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C( 2z5?
SACRED HISTORY
AS A BRANCH OF
ELEMENTARY EDUCATION.
PART I.
ITS INFLUENCE ON THE INTELLECT.
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT,
MOUNT PLEASANT, RAMSGATE.
Price, Sixpence.
�I
�SACRED HISTORY
AS A BRANCH OF
ELEMENTARY EDUCATION.
UGHT the teaching of Sacred History, in its tra
ditional and biblical form, to be approved of or
maintained in the primary schools of a free and pro
gressive people 1
Such is the question which I propose to discuss.
Thus stated, it does not address itself exclusively to
any one nation, nor to any one Church. It is not a
criticism of one denomination, nor of one school-system
more than of another. It has no special reference to
the religious instruction of Catholics or Protestants as
such. Important and interesting for all sects and
parties alike, it is addressed alike to all, and the dis
cussion of it ought to be entirely free from party spirit
and sectarian prejudice.
To avoid misunderstanding, it may be well, here, at
the outset, clearly to define and to circumscribe the
subject proposed for consideration. The position which
I am to maintain would be utterly absurd, if it were
extended beyond the limits which are assigned to it by
the very title of this essay. There is no question, there
can be no question here, of any but the popular Sacred
History,—of Biblical History as it is commonly taught
O
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Sacred History :
in schools, and as we have all learned it in onr child
hood. I declare formally that I am not to treat of the
Bible, nor of Biblical History, as viewed in relation to
the science of Religion, as studied in our universities,
in our theological halls, and generally in the higher
walks of learning, by the light of comparative philology,,
of archaeology, and of all the other sciences which are
now made subservient to the science of history.
I most expressly restrict my subject to the now pre
vailing popular primary teaching of Biblical History;
and I shall accordingly take for reference, not this or
that learned work of historical, critical, or exegetical
interpretation of the Bible, but only the authorized
translation of it, which every one possesses, and which
is used in our schools.
It will be seen that this question, though bearing
closely upon the highest theological doctrines, presents
itself here in a totally different relation; for it turns, in
the first place and chiefly, upon a practical problem of
popular education. The discussion of such a question,
however various may be the opinions held regarding it,
ought to be cordially welcomed by every man in a free
country such as this, where true progress is universally
desired.
It is not difficult to discern and to state the principles
by which we ought to be guided in this discussion; and
there can scarcely be any dispute about these principles
when stated. All must agree that education, in every
stage from the lowest to the highest, ought to have a
twofold purpose—the culture of the intelligence, and that
of the moral conscience. Such ought especially to be
the design and the aim of the primary education which
addresses itself to the children of the people, among
whom, in the majority of cases, it is not likely to be
followed up by any other regular instruction. Before
these children, who can scarcely be expected to have
afterwards either the time or the means for completing
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
7
or correcting the ideas which have once been inculcated
on their minds, a teacher ought to say nothing, do
nothing, inculcate nothing, which may not have a good
effect npon the intellect or upon the heart,—nothing
but what may contribute to teach them either to think
aright or to act aright. To make men:-—\his is the
glorious task of the teacher in modern society. To
make men, is to develop, in the youths committed to
his care, enlightened intellects and upright consciences.
It is from this twofold point of view that we propose
to consider the study of Sacred History; it is by its
effects upon our two essential faculties, the intellect and
the conscience, that we propose to judge it.
I. The
influence of
Sacred History
upon the
DEVELOPMENT OF THE INTELLECT.
Let us put ourselves in the position of a child who
is being taught sacred history, and endeavour to
realize and explain to ourselves the ideas of Humanity,
of Nature, and of God, which will thus be conveyed
to the mind of the child, in these three great depart
ments which complete the cycle of human thought.
Let us see, first, how the modern idea of humanity
will harmonize with that of a sacred history.
What is the meaning of this expression, sacred
history ? Wherefore sacred 2 In what respect is it
more sacred than other histories ? Is it that it will
present to us the ideal of sanctity or holiness in action?
Is it a history of the purest, the best, the most virtuous
men ? This title of sacred history would be intelligi
ble, if applied to a book which should present to our
view a gallery of portraits worthy to serve as models
to humanity, a series of biographies, such as those of
Joseph and of Moses among the Hebrews, of Aristides,
and of Socrates among the Greeks, of Cakyamouni in
Hindostan, of the great Roman Stoics, of the Christian
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Sacred History:
martyrs and missionaries, of a Spinoza, of a Luther, of
a Vincent de Paul, of all those in short who have lived
and died for the defence of their faith, their reason,
their conscience, their earnest convictions. We might
thus have an admirable collection of the benefactors of
the human race, of men devoted to their duty, taken
impartially from all periods, from all peoples, and from
all creeds. But these exalted and noble lessons are
not what men call sacred history. This history is thus
named, not on account of the holiness of the precepts,
or of the examples which it contains, but because it is
the history of a people who were not, like others, left
to their own resources, of a people who received, from
God himself, revelations, promises, supernatural lights,
who were, in a word, the “people of God.”
What idea is the child to derive from this title
alone ?
His first impression, if left to himself, will be that
God, like men, has His favourites, His proteges; that,
by an entirely unmerited choice, He honoured with a
special affection and care one nation to the exclusion of
all others. The child, with his simple, direct, and
wholesome logic, will say exactly what Calvin said.
“ Certainly,” wrote the great Reformer in his energetic
freedom, “ in that God of old adopted the seed of
Abraham, He has given a sufficiently clear proof that
He did not love the whole human race equally.
Having rejected all other nations, He loved one
alone.
He restricted His special love to a small
number, whom He was pleased to choose from among
the rest.” It is well known that, up to our own time,
this theory has been frankly accepted by the theologians
called orthodox. In these days, however, when it is
clearly becoming impossible to maintain such a theory,
a peculiar explanation has been adopted. The doctrine
of absolute predestination, which Calvin consistently
made the chief corner stone of the orthodox system, is
now rejected by many theologians as incompatible with
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
9
morality: and it is said that all nations and all men
have an equal share in the love of God,—that the
■provisional and exceptional election of the Jews is not
a privilege,—that Israel is chosen only as an instru
ment, not for himself, but for the benefit of the whole
human race,—as a monitor whom God employs for the
general instruction of all His children. Supposing this
latter interpretation to be the true one, it would in
some degree be a reply to the moral objection of the
Divine partiality, which we shall repeatedly find again;
but it does not at all remove the historical objection,
which is that the sacred history causes the child to
conceive a thoroughly false idea of humanity, by the
very fact that it teaches him to divide human history
into two parts, the one sacred, the other profane ; the
one, in which God speaks, acts, and shows Himself
directly or personally on every page; and the other,
in which He does not thus interfere, and in which He
acts only by the operation of natural laws.
Until recently, it was considered orthodox to see in
ancient history, the reign of God in Israel, and the
reign of the devil everywhere else; but it is now more
generally thought correct to recognise a negative pre
paration among the Gentiles, as well as a positive pre
paration in Israel. It is thus assumed that there have
been two distinct kinds of divine revelation, all the
other nations having been enlightened only by the dim
and indirect rays of natural light; while the Jews, on
the contrary, were alone privileged to be in constant
and immediate communication with God himself. See
how much is implied in the mere expression—sacred
history.
I do not at present inquire whether this notion can
be reconciled with that of divine equity; but I ask
whether it can be for a moment maintained in the face
of history. History now enables us to say with full
assurance, that humanity is one, in all the diversity of
its families; and that God, who is also One, has
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Sacred History :
spoken to man always and everywhere by the same
means, and in the same forms. He is the Father of
all men and of all nations, and has not shown himself
to some, nor concealed himself from others, any more
three thousand years ago than to-day.
The Jews, indeed, affirm that they received, from
God himself, revelations of an entirely special and
supernatural kind, which are recorded in the Bible.
But the Brahmins, the Budhists, the Parsees, and I
may say all the nations of the east, are no less positive
in affirming the same pretension. There is not a single
nation of Asia, ancient or modern, which has not its
Bible, or which does not declare that it is the holy
people—the chosen people of God; not one which, in
support of this exceptional “ calling and election,” does
not appeal to miracles, to numerous interventions of
the Deity, to the testimony of thousands of their best
men, and finally to books divinely inspired.
