EDUCATION. 



external care. The instruction of which we have 

 given an outline is an instruction intended to 

 bring out man's powers to perfection, as far as 

 that can be done. But the child of the poorer 

 classes must not merely be trained to manhood, 

 but he must be trained to earn his daily bread. 

 And the problem thus becomes : Given only a 

 limited period for instruction, and given the 

 certainty that the child must work with his hands 

 for his livelihood, what is the best training to be 

 given him ? 



Now, we may regard it as a settled matter that 

 the school is not the proper place for training 

 him for a trade. All investigations shew that the 

 trade is best learned by apprenticeship. In 

 certain countries where it has been thought good 

 for the people to establish new industries, as in 

 Belgium, schools teaching these industries may be 

 established with beneficial effect. But these are 

 special cases. At the same time, as the child is 

 to work on matter for his livelihood, it is plain 

 that such a knowledge of the phenomena of 

 matter as he can acquire ought to be imparted 

 to him, that he may be able to act in his trade 

 not only by rule but with intelligence. But 

 the special aim of instructing him is to make 

 him preserve his manhood in the midst of his 

 trade. His trade has a narrowing influence. It 

 subjects him to the continual recurrence of the 

 same sort of activity, and the same ideas. But it 

 is intended that he should be more than a trades- 

 man that he should be a citizen and a man. 

 Accordingly, it is the business of the common 

 school to give all the instruction possible within 

 the period, in order that he may realise his re- 

 sponsibility as a citizen of an empire and as a 

 man. He is therefore to be taught reading, 

 writing, singing, and ciphering. He is to know 

 the geography and history of his own country, 

 and to have some general ideas of the history 

 and progress of mankind. Above all, the school 

 should furnish him with a strong moral disci- 

 pline, producing in him habits of punctuality 

 and neatness, and instilling into him love to 

 his fellow-men and to God. As his instruction 

 stops at a period when he is not fit to grapple 

 with abstract ideas, it must be carried on con- 

 cretely : by concrete examples, by living illustra- 

 tions, by actual occurrences. But his instruc- 

 tion should not end here. There should be schools 

 of improvement in the evening, where he could 

 resume and carry on the studies which he had 

 commenced in the day-school. The proper organ- 

 isation of such schools is one of the questions of 

 the day. A great deal could be done in these 

 improvement schools to give the working-man 

 instruction in the history of his country and of the 

 other nations of the earth, in making him ac- 

 quainted with the masterpieces of literature of all 

 ages, and in enabling him to see the working of 

 the laws of political economy and sociology. It 

 would be easy to sketch out a course which 

 would considerably make up for the necessity 

 under which he lies of giving up his instruc- 

 tion at an early age, and working for his bread. 

 But there is great difficulty in getting the right 

 men to undertake the work of instruction. And if 

 the instruction in such subjects is not given by 

 men who are masters of them, and know how to 

 teach, it may not only do no goody but may be 

 productive of much harm. 



Supposing that the child can have his instruc- 

 tion prolonged to sixteen or seventeen, but not 

 much longer, how are we to treat such cases ? 

 Here again the instruction cannot be complete 

 for want of time. And we must endeavour to 

 make the most of the necessities of the case. We 

 ask ourselves what does the pupil intend to be ? 

 and how far can the school help him? The 

 answer here is somewhat different from the 

 answer given in the last case. The pupil is to 

 act on matter for his livelihood, but his action is to 

 be less mechanical and more spiritual. His suc- 

 cess in his trade will depend on the dexterity with 

 which he can apply his knowledge of nature to the 

 actual wants of mankind. The school can give 

 him considerable insight into nature and into the 

 applications of scientific knowledge. Accordingly, 

 he will make the natural sciences in their applica- 

 tions and mathematics special objects of study. 

 But as the citizenship and the manhood are above 

 the trade, he will study the language and literature 

 of his own country. He will try to extend his 

 knowledge of human nature, taking Latin to enable 

 him to have clearer notions, and adding some one 

 or two modern languages, that he may know the 

 relations of the states of Europe to each other. 

 Schools intended for this class are in existence on 

 the continent, and we are beginning to attempt 

 them. The pupil may continue his instruction 

 after he has left the school by studying more 

 thoroughly all the sciences and their applica- 

 tions to human life ; or by selecting one or two, 

 and devoting special attention to them. For this 

 purpose technical colleges have been instituted 

 abroad, and the Scottish universities to a con- 

 siderable extent discharge the same function. 



For those who are able to pursue their culture 

 without having regard to the means of earning 

 their livelihood, and for those whose professions 

 demand nearly a purely human culture, there are 

 schools whose main business is the study of Latin 

 and Greek. These schools, by a perversion that 

 occurs continually in human nature, are apt to 

 forget the main aim of their existence, and to 

 raise the means into an end. It is not because 

 Latin and Greek are the final aim of these schools 

 that these languages are taught. Latin and Greek 

 are reckoned the best instruments of culture only 

 for a special period, the period from eleven to 

 nineteen, and they are so reckoned because they 

 bring into full play the faculties of the youth, and 

 they give him literatures exactly adapted to his 

 years that is, they afford him the best oppor- 

 tunities of studying human nature in a profitable 

 manner. But these studies should never be 

 carried on exclusively. They are a preparation, 

 as we have seen, for the study of our own greatest 

 writers, of what is best and most profound in 

 English literature. They lead up to a deeper 

 comprehension of our own social arrangements. 

 And they lay the best foundation for philosophical 

 studies. They ought, therefore, to be accom- 

 panied by a knowledge of English literature and 

 history appropriate to the stage of the student. 

 They ought to be tempered with a due mixture of 

 these studies, the natural sciences, and mathe- 

 matics, which impress the mind most strongly 

 with invariable order. In fact, here, as in every 

 other case, education must not be one-sided, but 

 equable and harmonious. 



The student then passes to the university. It 



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