious Lives. — 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 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
allegiance to Almighty God which we recognise as
religion — not the wickedness, but the goodness of a
school which refuses to admit any such dependence
and allegiance.

My sense of this danger is my reason for offering
the little I have to say upon the subject of education,
— my sense of the danger, and the assurance I feel
that it is no such great danger after all, but one that
parents of the cultivated class are competent to deal

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 39

with, and are precisely the only persons who can deal
with it.

* Mind ' and ' Matter ' equally governed by Law.
— As for this superior morality of some non-believers,
supposing 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 recognising 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. Con-
versely, that they who take no pains to study the
principles which govern human action and human
thought miss the blessings of obedience to certain
laws, though they may inherit the better blessings
which come of acknowledged relationship with the
Lawgiver.

Antagonism to Law shown by some Religious
Persons. — 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.

40 HOME EDUCATION

It is nothing to him that he is fearfully and wonder-
fully 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 unbelief, 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 meantime, 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 ? "

Parents must acquaint themselves with the
Principles of Physiology and Moral Science.—
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 observance of which will guide
into truthfulness, diligence, and uprightness of char-
acter. For this, also, is the law of God. Observe,
not into the knowledge of God, the thing best worth
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 educa-

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS 4!

tion of the human race, and that the parent may not
disregard them with impunity. My endeavour in this
and the following volumes of the series will be 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 this short compass must be very
imperfect and very incomplete ; but a hint here and
there may be enough to put intelligent parents on
profitable lines of thinking with regard to the edu-
cation of their children.

PART II

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN
I. — A GROWING TIME

Meals out of Doors. — 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 deliciously 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 is this to be considered : meals taken al
fresco are usually joyous, and there is nothing like
gladness for converting meat and drink into healthy

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 43

blood and tissue. All the time, too, the children
are storing up memories of a happy childhood.
Fifty years hence they will see the shadows of the
boughs making patterns on the white tablecloth ; and
sunshine, children's laughter, hum of bees, and scent
of flowers are being bottled up for after refreshment.

For Dwellers in Towns and Suburbs. — 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
six 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.

Possibilities of a Day in the Open. — ' 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 prevented during these long hours
in the open air. And long hours they should be;

44 HOME EDUCATION

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 practicable in any household, but
what seems to me absolutely best for the children ; and
that, in the faith that mothers work wonders once
they are convinced that wonders are demanded of
them. A journey of twenty minutes by rail or omni-
bus, and a luncheon basket, will make a day in the
country possible 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 bept 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 know-
ledge of hers. Then, there is much to be got by

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 45

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.

No Story-Books. — 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 ? And here, is there not infinitely more
displayed for their delectation ? Our wise mother,
arrived, first sends the children to let off their spirits
in a wild scamper, with cry, halloo, and hullaballoo,
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 up 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 may get.

II. — ' 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

46 HOME EDUCATION

brook, hedge or copse. This is an exercise that
delights children, and may be endlessly varied, carried
on in the spirit of a game, and yet with the exactness
and carefulness of a lesson.

How to See. — ' 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 suppose 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, 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 right-hand 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 the
wonderful apple tree; I should think there are a
million apples on it, all ripe and rosy!' 'A million,
Fanny ? ' ' 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.

Educational Uses of Sight-seeing.' — This is all
play to the children, but the mother is doing invalu-
able work; she is training iheir powers of observation

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 47

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 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, — then the mother
considers, pronounces, and, full of glee, he carries her
off to see for herself.

Discriminating Observation. — By degrees the
children will leam discriminatingly every feature of
the landscapes with which they are familiar ; and
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, in-
complete, 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 a lapse of

48 HOME EDUCATION

years, those features can rarely be recalled of which
the child was not cognisant when he saw them before
him.

III. — ' PICTURE-PAINTING '

Method of.— 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 well 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 this 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 under-
neath. 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 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.

Strain on the Attention. — This, too, is an exer-
cise children delight in, but, as it involves some

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 49

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.

Seeing Fully and in Detail. — 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 sympathetic,
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
describing 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 anything
lovely or interesting, she looks at it until she has the
picture in her c mind's eye ' ; and then she carries it

4

50 HOME EDUCATION

away with her, her own for ever, a picture ' on view '
just when she wants it.

A Means of After- Solace and Refreshment. —
It would be difficult to overrate this habit 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 me
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 sim-
plicity, 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

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 51

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.

IV.— FLOWERS AND TREES

Children should know Field-crops. — In the
course of this 'sight-seeing' and 'picture-painting,'
opportunities will occur to make the children familiar
with rural objects 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 ploughing of the land to the
getting in of the crops.

Field Flowers and the Life-History of Plants.
— Milkwort, eyebright, 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 the 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 Flowers1 very useful,
with its coloured plates, like enough to identify the
flowers by, common English names, and pleasant
facts and fancies that the children delight in. To
1 See Appendix A.

52 HOME EDUCATION

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 much happy occupa-
tion and, at the same time, much useful training:
better still is it to accustom children to make careful
brush drawings of the flowers that interest them, of
the whole plant where possible.

The Study of Trees. — 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 be their year-
long friends. In the winter, they will observe the
light tresses of the birch, the knotted arms of the
oak, 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; life stirs in the beautiful mystery of the
leaf-buds, a nest of delicate baby-leaves lying in
downy warmth within many waterproof wrappings;
oak and elm, beech and birch, each has its own way
of folding and packing its leaflets ; observe the ' ruby-
budded lime ' and the ash, with its pretty stag's foot
of a bud, not green but black —

" More black than ash-buds in the front of March."

The Seasons should be followed. — 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 pistil-
late 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

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 53

breaking out of all the 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.

Leigh Hunt on Flowers.— "Suppose," says
Leigh Hunt, " suppose flowers themselves 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
bud gradually unfolding like the leaf, amazing us,
enchanting us, almost alarming us with delight, as if
we knew not what enchantment were to ensue, till
at length, in all its fairy beauty, and odorous
voluptuousness, and mysterious elaboration 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 unspeakable 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

54 HOME EDUCATION

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.

Calendars. — It is a capital plan for children to
keep a calendar — the first oak-leaf, the first tad-
pole, 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 will, every year, 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.'

Nature-Diaries. — As soon as he is able to keep it
himself, a nature-diary is a source of delight to a
child. Every day's walk gives him something to
enter : three squirrels in a larch tree, a jay flying
across such a field, a caterpillar climbing up a nettle,
a snail eating a cabbage leaf, a spider dropping
suddenly to the ground, where he found ground ivy,
how it was growing and what plants were growing
with it, how bindweed or ivy manages to climb.

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 55

Innumerable matters to record occur to the intelligent
child. While he is quite young (five or six), he
should begin to illustrate his notes freely with brush-
drawings ; he should have a little help at first in
mixing colours, in the way of principles, not directions.
He should not be told to use now this and now that,
but, ' we get purple by mixing so and so,' and then he
should be left to himself to get the right tint. As
for drawing, instruction has no doubt its time and
place ; but his nature-diary should be left to his own
initiative. A child of six will produce a dandelion,
poppy, daisy, iris with its leaves, impelled by the
desire to represent what he sees, with surprising
vigour and correctness.

An exercise book1 with stiff covers serves for a
nature-diary, but care is necessary in choosing paper
that answers both for writing and brush-drawing.

'I can't stop thinking.' — 'But I can't stop
thinking ; I can't make my mind sit down ! ' Poor
little girl ! All children owe you thanks for giving
voice to their dumb woes. And we grown-up people
have so little imagination, that we send a little boy
with an over-active brain to play by himself in the
garden in order to escape the fag of lessons. Little
we know how the brain -people swarm in and out and
rush about!

" The human (brain) is like a millstone, turning ever round and

round ;
If it have nothing else to grind, it must itself be ground."

Set the child to definite work by all means, and give
him something to grind. But, pray, let him work

1 Nature note-books maybe had at the P.N.E.U. Office, 26 Victoria
Street. See Appendix A.

56 HOME EDUCATION

with things and not with signs — the things of Nature
in their own places, meadow and hedgerow, woods and
shore.

v. — 'LIVING CREATURES'

A Field of Interest and Delight. — 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 dis-
appearing, 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 Lord
Avebury has 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 the late
Dean 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 questioning the class, found that not
one of them had ever seen a bee. ' Had never seen
a bee ! Think for a moment,9 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

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 57

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 a ' humble ' from a honey-bee !

Children should be encouraged to Watch.—
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 whatever of larger growth comes in
their way. ' The creatures 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 children are blest were
made to see, and see into, the doings of creatures
too small for the unaided observation of older people.
Ants may be brought under home observation in the
following way : — Get two pieces of glass I foot square,
three strips of glass \\\ inches long, and one strip
ii inches long, these all \ inch wide. The glass
must be carefully cut so as to fit exactly. Place the
four strips of glass upon one of the sheets of glass
and fix in an exact square, leaving a J inch opening,
with seccotine or any good fixer. Get from an
ant-hill about twelve ants (the yellow ants are best,
as the red are inclined to be quarrelsome), a few eggs,
and one queen. The queen will be quite twice as
large as an ordinary ant, and so can be easily seen.
Take some of the earth of the ant-hill. Put the earth
with your ants and eggs upon the sheet of glass and
fix the other sheet above, leaving only the small hole
in one corner, made by the shorter strip, which should
be stopped with a bit of cotton-wool. The ants will
be restless for perhaps forty-eight hours, but will then
begin to settle and arrange the earth. Remove the
wool plug once a week, and replace it alter putting

58 HOME EDUCATION

two or three drops of honey on it. Once in three
weeks remove the plug to drop in with a syringe
about ten drops of water. This will not be necessary
in the winter while the ants are asleep. This 'nest'
will last for years.

With regard to the horror which some children
show of beetle, spider, worm, that is usually a trick
picked up from grown-up people. Kingsley's chil-
dren 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 recognise the
description of an old friend.

The Force of Public Opinion in the Home.—
Some children are born naturalists, with a bent in-
herited, perhaps, from an 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

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 59

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 nor a boulder
within miles of Selborne, escaped their eager examina-
tion. Audubon, the American ornithologist, is another
instance of the effect of this kind of early training.
" When I had hardly learned to walk," he says, " 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 generally accompanied my steps, procured birds
and flowers for me, and pointed out the elegant move-
ments 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 all,
their change of livery, thus exciting me to study them,
and to raise my mind towards their great Creator."

What Town Children can Do. — Town children
may get a great deal of pleasure in watching 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. But
much may be done with sparrows. A friend writes :
— " Have you seen the man in the gardens of the
Tuileries feeding and talking to dozens of them ?
They sit on his hat, his hands, and feed from his
fingers. When he raises his arms they all flutter
up and then settle again on him and round him.
I have watched him call a sparrow from a dis-
tance by name and refuse food to all others till

60 HOME EDUCATION

'petit choul a pretty pied sparrow, came for his
destined bit. Others had their names and came at
call, but I could not see any distinguishing feature ;
and the crowd of sparrows on the walk, benches and
railing, formed a most attentive audience to the bright
French talk which kept them in constant motion as they
were, here one and there another, invited to come for a
tempting morsel. Truly a St Francis and the birds !"
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 shuffling
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 it 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 because, 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

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 6 1

and Latin. For the evil is, that children get their
knowledge of natural history, like all their know-
ledge, at second hand. 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 blase 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 — curious eager little
souls, all agog to explore so much of this wonderful
world as they can get at, as quite their first business
in life.

" He prayeth best who loveth best

All things both great and small ;
For the dear God who loveth us,

He made and loveth all."

Nature Knowledge the most important for
Young Children. — 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 children as that which they get for themselves
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.

Mental Training of a Child Naturalist. — Con-
sider, too, what an unequalled mental training the
child-naturalist is getting for any study or calling
under the sun — the powers of attention, of discrimi-
nation, of patient pursuit, growing with his growth,
what will they not fit him for? Besides, life is so

62 HOME EDUCATION

interesting to him, that he has no time for the
faults of temper which generally have their source in
ennui \ there is no reason why he should be peevish
or sulky or obstinate when he is always kept well
amused.

Nature Work especially valuable for Girls. —
I say ' he ' from force of habit, as speaking of the
representative 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 ?

VI. — FIELD-LORE AND NATURALISTS' BOOKS

Reverence for Life. — 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 which should
necessitate the pulling of flowers to bits ; much less
should they be permitted to injure or destroy any
(not noxious) form of animal life. Reverence for life,

OUT-OF DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 63

as a wonderful and awful gift, which a ruthless
child may destroy but never can restore, is a lesson
of first importance to the child : —

" 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 under-
stand that science itself is in a sense sacred and
demands some sacrifices, all the 'common informa-
tion' they have been gathering until then, and the
habits of observation they have acquired, will form
a capital groundwork for a scientific education. In
the meantime, let them consider the lilies of the field
and the fowls of the air.

Rough Classification at First Hand. — For con-
venience in describing they should be able to name
and distinguish petals, sepals, and so on ; and they
should be encouraged to make such rough classifica-
tions 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

64 HOME EDUCATION

in the noticing of differences 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, is 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 himself, cultivates
no power but that of verbal memory, and a phrase
or two of ' Tamil ' or other unknown tongue, learnt
off, would serve that purpose just as well.

Uses of 'Naturalists" Books.— The real use of
naturalists' books at this stage is to give the child
delightful glimpses into the world of wonders he lives
in, to reveal the sort of things to be seen by curious
eyes, and fill him with desire to make discoveries
for himself. There are many l to be had, all pleasant
reading, many of them written by scientific men, and
yet requiring little or no scientific knowledge for
their enjoyment.

Mothers and Teachers should know about
Nature. — 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

1 Kingsley's Water Babies and Madam How and Lady Why.
All Mrs Brightwen's books. Miss Buckley's (Mrs Fisher) ' Eyes and
no Eyes ' Series. Life and her Children, etc. All Seton-Thompson's
books. Long's The School of the Woods, The Little Brother of the
Bear. Kearton's Wild Nature's Ways. Living Animals of the World.

:

to spenc

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 65

to spend an hour or two in the society of children,
should make herself mistress of this sort of informa-
tion ; 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.

VII. — THE CHILD GETS KNOWLEDGE BY MEANS
OF HIS SENSES

Nature's Teaching. — 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 new 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 super-
cilious grown-up people give him to ' keep him quiet*
The child is at his lessons, and is learning all about
it at a rate 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.

5

66 HOME EDUCATION

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 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, under-
stand, reason ; what material will he have, unless 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 mid-winter, 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.

Overpressure. — 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,

ou

fV»*a crkff

i

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 67

the sort of work for which the present state of his
mental development does not fit him. Who expects
a boy in petticoats to lift half a hundredweight ? But
give the child work that Nature intended for him, and
he quantity he can get through with ease is practi-
cally unlimited. Whoever saw a child tired of seeing,
of examining in his own way, unfamiliar 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.

Object Lessons. — Now, how far is this craving
for natural sustenance met? In infant and kinder-
garten schools, by the object lesson, which is good
so far as it goes, but is sometimes like that bean a
day on which the Frenchman fed his horse. The
child at home has more new things brought under his
notice, if with less method. Neither at home nor
at school is much effort made to set before the child
the abundant ' feast of eyes ' which his needs demand.

A Child learns from 'Things.'— We older
people, partly because of our maturer 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 know-
ing all about it ; knowledge of things flies to the
mind of a child as steel filings to a magnet. And,
pari passu with his knowledge of things, his vocab-
ulary grows ; for it is a law of the mind that what
we know, we struggle to express. This fact accounts

68 HOME EDUCATION

for many of the apparently aimless questions of
children ; they are in quest, not of knowledge, but of
words to express the knowledge they have. 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.

The Sense of Beauty comes from Early Con-
tact with Nature. — 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 neighbourhood 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 arc linked with the mere observation
of Nature and natural objects. " The (esthetic 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 ex-
ternal Nature " ; while he quotes Dr Morcll, 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 instruction.1'

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 69

Most Grown Men lose the Habit of Obser-
vation.— Thus, we owe something to Mr Evans for
taking his little daughter Mary Anne with him on
his long business drives among the pleasant War-
wickshire 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 Copperfield 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 may 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.

VIII. — THE CHILD SHOULD BE MADE FAMILIAR
WITH NATURAL OBJECTS

the'

An Observant Child should be put in the
way of Things worth Observing.— But what is
the use of being ' a very observant child/ if you are

70 HOME EDUCATION

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 streets become nimble-witted
enough. But the scraps of information 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 be 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.
Every Natural Object a Member of a Series.—
Now take up a natural object, it does not matter
what, and you are studying one of a group, a member
of a series ; whatever knowledge you get about it is
so much towards the science which includes all of
its kind. Break off an elder twig in the spring ; you
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 bearing 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.

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 71

Power will pass, more and more, into the
hands of Scientific Men. — 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 — 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 be able to rule, they will be able to act,
because they have taken the trouble to learn the facts
and the laws of Nature."

Intimacy with Nature makes for Personal
Well-being. — 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, im-
planted 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 threat-
ened daily to plunge him into recklessness, if not into
sin, upon hunting out and collecting, through rock
and bog, snow and tempest, every bird and egg of
the neighbouring forest. ... I have seen the young
London beauty, amid all the excitement and tempta-
tion of luxury and flattery, with her heart pure, and
her mind occupied in a boudoir full of shells and

72 HOME EDUCATION

fossils, flowers and seaweeds, keeping herself unspotted
from the world, by considering the lilies of the field,
how they grow."

IX.— OUT-OF-DOOR GEOGRAPHY

Small Things may teach. Great. — After this
long digression, intended to impress upon mothers
the supreme importance of stirring up in their chil-
dren 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/ said an advanced young theorist with all
sorts of certificates.

Pictorial Geography. — But the mother, who
knows better, will find a hundred opportunities to
teach geography by the way : a duck-pond is a lake
or an inland sea ; any brooklet will serve to illustrate
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 meadow, 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.

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 73

The Position of the Sun. — And not 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, Rain, Snow, and Hail. — "Clouds and
rain, snow and hail, winds and vapours, fulfilling His
word" — are all everyday mysteries that the mother
will be called upon to explain faithfully, however
simply. There are certain ideas which children
must get from within a walking radius of their own
home if ever they are to have a real understanding of
maps and of geographical terms.

Distance is one of these, and the first idea
of distance is to be attained by what children find
a delightful operation. A child walks at his usual
pace ; somebody measures and tells him the length
of his pace, and he measures the paces of his brothers
and sisters. Then such a walk, such a distance,
here and there, is solemnly paced, and a little sum
follows — so many inches or feet covered by each
pace equals so many yards in the whole distance.
Various short distances about the child's home
should be measured in this way ; and when the idea
of covering distance is fully established, the idea of
time as a means of measurement should be intro-
duced. The time taken to pace a hundred yards
should be noted down. Having found out that it
takes two minutes to pace a hundred yards, children
will be able for the next step — that if they have

74 HOME EDUCATION

walked for thirty minutes, the walk should measure
fifteen hundred yards ; in thirty-five minutes they
would have walked a mile, or rather seventeen hundred
and fifty yards, and then they could add the ten yards
more which would make a mile. The longer the legs
the longer the pace, and most grown people can walk
a mile in twenty minutes.

Direction. — By the time they have got somewhat
familiar with the idea of distance, that of direction
should be introduced. The first step is to make
children observant of the progress of the sun. The
child who observes the sun for a year and notes down
for himself, or dictates, the times of his rising and
setting for the greater part of the year, and the points
of his rising and setting, will have secured a basis for
a good deal of definite knowledge. Such observation
should take in the reflection of the sun's light, the
evening light reflected by east windows, the morning
light by west windows; the varying length and
intensity of shadows, the cause of shadows, to be
learned by the shadow cast by a figure between the
blind and a candle. He should associate, too, the hot
hours of the day with the sun high overhead, and the
cool hours of the morning and evening with alow sun ;
and should be reminded, that if he stands straight
before the fire, he feels the heat more than if he were in
a corner of the room. When he is prepared by a little
observation of the course of the sun, he is ready to
take in the idea of direction, which depends entirely
upon the sun.

East and West. — Ot course the two first ideas
are that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west ;
from this fact he will be able to tell the direction in
which the places near his own home, or the streets of

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 75

his own town, lie. Bid him stand so that his right
hand is towards the east where the sun rises, and his
left towards the west where the sun sets. Then he is
looking towards the north and his back is towards
the south. All the houses, streets and towns on his
right hand are to the east of him, those on the left
are to the west. The places he must walk straight
forward to reach are north of him, and the places
behind him are to the south. If he is in a place new
to him where he has never seen the sun rise or set and
wants to know in what direction a certain road runs,
he must notice in what direction his own shadow falls
at twelve o'clock, because at noon the shadows of all
objects fall towards the north. Then if he face the
north, he has, as before, the south behind him, the east
on his right hand, the west on his left ; or if he face
the sun at noon, he faces south.

Practice in finding Direction. — This will throw
an interesting light for him on the names of our great
railways. A child may become ready in noticing the
directions of places by a little practice. Let him
notice how each of the windows of his schoolroom
faces, or the windows of each of the rooms in his
home; the rows of houses he passes in his walks,
and which are the north, south, east and west sides
of the churches he knows. He will soon be prepared
to notice the direction of the wind by noticing the
smoke from the chimneys, the movement of branches,
corn, grass, etc. If the wind blow from the north —
€ The north wind doth blow and we shall have snow.'
If it blow from the west, a west wind, we expect
rain. Care must be taken at this point to make it
clear to the child that the wind is named after the
quarter it comes from, and not from the point it

76 HOME EDUCATION

blows towards — just as he is English because he
was born in England, and not French because he
goes to France. The ideas of distance and direction
may now be combined. Such a building is two
hundred yards to the east of the gate, such a village
two miles to the west. He will soon come across the
difficulty, that a place is not exactly east or west,
north or south. It is well to let him give, in a round-
about way, the direction of places as — ' more to the
east than the west,' ' very near the east but not quite,'
' half-way between east and west.' He will value the
exact means of expression all the more for having
felt the need of them.

Later, he should be introduced to the wonders of
the mariner's compass, should have a little pocket com-
pass of his own, and should observe the four cardinal
and all the other points. These will afford him the
names for directions that he has found it difficult to
describe.

Compass Drill. — Then he should do certain
compass drill in this way : Bid him hold the N of
the compass towards the north. " Then, with the
compass in your hand, turn towards the east, and
you will see a remarkable thing. The little needle
moves, too, but moves quite by itself in just the
other direction. Turn to the west, and again the
needle moves in the opposite direction to that in
which you move. However little you turn, a little
quiver of the needle follows your movement. And
you look at it, wondering how the little thing could
perceive you had moved, when you hardly knew
it yourself. Walk straight on in any direction,
and the needle is fairly steady; only fairly steady,
because you are sure, without intending it, to move a

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 77

little to the right or left. Turn round very slowly,
a little bit at a time, beginning at the north and
turning towards the east, and you may make the
needle also move round in a circle. It moves in
the opposite direction to yourself, for it is trying to
get back to the north from which you are turning."

Boundaries. — The children having got the idea
of direction, it will be quite easy to introduce that
of boundaries — such and such a turnip field, for
instance, is bounded by the highroad on the south,
by a wheat crop on the south-east, a hedge on the
north-east, and so on ; the children getting by
degrees the idea that the boundaries of a given
space are simply whatever touches it on every side.
Thus one crop may touch another without any
dividing line, and therefore one crop bounds the
other. It is well that children should get clear
notions on this subject, or, later, they will be vague
when they learn that such a county is ' bounded '
by so and so. In connection with bounded spaces,
whether they be villages, towns, ponds, fields, or
what not, children should be led to notice the
various crops raised in the district, why pasture-
lands and why cornfields, what manner of rocks
appear, and how many sorts of trees grow in the
neighbourhood. For every field or other space that
is examined, they should draw a rude plan in the
sand, giving the shape roughly and lettering the
directions as N, S, W, etc.

Plans. — By-and-by, when they have learned to draw
plans indoors, they will occasionally pace the length of
a field and draw their plan according to scale, allow-
ing an inch for five or for ten yards. The ground-
plans of garden, stables, house, etc., might follow.

78 HOME EDUCATION

Local Geography.— It is probable that a child's
own neighbourhood will give him opportunities to
learn the meaning of hill and dale, pool and brook,
watershed, the current, bed, banks, tributaries of a
brook, the relative positions of villages and towns ;
and all this local geography he must be able to
figure roughly on a plan done with chalk on a rock, or
with walking-stick in the gravel, perceiving the relative
distances and situations of the places he marks.

X. — THE CHILD AND MOTHER-NATURE

The Mother must refrain from too much
Talk. — 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 teach-
ing 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 in any given second.

Making a New Acquaintance. — 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 examination 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

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 79

than one or two such presentations should occur in a
single day.

Now, see how much leisure there is left ! 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 themselves.
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, irra-
tional doings, but, all the time, a fashioning is going
on : Nature is doing her part, with the vow —

" This child I to myself will take :
She shall be mine, and I will make
A lady of my own." l

Two Things permissible to the Mother. — There

is one thing 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
flow 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

1 Wordsworth.

SO HOME EDUCATION

on this ground with hard 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 Me
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.

XI.— 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 uninviting after the discussion of much
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 French Lesson. — The daily French lesson
is that which should not be omitted. That children
should learn French orally, by listening to and repeat-
ing 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
meantime, it is so important to keep tongue and

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 8 1

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.

Noisy Games. — 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. Meanwhile, 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 ; children love to indulge in cries
and shouts and view-halloos, and this ' rude ' and
1 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, training, use, work. Still,

6

82 HOME EDUCATION

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 off 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.

'Rond.es.' — Before Puritan innovations made us a
staid and circumspect people, English lads and lasses
of all ages danced out little dramas on the village
green, 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 gatherings
of the children, — and they are well worth preserving
'There came three dukes a-riding, a-riding, a-riding'
' Oranges and lemons, say the bells of St Clement's '
' Here we come gathering nuts in May ' ; * What has
my poor prisoner done ? ' and many more, all set to
delightful sing-song airs that 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 introduce games of this, or rather of a
more educational kind ; but is it not a fact that the
singing games of the kindergarten are apt to be
somewhat inane? Also, it is doubtful how far the
prettiest plays, learnt at school and from a teacher,
will take hold of the children as do the games which
have 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.

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 83

Skipping-rope and Shuttlecock. — Cricket, tennis,
and rounders are the games par excellence 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 bring-
ing 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. Races 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, throw-
ing it backwards 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 Austen 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 may be 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 recom-
mendation, 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. — Climbing is an amusement not much in
favour with mothers ; torn garments, bleeding knees,

84 HOME EDUCATION

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 exercise is so admirable
— the body being thrown into endless graceful pos-
tures which bring every muscle into play, — and
the training in pluck, daring, and resource so invalu-
able, 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 every-
body 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, there-
fore, of delight.

Clothing. — 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 many advantages over cotton, and more

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 85

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
woollen, who has become heated in play, does not
suffer a chill from the sudden loss of this heat, as
does the child in linen garments ; also, he is cooler
in the sunshine, and warmer in the shade.

XII.— WALKS IN BAD WEATHER

Winter Walks as necessary as Summer
Walks. — 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 important ; for who that could
would not be 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 afternoon.

Pleasures connected with Frost and Snow. —
When frost and snow are on the ground children have
verv festive times, what with sliding, snow-balling,
and snow-building. But even on the frequent days
when it is dirty under foot and dull over head they
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.

Winter Observations. — All that has been said
about * sight-seeing ' and ' picture-painting,' the little
French talk, and observations to be noted in the

86 HOME EDUCATION

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. The party 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, the
children 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 corners where the fence screens them."

" The sun, with ruddy orb
Ascending, fires the horizon."

" Every herb and every spiry 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
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.

Habit of Attention. — Winter walks, too, whether
in town or country, give great opportunities for
cultivating the habit of attention. The famous con-
jurer, Robert Houdin, relates in his autobiography,
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

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 87

objects momentarily seen in passing. The boy sur-
passed 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 educa-
tional amusement for many a winter's walk.

Wet Weather Tramps.— 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 garment
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.

Outer Garments for. — Children should have
woollen rain -garments — made of coarse serge, for
instance, — to be changed the moment they return
from a walk, 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-by the cloths dry, and are dipped again : what
has become of the water? It has evaporated, 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,'

88 HOME EDUCATION

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 Richter'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 con-
siderable 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. A mere time and distance tramp is
sufficiently joyous for a wet day, for, taken good-
humouredly, the beating rain itself is exhilarating.
The ' long run ' of the schoolboy, that is, a steady trot,
breaking now and then into a run, is capital exercise ;
but regard must be had to the powers of the children,
who must not be overdone.

Precautions. — At the same time, children should
never be allowed to sit or stand about in damp
clothes ; and here is the use of waterproof 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.

XIII. — ' RED INDIAN ' LIFE

Scouting. — Baden Powell's little book about Scout-
ing set us upon a new track. Hundreds of families
make joyous expeditions, far more educative than
they dream, wherein scouting is the order of the day.

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 89

For example, one party of four or more lies in ambush,
— the best ambush to be had, which is pitched upon
after much consideration. The enemy scouts ; first
he finds the ambush, and then his skill is shown in
getting within touch of the alert foe without being
discovered. But every family should possess Scouting
in default of the chance of going on the war-path with
a Red Indian. The evil of the ready-made life we
lead is that we do not discern the signs of the times.
An alert intelligence towards what goes on in the
open-air world is a great possession, and, strongly as
we sympathise with the effort made to put down
bird's-nesting, we shall lose, if we are not careful, one
of the few bits of what we may call 'Red Indian'
training still within our reach.

Bird-stalking. — But bird 'stalking,' ta adapt a
name, is a great deal more exciting and delightful
than bird's-nesting, and we get our joy at no cost of
pain to other living things. All the skill of a good
scout comes into play. Think, how exciting to creep
noiselessly as shadows behind river-side bushes on
hands and knees without disturbing a twig or a pebble
till you get within a yard of a pair of sandpipers, and
then, lying low, to watch their dainty little runs, pretty
tricks of head and tail, and to hear the music of their
call. And here comes in the real joy of bird stalking.
If in the winter months the children have become fairly
familiar with the notes of our resident birds, they will
be able in the early summer to ' stalk ' to some purpose.
The notes and songs in June are bewildering, but the
plan is to single out those you are quite sure of, and
then follow up the others. The key to a knowledge
of birds is knowledge of their notes, and the only way
to get this is to follow any note of which you are not

QO HOME EDUCATION

sure. The joy of tracking a song or note to its source
is the joy of a ' find,' a possession for life.

But bird-stalking is only to be done upon certain
conditions. You must not only be ' most mousy-quiet,'
but you must not even let a thought whisper, for if
you let yourself think about anything else, the entirely
delightful play of bird-life passes by you unobserved ;
nay, the very bird notes are unheard.

Here are two bird walks communicated by a bird-
lover : —

"We heard a note something like a chaffinch's,
only slower, and we looked up in the boughs of the
ash to try and track the bird by the sudden quiver of
one twig here, another, there. We found a steep, rocky
path which brought us almost level with the tree tops,
and then we had a good view of the shy little willow
wren busily seeking food. A note from the next tree
like a bubbling of song drew us further on, and then
we found the wood wren and watched him as with up-
turned head and bubbling throat he uttered his trill.

" A joyous burst of song came from a bush near by,
and we crept on, to find a blackcap warbler with
upraised crest turning excitedly round and round in
the ecstasy of song. We waited, and traced him to
his next station by his light touch on the branches.
A hoarse screech from another tree announced a green-
finch, and we had a long chase to get a glimpse of him ;
but he came to an outstanding twig, and then we
heard his pretty song, which I should never have
guessed to be his had we not seen him at it. A little
squeaky note made us watch the tree trunks, and,
sure enough, there was a tree-creeper running up and
round and round an ash, uttering his note all the time.

" Another day we got behind a wall from which

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 9!

we could examine a field that lay beside the lake.
There was the green plover with his jaunty crest,
running and pecking, and, as he pecked, we caught
sight of the rosy flash under his tail. We waited,
hoping for more, for the plovers stand so still that
they are lost in their surroundings. But someone
coughed, and up went the plovers, a dozen of them,
with their weary taunt, ' Why don't you let us alone ? '
Their distress roused other birds, and we saw a snipe
rise from the water edge, a marshy place, with hasty
zigzag flight ; it made a long round and settled not
much further than where it rose. The sandpipers rose,
two flying close to the water's edge, whistling all the
time. By the side of a little gully we watched a wag-
tail, and presently a turn in the sunshine showed us the
yellow breast of the yellow wagtail. A loud ' tis-sic '
near us drew our eyes to the wall, and there stood
a pied wagtail with full beak, waiting to get rid of
us before visiting his nest in the wall. We crept
away and sheltered behind a tree, and after a few
minutes' waiting we saw him go into his hole. An
angry chatter near by (like a broom on Venetian
blinds!) directed our eyes to a little brown wren
on the wall with cocked-up tail, but in a minute he
disappeared like a mouse over the side."

This is from another bird-lover : —

" Now, they (the children) are beginning to care more
for the birds than the eggs, and their first question,
instead of being, * What is the egg like ? ' is usually
' What is the bird like ? ' We have great searching
through Morris's British Birds l to identify birds we
have seen and to make quite sure of doubtful points.

1 John's British Birds > which costs as many shillings as Morris's does
guineas, is better for beginners.

Q2 HOME EDUCATION

" But now for the birds. Stonechats abound on the
heaths. I pricked myself up to my knees standing
in a gorse-patch watching and listening to the first I
saw, but I was quite rewarded, and saw at least four
pairs at one time. Do you know the birds ? The
cock birds are such handsome little fellows, black head
and mask, white collar, rufous breast and dark grey or
brown back. They have a pretty little song, rather
longer than a chaffinch's, besides the chit-chat cry
when they are disturbed. They do not make a
long flight, and will hover in the air like a flycatcher.
The sandmartins have numbers of holes in the cliffs.
We tried to see how deep they burrowed to build their
nests, but though I put my arm in up to the elbows in
several deserted holes, I could not reach the end. I
think my favourites are the reed-warblers. I know
of at least four pairs, and when I could induce the
children to both stop talking for a few minutes, we
were able to watch them boldly hopping up and
down the reeds and singing in full view of us."

This is the sort of thing bird-stalkers come upon —
and what a loss have those children who are not
brought up to the gentle art wherein the eye is
satisfied with seeing, and there is no greed of collect-
ing, no play of the hunter's instinct to kill, and yet
a lifelong joy of possession.

XIV. — THE CHILDREN REQUIRE COUNTRY AIR

The Essential Proportion of Oxygen.— 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 ;

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 93

also, that whatever produces heat, whether 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 situations where much breathing and burn-
ing 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.

Excess of Carbonic Acid Gas.— Also we know
that every breathing and every burning object expels
a hurtful gas — carbonic acid. A very small propor-
tion of this gas is present in the purest atmospheric
air, and in that small proportion is healthful ; but
increase that quantity by the action of furnaces,
fires, living beings, gas-lamps, and the air is ren-
dered 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.

Un vitiated, Unimpoverished Air. — For these
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, proportion ably, more oxygen

94 HOME EDUCATION

than adults need for their vital processes — it is
absolutely cruel not to give them very frequent,
if not daily, copious draughts of unvitiated, unim-
poverished air, the sort of air that can be had only
remote from towns.

Solar Light. — But this is only one of the
reasons why, for health's sake alone, it is of the first
importance to give children long days in the open
country. They want light, solar light, as well as
air. Country people are ruddier than town folk ;
miners are sallow, so are the dwellers in cellars
and in sunless 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, marked by the
free production of red corpuscles, appear to take
place most favourably under the influence of abund-
ant solar light. What is more, men of science are
beginning to suspect that not only the coloured light
rays of the solar spectrum, but the dark heat rays,
and the chemical rays, minister to vitality in ways
not yet fully understood.

A Physical Ideal for a Child.— 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 in this respect as in all
others ; but this is what bringing-up may, with some

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN 95

limitations, effect : — 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. There-
fore, it is worth while to have even a physical ideal
for one'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 produced : but
the bright eye, the open regard, the springing step ;
the tones, clear as a bell ; the agile, graceful move-
ments that characterise the well-brought-up child, are
the result, not of bodily well-being only, but of
'mind and soul according well/ of a quick, trained
intelligence, and of a moral nature habituated to
{ the joy of self-control.'

PART III

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES'
I. — EDUCATION BASED UPON NATURAL LAW

A Healthy Brain. — What I desire to set before the
reader is a method of education based upon natural
law. In the first place, we have 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 education depends.

Out-of-Door Life. — The consideration of out-of-door
life, in developing a method of education, comes second
in order ; because my object is 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 acquaint-
ance freely with Nature and natural objects ; that, in
fact, the intellectual education of the young child
should lie in the free exercise of perceptive power,
because the first stages of mental effort are marked

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES' 97

by the extreme activity of this power ; and the
wisdom of the educator is to follow the lead of
Nature in the evolution of the complete human
being.

The next subject for consideration — a rather dry
psycho-physiological one — seems to me, all the same,
to be very well worthy of attention as striking the
keynote of a reasonable method of education.

Habit the Instrument by which Parents
Work. — ' Habit is TEN natures ! ' If I could but
make others see with my eyes how much this saying
should mean to the 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. Observe, the material is there
to begin with ; his wheel will not enable the potter to
produce a porcelain cup out of coarse clay ; but the
instrument is as necessary as the material or the
design. It is unpleasant to speak of one's self, but
if the reader 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 dominant idea of one person's
life, if it be launched suddenly at another, conveys
no very great depth or weight of meaning to the
second person — he wants to get at it by degrees,
to see the steps by which the other has travelled.
Therefore, I shall venture to show how I arrived at
my present position, which is, from one of the three
possible points of view — The formation of habits
is education, and Education is the formation of
habits.

7

98 HOME EDUCATION

II. — THE CHILDREN HAVE NO SELF-COMPELLING
POWER

An Educational Cul-de-sac. — 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 teach, and
was young and enthusiastic in my work. It was
to my mind a great thing to be a teacher; it was
impossible but that the teacher should leave his
stamp on the children. His own was the fault if
anything went wrong, if any child did badly in school
or out of it. There was no degree of responsibility
to which youthful ardour was not equal. But, all
this zeal notwithstanding, the disappointing thing was,
that nothing extraordinary happened. The children
were good on the whole, because they were the chil-
dren of parents who had themselves been brought
up with some care ; but it was plain that they
behaved very much as ' 'twas their nature to.'
The faults they had, they kept ; the virtues 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 dis-
appointing. The children, no doubt, 'got on' — a
little ; but each one of them had 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 French, history and sums, was no
more than playing at education ; for who remembers
the scraps of knowledge he laboured over as a child ?

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES* 99

and would not the application of a few hours in later
life effect 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.

Love, Law, and Religion as Educational
Forces. — Looking for guidance to the literature of
education, I learned much from various sources,
though I failed to find what seemed to me an
authoritative guide, that is, one whose thought em-
braced the possibilities contained in the human nature
of a child, and, at the same time, measured the scope
of education. I saw how religious teaching helped the
children, gave them power and motives for continuous
effort, and raised their desires towards the best things.
I saw in how far law restrained from evil, and love
impelled towards good. But with these great aids
from without and from above, there was still the
depressing sense of labouring at 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
fiom year to year beyond that of being able to do
harder sums and read harder books.

Why Children are incapable of Steady Effort.
— 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

100 HOME EDUCATION

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.

Children should be saved the Effort of Decision.
—That the effort of decision is the most exhausting
effort of life, has been well said from the pulpit ; and
if that remain 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.

III.— 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 educa-
tional ' 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 right of his birth as a human being.

All Persons born with the same Primary
Desires. — That we all have the same instincts and
appetites, we are prepared to allow, but that the
principles of action which govern all men everywhere
are primarily the same, is a little startling; that, for
instance, the same desires stir in the breasts of savage
and of sage alike ; that the desire of knowledge,
which shows itself in the child's curiosity about things

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES* to!

and his eager use of his eyes, is equally active every-
where; 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 every-
where 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 Affections. — And it is not only the same
desires ; all people, everywhere, have the same
affections and passions which act in 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.

Content of the most Elemental Notion of
Human Nature. — 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 civilised or Christian teaching had never before
reached. Not only is a sense of duty common to
mankind, but the deeper consciousness of God, how-
ever vague such consciousness may be. And all this
and much more goes to make up the most elemental
notion of human nature.

Nature plus Heredity. — 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 reck-

102 HOME EDUCATION

less, because it is born in him, his mother's nature
or his grandfather'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 Cobbe tells us is the case in her family,
for instance, through five generations; the artistic
temperament, the taste for music or drawing, running
in families: here you get Nature with a twist, con-
firmed, sealed, riveted, utterly proof, you would say,
against any attempt to alter or modify it.

Plus Physical Conditions. — And, once more,
physical conditions come into 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.

Human Nature the Sum of certain Attributes.
— What, then, with the natural desires, affections, and
emotions common to the whole race, what with the
tendencies which each family derives by descent, and
those peculiarities which the individual owes to his
own constitution 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, to let every child
develop unhindered according to the elements of
character and disposition that are in him.

The Child must not be left to his Human
Nature. — 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

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES* 103

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 platform 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
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 circum-
stances step in and ' make 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 could 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
po^ver 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 incalculably strong.

Problem before the Educator. — 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 ship-
wreck on the rock of what he grew up to think

IO4 HOME EDUCATION

his characteristic virtue — his open-handedness, for
instance.

Divine Grace works on the Lines of Human
Effort. — In looking- for a solution of this problem,
I do not undervalue the Divine grace — far otherwise ;
but we do not always make enough of the fact that
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 edu-
cating his child, deserves, and assuredly gets, support
from above ; and that Rebecca, let us say, had no
right to bring up her son to be " thou worm, Jacob,"
in the trust that Divine grace would, speaking rever-
ently, pull him through. Being a pious man, the son
of pious parents, he was pulled through, but his days,
he complains at the end, were " few and evil."

The Trust of Parents must not be Supine.—
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 misplaced ; 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-ancl-by into the character of their child.

Nature then, strong as she is, is not invincible ; and,
at her 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 nor whip will break her in.

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES' IO5

IV. — HABIT 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.

Habit runs on the Lines of Nature. — But habit
runs on the lines of nature: the cowardly child habitu-
ally 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 may be a Lever. — 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 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
tnan for the well-dressed lady ; and there are chil-
dren trained in grudging habits, who never offer to
yield, or go, or do.

A Mother forms her Children's Habits in-
voluntarily.— 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

106 HOME EDUCATION

hardly a mother anywhere who has not some two
or three — crotchets sometimes, principles sometimes —
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 ques-
tion 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.

Habit forces Nature into New Channels.— 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 bare-
backed ponies with a foot on the back of each, or a
pantomime fairy dancing on air, or a clown behaving
like an indiarubber 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, that is,
the cultivation of persistent habits. And the 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 often rather die of
famine than forsake the house to which she is
accustomed. As for the dog, he is still more a
' bundle of habits ' than his master. Scatter the

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES* 10?

crumbs for the sparrows at nine o'clock every morn-
ing, 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 transmitted habit ; 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, religion, every
motive which should influence a thinking being?

Parents and Teachers must lay down Lines
of Habit. — All this is nothing new ; we have always
known that ' use is second 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 the reader.
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.

V. — THE LAYING DOWN OF LINES OF HABIT

' Begin it, and the thing will be completed ! '

is infallibly true of every mental and moral habitude :
completed, not on the lines you foresee and intend,
but on the lines appropriate and necessary to that
particular habitude. In the phrase 'unconscious

108 HOME EDUCATION

cerebration ' we are brought face to face with the fact
that, whatever seed of thought or feeling you implant
in a child — whether through inheritance or by early
Draining — grows, completes itself, and begets after
its kind, even as does a corporeal organism. It is a
marvellous and beautiful thing to perceive an idea —
when the idea itself is a fine one — developing within
you of its own accord, to find your pen writing down
sentences whose logical sequence delights you, and
yet in the conception of which you have had no
conscious part. When the experienced writer ' reels
off' in this fashion, he knows that so far as the run
of the words, the ordering of the ideas, go, his work
will need no revision. So fine a thing is this, that
the lingering fallacy of the infallible reason established
itself thereupon. The philosopher, who takes pleasure
in observing the ways of his own mind, is a thinker
of high thoughts, and he is apt to forget that the
thought which defiles a man behaves in precisely the
same way as that which purifies : the one, as the
other, develops, matures, and increases after its kind.
We Think, as we are accustomed to Think.—
How does this bear on the practical work of bring-
ing up children? In this way : We think, as rir are
accustomed to think ; ideas come and go and carry on
a ceaseless traffic in the rut — let us call it — you have
made for them in the very nerve substance of the
brain. You do not deliberately intend to think these
thoughts; you may, indeed, object strongly to the
line they are taking (two 'trains' of thought going on
at one and the same time !), and objecting, you may
be able to barricade the way, to put up ' No Road '
in big letters, and to compel the busy populace of the
brain-world to take another route. But who is able

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES' 109

for these things? Not the child, immature of will,
feeble in moral power, unused to the weapons of the
spiritual warfare. He depends upon his parents ; it
rests with them to initiate the thoughts he shall think,
the desires he shall cherish, the feelings he shall
allow. Only to initiate ; no more is permitted to
them ; but from this initiation will result the habits
of thought and feeling which govern the man — his
character, that is to say. But is not this assuming too
much, seeing that, to sum up roughly all we under-
stand by heredity, a child is born with his future in
his hands ? The child is born, doubtless, with the
tendencies which should shape his future ; but every
tendency has its branch roads, its good or evil out-
come ; and to put the child on the right track for the
fulfilment of the possibilities inherent in him, is the
vocation of the parent.