When among so many Bibles, among so many Words
of God, you take that of the Jews as absolutely true,
and declare those of all other nations absolutely false,
can you say, in all sincerity, that you have investi
gated, with equal attention, patience, and seriousness,
the claims of all these nations to this pretended revela
tion—to this pretended office of “ special instrument ”
of the Deity? Especially with reference to primary
instruction, is it not manifest that neither the pupils
nor the teachers are in a position to make this com
parison between the Hebrew Bible, the Veda of India,
the Avesta of Persia, the Koran of the Arabs, and the
other sacred books of the East ? They are virtually
forced to regard the Bible as an isolated monument,
without even dreaming of the possibility of tracing the
connection between the sacred codes of the various
ancient religions. The children do not know, and,
according to the present system, nine-tenths of them
will never know, that there are as many sacred histories,
and as many chosen peoples, and as many divine revela-
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
11
tions, as there have been, nations in the east, and almost
in all antiquity. By far the greater number, thanks to
this early instruction, will probably remain, all through
life, ignorant or misinformed regarding the fundamen
tal idea of human history—the natural progressive
development of all the human races, a development
which each of them attributes in the first place to a
miraculous revelation, but which the comparative his
tory of civilizations shows to be governed by law's
common to all, according to a general plan of divine
providence.
But how can the immense religious superiority of
the Jews, over all other ancient nations, be explained
on historical and natural grounds ?
In the first place, this superiority is neither so
decided nor so manifest, except to minds which are
unacquainted with the study of the ancient civiliza
tions. It is quite superfluous to say that, if we select
the most beautiful of the Psalms, or the purest and most
admirable pages of the Prophets, to be compared with
some gross form of fetichism, or of primitive idolatry,
if the Jehovah of Isaiah be opposed to the Jupiter of
Lucian, our minds may well be impressed with the
contrast. But take a wider view. Compare the moral
precepts of the Mosaic law with those of Zoroaster, or
of Manu,—the Hebrew poems with those of the Big
Veda; trace and remark the analogies of almost all the
prescriptions relating to manners, to legal defilements,
to ablutions, to the whole system of ritual, among the
Persians for example, and among the Hebrews. It
will then be found that the imaginary abyss of separa
tion has been nearly levelled up; and, instead of an
immense contrast, there will remain only inequalities
of various degrees. The Hebrews will have the advan
tage upon one point, the Persians upon another, and
upon a third the Hindoos, or the Egyptians.
Let us, however, forget for a moment that the mono
theism of Zoroaster is as real, if not as precise, as that
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Sacred History:
of the Hebrews; that the Persians and Parsees, no
less than the Hebrews, have had a horror of any
sensible representation of the Deity; that charity was
recognized and preached in India at an earlier date than
in Judea; that the appreciation and esteem of purity,
of holiness, and of labour, were more ancient, and pro
bably also more complete, among the Persians than
among the Jews ; and that numerous passages can be
quoted from the Vedas, or from the Yatpias, which
would sustain, in moral sublimity, a parallel with the
most admirable pages of the Bible.
Let us forget for a moment all these patent facts,
and many others similar, which might be noted, and let
us suppose that, in religion, the Jews have had, over the
rest of humanity, a clear superiority, equal to that, for
example, which the Greeks have had in the domain of
aesthetics. Would it be absolutely necessary, in order
to explain such a difference, to place that nation out
side of the common conditions of humanity, or to intro
duce for them alone the supernatural into history 1 If
you can explain, without any miracle, the genius of a
Homer, or of a Phidias, as well as that of a Zoroaster,
of a Budha, or of a Confucius, why should the same
explanation not apply to the genius of a Moses or of
an Isaiah ?
Seriously, whether we consult our own common
sense, or whether we examine the past, can we believe
that this same God, who now speaks to all men in the
same language, employed a few centuries ago extra
ordinary means, to make himself known exclusively to
a small Semitic tribe dwelling in Palestine, while, over
all the rest of the globe, the thousands and millions of
human creatures, whom He had there brought into
existence, were left by Him to grope in darkness 1 If
we desire to give to our children our cherished modern
idea of the unity, equality, and fraternity of men of
every race, and of every time, of every colour, and of
every clime, is it wise or right to teach them to behold
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
13
in the past some nations abandoned by God, and others
enlightened by Him, a handful of elect specially sur
rounded with miraculous cares, and all the rest,—that
is to say almost the totality of the human generations,
—deprived by God of these exceptional favours ?
Confining ourselves to this general criticism of the
dualistic character, which sacred history introduces into
the notion of humanity ; let us now see whether it will
give to our children better instruction upon the subject
of nature, and whether it will impart to them a more
correct idea of the physical than of the human world.
I shall not here formally enter upon the question of
the supernatural. Although perfectly convinced, for
my own part, that there have never been, in any time
nor in any place, more miracles than are now to be
seen in our daily life, I respect and would not unneces
sarily offend those persons who still to some extent
believe in the supernatural. Thank God, history
shows us, with sufficient clearness, the progress of
humanity in this question. From age to age, the
supernatural steadily loses ground. At the commence
ment of civilization all is prodigy,—the thunder, the
wind, an eclipse, a comet, the smallest meteor. By
degrees, in proportion as men come to understand a
little better the causes or the nature of such phenomena,
the circle of miracle becomes narrower; until at length,
as among Christians of the present day, men feel them
selves compelled to refer miracles to a remote period of
legendary antiquity, there to wait until another step of
progress be accomplished, which shall cause them to be
entirely renounced. Let us patiently and hopefully
await, from the force of events and the development of
humanity, the final fall of the few, frail, and ruinous
refuges of supernaturalism which still survive. Hu
manity moves, and is now again stirring itself; but
God guides the movement, and, notwithstanding every
obstacle, He will assuredly cause yet another stride on
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Sacred History:
wards to be taken in due time. It is only a question
of time, and it is useless for us to struggle passionately
against it.
But, without pausing to inquire what degree of
belief still generally retains its hold upon the minds
of men, and judging it more useful to regard the matter
from the believers’ point of view, let us seek to ascer
tain what part ought to be assigned to miracles in
education, especially in that of the children of the
people. However much you may believe in miracles,
I would say to a believer, yet you regard them only
as exceptions. You of course acknowledge that in
general the world is guided by invariable, inflexible,
universal laws. Would it not be well to maintain the
same position in the instruction of childhood ? Is it
not necessary to insist infinitely more upon the rule
than upon the exception ? In the first place, thoroughly
impress upon the child that there are laws of nature;
and let his mind, which is so readily inclined to fantasy,
be familiarized with those laws, and accustomed to seek
everywhere and always the physical explanation of
phenomena. After this has been done, it will be soon
enough to teach him, if you think it right to do so,
that in a very small number of extraordinary cases, two
or three thousand years ago, some revocations of or de
partures from those immutable laws have taken place.
If, on the contrary, at the age when his reason is still
so tender, so pliant, and so unsteady, you speak to him
continually of miracles and of prodigies, there must be
great danger of reversing the parts, of making him take
the exception for the rule, and, worst of all, of banish
ing from his mind the idea of seeking for the rule.
It ought to be borne in mind that reflection has to
be learned by the child. His spontaneous conception
of everything is under the figure of a material image ;
and, “as he has not yet any notion of the true condi
tions of knowledge and of certainty, his faith is in
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
J5
proportion to the effect produced upon his imagination,
and not in proportion to the evidence. He believes in
what is marvellous more easily than in what is simple.
The extraordinary is not only most interesting, but
also most convincing to the mind of a child. Miracle
is the thing which he most readily comprehends. It is
sufficient to make a strong impression upon his imagina
tion in order to convince him. The more brilliant the
colours, the more readily will his young genius be
captivated therewith. Nurses know this instinctively,
and hence their incredible stories often remain graven
in the memories of children, while reasonable and
probable narratives make little or no impression.
Phantoms have a much stronger hold than realities
upon the minds of children; ghosts are to them much
more formidable than living men; and fantastic pic
tures make a far stronger impression than the clear and
distinct reality.” These reflections of a great modern
philosopher explain how very difficult it is for a child
to acquire the idea of a Nature governed by regular
laws, and not by miraculous caprice.
