88 A LIBERAL EDUCATION ; 



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5. A certain amount of regularity, attentive 

 obedience, respect for others : obtained by fear, if 

 the master be incompetent or foolish ; by love and 

 reverence, if he be wise. 



So far as this school course embraces a training 

 in the theory and practice of obedience to the 

 moral laws of Nature, I gladly admit, not only 

 that it contains a valuable educational element, but 

 that, so far, it deals with the most valuable and 

 important part of all education. Yet, contrast 

 what is done in this direction with what might be 

 done ; with the time given to matters of compara- 

 tively no importance; with the absence of any 

 attention to things of the highest moment ; and 

 one is tempted to think of Falstaff's bill and " the 

 halfpenny worth of bread to all that quantity of 

 sack." 



Let us consider what a child thus " educated " 

 knows, and what it does not know. Begin with 

 the most important topic of all morality, as the 

 guide of conduct. The child knows well enough 

 that some acts meet with approbation and some 

 with disapprobation. But it has never heard that 

 there lies in the nature of things a reason for every 

 moral law, as cogent and as well defined as that 

 which underlies every physical law ; that stealing 

 and lying are just as certain to be followed by evil 

 consequences, as putting your hand in the fire, or\ 

 jumping out of a garret window. Again, though 

 the scholar may have been made acquainted, in 