Direction 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 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
dovn than to run off these lines at his peril. It
follows that this business of laying down lines to-
wards 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 or no he chooses to go that way.

I 10 HOME EDUCATION

Habit and Free-will. — 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
without 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 should do or say, think or feel, —
and do you not take away the child's free-will, make a
mere automaton of him by this excessive culture?

Habit rules ninety-nine in a hundred of our
Thoughts and Acts. — In the first place, whether
you choose or no to take any trouble about the
formation of his habits, it is habit > 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 thoughts,
make our usual small talk, go through the trivial round,
the common task, without any self-determining effort
of will at all. If it were not so — if we had to think,
to deliberate, about each operation of the bath or
the table — life would 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

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES III

as frequently as in our own. These we cannot save
them from, nor is it desirable that we should. What
vve 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.

Habit powerful even where the Will decides.
— 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 lines 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 because 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
frith resting on experience; but if we could discover
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.

VI. — THE PHYSIOLOGY OF HABIT

A work of Dr Carpenter's was perhaps the
first which gave me the clue I was in search of.
In his Mental Physiology — a most interesting book,

112 HOME EDUCATION

by the way — he works out the analogy between
mental and physical activity, and shows that the
correspondence in effect is due to a correspondence
in cause.

Growing Tissues form themselves to Modes
of Action. — To state roughly the doctrine of the
school Dr Carpenter represents — the tissues, as muscu-
lar tissue, for instance, undergo constant waste and as
constant reparation. Even those modes of muscular
action which \ve regard as natural to us, as walking and
standing erect, are in reality the results of a laborious
education ; quite as much so as many modes of action
which we consciously acquire, as writing or danc-
ing ; but the acquired modes become perfectly easy
and natural. Why? Because it is the law of the
constantly growing tissues that they should form
themselves according to the modes of action required
of them. In a case where the brain is repeatedly
sending down to the muscles, under nervous control
as they are, the message to have a certain action
done, that action becomes automatic in the lower
centre, and the faintest suggestion from outside comes
to produce it without the intervention of the brain.
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 ;
but 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

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES' 113

have been produced in the mountebank by a process
of early training".

Therefore Children should learn Dancing,
Swimming, etc., at an Early Age. — 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 an early
age: the fact being, that muscles and joints have
not merely to conform themselves to new uses, but
to grow to a modified pattern ; and this 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 difficulty 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, because it is registered
in the very substance of his spinal cord. The part of
his nervous system where consciousness resides (the
brain) has long ago given a standing order, and such are
the complications of the administration, that to recall
the order would mean the absolute re-making of the
parts concerned. And to correct bad habits of speak-
ing, 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

8

1 14 HOME EDUCATION

of new growth has taken place in the organs of voice
whilst he is making efforts to form the new habit

Moral and Mental Habits make their Mark
upon Physical Tissues. — But, practically, every-
body 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, con-
tracted 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 pre-
pared 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 make 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 consider that the brain, 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 an effort of will.

Persistent Trains of Thought. — Thus, the mis-

of the house knows that when her thoughts are

free to take their own course, they run to cares of

the house or the larder, to to-morrow's dinner or the

winter's clothing ; that is, thought runs into the rut

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES' 11$

which has been, so to speak, worn for it by constant
repetition. The mother's thoughts run on her chil-
dren, 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 unusual 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.

Incessant Regeneration of Brain Tissue. — If
we love, hate, think, feel, worship, at the expense
of actual physical effort on the part of the brain, and
consequent 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
Inn's share of the nourishment provided for the body.
As we have already seen, fully a sixth or a fifth of all
the blood in 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

Il6 HOME EDUCATION

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
repeated, tends to perpetuate itself; so that we find
ourselves automatically prompted to think, feel> or
do what we have been before accustomed to think,
feel, or do, under like circumstances, 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 \\\ 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 impression
on the cerebrum, in virtue of which the same state
may be reproduced at any future time in correspond-
ence to a suggestion fitted to excite it."

Artificial Reflex Actions may be Acquired. — Or,
to take 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
require all our attention and all our volition for its
first, second, or third performance, but by frequent
repetition it becomes, in a manner, part of our organ-
isation, and is performed without volition or even
consciousness.

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES' 117

" 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 ot
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 carry-
ing 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 organising conscious actions into more
or less unconscious, or reflex, operations. It may be
down laid 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 suffice to call up the other, and
that whether we desire it or not.

Intellectual and Moral Education.— "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 intimate interlocking of mind and
matter which is more directly important to the
educator — the idea which we have put broadly under
the (by no means scientifically accurate) figure of

Il8 HOME EDUCATION

a rut. Given, that the constant direction of the
thoughts produces a certain set in the tissues of the
brain, this set is the first trace of the rut or path,
a line of least resistance, along which the same
impression, made another time, will find it easier
to travel than to take another path. So arises
a right-of-way for any given habit of action or
thought.

Character affected by Acquired Modification
of Brain Tissue.— 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.

Outside Influence. — 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.

* HABIT IS TEN NATURES* Up

VII.— THE FORMING OF A HABIT — ' SHUT THE DOOR
AFTER YOU '

" po ge next thtncje."

"Lose this day loitering, and 'twill be the same story
To-morrow ; and the next, more dilatory :
The indecision brings its own delays,
And days are lost, lamenting o'er lost days,"

says Marlowe, who, like many of us, knew the misery
of the intellectual indolence which cannot brace itself
to "po ge next tljinge." No question concerning
the bringing up of children can, conceivably, be
trivial, but this, of dilatoriness, is very important.
The effort of decision, we have seen, is the greatest
effort of life ; not the doing of the thing, but the
making up of one's mind as to which thing to do
first. It is commonly this sort of mental indolence,
born of indecision, which leads to dawdling habits.
How is the dilatory child to be cured ? Time ? She
will know better as she grows older ? Not a bit of it :
" And the next, more dilatory " will be the story of
her days, except for occasional spurts. Punishments ?
No ; your dilatory person is a fatalist. ' What can't
be cured must be endured/ he says, but he will endure
without any effort to cure. Rewards ? No ; to him a
reward is a punishment presented under another aspect:
the possible reward he realises as actual ; there it is,
within his grasp, so to say ; in foregoing the reward
he is punished ; and he bears the punishment.
What remains to be tried when neither time, reward,
nor punishment is effectual ? That panacea of the
educationist : ' One custom overcometh another.'
This inveterate dawdling is a habit to be supplanted

120 HOME EDUCATION

only by the contrary habit, and the mother must de-
vote herself for a few weeks to this cure as steadily
and untiringly as she would to the nursing of her
child through measles. Having in a few — the fewer
the better — earnest words pointed out the miseries
that must arise from this fault, and the duty of over-
coming it, and having so got the (sadly feeble) will
of the child on the side of right-doing, she simply sees
that for weeks together the fault does not recur. The
child goes to dress for a walk ; she dreams over the
lacing of her boots — the tag in her fingers poised in
mid air — but her conscience is awake ; she is con-
strained to look up, and her mother's eye is upon
her, hopeful and expectant. She answers to the rein
and goes on ; midway, in the lacing of the second
boot, there is another pause, shorter this time; again
she looks up, and again she goes on. The pauses
become fewer day by day, the efforts steadier, the
immature young will is being strengthened, the
habit of prompt action acquired. After that first
talk, the mother would do well to refrain from one
more word on the subject; the eye (expectant, not
reproachful), and, where the child is far gone in a
dream, the lightest possible touch, are the only
effectual instruments. By-and-by, ' Do you think
you can get ready in five minutes to-day without
me?' 'Oh yes. mother.' 'Do not say " yes " unless
you are quite sure.' ' I will try.' And she tries, and
succeeds. Now, the mother will be tempted to relax
her efforts — to overlook a little dawdling because the
dear child has been trying so hard. This is absolutely
fatal. The fact is, that the dawdling habit has made
an appreciable record in the very substance of the
child's brain. During the weeks of cure new growth

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES' 121

has been obliterating the old track, and the track of a
new habit is being formed. To permit any reversion
to the old bad habit is to let go all this gain. To
form a good habit is the work of a few weeks; to
guard it is a work of incessant, but by no means
anxious care. One word more, — prompt action on
the child's part should have the reward of absolute
leisure, time in which to do exactly as she pleases,
not granted as a favour, but accruing (without any
words) as a right.

Habit a Delight in itself. — 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, is pleasurable.
This is one of the rocks that mothers sometimes 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
tvj 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 new 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.

122 HOME EDUCATION

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.

Tact, Watchfulness, and Persistence. — For
example, and to choose a habit of no great con-
sequence 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.

Stages in the Formation of a 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 shutting 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 ? '

' Because it is not polite to the people in the room
to make them uncomfortable.'

1 But if I am going out again that very
minute?'

' Still, shut the door, when you come in ; you can
open it again to go out. Do you think you can
remember ? '

' I'll try, mother.'

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES* 123

' Very well ; I shall watch to see how few " forgets "
you make.'

For two or three times Johnny remembers; and
then, he is off like a shot and half-way 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
forgotten 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, and 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 has really 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,
tae 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.

The Dangerous Stage. — Now that Johnny always
shuts the door, his mother's joy and triumph begin
to be mixed with unreasonable pity. ' Poor child,'
she says to herself, ' it is very good of him to take so

124 HOME EDUCATION

much pains about a little thing, just because he is
bid ! ' She thinks that, all the time, the child is
making an effort for her sake ; losing sight of the
fact that the habit has become easy and natural, that,
in fact, Johnny shuts the door without knowing that
he does so. Now comes the critical 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 half-way downstairs before he thinks of the door.
Then he does think of it, with a little prick of con-
science, strong enough, not to send him 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 sucli a hurry,' 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 ten minutes'
rummaging he docs 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.

VIII.— INFANT ' HAF.ITS '

The whole group of habitudes, half physical and
half moral, on which the propriety and comfort of

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES* 12$

everyday life depend, are received passively by the
child ; that is, he does very little to form these habits
himself, but his brain receives impressions from
what he sees about him ; and these impressions take
form as his own very strongest and most lasting
habits.

Some Branches of Infant Education. — Clean-
liness, order, neatness, regularity, punctuality, are all
1 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 for 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 be
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
there are still some nurses who belong to a class
to which an open window is an abomination; and
another is, they do not all know the meaning of
odours : 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.

A Sensitive Nose. — By the way, a very important
bit of physical education for a 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 not only as an avenue
of pleasure, but as a sort of danger-signal to

126 HOME EDUCATION

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.

The Baby is Ubiquitous. — To return to the
nursery. It would be a great thing if the nurse could
be impressed with the notion that the baby is ubiqui-
tous, 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 something 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. For the
same reason, the beds and bedclothes should be
turned down to air for a couple of hours before they
are made up.

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES* 127

Personal Cleanliness as an Early Habit.—
The nursery table, if there be 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 discoloured metal spoon, is degraded
--by so much. The children, too, should be encour-
aged to nice cleanliness in their own persons. We
have all 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 little mud-pies with the
boy in the gutter. Let them make their mud-pies
freely ; but that over, they should be impatient to
remove every trace of soil, and should do it themselves.
Young children may be taught to take care of their
finger-nails, and to cleanse the corners 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. Children should be early provided
w:th their own washing materials, and accustomed
to find real pleasure in the bath, 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.

128 HOME EDUCATION

Modesty and Purity. — 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
tempting and natural course to the mother. But alas !
we do not live in the Garden, and it may be well that
the child should be trained from the first to the con-
ditions 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 ; and in the one case, as
in the other, disobedience is attended with certain
loss and ruin.

The Habit of Obedience and the Sense of
Honour. — The sense of prohibition, of sin in dis-
obedience, will be a wonderful safeguard against
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 obedi-
ence in this matter he may glorify God with his body ;
let her keep watch against every approach of evil ;
and let her pray daily that each one of her children

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES' 1 29

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 remem-
bered 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 Essential. — 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 unsightly 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 imperfect and unsightly makeshifts.

The pleasure grown-up people take in waiting on
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 times a day, in the nursery,
garden, drawing-room, wherever their restless little
feet carry them? We are a bit sentimental about
scattered toys and faded nosegays, and all the tokens
of the children's presence; but the fact is, that the
lawless habit of scattering should not be allowed
to grow upon children. Everybody condemns the
mother of a family whose drawers are chaotic, whose

9

130 HOME EDUCATION

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 put away his Play-
things.— 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 winding 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.

Neatness Akin to Order. — 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 vase, but must have jar or vase graceful

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES' 131

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 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 a 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 well-chosen works of art, in
however cheap a reproduction.

Regularity. — The importance of Regularity in
infant education is beginning to be pretty generally
acknowledged. The young mother knows that she
must put her baby to bed at a 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 without
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
\hings he will get them.

Habits of Time and Place.— The fact is, the child
has already formed a habit of wakefulness or of feed-
ing at improper times, and he is as uneasy at his
habits being broken in upon as the cat is at a change
of habitation ; when he submits happily to the new
regulation, it is because the new habit is formed, and
is, in its turn, the source of satisfaction. According
to Dr Carpenter, " Regularity should begin even with
infant life, as to times of feeding, repose, etc. The

132 HOME EDUCATION

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-indul-
gence than to feed a child, or to allow it to remain
out of bed, at unseasonable times, merely because it
cries. It is wonderful how soon the actions of a young
infant (like those of a young dog or horse) come into
harmony with systematic ' training ' judiciously exer-
cised." 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.

IX. — PHYSICAL EXERCISES

Importance of Daily. — The subject of the
natural training of eye and muscles was taken up
pretty fully in treating of ' Out-of-door Life.' I will
only add, that to give the child pleasure in light
and easy motion — the sort of delight in the manage-
ment 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 suit-
able for the nursery. Certain moral qualities come
into play in alert movements, eye-to-eye attention,
prompt and intelligent replies; but it often happens
that good children fail in these points for want of
physical training.

Drill of Good Manners. — Just let them go
through the drill of good manners: let them rehearse
little scenes in play, — Mary, the lady asking the way
to the market ; Harry, the boy who directs her, and

'HABIT IS TEN NATURES' 133

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 ;
but this sort of drill should be attempted while
children are young, before the tyranny of mauvaise
honte sets in. Encourage them to admire and take
pride in light springing movements, and to eschew a
heavy gait and clownish action of the limbs.

Training of the Ear and Voice. — The training
of the ear and voice is an exceedingly important part
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/ ' ni-ice boy-oys/ Drill them in pro-
nouncing difficult words — ' imperturbability/' ipecacu-
anha,' ' Antananarivo,' — with sharp precision after a
single hearing ; in producing the several sounds of
each vowel ; and the sounds of the consonants
without attendant vowels. French, taught orally, is
exceedingly valuable as affording training for both
ear and voice.

The Habit of Music. — As for a musical training,
it would be hard to say how much that 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 Hullah 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 habit must be taken into account.
It is a pity that the musical training most children
get is of a random character; that they are not
trained, for instance, by carefully graduated ear and

134 HOME EDUCATION

voice exercises, to produce and distinguish musical
tones and intervals.

Let Children Alone. — 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 fire of Do and Don't ; but letting
them go their own way and grow, having 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, his 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 his part, and the peaches will
be no better than sloes.

PART IV

SOME HABITS OF MIND— SOME MORAL HABITS

A Science of Education. — Allow me to say once
more, that I venture to write upon subjects bearing
on home education with the greatest deference 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, that 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.

Education in Habit favours an Easy Life.—
V.Te have seen why Habit, for instance, is such a
marvellous force in human life. I find this view
of habit very encouraging, as giving a scientific
reasonableness 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

135

136 HOME EDUCATION

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 will go smoothly ; and this is just
what habit is, in an extraordinary degree, pledged to
effect. 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 themselves 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, c 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 attend
to. Is she never to be at ease with her children ? '

Training in Habits becomes a Habit. — 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 overmuch 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

SOMEHABITS OF MIND— SOME MORAL HABITS 137

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.

Habits inspired in the Home Atmosphere.—
We have already considered a group of half-physical
habits — order, regularity, neatness — which the child
imbibes, so to speak, in this way. But this is not
all : habits of gentleness, courtesy, kindness, candour,
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.

I.— 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 opera-
tion of one or two of the laws of thought. But just
recall, in the meantime, the fixity of attention with
vvhich the trained professional man — the lawyer, the
doctor, the man of letters — listens to a roundabout
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.

138 HOME EDUCATION

A Mind at the Mercy of Associations. — We will
consider, then, the nature and the functions of atten-
tion. 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 in
dreams — the rapid dance of ideas through the brain
during lighter sleep — how ideas follow one another
in a general way. In the wanderings of delirium, in
the fancies of the mad, the inconsequent prattle of the
child, and the babble 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 about glass — you wish to provoke
a proper curiosity as to how glass is made, and what
are its uses. Not a bit of it; he wanders off to
Cinderella's glass slipper ; then he tells you about 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 does 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 engage-

SOME HABITS OF MIND — SOME MORAL HABITS 139

ments of the present, is an infinite boon ; but to be
at the 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.

Wandering Attention.— 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 disposition,
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 schoolroom —
the children are thinking all the time about something
else than 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 governess, "there are
so many things more interesting than lessons to
think about ! "

Where is the harm ? In this : not merely that the
children are wasting time, though that is a pity ; but
that they are forming a desultory habit of mind, and
reducing their own capacity for mental effort.

The Habit of Attention to be Cultivated in
the Infant. — The help, then, is not in the will of the
child but in the habit of attention, a habit to be culti-
vated even in the infant. A baby, notwithstanding his
wonderful 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 discarded
plaything is picked up, and, with ' Pretty ! ' and dumb

140 HOME EDUCATION

show, the mother keeps the infants eyes fixed for
fully a couple of minutes — and this is his first lesson in
attention. Later, as we have seen, the child is eager
to see and handle every object that comes in bis
But watch him at his investigations: he flits from
thing to thing with less purpose than a butterfly
amongst die 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

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 iukiU eyelashes round it;
that all the day long it lies there in the grass and
looks Dp at the great sun, never blinking as Margaret
would do, but keeping its eye wide open. And that
is why it is called daisy, ' c because

always looking at the sun which makes the day. And
what does Margaret think it does at night, when there
is no sun ? It does what little boys and girls do ; it
just shuts up : : :h its white lashes tipped with

pink, and goes to sleep till the sun comes again in the
morning. By this time the daisy has become interest-
ing 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.

SOME HABITS OF MIND — SOME MORAL HABITS 141

Attention to ' Things ' ; Words a Weariness. —
But the tug-of-war begins with the lessons of the
schoolroom. 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 dazvdle over copy-
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 must be made bright and pleasant to
the child.

Lessons Attractive. — 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 power of the child's mind should rest
after effort, and some other power be called into play.
She should know how to incite the child to effort
through his desire of approbation, of excelling, of
advancing, his desire of knowledge, his love of his
parents, his sense of duty, in such a way that no one
set of motives be called unduly into play to the injury
of the child's character. But the danger she must
be especially alive to, is the substitution of any
other natural desire for that of knowledge, which is
equally natural, and is adequate for all the purposes
of education.

142 HOME EDUCATION

Time-table; Definite Work in a Given Time.

—I shall have opportunities to enter into some of
these points later ; meantime, let us look in at a home
schoolroom 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 much 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
'painstaking' lesson to follow, — the child gets through
his morning lessons without any sign of weariness.

Even with regular lessons and short lessons, a
further stimulus may be occasionally necessary to
secure the attention of the child. His desire of
approbation may ask the stimulus, not only of a word
of praise, but of something in the shape of a reward
to secure his utmost efforts. Now, rewards should be

SOME HABITS OF MIND— SOME MORAL HABITS 143

dealt out to the child upon principle : they should be
the natural consequences of his good conduct.

A Natural Reward. — What is the natural conse-
quence of work well 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 remaining 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 ms : 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 steamboats and railway trains. This
possibility of letting the children occupy themselves
variously in the few minutes they may gain at the
end of each lesson, is compensation which the home
schoolroom offers for the zest which the sympathy
of numbers, and emulation, are supposed to give to
school work.

Emulation. — As for emulation, a very potent
means of exciting and holding the attention of
children, it is often objected that a desire to excel, to
do better than others, implies an unloving temper,
which the educator should rather repress than culti-
vate. 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 another, prize, or
praise, or both, according as we excel others, whether
in football or tennis, or in picture-painting or poem-

144 HOME EDUCATION

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 possibly 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 ; that is, she can bring him up in such a
hearty outgoing 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. Emulation becomes
suicidal when it is used as the incentive to intellectual
effort, because the desire for knowledge subsides in
proportion as the desire to excel becomes active. As
a matter of fact, marks of any sort, even for conduct,
distract the attention of children from their proper
work, which is in itself interesting enough to secure
good behaviour as well as attention.

Affection as a Motive. — 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 mother,'
'Do not grieve poor mother,' etc., be brought too

SOME HABITS OF MIND— SOME MORAL HABITS 145

frequently before the child as the reason for right
doing, a sentimental relation is set up which both
parent and child will find embarrassing, the true
motives of action will be obscured, and the child, un-
willing to appear unloving, will end in being untrue.

Attractiveness of Knowledge.— Of course, the
most obvious means of quickening and holding the
attention of children lies in the attractiveness of
knowledge itself, and in the real appetite for know-
ledge with which they are endowed. But how
successful faulty teachers are in curing children of
any desire to know, is to be seen in many a school-
room. I shall later, however, have an opportunity
for a few words on this subject

What is Attention? — 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 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 sufficient motive.

Self-Compelled. — 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
without. 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
thq victory required of him is to fix his thoughts upon

1Q

146 HOME EDUCATION

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. But it cannot be too much borne
in mind that attention is, to a great extent, the
product of the educated mind ; that is, one can only
attend in proportion as one has the intellectual power
of developing the topic.

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.

The Secret of Overpressure. — 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 /^attention. 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 we are all ready to admit that it is not
the things we do, but the things \vefail 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

SOME HABITS OF MIND—SOME MORAL HABITS 147

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.

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 helping 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
absolutely ruinous both to bodily health and brain
power.

Wholesome Home Treatment for Mooning.—
Now, the fault is very seldom in the lessons, but
in the children ; they moon over their books, and a
little wholesome home treatment should cure them of
that ailment. Allow them, at the utmost, 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
sympathy ; 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 concentrated attention
has been bestowed on them. At the same time the
custom of giving home-work, at any rate to children
nnder fourteen, is greatly to be deprecated. The gain
of a combination of home and school life is lost to the

148 HOME EDUCATION

children ; and a very full scheme of school work may
be carried through in the morning hours.

Rewards and Punishments should be relative
Consequences of Conduct.— In considering the
means of securing attention, it has been necessary to
refer to discipline — the dealing out of rewards and
punishments, — a subject which every tyro of a nurse-
maid or nursery governess feels herself 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 Rosamond and the Purple Jar, hits the
right principle, though the incident is rather extrava-
gant. Little girls do not often pine for purple jars
in chemists' windows ; but that we should suffer for
our wilfulness in getting what is unnecessary 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.

Natural and Educative Consequences. — 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 consider 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, exceedingly little actual punishment is
necessary where children are brought up with care.
But this happens continually — the child who has done

SOME HABITS OF MIND— SOME MORAL HABITS 149

well gains some natural reward (like that ten minutes
in the garden), which the child forfeits who has done
less well ; and the mother must brace herself and
her child to bear this loss ; if she equalise 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 short-
coming. 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, she looks
about for some consequence related to the fault
which shall have an educative bearing on the child :
for instance, if a boy neglect his studies, the natural
consequence is that he remains ignorant ; but to allow
him to do so would be criminal neglect on the part
of the parent.

II. — THE HABITS OF APPLICATION, ETC.

Rapid Mental Effort. — The habits of mental
activity and of application are trained by the very
means employed to cultivate that of attention. The
ch'.ld may //^diligently through his work who might
be trained to rapid 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.

Zeal must be stimulated. — So of application.
The child must not be allowed to get into the mood

I$O HOME EDUCATION

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.

III. — THE HABIT OF THINKING

'A Lion' Operations included in Thinking.—
The actual labour of the brain is known to psy-
chologists under various names, and divided into
various operations : let us call it thinking, which, for
educational purposes, is sufficiently exact ; but, by
1 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 Archbishop Thompson in his Laws of
Thought1: — "When Captain Head was travelling
across the pampas of South America, his guide one
day suddenly stopped him, and pointing high into the
air, cried out ' A lion ! ' Surprised at such an excla-
mation, accompanied with such an act, he turned up his
eyes, and with difficulty perceived, at an immeasurable
height, a flight of condors, soaring 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.

1 This example, offered by so able a psychologist, is so admirable
that I venture to quote it more than once.

SOME HABITS OF MIND — SOME MORAL HABITS 151

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 and 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 com-
paring of things to find out wherein they are alike,
and wherein they differ ; a conclusion as to causes or
consequences from certain premisses.

IV.— THE HABIT OF IMAGINING

The Sense of the Incongruous. — All their lessons
w.'U 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 more mechanical efforts succeed the more strictly
intellectual, and that the pleasing exercise of the
imagination, again, succeed 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 delicious feast of
absurdities, which none of us, old or young, could

152 HOME EDUCATION

afford to spare ; but it is doubtful whether the child
who reads it has the delightful imaginings, the realis-
ing of the unknown, with which he reads The Swiss
Family Robinson.

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 Robinson Crusoe finding the footprints.
They must have ' funny books,' but do not give the
children too much nonsense-reading.

Commonplace Tales ; Tales of Imagination. —
Stories, again, of the Christmas holidays, of George
and Lucy, 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.

Imagination and Great Conceptions. — And
this, not for the children's amusement merely: it is
not impossible that posterity may write us down a
generation blest with little imagination, and, by so
far, the less capable of great conceptions and heroic

SOME HABITS OF MIND— SOME MORAL HABITS 153

efforts, for it is only as we have it in us to let a
person or a cause fill the whole stage of the mind, to
the exclusion of self-occupation, 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.

Imagination Grows. — 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 exist-
ence ; 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, why, 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.

Thinking comes by Practice.— How the chil-
dren's various lessons should be handled so as to
induce habits of thinking, we shall consider later ; 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

154 HOME EDUCATION

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 proud of this evidence of thought in his child.
There is some slight show of speculation even in
wondering c 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.

V. — THE HABIT OF REMEMBERING

Remembering and Recollecting. — Memory is
the storehouse of whatever knowledge we possess;
and it is upon the fact of the stores lodged in the
memory that we take rank as intelligent beings,
The children learn in order that they may remem-
ber. Much of what we have learned and experienced
in childhood, and later, we cannot reproduce, and
yet it has formed the groundwork of after-know-
ledge ; 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 realise. Again, much that we
have learned and experienced is not only retained

SOME HABITS OF MIND— SOME MORAL HABITS 155

in the storehouse of memory, 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.

A 'Spurious' Memory. — There is a third kind
of (spurious) memory — facts and ideas floating in
the brain which yet make no part of it, and are
exuded at a single effort; as when a barrister pro-
duces all his knowledge of a case in his brief, and
then forgets all about it; or when the schoolboy
c crams ' for an examination, writes down what he
has thus learned, and behold, it is gone from his
gaze for ever : as Ruskin puts it, " They cram to
pass, and not to know ; they do pass, and they dorit
know." That the barrister, the physician, should be
able thus to dismiss the case on which he has
ceased to be occupied, the publisher the book he
has rejected, is well for him, and this art of for-
getting 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?

Memory a Record in the Brain Substance.—
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 utilise remembered
facts — that is, to recollect '? And under what con-
ditions 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 period, and is then evacuated at a single
throw ? We are interested in a wonderful invention
— an instrument which records spoken words, and

156 HOME EDUCATION

will 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
cognisance of certain facts, and the nerve substance
of the brain records that cognisance.

Made under what Conditions. — 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 impressions? 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
undivided attention to any tiling 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 what has happened:
arrest the attention upon any fact or incident, and
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

SOME HABITS OF MIND — SOME MORAL HABITS 157

an old man, perhaps, the memory of it will flash
across him.

Recollection and the Law of Association. — But
it is not enough to have a recollection flash across one
incidentally ; we want to have the power of recalling
at will : and for this, something more is necessary
than an occasional act of attention producing a
solitary impression. 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 figuratively, a certain tract of the brain
may be conceived of as being overlaid with French.
This is to make a practical use of that law of asso-
ciation of ideas of which one would not willingly
become the sport ; and it is the neglect of this law
which invalidates much good teaching. The teacher
is content to produce a solitary impression which is
only recalled as it is acted upon by a chance sugges-
tion ; whereas he should forge the links of a chain
to draw his bucket out of the well. Probably the
reader may have heard, or heard of, a Dr Pick, who
grounded a really philosophical system of mnemonics
on these two principles of attention and association.
Whatever we may think of his application of it, the
principle he asserted is the right one.

158 HOME EDUCATION

Every Lesson must recall the Last.— 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, and so on to the beginning.

No Limit to the Recording Power of the
Brain. — 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 grand-
mother she has forgotten it entirely, has not a word
left. When this is the case, her French has been dis-
used ; she has not been in the habit of reading, 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.
But Links of Association a Condition of
Recollection. — 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 a lesson about Switzerland to-day, and one
about Holland to-morrow, and the one is linked to

SOME HABITS OF MIND — SOME MORAL HABITS 159

the other by the very fact that the two countries
have hardly anything in common ; what the one
has, the other has not. Again, the association will
be of similarity, and not of contrast. In our own ex-
perience we find that colours, places, sounds, odours
recall persons or events ; 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.

VI. — THE HABIT OF PERFECT EXECUTION

The Habit of turning out Imperfect Work. —
' 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
philosophically, and know that if the children get
the habit of turning 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 a recent exhibition of school-

160 HOME EDUCATION

work held throughout France. No faulty work was
shown, to be excused on the plea that it was the work
of children.

A Child should Execute Perfectly. — No work
should be given to a child that he cannot execute
perfectly, and then perfection should be required of
him as a matter of course. For instance, he 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 regular distances and at
regular slopes. If he produces a faulty pair, get him
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 everything he does
be 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 rarely be allowed to set his
hand to a new undertaking until the last is finished.

VII. — 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 inadequate 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 habits.

SOME HABITS OF MIND — SOME MORAL HABITS l6l

The Whole Duty of a Child.— First, and infinitely
the most important, is the 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, b ut of an act
of wilfulness, that state directly opposed to obedience,
and out of which springs all that foolishness which
is bound up in the heart of a child.

Obedience no Accidental Duty. — Now, if the
parent realise that obedience 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 so,' but the motive
of the apostolic injunction, " Children, obey your
parents in the Lord, for this is right''

Children must have the Desire to Obey. — 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 the habit has been formed which will, hereafter,
enable the child to use the strength of his will against

1 62 HOME EDUCATION

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 license. Exactly so ; because, in
these cases, there is no gradual training of the child
in the habit of obedience ; no gradual enlisting of his
will on the side of sweet service and a free-will offering
of submission to the highest law : the poor children
are simply bullied into submission to the will, that is,
the wilfulness, of another ; not at all, ' for it is right ' ;
only because it is convenient.

Expect Obedience. — The mother has no more
sacred duty than that of training her infant to instant
obedience. To do so is no difficult task ; the child is
still " trailing clouds of glory .... from God, who is
his home" ; the principle of obedience is within him,
waiting to be called into exercise. There is no need to
rate the child, or threaten him, or use any manner ot
violence, because the parent is invested with authority
which the child intuitively recognises. It is enough
to say, ' Do this,' in a quiet, authoritative 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
habit of obedience. If she begin by requiring that
her children always obey her, why, they will always
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

SOME HABITS OF MIND — SOME MORAL HABITS 163

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.
1 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 manners, 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.
1 Bedtime, Willie ! ' ' Oh, mamma, just 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 unbroken 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,
mother ' ; but her mother calls four times before Mary
comes. ' Put away your bricks ' ; and the bricks are
put away with 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 habit of perfect
obedience by never allowing him in anything else,
than it is to obtain this mere formal obedience by a

164 HOME EDUCATION

constant exercise of authority. By-and-by, when he
is old enough, take the child into confidence ; 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 command heaped upon command.

Law ensures Liberty. — 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!'

VIII. — TRUTHFULNESS

It is unnecessary 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.

Three Causes of Lying— all Vicious. — The
vice of lying arises from three causes: carelessness
in ascertaining the truth, carelessness in stating the
truth, and a deliberate intention to deceive. That
all three are vicious, is evident from the fact that a
man's character may be ruined by what is no more
than a careless mis-statement on the part of another :
the speaker repeats a damaging remark without taking

SOME HABITS OF MIND — SOME MORAL HABITS 165.

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.

Only One Kind visited on Children. — 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.

Accuracy of Statement. — 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 contrary vicious habit of playing fast and
loose with words.

Exaggeration and Ludicrous Embellishments.
—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

166 HOME EDUCATION

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,
happily, to be humorous without any sacrifice of
truth.

Reverence, etc. — As for reverence, consideration for
others, respect for persons and property, I can only
urge the importance of a sedulous cultivation of
these moral qualities — the distinguishing marks of a
refined nature — until they become the daily habits of
the child's life ; and the more, because a self-assertive,
aggressive, self-seeking temper is but too charac-
teristic of the times we live in.

Temper — Born in a Child. — I am anxious, how-
ever, to say a few words on the habit of sweet temper.
It is very customary to regard temper as constitu-
tional, 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

Not Temper, but Tendency. — It is no doubt
true that the children inherit a certain tendency to
irascibility or to amiability, to fretful ness, discon-
tentment, peevishness, sullenness, murmuring, and
impatience ; or to cheerfulness, trustfulness, good-
humour, patience, and humility. It is also true that
upon the preponderance 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

SOME HABITS OF MIND— SOME MORAL HABITS 167

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 in 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 account — fertile source of ugly
tempers. And this, because the child is born with
no more than certain tendencies.

Parents must correct Tendency by New Habit
of Temper. — 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 difficult 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. Remembering that every
envious, murmuring, discontented thought leaves a
track in the very substance of the child's brain for
£uch thoughts to run in again and again — that this
track, this rut, so to speak, 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.

Change the Child's Thoughts. — Let her change
the childs thoughts before ever the bad temper has
had time to develop into conscious feeling, much less

168 HOME EDUCATION

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 per-
ceive that he is being treated. As every fit of sullen-
ness 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 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 of which
every thoughtful person recognises the force.

PART V

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION

I. — THE MATTER AND METHOD OF LESSONS

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.

Parents must reflect on the Subject-matter of
Instruction. — I am about to invite your attention to
a subject that parents are accustomed to leave very
much in the hands of schoolmaster or governess when
they do not instruct their children themselves — I
.nean the choice of subjects of instruction, and the
ways of handling those subjects. Teachers are the
people who have, more than others, given themselves
to the consideration 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
169

170 HOME EDUCATION

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 quali-
fied persons, some insight on the part of fathers and
mothers is useful as hindering the teacher from drop-
ping into 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
schoolroom, it is iniquitous to leave the young gover-
ness, 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 baffle the most
strenuous teachers.

Home the best Growing-ground for Young
Children. — All the same, whatever be the advan-
tages of Kindergarten or other schools for little
children, the home schoolroom ought to be the best
growing-ground for them. And doubtless it would be
so, were the mother at liberty to devote herself to the
instruction of her children ; but this she is seldom free
to do. If she live in a town, she can send them to
school when they are six ; if in the country, 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 ot

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION I? I

time. Such a rara avis does not present herself in
answer to every advertisement; and in default of a
trained teacher, the mother must undertake to train
her governess — that is, she may supplement with her
own insight the scanty knowledge and experience of
the young teacher. ' I wish the children to be taught

to read, thus and thus, because ' : 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 sensible 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.

Three Questions for the Mother. — But if the
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 seriously, 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 be in a position to direct her
children's studies ; and will, at the same time, be
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.

Children learn, to Grow. — 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 so must the mind be sustained
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

1/2 HOME EDUCATION

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 power of the mind make
that power effective. People are apt to overlook the
fact that mind must have its aliment — we learn that
we may know, not that we may grow ; hence the
parrot-like saying of lessons, the cramming of ill-
digested facts for examinations, all the ways of taking
in knowledge which the mind does not assimilate.

Doctoring of the Material of Knowledge.—
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 teach-
ing, with lessons elaborately drawn up, in which
certain work is assigned to the perceptive faculties,
certain work to the imagination, to the judgment,
and so on. Now this doctrine of the faculties, which
rests on a false analogy between the mind and the
body, is on its way to the limbo where the phrenolo-
gist's ' bumps ' now rest in peace. The mind would
appear to be one and indivisible, and endowed with
manifold powers ; and this sort of doctoring of the
material of knowledge is Unnecessary for the healthy
child, whose mind is capable of self-direction, and ot
applying itself to its proper work upon the parcel
of knowledge delivered to it. 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.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 173

Children learn, to get Ideas. — 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 anything
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 a child receives no
new idea is a morning wasted, however closely the
little student has been kept at his books.

Ideas Grow and Produce after their Kind. —
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 experience
that, let our attention be forcibly drawn to some
public character, some startling theory, and for days
after we are continually hearing or reading matter
which bears 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

174 HOME EDUCATION

received is in the act of growth, and is reaching out
after its appropriate food. This process Q{ feeding
goes on with peculiar avidity in childhood, and the
growth of an idea in the child is proportionally rapid.

Scott and Stephenson worked with Ideas.—
Scott got an idea, a whole group of ideas, out of the
Border tales and ballads, the folklore of the country-
side, on which his boyhood was nourished : his ideas
grew and brought forth, and the Waverley Novels
are the fruit they bore. George Stephenson made
little clay engines with his playmate, Thomas
Tholoway ; by-and-by, when he was an engineman,
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.

Value of Dominant Ideas. — But how does this
theory of the vital and fruitful character 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-education provided for, his career marked out.

Lessons must furnish Ideas.— 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
selection of ideas to be a matter of chance : his lessons
should furnish him with such ideas as shall make for
his further education.

Children learn to get Knowledge. — But it is
not only to secure due intellectual growth and the

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 175

furnishing of his mind with ideas, that the child must
learn : the common notion, that he 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 be so
clearly chronicled on the brain, 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, but a little phial with
a narrow neck ; and, therefore, it behoves parent or
teacher to pour in only of the best.

Diluted Knowledge. —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 talking 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 grain of pure knowledge
in a whole gallon of talk, imposing upon the child the
labour of discerning the grain and of extracting it
from the worthless flood.

Dr Arnold's Knowledge as a Child.— 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

1/ HOME EDUCATION

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
distinguished him in after life. When occupying the
professorial chair at Oxford, he made quotations, we
are told, from Dr Priestley's Lectures on History, —
verbally accurate quotations, 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.

Literature Proper for Children. — This sort of
weak literature for the children, both in story and
lesson books, is the result of a reactionary process.
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 diluent. Teachers, and even parents, who
are careful enough about their children's diet, are

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION I?/

so reckless as to the sort of mental aliment offered
to them, that I am exceedingly anxious to secure
consideration for this question, of the lessons and
literature proper for the little people.

Four Tests which should be applied to
Children's Lessons. — We see, then, that the
children's lessons should provide material for their
mental growth, should exercise the several powers
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 1 remind you of two or three points which I have
endeavoured to establish in the preceding pages : —

Resume of Six Points already considered. —
(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 schoolroom 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.

12

178 HOME EDUCATION

(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 joyous, and
that occasions of friction in the schoolroom are greatly
to be deprecated.

Premising so much, let us now consider — What the
children should learn, and how they should be taught.

II.— THE KINDERGARTEN AS A PLACE OF EDUCATION

The Mother the best Kindergartnerin. — 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 and of the art of
education ; intense sympathy with the children, much
tact, much common sense, much common information,
much 'joyousness of nature,' and much governing
power ; — in a word, the Kindergarten method is nicely
contrived to bring the child en rapport with a superior
intelligence. 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 best Kindergartnerin ; for who so
likely as she to have the needful tact, sympathy,
common sense, culture?

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 179

The Nursery need not therefore be a Kinder-
garten.— Though every mother should be a Kinder-
gdrtnerin, in the sense in which Froebel would employ
the term, it does not follow that every nursery should
be a regularly organised Kindergarten. Indeed, the
machinery of the Kindergarten is no more than a
device to ensure the carrying out of certain educa-
tional principles, and some of these it is the mother's
business to get at, and work out according to
Froebel'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.

Field of Knowledge too circumscribed.— But
it is possible that the child's marvellous power of
obtaining knowledge by means of his senses may be
undervalued ; 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
h'*s reach, he has obtained, exact ideas, it is true — can
distinguish a rhomboid from a pentagon, a primary
from a secondary colour, has learned to see so truly
that he can copy what he sees in folded paper or
woven straw, — but 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. There-
fore, while the exact nicely graduated training of
the Kindergarten may be of value, the mother will
endeavour to give it by the way, and will by no means

I SO HOME EDUCATION

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-condemned, because he had folded a slip of paper
irregularly, as if found out in a falsehood. But
mother or nurse is quite able to secure that the child's
small offices are perfectly executed ; and, here is
an important point, without that slight strain of
distressful anxiety which may be observed in children
labouring to please that smiling goddess, their
' Kindergartnerin!

Training of a Just Eye and Faithful Hand.—
The Kindergarten 'Occupations' afford opportunities
for training in this kind of faithfulness ; but in the
home a thousand such opportunities occur; if only
in such trifles as the straightening of a tablecloth
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 some of the games and occupations
of the Kindergarten into the nursery may be allowed ;
provided that the mother does not depend upon these,
but makes all the child's occupations subserve the
purposes of his education.

' Sweetness and Light ' in the Kindergarten.—
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

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION iSl

unruffled gentleness, takes him by the hand, and leads
him out of the circle, — he is not treated as an offender,
only he does not choose to do as others do, therefore
he is not wanted there : the next time, he is quite
content to be 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 professes to take
account of the joyousness of the child's nature : to
allow him full and free expression 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
behaviour sometimes allowed in children is unneces-
sary— 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 some of the principles
which should govern Kindergarten training are pre-
cisely those in which every thoughtful mother en-
deavours to bring up her family ; while the practices
of the Kindergarten, being only ways, amongst others,
of carrying out these principles, and being apt to
become stereotyped and wooden, are unnecessary, but
may be adopted so far as they fit in conveniently with
the mother's general scheme for the education of her
family.

1 82 HOME EDUCATION

III.— FURTHER CONSIDERATION OF THE
KINDERGARTEN

The Childhood of Tolstoi. — There is possibly no
known field of research in which so little available
work has been done as in that covered by the word
' children/ The ' fair lande ' lies under our very eyes,
but whoso would map it out must write ' Unexplored '
across vast tracts. Thoughtful persons begin to
suspect that the mistakes we make through this
ignorance are grievous and injurious. For example,
are not all our schemes of education founded on the
presumption that a child's mind — his ' thinking, feel-
ing man ' — begins ' very small,' and grows great with
the growth of his body? We cannot tell if this is
indeed the case. The children keep themselves to
themselves in a general way, their winning ways
and frank confidences notwithstanding ; but if one
of us do, by chance, get a child revealed to him, he
is startled to find that the child has by far the keener
intelligence, the wiser thoughts, the larger soul of
the two. When genius is able to lift the veil and
show us a child, it does a service which, in our present
state of thought, we are hardly able to appraise ; and
when genius or simplicity, or both, shall have given
us enough such studies to generalise upon, we shall
doubtless reconsider the whole subject, and shall be dis-
mayed at the slights we have been putting upon child-
ren in the name of education. Count Tolstoi gives us,
in Childhood, Boyhood, Youth? unmistakable child-por-
traiture^ miniature in which a mother may see her child
and recognise what and how much there is in him : —
" Like our own dear mother,"
1 See Appendix A.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 183

the little fellow writes, in the verses he makes for his
grandmother's birthday; and then, when the verses
come to be read, ah ! the humiliation of soul he goes
through, and how surely he expects father and grand-
mother to find him out for a hypocrite. " Why did I
write it ? She's not here, and it was not necessary to
mention her ; I love grandma, it's true ; I reverence
her, but still she is not the same. Why did I write
it? Why have I lied?" This is the sort of thing
there is in children. We recognise it as we read,
and remember the dim, childish days when we, too,
had an ' organ of truth ' just so exquisitely delicate ;
and the recollection should quicken our reverence for
the tender consciences of children.

