Bates. — 0?i the Training of Teachers. Ill 



This is a loftier and truer teaching. The instinct of progress 

 has not been implanted in us merely to be balHed and disap- 

 pointed. We know that the future, whatever it be, will 

 emerge from the present as the present has emerged from the 

 past. But the Muse of history, if we are to put any faith in 

 her teachings, seems to bid us look with confidence to the 

 future where lies the golden age. " History is the best tonic 

 for drooping spirits." 



Even if completely successful, democracy will not fulfil 

 the expectations of those who are loudest in its praise. It 

 cannot turn life into a playtime. Strenuous effort, labour — 

 patient, steady, intelligent — will be as necessary as ever. All 

 the virtues which have marked man's advance hitherto will 

 still be indispensable. In all that makes life noble and really 

 useful the prize will be to him only w^ho strives. Competition 

 may conceivably be lessened, but that should be only to set 

 free our energies for employment in other directions. 



Let us interest ourselves in politics if we will : it is, 

 indeed, our duty to do so. But let patriotism govern our 

 political ideals and actions. Above all, we should remember 

 that national strength and greatness can never be attained, 

 nor can they endure, if our lives are divorced from morality. 



Art. XIV. — The Training of Teachers for Primary Schools. 



By the Eev. J. Bates. 



[Read before the Auckland Institute, 5th August, 1895.] 



In this colony, as in other democratic communities, the State 

 has assumed the responsibility of providing schools for ele- 

 mentary education. It would seem as if the democratic 

 movement was under some necessity to ally with itself 

 popular education. At any rate, the two go together. In 

 England, Germany, France, Switzerland, the United States, 

 and in the colonies of Australasia it has been the special care 

 of the several Legislatures to devise and establish systems of 

 primary instruction. Large sums of money are freely voted 

 and expended annually on education, and the demands on the 

 public purse under this head keep ever growing. Some of the 

 best intellects are busily employed in adapting the various 

 systems of education to the requirements of the people, and, 

 as fresh educational wants make themselves felt, strenuous 

 efforts are made to satisfy them. In view of these facts, 



