178 Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



such discourses resemble too often the banquets of the theatre, where the 



seemingly rich viands are painted pasteboard, and the choice wines only 

 coloured water. 



The result of four, five, or six years preparatory instruction is easily 

 given. Our pupil has gone through Mayor's Spelling Book, but he is unable 

 to write an ordinary sentence in English without several mistakes in spelling. 

 ITe can multiply and divide abstract numbers with great inaccuracy, but has 

 no idea of applying this knowledge to any question in concrete numbers. He 

 knows that the earth is like an orange, with a band round it called the 

 equator. He can repeat the names of some towns in foreign countries, but 

 does not know where they are situated. He can read, if one may so call a 

 repetition of words, with no idea of the sense. He can repeat the nine parts 

 of speech, just as in ancient times men learned to repeat the letters of the 

 alphabet as a charm against witchcraft. What more he learns is of so vague 

 a nature that it cannot be specified, such as that King Alfred let cakes get 

 burned and was well scolded, or that another king killed six of his wives. 



When we consider how much the child learns by the natural vigour of 

 his own mind before he goes to school, and how little he gains during his early 

 instruction, the conclusion must be that some improvement is necessary. He 

 went to school to increase his knowledge of the world around him, and during 

 five years he learns nothing from his teacher about distinction of colours, 

 nothing about shape or figure, nothing about animals, trees, or flowers. In 

 no respect are his perceptions quickened or his ideas enlarged, but on the 

 contrary they are impaired from lack of use. It is really lamentable to find a 

 naturally vigorous mind seriously injured by this absurd system. 



u If not so frequent would not this be strange, 

 That 'tis so frequent this is stranger still." 



The first instructor of a child seems, in most cases, not to know that 

 memory is cultivated in any other way than by constant repetition of the 

 words where the association is formed by sound alone. But before the child 

 went to school he had constantly employed the higher methods of association 

 of time, of place, and of cause and effect. That the memory works by these 

 laws must not only be known to the instructor, but he ought also from the 

 constant habit of employing them in his own studies unconsciously to impart 

 them to the pupil. 



It is most essential that a child should early become acquainted with the 

 powers of the mind he possesses, not by name, but by actual employment of 

 these powers; this is the greatest boon that a teacher can bestow. The 

 opinion is gradually gaining ground that a competent teacher is as necessary 

 for a child of four years old as for a boy of fourteen : but until most men 