"The Story of a Child."— I should like while
speaking of this subject to mention another book
which contains the self-revelation of a child, — a child
that once was summoned, to give evidence, out of the
dark abysm of time. This is the sort of study of
a child that is really precious, because it is to be had
on no other terms than by harking back to our own
childhood, vivifying it, reproducing it, by mere force of
imaginative power. This is absolutely the only way to
get into sympathy with a child, for children, with all
fheir frank confidences and ready chatter, are quite
inscrutable little persons, who never tell anyone the
sort of things that we read in this ' Story.' There is
no need to tell each other, for other children know,
and, as for telling the grown-ups, children are fully
persuaded that no grown-up, not even mother, could
understand ; Ponto might, perhaps, and confidences
will be poured into the ear of a dog which the loving
mother lays herself out for in vain.

184 HOME EDUCATION

"Each in his hidden sphere of joy or woe

Our hermit spirits dwell, and range apart,
Our eyes see all around in gloom or glow —

Hues of their own, fresh borrow'd from the heart."

And this is even more notably the case with
children than with ourselves. It is a law of our nature
with which it is absolutely useless to contend, and our
only means of true intimacy with a child is the power
of recovering our own childhood — a power which we
are apt to let slip as of no vital importance. This,
Miss Margaret Deland helps us to do : we recognise
our old selves, with a difference, in Ellen. Just so
irrational, inconsequent, loving and heroic, and
generally tiresome to the grown-up world were our
own impulses in that long ago, on which we look back
with tenderness, but seldom with complacency. If
we rise, after reading The Story of a Child,1 a little
more humble, a little more diffident, ready to believe
more than we see, why, it will do us no harm, and
should bless and help the children. From one word
of the author's we should like to differ. Miss Deland
thinks that it may be wholesome for the elders to
understand children better, but for the children, why,
she thinks that most of us grow up wonderfully well in
spite of this and all other difficulties. In a sense this
is true, but, in another sense, one of the saddest things
in life is the issue of splendid child-material into com-
monplace, uninteresting maturity, of a kind that the
world seems to be neither the better nor the worse for.

Tolstoi's childhood and that of Miss Deland's little
heroine would appear to be a far cry from ' the Kinder-
garten ' ; but as a matter of fact these two revelations
of what children are bring our contention to a point.

1 See Appendix A.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 185

We are told that, " but yesterday, in the University
of Edinburgh, the greatest figure in the Faculty was
Sir James Simpson, the discoverer of chloroform.
The other day his successor and nephew, Professor
Simpson, was asked by the librarian of the University
to go to the library and pick out the books on his
subject that were no longer needed. And his reply
to the librarian was this : ' Take every text-book that
is more than ten years old, and put it down in the
cellar.' " So far as education is a science, the truth
of even ten — much more, a hundred — years ago is
not the whole truth of to-day.

" Thoughts beyond their thought to those high seers were given " ;

and, in proportion as the urgency of educational
effort presses upon us, will be the ardour of our
appreciation, the diligence of our employment, of
those truths which the great pioneers, Froebel and
the rest, have won for us by no less than prophetic
insight. But, alas, and alas, for the cravings of
lazy human nature — we may not have an educational
pope ; we must think out for ourselves, as well as
work out, those things that belong to the perfect
bringing-up of our children.

What we Owe to Froebel. — We reverence
Froebel. Many of his great thoughts we share ; we
cannot say borrow, because some, like the child's
relations to the universe, are at least as old as
Plato ; others belong to universal practice and ex-
perience, and this shows their psychological Tightness.
Froebel gathered diffused thought and practice into
a system, but he did a greater thing than this. He
raised an altar to the enthusiasm of childhood upon
which the flame has never since gone out. The

1 86 HOME EDUCATION

true Kindergdrtnerin is the artist amongst teachers ;
she is filled with the inspiration of her work, and
probably most sincere teachers have caught some-
thing from her fervour, some sense of the beauty
of childhood, and of the enthralling delight of truly
educational work.

Requirements of a Person.— And yet I enter a
caveat. Our first care should be to preserve the
individuality, give play to the personality, of children.
Now persons do not grow in a garden, much less in
a greenhouse. It is a doubtful boon to a person to
have conditions too carefully adapted to his needs.
The exactly due sunshine and shade, pruning and
training, are good for a plant whose uses are sub-
ordinate, so to say, to the needs and pleasures of its
owner. But a person has other uses in the world,
and mother or teacher who regards him as a plant
and herself as the gardener, will only be saved from
grave mistakes by the force of human nature in
herself and in her child.

Nature as an Educator. — The notion of supple-
menting Nature from the cradle is a dangerous one.
A little guiding, a little restraining, much reverent
watching, Nature asks of us ; but beyond that, it is
the wisdom of parents to leave children as much
as may be to Nature, and " to a higher Power than
Nature itself."

Danger of undervaluing Children's Intelligence.
— Those of us who have watched an urchin of seven
making Catherine-wheels down the length of a street,
or a group of little girls dancing to a barrel organ,
or small boys and girls on a door-step giving what
Dickens calls ' dry nourishment ' to their babies, or
a small girl sent by her mother to make four careful

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 187

purchases out of sixpence and bring home the change
— are not ready to believe that physical, mental, and
moral development waits, so to speak, upon Kinder-
garten teaching. Indeed, I am inclined to question
whether, in the interest of carrying out a system,
the charming Kindergartnerin is not in danger some-
times of greatly undervaluing the intelligence of her
children. I know a person of three who happened to
be found by a caller alone in the drawing-room. It
was spring, and the caller thought to make himself
entertaining with talk about the pretty ' baa-lambs/
But a pair of big blue eyes were fixed upon him and
a solemn person made this solemn remark, " Isn't it
a dwefful howid thing to see a pig killed ! " We
hope she had never seen or even heard of the killing
of a pig, but she made as effective a protest against
twaddle as would any woman of Society. Boers
and kopjes, Russians and Japs, Treasure Island,
Robinson Crusoe and his man Friday, the fight of
Thermopylae, Ulysses and the Suitors — these are the
sorts of things that children play at by the month
together ; even the toddlers of three and four will hold
their own manfully with their brothers and sisters.
And, if the little people were in the habit of telling
ho-v they feel, we should learn perhaps that they are
a good deal bored by the nice little games in which
they frisk like lambs, flap their fins, and twiddle their
fingers like butterflies.

We aU like to be Humoured.— ' But,' says the
reader, 'children do all these things so pleasantly
and happily in the Kindergarten!' It is a curious
thing about human nature that we all like to be
managed by persons who take the pains to play on
our amiabilities. Even a dog can be made foolishly

1 88 HOME EDUCATION

sentimental ; and, if \ve who are older have our
foibles in this kind, it is little wonder that children
can be wooed to do anything by persons whose
approaches to them are always charming. It is
true that ' \V. V.,' the child whom the world has
been taught to love, sang her Kindergarten songs
with little hands waving in the ' air so blue ' ! but
that was for the delectation and delusion of the elders
when bedtime came. ' \V. V. ' had greater thoughts
at other times.

Teachers mediate too much. — There are still,
probably, Kindergartens where a great deal of
twaddle is talked in song and story, where the
teacher conceives that to make poems for the
children herself and to compose tunes for their
singing and to draw pictures for their admiration,
is to fulfil her function to the uttermost The
children might echo Wordsworth's complaint of
'the world/ and say, the teacher is too much with
us, late and soon. Everything is directed, expected,
suggested. No other personality out of book, picture,
or song, no, not even that of Nature herself, can get
at the children without the mediation of the teacher.
No room is left for spontaneity or personal initiation
on their part

Danger of Personal Magnetism.— Most of us
are misled by our virtues, and the entire zeal and
enthusiasm of the Kindergartnerin is perhaps her
stone of stumbling. ' But the children are so happy
and good ! ' Precisely ; the home-nursery is by no
means such a scene of peace, but I venture to think
it a better growing-place. I am delighted to see
that an eminent Frobelian protests against the
element of personal magnetism in the teacher ; but

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 189

there is, or has been, a good deal of this element in
the successful Kindergartner, and we all know how we
lose vigour and individuality under this sort of influence.
Even apart from this element of charm, I doubt if
the self-adjusting property of life in the Kindergarten
is good for children.

'Kindergarten* a False Analogy.— The world
suffered that morning when the happy name of
' Kindergarten ' suggested itself to the greatest among
educational ' Fathers.' No doubt it was simple and
fit in its first intention as meaning an out-of-door
garden life for the children ; but, a false analogy
has hampered, or killed, more than one philosophic
system — the child became a plant in a well-ordered
garden. The analogy appealed to the orderly,
scientific German mind, which does not much
approve of irregular, spontaneous movement in any
sort. Culture, due stimulus, sweetness and light,
became the chief features of a great educational
code. From the potting-shed to the frame and
thence to the flower-bed, the little plant gets in
due proportion what is good for him. He grows
in a seemly way, in ordered ranks ; and in fit
season puts forth his flower.

Now, to figure a person by any analogy whatsoever
is dangerous and misleading ; there is nothing in
nature commensurable with a person. Because the
analogy of the garden plant is very attractive, it is
the more misleading ; manifestations of purpose in
a plant are wonderful and delightful, but in a person
such manifestations are simply normal. The out-
come of any thought is necessarily moulded by that
thought, and to have a cultivated garden as the
ground-plan of our educational thought, either means

igo HOME EDUCATION

nothing at all, which it would be wronging the
Master to suppose, or it means undue interference
with the spontaneous development of a human being.
Mother-games too strenuous for a Child. — To
begin with the ' Mother-games/ a sweet conception,
most lovingly worked out. But let us consider;
the infant is exquisitely aware of every mood of
his mother, the little face clouds with grief or beams
with joy in response to the expression of hers. The
two left to themselves have rare games. He jumps
and pulls, crows and chuckles, crawls and kicks and
gurgles with joy ; and, amid all the play, is taught
what he may not do. Hands and feet, legs and
arms, fingers and toes, are continually going while
he is awake ; mouth, eyes and ears are agog. All is
play without intention, and mother plays with baby
as glad as he. Nature sits quietly by and sees to
it that all the play is really work ; and development
of every sort is going on at a greater rate during
the first two years of life than at any like period
of after life — enough development and not too
much, for baby is an inordinate sleeper. Then comes
in the educator and offers a little more. The new
games are so pretty and taking that baby might
as well be doing these as his own meaningless and
clumsy j umpings and pattings. But a real labour
is being put upon the child in addition to the heaviest
two years' work that his life will know. His sympathy
with his mother is so acute that he perceives some-
thing strenuous in the new play, notwithstanding all
the smiles and pretty talk ; he answers by endeavour,
great in proportion as he is small. His nerve centres
and brain power have been unduly taxed, some of the
joy of living has been taken from him, and though his

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION IQI

baby response to direct education is very charming,
he has less latent power left for the future calls of life.

The Society of his Equals too stimulating
for a Child. — Let us follow the little person to the
Kindergarten, where he has the stimulus of class-
mates of his own age. It certainly is stimulating.
For ourselves, no society is so much so as that of a
number of persons of our own age and standing ; this
is the great joy of college life ; a wholesome joy for
all young people for a limited time. But persons of
twenty have, or should have, some command over
their inhibitory centres. They should not permit
the dissipation of nerve power caused by too much
social stimulus ; yet even persons of twenty are not
always equal to the task of self-management in ex-
citing circumstances. What then, is to be expected
of persons of two, three, four, five ? That the little
person looks rather stolid than otherwise is no
guarantee against excitement within. The clash and
sparkle of our equals now and then stirs us up to
health ; but for everyday life, the mixed society of
elders, juniors and equals, which we get in a family,
gives at the same time the most repose and the
most room for individual development. We have all
wondered at the good sense, reasonableness, fun and
resourcefulness shown by a child in his own home
as compared with the same child in school life.

Danger of supplanting Nature. — Danger lurks
in the Kindergarten, just in proportion to the com-
pleteness and beauty of its organisation. It is possible
to supplement Nature so skilfully that we run some
risk of supplanting her, depriving her of space and
time to do her own work in her own way. ' Go and
see what Tommy is doing and tell him he mustn't/

IQ2 HOME EDUCATION

is not sound doctrine. Tommy should be free to do
what he likes with his limbs and his mind through
all the hours of the day when he is not sitting up
nicely at meals. He should run and jump, leap and
tumble, lie on his face watching a worm, or on his
back watching the bees in a lime tree. Nature will
look after him and give him promptings of desire
to know many things, and somebody must tell as
he wants to know; and to do many things, and
somebody should be handy just to put him in the
way ; and to be many things, naughty and good, and
somebody should give direction.

Importance of Personal Initiative. — Here we
come to the real crux of the Kindergarten question.
The busy mother says she has no leisure to be that
somebody, and the child will run wild and get into
bad habits ; but we must not make a fetish of habit ;
education is a life as well as a discipline. Health,
strength, and agility, bright eyes and alert movements,
come of a free life, out-of-doors, if it may be ; and as
for habits, there is no habit or power so useful to man
or woman as that of personal initiative. The re-
sourcefulness which will enable a family of children
to invent their own games and occupations through
the length of a summer's day is worth more in after
life than a good deal of knowledge about cubes and
hexagons, and this comes, not of continual intervention
on the mother's part, but of much masterly inactivity.

Parents and Teachers must sow Opportunities.
— The educational error of our day is that we believe
too much in mediators. Now, Nature is her own
mediator, undertakes, herself, to find work for eyes
and ears, taste and touch; she will prick the brain
with problems and the heart with feelings ; and the

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 193

part of mother or teacher in the early years (indeed,
all through life) is to sow opportunities, and then
to keep in the background, ready with a guiding or
restraining hand only when these are badly wanted.
Mothers shirk their work and put it, as they would say,
into better hands than their own, because they do
not recognise that wise letting alone is the chief
thing asked of them, seeing that every mother has
in Nature an all-sufficient handmaid, who arranges for
due work and due rest of mind, muscles, and senses.

In one way the children of the poor have better
chances than those of the rich. Poor children get
education out of household ways ; but there is a great
deal of good teaching to be got out of a wisely ordered
nursery, and their own small persons and possessions
should, as I have said, afford much 'Kindergarten'
training to the little family at home. At six or seven,
definite lessons should begin, and these need not
be watered down or served with jam for the acute
intelligences that will in this way be brought to
bear on them.

' Only' Children. — But what of only children, or the
child too old to play with her baby brother ? Surely
the Kindergarten is a great boon for these ! Perhaps
so ; but a cottage-child as a companion, or a lively
young nursemaid, might be better. A child will have
taught himself to paint, paste, cut paper, knit, weave,
hammer and saw, make lovely things in clay and
sand, build castles with his bricks ; possibly, too, will
have taught himself to read, write, and do sums,
besides acquiring no end of knowledge and notions
about the world he lives in, by the time he is six
or seven. What I contend for is that he shall do
these things because he chooses (provided that the

13

IQ4 HOME EDUCATION

standard of perfection in his small works be kept
before him).

The Child should be allowed some Ordering of
his Life. — The details of family living will give him
the repose of an ordered life; but, for the rest, he
should have more free-growing time than is possible
in the most charming school. The fact that lessons
look like play is no recommendation : they just want
the freedom of play and the sense of his own ordering
that belongs to play. Most of us have little enough
opportunity for the ordering of our own lives, so it is
well to make much of the years that can be given to
children to gain this joyous experience.

Helen Keller. — I think what I have said of natural
development as opposed to any too carefully organised
system is supported by a recent contribution, of unique
value, to the science of education — I mean the auto-
biography of Helen Keller.1

When she was nineteen months old, Helen had a
severe illness, in which she lost sight and hearing, and
consequently speech. She never recovered the lost
senses ; and here, we should say, was a soul almost
inviolably sealed, to which there was no approach but
through the single sense of touch ; yet, this lady's
book, written with her own unaided hands (she used
a typewriter), with hardly any revision, should rank as
a classic for the purity and pregnancy of the style,
independently of the vital interest of the matter. How
was the miracle accomplished ? Of her childhood
Helen says herself that, save for a few impressions, "the
shadows of the prison-house " enveloped it. But there
were always roses, and she had the sense of smell ; and
there was love — but she was not loving then. When

1 See Appendix A.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 195

she was seven Miss Sullivan came to her. This lady
had herself been blind for some years, and had been
at the Perkins Institute, founded by that Dr Howe
who liberated the intelligence of Laura Bridgman. But
Miss Sullivan is no mere output of any institution.
She is a person of fine sanity and wholesomeness,
trusting to her personal initiative, and aware from the
first that her work was to liberate the personality of
her little pupil and by no means to superimpose her
own. "Thus I came up out of Egypt," says Miss
Keller of the arrival of her teacher, and the voice
which she heard from Sinai said, " Knowledge is love
and light and vision " ; and then follows that amazing
and enthralling epic which tells how it was all done,
how the one word water was the key which opened the
doors of the child's mind, while the word love opened
those of the closed heart. Thenceforth, many new
words came every day with crowds of ideas ; and it is
not too much to say that this imprisoned and desolate
child entered upon such a large inheritance of thought
and knowledge, of gladness and vision, as few of us of
the seeing and hearing world attain to. The instru-
ment in this great liberation was nothing more than
the familiar manual alphabet, followed in course of
time by raised books and c Braille.'

Miss Sullivan on Systems of Education. — Like
all great discoveries, this, of a soul, was, in all its steps,
marked by simplicity. Miss Sullivan had little love
for psychologists and all their ways ; would have no
experiments ; would not have her pupil treated as a
phenomenon, but as a person. " No," she says, " I
don't want any more Kindergarten materials. ... I
am beginning to suspect all elaborate and special
systems of education. They seem to me to be built

196 HOME EDUCATION

up on the supposition that every child is a kind of
idiot who must be taught to think, whereas if the
child is left to himself he will think more and better,
if less showily. Let him go and come freely, let him
touch real things, and combine his impressions for
himself, instead of sitting indoors at a little round table,
while a sweet-voiced teacher suggests that he build a
stone wall with his wooden blocks, or make a rainbow
out of strips of coloured paper, or plant straw trees in
bead flower-pots. Such teaching fills the mind with
artificial associations that must be got rid of before the
child can develop independent ideas out of actual ex-
periences." It is a great thing to have a study of educa-
tion as it were de novo, in which we see the triumph of
mind, not only over apparently insuperable natural
obstacles, but over the dead wall of systematised educa-
tion— a more complete hindrance to many a poor
child than her grievous defects proved to Helen Keller.

The Kindergarten in the United States. — This
question of the Kindergarten, as the proper place for
the education of young children, is so important that I
should like to recommend to parents and teachers the
examination of the subject contained in the Special
Reports published by the Board of Education.1

We must go to the United States to witness the
apotheosis of educational theory ; I say theory rather
than practice, because the American mind, like the
French, seems to me severely logical as well as
generously impulsive. A theory arrives, is liberally
entertained, and is set to work with due appliances
on a magnificent scale to do that which in it lies
for the education of a great people. That is to say,
educational science in America appears to be deduc-

1 See Appendix A.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 197

tive rather than inductive ; theories are translated into
experiments with truly imposing zeal and generosity.
An inductive theory of education is, on the other
hand, arrived at by means of long, slow, various, and
laborious experiments which disclose, here a little,
and there a little, of universal truth. The Americans
have chosen, perhaps, the easier way, and in the end,
they too experiment upon their theory. The Kinder-
garten system illustrates what I mean ; notwith-
standing its German name, the Kindergarten is not a
common product in the Fatherland ; it is in America
that the ideas of Froebel have received their greatest
development, that the Kindergarten has become a cult,
and the great teacher a prophet. But the impulse has
worn itself out ; any way, it is waxing weak.

Mr Thistleton Mark on the Kindergarten.—
According to Mr Thistleton Mark — whose able paper
on ' Moral Education in American Schools ' offers
matter for much profitable reflection — " Even a sta-
tionary Froebelian is driven to have some better
holdfast than the ipse dixit of the great reformer.
The word Kindergarten is no longer a proper noun
signifying always and everywhere the one, sole,
original, and identical thing. It is a common noun,
and as such is assured of a more permanent place
in American speech." That is to say, educational
thought in America is tending towards the broad and
natural conception expressed in the phrase ' educa-
tion is a life/ But I wish that educationalists would
give up the name Kindergarten. I cannot help
thinking that it is somewhat of a strain to conscien-
tious minds to draw the cover of Froebelian doctrine
and practice over the broader and more living concep-
tions that are abroad to-day. Even revolutionised

198 HOME EDUCATION

Kindergarten practice must suffer from the memory
and habit of weaknesses such as are pointed out
by Dr Stanley Hall in the following words : —

Dr Stanley HaU on the Kindergarten.— " The
most decadent intellectual new departure of the
American Froebelists is the emphasis now laid upon
the mother- plays as the acme of Kindergarten wisdom
These are represented by very crude poems, indifferent
music and pictures, illustrating certain incidents of
child life believed to be of fundamental and typical
significance. I have read these in German and in
English, have strummed the music, and have given a
brief course of lectures from the sympathetic stand-
point, trying to put all the new wine of meaning I
could think of into them. But I am driven to the
conclusion that, if they are not positively unwhole-
some and harmful for the child, and productive of
anti-scientific and unphilosophical intellectual habits
in the teacher, they should nevertheless be superseded
by the far better things now available." 1

"Another cardinal error of the Kindergarten is
the intensity of its devotion to gifts and occupations.
In devising these Froebel showed great sagacity ; but
the scheme as it left his own hands was a very
inadequate expression of his educational ideas, even
for his time. He thought it a perfect grammar of
play and an alphabet of industries ; and in this
opinion he was utterly mistaken. Play and industry
were then relatively undeveloped ; and while his
devices were beneficent for the peasant children in
the country, they lead in the interests of the modern
city child a very pallid and unreal life." With these
important utterances I must conclude a superfici?!

1 Quoted by Mr Thistleton Mark.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 199

examination of the very important question, — Is the
Kindergarten the best training-ground for a child ?

IV. — READING

Time of Teaching to Read, an Open Question.

— Reading presents itself first amongst the lessons to
be used as instruments of education, although it is
open to discussion whether the child should acquire
the art unconsciously, from his infancy upwards, or
whether the effort should be deferred until he is, say,
six or seven, and then 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 : —

Mrs Wesley's Plan. — " None of them was taught
to read till five years old, except Kezzy, in whose
case I was overruled ; and she was more 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 thought them then 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 tenth of February ; the next day be began to

200 HOME EDUCATION

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 his 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." l

It is much to be wished that thoughtful mothers
would more often keep account of the methods they
employ with their children, with some definite note
of the success of this or that plan.

Many 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 pro-
ficiency. Whereby it is plain, 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 Reading without Tears, if
tears were not sometimes shed over the reading

1 Southey's Life of Wesley.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 2OI

lesson ; but, really, when that is the case, the fault
rests with the teacher.

The Alphabet. — As for his letters, the child usually
teaches himself. He has his box of ivory letters,
and picks out p for pudding, 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 (9, 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 observation 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.
There is no occasion to hurry the child : 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, but
£?, 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 teaching 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

2O2 HOME EDUCATION

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 the 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.

Word-making. — 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 c at' : tell him it is the word we use
when we say ' at home,' ' at school.' Then put b to
'at' — bat\ <: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 con-
sonants, 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 consonants without
effort. 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.

Word-making with Long Vowels, etc. — 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,'

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 203

and we get late, pate, rate, etc. The child may be
told that a in * rate' is long a; a in ' rat* is short
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. Require 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.

Early Spelling. — 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 compose 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 English words are, each,
a law unto itself: there is nothing for it, but the child
must learn to know them at sight ; he must recognise
' which,' precisely as he recognises ' B,' because he has

2O4 HOME EDUCATION

seen it before, been made to look at it with interest,
so that the pattern of the word is stamped on his
retentive brain. 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 lessons, the more will the child enjoy them.
Lessons in word-making help him to take intelligent
interest in words ; but his progress in the art of
reading depends chiefly on the ' reading at sight '
lessons.

Reading at Sight. — 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. Read the
passage for the child, very slowly, sweetly, with just
expression, so that it is pleasant to him to listen.
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.

The Reading of Prose. — At this stage, his reading
lessons must advance so slowly that he may just as
well learn his reading exercises, both prose and

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 205

poetry, as recitation lessons. Little poems suitable
to be learned in this way will suggest themselves at
once; but perhaps prose is better, on the whole, as
offering more of the words in everyday 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 Bar-
bauld's prose poems, are very suitable. Even for
their earliest reading lessons, it is unnecessary to put
twaddle into the hands of 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 him, 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 recognise them anywhere,
and the lesson has occupied probably ten minutes.

The next ' reading at sight ' lesson will begin with
a hunt for the familiar words, and then —

" Up above the world so high,
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 word
as we see the features of a face — say to the child,
' Can you spell sky ? ' — 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

206 HOME EDUCATION

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 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.

Careful Pronunciation.— The little people will
probably have to be pulled up on the score of pro-
nunciation. They must render ' high,' ' sky,' ' like,'
1 world,' with delicate precision ; c diamond,' they will
no doubt wish to hurry over, and say as ' di'mond,'
just as they will reduce 'history* to 'hist'ry.' But
here is 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 more 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.

A Year's Work. — ' But what a snail's progress ! '
you are inclined to say. Not so slow, after all : a
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.

Ordinary Method. — 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

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 2O?

not know, and he spells it ; that throws no light on
the subject, and he is told the word : he repeats it,
but as he has made no mental effort to secure the
word, the next time he meets with it the same process
is gone through. The reading lesson for that day
comes to an end. The pupil has been miserably
bored, and has not acquired one new word. EventiT-
ally, he learns to read, somehow, by mere dint of
repetition ; but consider what an abuse of his
intelligence 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.

V.— THE FIRST READING LESSON l
(Two Mothers Confer)

" You don't mean to say you would go plump into
words of three or four syllables before a child knows
his letters ? "

" It is possible to read words without knowing the
alphabet, as you may know a face without singling
out its features ; but we learn not only the names
but the sounds of the letters before we begin to
read words."

" Our children learn their letters without any
teaching. We always keep by us a shallow table
drawer, the bottom covered half an inch deep with
sand. Before they are two, the babies make round

1 It is so important that children should be taught to read in a
rational way, that I introduce two papers (by the writer) which have
appeared in the Parents' Review, in the hope that they will make the
suggested method fairly clear and familiar.

208 HOME EDUCATION

O and crooked S, and T for Tommy, and so on,
with dumpy, uncertain little fingers. The elder
children teach the little ones by way of a game."

" The sand is capital ! We have various devices,
but none so good as that. Children love to be
doing. The funny, shaky lines the little finger
makes in the sand will be ten times as interesting
as the shapes the eye sees/'

" But the reading ! I can't get over three syllables
for the first lesson. Why, it's like teaching a twelve-
months old child to waltz ! "

" You say that because we forget that a group of
letters is no more than the sign of a word, while a word
is only the vocal sign of a thing or an act. This is how
the child learns. First, he gets the notion of table ;
he sees several tables; he finds they have legs,
by which you can scramble up ; very often covers
which you may pull off; and on them many
things lie, good and pleasant for a baby to enjoy ;
sometimes, too, you can pull these things off the
table, and they go down with a bang, which is
nice. The grown-up people call this pleasant
thing, full of many interests, 'table,' and, by-and-
by, baby says ' table ' too ; and the word ' table '
comes to mean, in a vague way, all this to him.
' A round table,' ' on the table,' and so on, form
part of the idea of 'table' to him. In the same
way baby chimes in when his mother sings. She
says, ' Baby, sing,' and, by-and-by, notions of * sing/
' kiss/ ' love/ dawn on his brain."

" Yes, the darlings ! and it's surprising how many
words a child knows even before he can speak them ;
' pussy/ ' dolly,' ' carriage/ soon convey interesting
ideas to him."

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 209

" That's just it. Interest the child in the thing,
and he soon learns the sound-sign for it — that is,
its name. Now, I maintain that, when he is a
little older, he should learn the form-sign — that
is, the printed word — on the same principle. It is
far easier for a child to read plum-pudding
than to read ' t o, to,' because ' plum-pudding ' conveys
a far more interesting idea."

" That may be, when he gets into words of three
or four syllables ; but what would you do while he's
in words of one syllable — indeed, of two or three
letters?"

" I should never put him into words of one
syllable at all. The bigger the wdrd, the more
striking the look of it, and, therefore, the easier it
is to read, provided always that the idea it conveys
is interesting to a child. It is sad to see an in-
telligent child toiling over a reading-lesson infinitely
below his capacity — ath, eth, ith, oth, uth — or, at
the very best, 'The cat sat on the mat.' How
should we like to begin to read German, for ex-
ample, by toiling over all conceivable combinations
of letters, arranged on no principle but similarity
of sound; or, worse still, that our readings should
be graduated according to the number of letters
each word contains ? We should be lost in a
hopeless fog before a page of words of three letters,
all drearily like one another, with no distinctive
features for the eye to seize upon ; but the child ?
'Oh, well — children are different; no doubt it is
good for the child to grind in this mill ! ' But
this is only one of many ways in which children
are needlessly and cruelly oppressed ! "

" You are taking high moral ground ! All the

210 HOME EDUCATION

same, I don't think I am convinced. It is far easier
for a child to spell cat, cat, than to spell plum-
pudding, plum-pudding."

" But spelling and reading are two things. You
must learn to spell in order to write words, not to
read them. A child is droning over a reading-lesson,
spells cough; you say ' cough,' and she repeats.
By dint of repetition, she learns at last to associate
the look of the word with the sound, and says
'cough' without spelling it; and you think she
has arrived at ' cough ' through cough. Not a bit
of it ; c o f spells cough ! "

" Yes ; but ' cough ' has a silent «, and a gh with
the sound of / There, I grant, is a great difficulty.
If only there were no silent letters, and if all letters
had always the same sound, we should, indeed, have
reading made easy. The phonetic people have some-
thing to say for themselves."

" You would agree with the writer of an article
in a number of a leading review : * Plough ought
to be written and printed plow ; through, thru ;
enough, enuf\ ought, aut or ort* ; and so on. All
this goes on the mistaken idea that in reading we
look at the letters which compose a word, think of
their sounds, combine these, and form the word.
We do nothing of the kind ; we accept a word,
written or printed, simply as the symbol of a word
we are accustomed to say. If the word is new to
us we may try to make something of the letters,
but we know so well that this is a shot in the dark,
that we are careful not to say the new word until
we have heard some one else say it."

" Yes, but children are different."

" Children are the same, ' only more so.' We could,

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 211

if we liked, break up a word into its sounds, or put
certain sounds together to make a word. But these
are efforts of mind beyond the range of children.
First, as last, they learn to know a word by the look
of it, and the more striking it looks the easier it is to
recognise ; provided always that the printed word is
one which they already know very well by sound and
by sense."

" It is not clear yet ; suppose you tell me, step by
step, how you would give your first reading lesson.
An illustration helps one so much."

" Very well : Bobbie had his first lesson yesterday
— on his sixth birthday. The lesson was part of the
celebration. By the way, I think it's rather a good
plan to begin a new study with a child on his birth-
day, or some great day ; he begins by thinking the
new study a privilege."

" That is a hint. But go on ; did Bobbie know his
letters ? "

" Yes, he had picked them up, as you say ; but I
had been careful not to allow any small readings.
You know how Susanna Wesley used to retire to her
room with the child who was to have his first reading-
lesson, and not to appear again for some hours, when
the boy came out able to read a good part of the first
chapter of Genesis? Well, Bobbie's first reading-
lesson was a solemn occasion too, for which we had
been preparing for a week or two. First, I bought a
dozen penny copies of the ' History of Cock Robin '
— good bold type, bad pictures, that we cut out.

" Then we had a nursery pasting day — pasting the
sheets on common drawing-paper — six one side down,
and six the other ; so that now we had six complete
copies, and not twelve.

212 HOME EDUCATION

" Then we cut up the first page only, of all six
copies, line by line, and word by word. We gathered
up the words and put them in a box, and our prepara-
tions were complete.

" Now for the lesson. Bobbie and I are shut in by
ourselves in the morning-room. I always use a black-
board in teaching the children. I write up, in good
clear ' print ' hand,

Cock Robin.

Bobbie watches with the more interest because he
knows his letters. I say, pointing to the word, ' cock
robin,' which he repeats.

" Then the words in the box are scattered on the
table, and he finds half a dozen 'cock robins' with
great ease.

" We do the same thing with ' sparrow,' c arrow,'
' said,' ' killed,' ' who,' and so on, till all the words in
the verse have been learned. The words on the black-
board grow into a column, which Bob reads back-
wards and forwards, and every way, except as the
words run in the verse.

" Then Bobbie arranges the loose words into
columns like that on the board.

" Then into columns of his own devising, which he
reads off.

" Lastly, culminating joy (the whole lesson has
been a delight ! ), he finds among the loose words, at
my dictation,

'Who killed Cock Robin

I said the sparrow
With my bow and arrow
I killed Cock Robin,'

arranging the words in verse form.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 21$

"Then I had still one unmutilated copy, out of
which Bob had the pleasure of reading the verse, and
he read it forwards and backwards. So long as he
lives he will know those twelve words/'

" No doubt it was a pleasant lesson ; but, think of
all the pasting and cutting ! "

" Yes, that is troublesome. I wish some publisher
would provide us with what we want — nursery rhymes,
in good bold type, with boxes of loose words to
match — a separate box, or division, for each page, so
that the child may not be confused by having too
many words to hunt amongst. The point is that he
should see, and look aty the new word many times, so
that its shape becomes impressed on his brain."

" I see ; but he is only able to read ' Cock Robin ' ;
he has no general power of reading."

" On the contrary, he will read those twelve words
wherever he meets with them. Suppose he learns
ten words a day, in half a year he will have at least
six hundred words ; he will know how to read a little."

" Excellent, supposing your children remember all
they learn. At the end of a week, mine would
remember ' Cock Robin,' perhaps, but the rest would
be gone ! "

" Oh, but we keep what we get ! When we have
mastered the words of the second verse, Bob runs
through the first in the book, naming words here and
there as I point to them. It takes less than a minute,
and the ground is secured."

"The first lesson must have been long?"

"I'm sorry to say it lasted half an hour. The
child's interest tempted me to do more than I
should."

" It all sounds very attractive — a sort of game — but

214 HOME EDUCATION

I cannot be satisfied that a child should learn to read
without knowing the powers of the letters. You
constantly see a child spell a word over to himself,
and then pronounce it ; the more so, if he has been
carefully taught the sounds of the letters — not merely
their names."

" Naturally ; for though many of our English words
are each a law unto itself, others offer a key to a
whole group, as arrow gives us sp arrow, m arrow,
h arrow ; but we have alternate days — one for reading,
the other for word-building — and that is one way to
secure variety, and, so, the joyous interest which is
the real secret of success."

VI.— READING BY SIGHT AND BY SOUND

Learning to read is Hard Work. — Probably that
vague whole which we call ' Education ' offers no more
difficult and repellent task than that to which every
little child is (or ought to be) set down — the task
of learning to read. We realise the labour of it when
some grown man makes a heroic effort to remedy
shameful ignorance, but we forget how contrary to
Nature it is for a little child to occupy himself with
dreary hieroglyphics — all so dreadfully alike ! — when
the world is teeming with interesting objects which
he is agog to know. But we cannot excuse our
volatile Tommy, nor is it good for him that we should.
It is quite necessary he should know how to read ; and
not only so — the discipline of the task is altogether
wholesome for the little man. At the same time, let
us recognise that learning to read is to many children
hard work, and let us do what we can to make the
task easy and inviting.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 21$

Knowledge of Arbitrary Symbols.— In the first
place, let us bear in mind that reading is not a science
nor an art. Even if it were, the children must still be
the first consideration with the educator ; but it is not.
Learning to read is no more than picking up, how
we can, a knowledge of certain arbitrary symbols for
objects and ideas. There are absolutely no right and
necessary ' steps ' to reading, each of which leads to
the next ; there is no true beginning, middle, or end.
For the arbitrary symbols we must know in order to
read are not letters, but words. By way of illustration,
consider the delicate differences of sound represented
by the letter * o ' in the last sentence ; to analyse and
classify the sounds of ' o' in ' for,' ' symbols/ * know/
' order/ * to/ ' not/ and ' words/ is a curious, not
especially useful, study for a philologist, but a labori-
ous and inappropriate one for a child. It is time we
faced the fact that the letters which compose an
English word are full of philological interest, and that
their study will be a valuable part of education by-
and-by ; but meantime, sound and letter-sign are so
loosely wedded in English, that to base the teaching
of reading on the sounds of the letters only, is to lay
up for the child much analytic labour, much mental
confusion, due to the irregularities of the language;
and some little moral strain in making the sound of a
letter in a given word fall under any of the ' sounds '
he has been taught.

Definitely, what is it we propose in teaching a child
to read ? (a) that he shall know at sight, say, some
thousand words ; (b) That he shall be able to build
up new words with the elements of these. Let him
learn ten new words a day, and in twenty weeks he
will be to some extent able to read, without any

2l6 HOME EDUCATION

question as to the number of letters in a word. For
the second, and less important, part of our task,
the child must know the sounds of the letters,
and acquire power to throw given sounds into new
combinations.

What we want is a bridge between the child's
natural interests and those arbitrary symbols with
which he must become acquainted, and which, as we
have seen, are words, and not letters.

These Symbols should be Interesting. — The
child cares for things, not words ; his analytic power is
very small, his observing faculty is exceedingly quick
and keen ; nothing is too small for him ; he will spy out
the eye of a fly ; nothing is too intricate, he delights
in puzzles. But the thing he learns to know by look-
ing at it, is a thing which interests him. Here we
have the key to reading. No meaningless combina-
tions of letters, no da, cle, di, do, du, no ath, eth, ith
oth, uth, should be presented to him. The child should
be taught from the first to regard the printed word as
he already regards the spoken word, as the symbol of
fact or idea full of interest. How easy to read ' robin
redbreast/ 'buttercups and daisies'; the number of
letters in the words is no matter; the words them-
selves convey such interesting ideas that the general
form and look of them fixes itself on the child's brain
by the same law of association of ideas which makes it
easy to couple the objects with their spoken names.
Having got a word fixed on the sure peg of the idea
it conveys, the child will use his knowledge of the
sounds of the letters to make up other words contain-
ing the same elements with great interest. When he
knows ' butter ' he is quite ready to make ' mutter '
by changing the b for an m.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 2 1/

Tommy's First Lesson.— But example is better
than precept, and more convincing than the soundest
reasoning. This is the sort of reading lesson we have
in view. Tommy knows his letters by name and
sound, but he knows no more. To-day he is to be
launched into the very middle of reading, without any
' steps ' at all, because reading is neither an art nor a
science, and has, probably, no beginning. Tommy is
to learn to read to-day —

" I like little pussy,
Her coat is so warm " —

and he is to know those nine words so well that he
will be able to read them wherever they may occur
henceforth and for evermore.

" Oh, yes," says a reader, " as in the ' Cock Robin '
lesson ; grant that the principle is sound — and there
is much to be said on both sides of that question —
but grant it, who in the world could get through all
the pasting and cutting and general messing prepara-
tory to the great lesson ? No ; the method of the
books may be only second-best, but ready-made
books must do for me. I have no time to make
my own apparatus."

I must own that the cutting and pasting was
very clumsy, but the lesson served its purpose because
it induced a good friend to education 1 to have a
delightful ' Little Pussy ' box prepared for us, loose
words, nice big type, two lines in a bag. Whoso learns
'Little Pussy' as it should be learned will know
at least one hundred words — not a bad stock-in-trade
for a beginner — all of them good useful words that
we want every day. There is one objection ; such

1 Miss Miller, founder of a Training College at Oxford.

2l8 HOME EDUCATION

contractions as * I'll ' are ugly at the best, and I hope
that in the word-lessons based upon ' Little Pussy/
pieces will be chosen in which this fault is avoided.

Steps. — And now, we begin. Materiel: Tommy's
box of loose letters, the new ' Little Pussy ' box, pencil
and paper, or much better, blackboard and chalk.
We write up in good big print hand ' Pussy.' Tommy
watches with interest : he knows the letters, and prob-
ably says them as we write. Besides, he is prepared
for the great event of his life ; he knows he is going
to begin to learn to read to-day. But we do not ask
anything yet of his previous knowledge. We simply
tell him that the word is 'pussy.' Interest at once;
he knows the thing, pussy, and the written symbol is
pleasant in his eyes because it is associated with an
existing idea in his mind. He is told to look at the
word ' pussy ' until he is sure he would know it again.
Then he makes ' pussy ' from memory with his own
loose letters. Then the little bag containing our two
lines in loose words is turned out, and he finds the
word ' pussy ' ; and, lastly, the little sheet with the
poem printed on it is shown to him, and he finds
' pussy,' but is not allowed yet to find out the run of
the rhyme. ' Coat, little, like, is, her, warm, I, so/ are
taught in the same way, in less time than it takes to
describe the lesson. When each new word is learned,
Tommy makes a column of the old ones, and reads
up and down and cris-cras, the column on the black-
board.

Reading Sentences. — He knows words now, but
he cannot yet read sentences. Now for the delight of
reading. He finds at our dictation, amongst his loose
words, 'pussy — is — warm/ places them in 'reading'
order, one after the other, and then reads off the

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 2 19

sentence. Joy, as of one who has found a new planet !
And Tommy has indeed found a new power. Then,
' her — little — coat — is — warm/ ' Pussy — is — so — little/
' I — like — pussy/ ' Pussy — is — little — like — her — coat/
and so on through a dozen more little arrangements.
If the rhyme can be kept a secret till the whole is
worked out, so much the better. To make the verses
up with his own loose words will give Tommy such
a delicious sense that knowledge is power, as few
occasions in after life will afford. Anyway, reading is
to him a delight henceforth, and it will require very
bad management indeed to make him hate it.

Tommy's Second Lesson. — Tommy promises
himself another reading lesson next day, but he has
instead a spelling lesson, conducted somewhat in this
way : —

He makes the word ' coat ' with his letters, from
memory if he can ; if not, with the pattern word. Say
' coat ' slowly ; give the sound of the c. ' Take away c,
and what have we left ? ' A little help will get ' oat '
from him. How would you make ' boat' (say the word
very slowly, bringing out the sound of b). He knows
the sounds of the letters, and says b-oat readily ; fl-oat,
two added sounds, which you lead him to find out ;
g-oat, he will give you the gt and find goat a charming
new word to know ; m-oat, he easily decides on the
sound of m ; a little talk about moat ; the other
words are too familiar to need explanation. Tommy
will, no doubt, offer ' note/ and we must make a clean
breast of it and say, c No, note is spelt with other
letters ' ; but what other letters we do not tell him
now. Thus he comes to learn incidentally and very
gradually that different groups of letters may stand
for the same sounds. But we do not ask him to

220 HOME EDUCATION

generalise ; we only let him have the fact that n-oat
does not spell the symbol we express by 'note/
'Stoat' — he will be able to give the sounds of the
initial letters, and stoat again calls for a little talk —
another interesting word. He has made a group of
words with his letters, and there they are on the black-
board in a column, thus —

c-oat

m-oat

g-oat

fl-oat

st-oat

b-oat

He reads the column up and down and cris-cras;
every word has a meaning and carries an idea. Then
the loose words he knows are turned out, and we
dictate new sentences, which he arranges : ' I — like —
her — goat ' ; ' her — little — stoat — is — warm,' and so
on, making the new words with loose letters.

Unknown Words. — Now for a new experience.
We dictate ' pussy is in the boat' Consternation !
Tommy does not know ' in ' nor ' the.' ' Put counters
for the words you don't know ; they may soon come
in our lessons/ and Tommy has a desire and a need
—that is, an appetite for learning.

Like Combinations have Different Sounds. —
We deal with the remaining words in the same way
'little' gives brittle, tittle, skittle: pussy, is, I, and her,
give no new words. ' Like ' gives mike and pike.
' So ' gives no, do (the musical ' do '), and lo ! From
' warm ' we get arm, harm, charm, barm, alarm ;
we pronounce warm as arm. Tommy perceives that
such a pronunciation is wrong and vulgar, and sees

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 221

that all these words are sounded like ' arm,' but not
one of them like 'warm' — that is, he sees that the
same group of letters need not always have the same
sound. But we do not ask him to 'make a note of
this new piece of knowledge ; we let it grow into him
gradually, after many experiences.

By this time he has eighteen new words on the
blackboard of which to make sentences with the nine
loose words of 'pussy.' Her skittle is little, her
charm is brittle, her arm is warm, and so on. But we
take care that the sentences make sense. Her goat
is brittle, is ' silly,' and not to be thought of at all.
Tommy's new words are written in his ' note-book '
in print hand, so that he can take stock of his
possessions in the way of words.