Such being the instinctive propensity of a child,
must it not be injurious to the development of his
reason to implant in his mind at first, as the basis of
intelligence, a thick stratum of the marvellous, which
cannot but tend strongly to stifle the faculty of
rational reflection, of which the culture and the growth
are already so difficult and so slow 1 This is precisely
the danger which, in my opinion, is presented by
sacred history. Taking possession, as it does, before
any other history, of the still vacant mind, it widely
diffuses and plants therein a taste for the miraculous,
instead of furnishing an antidote to that taste already
by nature so strong.
Recall to mind the impressions of your childhood,—
your first lessons of sacred history. You will find that
these fall into two great classes, both belonging to the
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Sacred History:
marvellous ; on the one hand legends, and on the other
miracles properly so called.
By legends, I mean narratives which believers them
selves can no longer take in the literal sense, but are
now constrained to regard as allegorical, while attribut
ing to them a symbolism as profound as they may wish.
Bor example, Adam and Eve are placed naked and
innocent, in a delightful garden, at the centre of which
two mysterious trees spread their boughs. Do you
remember their magical peculiarities ? The one is the
tree of life, the other gives the knowledge of good and
evil. All at once a reptile, the serpent (for, do not
forget, Genesis does not say that this serpent was the
devil,—a personage who does not make his appearance
in the Jewish religion until a very much later time;—
it says merely that it was “more subtile than any
of the field,” Gen. iii. 1),—the serpent, then, caused
our first parents to eat the fruit of one of these trees.
It was the tree of knowledge ; and you know that, as
soon as they had eaten that fruit, it had indeed the
effect of making them know what they had till then
been ignorant of. Then, says the Bible :—
Gen. iii. 22-24.—“ The Lord God said, Behold, the man
is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now,
lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life,
and eat, and live for ever; therefore the Lord God sent
him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from
whence he was taken. So he drove out the man; and he
placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and
a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way
of the tree of life.”
Surely it cannot wound the religious feelings of my
readers to enquire simply, whether any of them can
here believe the Bible in the literal sense. Who can
now be found to maintain that there really did exist
two trees of which the magical fruits had these virtues,
the one to make man think, and the other to render
him immortal ? Who ever imagines now that the
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
17
knowledge of good and evil, which we all in some
degree possess, is actually derived, as Genesis says it is,
from a certain fruit eaten by our first parents 1 Who
can believe that God drove man out of Eden, for fear
that he should steal for himself immortality, as he had
already stolen knowledge ?—No one, assuredly. It is
so little believed, that, among modern theologians, it
is now generally thought necessary to apply a fanciful
interpretation to the whole of this primitive legend.
It has also been argued by some that it is impossible
to determine clearly what portion of this picture ought
to be taken literally, and what in a figurative sense.
Perhaps so; but that is precisely the character of a
myth. The phrase magical fruit, as here employed,
may be objected to, because there is no such expression
in the Bible; but then is not this one tree called the
tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and that other
the tree of life ? These words must either signify
nothing, or else they suppose qualities very different
from those of ordinary trees. Doubtless you may
spiritualize all this •, but then, who hinders you from
doing the same with all the analogous myths of the
Vedas and of the Avesta? If you were to give this
story to the children, as you in reality take it your
selves,—as a beautiful myth,—as an ancient and
simple legend, enveloping a great moral truth, it might
then be all right and proper. But was it necessary
that God should intervene to dictate only myths ? If
so, what difference, of any value, can you establish
between the Word of God and mythology1? Among
two neighbouring nations you find the same cosmogonic
allegory under different forms more or less poetic : in
the one case it shall be only an imposture, while in
the other case it is celestial truth ! Is this reasonable?
Without insisting upon a crowd of other myths, to
which the same or similar reflections would apply, let
us come to the miracles properly so called.
May it not be said that the most important function
B
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Sacred History:
and aim of instruction ought to be, to make children
early practise the habit of putting to themselves always
these two questions,—WHY ? and HOW ? It is only
thus that they can acquire the knowledge that the things
which they learn from their teachers or from their
books, are truths and realities; and this alone is true
knowledge. It is only thus that they can be educa
tionally inspired with that thirst for the knowledge of
all things real and true, which is the mainspring of
human progress. It is only thus that their reasoning
powers, the highest faculties of their minds, can be
exercised, disciplined, trained, and developed.
But will a history composed of miracles, that is to
say, of things which cannot be explained—of which it
is impossible to know the why and the how ;—will such
a history tend to encourage or to extinguish the scien
tific curiosity of a child ? It has, to all his questions,
a stereotyped reply, which cuts short the spirit of
investigation:— Why.?—Because God willed it. How?
—As God willed it.
It is the peculiar character of the Semitic peoples,
and especially of the Jewish race, to disdain secondary
causes, and to prefer always, overleaping all intermedi
ate steps, to ascend at once to first principles, or to the
great First Cause. The necessary consequence of this is
a general want of relish for the detailed study of facts,
for the scientific observation of nature, for comparative
criticism and analysis. Ask an Arab how the grass
grows, how the stream flows, what produces earth
quakes, famines, or epidemics,-—a thousand similar
questions; and he will reply to you, astonished at your
ignorant curiosity,—Allah is Allah. Is not the reason
and cause of everything a decree of God ? What is the
use of climbing step by step in the series of secondary
causes ? Why not accept the will of God as a univer
sally sufficient explanation ?
This is exactly the effect which sacred history inevi
tably produces upon the intellect of childhood. It
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
J9
accustoms the mind to dispense with the laborious
investigation of the how and the why, causing it to
refer things directly to God without any other explana
tion. Instead of being trained to see God in all those
secondary causes and natural laws, by which He con
stantly manifests himself to us,—instead of being made
to perceive that every pathway of science leads straight
up to the Author of all, the child is led, through the
irregular eross-roads and by-ways of miracle, to seek
God chiefly by imagination, and is hindered from
learning that He is rather to be found by reason on the
one hand, and by conscience on the other.
Suppose that a pupil were to ask the question,—
Why and how could there be a universal deluge 1—■
Instead of having imparted to him a few scientific
notions as to the natural character and physical causes
of the great changes and revolutions of the globe, his
legitimate and wholesome curiosity will be snubbed and
repulsed, and he will be instructed to behold and to
wonder at the act of God, whereby “the fountains of the
great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven
were opened,” (Gen. vii. 11). Will not that child be
very much enlightened ?
When the account of the appearance of the rainbow
after the deluge is the Bible-lesson for the day; this
might be a favourable opportunity for making the chil
dren understand, in opposition to their natural propen
sity for seeing miracles everywhere, that there is
absolutely nothing at all supernatural about the rain
bow, and that it was quite in the nature of things that
a rainbow should be produced at the time, for example,
when the rains of the deluge ceased. But listen to the
explanation of the matter which they will be required
to accept:—
Gen. viii. 13.—“ And it came to pass in the six hundredth
and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month,
the waters were dried up from off the earth.”
Gen. ix. 8-17.—“ And God spake unto Noah, and to his
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Sacred History:
sons with him, saying, And I, behold, I establish my cove
nant with you, and with your seed after you; and with
every living creature that is with you: . . . neither shall
there any more be a flood to destroy the earth. And God
said, This is the token of the covenant. ... I do set my bow
in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant be
tween me and the earth : and it shall come to pass, when I
bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in
the cloud; . . . and I will look upon it that I may remem
ber the everlasting covenant between God and every living
creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.”
I do not insist upon the significance of this latter
clause, which, taken in its literal sense, as it must be
taken by children, will represent to them God looking
upon His bow in order that He may remember His
covenant. The myth, which is here put in the place
of natural causes, is of small importance for wellinformed persons, but the truly important consideration
is that it is presented to children as an absolute fact,
and that they are thus taught and accustomed to rest
satisfied with merely chimerical explanations of natural
phenomena.
What must be the influence of a primary education,
which turns thus continually upon an inexhaustible
stock of marvels 1 How can we expect the intellectual
faculties of our children to be awakened, confirmed and
developed, if, to all their questions about the nature of
things, the only reply is this,—God is God, and He is
omnipotent.
Master, the child will say, is it really true that there
have been men who lived more than 900 years ? Is it
really true that one or two men have ascended up to
heaven in a chariot of fire ? That two or three others,
being actually dead, have come to life again ?—What
presumption to ask if these things are true ! How can
you be so wicked as to doubt it ?—They are written in
the Bible.
