THE SPIRIT OF MANUAL TRAINING. 445 



measure out a suitable penalty in addition. The same effort can 

 "better be applied to an attempt to show the boy why a certain 

 line of conduct is wrong, and the greater beauty of the right. All 

 appeals are avoided which involve in any way the fear of conse- 

 quences. This applies not only to the discipline of the school but 

 also to questions of scholarship. The system of daily marking 

 has been abolished, and an attempt made to substitute the natural 

 and proper motive for study in place of the lower and artificial 

 one. No rod, either mental or physical, is held over the boy. 

 Solomon was the great advocate of that system of government, 

 but, judging from the subsequent behavior of Rehoboam, it has 

 been suggested that it was not a success even in the hands of so 

 wise a man. The school is to prepare for life, and in life things 

 are not conducted in that way. The difficult art of governing 

 one's self can best be learned if the practice begins in boyhood. It 

 becomes increasingly difficult to choose the wrong as one recog- 

 nizes more and more clearly that the offense is primarily against 

 one's own nature, and can meet forgiveness only by self -atone- 

 ment. The deepest philosophy of life thus forms an essential part 

 of the curriculum of a manual training school. I do not believe 

 that a school conducted in this spirit ever graduates a boy who 

 feels that he is escaping from restraint when he leaves the school. 

 He is under the eye of an ever-present master, who judges with 

 increasing culture, not according to appearance, but righteous 

 judgment ; for that master, if the school has been successful, is 

 himself. We feel justified in subordinating the less serious ends 

 of education to this one supreme end ; for conduct, as Matthew 

 Arnold says, is at least three fourths of life. It is the essence of 

 religion, the material of men. 



In thus seeking to reach the inner sources of conduct and 

 achievement, the manual training school renders an inestimable 

 service if it succeed in arousing boys to think for themselves, and 

 in making them the guardians of their own destiny, working 

 under divine law. But the work of the school does not end here. 

 The occupations of life which open before its graduates are varied 

 and numerous. There is something for all talents, however di- 

 verse. A school which produces men must so train its boys that 

 they will be competent to take some definite and acceptable part 

 in this complex activity. The selection of the right part to be 

 taken is a matter of no small moment. It must be made ulti- 

 mately by the boy himself, but he is as yet so young and so inex- 

 perienced, it is no wonder that many men declare in after-life that 

 they have mistaken their vocation. Unless his genius be of the 

 pronounced type which knows its future from the very cradle, 

 this selection, all-important as it is, is extremely difficult to make. 

 The boy needs help and friendly counsel. To prevent the enor- 