Moral Training in Reading Lessons. — The next
day we do the last two lines of the stanza, as at first.
These lines afford hardly any material for a spelling
lesson, so in our next lesson we go on with the second
verse. But our stock of words is growing; we are
able, as we go on, to make an almost unlimited
number of little sentences. If we have to use counters
now and then, why, that only whets our appetite for
knowledge. By the time Tommy has worked ' Little
Passy' through he has quite a large stock of words;
has considerable power to attack new words with
familiar combinations ; what is more, he has achieved ;
he has courage to attack all ' learning,' and has a
sense that delightful results are quite within reach.
Moreover, he learns to read in a way that affords him
some moral training. There is no stumbling, no
hesitation from the first, but bright attention and
perfect achievement. His reading lesson is a delight,
of which he is deprived when he comes to his lesson

222 HOME EDUCATION

in a lazy, drawling mood. Perfect enunciation and
precision are insisted on, and when he comes to
arrange the whole of the little rhyme in his loose
words and read it off(most delightful of all the lessons)
his reading must be a perfect and finished recitation.1
I believe that this is a practical common-sense way
to teach reading in English. It may be profitable
for the little German child to work through all
possible dreary combinations of letters before he
is permitted to have any joy in ' reading,' because
wherever these combinations occur they will have the
sounds the child has learned laboriously. The fact
that English is anomalous as regards the connection
between sign and sound, happily exonerates us from
enforcing this dreary grind.2

VII. — RECITATION
<The Children's Art*

On this subject I cannot do better than refer the
reader to Mr Arthur Burrell's Recitation? This book
purports to be a handbook for teachers in elementary
schools. I wish that it may be very largely used by
such teachers, and may also become a family hand-
book ; though many of the lessons will not be called
for in educated homes. There is hardly any ' subject '

1 Spirited nursery rhymes form the best material for such reading
lessons. A " Delightful Reading Box " has been issued on a similar plan
to the ' Pussy ' Box, whose one fault is that the verses are a little dull.
But this ' Box ' should be of great use.

2 It is desirable that ' Tommy ' should not begin to ' read ' until his
intelligence is equal to the effort required by these lessons. Even then,
it may be well to break up one into two, or half a dozen, as he is able to
take it.

3 Appendix A.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 223

so educative and so elevating as that which Mr Burrell
has happily described as 'The Children's Art.' All
children have it in them to recite ; it is an imprisoned
gift waiting to be delivered, like Ariel from the pine.
In this most thoughtful and methodical volume we
are possessed of the fit incantations. Use them
duly, and out of the woodenness of even the
most commonplace child steps forth the child-artist,
a delicate sprite, who shall make you laugh and make
you weep. Did not the great Sir Walter " sway to
and fro, sobbing his fill," to his little ' Pet's ' speaking
of—

" For I am sick, and capable of fears,

Oppressed with wrong, and therefore full of fears ;

A widow, husbandless, subject to fears ;

A woman, naturally born to fears " ?

Marjorie Fleming was, to be sure, a child-genius ;
but in this book we learn by what carefully graduated
steps a child who is not a genius, is not even born of
cultivated parents, may be taught the fine art of beauti-
ful and perfect speaking; but that is only the first
step in the acquisition of ' The Children's Art' The
child should speak beautiful thoughts so beautifully,
with such delicate rendering of each nuance of meaning,
that he becomes to the listener the interpreter of the
author's thought. Now, consider what appreciation,
sympathy, power of expression this implies, and you
will grant that ' The Children's Art ' is, as Steele said
of the society of his wife, " a liberal education in itself."
It is objected — ' Children are such parrots ! They say
a thing as they hear it said ; as for troubling them-
selves to " appreciate " and " interpret," not a bit of it ! '
Most true of the ' My name is Norval ' style of recita-
tion ; but throughout this volume the child is led to

224 HOME EDUCATION

find the just expression of the thought for himself;
never is the poor teacher allowed to set a pattern—
' say this as I say it.' The ideas are kept well within
the child's range, and the expression is his own. He is
caught with guile, his very naughtiness is pressed into
service, he finds a dozen ways of saying ' I shan't/ is
led cunningly up to the point of expressing himself,
and — he does it, to his own surprise and delight.
The pieces given here for recitation are a treasure-
trove of new joys. ' Winken, Blinken, and Nod,' ' Miss
Lily white's Party/ and 'The Two Kittens/ would
compel any child to recite. Try a single piece over
with the author's markings and suggestions, and you
will find there is as much difference between the
result and ordinary reading aloud as there is in a
musical composition played with and without the
composer's expression marks. I hope that my
readers will train their children in the art of recita-
tion ; in the coming days, more even than in our own,
will it behove every educated man and woman to be
able to speak effectively in public; and, in learning
to recite you learn to speak.

Memorising. — Recitation and committing to
memory are not necessarily the same thing, and it is
well to store a child's memory with a good deal of
poetry, learnt without labour. Some years ago I
chanced to visit a house, the mistress of which had
educational notions of her own, upon which she was
bringing up a niece. She presented me with a large
foolscap sheet written all over with the titles of
poems, some of them long and difficult : Tintern
Abbey , for example. She told me that her niece
could repeat to me any of those poems that I liked
to ask for, and that she had never learnt a single

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 22$

verse by heart in her life. The girl did repeat several
of the poems on the list, quite beautifully and without
hesitation; and then the lady unfolded her secret.
She thought she had made a discovery, and I thought
so too. She read a poem through to E. ; then the
next day, while the little girl was making a doll's frock,
perhaps, she read it again ; once again the next day,
while E.'s hair was being brushed. She got in about
six or more readings, according to the length of the
poem, at odd and unexpected times, and in the end E.
could say the poem which she had not learned.

I have tried the plan often since, and found it
effectual. The child must not try to recollect or to
say the verse over to himself, but, as far as may be,
present an open mind to receive an impression of
interest. Half a dozen repetitions should give
children possession of such poems as — 'Dolly and
Dick,' 'Do you ask what the birds say?' 'Little
lamb, who made thee?' and the like. The gains of
such a method of learning are, that the edge of the
child's enjoyment is not taken off by weariful verse
by verse repetitions, and, also, that the habit of
making mental images is unconsciously formed.

I remember once discussing this subject with the
late Miss Anna Swanwick in some connection with
Browning which I do not recall, but in the course of
talk an extremely curious incident transpired. A lady,
a niece of Miss Swanwick's, said that after a long
illness, during which she had not been allowed to do
anything, she read 'Lycidas' through, by way of a
first treat to herself as a convalescent. She was
surprised to find herself the next day repeating to
herself long passages. Then she tried the whole
poem and found she could say it off, the result of

15

226 HOME EDUCATION

this single reading, for she had not learned the poem
before her illness, nor read it with particular attention.
She was much elated by the treasure-trove she had
chanced upon, and to test her powers, she read the
whole of ' Paradise Lost,' book by book, and with the
same result, — she could repeat it book by book after
a single reading ! She enriched herself by acquiring
other treasures during her convalescence ; but as
health returned, and her mind became preoccupied
with many interests, she found she no longer had this
astonishing power. It is possible that the disengaged
mind of a child is as free to take and as strong to
hold beautiful images clothed in beautiful words as
was that of this lady during her convalescence. But,
let me again say, every effort of the kind, however
unconscious, means wear and tear of brain substance.
Let the child lie fallow till he is six, and then, in this
matter of memorising, as in others, attempt only a
little, and let the poems the child learns be simple
and within the range of his own thought and ima-
gination. At the same time, when there is so much
noble poetry within a child's compass, the pity of it,
that he should be allowed to learn twaddle !

VIII.— READING FOR OLDER CHILDREN

In teaching to read, as in other matters, cest le
premier pas qui coiite. The child who has been
taught to read with care and deliberation until he
has mastered the words of a limited vocabulary,
usually does the rest for himself. The attention of
his teachers should be fixed on two points — that
he acquires the habit of reading, and that he does
not fall into slipshod habits of reading.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 22?

The Habit of Reading. — The most common and
the monstrous defect in the education of the day is
that children fail to acquire the habit of reading.
Knowledge is conveyed to them by lessons and talk,
but the studious habit of using books as a means of
interest and delight is not acquired. This habit
should be begun early ; so soon as the child can read
at all, he should read for himself, and to himself,
history, legends, fairy tales, and other suitable matter.
He should be trained from the first to think that one
reading of any lesson is enough to enable him to
narrate what he has read, and will thus get the habit
of slow, careful reading, intelligent even when it is
silent, because he reads with an eye to the full
meaning of every clause.

Reading Aloud.— He should have practice, too, in
reading aloud, for the most part, in the books he is
using for his term's work. These should include a
good deal of poetry, to accustom him to the delicate
rendering of shades of meaning, and especially to
make him aware that words are beautiful in them-
selves, that they are a source of pleasure, and are
worthy of our honour; and that a beautiful word
deserves to be beautifully said, with a certain round-
ness of tone and precision of utterance. Quite young
children are open to this sort of teaching, conveyed,
not in a lesson, but by a word now and then.

Limitation. — In this connecton the teacher should
not trust to setting, as it were, a copy in reading for
the children's imitation. They do imitate readily
enough, catching tricks of emphasis and action in an
amusing way ; but these are mere tricks, an aping of
intelligence. The child must express what he feels
to be the author's meaning ; and this sort of intelli-

228 HOME EDUCATION

gent reading comes only of the habit of reading
with understanding

Reading to Children. — It is a delight to older
people to read aloud to children, but this should be
only an occasional treat and indulgence, allowed
before bedtime, for example. We must remember
the natural inertness of a child's mind ; give him the
habit of being read to, and he will steadily shirk the
labour of reading for himself ; indeed, we all like to
be spoon-fed with our intellectual meat, or we should
read and think more for ourselves and be less eager
to run after lectures.

Questions on the Subject-matter. — When a
child is reading, he should not be teased with
questions as to the meaning of what he has read,
the signification of this word or that ; what is
annoying to older people is equally annoying to
children. Besides, it is not of the least consequence
that they should be able to give the meaning of
every word they read. A knowledge of meanings,
that is, an ample and correct vocabulary, is only
arrived at in one way — by the habit of reading. A
child unconsciously gets the meaning of a new word
from the context, if not the first time he meets with
it, then the second or the third : but he is on the
look-out, and will find out for himself the sense of any
expression he does not understand. Direct questions
on the subject-matter of what a child has read are
always a mistake. Let him narrate what he has
read, or some part of it. He enjoys this sort of con-
secutive reproduction, but abominates every question
in the nature of a riddle. If there must be riddles,
let it be his to ask and the teacher's to direct him
to the answer. Questions that lead to a side issue

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 229

or to a personal view are allowable because these
interest children — * What would you have done in his
place ? '

Lesson-Books. — A child has not begun his edu-
cation until he has acquired the habit of reading to
himself, with interest and pleasure, books fully on a
level with his intelligence. I am speaking now of his
lesson-books, which are all too apt to be written in a
style of insufferable twaddle, probably because they
are written by persons who have never chanced to
meet a child. All who know children know that
they do not talk twaddle and do not like it, and
prefer that which appeals to their understanding.
Their lesson-books should offer matter for their read-
ing, whether aloud or to themselves ; therefore they
should be written with literary power. As for the
matter of these books, let us remember that children
can take in ideas and principles, whether the latter
be moral or mechanical, as quickly and clearly as we
do ourselves (perhaps more so) ; but detailed pro-
cesses, lists and summaries, blunt the edge of a child's
delicate mind. Therefore, the selection of their first
lesson-books is a matter of grave importance, because
it rests with these to give children the idea that
knowledge is supremely attractive and that reading
is delightful. Once the habit of reading his lesson-
books with delight is set up in a child, his education
is — not completed, but — ensured ; he will go on for
himself in spite of the obstructions which school too
commonly throws in his way.

Slipshod Habits; Inattention. — I have already
spoken of the importance of a single reading. If a
child is not able to narrate what he has read once,
let him not get the notion that he may, or that he

230 HOME EDUCATION

must, read it again. A look of slight regret because
there is a gap in his knowledge will convict him.
The power of reading with perfect attention will not
be gained by the child who is allowed to moon over
his lessons. For this reason, reading lessons must
be short; ten minutes or a quarter of an hour of
fixed attention is enough for children of the ages we
have in view, and a lesson of this length will enable
a child to cover two or three pages of his book. The
same rule as to the length of a lesson applies to
children whose lessons are read to them because they
are not yet able to read for themselves.

Careless Enunciation. — It is important that,
when reading aloud, children should make due use
of the vocal organs, and, for this reason, a reading
lesson should be introduced by two or three simple
breathing exercises, as, for example, a long inspira-
tion with closed lips and a slow expiration with open
mouth. If a child read through his nose, it is well
to consult a doctor; an operation for adenoids may
be necessary, which is rarely distressing, and should
be performed while children are young. Provincial
pronunciation and slipshod enunciation must be
guarded against. Practice in pure vowel sounds,
and the respect for words which will not allow of
their being hastily slurred over, should cure these
defects. By the way, quite little children commonly
enunciate beautifully, because a big word is a new
acquirement which they delight in and make the
most of; our efforts should be directed to make
older children hold words in like esteem.

The habit of ' minding your stops ' comes of intelli-
gent reading. A child's understanding of the passage
will lead him to correct pointing.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 23!
IX. — THE ART OF NARRATING

Children Narrate by Nature. — Narrating is an
art, like poetry-making or painting, because it is
there, in every child's mind, waiting to be discovered,
and is not the result of any process of disciplinary
education. A creative fiat calls it forth. ' Let him
narrate'; and the child narrates, fluently, copiously,
in ordered sequence, with fit and graphic details, with
a just choice of words, without verbosity or tautology,
so soon as he can speak with ease. This amazing
gift with which normal children are born is allowed
to lie fallow in their education. Bobbie will come
home with a heroic narrative of a fight he has seen
between 'Duke' and a dog in the street. It is
wonderful ! He has seen everything, and he tells
everything with splendid vigour in the true epic vein ;
but so ingrained is our contempt for children that we
see nothing in this but Bobbie's foolish childish way !
Whereas here, if we have eyes to see and grace to
build, is the ground-plan of his education.

Until he is six, let Bobbie narrate only when and
what he has a mind to. He must not be called
upon to tell anything. Is this the secret of the
strange long talks we watch with amusement between
creatures of two, and four, and five ? Is it possible
that they narrate while they are still inarticulate,
and that the other inarticulate person takes it all in ?
They try us, poor dear elders, and we reply 'Yes,'
' Really ! ' ' Do you think so ? ' to the babble of whose
meaning we have no comprehension. Be this as it
may ; of what goes on in the dim region of ' under
two' we have no assurance. But wait till the little
fellow has words and he will ' tell ' without end to

232 HOME EDUCATION

whomsoever will listen to the tale, but, for choice,
to his own compeers.

This Power should be used in their Education.
— Let us take the goods the gods provide. When
the child is six, not earlier, let him narrate the fairy-
tale which has been read to him, episode by episode,
upon one hearing of each ; the Bible tale read to
him in the words of the Bible; the well-written
animal story ; or all about other lands from some
such volume as The World at Homey The seven-
years-old boy will have begun to read for himself, but
must get most of his intellectual nutriment, by ear,
certainly, but read to him out of books. Geography,
sketches from ancient history, Robinson Crusoe? The
Pilgrims Progress? Tanglewood Tales? Heroes of
Asgard? and much of the same calibre, will occupy
him until he is eight. The points to be borne in
mind are, that he should have no book which is not a
child's classic ; and that, given the right book, it must
not be diluted with talk or broken up with questions,
but given to the boy in fit portions as wholesome
meat for his mind, in the full trust that a child's
mind is able to deal with its proper food.

The child of eight or nine is able to tackle the
more serious material of knowledge ; but our business
for the moment is with what children under nine
can narrate.

Method of Lesson. — In every case the reading
should be consecutive from a well-chosen book. Before
the reading for the day begins, the teacher should
talk a little (and get the children to talk) about the last
lesson, with a few words about what is to be read,
in order that the children may be animated by
1 See Appendix A.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 233

expectation ; but she should beware of explanation,
and, especially, of forestalling the narrative. Then,
she may read two or three pages, enough to include
an episode ; after that, let her call upon the children
to narrate, — in turns, if there be several of them.
They not only narrate with spirit and accuracy, but
succeed in catching the style of their author. It is
not wise to tease them with corrections ; they may
begin with an endless chain of ' ands,' but they soon
leave this off, and their narrations become good
enough in style and composition to be put in a
' print book ' !

This sort of narration lesson should not occupy
more than a quarter of an hour.

The book should always be deeply interesting, and
when the narration is over, there should be a little
talk in which moral points are brought out, pictures
shown to illustrate the lesson, or diagrams drawn on
the blackboard. As soon as children are able to
read with ease and fluency, they read their own lesson,
either aloud or silently, with a view to narration ;
but where it is necessary to make omissions, as in
the Old Testament narratives and Plutarch's Lives
for example, it is better that the teacher should
always read the lesson which is to be narrated.

X. — WRITING

Perfect Accomplishment. — I can only offer a
few hints on the teaching of writing, though much
might be said. First, let the child accomplish some-
thing perfectly in every lesson — a stroke, a pothook,
a letter. Let the writing lesson be short ; it should
not last more than five or ten minutes. Ease in

234 HOME EDUCATION

writing comes by practice ; but that must be secured
later. In the meantime, the thing to be avoided is
the habit of careless work — humpy m's, angular o's.

Printing. — But the child should have practice in
printing before he begins to write. First, let him
print the simplest of the capital letters with single
curves and straight lines. When he can make the
capitals and large letters, with some firmness and
decision, he might go on to the small letters — 'printed'
as in the type we call ' italics,' only upright, — as simple
as possible, and large.

Steps in Teaching. — Let the stroke be learned
first ; then the pothook ; then the letters of which
the pothook is an element — «, ;;/, v, zu, r, h, p, y ; then
o, and letters of which the curve is an element — a, c,
£•, <?, x, s, q ; then looped and irregular letters — b, l,f
t, etc. One letter should be perfectly formed in a day
and the next day the same elemental forms repeated
in another letter, until they become 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
chalk and blackboard are better than pen and 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 'handwriting' 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.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 235

Set good copies before him, and see that he imitates
his model dutifully : the writing lesson being, 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 characters set. The child may have
to write several lines before he succeeds in pro-
ducing this.

Text-hand. — If he write in books with copperplate
headlines (which are, on the whole, to be eschewed),
discrimination should be exercised in the choice of
these ; 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 continued until he makes the
letters with ease. It is much easier for the child to
get into an irregular scribble by way of ' small-hand,'
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.

A ' New Handwriting.1 — Some years ago I heard
of a lady who was elaborating, by means of the study
of old Italian and other manuscripts, a 'system of
beautiful handwriting ' which could be taught to
children. I waited patiently, though not without some
urgency, for the production of this new kind of ' copy-
book.' The need for such an effort was very great,
for the distinctly commonplace writing taught from
existing copy-books, however painstaking and legible,
cannot but have a rather vulgarising effect both on
the writer and the reader of such manuscript. At

236 HOME EDUCATION

last the lady, Mrs Robert Bridges, has succeeded in
her tedious and difficult undertaking, and this book
for teachers will enable them to teach their pupils a
style of writing which is pleasant to acquire because
it is beautiful to behold. It is surprising how quickly
young children, even those already confirmed in
'ugly' writing, take to this 'new handwriting.'

But Mrs Bridges' purpose in A New Handwriting
will be better understood by some passages quoted,
with her permission, from her preface : — " The accom-
panying ten plates are intended chiefly for those who
teach writing : a few words, both of apology and ex-
planation, are needed to introduce them. I was always
interested in handwriting, and after making acquaint-
ance with the Italianised Gothic of the sixteenth
century, I consciously altered my hand towards
some likeness with its forms and general character.
The script happening to please, I was often asked to
make alphabets and copies, and begged by profes-
sional teachers to have such a book as this printed,
that they might use it in their schools. One can
never quite satisfy oneself in the making of models
for others to copy, but these plates are very much
what I intended, though, owing to my inexperience,
some of them have suffered in the reproduction. . . .
A child must first learn to control his hand and
constrain it to obey his eye ; at this earliest stage,
any simple forms will serve the purpose ; and hence
it might be further argued that the forms are always
indifferent, and that full mastery of the hand can be
as well attained by copying bad models as good ; but
this can hardly be : the ordinary copybook, the
aim of which seems to be to economise the component
parts of the letters, cannot train the hand as more

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 237

varied shapes will ; nor does this uniformity, exclusive
of beauty, offer as good training to the eye. More-
over, I should say that variety and beauty of form
are attractive, even to little children, and that the
attempt to create something which interests them,
cheers and crowns their stupendous efforts with a
pleasure that cannot be looked for in the task of
copying monotonous shapes. But whether such a
hand as that here shown lends itself as easily as the
more uniform model to the development of a quick,
useful cursive, I cannot say; and it is possible that
the degradations, inevitable in the habit of quick
writing, might produce a mere untidiness, almost the
worst reproach of penmanship. Some of the best
English hands of to-day are as good a quick cursive
as one can desire, and show points of real beauty ;
but such hands are rare, and are only those which
have, as we say, character ; which probably means
that the writer would have done well for himself
under any system : whereas the average hands, which
are the natural outcome of the old copybook writing,
degraded by haste, seem to owe their common
ugliness to the mean type from which they sprang ;
and the writers, when they have occasion to write
well, find they can do but little better, and only
prove that haste was not the real cause of their bad
writing."

How to Use. — The method of using Mrs Bridges'
Handwriting^ which we find most effectual, is to
practise each form on the blackboard from the plate,
and later to use pencil, and still later pen and ink.
By-and-by the children will be promoted to transcribe
little poems, and so on, in this very pleasing script.
1 See Appendix A.

238 HOME EDUCATION

Set headlines are to be avoided, as children fail
to use the forms of the headline in their ordinary
writing. It is sometimes objected that this rather
elaborate and beautiful handwriting will interfere with
a characteristic ' hand/ but it seems to me that to
have a beautiful, instead of a commonplace, basis for
handwriting is a great gain.

XI. — TRANSCRIPTION

Value of Transcription. — The earliest practice
in writing proper for children of seven or eight should
be, not letter-writing or dictation, but transcription,
slow and beautiful work, for which the New Hand-
writing is to be preferred, though perhaps some of
the more ornate characters may be omitted with
advantage.

Transcription should be an introduction to spelling.
Children should be encouraged to look at the word,
see a picture of it with their eyes shut, and then
write from memory.

Children should Transcribe favourite Pass-
ages.— A certain sense of possession and delight may
be added to this exercise if children are allowed to
choose for transcription their favourite verse in one
poem and another. This is better than to write a
favourite poem, an exercise which stales on the little
people before it is finished. But a book of their own,
made up of their own chosen verses, should give them
pleasure.

Small Text - hand — Double - ruled Lines. —
Double-ruled lines, small text-hand, should be used
at first, as children are eager to write very minute
'small hand,' and once they have fallen into this habit

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 239

it is not easy to get good writing. A sense of
beauty in their writing and in the lines they copy
should carry them over this stage of their work with
pleasure. Not more than ten minutes or a quarter
of an hour should be given to the early writing-
lessons. If they are longer the children get tired
and slovenly.

Position in Writing. — For the writing position
children should sit so that light reaches them from
the left, and desk or table should be at a comfortable
height.

It would be a great gain if children were taught
from the first to hold the pen between the first and
second fingers, steadying it with the thumb. This
position avoids the uncomfortable strain on the
muscles produced by the usual way of holding a pen
— a strain which causes writer's cramp in later days
when there is much writing to be done. The pen
should be held in a comfortable position, rather near
the point, fingers and thumb somewhat bent, and the
hand resting on the paper. The writer should also be
allowed to support himself with the left hand on the
paper, and should write in an easy position, with bent
head but not with stooping figure. It would be
unnecessary to say that the flat of the nib should be
used if children had not a happy gift for making
spider marks with the nib held sideways. In all
writing lessons, free use should be made of the black-
board by both teacher and children by way of model
and practice.

Desks. — The best desks I know are those recom-
mended by Dr Roth,1 single desks which may be
raised or lowered, moved backwards or forwards, with

1 See Appendix A.

240 HOME EDUCATION

seat, back, and a back pad, and rests for the feet.
There may be others as good, even better, in the
market, but these seem to answer every purpose.

Children's Table. — For little children it is a good
plan to have a table of the right height made by the
house carpenter, the top of the table consisting of two
leaves with hinges. These leaves open in the middle,
and disclose a sort of box in the space which is often
used for a drawer, the table-top itself making the
lids of the box. Such a receptacle for the children's
books, writing materials, etc., is more easily kept neat
by themselves than is an ordinary drawer or box.

XII. — SPELLING AND DICTATION

Of all the mischievous exercises in which children
spend their school hours, dictation, as commonly
practised, is perhaps the most mischievous ; and this,
because people are slow to understand that there
is no part of a child's work at school which some
philosophic principle does not underlie.

A Fertile Cause of Bad Spelling. — The common
practice is for the teacher to dictate a passage, clause
by clause, repeating each clause, perhaps, three or
four times under a fire of questions from the writers.
Every line has errors in spelling, one, two, three,
perhaps. The conscientious teacher draws her pencil
under these errors, or solemnly underlines them with
red ink. The children correct in various fashions;
sometimes they change books, and each corrects the
errors of another, copying the word from the book or
from the blackboard. A few benighted teachers still
cause children to copy their own error along with
the correction, which last is written three or four

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 241

times, learned, and spelt to the teacher. The latter
is astonished at the pure perversity which causes the
same errors to be repeated again and again, notwith-
standing all these painstaking efforts.

The Rationale of Spelling. — But the fact is,
the gift of spelling depends upon the power the eye
possesses to ' take ' (in a photographic sense) a detailed
picture of a word ; and this is a power and habit which
must be cultivated in children from the first. When
they have read ' cat,' they must be encouraged to see
the word with their eyes shut, and the same habit will
enable them to image ' Thermopylae.' This picturing
of words upon the retina appears to me to be the
only royal road to spelling ; an error once made and
corrected leads to fearful doubt for the rest of one's
life, as to which was the wrong way and which the
right. Most of us are haunted by some such doubt
as to whether ' balance,' for instance, should have one
' 1 ' or two ; and the doubt is born of a correction.
Once the eye sees a misspelt word, that image
remains ; and if there is also the image of the word
rightly spelt, we are perplexed as to which is which.
Now we see why there could not be a more ingenious
way of making bad spellers than ' dictation ' as it is
commonly taught. Every misspelt word is an image
in the child's brain not to .be obliterated by the right
spelling. It becomes, therefore, the teacher's business
to prevent false spelling, and, if an error has been
made, to hide it away, as it were, so that the impres-
sion may not become fixed.

Steps of a Dictation Lesson. — Dictation lessons,
conducted in some such way as the following, usually
result in good spelling. A child of eight or nine
prepares a paragraph, older children a page, or two or

16

242 HOME EDUCATION

three pages. The child prepares by himself, by
looking at the word he is not sure of, and then seeing
it with his eyes shut. Before he begins, the teacher
asks what words he thinks will need his attention.
He generally knows, but the teacher may point out
any word likely to be a cause of stumbling. He lets
his teacher know when he is ready. The teacher asks
if there are any words he is not sure of. These she
puts, one by one, on the blackboard, letting the child
look till he has a picture, and then rubbing the word
out. If anyone is still doubtful he should be called
to put the word he is not sure of on the board, the
teacher watching to rub out the word when a wrong
letter begins to appear, and again helping the child to
get a mental picture. Then the teacher gives out the
dictation, clause by clause, each clause repeated once.
She dictates with a view to the pointing, which the
children are expected to put in as they write ; but
they must not be told 'comma,' 'semicolon,' etc.
After the sort of preparation I have described, which
takes ten minutes or less, there is rarely an error in
spelling. If there be, it is well worth while for the
teacher to be on the watch with slips of stamp-paper
to put over the wrong word, that its image may be
erased as far as possible. At the end of the lesson,
the child should again study the wrong word in his
book until he says he is sure of it, and should write it
correctly on the stamp-paper.

A lesson of this kind secures the hearty co-operation
of children, who feel they take their due part in it ;
and it also prepares them for the second condition of
good spelling, which is — much reading combined with
the habit of imaging the words as they are read.

Illiterate spelling is usually a sign of sparse read-

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 243

ing ; but, sometimes, of hasty reading without the
habit of seeing the words that are skimmed over.

Spelling must not be lost sight of in the children's
other studies, though they should not be teased to
spell. It is well to write a difficult proper name, for
example, on the blackboard in the course of history
or geography readings, rubbing the word out when
the children say they can see it. The whole secret
of spelling lies in the habit of visualising words from
memory, and children must be trained to visualise in
the course of their reading. They enjoy this way of
learning to spell.

XIII. — COMPOSITION

George Osborne's Essay. — " What a prodigiously
well-read and delightful person the Reverend Lawrence
Veal was, George's master ! ' He knows everything'
Amelia said. ' He says there is no place in the bar
or the senate that Georgy may not aspire to. Look
here/ and she went to the piano-drawer and drew
out a theme of George's composition. This great
effort of genius, which is still in the possession of
Georgy's mother, is as follows : —

" ' On Selfishness. — Of all the vices which degrade
tr. 2 human character, Selfishness is the most odious
and contemptible. An undue love of Self leads to
the most monstrous crimes, and occasions the great-
est misfortunes both in States and Families. As a
selfish man will impoverish his family and often
bring them to ruin ; so a selfish king brings ruin on his
people and often plunges them into war. Example :
The selfishness of Achilles, as remarked by the poet
Homer, occasioned a thousand woes to the Greeks —
L 'Acajou? a'Aye' eOtjice — (Horn., //. A. 2). The

244 HOME EDUCATION

selfishness of the late Napoleon Bonaparte occa-
sioned innumerable wars in Europe, and caused him
to perish, himself, in a miserable island — that of St
Helena in the Atlantic Ocean.

" ' We see by these examples that we are not to
consult our own interest and ambition, but that
we are to consider the interests of others as well as
our own. GEORGE S. OSBORNE.

"' ATHENA HOUSE, 24 April 1827.'

"'Think of him' (George was 10) 'writing such a
hand, and quoting Greek too, at his age/ the delighted
mother said."

And well might Mrs George Sedley be delighted.
Would not many a mother to-day triumph in such a
literary effort? What can Thackeray be laughing at?
Or does he, in truth, give us this little ' theme ' as a
tour deforce ?

An Educational Futility.— I think this great
moral teacher here throws down the gauntlet in
challenge of an educational futility which is practised,
and an educational fallacy which is accepted, even
in the twentieth century. That futility is the exac-
tion of original composition from schoolboys and
schoolgirls. The proper function of the mind of the
young scholar is to collect material for the general-
isations of after-life. If a child is asked to generalise,
that is, to write an essay upon some abstract theme,
a double wrong is done him. He is brought up
before a stone wall by being asked to do what is
impossible to him, and that is discouraging. But a
worse moral injury happens to him in that, having
no thought of his own to offer on the subject, he puts
together such tags of commonplace thought as have

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 245

come in his way and offers the whole as his 'com-
position/ an effort which puts a strain upon his
conscience while it piques his vanity. In these days
masters do not consciously put their hand to the work
of their pupils as did that * prodigiously well-read and
delightful ' master who had the educating of George
Osborne. But, perhaps without knowing it, they give
the ideas which the cunning schoolboy seizes to
' stick ' into the ' essay ' he hates. Sometimes they do
more. They deliberately teach children how to 'build
a sentence ' and how to ' bind sentences ' together.

Lessons in Composition. — Here is a series of
preliminary exercises (or rather a part of the series,
which numbers 40) intended to help a child to write
an essay on ' An Umbrella,' from a book of the hour
proceeding from one of our best publishing houses : —

" Step I.

"i. What are you?
" 2. How did you get your name ?
" 3. Who uses you ?
" 4. What were you once ?
" 5. What were you like then ?
" 6. Where were you obtained or found ?
" 7. Of what stuff or materials are you made ?
" 8. From what sources do you come ?
" 9. What are your parts ?
" 10. Are you made, grown, or fitted together?

" Step II.

" I am an umbrella, and am used by many people,
young and old.

" I get my name from a word which means a shade.
"The stick came perhaps from America, and is

246 HOME EDUCATION

quite smooth, even, and polished, so that the metal
ring may slide easily up and down the stick.

" My parts are a frame and a cover. My frame
consists of a stick about a yard long, wires, and a
sliding metal band. At the lower end of the stick
is a steel ferrule or ring. This keeps the end from
wearing away when I am used in walking.

" Step III.

" Now use it, is, are, and was, instead of /, have, my,
and am.

11 Exercise.
" Now write out your own description of it."

Such Teaching a Public Danger. — And this is
work intended for Standards VI. and VII. ! That is
to say, this kind of thing is the final literary effort to
be exacted from children in our elementary schools !

The two volumes (I quote from near the end of
the second and more advanced volume) are not to
be gibbeted as exceptionally bad. A few years
ago the appalling discovery was made that, both in
secondary and elementary schools, 'composition' was
dreadfully defective, and, therefore, badly taught.
Since then many volumes have been produced, more
a- less on the lines indicated in the above citation,
and distinguished publishers have not perceived that
to offer to the public, with the sanction of their name,
works of this sterilising and injurious character, is an
offence against society. The body of a child is sacred
in the eye of the law, but his intellectual powers may
be annihilated on such starvation diet as this, and

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 247

nothing said ! The worst of it is, both authors and
publishers in every case act upon the fallacy that
well-intentioned effort is always excusable, if not
praiseworthy. They do not perceive that no effort
is permissible towards the education of children
without an intelligent conception, both of children,
and of what is meant by education.

'Composition' comes by Nature. — In fact,
lessons on 'composition' should follow the model of
that famous essay on " Snakes in Ireland " — " There
are none." For children under nine, the question of
composition resolves itself into that of narration, varied
by some such simple exercise as to write a part and
narrate a part, or write the whole account of a walk
they have taken, a lesson they have studied, or of some
simple matter that they know. Before they are ten,
children who have been in the habit of using books
will write good, vigorous English with ease and
freedom ; that is, if they have not been hampered by
instructions. It is well for them not even to learn
rules for the placing of full stops and capitals until
they notice how these things occur in their books.
Our business is to provide children with material in
their lessons, and, leave the handling of such material
to themselves. If we would believe it, composition is as
natural as jumping and running to children who have
been allowed due use of books. They should narrate
in the first place, and they will compose, later, readily
enough ; but they should not be taught ' composition.'

XIV. — BIBLE LESSONS

Children enjoy the Bible. — We are apt to
believe that children cannot be interested in the

248 HOME EDUCATION

Bible unless its pages be watered down — turned into
the slipshod English we prefer to offer them. Here
is a suggestive anecdote of the childhood of Mrs
Harrison, one of the pair of little Quaker maidens
introduced to us in the Autobiography of Mary Howitt,
the better known of the sisters. " One day she found
her way into a lumber room. There she caught sight
of an old Bible, and turning over its yellow leaves she
came upon words that she had not heard at the usual
morning readings, the opening chapters of St Luke —
which her father objected to read aloud — and the
closing chapter of Revelation. The exquisite picture
of the Great Child's birth in the one chapter, and the
beauty of the description of the New Jerusalem in the
other, were seized upon by the eager little girl of six
years old with a rapture which, she used to say, no
novel in after years ever produced."

And here is a mention of a child of five. " The
little ones read every day the events of Holy Week
with me. Z. is inexpressibly interesting in his deep,
reverent interest, almost excitement."

We are probably quite incapable of measuring the
religious receptivity of children. Nevertheless, their
fitness to apprehend the deep things of God is a fact
with which we are called to ' deal prudently/ and to
deal reverently. And that, because, as none can
appreciate more fully than the ' Darwinian,' the
attitude of thought and feeling in which you place
a child is the vital factor in his education.

Should know the Bible Text. — Children between
the ages of six and nine should get a considerable
knowledge of the Bible text. By nine they should
have read the simple (and suitable) narrative portions
of the Old Testament, and, say, two of the gospels.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 249

The Old Testament should, for various reasons, be
read to children. The gospel stories, they might read
for themselves as soon as they can read them beauti-
fully. It is a mistake to use paraphrases of the text ;
the fine roll of Bible English appeals to children with
a compelling music, and they will probably retain
through life their first conception of the Bible scenes,
and, also, the very words in which these scenes are por-
trayed. This is a great possession. Half the clever
talk we hear to-day, and half the uneasiness which
underlies this talk, are due to a thorough and perfect
ignorance of the Bible text The points of assault are
presented to men's minds naked and jagged, without
atmosphere, perspective, proportion ; until the Bible
comes to mean for many, the speaking of Balaam's ass
or the standing still of the sun at Joshua's bidding.

But let the imaginations of children be stored with
the pictures, their minds nourished upon the words,
of the gradually unfolding story of the Scriptures, and
they will come to look out upon a wide horizon within
which persons and events take shape in their due
place and in due proportion. By degrees, they will
see that the world is a stage whereon the goodness of
God is continually striving with the wilfulness of man ;
that some heroic men take sides with God ; and that
others, foolish and headstrong, oppose themselves to
Him. The fire of enthusiasm will kindle in their
breast, and the children, too, will take their side, with-
out much exhortation, or any thought or talk of
spiritual experience.

Essential and Accidental Truth. — As for
whether such and such a narrative be a myth, or a
parable, or a circumstance that has actually occurred,
such questions do not affect the sincere mind of a child,

250 HOME EDUCATION

because they have nothing to do with the main issues.
It is quite well to bring before children, in the course
of their Bible readings, whatever new light modern
research puts in our way ; the more we can help them
in this way, the more vivid and real will Bible teach-
ing become to them. But this grace, at any rate, the
children may claim at our hands, that they shall not
be disturbed by questions of authenticity in their Bible
reading any more than in their reading of English
history. Let them hear the story of the Garden of
Eden, for example, as it stands ; just so, we might even
let them have the story of the man who went fishing
and found a goodly pearl ; and this, because the thing
that matters in both stories is the essential truths they
embody, and not the mere accidents of time and place.
It is conceivable that the 'pearl of great price' was
matter of current talk at the time ; a so-called ' fact '
seized upon by our Lord to make of it the vehicle
for essential truth. If we will believe it, the minds
of children are, perhaps, more fit than our own to
appropriate and deal with truth. By-and-by they
will perceive, and discard, if necessary, the accidental
circumstances with which the truth is clothed upon ;
but let us be very chary of our own action. Let us
remember that neither we nor the children can bear
the white light of naked truth ; that if, for example,
we succeed in destroying the clothing that covers the
story of the first fall — the tree and its fruit, the
tempting serpent, the yielding woman — we have no
other clothing at hand for the fundamental truths of
responsibility, temptation, sin ; and, once uncovered,
with no vesture which we can lay hold upon, the
truths themselves will assuredly slip from our grasp.
We need not be at the pains to discriminate, in

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 251

teaching children Bible narratives, between essential
and accidental truth — the truth which interprets our
own lives, and that which concerns only the time,
place, and circumstances proper to the narrative.
The children themselves will discern and keep fast
hold of the essential, while the merely accidental slips
from their memory as from ours. Therefore, let the
minds of young children be well stored with the
beautiful narratives of the earlier portions of the Old
Testament and of the gospels ; but, in order that these
stories may be always fresh and delightful to them,
care must be taken lest Bible teaching stale upon their
minds. Children are more capable of being bored
than even we ourselves, and many a revolt has been
brought about by the undue rubbing-in of the Bible,
in season and out of season, even in nursery days. But
we are considering, not the religious life of children,
but their education by lessons ; and their Bible lessons
should help them to realise in early days that the know-
ledge of God is the principal knowledge, and, there-
fore, that their Bible lessons are their chief lessons.

Method of Bible Lessons. — The method of such
lessons is very simple. Read aloud to the children a
few verses covering, if possible, an episode. Read
reverently, carefully, and with just expression. Then
require the children to narrate what they have listened
to as nearly as possible in the words of the Bible. It
is curious how readily they catch the rhythm of the
majestic and simple Bible English. Then, talk the
narrative over with them in the light of research and
criticism. Let the teaching, moral and spiritual, reach
them without much personal application. I know
of no better help in the teaching of young children
than we get in Canon Paterson Smyth's Bible for the

252 HOME EDUCATION

Young. Mr Smyth brings both modern criticism and
research to bear, so that children taught from his little
manuals will not be startled to be told later that the
world was not made in six days ; and, at the same time,
they will be very sure that the world was made by God.
The moral and spiritual teaching in these manuals is on
broad and convincing lines. It is rather a good plan
occasionally to read aloud Mr Smyth's lesson on the
subject after the Bible passage has been narrated.
Children are more ready to appropriate lessons that
are not directly levelled at themselves; while the
teacher makes the teaching her own by the interest
with which she reads, the pictures and other illustra-
tions she shows, and her conversational remarks.

Picture Illustrations. — The pictures in the Illus-
trated New Testament are, at the same time, reverent
and actual, an unusual combination, and children
enjoy them greatly. It would be well for them to
have only the penny gospel they are reading, but
it should perhaps be protected (and honoured) by
an embroidered cover. A tattered Bible is not a
wholesome sight for children. The Holy Gospels with
Illustrations from the Gld Masters} published by the
S.P.C.K., is admirable. The study of such pictures
as are here reproduced should be a valuable part of a
child's education ; it is no slight thing to realise how
the Nativity and the visit of the Wise Men filled the
imagination of the early Masters, and with what ex-
ceeding reverence and delight they dwelt upon every
detail of the sacred story. This sort of impression is
not to be had from any up-to-date treatment, or up-to-
date illustrations ; and the child who gets it in early
days, will have a substratum of reverent feeling upon

1 See Appendix A.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 253

which should rest his faith. But it is well to let the
pictures tell their own tale. The children should study
a subject quietly for a few minutes ; and then, the
picture being removed, say what they have seen in it.
It will be found that they miss no little reverent or
suggestive detail which the artist has thought well to
include.

The various R.T.S. publications issued in the series
of Bypaths of Bible Knowledge will be found very
helpful by the teacher, as illustrating modern re-
search ; notably, Professor Sayce's Fresh Light from
Ancient Monuments, and Budge's Dwellers on the Nile.1

Bible Recitations. — The learning by heart of
Bible passages should begin while the children are
quite young, six or seven. It is a delightful thing
to have the memory stored with beautiful, comforting,
and inspiring passages, and we cannot tell when and
how this manner of seed may spring up, grow, and
bear fruit; but the learning of the parable of the
Prodigal Son, for example, should not be laid on the
children as a burden. The whole parable should be
read to them in a way to bring out its beauty and
tenderness ; and then, day by day, the teacher should
recite a short passage, perhaps two or three verses,
saying it over some three or four times until the
children think they know it. Then, but not before,
let them recite the passage. Next day the children
will recite what they have already learned, and so on,
until they are able to say the whole parable.

XV.— ARITHMETIC

Educative Value of Arithmetic.— Of all his early
studies, perhaps none is more important to the child

1 See Appendix A.

254 HOME EDUCATION

as a means of education than that of arithmetic.
That he should do sums is of comparatively small
importance ; but the use of those functions which
'summing' calls into play is a great part of educa-
tion ; 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 without 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 habits of insight, readi-
ness, accuracy, intellectual truthfulness 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.

Problems within the Child's Grasp. — How is
this insight, this exercise of the reasoning powers,
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,' — 953,783,465-1-873 —
which shall fill the child's slate, and keep him occupied

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 255

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
discouraged 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 boy's share.' That 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 concen-
trated 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.

Demonstrate. — The next point is to demonstrate
everything demonstrable. 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, applying rules aptly,
without seeing the reason of them ; but arithmetic
becomes an elementary mathematical training only

256 HOME EDUCATION

in so far as the reason why of every process is clear
to the child. 2 + 2 = 4, is a self-evident fact, admitting
of little demonstration ; 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, multiply, 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,
thus—

oo o =3 beans

o o o o = 4 „

oo 000=5 »

and be exercised upon it until he can tell, first without
counting, and then without looking at the beans, that
2 + 7 = 9, etc.

Thus with 3, 4, 5, — each of the digits : as he learns
each line of his addition table, he is exercised upon
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

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 257

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 he 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 1 2 ; that is, ' twice 6 are 1 2 ' 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=1 6, 2x7=1 4, etc., he will
take 4, 6, 8, 10, 12 beans, and divide them into groups
of two: then, how many twos in 10, in 12, in 20?
And so on, with each line of the multiplication table
that he works out.

Problems. — 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. Care-
fully graduated teaching and daily mental effort on
the child's part at this early stage may be the means
of developing real mathematical power, and will
certainly promote the habits of concentration and
effort of mind.

Notation. — When the child is able to work pretty
freely with small numbers, a serious difficulty must
be faced, upon his thorough mastery of which will

17

258 HOME EDUCATION

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 shops. Lighter money is used — shillings.
How many pennies is a shilling worth ? How many
shillings, then, might he have 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 (or are worth) 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 4^. 2d. ; show the child
how put down : the pennies, which are worth least,
to the right; the shillings, which are worth more,
to the left.