Master, how can a she-ass speak?—Everything is
possible to God.
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
21
But that cruse of oil which never failed nor was
exhausted, how was that?—God is all-powerful.
And how could Jonah have been able to live three
days and three nights in the belly of a fish?—My
child, if the Bible said that Jonah swallowed the whale,
instead of being swallowed by it, it would still be
necessary to believe it.
It is thus that, while wishing to teach our children
to honour God, and to believe His Word, they are in
reality taught to learn nothing, but to bend their minds
in passive submission to this modern and Protestant
form of the worst feature of Popery,—the Bible says
so, or the Bible does not say so.
I have often heard it said that there is nothing
which children learn more willingly than sacred history.
I can easily believe it ; for, excepting fairy tales, there
is nothing better suited to please their childish minds :
it is so full of prodigies ! But will the recounting of
prodigies convey genuine instruction to the children?
Will they thus be taught to think, to reflect, to observe,
and to search always for truth and reality ? Or will
the influence of such teaching be exactly the reverse ?
You see it is a practical question, demanding the
most serious consideration. The teacher of a primary
school is in the presence of children, by far the greater
number of whom cannot be expected to acquire in after
life any regular knowledge of the natural, physical, or
mathematical sciences. It must certainly be injurious
to make such children believe that one day, at the end
of a battle between two Asiatic tribes, in order to con
fer upon a Jewish captain the signal advantage of
slaughtering a few more fugitives, God actually caused
the sun to halt in its diurnal motion through the sky,
and to stand still for “ about a whole day,” and that
He moreover set to work, (for the Bible says so, and
the children will take it in the most literal sense,)
to “cast dozen great stones from heaven,” (hailstones)
whereby more of the fugitives died than those who
�22
Sacred History:
were slain by the victorious Israelites. (Josh. x. 11-13.)
To confirm the impression of this prodigious miracle as
a literal fact upon their minds, the children will
probably be reminded of another occasion, when,
touched by the prayers and tears of a sick king who
had been told that he was about to die, God relented
so far as to promise him a supplement of fifteen years
of life, and, as a sign that the promise would be ful
filled, “ He brought the shadow ten degrees backward,
by which it had gone down in the dial of Ahaz,” (2
Kings xx. 11); “So the sun returned ten degrees, by
which it was gone down,” (Isaiah xxxviii. 8).
What man of common sense, if he will only give the
matter a serious thought, can ever be persuaded that
this profusion of miracles, bidding defiance to all the
conclusions of human reason, and even to the laws of
mathematics, is a wholesome education for the minds
of children, ignorant, credulous, imaginative, and con
fiding, who will probably never afterwards be in a
position to acquire a scientific notion of the laws of
nature, and to whom therefore and henceforth, it will
seem, as it did to the primitive peoples, quite natural
that a miracle should, at any moment, interfere with
and upset the regular course of nature ?
There are, however, some teachers who, on the con
trary, maintain that nothing is better fitted to form the
intellect and to improve the mind of a child, than the
study of miracles. The miraculous is, according to
them, one of the best means of culture. Such a thesis
can only be maintained by those who do not properly
understand what a miracle is. If a child sets himself
to reflect upon the miracle of Isaiah or of Joshua, how
ever little he may have been taught of the elements of
cosmography, it will immediately occur to him that, if
the Sun (or the Earth) had stood still or gone backwards
in space, there must have thence resulted, in instant
succession, throughout vast systems of worlds, endless
perturbations, huge catastrophes, universal destruction ;
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
23
and, rather than, suppose such impossibilities to serve
no purpose but to favour a petty Jewish king, or to
complete the massacre of a troop of Amorites, a child
who has been truly taught to reflect will think of these
miracles exactly what you think of those of all re
ligions, except your own.
It is impossible to find any mode but one, of recon
ciling the miraculous with good instruction ; and that
is to explain it, or, in other words, to deny it; and
this is what even the believers are now, in some
measure, forced to do. In these days, for example,
even among the orthodox, you will find very few
persons who believe in the plagues of Egypt. It is
not now uncommon to hear even fervent defenders of
miracle explaining, that these plagues arose from natural
causes which occur in Egypt every year but in smaller
proportions; that frogs, lice, locusts, water resembling
blood, etc., are well known there; and that the Bible
narrative only shows us God giving to these facts a
proportion and a fitness, which raised them to the
sphere of the miraculous. Well, be it so ; but having
once entered upon this path, how far are we to go ?
With regard to the passage of the Red sea, the
physical possibility of this famous miracle may be
explained to the children by the action of the tides
combined with violent winds. As to the manna and the
quails it may be said that in winter innumerable flocks
of quails reach the warm countries, and that the manna
appears to have been the savoury fruit of a shrub which
grows abundantly in thedesert of Arabia. Elsewhere, the
teacher may explain to his pupils that the art of discover
ing springs of water, and of rendering the water drink
able, still continues to be a requisite qualification for the
guide of an army or of a tribe in the sands of Arabia, etc.
It is thus that some of our Protestant theologians
are now disposed to treat sacred history, while others,
more conservative, are ready to exclaim,—Take care
what you do, to explain a miracle is to reject it, and
�24
Sacred History:
all the miracles hang together, so that if you reject
one of them, you reject them all.
Very true; and, likewise, if you adopt one of them,
you adopt all the others. Human history is one great
book, of which every page is full of miracles. How
can the supernatural be preserved whole and entire in
a single one of these pages, when it is banished with
out hesitation from all the others? Tf God has
performed miracles among the Jews, why deny that
He may have done the same among the Hindoos and
among the Persians, among the Celts and among the
Germans, as the ancient writings of all these peoples
abundantly affirm that He did ?
Then you had better say at once that, in the name of
science and through hatred of the supernatural, you mean
to deprive us of the whole Bible, Old and New Testaments.
No, this discussion has no tendency whatever to
deprive you of the Bible, but only of the superstition
of the Bible. Even you who profess so absolutely to
revere the Bible as the “Word of God,” do you think
it would be difficult to make you confess that you
reject many passages of it as containing indefensible
errors? Do you believe, for example, that the hare
and the rabbit are ruminants ? It is not merely Moses
however, it is God himself who, according to two
formal texts of the Bible (I speak always of the Bible
which is in every hand), directly affirms that both these
animals chew the cud, (Lev. xi. 4-6; Deut. xiv. 7).
If there be one single error in the Bible, there may
be two, there may he ten, and we thenceforth differ
from one another only about a question of number;
which amounts to saying that no person can any longer
maintain the absolute infallibility of the Bible; and,
if it contains errors, then there is nothing, even from
the believers’ point of view, to hinder us or them from
regarding the supernatural as one of these errors.
Upon the third point, it is often affirmed that sacred
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
25
history abundantly compensates, in precious advan
tages, for all the objections which can otherwise be
brought against it. There are many who admit that
it presents deficiencies and inaccuracies with regard to
the knowledge of humanity and of nature, while main
taining its entire perfection with regard to the know
ledge of God.
I do not forget that Biblical history, suitably treated
from the Christian point of view, often serves admir
ably to impress upon the children these two grand ideas,
—that of the one God, and that of the living God.
Even here, however, is there not some illusion ?
Among the men of three or four thousand years ago,
the notion of God evidently was not, could not be,
that which it has become with the progress of humanity.
In the earliest times of which the vestiges have been
preserved to us in certain books of the Bible, it bore
the stamp of a rude anthropomorphism. But, however
rude it may have been, it is not we who shall forget
that, in its time, anthropomorphism was a progress,
and that it marked the first dawn of religious and
philosophical thought.
We do not at all wonder to see God humanized in
the most ancient pages of this same Bible, in the later
portions of which we shall find the purest and highest
expression of the religious sentiment, precisely because
we know that the Bible is neither an exceptional book,
nor even the work of one single period ; but merely a
collection of Hebrew literature from its first attempts
to its highest development.
