Kemp. — On the Medical Aspects of Education. xxxi 



the principles that should guide them, and how frequently is failure the 

 issue. 



I had intended, had time allowed, to have spoken of the influence of 

 school life upon the sight and figures of children, showing how they are 

 injured from ignorance of the proper size and position of seats, desks, and 

 windows. I must, however, pass them over in silence, thou.gh it ought to 

 be carefully considered in all schools, as the seeds of short sight and curva- 

 tures of the spine are almost always, I might say always, laid at school. 



In conclusion I wish to guard myself against the charge of undervaluing 

 education and mental training ; I value it in the highest degree ; all I wish 

 to insist on is that it shall be carried on j^ari passu with physical training, 

 and that the peculiar tendencies possessed by individual children shall be 

 more carefully studied, and the amount of work given to those children 

 ordered accordingly. 



The last time I had the honom* of addressing you in this room on the 

 subject of the education of children, I tried to point out to you some of the 

 evils which are attendant upon the present system of school training — how 

 it fails to make any allowance for differences of temperament and disposition 

 in children ; what little chances a boy or girl, who has an inherited ten- 

 dency to nervous disease, insanity, consumption, or heart - disease, has, 

 under present existing school life, to outgrow such tendencies ; indeed, there 

 is almost the certainty of developing them into activity; how, during school 

 life, so little attention is paid to physical training, the great aim being to 

 develope the mental powers to the utmost, at the expense even of physical 

 health ; how the high competitive examinations of advanced schools and 

 colleges are fraught with infinite danger to those who engage in them, 

 because they demand more of their pupils than they can be expected to give, 

 without at the same time injm-ing their brains and nervous systems ; and 

 how much more strain and demand is put upon the mental powers of 

 growing children than ought to be pu.t upon them. I purpose this evening 

 to pursue the subject further, and endeavour to show you when pressure 

 may with safety be put upon children, and also to show how sight and figure 

 are injured, from ignorance of those laws which should be observed in order 

 to preserve school children from affections of the eyes and spine. 



The first question, then, that presents itself for our consideration is, 

 When may we with safety put pressure upon a child ? It is obvious that 

 no answer can be given to this question, which shall be of universal appU- 

 cation ; for so many circumstances have to be considered, that each case 

 must be carefully studied and our answer framed accordingly. "We aU know 

 that probably no two children are exactly alike in temperament, habits, power 