When the child is able to work freely with shillings
and pence, and to understand that 2 in the right-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 gradually. Tell
him of uncivilised 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 years without coming
to the end of the numbers we might name ; but after
all, we have very few numbers to count with, and

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 259

very few figures to express them by. We have but
nine figures and a nought : we take the first figure
and the nought 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:
when 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 has 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. Mean-
time, * 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 multi-
plication sum, let him not say he carries 'two/ or
' three,' but ' two tens,' or * three hundreds,' as the
case may be.

Weighing and Measuring. — 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

260 HOME EDUCATION

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, and afford considerable exercise of judg-
ment 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 himself. Let
him not only measure and 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 tablecloth? how many feet
long and broad a map, 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 measur-
ing and weighing concrete quantities, the scholar is
prepared to take in his first idea of a ' fraction,' half
a pound, a quarter of a yard, etc.

Arithmetic a Means of Training.— Arithmetic
is valuable as a means of training children in habits
of strict accuracy, but the ingenuity which makes
this exact science tend to foster slipshod habits
of mind, a disregard of truth and common honesty,
is worthy of admiration ! The copying, prompting,
telling, helping over difficulties, 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,

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OK EDUCATION 261

or right — it cannot be something between the two.
That which is wrong 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 teacher
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
carefully graduated ; but there is no subject in
which the teacher has a more delightful conscious-
ness of drawing out from day to day new power in
the child. Do not offer him 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 be 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.

The ABO Arithmetic. — Instead of entering
further into the subject of the teaching of elementary
arithmetic, I should like to refer the reader to the
A B C Arithmetic by Messrs Sonnenschein & Nesbit.

The authors found their method upon the following
passage from Mill's Logic : — " The fundamental truths
of the science of Number all rest on the evidence of
sense ; they are proved by showing to our eyes and
our fingers that any given number of objects, ten balls
for example, may by separation and re-arrangement
exhibit to our senses all the different sets of numbers
the sum of which is equal to ten. All the improved
methods of teaching arithmetic to children proceed
on a knowledge of this fact. All who wish to carry

262 HOME EDUCATION

the child's mind along with them in learning arithmetic,
all who wish to teach numbers and not mere ciphers,
now teach it through the evidence of the senses in the
manner we have described."

Here we may, I think, trace the solitary source of
weakness in a surpassingly excellent manual. It is
quite true that the fundamental truths of the science of
number all rest on the evidence of sense ; but, having
used eyes and fingers upon ten balls or twenty balls,
upon ten nuts, or leaves, or sheep, or what not, the
child has formed the association of a given number
with objects, and is able to conceive of the association
of various other numbers with objects. In fact, he
begins to think in numbers and not in objects, that is,
he begins mathematics. Therefore I incline to think
that an elaborate system of staves, cubes, etc., instead
of tens, hundreds, thousands, errs by embarrassing the
child's mind with too much teaching, and by making
the illustration occupy a more prominent place than
the thing illustrated.

Dominoes, beans, graphic figures drawn on the
blackboard, and the like, are, on the other hand, aids
to the child when it is necessary for him to conceive
of a great number with the material of a small one ;
but to see a symbol of the great numbers and to work
with such a symbol are quite different matters.

With the above trifling exception, which does not
interfere at all with the use of the books, nothing can be
more delightful than the careful analysis of numbers
and the beautiful graduation of the work, " only one
difficulty at a time being presented to the mind."
The examples and the little problems could only have
been invented by writers in sympathy with children.
I advise the reader who is interested in the teaching

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 263

of arithmetic to turn to Mr Sonnenschein's paper on
' The Teaching of Arithmetic in Elementary Schools/
in one of the volumes published by the Board of
Education.1

Preparation for Mathematics. — In the ' forties '
and ' fifties ' it was currently held that the continual
sight of the outward and visible signs (geometrical
forms and figures) should beget the inward and
spiritual grace of mathematical genius, or, at any rate,
of an inclination to mathematics. But the education-
alists of those days forgot, when they gave children
boxes of ' form ' and stuck up cubes, hexagons, penta-
gons, and what not, in every available schoolroom
space, the immense capacity for being bored which is
common to us all, and is far more strongly developed
in children than in grown-up people. The objects
which bore us, or the persons who bore us, appear
to wear a bald place in the mind, and thought turns
from them with sick aversion. Dickens showed us
the pathos of it in the schoolroom of the little
Gradgrinds, which was bountifully supplied with
objects of uncompromising outline. Ruskin, more
genially, exposes the fallacy. No doubt geometric
forms abound, — the skeletons of which living beauty,
in contour and gesture, in hill and plant, is the cover-
ing; and the skeleton is beautiful and wonderful
to the mind which has already entered within the
portals of geometry. But children should not be
presented with the skeleton, but with the living
forms which clothe it. Besides, is it not an inverse
method to familiarise the child's eye with patterns
made by his compasses, or stitched upon his card,
in the hope that the form will beget the idea ? For

1 See Appendix A.

264 HOME EDUCATION

the novice, it is probably the rule that the idea must
beget the form, and any suggestion of an idea from
a form comes only to the initiated. I do not think
that any direct preparation for mathematics is desir-
able. The child, who has been allowed to think and
not compelled to cram, hails the new study with
delight when the due time for it arrives. The reason
why mathematics are a great study is because there
exists in the normal mind an affinity and capacity
for this study ; and too great an elaboration, whether
of teaching or of preparation, has, I think, a tendency
to take the edge off this manner of intellectual interest.

XVI. — NATURAL PHILOSOPHY

A Basis of Facts. — Of the teaching of Natural
Philosophy, I will only remind the reader of what was
said in an earlier chapter — 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 accustomed 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
so far as his small experience will carry him. Above
all, when you come to the rescue, let it not be in
the ' cut and dried ' formula of some miserable little
text-book; let him have all the insight available,

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 265

and you will find that on many scientific questions
the child may be brought at once to the level of
modern thought. Do not embarrass him 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 important that he should learn the terms verte-
brate and invertebrate than that he should class the
animals he meets with according to this difference.

Eyes and No-eyes. — The method of this sort of in-
struction 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 Eyes 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 a child : the business
of the parent is to afford him abundant and varied
opportunities, and to direct his observations, so that,
knowing little of the principles of scientific classifica-
tion, he is, unconsciously, furnishing himself with the
materials for such classification. It is needless to
repeat what has already been said on this subject;
bnt, 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 those who have never entered on scientific
pursuits are blind to most of the poetry by which

266 HOME EDUCATION

they are surrounded. Whoever has not in youth
collected plants and insects, knows not half the halo
of interest which lanes and hedgerows can assume."

Principles. — In this connection I should like to
recommend The Sciences, by Mr Holden. America
comes to the fore with a schoolbook after my own
heart. The Sciences is a forbidding title, but since
the era of Joyce's Scientific Dialogues I have met with
nothing on the same lines which makes so fit an ap-
proach to the sensible and intelligent mind of a child.
This is what we may call a ' first-hand ' book. The
knowledge has of course all been acquired ; but then
it has been assimilated, and Mr Holden writes freely
out of his own knowledge both of his subject-matter
and of his readers. The book has been thrown into
the form of conversations between children — simple
conversations without padding. About three hundred
topics are treated of: Sand-dunes, Back-ice, Her-
culaneum, Dredging, Hurricanes, Echoes, the Prism,
the Diving-bell, the Milky Way, and, shall I say,
everything else ? But the amazing skill of the author
is shown in the fact that there is nothing scrappy and
nothing hurried in the treatment of any topic, but each
falls naturally and easily under the head of some prin-
ciple which it elucidates. Many simple experiments
are included, which the author insists shall be per-
formed by the children themselves. I venture to
quote from the singularly- wise preface, a vade mecum
for teachers : —

" The object of the present volume is to present
chapters to be read in school or at home that shall
materially widen the outlook of American school-
children in the domain of science, and of the applica-
tions of science to the arts and to daily life. It is in

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 267

no sense a text -book, although the fundamental
principles underlying the sciences treated are here
laid down. Its main object is to help the child to
understand the material world about him.

To be Comprehended by Children. — " All natural
phenomena are orderly ; they are governed by law ;
they are not magical. They are comprehended by
someone; why not by the child himself? It is not
possible to explain every detail of a locomotive to a
young pupil, but it is perfectly practicable to explain
its principles so that this machine, like others, becomes
a mere special case of certain well-understood general
laws. The general plan of the book is to awaken
the imagination ; to convey useful knowledge ; to
open the doors towards wisdom. Its special aim is
to stimulate observation and to excite a living and
lasting interest in the world that lies about us.

" The sciences of astronomy, physics, chemistry,
meteorology, and physiography are treated as fully
and as deeply as the conditions permit ; and the
lessons that they teach are enforced by examples
taken from familiar and important things. In as-
tronomy, for example, emphasis is laid upon
phenomena that the child himself can observe, and
h^ is instructed how to go about it. The rising and
setting of the stars, the phases of the moon, the uses
of the telescope, are explained in simple words. The
mystery of these and other matters is not magical, as
the child at first supposes. It is to deeper mysteries
that his attention is here directed. Mere phenomena
are treated as special cases of very general laws. The
same process is followed in the exposition of the other
sciences.

" Familiar phenomena, like those of steam, of

268 HOME EDUCATION

shadows, of reflected light, of musical instruments, of
echoes, etc., are referred to their fundamental causes.
Whenever it is desirable, simple experiments are de-
scribed and fully illustrated, and all such experiments
can very well be repeated in the schoolroom. . . .
The volume is the result of a sincere belief that much
can be done to aid young children to comprehend the
material world in which they live, and of a desire to
have a part in a work so very well worth doing."

I cannot help quoting also in this connection from
an article1 by the Rev. H. H. Moore dealing with
a forgotten pioneer of a rational education and his
experiment. This pioneer was the Rev. Richard
Dawes, at one time Rector of Kings Somborne parish,
Hampshire, who, in 1841, worked out the problem of
rational education in an agricultural village, in which
he found the population unusually ignorant and
debased, The whole story is of great interest, but
our concern is with the question of Natural Philosophy,
the staple of the teaching given in this school.

As taught in a Village School. — Mr Dawes thus
explained his object : — " I aimed at teaching what
would be profitable and interesting to persons in the
position in life which the children were likely to
occupy. I aimed at their being taught what may be
called the philosophy of common things — of everyday
life. They were shown how much there is that is
interesting, and which it is advantageous for them
to know, in connection with the natural objects with
which they are familiar ; they had explained to them,
and were made acquainted with, the principles of a
variety of natural phenomena, as well as the principles
and construction of various instruments of a useful

1 Parent? Review ', April 1904.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 269

kind. A practical turn was given to everything ; the
uses and fruits of the knowledge they were acquiring
were never lost sight of." A list of some of the
subjects included in this kind of teaching will be the
best commentary on Mr Dawes' scheme : —

" Some of the properties of air, explaining how its
pressure enables them to pump up water, to amuse
themselves with squirts and popguns, to suck up
water through a straw; explaining also the principles
and construction of a barometer, the common pump,
the diving-bell, a pair of bellows. That air expands
by heat, shown by placing a half-blown bladder near
the fire, when the wrinkles disappear. Why the
chimney-smoke sometimes rises easily in the air,
sometimes not. Why there is a draught up the
chimney, and under the door, and towards the fire.
Air as a vehicle of sound, and why the flash of a
distant gun fired is seen before the report is heard ;
how to calculate the distance of a thunderstorm ; the
difference in the speeds at which different materials
conduct sound. Water and its properties, its solid,
fluid, and vaporous state ; why water - pipes are
burst by frost ; why ice forms and floats on the sur-
face of ponds, and not at the bottom ; why the kettle-
lid jumps up when the water is boiling on the fire ;
the uses to which the power of steam is applied ;
the gradual evolution of the steam-engine, shown by
models and diagrams ; how their clothes are dried,
and why they feel cold sitting in damp clothes ; why
a damp bed is so dangerous ; why one body floats in
water, and another sinks ; the different densities of
sea and fresh water ; why, on going into the school
on a cold morning, they sometimes see a quantity of
water on the glass, and why on the inside and not

2/0 HOME EDUCATION

on the outside ; why, on a frosty day, their breath is
visible as vapour ; the substances water holds in
solution, and how their drinking water is affected by
the kind of soil through which it has passed. Dew,
its value, and the conditions necessary for its forma-
tion ; placing equal portions of dry wool on gravel,
glass, and the grass, and weighing them the next
morning. Heat and its properties ; how it is that the
blacksmith can fit iron hoops so firmly on the wheels
of carts and barrows ; what precautions have to be
taken in laying the iron rails of railways and in
building iron bridges, etc. ; what materials are good,
and what bad, conductors of heat ; why at the same
temperature some feel colder to our touch than
others ; why a glass sometimes breaks when hot
water is poured into it, and whether thick or thin
glass would be more liable to crack ; why water
can be made to boil in a paper kettle or an egg-
shell without its being burned. The metals, their
sources, properties, and uses ; mode of separating
from the ores. Light and its properties, illustrated
by prisms, etc. ; adaptation of the eye ; causes of long-
and short-sightedness. The mechanical principles of
the tools more commonly used, the spade, the plough,
the axe, the lever, etc."

" It may surprise some who read carefully the
above list that such subjects should have been taught
to the children of a rural elementary school. But it
is an undeniable fact that they were taught in Kings
Somborne school, and so successfully that the chil-
dren were both interested and benefited by the
teaching. Mr Dawes, in answer to the objection
that such subjects are above the comprehension of the
young, said : — * The distinguishing mark of Nature's

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 2/1

laws is their extreme simplicity. It may doubtless
require intellect of a high order to make the discovery
of these laws ; yet, once evolved, they are within
the capacity of a child, — in short, the principles of
natural philosophy are the principles of common
sense, and if taught in a simple and common-sense
way, they will be speedily understood and eagerly
attended to by children ; and it will be found that
with pupils of even from ten to twelve years of
age much may be done towards forming habits of
observation and inquiry.' Such a fact, I think,
suggests some valuable practical lessons for those who
have the responsibility of deciding what subjects to
include in an educational system for children."

In reading of this remarkable experiment, we
feel that we must at once secure a man, all-informed
like the late Dean Dawes, to teach our own Jack and
Elsie ; but it is something to realise what these young
persons should know, and Mr Holden has done a
great deal for us. Some of the chapters in The
Sciences may be beyond children under nine, but they
will be able to master a good deal. One thing is
to be borne in mind : nothing should be done with-
out its due experiment. By the way, our old friend,
Jcyce's Scientific Dialogues^ if it is still to be had,
describes a vast number of easy and interesting ex-
periments which children can work for themselves.

XVII. — GEOGRAPHY

Geography is, to my mind, a subject of high
educational value ; though not because it affords
the means of scientific training. Geography does
present its problems, and these of the most inter-

272 HOME EDUCATION

esting, and does afford materials for classification ;
but it is physical geography only which falls within
the definition of a science, and even that is rather
a compendium of the results of several sciences than a
science itself. But the peculiar value of geography lies
in its fitness to nourish the mind with ideas, and
to furnish the imagination with pictures. Herein
lies the educational value of geography.

As commonly Taught. — Now, how is the sub-
ject commonly taught? The child learns the names
of the capital cities of Europe, or of the rivers of
England, or of the mountain-summits of Scotland,
from some miserable 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 educa-
tion goes — that is, the developing of power, 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 information which the geography
lesson should afford. That is true, and is to be
borne in mind in the schoolroom ; the child's geo-
graphy lesson should furnish just the sort of informa-
tion 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 per-
sonal 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

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 273

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 !

Geography should be Interesting. — But, you
say, this sort of knowledge, though it may be a
labour to the child to acquire it, is useful in after
life. Not a bit of it ; and for this reason — it has
never been really received by the brain at all; has
never got further than the floating nebulae of mere
verbal memory of which I have already had occasion
to speak. 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
bits we heard from travelled friends, about the Rhine,
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, that his mind shall thereby be stored with
ideas, his imagination with images ; for practical pur-
poses he must learn such geography only as, the
nature of his mind considered, he will able to
remember; 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.

How to begin. — But, how to begin ? In the first
place, the child gets his rudimentary notions of geo-
graphy as he gets his first notions of natural science,
in those long hours out of doors of which we have
already seen the importance. A pool fed by a mere
cutting in the fields will explain the nature of a lake,

274 HOME EDUCATION

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 own lake." In this con-
nection will come in a great deal of pleasant talk
about places, ' pictorial geography/ until the child
knows by name and nature the great rivers and
mountains, 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 in the sand or gravel. ' This
crooked line is the Rhine ; 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 their ruined castles — now on this side,
now on that. This dot is Cologne,' etc. Especially,
let these talks cover all the home scenery and
interests you are acquainted with, so that, by-and-by,
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 York 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 ? — Give him next intimate knowledge,
with the fullest details, 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

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 275

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 fur-
nished 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,1 the same author's
Polar World,1 Livingstone's missionary travels, Mrs
Bishop's Unbeaten Tracks in Japan^ — in fact, any
interesting, well-written book of travel. It may be
necessary to leave out a good deal, but every illus-
trative 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. — Maps must be carefully used in this kind
of work, — a sketch-map following the traveller's pro-
gress, to be compared finally with a 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 confirm-
ing the child's exact knowledge. In this way, too, he
gets intelligent notions of physical geography ; in the
course of his readings 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
1 See Appendix A,

276 HOME EDUCATION

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.

What General Knowledge a Child of Nine
should have. — Supposing that between the child's
sixth and his ninth year half a dozen well-chosen
standard books of travel have been read with him in
this way, he has gained distinct ideas of the contours,
the 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.

Particular Knowledge. — But we are considering
lessons as ' Instruments of Education ' ; and the sort
of knowledge of the world I have indicated will be
conveyed rather by readings in the * Children's Hour '
and at other times than by way of lessons. I know
of nothing so good as the old-fashioned World at
Home (ion lessons) for children between six and seven.
As they hear, they wonder, admire, imagine, and can
even 'play at' a hundred situations. The first ideas of
geography, the lessons on place, which should make a
child observant of local geography, of the features of
his own neighbourhood, its heights and hollows, and
level lands, its streams and ponds, should be gained,
as we have seen, out of doors, and should prepare him
for a certain amount of generalisation — that is, he
should be able to discover definitions of river, island,
lake, and so on, and should make these for himself in
a tray of sand, or draw them on the blackboard.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 2/7

Definitions. — But definitions should come in the
way of recording his experiences. Before he is taught
what a river is, he must have watched a stream and
observed that it flows ; and so on with the rest.

Children easily simulate knowledge, and at this
point the teacher will have to be careful that nothing
which the child receives is mere verbiage, but that
every generalisation is worked out somewhat in this
way : — The child observes a fact, as, for example, a
wide stretch of flat ground ; the teacher amplifies. He
reads in his book about Pampas, the flat countries of the
north-west of Europe, the Holland of our own eastern
coast, and, by degrees, he is prepared to receive the
idea of a plain, and to show it on his tray of sand.

Fundamental Ideas. — By the time he is seven,
or before, he finds himself in need of further know-
ledge. He has read of hot countries and cold
countries, has observed the seasons and the rising
and setting of the sun, has said to himself —

"Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are ! " —

knows something of ocean and sea, has watched the
tide come in and go out, has seen many rough sketch-
maps made and has made some for himself, and has,
no doubt, noticed the criss-cross lines on a 'proper'
map ; that is to say, his mind is prepared for know-
ledge in various directions ; there are a number of
things concerned with geography which he really
wants to know.

The shape and motions of the earth are funda-
mental ideas,1 however difficult to grasp, but the
difficulty is of a kind which increases with years.

1 See Appendix A.

278 HOME EDUCATION

The principle in each case is simple enough, and a
child does not concern himself, as do his elders, with
the enormous magnitude of the scale upon which
operations in space are carried on. It is probable
that a child's vivid imagination puts him on a level
with the mathematician in dealing with the planetary
system, with the behaviour and character of Earth,
with the causes of the seasons, and much besides.

Meaning of a Map. — Then, again, geography
should be learned chiefly from maps. Pictorial read-
ings and talks introduce him to the subject, but so
soon as his geography lessons become definite they
are to be learned, in the first place, from the map.
This is an important principle to bear in mind. The
child who gets no ideas from considering the map,
say of Italy or of Russia, has no knowledge of geo-
graphy, however many facts about places he may
be able to produce. Therefore he should begin
this study by learning the meaning of a map and
how to use it. He must learn to draw a plan of
his schoolroom, etc., according to scale, go on to
the plan of a field, consider how to make the plan
of his town, and be carried gradually from the idea
of a plan to that of a map ; always beginning with
the notion of an explorer who finds the land and
measures it, and by means of sun and stars, is able
to record just where it is on the earth's surface, east
or west, north or south.

Now he will arrive at the meaning of the lines of
latitude and longitude. He will learn how sea and
land are shown on a map, how rivers and mountains
are represented ; and having learned his points of
direction and the use of his compass, and knowing
that maps are always made as if the beholder were

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 279

looking to the north, he will be able to tell a good
deal about situation, direction, and the like, in very
early days. The fundamental ideas of geography
and the meaning of a map are subjects well fitted to
form an attractive introduction to the study. Some
of them should awaken the delightful interest which
attaches in a child's mind to that which is wonderful,
incomprehensible, while the map lessons should lead
to mechanical efforts equally delightful. It is only
when presented to the child for the first time in the
form of stale knowledge and foregone conclusions
that the facts taught in such lessons appear dry and
repulsive to him. An effort should be made to treat
the subject with the sort of sympathetic interest and
freshness which attracts children to a new study.

XVIII. — HISTORY

A Storehouse of Ideas. — Much that has been
said about the teaching of geography applies equally
to that of history. Here, too, is a subject which
should be to the child an inexhaustible storehouse
of ideas, should enrich the chambers of his House
Beautiful with a thousand tableaux, pathetic and
heroic, 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 miser-
able little chronicle of feuds, battles, and death which
is presented to him by way 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

280 HOME EDUCATION

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 judgment
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 undertake 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.

'Outlines' Mischievous. — 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 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 lifetime 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 Richard and Saladin, or with
Henry V. — Shakespeare's Henry V. — and his vie-

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 281

torious 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 our-
selves, that the people of some other land were, at
one time, at any rate, better than we, why, so much
the better for him.

So are most History Books written for Chil-
dren.— 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 compendiums, 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 paraphrasing mothers are so ready at, and the
children may be taken through the first few volumes
of a well-written, illustrated, popular history of Eng-
land, say as 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 would be fuller information, more graphic details
about two or three early epochs.

Early History of a Nation best fitted for
Children. — The early history of a nation is far better

282 HOME EDUCATION

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 interesting
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 his-
tory 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, caring 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.

Some old Chronicles. — First in order of time, and
full of the most captivating reading, is the Ecclesias-
tical History of England^- of the Venerable Bede, who,
1 See Appendix A.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 283

writing of himself so early as the seventh century,
says, " It was always sweet to me to learn, to teach,
and to write." " He has left us," says Professor
Morley, "a history of the early years of England,
succinct, yet often warm with life ; business-like, and
yet childlike 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 perfection the art of chronicle-making.
He is especially vivid and graphic about contem-
porary 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 Leona-
ford, 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

284 HOME EDUCATION

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 Richard Cceur de Lion, by Richard of Devizes,
and Geoffrey de Vinsany, and of the crusade of St
Louis, by Lord John de Joinville.

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,
you may put any dull outlines into their hands, and
they will make history for themselves.

Age of Myths. — 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 Malmesbury was
writing his admirable History of the Kings of Eng-
land, what does Geoffrey do but weave the traditions

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 285

of the people into an orderly History of the British
Kings, reaching back all the way to King Brut,
the grandson of ^Eneas. 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 language which
Walter, Archdeacon of Oxford, brought out of Brit-
tany." 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, 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, be 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.1

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 story of the French wars?
And so of as much else as there is time for ; the
principle being, that, wherever practicable, the child
should get his first notions of a given period, not
from the modern historian, the commentator and

1 Bohn's Antiquarian Library (53. a volume) includes Bede, William of
Malmesbury, Dr Giles's Six Old English Chronicles — Asser and Geoffrey
of Monmouth being two of them — Chronicles of the Crusaders ; etc.

286 HOME EDUCATION

reviewer, but from the original sources of history,
the writings of contemporaries. The mother must,
however, exercise discrimination in her choice of
early ' Chronicles,' as all are not equally reliable.

Plutarch's ' Lives.' — In the same way, readings
from Plutarch's Lives will afford the best prepara-
tion for the study of Grecian or of Roman 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
Philip, at the price of thirteen talents ( = ^"2518, 155.),
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 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 great 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 for-
feiture 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 laying hold on the bridle, turned
him to the sun, for he had observed, it seems, that the

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 287

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
forthee.'"

Here, again, in North's inimitable translation, we
get the sort of vivid graphic presentation which makes
' History ' as real to the child as are the adventures
of Robinson Crusoe.

To sum up, to know as much as they may 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.

History Books. — It is not at all easy to choose the
right history books for children. Mere summaries
of facts must, as we have seen, be eschewed ; and
we must be equally careful to avoid generalisations.

288 HOME EDUCATION

The natural function of the mind, in the early years
of life, is to gather the material of knowledge with a
view to that very labour of generalisation which is
proper to the adult mind ; a labour which we should
all carry on to some extent for ourselves. As it is,
our minds are so poorly furnished that we accept the
conclusions presented to us without demur ; but we
can, at any rate, avoid giving children cut-and-dried
opinions upon the course of history while they are
yet young. What they want is graphic details con-
cerning events and persons upon which imagination
goes to work ; and opinions tend to form themselves
by slow degrees as knowledge grows.

Mr York Powell has, perhaps more than others,
hit upon the right teaching for the young children I
have in view. In the preface to his Old Stories from
British History^ he says: — "The writer has chosen
such stories as he thought would amuse and please
his readers, and give them at the same time some
knowledge of the lives and thoughts of their fore-
fathers. To this end he has not written solely of
great folk — kings and queens and generals — but also
of plain people and children, ay, and birds and beasts
too " ; and we get the tale of King Lear and of
Cuculain, and of King Canute and the poet Otter,
of Havclock and Ubba, and many more, all brave
and glorious stories ; indeed, Mr York Powell gives
us a perfect treasure-trove in his two little volumes
of Old Stories and Sketches from British Plistory^
which are the better for our purpose, because child-
ren can read them for themselves so soon as they
are able to read at all. These tales, written in
good and simple English, and with a certain charm
1 See Appendix A.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 289

of style, lend themselves admirably to narration.
Indeed, it is most interesting to hear children of
seven or eight go through a long story without
missing a detail, putting every event in its right order.
These narrations are never a slavish reproduction of
the original. A child's individuality plays about what
he enjoys, and the story comes from his lips, not
precisely as the author tells it, but with a certain
spirit and colouring which express the narrator. By
the way, it is very important that children should
be allowed to narrate in their own way, and should
not be pulled up or helped with words and expres-
sions from the text. A narration should be original
as it comes from a child — that is, his own mind should
have acted upon the matter it has received. Narra-
tions which are mere feats of memory are quite
valueless. I have already spoken of the sorts of old
chronicles upon which children should be nourished ;
but these are often too diffuse to offer good matter
for narration, and it is well to have quite fitting
short tales for this purpose.

I should like to mention two other little volumes
in which children delight, which feed patriotic senti-
ment and lay a broad basis for historical knowledge.
I mean Mrs Frewen Lord's Tales from St Paul's1 and
Tales from Westminster Abbey} It is a beautiful and
delightful thing to take children informed by these
tales to the Abbey or St Paul's, and let them
identify for themselves the spots consecrated to
their heroes. They know so much and are so full
of vivid interest that their elders stand by instructed
and inspired. There are, no doubt, multitudes of
historical tales and sketches for children, and some of
1 See Appendix A.

19

290 HOME EDUCATION

them, like Miss Brooke Hunt's Prisoners of the Tower}
are very good ; but let the mother beware : there is
nothing which calls for more delicate tact and under-
standing sympathy with the children than this appar-
ently simple matter of choosing their lesson-books,
and especially, perhaps, their lesson-books in history.

Many children of eight or nine will be quite ready
to read with pleasure A History of England, by H. O.
Arnold Forster, who has long since won his spurs in
the field of educational literature. In this, as in matters
of more immediate statecraft, Mr Arnold Forster has
the gift to see a defect and a remedy, an omission
and the means of supplying it. He saw that English
children grew up without any knowledge of the con-
ditions under which they live, and of the laws which
govern them ; but, since the appearance of The Citizen
Reader and The Laws of Every-day Life, we have
changed all that. The History of England, or, as the
children call it, History, ignoring the fact that there
is any other history than that of England, has hitherto
been presented to young people as " outlines of dates
and facts, or as collections of romantic stories, with
little coherence and less result on the fortunes of the
country." Mr Arnold Forster says in his preface
that he " is reluctant to introduce his book by any
such repellent title as ' A Summary/ or * An Outline
of English History.' Such titles seem on the face of
them to imply that the element of interest and the
romance inseparable from the life and doings of in-
dividuals are excluded, and that an amplified chrono-
logical table has been made to do duty for history.
But to read English history and fail to realise that it
is replete with interest, sparkling with episode, and
1 See Appendix A.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 291

full of dramatic incident, is to miss all the pleasure
and most of the instruction which its study, if properly
pursued, can give." The author fulfils his implied
promise, and his work is, I venture to say, as " replete
with interest, sparkling with episode, and full of
dramatic incident" as is possible, considering the
limitations imposed upon him by the facts that he
writes for uneducated readers, and gives us a survey
of the whole of English History in a pleasant,
copiously and wisely illustrated volume of some eight
hundred pages. How telling and lucid this is, for
example, and how we all wish we had come across such
a paragraph in our early studies of architecture : —
"On page 23 we have pictures of two windows. One
of them is what is called a Pointed window. All the
arches in it go up to a point. It was built a long
time before the Tudor period. The other was built
in the time of Queen Elizabeth. In it the upright
shaft, or mullion, of the window goes straight up to
the top without forming an arch. This style of
building a window is called the Perpendicular Style,
because the mullions of the windows are ' per-
pendicular.' Some of the most famous buildings
in England built in Tudor times, and in the per-
pendicular style, are the Chapel of King's College,
Cambridge, and Hatfield House, the residence of the
Marquis of Salisbury, in Hertfordshire." Mr Arnold
Forster has done in this volume for children and the
illiterate, what Professor Green did in his Shorter
History of England for somewhat more advanced
students, awakening many to the fact that history
is an entrancing subject of study. This is a real
introduction to real history. The portraits are an
especially valuable feature of the work.

292 HOME EDUCATION

Dates. — In order to give definiteness to what may
soon become a pretty wide knowledge of history —
mount a sheet of cartridge-paper and divide it into
twenty columns, letting the first century of the Christian
era come in the middle, and let each remaining column
represent a century B.C. or A.D., as the case may be.

Then let the child himself write, or print, as he is
able, the names of the people he comes upon in due
order, in their proper century. We need not trouble
ourselves at present with more exact dates, but this
simple table of the centuries will suggest a graphic
panorama to the child's mind, and he will see events
in their time-order.

Illustrations by the Children.— History readings
afford admirable material for narration, and children
enjoy narrating what they have read or heard. They
love, too, to make illustrations. Children who had
been reading Julius Casar (and also, Plutarch's Life),
were asked to make a picture of their favourite scene,
and the results showed the extraordinary power of
visualising which the little people possess. Of course
that which they visualise, or imagine clearly, they
know; it is a life possession.

The drawings of the children in question are
psychologically interesting as showing what various
and sometimes obscure points appeal to the mind
of a child ; and also, that children have the same
intellectual pleasure as persons of cultivated mind
in working out new hints and suggestions. The
drawings, be it said, leave much to be desired, but they
have this in common with the art of primitive peoples :
they tell the tale directly and vividly. A girl of nine
and a half pictures Julius Caesar conquering Britain.
lie rides in a chariot mounted on scythes, he is robed

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 293

in blue, and bits of blue sky here and there give the
complementary colour. In the distance, a soldier
plants the ensign bearing the Roman eagle, black
on a pink ground ! In the foreground, is a hand
to-hand combat between Roman and Briton, each
having a sword of enormous length. Other figures
are variously employed.

Another, gives us Antony ' making his speech after
the death of Caesar.' This girl, who is older, gives us
architecture ; you look through an arch, which leads
into a side street, and, in the foreground, Antony
stands on a platform at the head of a flight ot
marble steps. Antony's attitude expresses indig
nation and scorn. Below, is a crowd of Romans
wearing the toga, whose attitudes show various shades
of consternation and dismay. Behind, is Antony's
servant in uniform, holding his master's horse ; and on
the platform, in the rear of Antony, lies Caesar, with
the royal purple thrown over him. The chief value of
the drawing, as a drawing, is that it tells the tale.

Another girl draws Calpurnia begging Caesar not
to go to the Senate. Caesar stands armed and per-
turbed, while Calpurnia holds his outstretched hand
with both of hers as she kneels before him, her face
raised in entreaty ; her loose blue night-robe and long
golden hair give colour to the picture. This artist
is fourteen, and the drawing is better done.

Another artist presents Brutus and Portia in the
orchard with a ' south-wall ' of red brick, espaliers,
and two dignified figures which hardly tell their tale.

Another child gives us the scene in the forum,
Caesar seated in royal purple, Brutus kneeling before
him, and Casca standing behind his chair with out-
stretched hand holding a dagger, saying "Speak,

294 HOME EDUCATION

hands, for me," while Caesar says, " Doth not Brutus
bootless kneel ? "

Again, we get Lucius playing to Brutus in the tent.
Brutus, armed cap-a-pie, seated on a stool, is vainly
trying to read, while Lucius, a pretty figure, seated
before him, plays the harp. The two sentries, also
fully armed, are stretched on the floor sound asleep.

Another, gives us Claudius dressed as a woman
at the women's festival — the ladies with remarkable
eyes, and each carrying a flaming torch.

Another pictures, with great spirit, Caesar reading
his history to the conquered Gauls, who stand in rows
on the hillside listening to the great man with
exemplary patience.

In these original illustrations (several of them by
older children than those we have in view here), we
get an example of the various images that present
themselves to the minds of children during the read-
ing of a great work ; and a single such glimpse into
a child's mind convinces us of the importance of sus-
taining that mind upon strong meat. Imagination
does not stir at the suggestion of the feeble, much-
diluted stuff that is too often put into children's hands.

' Playing at ' History. — Children have other ways
of expressing the conceptions that fill them when
they are duly fed. They play at their history lessons,
dress up, make tableaux, act scenes ; or they have
a stage, and their dolls act, while they paint the
scenery and speak the speeches. There is no end to
the modes of expression children find when there is
anything in them to express.

The mistake we make is to suppose that imagina-
tion is fed by nature, or that it works on the insipid
diet of children's story-books. Let a child have the

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 295

meat he requires in his history readings, and in the
literature which naturally gathers round this history,
and imagination will bestir itself without any help of
ours ; the child will live out in detail a thousand
scenes of which he only gets the merest hint.

XIX. — GRAMMAR

Grammar a Difficult Study. — Of 'grammar, 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 respect the Latin grammar is
easier ; a change in the form, the shape of the word, to
denote case, is what a 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 the 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
: hows no change in the form of the word.

Latin Grammar. — Of the teaching of Latin
grammar, I think I cannot do better than mention a
book for beginners that really answers. Children of
eight and nine take to this First Latin Course (Scott
and Jones)1 very kindly, and it is a great thing to
begin a study with pleasure. It is an open question,
however, whether it is desirable to begin Latin at so
early an age.

1 See Appendix A.

296 HOME EDUCATION

English Grammar a Logical Study. — 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 ; that is, that he should learn a little of what
is called analysis of sentences before he learns to
parse; should learn to divide simple sentences into
the 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.

"'So then I took up the next book. It was about
grammar. It said extraordinary things about nouns
and verbs and particles and pronouns, and past
participles and objective cases and subjunctive
moods. * What are all these things ? ' asked the
King. ' I don't know, your Majesty,' and the Queen
did not know, but she said it would be very suitable
for children to learn. It would keep them quiet,'"1

It is so important that children should not be puzzled
as were this bewildered King and Queen, that I add a
couple of introductory grammar lessons ; as a single
example is often more useful than many precepts.

LESSON I

Words put together so as to make sense form what
is called a sentence.

' Barley oats chair really good and cherry ' is not
a sentence, because it makes no(n)sense.

1 Tom has said his lesson ' is a sentence.

It is a sentence because it tells us something about
Tom.

1 Palace Tales, H. Fielding.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 297

Every sentence speaks of someone or of something,
and tells us something about that of which it speaks.
So a sentence has two parts :

(1) The thing we speak of;

(2) What we say about it.

In our sentence, we speak of ' Tom.'

We say about him that he ' has learned his
lesson.'

The thing we speak of is often called the SUBJECT,
which just means that which we talk about.

People sometimes say ' the subject of conversation
was so and so,' which is another way of saying * the
thing we were speaking about was so and so.'

To be learnt —

Words put together so as to make sense form a
sentence.

A sentence has two parts : that which we speak of,
and what we say about it.

That which we speak of is the SUBJECT.

Exercises on Lesson I

1. Put the first part to —

has a long mane.

is broken.

cannot do his sums.

— played for an hour ; etc., etc.

2. Put the second part to —

That poor boy .

My brother Tom .

The broken flowerpot

Bread and jam .

Brown's tool-basket ; etc., etc.

298 HOME EDUCATION

3. Put six different subjects to each half sentence
in r.

4. Make six different sentences with each subject
in 2.

5. Say which part of the sentence is wanting, and
supply it in —

Has been mended

Tom's knife

That little dog

Cut his finger

Ate too much fruit

My new book

The snowdrops in our garden, etc., etc.

N.B. — Be careful to call the first part of each
sentence the subject.

Draw a line under the subject of each sentence in
all the exercises.

LESSON II

We may make a sentence with only two words — the
name of the thing we speak of and what we say
about it : —

John writes.

Birds sing.

Mary -sews.

We speak about ' John.'
We say about him that he 'writes.'
We speak about ' birds.'
We say about them that they ' sing.'
These words, writes, sing, sews, all come out of the
same group of words, and the words in that group are

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 299

the chief words of all, for this reason — we cannot
make sense, and therefore cannot make a sentence,
without using at least one of them.

They are called VERBS, which means words, because
they are the chief words of all.

A verb always tells one of two things about the
subject. Either it tells what the subject is, as —
I am hungry.
The chair is broken.
The birds are merry ;
or it tells what the subject does, as —
Alice writes.
The cat mews.
He calls.
To be learnt —

We cannot make a sentence without a verb.
Verb means word.
Verbs are the chief words.
Verbs show that the subject is something —

He is sleepy ;
or does something —

He runs.

Exercises on Lesson II

i. Put in a verb of being: —

Mary sleepy.

Boys rough.

Girls quiet.

He first yesterday.

I a little boy.

Tom and George swinging before dinner.

We busy to-morrow.

He punished ; etc., etc.

$00 HOME EDUCATION

2. Make three sentences with each of the following
verbs: — Is, are, should be, was, am, were, shall be,
will be.

3. Make six sentences with verbs of being in each.

4. Put a verb of doing to —

Tigers .

The boy with the pony .

My cousins ; etc., etc.

5. Make twenty sentences about —

That boy in kilts,
with verbs showing what he does.

6. Find the verbs, and say whether of being or
doing, in —

The bright sun rises over the hill.

We went away.

You are my cousin.

George goes to school.

He took his slate.

We are seven.

7. Count how many verbs you use in your talk for
the next ten minutes.

8. Write every verb you can find in these exercises,
and draw a line under it.

XX. — FRENCH

French should be acquired as English is, not as a
grammar, but as a living speech. To train the ear to
distinguish and the lips to produce the French voc-
ables 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

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 301

French. Sir Lyon Playfair, once speaking at a con-
ference 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 boys were required to
speak Latin during school hours, and French at all
other times. There is hardly another civilised 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 combina-
tions 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 into sentences and kept in use
from day to day. A note-book in which she enters
the child's new words and sentences will easily
enable the teacher to do this. The young child has
no foolish shame about saying French words — he pro-
nounces them as simply as if they were English ;

302 HOME EDUCATION

but it is very important 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 ?

M. Gouin's Method. — A serious effort is being
made to approach the study of foreign languages
rationally and scientifically. I have no hesitation
in saying that M. Gouin's work (The Art of Teach-
ing and Studying Languages) l is the most important
attempt that has yet been made to bring the study
of languages within the sphere of practical edu-
cation. Indeed, the great reform in our methods
of teaching modern languages owe their origin to
this remarkable work. The initial idea, that we
must acquire a new language as a child acquires
his mother tongue, is absolutely right, whether the
attempt to follow this idea out by analysing a
language into a certain number, say fifteen, ex-
haustive ' series/ be right or not. Again, it is
incontestable that the ear, and not the eye, is the
physical organ for apprehending a language, just
as truly as it is by the mouth, and not the ear, we
appropriate food. If M. Gouin's book establish these
two points only, it will be a valuable contribution
to educational thought. Equally important is his
third position, that the verb is the key to the sen-
tence, and more, is the living bridge between thought
and act He maintains, too, that the child thinks in
sentences, not in words ; that his sentences have a
logical sequence; that this sequence is one of time

1 See Appendix A.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 303

— the order of the operations in, for example, the
growth of a plant, or the grinding of corn in a mill ;
that, as the child perceives the operations, he has an
absolute need to express them ; that his ear solicits,
his memory cherishes, his tongue reproduces, the
words which say the thing he thinks. No doubt
M. Gouin's method should be more successful than
any other in steeping the student (child or man) in
German or French thought. If you are all day
long trying to work out a ' series ' in French, say,
you come to think in French, to * dream in French,'
to speak French. Moreover, one has a delightful
sense that at last the way is made clear to us to
conduct all teaching in the language under study.
You have the ' Art Series ' and the ' Bee Series '
and the ' River ' and the ' Character Series ' and
the ' Poet Series/ and any series you like. You
think the thing out in the order of time and natural
sequence ; you get the right verbs, nouns, and such
epithets as are necessary, follow suit, and in amaz-
ingly few sentences, very short sentences too, con-
nected by ' and/ you have said all that is essential
to the subject. The whole thing is a constant
surprise, like the children's game which unearths
t1ie most extraordinary and out-of-the-way thing
you can think of by means of a dozen or so
questions.

The 'Series.'— Thus, a language learned by M.
Gouin's method is ' a liberal education in itself/ One
learns how few and simple are, after all, the concep-
tions of which the human mind is cognisant, and how
few and simple, putting mere verbiage aside, are the
words necessary to express these.

You really learn to think in the new language,

304 HOME EDUCATION

because you have no more than vague impressions
about these acts or facts in your mother tongue.

You order your thoughts in the new language,
and, having done so, the words which express these
are an inalienable possession.

Here is an example of an elementary ' Series,'
showing how ' the servant lights the fire ' :

" The servant takes a box of matches, takes.

She opens the match-box, opens.

She takes out a match, takes out.

She shuts up the match-box, shuts up.

She strikes the match on the cover, strikes.

The match takes fire, takes fire.

The match smokes, smokes.

The match flames, flames.

The match burns, burns.
And spreads a smell of burning over the kitchen, spreads.

The servant bends down to the hearth, bends doivn.

Puts out her hand, puts out.

Puts the match under the shavings, puts.

Holds the match under the shavings, holds.

The shavings take fire, take fire.

The servant leaves go of the match, leaves go.

Stands up again, stands up.

Looks at her fire burning, looks.
And puts back the box of matches in its place, puts back?

But any attempt to quote gives an uncertain and
unsatisfactory idea of this important work.

How does the Child learn ? — Whatever may be
said of M. Gouin's methods, the steps by which he
arrives at them are undoubtedly scientific. He learns
from a child :

" Unhappily the child has remained up to the present
a hackneyed riddle, which we have never taken
sufficient trouble to decipher or examine. ..."

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 305

"The little child, which at the age of two years
utters nothing but meaningless exclamations, at the
age of three finds itself in possession of a complete
language. How does it accomplish this ? Does
this miracle admit of explanation or not? Is it a
problem of which there is a possibility of finding the
unknown quantity? . . . The organ of language —
ask the little child — is not the eye: it is the ear.
The eye is made for colours, and not for sounds and
words. . . . This tension, continuous and contrary
to nature, of the organ of sight, the forced precipi-
tancy of the visual act, produced what it was bound
to produce, a disease of the eyesight."

