A Liberal Education 53 



and pleasure would be at his elbow telling him to do 

 this and avoid that; and by slow degrees the man would 

 receive an education, which, if narrow, would be thor- 

 ough, real, and adequate to his circumstances, though 

 there would be no extras and very few accomplishments. 5 



And if to this solitary man entered a second Adam, 

 or, better still, an Eve, anew and greater world, that of 

 social and moral phenomena, would be revealed. Joys 

 and woes, compared with which all others might seem but 

 faint shadows, would .spring from the new%elations. Hap- 10 

 piness and sorrow woirW tale the place of the coarser 

 monitors, pleasure and pain; but conduct would still be 

 shaped by the observation of the natural consequences 

 of actions ; or, in other words, by the laws or the nature of 

 man. 15 



To every one of us the world was once as fresh and 

 new as to Adam. And then, long before we were sus- 

 ceptible of any other mode of instruction, Nature took 

 us in hand, and every minute of waking life brought its 

 educational influence, shaping our actions into rough ac- 20 

 cordance with Nature's laws, so that we might not be 

 ended untimely by too gross disobedience. Nor should 

 I speak of this process of education as past, for any one, 

 be he as old as he may. For every man, the world is as 

 fresh as ij was at the first day, and as full of untold 25 

 novelties for him who has the eyes to see them. And 

 Nature is still continuing her patient education of us in 

 that great university, the universe, of which we are all 

 members Nature having no Test-Acts. 



Those who take honors in Nature's university, who 30 

 learn the laws which govern men and things and obey 

 them, are the really great and successful men in this 

 world. The great mass of mankind are the " Poll," who 

 pick up just enough to get through without much dis- 



