EDUCATION, AS IT IS AND AS IT SHOULD BE. 69 



ed with all the faculties of human nature, but none of them developed, 

 — a bud not yet opened. When the bud uncloses, every one of the 

 leaves unfolds ; not one remains behind. Such must be the process 

 of education. No faculty in human nature hut must he treated with 

 the same attention, for their co-agency alone can secure success." 

 Which of the Pestalozzians has been Pestalozzian here ? Again : — 

 " The strictest attention should he paid to the shades of individual 

 character and talent." Notwithstanding this especial injunction, the 

 Pestalozzians make it a boast that all their pupils have received the 

 same treatment! It is an injunction disregarded by general consent; 

 not fifty Pestalozzis could have enforced attention to it : nothing hut 

 Phrenology could do so. 



Now, however, we come to a point more important than the rest ; 

 one, indeed, which includes all the others. In an article of mine 

 which appeared some time ago in The Analyst,* the following pas- 

 sage occurs : — " I think it may safely be affirmed that, if a pupil does 

 not advance in his studies, or does not advance so quickly as he 

 should, the fault is never his own ;" and, after bringing proofs of 

 this, I conclude : — " I contend, therefore, in every case in which the 

 pupil remains stationary, or advances but slowly, the cause must be 

 referred either to the ignorance of the teacher, or to the mal-organi- 

 zation of the pupil's brain." This was stigmatized by Pestalozzians 

 as dangerous, &c. Judge, then, of my surprise when I met with the 

 following passage of Pestalozzi : — " The interest in study is the first 

 thing which a teacher, and, in the instances before us, which a mother, 

 should endeavour to excite and keep alive. There are hardly any 

 circumstances in which a want of application does not proceed from a 

 want of interest, and there are, perhaps, none under which a want of 

 interest does not originate in a mode of teaching adopted by the 

 teacher. I would go so far as to lay it down as a rule that, whenever 

 children are inattentive, and apparently take no interest in a lesson, 

 the teacher should always first look to himself for the reason." Here 

 is the same idea, in nearly the same words, by Pestalozzi himself I 

 He even goes further than I did, for I divided the blame between the 

 teacher and the organization ; Pestalozzi throws it justly almost en- 

 tirely on the former. I mention this to show how impossible it is 

 that the mere dicta of any individual, however illustrious or success- 

 ful, can place a subject like education on a firm foundation ; for his 

 followers, overlooking his precepts, will merely shelter their own ab- 



• Vol. ii., i>. 413. 