This refers to M. Gouin's herculean labours in the
attempt to learn German. He knew everybody's
* Method/ learned the whole dictionary through, and
found at the end that he did not know one word of
German ' as she is spoke/

He returned to France, after a ten months' absence,
and found that his little nephew — whom he had left,
a child of two and a half, not yet able to talk — had
in the interval done what his uncle had signally
failed to do. " ' What ! ' I thought ; ' this child and
I have been working for the same time, each at a
h nguage. He, playing round his mother, running
after flowers, butterflies and birds, without weariness,
without apparent effort, without even being conscious
of his work, is able to say all he thinks, express all
he sees, understand all he hears ; and when he began
his work, his intelligence was yet a futurity, a
glimmer, a hope. And I, versed in the sciences,
versed in philosophy, armed with a powerful will,
gifted with a powerful memory .... have arrived
at nothing, or at practically nothing ! ' "

20

306 HOME EDUCATION

" The linguistic science of the college has deceived
me, has misguided me. The classical method, with
its grammar, its dictionary, and its translations, is a
delusion." " To surprise Nature's secret, I must
watch this child."

M. Gouin watches the child — the work in question
is the result of his observations.

The method of teaching may be varied, partly
because that recommended by M. Gouin requires a
perfect command of the French tongue, and teachers
who are diffident find a conversational method founded
on book and picture l easier to work and perhaps as
effectual— more so, some people think ; but, be this
as it may, it is to M. Gouin we owe the fundamental
idea.

It is satisfactory to find principles, which we have
urged continually, enunciated in this most thought-
ful work. For example: "If one learns French
without being able to read it — as the child does —
there will be no longer much greater difficulty in
pronouncing it than in pronouncing words in English.
' How about the spelling ? ' you will ask. The
spelling ? You would learn it as the young French
children learn it, as you yourself have learnt the
English spelling, ten times more difficult than the
French ; and this without letting the study of the
spelling spoil your already acquired pronunciation.
Besides, the spelling is a thing that can be reformed—
the pronunciation hardly at all. We must choose
between the two evils." M. Gouin speaks of the
possibility of a child's picking up another tongue —
even Chinese from a Chinese nurse ; and his words
remind me of an extraordinary instance of a child's
1 See Appendix A.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 307

facility in picking up languages, which once came
before me. Having occasion to speak in public of
three little children, all aged three, belonging to
different families, where one parent was English, the
other German, I said that these three children of my
acquaintance could each say everything they had
to say, express the whole range of their ideas, with
equal ease and fluency in the two languages. At
the close of the meeting, a gentleman present came
forward and endorsed my remarks. He said he had
a son whose wife was a German lady, and who was
now a missionary in Bagdad. They have a child of
three, and their child speaks three languages with
perfect fluency — English, German, and Arabic I No
doubt the child will forget two of the three, and this
is no argument for teaching foreign tongues to
babies, but surely it does prove that the acquisition
of a foreign tongue need not present insuperable
difficulties to any of us.

XXI. — PICTORIAL ART

Study of Pictures. — The art training of children
should proceed on two lines. The six-year-old child
should begin both to express himself and to appreci-
ate, and his appreciation should be well in advance
of his power to express what he sees or imagines.
Therefore it is a lamentable thing when the apprecia-
tion of children is exercised only upon the coloured
lithographs of their picture-books or of the ' Christmas
number.' But the reader will say, 'A young child
cannot appreciate art ; it is only the colour and
sentiment of a picture that reach him. A vividly
coloured presentation of Bobbie's Birthday, or of

308 HOME EDUCATION

Barbara's Broken Doll, will find its way straight to his
"business and bosom.'" 'Therefore,' says the reader,
' Nature indicates the sort of art proper for the
children ! ' But, as a matter of fact, the minds of
children and of their elders alike accommodate them-
selves to what is put in their way ; and if children
appreciate the vulgar and sentimental in art, it
is because that is the manner of art to which they
become habituated. A little boy of about nine was
(with many others) given reproductions of some half-
dozen of the pictures of Jean Francois Millet to study
during a school term. At the end, the children were
asked to describe the one of these pictures which they
liked best. Of course they did it, and did it well.
This is what the little boy I mentioned makes of it : —
" I liked the Sower best. The sower is sowing seeds ;
the picture is all dark except high up on the right-
hand side where there is a man ploughing the field.
While he is ploughing the field the sower sows.
The sower has got a bag in his left hand and is
sowing with his right hand. He has wooden clogs
on. He is sowing at about six o'clock in the
morning. You can see his head better than his legs
and body, because it is against the light."

A little girl of seven prefers the ' Angelus,' and
says : — " The picture is about people in the fields, a
man and a woman. By the woman is a basket with
something in it ; behind her is a wheelbarrow. They
are praying ; the man has his hat off in his hand.
You can tell that it is evening, because the wheel-
barrow and the basket are loaded."

Should be Regular. — When children have begun
regular lessons (that is, as soon as they are
six), this sort of study of pictures should not

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 309

be left to chance, but they should take one artist
after another, term by term, and study quietly some
half-dozen reproductions of his work in the course
of a term.

The little memory outlines I have quoted show
that something definite remains with a child after
his studies ; but this is the least of the gains. We
cannot measure the influence that one or another
artist has upon the child's sense of beauty, upon his
power of seeing, as in a picture, the common sights
of life ; he is enriched more than we know in having
really looked at even a single picture. It is a
mistake to think that colour is quite necessary to
children in their art studies. They find colour in
many places, and are content, for the time, with form
and feeling in their pictures. By the way, for school-
room decorations, I know of nothing better than the
Fitzroy Pictures,1 especially those of the Four Seasons,
where you get beauty, both of line and colour, and
poetic feeling. I should like, too, to quote Ruskin's
counsel that English children should be brought up
on Jean Richter's picture-books for children, the
Unser Vater, Sontag^ and the rest.

I subjoin notes of a lesson on a Picture-talk 2 given
to children of eight and nine, to show how this sort of
lesson may be given.

PICTURE-TALK
"Objects

"i. To continue the series of Landseer's pictures
the children are taking in school.

" 2. To increase their interest in Landseer's works.

1 See Appendix A. 2 By a student of the House of Education.

310 HOME EDUCATION

"3. To show the importance of his acquaintance
with animals.

" 4. To help them to read a picture truly.

" 5. To increase their powers of attention and
observation.

" Step I. — Ask the children if they remember what
their last picture-talk was about, and what artist was
famous for animal-painting. Tell them Landseer was
acquainted with animals when he was quite young:
he had dogs for pets, and because he loved them he
studied them and their habits — so was able to paint
them.

" Step II. — Give them the picture ' Alexander and
Diogenes' to look at, and ask them to find out all
they can about it themselves, and to think what idea
the artist had in his mind, and what idea or ideas he
meant his picture to convey to us.

" Step III. — After three or four minutes, take the
picture away and see what the children have noticed.
Then ask them what the different dogs suggest to
them : the strength of the mastiff representing
Alexander; the dignity and stateliness of the blood-
hounds in his rear ; the look of the wise counsellor
on the face of the setter ; the rather contemptuous
look of the rough-haired terrier in the tub. Ask
the children if they have noticed anything in the
picture which shows the time of day: for example,
the tools thrown down by the side of the workman's
basket suggesting the mid-day meal ; and the bright
sunshine on the dogs who cast a shadow on the tub
shows it must be somewhere about noon.

" Step IV. — Let them read the title, and tell any
facts they know about Alexander and Diogenes ; then
tell them Alexander was a great conqueror who lived

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 31!

B.C. 356-323, famous for the battles he won against
Persia, India, and along the coast of the Mediterranean.
He was very proud, strong, and boastful. Diogenes
was a cynic philosopher. Explain cynic, illustrating
by the legend of Alexander and Diogenes ; and from
it find out which dog represents Alexander and which
Diogenes.

" Step V. — Let the children draw the chief lines of
the picture, in five minutes, with pencil and paper."

Original Illustrations. — I have spoken, from time
to time, of original illustrations drawn by the children.
It may be of use to subjoin notes of a lesson l
showing the sort of occasional help a teacher may
give in this kind of work ; but in a general way it is
best to leave children to themselves.

" Objects

"I. To help the children to make clear mental
pictures from description, and to reproduce the same
in painting.

" 2. To increase their power of imagination.

" 3. To help them in their ideas of form and colour.

" 4. To increase their interest in the story of Beowulf
by letting them illustrate a scene from the book they
are reading.

" 5. To bring out their idea of an unknown creature
(Grendel).

" Steps

" Step I. — To draw from the children what they

know of the poem ' Beowulf,3 and of the hero himself.

" Step II. — To tell them any points they may miss

1 By a student of the House of Education.

312 HOME EDUCATION

in the story, as far as they have read (i.e. to the death
of Grendel).

" Step III. — To read the description of the dress at
that time, and the account of Grendel's death (includ-
ing three possible pictures).

" Step IV. — To draw from the children what mental
pictures they have made — and to re-read the passage.

"Step V. — To let them produce their mental pic-
ture with brush and paint.

" Step VI. — To show them George Harrow's
'original illustration' of Beowulf in Heroes of
Chivalry and Romance?

Drawing Lessons. — But 'for their actual draw-
ing lessons/ says the reader, ' I suppose you use
" blobs " ? ' — ' blobs,' i.e. splashes of paint made with
the flat of the brush, which take an oval form. I think
blobs have one use — they give a certain freedom in
using colour. Otherwise ' blobs ' seem to me a sort
of apparatus of art which a child acquires with a good
deal of labour, and with which, by proper combinations
into flowers, and so on, he can produce effects beyond
his legitimate power as an artist, while all the time he
can do this without a particle of the feeling for the
natural object which is the very soul of art. The
power of effective creation by a sort of clever trick
maims those delicate feelers of a child's nature by
which he apprehends art.

" Let the eye " (says Ruskin) (< but rest on a rough
piece of branch of curious form during a conversa-
tion with a friend, rest, however unconsciously, and
though the conversation be forgotten, though every
circumstance connected with it be as utterly lost to
the memory as though it had not been, yet the eye
will, through the whole life after, take a certain

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 313

pleasure in such boughs which it had not before,
a pleasure so slight, a trace of feeling so delicate, as
to leave us utterly unconscious of its peculiar power,
but undestroyable by any reasoning, a part thence-
forward of our constitution."

This is what we wish to do for children in teaching
them to draw — to cause the eye to rest, not uncon-
sciously, but consciously, on some object of beauty
which will leave in their minds an image of delight
for all their lives to come. Children of six and seven
draw budding twigs of oak and ash, beech and larch,
with such tender fidelity to colour, tone, and gesture,
that the crude little drawings are in themselves things
of beauty.

Children have 'Art ' in them. — With art, as with
so many other things in a child, we must believe that
it is there, or we shall never find it. Once again, here
is a delicate Ariel whom it is our part to deliver from
his bonds. Therefore we set twig or growing flower
before a child and let him deal with it as he chooses.
He will find his own way to form and colour, and our
help may very well be limited at first to such
technical matters as the mixing of colours and the
like. In order that we may not impede the child's
freedom or hinder the deliverance of the art that is
in him, we must be careful not to offer any aids in
the way of guiding lines, points, and such other
crutches ; and, also, he should work in the easiest
medium, that is, with paint brush or with charcoal, and
not with a black-lead pencil. Boxes of cheap colours
are to be avoided. Children are worthy of the best, and
some half-dozen tubes of really good colours will last
a long time, and will satisfy the eye of the little artists.

Clay-modelling. — While speaking of the art train-

HOME EDUCATION

ing of children, it may be as well to give a word to
clay-modelling. Neat little birds'-nests, baskets 'of
eggs, etc., are of no use in the way of art development,
and soon cease to be amusing. The chief thing the
teacher has to do is to show the child how to prepare
his clay so as to expel air-bubbles, and to give him
the idea of making a little platform for his work, so
that it may from the first have an artistic effect.
Then put before him an apple, a banana, a Brazil
nut, or the like ; let him, not take a lump of clay
and squeeze it into shape, but build up the shape he
desires morsel by morsel. His own artistic perception
seizes on the dint in the apple, the crease in the child's
shoe, the little notes of expression in the objects
which break uniformity and make for art.

The Piano and Singing. — I must close, with the
disappointing sense that subjects of importance in
the child's education have been left out of count, and
that no one matter has been adequately treated.

Certain subjects of peculiar educational value,
music, for instance, I have said nothing about, partly
for want of space, and partly because if the mother
have not Sir Joshua Reynolds's 'that!' in her, hints
from an outsider will not produce the art-feeling
which is the condition of success in this sort of
teaching. If possible, 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. I should like,
in connection with singing, to mention the admir-
able educational effects of the Tonic Sol-fa method.1

1 See Appendix A.

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION 315

Children learn by it in a magical way to produce sign
for sound and sound for sign, that is, they can not
only read music, but can write the notes for, or make
the proper hand signs for, the notes of a passage
sung to them. Ear and voice are simultaneously
and equally cultivated.

Mrs Curwen's Child Pianist^ method is worked out,
with minute care, upon the same lines ; that is, the
child's knowledge of the theory of music and his ear
training keep pace with his power of execution, and
seem to do away with the deadly dreariness of
' practising.'

Handicrafts and Drills. — It is not possible
to do more than mention two more important
subjects — the Handicrafts and Drills — which should
form a regular part of a child's daily life. For
physical training nothing is so good as Ling's Swedish
Drill, and a few of the early exercises are within the
reach of children under nine. Dancing, and the
various musical drills, lend themselves to grace of
movement, and give more pleasure, if less scientific
training, to the little people.

The Handicrafts best fitted for children under
nine seem to me to be chair-caning, carton-work,
basket-work, Smyrna rugs, Japanese curtains, carv-
ing in cork, samplers on coarse canvas showing a
variety of stitches, easy needlework, knitting (big
needles and wool), etc. The points to be borne in
mind in children's handicrafts are : (a) that they
should not be employed in making futilities such
as pea and stick work, paper mats, and the like ; (b)
that they should be taught slowly and carefully
what they are to do; (c) that slipshod work should

1 See Appendix A.

3l6 HOME EDUCATION

not be allowed ; (d) and that, therefore, the children's
work should be kept well within their compass.

May I hope, in concluding this short review of the
subjects proper for a child's intellectual education,
that enough has been said to show the necessity of
grave consideration 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 teaching for themselves ?

PART VI

THE WILL— THE CONSCIENCE— THE DIVINE
LIFE IN THE CHILD

I. — THE WILL

Government of Mansoul. — We have now to con-
sider a subject of unspeakable importance 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 govern-
ment of this kingdom of Mansoul is, like that of
some well-ordered states, carried on in three cham-
bers, each chamber with its own functions, exercised,
not by a multitude of counsellors, but by a single
minister.

Executive Power vested in the Will. — In the
outer of the three chambers sits the Will. Like
that Roman 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

317

318 HOME EDUCATION

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.

What is the Will?— I do not know what the
will is ; it would appear to be an ultimate fact,
not admitting of definition : but there are few sub-
jects on which those who have the education of
children in their hands make more injurious mistakes ;
and therefore it is worth while to consider, as we
may, what are the functions of the will, and what
are its limitations.

Persons may go through life without deliber-
ate act of Will. — In the first place, the will does not
necessarily come into play in any of the aspects in
which we have hitherto considered the child. lie
may reflect and imagine; be stirred by the desire of
knowledge, of power, of distinction ; may love and
esteem ; may form habits of attention, obedience,
diligence, 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 to whom they belong. Great
intellectual powers by 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

THE WILL— CONSCIENCE — DIVINE LIFE 319

more than an endless pouring forth of ideas connected
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.

Character the Result of Conduct regulated by
Will. — It is not necessary to say a word about the
dignity and force of character which a confirmed will
gives to its possessors. 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 graces, which have been wrecked for the
lack of a determining will.

Three Functions of the 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 will appears to be of purely
spiritual nature, yet it behaves like any member of
the body in this — that it becomes vigorous and
capable in proportion as it is duly nourished and fitly
employed.

A Limitation of the Will disregarded by
some Novelists. — 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 member

320 HOME EDUCATION

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, is not able 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.

Parents fall into this Metaphysical Blunder. —
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 strong will.' He will rule the sports
of the nursery, will monopolise 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 consequence, the child's will
is not to be broken, so all his vagaries must go un-
checked ; on the other, the decision is, that the child's
will must be broken at all hazards, and the poor little
being is subjected to a dreary round of punishment
and repression.

Wilfulness indicates want of Will Power.—
But, all the time, nobody perceives that it is the mere
want of will that is the matter with the child. He is

THE WILL — CONSCIENCE — DIVINE LIFE 32!

in a state of absolute 'wilfulness/ — the rather un-
fortunate word we use to describe the state in which
the will has no controlling power ; willessness, 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
possession, upon the employment of which every other
gift, be it beauty or genius, strength or skill, depends
for its value.

What is Wilfulness ? — What, then, is wilfulness, if
it be 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. Appetite, passion, there is no limit
to their power and their persistence 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 is only apparent ; the child is, in fact,
hurried along without resistance, because that oppos-
ing force which should give balance to his character
is undeveloped and untrained.

The Will has Superior and Inferior Func-
tions.— The will has its superior and its inferior,
what may be called its moral and its mechanical,

21

322 HOME EDUCATION

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.

The Will not a Moral Faculty. — 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.

A Disciplined Will necessary to Heroic Chris-
tian Character. — Once again, though a disciplined
will is not a necessary condition of the Christian life,
it is necessary to the development of the heroic
Christian character. A Gordon, a Havelock, a Flor-
ence Nightingale, a St 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 «#willing souls, and then they
will do what they can ; but their power of service is

THE WILL — CONSCIENCE — DIVINE LIFE 323

limited by their past. Not so the child of the Chris-
tian mother, whose highest desire is to train him for
the Christian life. When he wakes to the conscious-
ness 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.

The sole Practical Faculty of Man. — 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 your-
self do what you wish to do ? " says Guy, in the Heir
of Redclyffe, to poor Charlie Edmonston, who has
never been in the habit of making himself do
anything. There are those, no doubt, who have
riot even arrived at wishing, but most of us desire to
do well ; what we want to know is, how to make our-
selves 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-inten-
tioned and respectable ; it is in proportion as a man
has self-controlling, self-compelling 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.

How the Will operates. — 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 "

324 HOME EDUCATION

is to " move one thing to or from another," we need
not be surprised if great moral results are brought
about by what seem inadequate means ; and a little
bit of nursery experience will show better than much
talking what is possible to the will. A baby falls,
gets a bad bump, and cries piteously. The experi-
enced nurse does not " kiss the place to make it well,"
or show any pity for the child's trouble — that would
make matters worse ; the more she pities, the more
he sobs. 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 of which he is distinctly con-
scious. 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.

The Way of the Will — Incentives. — 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.

Diversion. — Again, some slight affront has called
up a flood of resentful feeling : So-and-so should not

THE WILL — CONSCIENCE— DIVINE LIFE 325

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 every temptation that besets the flesh and spirit.

Change of Thought. — 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 himself 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.

The Way of the Will should be taught to
Children. — It is something to know 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 ;

326 HOME EDUCATION

there is a power within you, 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.

Power of Will implies Power of Attention. —
But you perceive that, though the will is all-power-
ful within certain limits, these are but narrow limits
after all. Much must go 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 importance 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 make them think steadily
thoughts of their own choosing or of anyone 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 intiim the habit of attention.

Habit may Frustrate the Will. — 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 frustrator, of the
will. The unhappy drunkard does will with what
strength there is in him ; he turns away the eyes of

THE WILL — CONSCIENCE— DIVINE LIFE 327

his mind from beholding his snare ; he plies himself
assiduously 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, pro-
crastinating, in some way tiresome, habit, which is in
almost daily struggle with the rectified will ? But
T 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 unnecessary
to say a word more here of habit as an ally or a
hinderer of the will.

Reasonable Use of so effective an Instru-
ment.— And, once more, only the man of cultivated
reason is capable of being ruled by a well-directed will.
If his understanding 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 movement 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.

How to Strengthen the Will. — One other limi-
tation 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

3<88 HOME EDUCATION

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
license when he can. That is the secret of the mis-
carrying 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 greatest effort, the highest accom-
plishment of human life — the making, 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.

Habit of Self-management. — 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 things he should
not think of; — that, in fact, he can be such a brave,
strong little fellow, he can make himself think of what
he likes; and let him try little experiments — that
if he once get his thoughts 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 he is a man. Not all this at once, of course;

THE WILL— CONSCIENCE —DIVINE LIFE 329

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 him-
self, and it is astonishing how much self-compelling
power quite a young child will exhibit. " Restrain
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.

Education of the Will more important than
that of the Intellect. — 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 propositions, will never of themselves lead to the
uniform habit of right action. It is by doing, that we
learn to do ; by overcoming, that we learn to over-
come ; 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."

II. — THE CONSCIENCE

Conscience is Judge and Lawgiver. — 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 willing we
are enabled to do ; but there is a higher power behind,

33° HOME EDUCATION

whose mandate the will does no more than express.
Conscience sits supreme in the inner chamber. Con-
science is the lawgiver, and utters the c 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 art the man '
of conscience, there is no appeal.

' I am, I ought, I can, I will.'—' I am, I ought,
I can, I will ' — these are the steps of that ladder of
St Augustine, whereby we

" rise on stepping-stones
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. * / wiir — 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 con-
stituted 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 possibilities of
ruin and loss which lie about every human life that
I am pressing upon parents 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 wilfulncss, no pains to fortify
them with the habits of a good life.

THE WILL — CONSCIENCE — DIVINE LIFE 331

Inertness of Parents not supplemented by
Divine Grace. — 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
power we choose to leave unused 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, for which the child
has to thank his parents, remain with him through
life, however much else he may have to thank God for ;
and a feeble will, bad habits, an uninstructed con-
science, stick by many a Christian man through his life,
because his parents failed in their duty to him, and
he has not had force enough in himself to supply
their omission.

Conscience not an Infallible Guide. — In this
matter of conscience, for instance, the laissez-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 fully-informed 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 progress 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 everyday experience of
the wrong-headed things men do from conscientious
motives. The vagaries of the uninstructed conscience

332 HOME EDUCATION

are so familiar as to have given rise to popular pro-
verbs : ' Honour among thieves/ ' To strain out the gnat
and swallow the 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.

But a real Power. — 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 neglecting 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 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 acknow-
ledged 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."

That Spiritual Sense whereby we know
Good and Evil. — 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 thus much is evident — that conscience
is as essential a part of human nature as are the

THE WILL— CONSCIENCE — DIVINE LIFE 333

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 reprov-
ing 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
responsibility 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 steer-
ing of others. The wonder that Almighty God can
endure so far to leave the very making of an immortal
b^ing in the hands of human parents is only matched
by the wonder that human parents can accept this
divine trust with hardly a thought of its significance.

A Child's Conscience an Undeveloped Capa-
bility rather than a Supreme Authority. — Look-
ing, 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 ? For though the ill-taught

334 HOME EDUCATION

conscience may make fatal blunders, and a man may
carry slaughter amongst the faithful because his con-
science 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 qualities 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 employers, and a source
of income to himself.

The Uninstructed Conscience. — As with that
of the will, so with the education of the conscience ;
it depends upon much that has gone before. Refine-
ment of conscience cannot coexist 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 hog's lard and
beef fat had been used to grease the cartridges dealt
out to the Sepoys. Those scruples which are beyond
the range of our ideas we call superstitions and
prejudices, and are unwilling to look upon conduct
as conscientious, even when prompted by the unin-
structed conscience, unless in so far as it is reasonable
and right in itself.

The Processes implied in a ' Conscientious '
Decision. — Therefore, it is plain that before conscience
is in a position to pronounce its verdict on the facts of
a given case, the cultivated reason must review the
pros and cons ; the practised judgment must balance
these, deciding which have the greater weight. At-
tention must bring all the powers of the mind to bear

THE WILL— CONSCIENCE— DIVINE LIFE 335

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 conscience, 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 intelli-
gence; the judge is always sitting, the counsel always
on the spot.

The Instructed Conscience nearly always
right. — 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 alert, 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 anyrate nearly always right.
It is not generally mature until the man is mature ;
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.

The Good Conscience of a Child. — 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 will ; for it is right.' And once able to

336 HOME EDUCATION

give either of these answers to the solicitations that
assail him, the child is able to live ; for the rest, the
development, and what may be called the adjustment,
of conscience will keep pace with his intellectual growth.
But allowing that a great deal of various discipline
must go to secure that final efflorescence of a good
conscience, what is to be done by way of training the
conscience itself, quickening the spiritual taste so that
the least soup^on of evil is detected and rejected ?

Children play with Moral Questions.— There
is no part of education more nice and delicate than
this, nor any in which grown-up people are more apt
to blunder. Everyone knows how tiresome it is to
discuss any nice moral question with children ; how
they quibble, suggest a hundred ingenious explana-
tions or evasions, fail to be shocked or to admire in
the right place — in fact, play with the whole ques-
tion ; or, what is more tiresome still, are severe and
righteous overmuch, and 'deal damnation round'
with much 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. Discussions 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.

The Bible the Chief Source of Moral Ideas.—
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 WILL — CONSCIENCE — DIVINE LIFE 337

the Bible, which rarely offers comment or expla-
nation. 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
quarter of an hour be one of sweet leisure and sober
gladness, the child's whole interest being allowed to
go to the story without distracting moral considera-
tions ; 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.

Tales fix attention upon Conduct. — The Bible
(the fitting parts of it, that is) first and supreme ; 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 conse-
quences, but by degrees his conscience acquires dis-
criminating 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 ; 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 conveyed to the

22

338 HOME EDUCATION

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."

Ignorance of a Child's Conscience. — 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 ; nothing 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 the childish conscience,
a degree of ignorance puzzling to grown-up people
when they chance to discover it, which is not often,
for the children, notwithstanding their endless chatter
and their friendly, loving ways, live very much to them-
selves. They commit serious offences against truth,
modesty, love, and do not know that they have done
wrong, while some absurd featherweight of transgres-
sion 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 unpardonable 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 children

THE WILL — CONSCIENCE — DIVINE LIFE 339

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
consciences/ as if conscience were any more than a
spiritual organ waiting for direction !

Instructing the Conscience — Kindness. — 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 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 fire 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 kindness in many
aspects, end with the law: Be kind, or, "Be kindly
affectioned one to another." Let them know that

340 HOME EDUCATION

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 breaking. 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.

The Conscience made effective by Discipline.
— Be courteous, be candid, be grateful, be considerate,
be true ; there are aspects of duty enough to occupy
the attention of mother and child for every day of
the child-life; and all the time, the idea of duty is
being formed, and conscience 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
divinely implanted conscience, but that same con-
science made effective by discipline. It is even so ;
in every department of life, physical or spiritual,
human effort appears to be the condition of the
Divine energising ; there must be a stretching forth
of the withered arm before it receives strength ; and
we have every reason to believe that the instructed

THE WILL — CONSCIENCE — DIVINE LIFE 34!

conscience, being faithfully followed, is divinely
illuminated.

III. — THE DIVINE LIFE IN THE CHILD

" The very Pulse of the Machine." — It is evident
we have not yet reached

" The very pulse of the machine."

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 themselves, a victory over the world.
It is a Priest that our spirits cry out 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."1

Parents have some Power to Enthrone the
King. — 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 c< 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 infer-
ence, and set in order such knowledge as we have ;
for the keys even of this innermost chamber are

1 Maurice, Sermons on Sacrifice.

342 HOME EDUCATION

placed in the hands of parents, and it is a great deal
in their power to enthrone the King, to induct the
Priest, that every human spirit cries for.

The Functions and Life of the Soul. — 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, imagina-
tion, 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 func-
tions, 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 God 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,"1 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 func-
tions, 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,
i Christmas Day, and other Sermons.

THE WILL — CONSCIENCE— DIVINE LIFE 343

is ineffective till it be nourished with its proper food,
exercised in its proper functions, so of the soul ;
and its chamber is dull, with cobwebbed doors and
clouded windows, until it awake to its proper life ;
not quite empty, though, for there is the nascent
soul ; and the awakening into life takes place, some-
times with the sudden shock, the gracious miracle,
which we call conversion ; sometimes, 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.

What is the Life of the Soul?— This life of the
soul, what is it? Communicated life, as when one
lights a torch at the fire ? Perhaps ; but it is some-
thing 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 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 ! "

The Parent must present the Idea of God to
the Soul of the Child. — 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 promote 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

344 HOME EDUCATION

child. To do so is his bounden duty and service. If
he neglect or fail in this, I am not sure how much it
matters 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 throughout his universe, Almighty God
works by apparently inadequate means. Who would
say that a bee can produce apple trees? Yet a bee
flies from an apple tree laden with 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.

Must not make Blundering Efforts. — 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 capabilities
and functions of the child, partly, because it is in-
structive to see how the mysteries of the religious

THE WILL — CONSCIENCE— DIVINE LIFE 345

life appear when it is looked at from without its own
sphere; partly, because I wish to rise by unbroken
steps to the supreme function of the parent in the
education of his child. For here the similitude of the
bee and the apple tree fails. The parent must not
make blundering, 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, humility, gentleness, love,
and sound judgment, if he would present his child
to God, and the thought of God to the soul of his
child.

God presented to Children as an Exactor and
a Punisher. — " 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 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 unwilling 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 Father 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"?

346 HOME EDUCATION

Parents must select Inspiring Ideas. — These
are but two of many deterrent thoughts of God
commonly presented to the tender soul ; and the
mother, who realises 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 for 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 children should receive a few vital ideas
that their souls may grow upon than a great deal of
indefinite teaching.

We must Teach only what we Know. — 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, 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

THE WILL — CONSCIENCE — DIVINE LIFE 347

poured upon 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.

Fitting and Vital Ideas. — 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.

And there are some few ideas which are as the
daily bread of the soul, without which life and growth
are impossible. 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 well-instructed he may be in theology.

The Knowledge of God distinct from Moral-
ity.— 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 riches ; these limitations shut out so much of the
ordinary teaching about divine things that the
question becomes rather, What shall we teach ? than,
How shall we choose ?

The Times and the Manner of Religious
Instruction. — The next considerations that will press
upon the mother are of the times, and the manner,

348 HOME EDUCATION

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 be 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 every-
thing 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. Few words need be said, no exhortation at
all ; just the flash of conviction from the soul of the
mother to the soul of the child. Is 'Our Father'
the thought thus laid upon the child's soul ? There
will be, perhaps, no more than a sympathetic meeting
of eyes hereafter, between mother and child, over a
thousand showings 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 opportunities 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.
The Reading of the Bible. — A word about the

THE WILL — CONSCIENCE — DIVINE LIFE 349

reading of the Bible. I think we make a mistake
in burying the text under our endless comments
and applications. Also, I doubt if the picking out
of individual verses, and grinding these into the
child until they cease to have any meaning for him,
is anything but a hindrance to the spiritual life.
The Word is full of vital force, capable of applying
itself. A seed, light as thistledown, 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.

Father and Giver. — "Our Father, who is in

350 HOME EDUCATION

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
to 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 one little 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 and benign — not One who exacts service at
the sword's point, as it were, but One whom His
children run to obey.

The Essence of Christianity is Loyalty to a
Person. — 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, however 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

THE WILL — CONSCIENCE — DIVINE LIFE 351

all our orthodox beliefs as things not knowable. Per-
haps 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 formu-
laries 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 proclamation of boundless 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 could command such measure of
loyalty, what shall we say of " the Chief amongst ten
thousand, the altogether lovely " ?

Jesus, our Saviour. Here is a thought to be brought
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 ;
but 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 a matter
of question when the child should first learn the
' Story of the Cross.' One thinks it would be very
delightful 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

3S2 HOME EDUCATION

Messiah ; and then, when their minds are full of the
expectation of the Jews, to bring before them the
mystery of the Birth in Bethlehem, the humiliation
of the Cross. But perhaps no gain in freshness of
presentation would make up to the children for not
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, —

' "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 until 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."

Appendices

APPENDIX A

APPENDED is a list of books, etc., spoken of in various
connections in this volume, with particulars as to publisher
or agent, and price; but it must be borne in mind that
books of the kind are constantly going out of print, and
that the mention of these in the text is designed rather to
indicate the sort of books it is desirable to use than to point
out particular works. Indeed, to regard this as a stereotyped
list of school-books for young children would be unfair both
to authors and publishers, and also to the purchaser; for
there are, no doubt, many equally good books in the market
at the present time, and new works on similar lines are
constantly issuing from the press.

Page.

™,

Author.

Publisher or
Agent.

Price.

51

Wild Flowers

Ann Pratt.

S.P.C.K.

8s.

55

Nature Note-books

To be had at

is. and

26 Victoria

is. 6d.

St., S.W.

each.

58

The Natural History of

Gilbert White.

Cassell.

6s.

Selborne.

64

The Water Babies

Chas. Kingsley.

Macmillan.

2S.

M

Madam How and Lady

M

»

2s. 6d.

Why.

)5

Inmates of My House

Mrs Brightwen.

Fisher Un-

2S.

and Gardun.

win.

23

354

HOME EDUCATION

Page.

Title.

Author.

Publisher or
Agent.

Price.

64

Wild Nature Won by

Mrs Brightwen.

Fisher Un-

2S.

Kindness.

win.

"

Eyes and No Eyes Series
(parts i.-vi.).

A. Buckley
(Mrs Fisher).

Cassell.

4d. and
6d. each.

»

Life and Her Children .

n

Stanford.

6s.

The Fairy - land of

M

j >

Science.

(J

The School of the

W. Long.

Ginn & Co.

7s. 6d.

Woods.

(J

The Little Brother of

»

• j

the Bear.

..

Wild Nature's Ways .

R. Kearton.

Cassell.

IDS. 6d.

n

Living Animals of the

...

Hutchinson.

IDS. 6d.

World, 2 vols.

net. each.

,,

The Lives of the Hunted

Seton Thomp-

Nutt.

6s. net.

son.

The Biography of a

Hodder &

}j

Grizzly.

Stoughton.

88

Scouting

Baden-Powell

Glaisher.

is. net.

9i

British Birds in their

Rev. C. A.

S.P.C.K.

5s.

Haunts.

Johns.

151

Alice in Wonderland .

Lewis Carroll.

Macmillan.

From 2s.

152

The Swiss Family

Routledge.

2S.

Robinson.

'52

Robinson Crusoe .

D. Defoe.

»

From 2s.

182

Childhood, Boyhood,

Count Tolstoi.

Dent.

35. 6d.

and Youth.

184

The Story of a Child .

Margt. Deland.

Longmans.

5s.

194

Helen Keller

An Autobio-

Hodder &

75. 6d.

graphy.

Stoughton.

261 1

Special Reports on Edu-
cational Subjects, vol.

...

Eyre & Spot-
tiswoode.

2S. 6d.

35. 2d.

*»*j i

ii., vol. viii.

205

Parables from Nature .

Mrs Gatty.

Bell.

3s.

Prose Poems

Mrs Barbauld.

Glaisher.

6d. and

2S.

222

A Delightful Reading-

Sar. M. Mason.

School Depot

is. 6d.

Box.

South Nor-

wood.

f|

Recitation : A Hand-

A. Burrell.

Griffith &

3s. 6d.

book for Teachers.

Kurran.

232

The World at Home .

...

Nelson.

M

APPENDICES

355

Page.

Title.

Author.

Publisher or
Agent.

Price.

232

The Heroes of Asgard .

A. & E. Keary.

Macmillan.

2S. 6d.

,,

Tanglewood Tales

N. Hawthorne.

Blackwood.

is. 2d.

232

The Pilgrim's Progress .

Bunyan.

Glaisher.

From is.

HI}

Plutarch's Lives .

Nat. Library.

Cassell.

3d. each.

236

A New Handwriting for

Mrs Bridges.

Glaisher.

2S. 8d.

Teachers.

239

Dr Roth's Desk .

...

Educational

From £2.

Supply, 42a

Holborn

Viaduct,

London.

252

The Bible for the Young

Dr Paterson

Sampson

is. net.

Smyth.

Low.

a vol.

§J

The Holy Gospels with

...

S.P.C.K.

£2, 2S.

Illustrations from the

Old Masters.

sj

The Illustrated New

...

R.T.S.

is. net.

Testament.

t f

Penny Illustrated Gos-

Walters, 15

id. each.

pels.

Strand,

London.

253

Bypaths of Bible Know-

Professor Sayce

R.T.S.

2s. each.

ledge, vols. ii., iii., viii.,

and others.

xvii.

26l

The ABC Arithmetic,

Sonnenschein

is. each.

266 \
27I/

Teachers', partsi. and ii.
The Sciences

and Nesbitt.
E. S. Holden.

Ginn & Co.

2s. 6d.

266

Scientific Dialogues

Joyce.

Bell, Bohn's

5s.

Library.

268

The Parents' Review .

26 Victoria

6d.

St., London

monthly.

S.W.

273

The Voyages of Captain
Cook.

...

/ Routledge.
\ Newnes.

2S. \

3s. 6d. /

275

The Tropical World

Dr Hartwig.

Longmans.

75. net.

,,

The Polar World .

,,

,,

i »

rt

Unbeaten Tracks in

Mrs Bishop.

Murray.

2S. 6d.

277

Japan.
The London Geographi-

C. M. Mason.

Stanford.*

net.
is. to

cal Readers, 5 vols.

2s. 6d. ea.

282

Ecclesiastical History of

Venerable

Dent.

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APPENDICES 357

APPENDIX B

Questions for the Use of Students^

PART I

SOME PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS

T. Show that children are a public trust. What follows?

2. What questions does Pestalozzi put to mothers?

3. What is Mr Herbert Spencer's argument for the study
of education ?

4. How do parents usually proceed ?

5. What is the strenuous part of a parent's work ?

I. A METHOD OF EDUCATION

1. Contrast four or five older theories with later, and
perhaps sounder notions.

2. Point out the opposite characters of a system and a
method.

3. Why is a system tempting to parents?

II. THE CHILD'S ESTATE

1. What do the Gospel sayings about children indicate?

2. What are the three commandments of the Gospel code
of education ?

1 The students in question are persons preparing to become
"Qualified Members" of the Parents' National Educational -Union.
Particulars may be had at the office, 28 Victoria Street, London, S.W.

358 HOME EDUCATION

III. OFFENDING THE CHILDREN

1. Distinguish between 'offending' and 'despising
children.

2. What is to be said of parents whose children have * no
sense of ought '1

3. Trace the steps by which a mother's 'no' comes to be
disregarded.

4. Why must parents themselves be law-compelled ?

5. Show that parents may offend their children by dis-
regarding the laws of health.

6. By disregarding the laws of the intellectual life.

7. Of the moral life.

IV. DESPISING THE CHILDREN

1. Show that children may be despised in the choice of a
nurse.

2. By taking their faults too lightly.

V. HINDERING THE CHILDREN

i. In what ways may parents hinder their children's
access to God ?

VI. CONDITIONS OF HEALTHY BRAIN ACTIVITY

1. What is the first condition of successful education ?

2. Show that daily efforts, intellectual, moral, and physical,
are necessary for children.

3. On what principle is the blood-supply regulated ?

4. Show the importance of rest after meals.

5. What is the best time for lessons ? Why ?

6. On what principle should a time-table be arranged ?

7. Show that brain activity is affected by nourishment.

APPENDICES 359

8. Under what conditions does food increase the vital
quality of the blood?

9. Why must food be varied ?

10. Show that children are spendthrifts of vitality.
IT. Give a few useful hints concerning meals.

1 2. Why should there be talk at meals ?

13. Give some rules to secure variety.

14. Show fully that air is as important as food.

15. What have you to say of the children's daily
walk?

1 6. What is meant by the oxygenation of the blood?

17. Show that oxygen has its limitations.

1 8. What are the dangers of unchanged air in spacious
rooms ?

19. 'I feed Alice on beef-tea.' Why?

20. What of Alice's mind ?

21. What are the joys of Wordsworth's ' Lucy ' ?

22. Show the danger of stuffy rooms.

23. What principle must regulate ventilation ?

24. Why is night air wholesome ?

25. Upon what physical facts does the need of sunshine
depend ?

26. Show that the skin does much scavenger's work.

27. Why do persons die of external scalds or burns ?

28. Why is a daily bath necessary?

29. Give some instructions for clothing children.

VII. 'THE REIGN OF LAW' IN EDUCATION

1. What should be the method of all education ?

2. Why are common sense and good intentions not
sufficient ?

3. How may we meet the danger to religion arising from
the blameless lives of some non-religious persons ?

4. Account for the superior morality of such non-
believers.

360 HOME EDUCATION

5. Show that all observance of law brings its reward.

6. Show that parents should not lay up crucial difficulties
for their children.

7. Why should parents study mental and moral science?

PART II

OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE FOR THE CHILDREN
I. A GROWING TIME

1. Why is out-of-door life for young children especially
important in these days?

2. What are the gains of meals out of doors ?

3. What might be accomplished by dwellers in towns
and suburbs ?

4. What five or six points should be remembered in a
day in the open ?

5. What of story-books or tale-telling on such occasions?

6. What of 'the baby'?

II. 'SIGHT-SEEING'

1. Give an example of 'sight-seeing.'

2. What five or six educational uses may be made of
' sight-seeing ' ?

3. Show the value of discriminating observation.

III. 'PICTURE PAINTING'

1. What is meant by 'picture painting'?

2. Give an example.

3. Show the value of this exercise.

APPENDICES 361

4. What caution must be borne in mind ?

5. What invaluable habit should this play tend to form?

6. What is the mother's part in the play?

7. What is the after-reward for taking pains in the act of
seeing ?

IV. FLOWERS AND TREES

1. With what field crops may children become acquainted
in your neighbourhood ?

2. What should a child know about any wild flower of
his neighbourhood ?

3. How should children take up the study of trees ?

4. Show how the seasons should be followed in this study.

5. What does Leigh Hunt say about flowers?

6. What use should be made of calendars and note-
books ?

7. What of the child who says, ' I can't stop thinking ' ?

V. ' LIVING CREATURES '

1. What part of the pleasure in living creatures may be
secured for town dwellers ?

2. Of what ' creatures ' may children observe the habits ?

3. What points about an insect should children observe ?

4. How did White of Selborne and Audubon get their
bent towards nature ?

5. What can town children do in getting a knowledge of
' living creatures ' ?

6. Show that nature-knowledge is the most important
knowledge for young children.

7. What intellectual powers are trained in the child
naturalist ?

8. Show that nature-work is especially valuable for girls.

362 HOME EDUCATION

VI. FIELD LORE AND NATURALISTS' BOOKS

1. Should young children be taught the elements of
natural science ?

2. Show the value of rough classifications.

3. Contrast with classifications learnt from books.

4. What are the uses of Naturalists' books ?

5. Name a few.

6. Why should mothers and teachers have some knowledge
of nature?

VII. THE CHILD GETS KNOWLEDGE BY MEANS OF
HIS SENSES

1. Show, from the behaviour of a baby, that a child gets
knowledge by means of his senses.

2. Characterise Nature's teaching.

3. Wherein lies the danger of over-pressure?

4. Why are object-lessons inefficient?

5. Why does a child learn most from things!

6. Give some examples showing that a sense of beauty
comes from early contact with nature.

7. What docs Dickens say on the subject of a child's
observing powers ?

VIII. THE CHILD SHOULD BE MADE FAMILIAR WITH
NATURAL OBJECTS

1. Compare town and country as to things worth
observing.

2. How does the fact that every natural object is a
member of a series affect education ?

3. ' Power will pass more and more into the hands of
scientific men ' — how should this influence parents and
teachers ?

4. In what ways does intimacy with nature make for
personal well-being ?

APPENDICES 363

IX. OUT-OF-DOOR GEOGRAPHY

1. Show that small things may suggest great in pictorial
geography.

2. What should children be taught to observe about the
position of the sun ?

3. What, of clouds, rain, snow, and hail ?

4. Show how, by pacing, a child should get the idea of
distance.

5. What is the first step towards a knowledge of
direction ?

6. What practice should a child have in finding direction?

7. What compass-drill would you give him ?

8. How should a child get the notion of boundaries ?

9. When should he begin to make 'plans'?

10. What geographical ideas should he get from his own
neighbourhood ?

X. THE CHILD AND MOTHER NATURE

1. Why must the mother refrain from much talk?

2. How is a new acquaintance begun ?

3. What are the two things permissible to the mother?

XI. OUT-OF-DOOR GAMES, ETC.

1. Why should not the French lesson be omitted?

2. Why should children indulge in cries and shouts out
of doors ?

3. Why should rondes be preserved ?

4. What are the best ways of using skipping-rope and
shuttlecock ?

5. What is to be said for climbing?

6. What, for woollen garments ?

364 HOME EDUCATION

XII. WALKS IN BAD WEATHER

1. Why are winter walks as necessary as summer walks?

2. What pleasures are connected with frost and snow?

3. How may children be kept alert on dull days ?

4. How does winter lend itself to observation ?

5. Why are wet weather tramps wholesome and necessary ?

6. What sort of garments are necessary? Why?

7. What precautions should be borne in mind ?

XIII. 'RED INDIAN' LIFE

1. What do you understand by 'scouting'? Show the
value of scouting.

2. Describe a ' bird-stalking ' expedition.

3. In what ways should these things afford training ?

XIV. THE CHILDREN REQUIRE COUNTRY AIR

1. How may the essential proportion of oxygen be
diminished ?

2. How is excess of carbonic acid gas produced ?

3. Why do children, especially, need unvitiated, unim-
poverished air ?

4. Show that children require solar light.

5. Describe a physical ideal for a child, and show the use
of having such an ideal.

PART III

' HABIT is TEN NATURES '
I. EDUCATION BASED UPON NATURAL LAW

1. Show that a healthy brain and outdoor life are con-
ditions of education.

2. Show that habit is the instrument by which parents work.

APPENDICES 365

II. THE CHILDREN HAVE NO SELF-COMPELLING POWER

1. Show that education is commonly a cul-de-sac.

2. Name three great educational forces.

3. Why are not these forces sufficient?

4. Why are children incapable of steady effort ?

5. Why should young children be, to some extent, saved
the effort of decision ?

III. WHAT is 'NATURE'?

1. What may we state of the child as a human being?

2. Show that all persons are born with the same primary
desires.

3. And affections.

4. Name affections common to us all.

5. What does the most elemental notion of human
nature include ?

6. What have you to say of the strength of nature plus
heredity ?

7. What manner of differences may physical conditions
bring about ?

8. Of what is human nature the sum ?

9. Why must not the child be left to his human nature?

10. What is the problem before the educator?

n. Show that divine grace works on the lines of human
effort.

