April 15, 1887.1 



SGIBNCE, 



369 



you not call it on Sundays, when you preach, the 

 temple of the spirit ? " I am speaking, gentlemen, 

 of geography, and economics, and hygiene, as 

 school-subjects, and on which a fifth or sixth 

 form boy would be held to waste his time. And so 

 on I might go for pages, criticising existing prac- 

 tice, in the light of general principles, and sug- 

 gesting the materials to be used for the making of 

 a true man. So potent are general truths, so keen- 

 ly practical is philosophy, so penetrating are tru- 

 isms. It is life that truly educates us : it is the 

 revelation to the young mind of moral and spirit- 

 ual ideas in their prosaic but fruitful relations to 

 the hard facts and stern duties of common day, 

 that is the main purpose of the great English pub- 

 lic school, as of all schools. Can any one who has 

 looked at the records of our law courts for the past 

 seven or eight years believe that this instruction is 

 not needed? Can any one believe that it is con- 

 tinuously given? 



But let me pass on to consider the bearing of 

 this by no means, I hope, inapt or inept introduc- 

 tion, to the special question which heads this ad- 

 dress. 



By the common consent of all nations, as well 

 as of physiologist?, the life of the body and the 

 mind of man falls into three periods, — the period 

 up to 7, that of the infant school ; the period to 

 14, that of the primary school ; and the period 

 from 14 to 21, that of the secondary school and 

 the university. These, I think, may again be sub- 

 divided thus : to the age of 5, the age of 5 to 7, 

 from 7 to 11, from 11 to 14, from 14 to 18, from 

 18 to 21. But I do not propose to deal here with 

 these various subdivisions, but to confine myself 

 to the larger divisions which we have agreed to 

 call primary, secondary, and university. 



Now, let us get hold of some leading idea which 

 shall give us at once guidance and a criterion of 

 judgment at all these stages. That idea I believe 

 to be contained chiefly in the word ' nutrition,' — 

 in the primary stage nutrition of feeling, inner 

 and outer, that is to say, of the emotions within 

 and the realities of sense without, and through 

 these, training, with a minimum of discipline ; in 

 the secondary stage again, nutrition through the 

 hard facts of life and the presentation of concrete 

 ideals, and through these a maximum of disci- 

 pline ; in the university stage still nutrition, but 

 now through ideas, with self-discipline as the 

 necessary pathway to the apprehension of ideas. 



And here I must try to distinguish between 

 training and discipline, terms often confounded. 

 If I carry a child through the explanation of any 

 object of knowledge, step by step, in the true 

 logical order of that explanation, and, repeating 

 this again and again, finally cause him to repro- 



duce the process, I am calling into activity his intel- 

 lectual powers in the order in which they alone can 

 truly comprehend. I am thus training him. If, on 

 the other hand, I call upon him to apply past knowl- 

 edge to the explanation of some new thing, I dis- 

 cipline him. For example : the geologist may 

 explain to me a section of the earth's surface by 

 exhibiting in logical sequence the causes whose 

 operations have made it what it is. As often 

 as I follow him through this explanation my 

 faculties are at work in their natural order, and 

 I am thereby trained. But if the same geologist, 

 knowing that he has conveyed to me through his 

 past instructions, principles and causal forces, 

 takes me to a new section of country and calls on 

 me to map it and explain it, he disciplines me. 

 Again : in the moral sphere which concerns doing 

 under the pressure of motives, when I lead a 

 child by the hand and guide him to the feeling of 

 the right motive, and to action in accordance with 

 it, I train him. When I throw him on his own 

 resources, and, withdrawing my fostering hand, 

 call on him to do his duty, which means to sacrifice 

 inclination to the moral ' ought,' — to offer up self 

 to virtue, — I discipline him. Training is the 

 peculiar virtue of the primary school. In intel- 

 lectual and moral training there is the following 

 of a stronger on whom the weaker leans : in dis- 

 cipline there is the self-exertion of will in the 

 face of difficulties, this will being the root of our 

 distinctive humanity. Training may make a well- 

 disposed youth, but it is discipline alone that 

 makes him strong, virile, — a will, a man. Dis- 

 cipline is the peculiar virtue of the secondary 

 school. 



When the primary and secondary schools have 

 attained their end, we have a great result truly ; 

 but, after all, our pupil is as yet only a man 

 among men, a capable, upright citizen, it may be. 

 That is all, though much. He is fit for more than 

 this, however. He can rise above mere world- 

 citizenship, and become a citizen of a city not 

 made with hands. The divine in him — his spirit- 

 hood as distinguished from his mere man:-hood — 

 claims fellowship and kindred with God. He can 

 rise to the contemi^lation of ideas, and regard 

 them face to face. The true is an idea : it is the 

 motive inspiration of scientific inquiry. The beau- 

 tiful is an idea : it is the subtle perception of the 

 music of creation. The good is an idea : it is the 

 comprehension of the harmony of the universal 

 movement. When man attains his full stature 

 and to communion with ideas, he raises his head 

 above the vaporous clouds of earth and breathes 

 an 'ampler ether, a diviner air.' He now be- 

 gins to see the cosmic order as truly a spirit- 

 ual order, and, returning to the ordinary life 