In the earliest portions, everything bears the trace
of a primitive social state, everything there has, so
to say, the tone and the aspect of childhood; but by
degrees the images change, the symbols are purified,
and the worship, as well as the literature of the nation,
becomes more elevated and more spiritual. If this
development be taken into account, the differences
which appear between Genesis, for example, and the
�q.6
Sacred History:
poetic writings of the later period, are not greater nor
more surprising than the interval which separates the
Niebelungen from Klopstock and from Goethe, or than
the contrast between the “ legends of the round table ”
and the works of our modern historians. If, on the
contrary, this successive and progressive character be
abstracted from the books of the Bible, then sacred
history becomes a chaotic mixture of sublime and of
rude ideas, and then it must tend, upon many points,
to mislead the mind of a child.
If the Bible is a human book, its anthropomorphism
is not only no reproach, but must even be admired, as
it is admired in the commencements of other ancient
religions. When I read therein, God repents, God is
angry, God forgets, and God remembers, God is glad,
and God is grieved, when I read on every page, God
speaks, or God appears, I easily reduce to their true
value these various symbols, while fully appreciating
their ingenuity or simplicity, and the beauty or the
truth which they may contain. But when you give
these same symbols to a child, as so many supernatural
facts, derived from a book which not only is true, but
which is the very Word of God, then the danger com
mences, and it is necessary to protest against this sub
stitution of ancient Hebrew anthropomorphism for
eternal and pure truth.
God is not only thus humanly personified in the
Bible, but He is therein sometimes materialized to an
extent which is now almost inconceivable to us, who
are accustomed to contemplate Jehovah only through
the light of Gospel times. For example, when Noah
came out of the Ark, he offered a burnt-offering of
many animals to God ; “ and the Lord smelled a sweet
savour
“ and the Lord said in his heart, I will not
again curse the ground any more,” (Gen. viii. 21).
Would the most fervent imitators of the Biblical style
now venture to employ such an expression, even
under the pretext of symbolism ?
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
27
It would be more than wearisome to collect here all
the traces of a similar materialism, all the texts in
which corporeal forms are attributed to God. Think
of the burning bush; think of Sinai, where, from the
midst of cloudsand of thunders, with “the voice of
the trumpet exceeding loud,” God gives, with his own
hand, to Moses, two tables, written, says Exodus,
“with the finger of God,” (xxxi. 18 ; xxxii. 16). Think
especially of the prominence given to this idea,—
majestic, if its poetic symbolism be understood, but
extremely rude if taken literally as given in the Bible:
—no man can see or hear God without instantly
dying: one single people has been able to hear him,
one single man has been able to see him—without
perishing. Would it be easy to explain the following
passages, so that they shall not have, at least for
children, a sense decidedly too material ?
Exod. xix. 18-24.—“And Mount Sinai was altogether
on a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire:
and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace,
and the whole mount quaked greatly. And when the voice
of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and louder,
Moses spake, and God answered him by a voice. And the
Lord came down upon Mount Sinai, on the top of the
mount; and the Lord called Moses up to the top of the
mount; and Moses went up. And the Lord said unto
Moses, Go down, charge the people, lest they break
through unto the Lord to gaze, and many of them perish.
And let the priests also, which come near unto the
Lord, sanctify themselves, lest the Lord break forth upon
them........... Thou shalt come up, thou and Aaron with
thee; but let not the priests and the people break
through to come up unto the Lord, lest he break forth
upon them.”
Exod. xx. 18-21.—“And all the people saw the thunderings, and the lightnings, and the noise of the trumpet, and
the mountain smoking: and when the people saw it, they
removed, and stood afar off. And they said unto Moses,
Speak thou with us, and we will hear; but let not God
speak with us lest we die..............And the people stood afar
�Sacred History:
off: and Moses drew near unto the thick darkness where
God was."
Deut. v. 24-26.—“Behold, the Lord onr God hath
shewed us his glory and his greatness, and we have heard
his voice out of the midst of the fire: we have seen this
day that God doth talk with man, and he liveth. Now,
therefore, why should we die ? for this great fire will con
sume us : if we hear the voice of the Lord our God any
more, then we shall die. For who is there of all flesh that
hath heard the voice of the living God speaking out of the
midst of the fire, AS WE have, and lived? ”
And, as a commentary upon this scene, as grand
and imposing, as it is possible for an exhibition of
symbols to be, addressed only to the senses through
the imagination, let us see how Moses afterwards sums
it up and estimates its importance:—
Deut. iv. 32-36.—“ Ask now of the days that are past,
which were before thee, since the day that God created
man upon the earth, and ask from the one side of heaven
unto the other, whether there hath been any such thing
as this great thing is, or hath been heard like it. . Did ever
people hear the voice of God speaking out of the midst of the
fire, as thou hast heard, and live? .... Out of heaven he
made thee to hear his voice, that he might instruct thee :
and upon earth he shewed thee his great fire; and thou
heardest his words out of the midst of the fire.”
Elsewhere it is not the voice, it is the sight of God
which kills. It is said to have happened, in a small
number of quite exceptional cases, that God has con
sented to let himself be seen, and seen by the eyes of
the flesh. These miracles are accordingly narrated to
us with the greatest solemnity.
One day, the seventy elders of Israel followed Moses
up into “ the Mount of God.” Moses, however, alone
went up to God in the mount, but the elders went up
so far, that, according to the text,—
Exod. xxiv. 10. 11.—“ They saw the God of Israel: and
there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a
sapphire stone, and as it were the body of heaven in his
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
29
clearness. And upon the nobles of the children of Israel he
laid not his hand : also they saw God and did eat and drink."
Moses alone,—and it was this which gave him in the
eyes of his people a supernatural character,-—was able
to penetrate into that cloud where resided “ the glory
of God,” and out of which God appeared like a con
suming fire. God himself renders to him this testimony,
that He would speak with him “ mouth to mouth" even
apparently, and not in dark speeches,” (Num. xii. 8.)
This peculiar privilege is repeatedly described —“The
Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as -a man speaketh
unto his friend,” (Exod. xxxiii. 11; Deut. xxxiv. 10,
&c.).
Such declarations as these, and many more such
might be quoted, have a character thoroughly and
undeniably materialistic, if regarded as records of literal
facts, and not as poetic fictions; but even these are
Dot the worst. The material conception or representa
tion of God has been carried to a degree of still more
astounding grossness. Witness that passage which
equals, in primitive rudeness, anything which the most
barbarous nations have written about the nature of
their, gods. Moses had long conversed with God, but
hitherto he had not seen him. He said to God one
day, “ I beseech thee, show me thy glory! ” God did
not reply that his essence being incorporeal cannot be
seen ; but, on the contrary, He consented to pass before
Moses, and to let him hear his voice: but, added He,—
Exod. xxxiii. 20-23.—“ Thou canst not see my face; for
there shall no man see me and five. And the Lord said,
Behold, there is a place by me, and thou shalt stand upon
a rock: and it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth
by, that I will put thee in a clift of the rock, and will
cover thee with my hand while I pass by : And I will take
away mine hand, and thou shalt see my back parts; but my
face shall not be seen.”
Would it not be highly irreverent and even profane
to regard this passage as a literal, and divinely inspired,
�30
Sacred History:
and therefore infallible record of facts ? What would
be said of such a story, if it were found anywhere else
than in “ the Holy Bible I ”
When people and teachers come to see, in all these
pretended miracles of Horeb and of Sinai, only their
true character of tragic and sombre poetry, there will
no longer be any question about the propriety of putting
them into the hands and heads of children, any more
than there is at present about the ‘ Prometheus ’ of
TEschylus, or the 1 Inferno ’ of Dante, or Milton’s
‘ Paradise Lost.’ But, once more, do you not perceive
what an abyss there is between admiring myths as
myths, and accepting them as supernatural facts dic
tated by God himself?
Elsewhere, God is represented as a man obliged to
make personal inquiry as to whether a rumour which
has reached him is correct or not:—
Gen. xviii. 20, 21.—“ And the Lord said, Because the
cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is great, and because their sin
is very grievous; I will go down now, and see whether they
have done altogether according to the cry of it, which is
come unto me; and if not, I will know.”
Again, men began to build a tower, whose top should
reach unto heaven :—
Gen. xi. 5-7.—“ And the Lord came down to see the city
and the tower, which the children of men builded. And
the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all
one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing
will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to
do. Go to, let us go down, and there confound their
language.”
And it is thus that the famous confusion of languages
is explained !