12. Why must not the trust of parents be supine ?

IV. HABIT MAY SUPPLANT 'NATURE'

1. Show that habit runs on the lines of nature.

2. How must habit work to be a lever ?

3. Show that a mother forms her children's habits in-
voluntarily.

366 HOME EDUCATION

4. Illustrate the fact that habit may force nature into new
channels.

5. To what end must parents and teachers lay down the
lines of habit ?

V. THE LAYING DOWN OF LINES OF HABIT

1. Show that parents initiate their children's habits of
thought and feeling by their own behaviour.

2. Does education in habit interfere with free-will ?

3. Show how good it is that habit should rule our
thoughts.

4. Show that habit is powerful even when the will decides.

VI. THE PHYSIOLOGY OF HABIT

1. Illustrate the fact that growing tissues form themselves
to the modes of action required of them.

2. Show fully and exactly why children should learn
dancing, swimming, etc., at an early age.

3. To what fact is the strength of moral habits probably
due?

4. Show the danger of persistent trains of thought.

5. What does the incessant regeneration of brain tissue
imply to the educator ?

6. Show that to acquire artificial reflex action in certain
directions is a great part of education.

7. What are the aims of intellectual and moral
education ?

8. Show that character is affected by the acquired
modification of brain tissue.

9. Show the need for care with regard to outside in-
fluences.

APPENDICES 367

VII. THE FORMING OF A HABIT — ' SHUT THE DOOR

AFTER YOU '

1. What remains to be tried when neither time, reward,
nor punishment is effective in curing a bad habit ?

2. Show that habit is a delight in itself.

3. Show that misguided sympathy is a hindrance in the
formation of habits.

4. What are the qualities necessary in the mother who
would form habits in her children ?

5. What are the stages in the formation of a habit?

6. Which is the dangerous stage ?

VIII. INFANT HABITS

1. Show the necessity for cleanliness in the nursery.

2. How do cleanliness, order, etc.. educate a child?

3. Why is the training of a sensitive nose an important
part of education ?

4. Why should nurses know that the baby is ubiquitous ?

5. Show that personal cleanliness should be made an
early habit.

6. How may parents approach the subjects of modesty
and purity ?

7. Show how the habit of obedience and the sense of
honour are safeguards.

8. What manner of life is the best safeguard ?

9. Give some suggestions with regard to ' order ' in the
nursery.

10. Show how and why the child of two should put away
his playthings.

11. Distinguish between neatness and order.

12. What occasions are there for regularity with an infant?

13. Show that irregularity leads to self-indulgence.

368 HOME EDUCATION

IX. PHYSICAL EXERCISES

1. Show the importance of daily physical exercises.

2. What moral qualities appear in alert movements ?

3. Suggest a drill of good manners.

4. How would you train the ear and voice?

5. How may the habit of music be cultivated ?

6. Show that the mother who trains habits can let her
children alone.

PART IV

SOME HABITS OF MIND — SOME MORAL HABITS

1. What can a knowledge of the science of education
effect ?

2. Show that education in habit favours an easy life.

3. Show how the mother's labours are eased by the fact
that training in habits becomes a habit.

4. Instance some habits inspired with the home atmo-
sphere.

I. THE HABIT OF ATTENTION

1. Why is the habit of attention of supreme importance ?

2. Instance minds at the mercy of associations.

3. Give instances from literature of the habit of wandering
attention.

4. Where is the harm of wandering attention ?

5. How may the habit of attention be cultivated in the
infant ?

6. How would you cultivate attention to lessons ?

7. What principles should help the teacher to make
lessons attractive ?

8. Show the value of definite work in a given time.

9. On what principle must a time-table be drawn up?

APPENDICES 369

10. What is the natural reward of attention at lessons ?

11. What is to be said for and against emulation?

12. What is the risk in employing affection as a motive ?

13. Show that the attractiveness of knowledge is a suffi-
cient motive to the learner.

14. What is attention ?

15. How would you induce self-compelled attention?

1 6. What is the secret of over-pressure ?

1 7. How may parents be of use in the home-work of the
day-school boy ?

1 8. Describe a wholesome home-treatment for 'mooning.'

19. What have you to say of the discipline of con-
sequences ?

20. Show that rewards and punishments should be
relative^ rather than natural, consequences of conduct.

21. Distinguish between natural and educative conse-
quences.

II. THE HABITS OF APPLICATION, ETC.

1. How may rapid mental effort be secured ?

2. How may zeal be stimulated?

III. THE HABIT OF THINKING

1. Give the example of thinking cited.

2. What operations are included in ' thinking ' ?

IV. THE HABIT OF IMAGINING

1. What is the double danger of many books ministering
to the sense of the incongruous ?

2. Show that commonplace tales leave nothing to the
imagination.

3. In what way do tales of the imagination afford chil-
dren a second life ?

24

37O HOME EDUCATION

4. Show that we can have great conceptions only as we
have imagination.

5. Upon what does imagination grow ?

6. What lessons should feed imagination ?

7. Why?

8. Show the educative value of the right story-books.

9. How would you promote the habit of thinking ?

V. THE HABIT OF REMEMBERING

1. Distinguish between remembering and recollecting.

2. Describe what is here called a 'spurious' memory.

3. What results from the fact that memory is a record on
the brain substance ?

4. Made under what conditions ?

5. Show that recollection depends upon the law of
association of ideas.

6. What is the condition for recollecting a course of
lessons?

7. Given, what conditions, may we say there is no
limit to the recording power of the brain ?

8. Show that links of association are a condition of
recollection. Where are these to be discovered ?

VI. THE HABIT OF PERFECT EXECUTION

1. What national error hinders us from the effort to throw
perfection into all we do ?

2. Show the danger of the habit of turning out imperfect
work.

3. How may a child be taught to execute perfectly ?

VII. SOME MORAL HABITS — OBEDIENCE

1 . What is the whole duty of a child ?

2. What is the state opposed to obedience?

3. Show that a parent has no right to forego obedience.

APPENDICES 371

4. What is the true motive for obedience ?

5. Account for the fact that strictly brought up children
are often failures.

6. Why may parents and teachers expect obedience ?

7. How may children be brought up to 'do as they
choose ' ?

8. What manner of obedience is of lasting value to
the child?

9. How may children be trained towards liberty ?

VIII. TRUTHFULNESS, ETC.

1. What are the causes of lying ?

2. Show that all kinds of lying are vicious.

3. How is it that only one kind is visited on children ?

4. How would you train a child in accuracy of statement?

5. How would you deal with exaggeration ?

6. With ludicrous embellishments ?

7. Show that reverence, consideration, etc., claim special
attention in these days.

8. Is temper born in a child ?

9. Show that, not temper, but tendency is ' born.'

10. How must parents correct such tendency?

11. Show fully the efficacy of changing the child's
thoughts.

12. Distinguish between changing a child's thoughts and
conveying to him the thought you intend him to think.

PART V

LESSONS AS INSTRUMENTS OF EDUCATION
I. THE MATTER AND METHOD OF LESSONS

1. Discuss the statement, This is 'an age of pedagogy.'

2. Why must parents reflect on the subject-matter of
instruction ?

372 HOME EDUCATION

3. Show that home is the best growing ground for young
children.

4. Why must a mother have definite views ?

5. What are the three questions for the mother?

6. Show that children learn, to grow.

7. Show that any doctoring of the material of knowledge
is unnecessary for a healthy child.

8. What is an idea ?

9. Show that an idea feeds, grows, and produces.

10. What did Sir Walter Scott and George Stephenson
each do with an idea?

11. Show the value of dominant ideas.

12. Why must lessons furnish ideas?

13. What quality of knowledge should children get?

14. What is the evil of 'diluted knowledge' ?

15. Illustrate a child's power of getting knowledge
(Dr Arnold).

16. What is the harm of lesson-books with pretty pictures
and easy talk ?

17. What are the four tests which should be applied to
children's lessons ?

1 8. Give a rtsume of six points already considered.

II. THE KINDERGARTEN AS A PLACE OF EDUCATION

1. Show that the mother is the best Kindergartnerin.

2. How may the child get education out of his daily
nursery life ?

3. Show that the children's pursuit of real knowledge
may be hindered by the kindergarten.

4. Show that a just eye and a faithful hand may be
trained at home.

5. In what respects does the kindergarten give a hint
of the discipline proper for the nursery.

6. What temper should be cultivated in the nursery ?

APPENDICES 373

7. What general conclusion may we come to as to the
principles and practices of the kindergarten ?

III. FURTHER CONSIDERATION OF THE KINDERGARTEN

1. What anecdote of a child is quoted from Tolstoi's
Childhood, Boyhood, and Youth ?

2. Why are such tales as Miss Deland's The Story of a
Child valuable?

3. What do we owe to Froebel ?

4. What may we learn from the true Kindergartnerin ?

5. Comment upon, ' Persons do not grow in a garden.'

6. Show that we must leave opportunity for the work of
nature in education.

7. Give instances showing the intelligence of children.

8. Account for the pleasure children take in kindergarten
games.

9. In what ways do teachers mediate too much ?

10. Show the danger of personal magnetism in the teacher.
n. Show fully that the name 'kindergarten' implies

a false analogy.

12. What might be said concerning the Froebel 'mother-
games ' ?

13. Is the society of a large number of his equals in age
the best for a young child ?

14. Show the dangers of supplanting nature.

15. What would you say regarding the importance of
personal initiative ?

1 6. In what ways must parents and teachers sow
opportunities ?

17. Do 'only' children profit by the kindergarten?

1 8. In what ways should children be allowed some order-
ing of their lives ?

19. Give a few of the lessons we may learn from the
autobiography of Helen Keller.

HOME EDUCATION

20. What conclusions does Miss Sullivan, Helen Keller's
teacher, arrive at with regard to systems of education ?

21. Account for the success of the kindergarten in the
United States.

22. What changes does Mr Thistleton Mark observe?

23. Give some of the comments of Dr Stanley Hall.

IV. READING

1. Discuss the question of the age at which children
should learn to read.

2. How did Mrs Wesley teach her children to read ?

3. Give a few hints for teaching the alphabet.

4. How would you introduce a child to word-making?

5. Describe a lesson in word-making with long vowels,
etc.

6. How should the child's first reading lessons help him
to spell ?

7. Give the steps of a reading lesson on ' Twinkle,
twinkle, little star.'

8. Why is prose better in some ways than verse for early
lessons ?

9. Describe a second reading lesson on 'Twinkle,
twinkle, little star.'

10. Show that slow and steady progress tends to careful
enunciation.

11. Show how much a child might gain in a year's work
on these lines.

12. Contrast this steady progress with the casual way in
which children generally learn to read.

V. FIRST READING LESSON
(Two Mothers Confer]

APPENDICES 375

VI. READING BY SIGHT AND BY SOUND

1. Why is learning to read hard work?

2. What are the symbols children must learn?

3. What do we definitely propose in teaching a child
to read ?

4. Can the symbols he learns be interesting ?

5. Describe the stages of a lesson on 'I like little Pussy.'

6. How does Tommy learn to read sentences ?

7. Describe Tommy's first spelling lesson.

8. How would you deal with the fact that like combina-
tions have different sounds ?

9. Show that his reading lesson should afford moral train-
ing to a child.

VII. RECITATION
'THE CHILDREN'S ART'

1. What should we aim at in teaching children to recite i

2. How should we proceed ?

3. What should we avoid?

4. Why may we expect success ?

5. Distinguish between reciting and memorising.

6. Show that children have a natural capacity for
Memorising.

7. How would you teach them to memorise a poem?

VIII. READING FOR OLDER CHILDREN

1. To what two points must the teacher attend?

2. What is the most common and the monstrous defect
in the education of the day ?

3. How may we correct this defect ?

376 HOME EDUCATION

4. What points require attention when the child is reading
aloud ?

5. What must the teacher be careful to avoid ?

6. What is to be said for and against reading to children?

7. Should children be questioned about the meaning of
what they read ?

8. Why not?

9. Suggest a better test of their intelligence.

10. Why is the selection of a child's early lesson-books a
matter of great importance ?

11. What general rule should help in the choice of these?

12. How may the attention of children be secured during
a reading lesson ?

13. Give two or three hints with regard to careful
enunciation.

IX. THE ART OF NARRATION

1. Prove from your own observation that children narrate
by nature.

2. How should this power be used in their education ?

3. What points must be borne in mind with regard
to a child's narrations ?

4. Describe the method of a lesson.

X. WRITING

1 . How would you avoid the habit of careless work ?

2. What printing should a child do before he comes
to write ?

3. What stages should be followed in teaching writing ?

4. What is to be said about copperplate headlines ?

5. Why should children practise in text-hand?

6. What arguments are advanced in favour of a beautiful
handwriting ?

APPENDICES 377

7. What is to be said for a beautiful basis for characteristic
handwriting ?

8. Suggest a way of using A New Handwriting.

XL TRANSCRIPTION

1. Show the use of transcription before children write
dictation.

2. What should children transcribe ?

3. How should transcription help children to spell ?

4. WThy should text-hand and double-ruled lines be used?

5. Describe the proper position in writing.

6. How should children hold their pens ?

7. What are the points of a good desk ?

8. Describe a school-table for little children.

XII. SPELLING AND DICTATION

1. Show how dictation may be made a cause of bad
spelling.

2. What is the rationale of spelling ?

3. What are the steps of a dictation lesson as it should be ?

4. Show clearly what principle is involved.

5. What are the two causes of illiterate spelling?

XIII. COMPOSITION

1. Show that the exaction of original composition from
school-boys and school-girls is a futility.

2. And a moral injury to the children.

3. Illustrate the sort of teaching that should be regarded
as a public danger.

4. Upon what condition does composition 'come by
nature'?

378 HOME EDUCATION

XIV. BIBLE LESSONS

1. Illustrate the religious receptivity of children.

2. What Bible knowledge should children of nine have?

3. What would you say with regard to Bible narratives
done into modern English ?

4. Show fully why children should be made familiar with
the text.

5. What conception should gradually unfold itself to
them?

6. Distinguish between essential and accidental truth.

7. In what event may it be said that ' the truths them-
selves will assuredly slip from our grasp ' ?

8. Why should care be taken lest Bible teaching stale
upon the minds of children ?

9. Describe the method of a Bible lesson.

10. What use would you make of illustrations?

11. What is to be said as to the learning by heart of Bible
passages ?

XV. ARITHMETIC

1. Why is arithmetic important as a means of education ?

2. How would you test a child's knowledge of principles?

3. Why are long sums mischievous ?

4. What mental exercise should a problem offer ?

5. What caution must be observed?

6. How may arithmetic become an elementary training in
mathematics ?

7. How should a child demonstrate 4x7 = 28?

8. How would you use buttons, beans, etc. ?

9. Show how you would teach a child to work out an
addition and subtraction table with each of the digits.

10. When would you introduce multiplication and divi-
sion tables ?

11. How would you teach division?

APPENDICES 379

12. What is the step between working with things
and with abstract numbers ?

13. How would you introduce our system of notation?

14. Why?

15. Show fully how you would deal with 'tens.'

1 6. How long should a child work with 'tens' and units
only?

1 7. What should follow ?

1 8. What rule must be observed throughout?

1 9. How would you apply the same principle to weights
and measures ?

20. What part should parcels play at this stage, and why?

21. Show how the child should use a foot-rule.

22. How would you exercise his judgment as to measures
and weights.

23. How does the idea of a fraction occur in this work
with concrete quantities ?

24. What should be the moral value of the study of
arithmetic ?

25. How does the inferior teacher instil a disregard of
truth and common honesty in this study ?

26. How would you deal with a 'wrong ' sum ?

27. What should the daily arithmetic lesson be to the
children ?

28. Discuss the ABC Arithmetic.

29. What is to be said against accustoming young
children to the sight of geometrical forms and figures ?

XVI. NATURAL PHILOSOPHY

1. Show that childhood is the time for gathering
materials for classification.

2. What does Mr Herbert Spencer say as to the value
of scientific pursuits ?

3. Show that children are able to comprehend principles.

380 HOME EDUCATION

4. Mention some of the phenomena they might readily
understand.

5. From the subjects taught successfully in a village
school, write a list of questions which intelligent children
should be able to answer.

6. ' The principles of natural philosophy are the principles
of common sense.' Show how this statement should be a
key to our educational practice.

XVII. GEOGRAPHY

1. Wherein lies the peculiar educational value of
geography ?

2. How is geography commonly taught ?

3. What sort of information about places do children and
grown-up people enjoy ?

4. Why is the geography learnt at school of little use in
afterlife?

5. What should a child learn in geography ?

6. How should he get his rudimentary notions ?

7. How should children be introduced to maps?

8. Why should a child be made 'at home' in some one
region ?

9. Why is it well to follow the steps of a traveller ?

10. Mention a few books useful in this connection,
n. How should maps be used in this kind of work?

12. How should a child get his first notion of a glacier,
a canon, etc. ?

13. What course of reading might parents aim at between
a child's fifth and his tenth year ?

14. How should young children get their lessons on placet

15. How should they arrive at definitions?

16. What fundamental ideas should a child receive?

17. How should he be introduced to the meaning of
a map?

APPENDICES 381

XVIII. HISTORY

1. What is the intellectual and what the moral worth of
history as an educational subject ?

2. What is to be said of the usual ways of teaching
English history ?

3. What, if the little text-book be moral or religious in
tone?

4. What is the fatal mistake as regards the early teaching
of history ?

5. What is the better way?

6. What should a child know of the period in which any
person, about whom he is reading, lived ?

7. What moral gain may he get from such intimate
knowledge ?

8. What manner of books must be eschewed?

9. What is the least that should be done to introduce
children to the history of England ?

10. Why is the early history of a nation better fitted for
children than its later records ?

11. Why are the old Chronicles profitable reading for
them?

12. Name and comment upon a few of the Chronicles
upon which children's knowledge of history should rest.

13. What effect on a child should the reading of such
old Chronicles have ?

14. Show that children should know something of the
heroic age of their own nation.

15. What use may be made of Geoffrey of Monmouth's
History of the British Kings ?

1 6. From what authority should a child get the story
of the French wars ?

17. Why do Plutarch's Lives afford the best preparation
for the study of Grecian and Roman history ?

1 8. Give two counsels which should regulate the teaching
of history.

382 HOME EDUCATION

19. Upon what principles should history books for
children be selected ?

20. Mention one or two books that lend themselves
to narrating.

21. Comment upon Mr Arnold Forster's History of
England.

22. How would you help children to clearness with
regard to dates?

23. Mention two or three ways in which children's minds
work if their history books are of the proper quality.

XIX. GRAMMAR

1. Why is grammar uninteresting to a child?

2. Why is English grammar peculiarly hard ?

3. Show that the Latin grammar is easier.

4. Show that the Latin, affords some help in the learning
of English grammar.

5. Why should a child begin with a sentence and not
with the parts of speech ?

6. Write notes of one or two introductory lessons.

XX. FRENCH

1. How should French be acquired ?

2. Show that the learning of French is an education of
the senses.

3. What are our two difficulties in speaking French ?

4. Show that these hindrances should be removed in
childhood.

5. How?

6. How might the difficulty of accent be dealt with ?

7. What half-dozen principles has M. Gouin made plain
to us?

8. Show that the Series method enables a child to think
in the new language.

APPENDICES 383

9. Trace fully the steps by which the author worked out
his theory.

10. How does he treat the difficulty of spelling?

11. Illustrate the facility with which a child learns a new
language.

XXI. PICTORIAL ART, ETC.

1. Upon what two lines should the art training of children
proceed ?

2. How should picture-talks be regulated ?

3. What gains may we hope for from this kind of
teaching ?

4. Discuss the use of blobs in early drawing lessons.

5. What should be our aim in these lessons ?

6. Children have 'art' in them. How should this fact
affect our teaching ?

7. What should we bear in mind in teaching clay-modelling
to children ?

8. Name methods of teaching singing and the piano which
are to be commended.

9. What physical exercises would you recommend ?

10. Name some handicrafts suitable for young children.

PART VI

THE WILL— THE CONSCIENCE — THE DIVINE LIFE
IN THE CHILD

I. THE WILL

1. How is the government of Mansoul carried on ?

2. Show that the executive power is vested in the will.

3. What is the will ?

4. In what respects may persons go through life without
a deliberate act of will ?

384 HOME EDUCATION

5. Show that character is the result of conduct regulated
by will.

6. What are the three functions of the will ?

7. What limitation of the will is disregarded by certain
novelists ?

8. Show that parents blunder into this metaphysical
error.

9. Show that wilfulness indicates want of will-power.

10. What is wilfulness ?

1 1 . What are the superior and inferior functions of the
will?

12. Show that the will does not always act for good.

13. Show that a disciplined will is necessary to heroic
Christian character.

14. How would you distinguish between effective and
non-effective persons ?

1 5. How does the will operate ?

16. Show how incentives, diversion, change of thought
are severally aids to the will.

17. What should be taught to children as to the 'way of
the will ' ?

1 8. Show that power of will implies power of attention.

19. Show that habit may frustrate the will.

20. Show the necessity for the reasonable use of so
effective an instrument.

21. By what line of conduct should parents strengthen
the wills of their children ?

22. How may children be taught to manage themselves?

23. Show that the education of the will is more import-
ant than that of the intellect.

II. CONSCIENCE

1. What are the functions of conscience ?

2. What is implied in ' I am, I ought, I can, I will ' ?

APPENDICES 385

3. What mistake is made by the inert parent with regard
to the divine grace ?

4. Show that conscience is not an infallible guide.

5. How does Adam Smith illustrate the fact that con-
science is a real power ?

6. What do we know of conscience ?

7. Distinguish between a nascent and a trained con-
science.

8. Show that refinement of conscience cannot coexist
with ignorance.

9. What are the processes implied in a 'conscientious'
decision ?

10. What may be said of the instructed conscience?

11. What may be expected of the good conscience of
a child?

12. Show that children play with moral questions.

13. How would you impart any of the moral ideas con-
tained in the Bible to a child ?

14. Show the use of tales in the training of conscience.

15. Show the extreme ignorance of a child's conscience.

1 6. How would you instruct children in the duty of
' kindness,' for example ?

1 7. What is to be said of the conscience made effective
by discipline ?

III. THE DIVINE LIFE IN THE CHILD

1. What is the * very pulse of the machine ' ?

2. Show that parents have some power to enthrone the
King.

3. Define as far as you can the functions of the soul.

4. What is the life of the soul ?

5. Show by the illustration of the bee and the apple-tree
what is the parent's part in quickening the Divine life in
his child.

25

386 HOME EDUCATION

6. Show where the similitude of the bee and the apple-
tree fails.

7. By what two deterrent ideas is God most often pre-
sented to children ?

8. What precautions must a mother take to secure that
her children get inspiring ideas of God ?

9. What considerations should help us to select the
quickening thoughts proper for children ?

10. How would you select fitting and vital ideas ?

11. Show the danger of confounding 'being good' with
knowing God.

12. What cautions will the mother observe as to the
times and the manner of religious instruction ?

13. Make some suggestions for the reading of the Bible.

14. How might a mother give her child the idea of God
as Father and Giver ?

15. How may children be brought up in allegiance to
Christ?

1 6. How would you bring the thought of their Saviour
home to children ?

17. Show that the indwelling of Christ is a thought fit
for children.

APPENDICES 387

APPENDIX C

THE EXAMINATION OF A CHILD OF SEVEN UPON A TERM'S
WORK ON THE LINES INDICATED IN THIS VOLUME

CLASS IB

Programme of the Term's Work, on which the Examination

Questions are set
Bible Lessons.

The Bible for the Young, by Rev. J. Paterson Smyth
(Sampson, Low, is. each); Exodus, Lessons i. -vii. ;
St Mark 's Gospel, i., ii., iii., iv. Teacher to prepare
beforehand as much of each lesson as the children
can understand, and to use the Bible passages in
teaching.

Recitations.

To recite two poems, to learn three hymns, and a passage
of six verses, each, from (a) Exodus, (b) St Mark's
Gospel (part set for Bible lessons). Longman's Junior
Poetry Book (is. 6d.) may be used, or Miss Wood's
A First Book of Poetry (Macmillan, 23. 6d.).

Sums.

Chapter xi., ABC Arithmetic (Teacher's Book, part i.,
is. ; Sonnenschein). Tables up to twelve times
twelve. Tables should be worked out in money
thus : (9x7 = 63 pence = 55. 3d.).

N.B. — The terms ' tens ' and ' units,' etc., should be
used instead of c staves ' and ' cubes,' etc.

BEGINNERS — Chapters vi., vii., viii.
Books for Pupils, containing exercises only, are published at 46. each.

Music.

Child Pianist (Curwen & Son), continue. Teacher's
Guide (revised edition).

388 HOME EDUCATION

Singing.

Three French Songs, Chansons d'Enfants (Librairie Ch.
Delagrave, Paris, is. 6d.). Ten Minutes' Lessons in
Tonic Sol-fa (Curwen & Son). Three English songs
from No vello's School Songs, book xxi. (8d.).

Drill.

Light-Pole Exercises and Calisthenics, from Musical
Drills for Standards (Philip & Son, as. gd.). Ex-
students take House of Education Drills.

Writing.

A New Handwriting for Teachers, by M. M. Bridges
(Mrs Bridges, Yattenden, Newbury, 25. gd.), page 2,
lines i and 2 ; page 3, line 5. Two letters to be
mastered each lesson. Transcribe from Reading Book
in New Handwriting and write a little from dictation.

Reading.

Read books used for History, Geography, Tales, and

Hiawatha.

BACKWARD CHILDREN. — Happy Reader, part ii., by E. L.
Young (Simpkin, Marshall, & Co.).

English History.

Sketches from British History, by F. York Powell (Long-
mans, is. 3d.), lessons xx.-xxxi. Mrs Frewen Lord's
Tales from St Paul's (Sampson Low, is.), pages 1-19.

Tales.

The Pilgrim's Progress (Partridge, is.), pages 102-148.
The Heroes of Asgard (Macmillan, 35. 6d.), pages
50-108. Two Tales from Mrs Beesly's Stories from
the History of Rome (Macmillan, 25. 6d.).

Natural History}

Keep Nature Note-Book. Watch and describe twelve

1 Where there are children in la as well in \b, both classes should
work together, doing the work of \b in the subjects thus indicated ; or,
if the children are backward, that of la.

APPENDICES 389

birds. The Birds of the Air, by A. Buckley (Cassell,
6d.), pages 38-79. Children to notice all they
can themselves about birds. Wild Nature Won by
Kindness, by Mrs Brightwen (Fisher Unwin, 2S.),
pages 99-139.

Picture Talk.

Study six reproductions of J. F. Millet's work (see the
Perry Pictures).

French!

The Gouin Method : The Study of French, by Eugene
and Duriaux (Macmillan & Co., 33. 6d.), pages 31, 35,
36, 37. Make new sentences with the words learnt in
these Series. Illustrated French Primer, by H. Bue
(Hachette & Co., is. 6d.), pages 109-112, 141-150.

Geography.

London Geographical Reader (Stanford), book ii.
(is. 6d.), pages 1-14. Book i. (is.), pages i-u. Map
questions to be worked through with map before each
lesson. Description of any rivers, hills, mountains,
etc., the child may know of, with plans.

Work.

Six twigs of trees (not done before) in brushwork. For
occasional use, Pour Dessiner Simplement, par V.
Jacquot et P. Ravoux (Glaisher, 33. 6d.), cahier ii.
Attend to garden {Aunt Mai's Annual, 1894). Carton
Work, by G. C. Hewitt (King & Sons, Halifax, 25.) :
make a pillar-box, a match-box, a pen-tray, and a
vase. Smyrna rugs (see Aunt Mafs Annual, 1894).
Children make their own designs. Self-Teaching
Needlework Manual (Longmans, is.) : children to be
exercised in stitches, pages 1-15. Use coarse canvas
and wool ; then, coloured cotton and coarse linen.

1 See note, page 388.

390 HOME EDUCATION

Questions on Preceding Programme

Bible Lessons.

I. i. What do you know of Moses as a little boy ?

2. Tell about Moses and the burning bush.
II. i. Tell the story of Jesus curing the man sick of the

palsy.
2. When did Jesus say, "Peace, be still"? Tell all

about it.
Writing.

l\b Write I " The fidd m°USe haS g°ne t0 her neSt"

Natural History.

la. How does a beaver build his house ?
Ib. i. Tell one story about 'Blanche.' What have
you noticed about any tits you have watched ?
Irt&I£. 2. Describe a rook, a starling, a chaffinch, and tell
anything you have noticed about them.

Geography.

Ib. i. How can we tell that the earth is round ?

2. What countries would you pass through going from

England to Russia by land ?

3. What are the countries to the South of Europe?

Which countries have the most indented coast-
lines ? Mention two inland seas and say where
they are.
la. i. Describe a forest in Brazil.

2. Tell about the Indian's blow-pipe, and a hanging
nest. Can you draw a hanging nest ?

Number.

Ib. i. Tom went to school at 6J; he was 8 years and 3
months at one school, 4 years at another, i year
and 9 months going round the world, 3 years
and 3 months in Corea, and 5^ months in
Japan. How old was he then ?

APPENDICES 391

2. John had to take three cheques to the bank,

;£i75, 133. 3d, ^30, 75. 5d., and ^89, 193.
i id. How much did the cheques come to ?

3. Find the rent of four houses at ^17, 8s. 4jd. a

year each.

BEGINNERS —

1. Which is greater, and by how much, a quarter of a

hundred or a fifth of a hundred ?

2. How many pounds in a hundred shillings?

3. If tops cost Qd. for 5, how much will 25 cost?

la. i. If Jack's dinner costs is. 6d., how much will he
have to pay for himself and three friends ?

2. If a copy of Robinson Crusoe cost 6s., how many

can I buy for £2, 25. od. ?

3. How many sixpences are equal to nine fourpenny

pieces ?

BEGINNERS —

1. How many newts and how many robins have

twenty-eight legs between them ?

2. His father gave Jack id. a week. How many

weeks must he save to buy a slate for 4d. ?

Picture Talk.

Describe from memory the picture of Millet's you liked
best.

Tales.

la. Tell a fairy tale.
Ib. i. Tell about the trial of Christian and Faithful in

Vanity Fair.
2. Tell about Odin's journey to Jotunheim until he

came to the land of giants,
or, 3. Tell a short story from the History of Rome.

History.

i. Can you remember two Scottish proverbs?

3Q2 HOME EDUCATION

2. Tell a story of John Hall, or Wat Tyler, or Robin

Hood.

3. Tell what Taswell says about the burning of St

Paul's. What are the words over the north
transept door ?

Reading}

Father to choose unseen passage, marking words not
known.

Recitations.1

Father to choose a poem, a hymn, and two Bible
passages.

Singing.1

Father to choose an English and a French song and,
(I£), two Tonic Sol-fa exercises.

Drill.1

Drill, before parents.

Music.1

Examine in work done.

Drawing.

(a) An outline drawing with your brush of a bird and
a cat, (b] a brushdrawing of an ash, and a lime twig
with leaf-buds.

Work}

Outside friend to examine.

N.B. — The work suggested in the course of this volume
is usually with a view to children in classes la and I£, but
many children in their ninth year are fit for Class II.
(See Appendix D).

1 Subjects thus indicated to be marked according to Regulations.

APPENDICES 393

B. B., aged 7j. CLASS IB

Subjects taken

1. Bible Lessons. 6. Tales.

2. Writing. 7. Natural History.

3. Number. 8. History.

4. Picture Talk. 9. Reading.

5. Geography. 10. Drawing.

The answers of all the children in this class reach much
the same standard as those here printed. The children in
class ib range in age from seven to eight or eight and a half.

Bible Lessons

I. (i) When Moses was born, King Pharaoh of Egypt
had ordered that all the new-born baby-boys should be
killed, and Moses' mother hid him for three months and
at last he grew so big that when he cried he would be
heard. So his mother made him a basket of bulrushes
and put him in it in the water. And she plastered it
together so that the water would not get in. And when
Pharaoh's daughter came down to bathe, her servants
walked along by the river, and when she saw the basket
in the river, she asked her maid to bring it to her. And
when she opened the basket she saw the baby in it, and
she said that this was one of the Hebrews' children. Then
the baby's sister came and asked Pharaoh's daughter if she
would get a nurse for the baby, and Pharaoh's daughter
said 'Yes.' And she brought a Hebrew woman, and it
was the child's mother. And Pharaoh's daughter said that
she would call him Moses, because she drew him out of the
water. Then Pharaoh's daughter gave the baby to his
mother, and she took him home and nursed him and she
taught him to be good. And then when he was pretty old
he was taken to the palace and there he got a very good
education.

394 HOME EDUCATION

(2) When Moses was married, he was out in the field
keeping his wife's father's sheep when he saw a burning
bush. And a voice spoke out from the burning bush and
said, " Draw not nigh hither, put off thy shoes from off thy
feet for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground."
It was God speaking to him, and God told him to go and
bring the children of Israel out of Egypt. But Moses said,
"Who am I to go to Pharaoh ? he won't listen to me," and
God said that he would be with him. But Moses said,
" Pharaoh will not believe that God has spoken to me at
all." Then God said, "I will teach you to make signs
before Pharaoh." But Moses said, "I am slow of speech."
And God was angry with Moses and said that he would
send his brother Aaron to do the speaking.

II. (i) Jesus was surrounded with people and there was
a man sick of the palsy wanted to see him ; and he was
let down through the roof on his bed which was only a
mattress. And Jesus said, "Rise, take up thy bed and
walk." And the man took up his bed and was cured.

(2) When Jesus was crossing the sea of Galilee with his
disciples to the other side there arose a great storm, and
Jesus' disciples thought that they would be thrown into
the sea. And they awoke Jesus and said to him, " Master,
carest thou not that we perish." And Jesus woke up and
said to the sea and the foam, "Peace, be still." And his
disciples marvelled and said, " What manner of man is this
that even the sea obeys him."

Number
la. i. 6/.

2. 7 copies.

3. 6 sixpences.

Beginners. —

1. 14 Robins.

2. 4 weeks.

APPENDICES 395

Picture Talk

'THE FIRST STEP'

In this picture I see a baby taking its first step
alone. The father is stretching out his arms to catch
it, then the baby toddles to its father.

They are not rich people and they live in a farm, and
the father had just left off his work when his wife met him
in the garden and told him that his baby was going to
walk alone for the first time.

Geography

1. We know that the world is round because if a
sailor starts from his home and sails on and on without
turning he will come back to the place he started from ;
if you stand on the sea shore and watch a ship coming
to-wards you, you will first of all see the mast of the ship
and then the hull last ; if you stand on a high place you
will see that you are in the middle of a circle.

Tales
FROM 'HEROES OF ASGARD*

2. Loki, before he left Jotunheim, told his witch- wife
to keep the children indoors, for said he, the ^Esir will
soon find out that we have a secret down here, but while
Loki was away, his wife could not keep Jormungand in
the house, because he grew so big, that she had to let
his tail out of the door. And Odin saw Jormungand's
tail sticking out of the door, so he dismounted Air
Throne, and said farewell to all the ^sir, and then
went to Jotunheim, but before he went he taught all
the people how to fight and make armour, and not to
forget what he had taught them. So he went on and
on and on until he came to the Golden Van, and asked

39^ HOME EDUCATION

him what his education was, and what he did up here.
And the answer was, that he gave wisdom, but that it was
so dear that many people turned away sorrowfully. Odin
said, "What is the price? I would willingly give my
right hand." But the Van said it is your right eye you
must give; but Odin didn't think the price too dear,
so he plucked his right eye out and gave it to the Van.
Then he got wisdom and set off for Jotunheim. At
last he came to the very edge of Jotunheim, and then he
peeped over to Jotunheim and saw all the hideous creatures
that lived down there ; and he hung over Jotunheim two
or three days and nights before he went in.

Natural History

1. There was a lady that Van ted to have a pair of
pigeons, and a friend sent her two. And when she
opened the basket she found that the mate had flown
away. Then the lady got a mate for the pigeon but
the pigeon just pecked at it, so the lady got another
one, that was white like herself, and so she kept this
one. The female was named Blanche ; and every day
for four hours Blanche would come in to the lady's
room and take a rest on a great big Bible that lay
on the table.

2. Tits are very fond of fat in the Winter. There are
four different kinds of Tits, Greater Tit, Marsh Tit, Blue
Tit, and the Cole Tit. And sometimes the tits sit at the
entrance to a beehive and .eat all the bees that come out.
They build in old letter-boxes sometimes. The Blue
Tits are great fighters, and if you hang a basket outside
your window with fat in it, the Blue Tit will hang down
and eat all it wants, and act King of the Castle. And
the Cole Tit takes away all it wants and stores it up.

Rooks are black and very like crows, and the way you
will know them from crows is that they build altogether

APPENDICES 397

and crows don't. When the rook is one year old, it has
a grey bald patch on its head.

Starlings look black when you see them far off and
when you see them near to you they look purple and
white on their backs. They build in hollow trees and
in chimneys.

History

1. One day when King James of Scotland was staying
with his friend McFarlane, he saw his geese running about
in the yard and playing; and the king laughed at them.
And that evening they had a goose for dinner and it was
so lean and tough that the king could not help saying
" McFarlane, your geese mind their play more than their
meat." And always after that people that played more
than they worked were called McFarlane's geese.

ROBIN HOOD AND THE FORESTERS

2. One day when Robin Hood was only sixteen, he was
walking in the Forest with his bow and arrow, when he met
fifteen foresters, who laughed at him when they saw the
bigness of his bow. Then Robin got angry with them and
said, "I am only out bird-shooting to-day." But they
just laughed at him the more, and he said, " I would wager
my head, I hit a deer at twelve score yards." And they
held him to his word, and they staked one hundred shillings
against that. Then they sent a deer galloping past him,
and just as he was taking aim, one of the foresters jeeringly
bade him remember his head was at stake, because he was
frightened he would lose his money. And all the foresters
marvelled because Robin Hood hit the deer. But Robin
Hood said he wouldn't take any man's money, except the
man's money who had tried to put him out when he was
taking aim ; and that, he said, " we will spend on a feast for
us all." Then the man that had lost his money, made a

398 HOME EDUCATION

cut at Robin, but Robin dashed nimbly aside, and ran away
one hundred yards, and then he turned round, and shot the
man that had tried to put him out when he was taking aim.
The foresters saw his fall, and all ran for Robin Hood, but
he shot them down dead or badly wounded as they came
to him. The friends of these foresters got Robin Hood
outlawed for this act.

(Children in Classes la and 16 narrate the answers to
their examination questions, which are written at their
dictation.)

APPENDIX D

THE EXAMINATION OF A CHILD IN HIS NINTH YEAR
UPON A TERM'S WORK ON THE LINES INDICATED IN
THIS VOLUME

CLASS II

Programme of the Terms Work, on which the Examination

Questions are set
Bible Lessons.

The Bible for the Young, by Rev. J. Paterson Smyth
(Sampson Low, is. each vol.); Exodus, Lessons i.-vii.
inclusive. St MarKs Gospel, chapters i., ii., iii., iv.
Teacher to prepare beforehand, and to use the Bible
passages in teaching. Answers to the Catechism with
explanations as far as the Lord's Prayer (optional).

Recitations.

Lyra Heroica (Nutt, as. 6d.), Boadicea, and A Welcome.
Two hymns and two passages of twelve verses each,
one from Exodus, one from St Mark.

APPENDICES 399

French.

The Gouin Series; pages 76, 78, 80, 82, 84, 93, from The
Study of French, by Eugene and Duriaux (1898 edition,
Macmillan & Co., 35. 6d.). Little French Folk, by
C. T. Onions (Simpkin & Marshall, 2S.), pages 15-25.
Make new sentences with the words learnt in the
Series. Recite two poems from La Lyre Enfantine
(Hachette & Co., is. 3d.).

Latin.

A First Latin Course, by E. H. Scott and F. Jones
(Blackie, is. 6d.), pages i-io, 67-71, and vocabularies.
Revise work carefully by means of exercises, and make
fresh sentences with all the words learnt. Boys may, if
desired, take Latin instead of German ; in this case they
should take Hall's Child's First Latin Book (Murray,
2s.), pages 1-23 in addition.

BEGINNERS, A First Latin Course, by E. H. Scott and
F. Jones, pages 1-5, with vocabularies and exercises on
pages 67, 68, 69.

German.

Little German Folk, by M. Schramm (The Norland Press,
2S.), pages 16-20 inclusive, to be learnt orally, only.

Drill.

Light- Pole and Calisthenic Exercises, from Musical Drill
for Standards (Philip & Son, is. 6d.). Ex-students
take House of Education Drills.

Music.

Continue Child Pianist (Curwen & Son) ; teacher using
the Teacher's Guide.

Singing.

Two French songs, La Lyre des £coles\ two German
songs, Deutscher Liedergarten (each of these, Curwen

400 HOME EDUCATION

& Son, 2S. 6d.). Two new English songs from
Novello's School Songs, book xxi. (8d.). Ten
Minutes' Lessons in Tonic Sol-fa (Curwen & Son).

Geography.

London Geographical Readers (Stanford) : book ii.
(is. 6d.), pages 1-22; book iii. (25. 3d.), pages 1-26;
map questions to be answered from map and then from
memory, and then in filling up blank map from memory
before each lesson. All geography to be learnt with
map. Children to make memory maps. Know some-
thing about foreign places coming into notice in the
current newspapers. The School Atlas, edited by
H. O. Arnold-Forster (37 Bedford Street, London, 33.).

English Grammar.

A Short English Grammar, by Professor Meiklejohn
(Holden, is.), pages 25-52. Parse and point out
Subjects, Verbs, Objects.

BEGINNERS, pages 5-25.

Writing.

A New Handwriting for Teachers, by M. M. Bridges
(Mrs Bridges, Yattenden, Newbury, 25. gd. post free) ;
practise pages i, 2, 3. Two perfectly-written lines
every day. Transcribe some of your favourite passages
from Shakespeare's Julius Ccesar, with page 6 as model.

Dictation.

Two pages at a time to be prepared carefully; then a
paragraph from these pages to be written from dictation
or from memory. The Citizen Reader, by H. O.
Arnold-Forster (Cassell, is. 6d.), chapters vi., vii., viii.
(both parts).

Plutarch 's 'Lives?

Plutarch's Julius Casar (omitting unsuitable parts)
(Cassell's National Library, 3d.).

APPENDICES 401

English History.

A History of England, by H. O. Arnold- Forster (Cassell,
55.), pages 1-56 (B.C. 55-A.D. 871). Read from
Shakespeare's y#//kr Casar (Cassell's National Library,
3d.). Read contemporary parts from Old Stories from
British History (Longmans, is.).

French History.

A First History of France, by L. Creighton (Longmans,
35. 6d.), pages 2-22, to be contemporary with English
history. Any time over should be given to English
history.

Drawing.

Pour Dessiner Simplement, par V. Jacquot et P. Ravoux

(Glaisher, 35. 6d.), cahiers ii. and iii., for occasional use.

Twelve twigs of trees with leaf-buds in brushdrawing.

Original brushdrawings from scenes in Julius C&sar.

Garden (or section of) drawn to scale ;
and. Join the Portfolio of Painting (see The Children's

Quarterly).

Picture Talk.

Study six reproductions of J. F. Millet's work (see Perry
Pictures).

Reading.

Geography, English history, French history, should afford
exercise in careful reading. The Morte D' Arthur,
Selections by C. L. Thomson (Marshall, 25.), pages 190-
238), or, poetry, to be read on Thursdays.

