CHAPTER VII. THE MISSION OF THE SCHOOLMASTER. PROLOGUE OF QUOTATIONS. "The cause of education is the cause of liberty. Nature and Providence point it out as the great means of human improvement. Let us all endeavour to give to our School Committees a loftier pitch; to inspire into the teacher a more generous ambition, and stimulate his exertions by giving him a still nobler estimate of high vocation. Let us attempt to move every individual in the community to a better sense of his obligations to aid in the cause of public instruction." S. G. GOODRICH.-" Fireside Education." "Teachers address themselves to the culture of the intellect mainly. The fact that children have moral natures and social affections then in the most rapid state of development is scarcely recognised. Such elevation of the subordinate-such casting down of the supreme -is incompatible with all that is worthy to be called the prosperity of their manhood. In such early habits there is a gratification and proclivity to ultimate downfall and ruin. If persevered in, the consummation of a people's destiny may still be a question of time but it ceases to be one of certainty. HORACE MANN, "First Annual Report of the Board of Education of Massachusetts." CHAPTER VII. Right Estimate of Educational Power-Objections to Education-Evidence taken by Mr. Chadwick illustrating its Benefits to the Workman-Importance of Moral Education-Education and Crime-Intemperance and Education-Sweden-Norway-Glasgow-The Fable of the Syrens-Influence of Education on Holland-The Schoolmaster-Duty of Elevating the Profession-The End of Learning-Milton-Dr. Channing-Degradation of Children-Ragged Schools-Old House in Pye Street-The Old Stable-Auxiliaries to the Schoolmaster. EVERY essay on the people, every treatise on political economy, at this time is incomplete which does not include, as one of the most important elements of the social state, education. We have already seen that the foundation of the people's sorrows is in a diseased moral condition. Education, therefore, is prominently insisted on, because if properly interpreted, it is the readiest means of access to the moral nature of the classes it seems so desirable to elevate; it is not that the possession of certain elements of knowledge, the power to read and to write, are magical, and that the possessor of such knowledge has an amulet, a sacred charm hung round the spirit; but knowledge, it is well known, enlarges the soul, it gives to the mind more correct apprehensions and more noble dispositions; it seems on the whole impossible for a man to obtain even the first rays of true instruction without also enlarging the boundaries of his moral being for power, if not for goodness. Hence the foundation of all improvement is said to be in judicious education; it ennobles and dignifies a man, it makes him of worth to himself, puts him in the way for obtaining ideas, makes them a source of worldly value, and infinitely curious and beautiful speculation to him; education holds the enchantment of power, it is the surest means of making even the poorest man an excellent citizen, it will by dignifying him set him beyond the contagion of corruption, by exalting and purifying his tastes it will compel him to select his companions with greater care, as he will seek in them education and taste similar to his own; this at once girds the soul for warfare, and trains it to stand in the attitude of moral defiance by which it may meet the assault and achieve the victory. Every other system of improvement will be successful, just as it sends education before it as its herald. is true too that the educated man has a preservative against crime and vice which an uneducated man has not. It is further true that the soul of the educated man expands to the time and the occasion, and he is better fitted to avail himself of all opportunities for uplifting himself from his condition. Finally, we may say, that education is at once the soul's eye and hand, that by which it sees and holds, it is a knowledge of the means of Providence, and how to use them. But while this is conceded, it must It |