Surely the specimens which I have quoted, though
the series might easily be largely extended, are amply
sufficient to show, to those who require such proof,
that not everything in the Bible is fitted to convey to
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
31
our children such a pure and spiritual notion of God as
it has been customary to believe. Some one will hasten to reply:—11 But we never
read these passages in the schools, we suppress them,
or we suitably modify them in our lesson-hooks.”—I
am fain to believe that in many cases it is so; but,
whether you teach these things or not, they are never
theless in the Bible, and are there by the same title as
the most admirable passages; so that they suffice to
show to us clearly, in its true aspect, the degree of
civilization and of enlightenment, to which the books
containing them belong.
And then, although you may, in some measure,
suppress such passages as bear too visibly their date
upon them, you do not suppress those innumerable
revelations, apparitions, or manifestations of God, of
which the Bible is full, and you cannot deny that they
all (excepting perhaps some of the prophecies which,
moreover, do not come under the denomination of
sacred history) address themselves to the senses through
the imagination.
From one end of the Bible to the other, God speaks
to patriarchs, to judges, to kings, to warriors, to priests.
Is it by the voice of conscience 1 No, it is by a vision,
a “ sign,” by a miracle, by a dream. When He
speaks to all his people, it is by blessings or cursings
of a temporal kind. It is not from within, it is from
without that He governs : it is not by love, it is by fear.
Ah ! my readers, is there not still a necessity, even
after so many centuries of Christianity, for a fresh and
vigorous effort to extirpate that superstitious instinct,
which even now makes so many people tremble at the
noise of thunder and at the flash of lightning, as if God
were then either more present or more to be feared
than when the sun shines clearly in a serene sky ?
Must we still continue to propagate, in our families or
in our schools, that false idea which is the very soul of
the primitive history of every nation, and of the- Jews
�32
Sacred History:
as of the others :—if you suffer, God is punishing you :
if you prosper, God is blessing you: if an epidemic, a
famine, or an earthquake ravages a country, God is
angry : if the harvest is double, God is favourable : you
have been victorious, then the Eternal has fought upon
your side : vanquished, it is because He has abandoned
you 1
One of the masterpieces of Semitic literature, which
has been and must ever be in all ages admired,—the
poem of Job,—presents to us the first recorded protest
of the human conscience against this idea. Job is struck
with plagues and afflictions, and his friends thence infer,
according to the custom, that God is thus punishing
him for his sin. But Job replies with indignant
eloquence—“ No, I am not guilty. No, my suffering
is not an expiation.”
Job xiii. 15-18.—“ Though he slay me, yet will I trust
in him ; but I will maintain (in the margin, prove or argue)
mine own ways before him. He also shall be my salvation ;
for an hypocrite shall not come before him..............Behold
now, I have ordered my cause: I know that I shall be jus
tified.” (Read also ch. xxxi. &c.).
Every one knows that, at the end of the poem, God
declares to the three friends that they have been wrong,
and that Job’s view of the matter is correct :—
Job xlii. 7.—“For ye have not spoken of me the thing
that is right, as my servant Job bath.''''
This is manifestly the chief signification and purport
of the book ■, and it is to this that the attention of our
children ought chiefly to be directed, if we would have
them to understand what they read; instead of insisting
precisely upon the one circumstance which weakens the
lesson, by shewing them that, in the end, God restores
to Job all his possessions, and by thus teaching them,
here also, to regard material prosperity as a criterium of
the divine favour.
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
33
Plato, wishing to make us understand how entirely
the moral life is independent of external conditions,
shows to us the just man overwhelmed with sufferings,
with contempt, with calumnies, and with afflictions of
every kind; in the midst of which, and even upon the
cross where he dies, we are taught to recognize in him
the just man, the teacher of truth, the friend of God,
the pattern for our imitation, and, at the same time,
the most truly happy of men ! Would not this sublime
lesson be worth more than hundreds of Biblical miracles
for teaching our children to realize that they are more
or less near to God, not in proportion to the success of
their enterprises, not according to external indications
of prosperity or adversity, popularity or contempt, but
according to the internal testimony of their own con
science, according to their degree of obedience to duty ?
It would be absurd to look for this profound intelli
gence of the spiritual sense of religion, in a nation or
tribe at the commencement of its social development.
But it is none the less absurd that, three or four thou
sand years afterwards, it should still be imagined that
we have only to reproduce, without any change, the
first lispings of human thought, and to regard this
reproduction as an infallible revelation.
Where the notion of the Bather Almighty, revealing
himself to the reason and to the conscience, has not yet
acquired all its fulness, we need not wonder to find
that the relations between God and man are often pre
sented in a very imperfect fashion.
Take, for example, prayer or blessing, as it appears
in the first books of the Old Testament, and try to
discover in these a spiritual and moral character. You
will not find it any more than you will find there the
God who is purely spirit and purely love.
Prayer* is there, as among all the peoples of that
period, a mystic spell, a sort of magic power, a cabal* And Imprecation. See the history of Balaam, Num. xxiii.
25, 26.
�^4
Sacred History:
istic formula. Let us look at a single specimen. It is
at the crisis of a battle : Moses has not taken part in
the fight, but has withdrawn to an adjoining hill, armed
with his rod, and there he intercedes for his people.
Exod. xvii. 11-14.—“And it came to pass, when Moses
held up his hand, that Israel prevailed; and when he let
down his hand Amalek prevailed. But Moses’ hands were
heavy ; and they took a stone and put it under him, and he
sat thereon : and Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands, the
one on the one side, and the other on the other side : and
his hands were steady until the going down of the sun.
And Joshua discomfited Amalek and his people with the
edge of the sword. And the Lord said unto Moses, Write
this for a memorial in a book.”
Here again I would be the first to recognise a beauti
ful poetic image, if the story is to be understood in
the same manner as the analogous stories, which we
may read in the Vedas, or elsewhere. But those who
desire to make us and our children believe that the
thing has actually taken place, ought to see that, if
such virtue must be literally attributed to this
mechanical prayer of Moses, they have no longer any
right to ridicule the prayer-mills of the Budhists, or
the rosaries of the Roman Catholics.
But, it is said by some, this is a type, an emblem, an
allegory, which we must “interpret spiritually.”
Be it so, but who hinders you from interpreting
spiritually all the similar imagery, which abounds in
the other religious and mythological books of antiquity?
If you have so much indulgence for the rudest allegories
of Hebrew legend, whence comes your severity or con
tempt for the most beautiful and symbolical stories of
Greek, Hindoo, or Scandinavian legend ? God speaks,
God appears in person, God dictates a book ! and that
book contains pages which, in order to be accepted by
reason, require to be “ spiritualized,” neither more nor
less than those of Hesiod, of the Vedas, or of the
Eddas!
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
35
The truth, is that, among all primitive peoples,
prayer, blessing, and cursing have a peculiar virtue, a
mysterious influence, a magic power. Of this the
history of Isaac is one of the clearest examples.
The old man, wishing and intending to bless Esau,
is the dupe of a coarse imposition; and the words
which, in his thought, he addresses to Esau, fall,
unknown to him, upon the ears of Jacob. When
Esau returns from his hunting, to which he had been
sent by his father himself, Isaac, astonished and
trembling, says to him :—
Gen. xxvii. 33-37.—“ Thy brother came with subtilty,
and hath taken away thy blessing........... I have blessed
him, yea, and he shall be blessed............ I have made him
thy lord, and all his brethren have I given to him for
servants; and with corn and wine have I sustained him:
and what shall I do now unto thee, my son ? ”
Can it be denied in presence of words so clear, that,
for the Isaac of Genesis, the blessing was a kind of
talisman or spell, an enchanted formula, consisting in
the words, not in the thought, and having a virtue
equally independent of the intention of him who gave
it, and of the merit of him who received it 1 A stolen
blessing was not on that account the less valid I
How can all this be explained to children 1
But an explanation is not withheld, we have often
heard and read it, as follows :—Isaac knew very well
that, before the birth of the twin brothers, God had
said to Rebecca, “ the elder shall serve the younger.”
Moreover, when the blessing had been given to Jacob,
Isaac felt that it was, notwithstanding the imposture
of his son, an accomplished fact, which he did not feel
himself at liberty to undo, and which had acquired, by
its very accomplishment, a providential character.