Nature Lore.

(Tuesday) Buckley's Fairy Land of Science (Stanford),
pages 99-123. (Wednesday) The Sciences, by E. S.
Holden (Ginn & Co., 25. 6d., pages 1-34. Seaside ana
Wayside may also be used. Keep a Nature Notebook.
Record, when you see them, and describe twelve birds

26

402 HOME EDUCATION

and notice all you can about them. (Saturday) Birds
of the Air, by Mrs Fisher (Cassell, 6d.), pages 38-79.
All members must take in The Children's Quarterly.
Arithmetic.

ABC Arithmetic, Teacher's Book, part ii. (Sonnen-
schein & Nesbitt, is.), pages 93-111. Mental Arith-
metic and Numeration for five minutes on alternate
days. Mair's Mental Arithmetic (Sonnenschein, 9d.).
Steady progress. Much care with tables.
BEGINNERS, 1-27.
Composition.

The Citizen Reader, by H. O. Arnold-Forster (Cassell,
is. 9d.), chapters vi., vii., viii. (both parts). Selections
from Morte D' Arthur. Read and write substance.
Young children who cannot write easily may narrate.
Work.

Cardboard Modelling, by A. Sutcliffe and W. Nelson
(Philip & Son, 25. 6d.), or, better, A Manual of Card-
board Modelling, by H. Heaton (Newmann & Son,
55.). Make a set of furniture for the bedroom of your
doll's house. Make the curtains, rugs, bed linen, and
counterpane for this bedroom. Self-Teaching Needle-
work Manual (Longmans, is.). Practise stitches on
pages 15-24. Attend to Garden (Aunt Mai's Annual,
1894).

Questions on Preceding Programme

Bible Lessons.

I. i. " Take this child and nurse it for me." Tell what
you know about the education and early life of
the child.

2. "Who made thee a ruler and a judge over us?"
" Take off the shoes from off thy feet." On
what occasions were these words used? Tell
the whole story in each case.

APPENDICES 403

II. i. (a) « Come ye after me." (b) " Arise, take up thy
bed." (*)" Stretch forth thine hand." (d]
"Peace, be still.'' Tell all about the occasions
when these words were used.

2. Give, as far as you can in the words of the Bible,
the Parable of the Sower.

Writing.

Write from memory two lines of A Welcome.

Dictation.

The Citizen Reader, page 79, § 2.

Composition.

Describe your favourite scene fromftdius Ccesar, or,
the picture of J. F. Millet's that you like best.

English Grammar.

1. Analyse and parse the words in italics, —
" O, when do fairies hide their heads'?

When snow lies on the hills,
When /ray/ has spoiled their mossy beds,
And crystallised their rills."

2. Make sentences using the following words, and

parse each of them : this, which, herself, many,
above, after, once, very, that.

BEGINNERS —

1. Pick out the nouns, adverbs, prepositions, and verbs

in (i).

2. Make sentences containing the following words,

and say what part of speech each is : hert carry,
very, to, on, before, soon, all, since.

English History.

i. "You can put me to death but you will gain more
honour if you spare my life." What do you
know of the speaker ?

404 HOME EDUCATION

2. What history is there in the words Manchester,

Thursday ', Saturday, Oxford^ Who gave us
these words ?

3. "From the fury of the Northmen, good Lord

deliver us." What do you know about these
Northmen ?
French History.

1. "Martin has clothed me with his garment." Tell

what you know about this Martin. On what
day of the year do we remember him ?

2. " Thus did you break the vase at Soissons." Tell

what you know of the speaker.

3. What do you know of Charles the Great ?

Plutarch's ' Lives:

1. " Arms and laws do not flourish together." Who

said this ? Tell the story.

2. Describe one of Caesar's expeditions into Gaul.

Natural History.

1. What are earth-pillars, landslips, and pot-holes?

How are they caused ? Describe some work of
water as a sculptor that you have seen.

2. Make a diagram, giving the names and the sizes as

near as you can of the planets. Which planets
have you seen? What do you know about
Jupiter and Saturn ?

3. Describe a rook, a starling, a jackdaw, a thrush.

Tell anything you have noticed about them.

Geography.

1. What countries can I visit in going from England by

sea through the Mediterranean to the Black Sea?

2. What are the boundaries of Austria, Switzerland,

Greece ?

3. Draw a map of Northumberland, putting in the

river Tyne and the chief towns on its banks.

4. Describe a journey in the Lake District.

APPENDICES 405

French.

1. Recite Les Cerises and the poem learnt.

2. Name, in French, the various parts of a house, and

make six sentences, using the words.

German.

1. Tell, in German, all you can about the pictures on

pages 1 8 and 1 9 of Little German Folks.

2. Make three new sentences with some of the words

you have learnt.

Latin.

1. Translate into Latin: (a) The road is not safe; (If)

The slave is Roman ; (c) Here is a wide road ;
(d) The town has four big gates ; (e) The poet's
daughter is tall.

2. Make sentences, using the words, — sex, Romani,

magnae, pila, trains, cujus, dux, octo, reliqui, vos.
BOYS ONLY. 3. Decline fully, — bona ma/us, niger equus,
vir liber.

BEGINNERS —

1. Do the first half of question 2 above.

2. Answer in Latin the questions, — Ubi est portal

Quot portae sunt 1 Estne seruus magnus ?

Arithmetic.

1. If a railway guard travels 2303 miles a week, how

much does he travel in twelve days ?

2. Find the interest on (a) £11, 153., (b) £7, i6s., at

5% for one year.

3. What sum of money multiplied by n will give

^38,020, 43. 9jd. ?

BEGINNERS —

i. How much is each of the following numbers — 197,
931, 240, 99, short of 1000 ?

406 HOME EDUCATION

2. If quill pens cost 123. a thousand, how much would

250 cost ?

3. How many florins in 1000 shillings?

Drawing.

(a) An outline of a bird with your brush.

(£) An original brush-drawing from fulius Casar.

(c) A birch, and an elm twig.

Recitations}-

Father to choose a poem, and ten verses from St Mark
and ten verses from Exodus.

Reading?-

Father to choose unseen poem, marking words not known.

Music}-

Examine in work done.

Singing.1

Father to choose an English, a French, and a German
song, and two Tonic Sol-fa exercises.

Drill.1

Drill, before parents.

Work.1

Outside friend to examine.

A. A., aged 9 years
Subjects taken

Scripture. Arithmetic.

English History. French.

French History. Composition.

Natural History. Drawing.

Geography. English Grammar.

Writing. Plutarch's Lives.
Dictation.

1 Subjects thus indicated to be marked according to Regulations.

APPENDICES 407

French

LES CERISES.

i. Albert a envie de manger des cerises.
II court au verger, et grimpe k un cerisier.
Albert se pose & califourchon, sur une branche.
D'oeil, il choisit les plus belles cerises,
II cueille les plus mures,
Et les mange au fur et a mesure.

DlEU

Qui dit au soleil sur la terre
D'eclairer tout honime et tout lieu,
Qui donne a la nuit son mystere,
O mes enfants, c'est Dieu.

Le bluet le ciel superbe.
Qui les a teints d'un meme bleu,
Qui verdit 1'emeraude 1'herbe ?
O mes enfants, c'est Dieu.

1 Qui donne au bosquet son ombrage,

Et quand 1'oiseau chante au milieu,

Qui donne a 1'oiseau son ramage?

O mes enfants, c'est Dieu.

Qui donne a chacun chaque chose,
A Tun beaucoup, a 1'autre peu,
Moins au ciron, plus a la rose ?
O mes enfants, c'est Dieu.

Qui donne a vos meres ce charme,
De rire a votre moindre jeu,
Pleurant a votre moindre larme ?
O mes enfants, c'est Dieu.

2. Les murs, les portes, la salle a manger, la cuisine,
le feu.2

1 Dictated to end. 2 Dictated.

408 HOME EDUCATION

Composition

JULIUS CESAR

My favourite scene from Julius Ccesar is where Mark
Antony makes his speech to the people about Caesar, and
they all think it such a good one, and wished to destroy
the conspirators who had killed Caesar. He tells them
that he had thrice offered the crown to Caesar and yet he
had refused it, and yet Brutus in his speech had said that
the deed was done for the good of the country in case
Caesar should get to be the King, which would not be
good for Rome. Antony said that in Caesar's will he had
left to every one of the people a sum of money, and left
his shaded gardens for the public use.

English Grammar

i. Nouns — fairies, heads, snow, hills, frost, beds, rills.
Preposition — on .

Verbs — hide, lies, spoiled, has, crystallised.
2 her Pronoun.

carry Verb.

very

to Preposition.

on Preposition.

before Preposition.

soon

all Adjective.

since Preposition.

Were you with her ?
Will you carry this ?
Yesterday was very wet.
Are you going to London ?
London is on the Thames.
Please walk on before us.
We will be there soon.
That is all.
Since you are not coming I will not come.

APPENDICES 409

Plutarch's ' Lives '

1. These words "Arms and laws do not flourish
together," were said by Julius Caesar in answer to a book
that had been written by a greater orator than himself called
Cicero. In this he said that the people could not expect
him to be such a great orator as Cicero who had studied
all his life for Caesar had to fight and could not study.

2. When Caesar first went into Gaul to fight against the
Helvetians and the Tigurini he sent out his lieutenant
to fight the Tigurini. His lieutenant defeated them so he
went on to fight the Helvetians who had burnt 400 of their
villages, and 1 2 of their large towns. He marched against
them and after having fought them he defeated them and
he made the prisoners he took resettle in the land and
rebuild the towns and villages they had burnt for fear that
other tribes from Germany should come and settle in a
country that was left with no inhabitants.

Arithmetic

i. 1000 1000 1000 1000
197 931 240 99

803 69 760 901

2. If quill pens cost 125. a thousand, how much would
250 cost?

4)12

3 Ans. 35. = four 2 50.

3. How many florins in 1000 shillings?

2)1000

500 Ans. 500 florins.

410 HOME EDUCATION

English History

1. Caractacus was one of the early British chiefs who
held out against the Romans for a long time. After he had
been fighting many times he was defeated and taken
prisoner by the Romans and was then brought before the
R. Governor, where he was tried. The Roman Governor
wished to put him to death, but he said " You can put me
to death but you will more honour if you spare my life."
So after a time he was let go, and the Governor said for his
brave words he was to be well treated.

2. Chester or Castra in Latin meant camp, so therefore in
the word Manchester it is shown that the Romans had a
camp there and that tells us it is a old town.

2. (b] When we use the word Thursday, we are bringing
the old Saxon God Thor into our mind, as it was on this
day that the Saxons worshipped this God.1

(c) When we say the word Saturday, we are again
recalling the old Saxon God, whose name was Saturn, the
planet which we now have, and it was on this day that the
Saxons worshipped their old God.1

3. The Northmen were a wild race who came from
Germany and Denmark, and they were always coming and
invading England as the Saxons had done before them.
Canute was their greatest king and he had many flatterers at
his court, and they said that everything would obey him, the
water, the sun and the moon, etc. So one day he ordered
his chair to be carried to the water's edge and then he said
to the sea " Come no further on my land," but of course the
sea still came on, and his courtiers had to rush and save him
from getting very wet. The Northmen plundered the land
and burnt it, so that the Saxons all wanted to get rid ol
them, and some of the Bishops prayed "From the fury of
the Northmen, good Lord deliver us." *

1 Dictated.

APPENDICES 411

Natural History

i. Earth pillars are pillars of earth generally with a stone
on the top. Where they are now was once all level ground,
but the rain came and washed away the softest clay, then
the sun came, and hardened the other into cracks. Then
more rain came and washed that away, but occasionally
there was a large stone which prevented the water washing
the clay away and there it remained beneath, thus forming
an earth pillar with a stone on the top. When the stone
comes off, the pillar is almost sure to fall down for then
it is no longer protected from the rain.

[Diagram of four earth pillars\

i. (b) A landslip is a large piece of land which has
fallen away from the top of a cliff, or the side of a hill. It
is caused by the rain sinking down through some soil until
it comes to a hard rock, and then more and more rain
coming, it makes a regular little pond or pool. This makes
the foundation of the hill or cliff very unsafe. Then it
begins to fall away, and thus gradually the whole part goes
down, and that is how the landslip is caused.1

i. (c) Pot-holes are round holes at the sides of a water-
fall. They are caused by the water coming down and
bringing little stones with it, and beating them against the
rock on each side of the waterfall, so that it gradually
pounds away the side of the rock till it makes it into a
round hole. If you look in these holes you will generally
find one or two round stones, which have been used by the
water for pounding the rock. When the water has broken
these stones to tiny little bits, it brings others down, which
it uses in the same way, and so it continues to make the
pot-hole.1

I have noticed a waterfall in Ireland gradually cutting

1 Dictated.

412 HOME EDUCATION

itself deeper and deeper into the earth, and carrying down
the rocks from up above.1

3. (a) A rook is a fairly large black bird. It does a
great deal of good to the farmers by eating the grubs which
are in their fields, though it eats a little corn, but it does
much more good than evil. Once several farmers decided
to shoot all the rooks round about, expecting to get a very
good crop, but instead of this they had only a very little
corn, so that they had to induce more rooks to come and
settle there again. Rooks generally fly in flocks. They
make their nests high up in tall trees, and use the same
nests each year, repairing them every now and then in the
winter to keep them all right for the next nesting time.1

3. (b) A starling is also a black bird, but it has bright
colours on the tips of its wings so that it does not look
nearly as black as a rook. It is the smallest of its family,
the crow is the largest. It feeds generally upon grubs,
though it will eat bread and corn when it cannot get other
food. Its eggs are pale blue, and there are from four to five
of them in the nest, which is generally built half-way up a
tree or in old buildings and barns.1

3. (c) A jackdaw is another black bird, though it has
a little grey on the head and a little on the body. It
belongs to the crow family and builds its nest very high up,
and so is very hard to find. The nest is made of straw and
bits of dry grass and other little bits of old stuff. Its eggs
are the same colour as the starling.1

3. (ct) The colours of a thrush are, on the back a browny
grey, the throat and breast are a whity grey with spots of
brown, the tail also brown with a little white and spots
underneath, and the wings are brown like the back. Its
nest is made of dry grass, etc., and other bits of old stuff, and
the inside is lined with mud. Its eggs are generally about
four, occasionally five. They are a beautiful blue colour
1 Dictated.

APPENDICES 413

with spots of brownish black. It sings very beautifully.
Once a little thrush was known to die from having sung too
violently, and by that breaking one of its bloodvessels.1

I have noticed that the thrush sings very loudly, and that
the sort of song he sings is — ' Pretty Mary ' or ' Pretty
Joey.' When we put out crumbs for the birds in the
morning, the thrush does not come so much as the other
birds, such as sparrows and black-birds, etc.1

Scripture

I. i. There had been a law made by the king of Egypt
that all the Hebrew children should be put to death so
Moses' mother took her little babe Moses to the river's side
in a cradle which she had made and pushed it out until it
went into the reeds on the other side. When Pharoah's (sic)
daughter came down to bathe in the river, she heard the
baby crying, and told some of her maids to fetch the cradle
and see what was in it. When she found it was a little baby
she thought she would keep it, as she had none herself.
Before this Moses' mother had put her daughter to watch
what would happen to the baby, and when she saw the
Princess take it, she came and asked if she should get a nurse
for it. The Princess said to the mother " Take this child
and nurse it for me." So Moses was taken into the palace
and nursed there and was treated as a prince.

All royal children were very well educated so Moses was
taken to school and had to study very hard. When he had
learned reading and writing, he went to college at On,
where there was a University and here he studied all the
arts and laws of the Egyptians. We know he was a great
warrior because we told him coming back in triumph
after defeating some of the enemies of Pharoah (sic).

II. i. (a) Jesus was walking along by the Sea of Galilee
when he saw two fishermen, whose names were Andrew and

1 Dictated.

4H HOME EDUCATION

Simon Peter, and they were mending their nets. He
turned to them, wishing them to be his disciples and said
"Come ye after me." So they left their nets and followed
Him.1

(b) Jesus was in Peter's house at Capernaum and as he
healed the people there was a great crowd round about and
a man which had palsy could not get in. So his four friends
which were carrying him lifted him up on to the roof, and
then opened the trap door, and let him down unto Jesus.
When Jesus saw their faith He said " Is it easier to say
forgive thee thy sins," or to say "Arise and take up thy
bed." Then He turned to the man and said "Arise, take
up thy bed and go to thy house." So the man was healed.1

(c) After Jesus had healed the man with the withered
hand the Pharisees took counsel with the Herodians how
they could destroy Him, but Jesus took a boat to sail
across the Sea of Galilee to the other shore. As He was
going, He fell asleep in the boat. When they got about
half-way across a great storm came on, so that the boat was
almost full of water and His disciples were frightened, and
woke Him up and said " Master, save us, for otherwise we
shall drown." Then Jesus woke and said, "Have ye so
little faith, that ye are frightened at this storm." So He
got up, and said to the winds and the storm " Peace, be
still" and the storm ceased, and there was a great calm.
Then the disciples marvelled and said to themselves " Who
is this, that even the winds and the waves obey." l

II. 2. A sower went forth to sow, and as he sowed some
of the seeds fell by the way side and the fowls of the air
came along, and ate them up ; others fell upon rocky places,
where there was no depth of earth, and they sprang up
quickly but when the sun came out it scorched them up —
others fell among thorns and prickles, so that when they
came up, they were choked and could not live, and others
1 Dictated.

APPENDICES 415

fell among good soil and produced fruit, some thirty fold,
some sixty, and some a hundred.1

French History

1. Martin, who was afterwards made saint, came from
Germany. When he was only about ten years old he ran
away from home to become a monk, but he was taken by
the Romans to be made a soldier. One day while he
was a soldier he was coming out of town when he saw a
beggar without anything on him who was asking for alms,
so he took out his purse but he found he had no money in
it so taking his sword he cut his cloak in half and gave one
half to the beggar. In a dream that night he saw God
clothed in half a cloak and He said to the angels
around Him " Martin who is not yet a Christian has clothed
me with his garment." So he took it as a sign that he
should be made a Christian and so he went to the Bishop
and was baptized. After he left the army, he studied some
time in Italy and then came back to Gaul and founded the
first Christian monastery at Tours. He went from place to
place with his disciples preaching and teaching and he was
one of the most famous early Christian teachers.

2. Clovis was one of the great Merovingian kings. When
he was only about sixteen years old, he was made king of
the Franks. After they had been plundering a church the
B! shop of Rheims asked Clovis if he would send him back
a silver vase which had originally belonged to that church,
so Clovis sent back a message saying he would, if it fell to
his share, but otherwise he could not. When all the
treasure was collected, Clovis asked if the silver vase could
be given to him and all agreed but one man, who said that
rather than let him have it, he would break it, so he took
his sword and smashed it in little pieces. This was at
Soissons. Some time after, when he was reviewing his

1 Dictated. Some Scripture answers omitted for want of space.

4l6 HOME EDUCATION

army, he saw the same man that had broken the vase, and
as his sword was hanging not quite properly, he told the
man to right it. As the man was doing so, he drew out his
own sword, and cut the man's head off, saying at the same
time "Thus did you break the vase at Soissons." Later
on, when he was fighting a battle, he was not yet a
Christian, and the fight was going against him, so he called
out " If I win this battle, I will serve the Lord of my wife,"
she being already a Christian, and as he did win, he was
baptized by the Bishop, who had already received the
pieces of the vase which had been broken. As he was
being baptized the Bishop said to him " Adore what you
have burnt, burn what you have adored."1

3. Charles the Great, or Charlemange, as he is usually
called, was one of the very greatest Emperors. His empire
stretched to the mouth of the Elbe in Germany, to the
Theiss in Austria, half of Italy, the whole of France and
a small piece of Spain. He was called the Emperor of the
West, and had been made so by the Pope. There had not
been an Emperor of the West for a long time, there having
been nobody great enough for the position. He was a very
good king, and had schools built all over the country, and
thus he made a Christian empire amidst all the wild races
there. He placed Counts over the different parts to see
that all was done well there, and if they could not manage
anything, they were to send up to Charlemange. He had
also two chief ministers whom he sent round to the different
places to see that the Counts did their work rightly- He
liked to live best at a place in Germany called Aachen, and
it was there he died.1

Geography

i. In going a tour from England through the Medi-
terranean to the Black Sea, I could go first to France, then
to Spain and Portugal, then reach Gibraltar, and on one

1 Dictated.

APPENDICES 417

side be Africa, and on the other Spain, Then I would
see France again and then Italy with the Island of Sicily.
Then I would pass Turkey and Greece, and come to the
Straits of Constantinople, and reaching the Black Sea I
could visit Russia.

2. The boundaries of Austria are —

North, Germany and Russia.

South, Turkey.

East, Russia and Turkey.

West, Adriatic Sea and Italy.
The boundaries of Switzerland : —

North, Germany.

South, Italy.

East, Austria.

West, France.
The boundaries of Greece are —

North, Turkey.

South, Mediterranean.

East, Archipelago.

West, Adriatic Sea.

4. A journey in the lake District would be very beauti-
ful, especially in summer. Derwent-water is the most
beautiful of the lakes, but Windermere is the largest of
all. The Lake District is called the playground of Eng-
land, because people go there to see the glorious scenery.
Tnere are many mountains of which Helvyllen is the
monarch, but Scaw-fell is higher. There are lots of other
mountains with curious names, one is the Pillar another the
Saddle-back, and there is a waterfall there which has a lot
of water rushing down. The poets Southy (sic) and Words-
worth lived in the Lake District, and Southey has written
a poem about the waterfall splashing and dashing. One
of the towns is called Ambleside and from there the coachs
(sic) start for the lakes.

5. A Map of Northumberland.

27

418 HOME EDUCATION

This boy has written the whole of his papers, excepting
where 'dictated' is indicated by the figure ' i.' Children
in Class II. may write part and dictate part of their
examination work, as to write the whole would be tiring
for the younger pupils.

Parents and teachers are so often at a loss as to whether
the work of the children they are teaching does, or does
not, reach a fair average standard, and as to whether their
education is conducted on lines too broad or too
narrow, that these specimens of children's work may be of
use by way of a fair average standard. The programme
of the term's work for each child is given, as well as the
examination questions the children have answered. It will
be seen that the plan of their studies is very much the
same as would be adopted in the case of advanced
students, that is to say, the children read during the term
an appointed number of pages or chapters in a consider-
able number of books written with intelligence. I think
that the style of the children's answers justifies this method
of teaching ; they speak out of a full and satisfying know-
ledge of their subjects. It is astonishing what repose of
mind children gain when they entirely comprehend their
lessons, and that they should remember what they have
fully understood is a matter of course. The little girl
(Appendix C) has dictated all her answers, but sends speci-
mens of her writing and reading. The boy's work is
partly dictated and partly written by himself. I have
indicated the end of each dictated answer. His diagrams,
maps, drawings, are very good. His pointing, spelling, etc.,
have been carefully preserved. Having been educated
upon books for three years, spelling and composition
have come to him as matters of course. Hundreds of
children educated in the same way are constantly producing
comparable results. Some children, as one in fifty, per-
haps, are inveterately bad spellers, but no child taught in
this way fails to compose with ease and vigour. The

APPENDICES 419

habit of narration in ordinary lessons makes the dictation
of answers to examination questions a very simple matter.

I should add that this work is done during morning school,
which lasts two and a half (for the girl) to three hours (for
the boy), out of which time half an hour is given to drill
and play. No preparation is done in the evenings. The
afternoons are spent in field work, handicrafts, etc., but no
book work is done except in the morning school-hours.

Index

Accuracy, 165.

Adam Bede, 69.

Affection as a motive, 144.

Affections, the, 101.

Air, as important as food, 28 ; un-
changed, 31 ; night, wholesome,
34 ; country, 92 ; unvitiated, 93.

Airings, indoor, 33.

Alfred, King, 283.

Alphabet, teaching the, 201.

Ants, how to keep, 57.

Application, habits of, 149, 150.

Arithmetic, the teaching of, 253-
264 ; a means of training, 260.

Arnold, Dr, 175.

Art, pictorial, 307-313.

Artificial reflex actions, 116.

Asser, 283.

Association, a mind at the mercy of,
138 ; the law of, 157 ; a condition
of recollection, 158.

Attention, habit of, 86, 137-149 ;
wandering, 139; to things, 141 ;
what is,? 145; self -compelled.

145-

Audubon, 59.
Augustine, St, 330.
Austen, Jane, 83
Autobiography of Mary Howitt,

248.
Avebury, Lord, 56.

Baby is ubiquitous, the, 126.
Bath, the daily, 36.
Bede, the Venerable, 284, 285.
Beef- tea, 32.

Bible, lessons, 247-253 ; method
of, lessons, 251; recitations in,

lessons, 253 ; the, the chief source
of moral ideas, 336 ; the reading
of the, 348.

' Bird-stalking,' 89-92.

Blood, certain causes affect the
quality of the, 25.

Books, field-lore and naturalists',
62; uses of naturalists', 64;
lesson, 229.

Brain, conditions of healthy, activ-
ity, 20 ; all mind labour means
wear of, tissue, 21 ; a healthy, 96 ;
incessant regeneration of, tissue,
115 ; no limit to recording power
of the, 158.

Bridgman, Laura, 195.

Burns, 126.

Calendars, naturalists', 54.

Carpenter, Dr, 68, in, 1 12, 116, 131.

Cerebration, unconscious, To8.

Change, of occupation, 23 ; the
child's thoughts, 167, 325.

Character affected by acquired modi-
fications of brain tissue, 118 ; the
result of conduct regulated by
will, 320.

Charles II. , 29.

Charts, history, 293.

Child, the estate of the, 1 1 ; divine
estimate of the, 12.

Children, are public trusts, I ; train-
ing of, dreadfully defective, 3 ;
offending the, 13-17; are born law-
abiding, 13 ; must perceive that
their governors are law-compelled,
1 5 ; should have the best of their
mothers, 17; despising the, 17;

INDEX

421

hindering the, 19 ; the faults of,
are serious, 19 ; relationships of,
with God, 19 ; the, walk every-
day, 29 ; out-of-door life for the,
42-95 ; should know field-crops,
51; should follow the seasons,
52 ; should be encouraged to
watch, 57 ; what town, can do, 59 ;
get knowledge by means of their
senses, 65 ; learn from things ; 67 ;
should be made familiar with nat-
ural objects, 69 ; and mother
nature, 78-80 ; require country air,
92; a physical ideal for, 94, have no
self-compelling power, 98 ; are in-
capable of steady effort, 99 ; should
be saved the effort of decision,
I oo ; must not be left to their human
nature, 102 ; habits of, are formed
involuntarily, 105 ; should learn
dancing, etc., at an early age, 113;
should put away their playthings,

130; should be let alone, 134;
should execute perfectly, 159 ;
must have desire to obey, 161 ;

learn, to grow, 171 ; learn, to get
ideas, 173 ; learn, to get know-
ledge, 174 ; literature proper for,
176 ; danger of undervaluing in-
telligence of, 1 86 ; should be
allowed some ordering of their
lives, 194 ; ' only,' 193 ; narrate by
nature, 231 ; enjoy the Bible, 247 ;
should know the Bible text, 248 ;
have art in them, 313 ; should be
taught the way of the will, 326 ;
play with moral questions, 336.

Christ, our King, 350 ; the indwell-
ing of, 352.

Christianity, the essence of, 350.

Christmas Day and other Sermons,
341, 342.

Cinderella, 138.

Classification, first-hand. 63.

Clay-modelling, 313.

Cleanliness, 124, 127.

Climbing, 83.

Clothing, 84.

Cobbe, Frances Power, 102.

Code of education in the Gospels, 12.

Coleridge, 61, 318, 337.

Common sense, 37.

Compass drill, 76.

Composition, 243-247 ; lessons in,
245 ; comes by nature, 247.

Conditions of healthy brain activity,
20-37

Conscience, is judge and lawgiver.
329 ; is not an infallible guide,
331 ; a real power, 332 ; a spiri-
tual sense, 332 ; an undeveloped
capability in children, 333 ; the
uninstructed, 334 ; the instructed,
335 ; a child's good, 335 ; of a
child ignorant, 338 ; instructing
the, 339 ; made effective by dis-
cipline. 340.

Consequences, natural and educa-
tive, of conduct, 148.

Copperfield, David, 69.

Cowper, 22, 86.

Creatures, living, 56-62.

Cul-de-sac, an educational, 89.

Darwin, 107.

Dates in history teaching, 289.

Dawes, the Rev. Richard, 270.

Days in the open, 43.

Decision, a ' conscientious.' 334.

Desires, the, 100.

Desks, 239, 265.

Despising the children, 17-19.

Dickens, Charles, 69, 186, 263.

Dictation, 240 ; steps of a lesson in,

241.
Diogenes and the Naughty Boys of

Troy, 152.
Direction, in geography lessons, 74 J

practice in finding, 75.
Distance, in geography lessons, 73.
Diversion, 324.
Divine life in the child, the, 341-

352;

Drawing lessons, 312.
Drills, 315.
Duty of a child, the whole, 160.

Edge-worth, Maria, 148.

Education, by Herbert Spencer, 4.

Education, traditional methods of,
6 ; code of, in the Gospels, 12 ;
'the reign of law 'in, 37 ; based
upon natural law, 96-134 ; is
the formation of habits, 97 ; in-

422

INDEX

tellectual and moral, 117; infant,
125 ; in habits favours an easy
life, 135 ; a science of, 135 ;
lessons as instruments of, 169-
316.

Educational forces, Love, Law,
Religion, 99.

Educator, problem before the, 103.

Emulation, 143.

Enunciation, 230.

Esau, 40.

Evans, Mr, 69.

Evenings at Home, 265.

Exaggeration, 165.

Exercise, mental, 21 ; daily physi-
cal, 132-134.

Family is the unit of the nation,

the, 5.

Farrar, Dean, 56.
Faults of children, the, 19.
Faust, Marlowe's, 107, 119.
Field lore, 62-65.
Fleming, Marjorie, 223.
Flowers, and trees, $1-56 ; field,

and the life -history of plants, 51 ;

Leigh Hunt on, 53,
Francis, S. , 60.
Free-will and habit, 1 10.
French Home Life, J.
French, the, lesson, 80, 157, 300-

307 ; M. Gouin's method, 302 ;

the Series, 303.
Froebel, 179, 185, 197, 198.

Games, out - of - door, 80 ; noisy,
81.

Garden of Eden, the, 128.

Garments, porous, 36 ; for walks in
bad weather, 87.

Geography, out-of-door, 72-78 ; pic-
torial, 72 ; physical, 73 ; ' dis-
tance,' 73 ; 'direction,' 74 ; use of
compass in, 76 ; ' boundaries,'
77; 'plans,' 77 ; local, 78, 271-
279 ; should be interesting, 273 ;
how to begin, 273 ; maps, 275 ;
general knowledge of, 276 ; par-
ticular knowledge of, 276 ; defini-
tions, 277 ; fundamental ideas of,
277.

God, relationship of children with,

19 ; allegiance to, 38 ; the Law-
giver, 39 ; presented as an
Exactor, 345 ; the knowledge of,
distinct from morality, 347 ; the
Father and Giver, 349.

Gordon, 322.

Gospels, the code of education in
the, 12, 19.

Gouin, M., 304.

Grace, divine, works on lines of
human effort, 104.

Grammar, 295-300 ; a difficult
study, 295 ; Latin, 295 ; English,
a logical study, 295 ; first lessons
in, 296-300

Guide's ' Magdalen,' 322.

Habit, is ten natures, 96-134; the
instrument by which parents
work, 97 ; may supplant nature,
105 ; runs on the lines of nature,
105 ; may be a lever, 105 ; a, is
formed involuntarily, 105 ; forces
nature into new channels, 106 ;
lines of, must be laid down, 107 ;
direction of lines of, 109 ; and
free-will, 1 10 ; rules our thoughts
and acts, no; powerful even
when the will decides, in ; the
physiology of, 1 1 i-i 18 ; the form-
ing of a, 119-124; a delight in
itself, 121 ; stages in formation of
a, 122 ; of music, 133 ; of atten-
tion, 137; of application, 149;
of thinking, 150 ; of imagining,
151 ; of remembering, 154 ; of
perfect execution, 159; of obedi-
ence, 160-164 ; may frustrate the
will, 326 ; of self-management,
328.

Habits, moral and mental, 113;
infant, 124-132; of time ;uid
place, 131; of mind, 135-168;
moral, 135-168 ; training in, be-
comes a habit, 136; inspired in
the home atmosphere, 137 ; slip-
shod, 229.

Hall, Dr Stanley, 198.

Handicrafts, 315.

Havelock, 322.

Head, Captain, 150.

Heidelberg, 159.

INDEX

423

Heredity, 101.

Hindering the children, 19, 20.

History, the teaching of, 279-295 ;

a storehouse of ideas, 279 ;

'outlines,' mischievous, 280;

early, best fitted for children,

281 ; chronicles, 282 ; myths, 284 ;

books, 287 ; dates in teaching,

291 ; narrating and illustrations,

294; 'playing at, '294.
Home, the best growing ground for

young children, 170 ; work, 147.
Honour, the sense of, 128.
Houdin, 86.
Howe, Dr, 195.
Hullah, Mr, 133.
Human nature, 101, 102.
Hunt, Leigh, 53.
Huxley, 23, 116.

Ideas, children learn, to get, 173 ;
grow and produce after their
kind, 173 ; Scott and Stevenson
worked with, 174 ; value of
dominant, 174 ; lessons must
furnish, 174 ; fitting and vital,

Illustrations, original, 311.
Imagination, tales of the, 152 ; and
great conceptions, 152 ; grows,

153-

Imagining, the habit of, 151-154.

Inattention, 229.

Incongruous, sense of the, 151.

Indian Mutiny, the, 335.

Inertness of parents, the, 332.

Influence, outside, 118.

Init ative, the importance of per-
sonal, 192.

Intelligence, the danger of under-
valuing children's, 186.

Intentions, good, and common
sense, 37.

Intimacy with nature, 71.

Intimations of Im mortality, 11-12.

Jerusalem, 82.

Jesus, our Saviour, 351.

Keller, Helen, 194-196.
Kindergarten, the, method, 8, 82,
170 ; the, as a place of education,

178-199 ; the nursery need not
be a, 179 ; field of knowledge
too circumscribed in the, 179;
'occupations,' 180 ; 'sweetness
and light' in the, I So; further
considerations of the, 182-199; a
false analogy, 189; Miss Sullivan
on the, 195; the, in the United
States, 196 ; Mr Thistleton Mark
on the, 197 ; Dr Stanley Hall on
the, 198.

Kindergartnerin, the mother the
best, 178 ; the true, 185, 188.

Kindness, 339.

Kingsley, 58, 71.

King's Somborne School. 268.

Knowledge, nature, 61 ; attractive-
ness of, 145 ; the doctoring of the
material of, 172 ; children learn,
to get, 174 ; diluted, 175 ; Dr
Arnold's, as a child, 175 ; of God
distinct from morality, 347.

Landseer, 309.

Law, reign of, in education, 37 ;
1 mind ' and ' matter ' equally
governed by, 39 ; antagonism to,
shown by some religious persons,
39 ; and love as educational
forces, 99 ; ensures liberty, 164.

Laws of health, 16 ; of the intel-
lectual and moral life, 1 6.

Laws of Thought, Thompson's,
150.

Lesson, must recall the last, each,
156 ; books, 229.

Lessons, attractive, 141 ; as instru-
ments of education, 169-316;
must furnish ideas, 174.

Life of Wesley, Southey's, 200.

Life, out - of - door, 92-95 ; the
divine, in the child, 341-353.

Light, solar, 94.

Literature, proper for children,
176.

Lives, law - abiding, often more
blameless than pious, 38.

Livingstone, Dr, 101, 274, 275.

Logic, J. S. Mill's, 261.

Lucy, Wordsworth's, 33.

Lycidas, 225.

Lying, three causes of, 164, 165.

424

INDEX

Macaulay's schoolboy, 30.
Magnetism in the teacher, personal.

188.

Malmesbury, William of, 283.
Manners, good, 132.
Mansoul, the government of, 317.
Maps, 275 ; the meaning of, 278.
Mark, Mr Thistleton, 197.
Marlowe, 119.

Masterly inactivity, 5, 134, 192.
Mathematics, the preparation for,

263.

Maurice, F. D., 341, 342.
Meals, concerning, 25 ; talk at, 26 ;

variety in, 27 ; out of doors, 42.
Memorising, 224.
Memory, a 'spurious,' 155; a

record in the brain substance,

'55-

Men, grown, lose habit of observa-
tion, 69 ; power will pass into the

hands of scientific, 71.
Mental effort, rapid, 149.
Mental Physiology, Dr Carpenter's,

68, in, 112, 116, 131.
Method, a way to an end, 8 ;

kindergarten, 8 ; a system easier

than a, 9.
Methods, traditional, of education,

6.

Mill, J. S., 261, 323.
Miller, Miss, 217.
Mind, labour means wear of brain,

21 ; and matter equally governed

by law, 39.
Modesty, 128.
Modifications, acquired, of brain

tissue, 1 1 8.

Monmouth, Geoffrey of, 285.
' Mooning,' 147.
Moore, the Rev. H. A. , 270.
Morell's Introduction to ATaital

Philosophy, 68, 329.
Morley, Professor, 283.
' Mother-games ' too strenuous for

children, 190.
Mother, the, the best kindergart-

nerin, 178.
Mothers, owe a 'thinking' love lo

their children, 2 ; form their chil-
dren's habits involuntarily, 105 ;

and teachers should know about

nature, 64 ; must refrain from
too much talk, 78.
Music, the habit of, 133, 314.

Narrating, the art of, 231-233.

Natural philosophy, 264-271.

Naturalist, mental training of a
child, 6l.

Naturalists' books, 64.

Nature, diaries, 54, 62, 65 ; work
most important for young chil-
dren, 61 ; especially valuable for
girls, 62 ; mothers and teachers
should know about, 64 ; the
teaching of, 65 ; intimacy with,
makes for personal well-being,
71 ; what is, 100 ; plus heredity,
101 , elemental notion of human,
IOI ; plus physical conditions,
102 ; human, the sum of certain
attributes, 102 ; as an educator,
1 86 ; danger of supplanting, 191.

Neatness akin to order, 130.

Newton, Sir Isaac, 54.

Nightingale, Florence, 322.

Nose, a sensitive, 125.

Notation, 257.

Nourishment, mental, 24.

' Nurse,' 18.

Obedience, habit of, 128, 160; no

accidental duty, 161 ; must be

expected, 162.
Object lessons, 67.
Observation, discriminating, 47 ;

grown men lose habit of, 69 ; in

winter, 85.

Occupation, change of, 23.
Offending the children, 13-17.
Opinion, the force of public, in the

home, 58.

Order, habit of, 129.
Overpressure. 66, 146.
( )sborne, George, 243.
Othello, 4.
Out-of-door life for the children,

43-45-

Oxygen, has its limitation, 30 ;
the essential proportion of, 92.

' racing,' 73.

Palace Tales, by H. Fielding, 296.

INDEX

425

Paradise Lost, 24, 226.

Parents, may offend by disregarding
laws of health and of the intellec-
tual and moral life, 16; must ac-
quaint themselves with principles
of physiology and moral science,
40 ; the trust of, must not be
supine, 104 ; must lay down laws
of habit, 107 ; must expect obedi-
ence, 162; must reflect on subject-
matter of instruction, 169 ; must
sow opportunities, 192 ; inertness
of, 331 ; have some power to
enthrone the King, 341 ; must
present idea of God to children,
343 ; must not make blundering
efforts, 344 ; must select inspiring
ideas, 346 ; must teach only what
they know, 346.

Parents' Review, the, 270.

Paul, St, 322.

Persistence, 122.

Persons, born with the same primary
desires and affections, all, loo,
101 ; the requirements of, 186.

Perspiration, free, 35; insensible, 35.

Pestalozzi, 2.

'Picture-painting,' 48-51; method
of, 48 ; a strain on the attention,
48 ; fully and in detail, 49 ; the
mother's part in, 49 ; a means of
after solace, 50.

Picture-talk, 309.

'Plans' in teaching geography, 77.

Plato, 185.

Pleasures connected with frost and
snow, 85.

Phtarch's Lives, 233, 286.

Possibilities of a day in the open,

43-
Power, no limit to the recording,

of the brain, 158.
Priestley's, Dr, Lectures on History,

176.

Printing, 234.

Problems in arithmetic, 257.
Pronunciation, careful, 206.
Prospero, 30.
Punch, 94.
Punishments, 148.
Purity, 128.
Pussy Box, 222.

Reading, 199-222 ; at sight, 204 ; the,
of prose, 204 ; ordinary method of
teaching, 206 ; the first, lessons,
207-222 ; by sight and by sound,
214 ; handwriting, 214 ; arbitrary
symbols, 215; sentences, 218;

. moral training in, lessons, 221 ; for
older children, 226-230; the habit
of, 227 ; aloud to children, 227.

Recitation, 222-226.

Recollection, 154 ; and the law of
association, 157.

' Red Indian ' life, 88.

Reflex actions may be acquired,
artificial, 1 1 6.

Regularity in infant education, 131.

Religion as as educational force, 99.

Religious instruction, 347.

Remembering, 154.

Rest, 22 ; after meals, 22.

Reverence, for life, 62 ; 166.

Rewards, 148.

Reynolds, Sir Joshua, 314.

Richter, J. Paul, 88.

Robinson Crusoe, 152, 187, 232.

Rondes, 82.

Rosamund and the Purple Jar, 148.

Ruskin, 155, 263, 312.

Scott and Stevenson worked with

ideas, 174.

Scott, Sir Walter, 223.
' Sight-seeing,' 45-48 ; how to do,

46 ; educational uses of, 46.
Simpson, Sir James, 185.
Singing, 314.

Skipping-rope and shuttlecock, 83.
Smith, Adam, 333.
Smollett's History of England, 175.
Soul, the functions and life of the,

342 ; what is the life of the ? 343.
Southey's Life of Wesley, 200.
Spelling, early, 203 ; bad, 240 ;

the rationale of, 241 ; causes of

illiterate, 243.

Spencer, Herbert, 3, 4, 265.
Steele, Richard, 223.
Sullivan, Miss, 195.
Sun, the, 73.
Sunshine, 34.

Swanwick, Miss Anna, 225.
System easier than a method, A, 9.
28

426

INDEX

Table for little children, a, 240.

Tact, 122.

Teachers, should know about nature,
64 ; must lay down laws of habit,
107 ; mediate too much, 188 ;
must sow opportunities, 192.

Temper, 1 66 ; not, but tendency,
166 ; new habit of, 167.

Tennyson, 52, 63, 69, 330.

Tests applied to children's lessons,
four, 177.

Text-hand, 235, 238.

The Ancient Mariner, 61.

The Heir of Redcly/e, 323.

The Mill on the Floss, 69.

Theology, nursery, 20.

Thermopylae, 187.

Thhigs, children learn from, 67.

Thinking comes by practice, 153.

Thompson's Laws of Thought, 150.

Thought, persistent trains of, 114.

Thoughts, think themselves, 108 ;
change the child's, 167.

Time-tables, 142.

Tin tern Abbey, 50.

Tolstoi, the childhood of, 182.

Tonic Sol-fa, 314.

Training, of children 'dreadfully
defective,' 3 ; of ear and voice,
133 ; mental, of a child naturalist,
6l ; of a just eye and faithful
hand, 180 ; in habits becomes a
habit, 136.

Tramps in wet weather, 87.

Transcription, 238-240.

Trees and flowers, 51-56; the
study of, 52.

Trench, Archbishop, 55.

Truth, essential and accidental, 249.

Truthfulness, 164, 165.

Tuileries, The, 59.

Ulysses, 187.

Vanity Fair, 243.
Ventilation, 33.

Walks, in bad weather, 85-88;
winter, 85 ; garments for, 87.

Watchfulness, 122.

Weighing and measuring, 259.

Wesley, Mrs, 199.

Wilfulness, what is ? 321.

Will, 317-329; executive power
vested in the, 317 ; what is the, ?
318 ; persons may go through life
without deliberate act of, 318 ;
three functions of, 319; wilful-
ness indicates want of, power,
320 ; the, has superior and inferior
functions, 321 ; the, is not a
moral faculty, 322 ; the, must be
disciplined, 322 ; the sole practi-
cal faculty of man, 323 ; how the,
operates, 323 ; the way of the,
324 ; power of, implies power of
attention, 326 ; habit may frus-
trate the, 326 ; how to strengthen
the, 327 ; education of the, 329.

Word-making, 202, 203.

Words a weariness, 141.

Wordsworth, II, 12, 33, 50, 69, 79,
1 88.

Work, definite, in a given time,
142.

Writing, 233-240 ; position in,

239-
'W. V.,'i88.

Zambesi, the tribes of the, 101.
Zeal must be stimulated, 149.

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