The whole was the result of a divine decree, and this
was perceived by the conscience of Isaac at the very
moment when the act of blessing was consummated.
�36
Sacred History:
We frankly confess that, in morality no less than in
good sense, this incredible theory, of an accomplished
fact which acquires by its very accomplishment a provi
dential character, appears to us even more deficient, if
that be possible, than the explanation of the biblical
Isaac. “ Thy brother hath come with subtilty, and hath
taken away thy blessing, I have blessed him, yea, and he
shall be blessed.”
Samson is again another example, among a thousand,
of these false and rude ideas, regarding the relations
between God and man. Here it is neither a prayer
nor a blessing, but a vow, in virtue of which the hair
of Samson’s head (orthodox theologians believe it
still), was the thing, the charm, or the talisman,
wherein his supernatural strength lay !
Samson keeps company with a woman of loose
character, (Judges xvi.); but that does not in the
smallest degree deprive him of the divine favour
attached to his hair. His head being cropped, he
loses the distinctive blessing of God; but his hair
grows again, and with it comes back the divine bless
ing. It is impossible to see anything else in the text,
unless it be put there by force; for, immediately
before narrating the last exploit of Samson, the Bible
explains to us how he has regained his strength by
telling us :—
Judges xvi. 22.—“ Howbeit the hair of his head began
to grow again after he was shaven.”
What is the profound religious idea which we may
hope, without sophistry, to derive from this lesson, for
the improvement of the minds or the hearts of our
children ? Explain it as you may, Samson will always
be for them only the Jewish Hercules ; and, I confess
it, I greatly prefer for their instruction the Hercules of
the Greeks. The latter, at least, will not now teach
them to think that God—the true God, the God whom
they themselves ought to worship—has actually figured
�Its Influence on the Intellect.
y]
in scenes and anecdotes, which, like those about Samson,
are trifling, superstitious, and absurd.
In conclusion :—To excite, to over-excite, in children
the taste for the extraordinary, to make them seek God,
not where He is ever to he found, not in the laws of
the physical or moral world, not in the eternal har
mony of the stars, not in the marvellous organisation
of the flower or of the insect, not in the sublime spec
tacle of unity and design presented by the Universe,
but in all sorts of disorders and capricious interferences
which, if they had taken place, would have proved
nothing but the divine instability, improvidence, and
weakness ; thus greatly to exaggerate and to confirm,
instead of counteracting, in their young minds, their
naturally fantastic and chimerical notions of things,
their ignorance of causes, their disregard of rule, fear
instead of thought, credulity instead of knowledge ;
and then to seal the whole with this disastrous idea,
that, if they have the misfortune to contest the absolute
truth of even the most absurd narratives, doctrines, or
miracles attested by a pretended Word of God, they are
guilty of blasphemous sacrilege, and doomed therefore
to eternal damnation, unless they repent and learn at
least to say, that the whole book is a divine revelation
of truth:—behold and consider the kind of influence
which the teaching of sacred history always inevitably
exerts, only in greater or less degree according to the
absence or presence of various antidotes, upon the cul
ture of our children’s intelligence, and upon the forma
tion of their ideas of humanity, of nature, and of God.
Ere long we will publish the second and the more
important division of the subject; and therein we will
strive to show how this kind of teaching acts upon the
conscience, and upon the moral direction of life.
�
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Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Title
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Sacred history as a branch elementary education. Part I. Its influence on the intellect
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: Ramsgate
Collation: 37 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Date of publication from British Library catalogue.
Publisher
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Thomas Scott
Date
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[1870]
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CT208
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[Unknown]
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Education
Bible
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Sacred history as a branch elementary education. Part I. Its influence on the intellect), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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Text
Language
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English
Bible-Criticism
Conway Tracts
Education
Religious Education
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Text
CATALOGUE AND CIRCULAR
OF
DR. DIO LEWIS’S
«
oiilg j^nrd for gaung ÿabieæ,
LEXINGTON, MASS.
1865.
BOSTON:
PRESS OF JOHN WILSON AND SON,
15, Water Street.
1865.
��CALENDAR
FOS 1865-6.
4
First quarter commences ....
,,
.
Nov. 28, 1865.
.
.
Nov. 29, 1865.
closes...........................
,,
Second quarter commences
.
.
. , Sept. 27, 1865.
,,
,,
closes......................
.
Jan. 30, 1866.
Third
„
commences
.
.
Jan. 31, 1866.
„
,,
closes......................
.
April 3, 1866.
Fourth
,,
commences
.
April 4, 1866.
„
,,
closes......................
.
June 5, 1866.
.
.
.
.
*
t
�FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
4
principi
DIO LEWIS, A.M., M.D.
Amiate ^rinxigal.
ISAAC N. CARLETON, M.A.
feiljus. w
De. DIO LEWIS,
Physical Culture, Anatomy, and Physiology.
ISAAC N. CARLETON, A.M.,
Ancient Classics and Natural Science.
THEODORE D. WELD,
Mental Philosophy, Ethics, Composition, and Critical Beading of
English Classics.
&
Mbs. HELEN C. LEWIS,
Dress, and the Duties of School-mother.
•
Mrs. LAURA T. CARLETON,
French and Mathematics.
Miss MARTHA A. DUDLEY,
*
English Studies.
Miss VIRGINIA F. TOWNSEND,
Rhetoric.
Prof. THOMAS F. LEONARD,
Elocution.
Prof. B. J. LANG,
Piano.
•
�FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
Prof. E. ZERDAHELYI,
Piano and Vocal Music.
Miss ELIZABETH P. PEABODY,
History.
Prof. J. B. TORRICELLI,
Italian and Spanish.
Prof. A. W. SPRAGUE,
t
Natural Philosophy.
Prof. JAMES C. SHARP,
Chemistry.
♦
Prof. PHILIP WILNER,
German.
Miss CHARLOTTE L. HULL,
Piano.
Miss LUCY SOLGER,
Piano.
Prof. GUILLAUME H. TALBOT,
French.
Prof. HENRY L. FETTEE,
Drawing, Crayon Drawing, Linear Perspective.
Rev. B. G. NORTHROP, A.M.,
Lecturer on Methods of Study.
5
�6
FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
NAMES OF PUPILS
DURING FIRST YEAR.
Cora H. Bearse................................
Fannie E. Bearse...........................
Nellie F. Krown................................
Lillie B. Chace................................
Flora C. Clark................................
Anna W. Dana................................
Julia Delano . *................................
Edith Edwards................................
Carrie F. Fish................................
Julia A. Floyd................................
Carrie L. Gerrish............................
Gertrude M. Hazard.......................
Emily K. Hill....................................
Clara M. Holmes...........................
Elizabeth C. Howland.......................
Lucy B. Hunt....................................
Ellen A. Ingersoll...........................
Carrie A. Ingols................................
Kate B. Judd.....................................
Florence F. Lewis...........................
Annie E. Lockey...........................
Elizlfeeth E. Ly man.......................
Harriet C. Peirce...........................
Mary E. Pendleton...........................
Hyannis, Mass.
Hyannis, Mass.
Middletown, Ct.
Valley Falls, R.I.
New York City, N.Y.
Portland, Me.
New Bedford, Mass.
Newburgh, N.Y. *
Fall River, Mass.
Medford, Mass.
Chelsea, Mass.
Newport, R.I.
Northampton, Mass.
Davenport, Iowa.
Leominster, Mass.
Northampton, Mass.
Canton, Ill.
Boston, Mass.
Northampton, Mass.
Buffalo, N.Y.
Leominster, Mass.
New Haven, Ct.
New Bedford, Mass.
Westerly, R.I.
\
�FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
Flora C. Plummer .
Evelyn A. L. Purdie
Anna P. Redfield .
Isabel M. Rotch. .
Mary E. Sawyer . .
Lydia C. Smith . .
Elizabeth L. Steele .
Anna M. Stone . .
M. Florence Usher .
Minnie V. Westall .
Lizzie J. Williams .
.
.
•
•
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
7
...................... Addison, Me.
...................... West Newton, Mass.
...................... Lexington, Mass.
, , . New Bedford, Mass.
...................... Dover, N.H.
...................... Provincetown, Mass.
...................... Farmington, Ct.
...................... Boston, Mass.
...................... West Medford, Mass.
...................... Fall River, Mass.
...................... Leavenworth, Kansas.
Total, 35.
REFERENCES.
The above young ladies and their friends, and the
prominent educators in and about Boston.
/
�8
FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES,
PLAN OF THE SCHOOL.
The general design of this school is to secure a sym
metrical development of body, mind, and heart; to give
due attention to physical and social culture, while impart
ing thorough instruction in Literature, Art, Science, and
Morals. The plan of the School embraces the following
The English Language. Elementary Sounds;
Spelling and Defining ; Reading ; Analysis of Wprds ;
Writing; Orthoepy; Elocution; Recitations; Grammar ;
Rhetoric ; Composition ; Critical Reading of Shakspeare,
Milton, and other Standard Classics.
-’■I- Mathematics. Arithmetic, mental and written;
Bookkeeping ; Algebra ; Geometry ; Trigonometry; Men
suration ; Surveying, and Conic Sections.
HI.
Physical Sciences.
Geography; Physiol
ogy, Anatomy, and Hygiene ; Natural Philosophy ;
Astronomy ; Chemistry ; Geology ; Physical Geogra
phy ; Botany ; Zoology, and the Philosophy of Natural
History.
IV. — Ancient and Modern Languages. Latin,
Greek, French, German, Spanish, and Italian.
V. History. Ancient and Modern $ Mythology ;
History of Civilization.
VI. —Music, Drawing, Painting.
VII. —Mental Philosophy, Ethics, Logic, Politi
cal Economy, Evidences of Christianity, Butler’s
Analogy.
�FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
9
®e%f^aohs.
A complete list of the Text-books which will be used
cannot now be given. Those already adopted are Eaton’s
Arithmetics, Greenleaf’s Algebras, Greenleaf’s Geometry,
Bradbury’s Trigonometry and Surveying, Youman’s
Chemistry, Hitchcock’s Anatomy and Physiology, Lewis’s
“Weak Lungs, and How to make them Strong,” Hows’
Shakespearian Reader, Hows’ Historical Shakespeare,
Haven’s Mental Philosophy, Harkness’s Latin Grammar,
Harkness’s Latin Reader, Hanson’s Latin Prose Book,
Frieze’s Virgil’s Æneid, Arnold’s Latin Prose Compo
sition, and Pinney and Arnoult’s French Grammar.
It will be for the advantage of pupils to purchase all
Text-books at the School, as they will be furnished there
at much less than retail prices.
âkljool
mù taxations.
The School year begins on the last Wednesday of
September, and ends on the first Wednesday of June.
It is divided into four quarters.
The vacations are Thanksgiving Day, Christmas week,
New-Year’s Day, the Twenty-second of February, Fast
Day, and May Day.
No pupils are received, except by special arrange
ment, who do not intend to remain till the close of the
School year ; nor are any deductions made on account of
absence or premature withdrawal from the school.
2
�10
FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
The Terms are $100 per quarter, payable in advance.
This amount defrays the expense of tuition in all branches
not on the list of “ Extra Charges ; ” also of board,
room-rent, heat, lights, daily riding, bathing, and, in case
of sickness, medical attendance and nùrsing.
The
charge for washing will be 75 cents per dozen.
The terms for pupils boarding at home are $32.50
per quarter.
Latin, Greek, and French, each .
Latin, with Greek or French . .
Instruction on the Piano, from $25
Instruction in Vocal Music,
25
Use of Piano, one hour each day .
. $10.00 per quarter.
. 17.50 ,,
,,
to 70.00 for 24 Lessons.
to 70.00
,,
,,
. . 2.00 per quarter.
The charge for Drawing, Painting, German, Italian,
and Spanish, will be extra ; and will vary according to
the number of pupils in the classes.
w
—♦—
It is earnestly desired that all pupils, who cannot
board at home, should reside in the family of the Princi
pal. The absorbing purpose of Dr. Lewis in the
establishment of this school was to furnish thè best
possible conditions for acquiring a complete education,
in the true and broad sense of the term. These condi
tions can be secured only by the most watchful attention
to diet, sleep, dress, ventilation, bathing, and recreation,
as well as to qualifications of teachers, and methods of
�FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
H
instruction. Such attention the head of a family can
obviously best give. Moreover, a wise, cheerful, loving
home-nurture is indispensable to the most rapid and har
monious development of the entire being.
Each pupil is requested to come furnished with rubber
boots, umbrella, a napkin-ring, and suitable clothing for *
the changing seasons ; every article being distinctly
marked with the name of the. owner in full.
It is expected that each pupil will attend church at
least once every sabbath. Places of worship can be
selected by parents, or by the young ladies, according to
denominational preferences; but these should be made
known to the Principal, on entering the school, that
satisfactory arrangements may be made for conveyance
and seats. There will be a small charge for pew-rent.
Young ladies in the family will enjoy facilities for
taking regularly warm and cold baths, under the care of
efficient and skilful attendants.
Pupils from a distance can remain in the family of
the Principal during the Summer vacation ; or, if it be
desired, can travel under suitable escort.
^oration Hub ^uilbrags.
The location of the “Lexington House” is most
favorable for school purposes. It stands on historic
ground, and is the chief architectural ornament of a
quiet village’, two hundred feet above the level of the sea,
and remarkable for its healthfulness and good morals.
Around it, on all sides, lies an open country, picturesque
in beauty, and threaded by delightful rides and walks.
�12
FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
Though thus rural and retired, Lexington is yet
within easy reach of several cities ; Boston being but ten
miles distant, and connected directly by railroad. The
house itself, as is well known to many, is commodious
and elegant. It contains more than a hundred rooms,
beside a spacious hall for gymnastics and social gather
ings. The rooms are large and well-ventilated; and are,
most of them, so situated as to receive daily the direct
rays of the sun.
—♦—
Ipljgsxral Otat.
It is the special and earnest aim of this School to give
Physical Culture a just and honorable place in its
course of instruction. American girls, especially of the
higher classes, are very many of them pale, nervous, and
fragile, with stooping shoulders, weak spines, and narrow
chests. Such, in studying under the ordinary and fash
ionable systems of education, greatly imperil their physi
cal well-being, compromise their enjoyment of life, and
often break down altogether in the midst of their labors.
Keenly do fine and sensitive natures suffer when high
hopes of usefulness, and bright anticipations of happi
ness, are thus blighted in the springtime of life ; but
such premature decay and suffering are only penalties for
violating law. If the claims of the body be wholly
disregarded, or too entirely subordinated to intellectual
cultivation, failure and disappointment are inevitable.
But let the early training of our youth be broad and
symmetrical, physiological and philosophical, and even
delicate girls may endure hard study, and thrive upon it.
We are resolved, therefore, to insist upon such a style
of life in our School as shall give to the body strength,
�FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
13
endurance, and grace; and help each one of our gradu
ates to go forth with “ a sound mind in a sound body.”
To carry out this purpose, we shall rely upon the
following means: —
I. — Regular and thorough instruction in Anatomy and
Physiology, with frequent familiar lectures on practical
hygiene, and constant attention to the personal regimen
of pupils.
II. — The careful practice, from two to four half-hours
each day, of the New Gymnastics; and exercises of the
Swedish Movement Cure, in the case of any who may
need special treatment.
III. — Plain and nutritious food, such as shall best
conduce to the healthy growth of muscle and brain.
IV. —Fixed hours for rising and retiring, so arranged
as to secure for all, regular and abundant sleep.
V. — Baths, both warm and cold.
VI. — Regular morning and evening walks, with daily
rides in favorable weather; recreations in the open air;
together with a great variety of in-door sports and amuse
ments.
VII. — A physiological dress, such as shall properly
protect the body without hindering its growth, deforming
its beauty, or interfering with any of its vital functions.
—♦—
(Kkmtnfarg anb (Komnum §tebi?s.
These will be faithfully taught, by experienced and
conscientious teachers. Great care will be taken to fix
firmly in the minds of pupils the rudimental principles
of learning; to acquaint them with the best methods of
study, and to assist them in forming habits of observa
tion and studiousness.
�14
FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
The founder of this School is determined that it shall
be second to none of its class in facilities for acquiring a
liberal and polished culture, as well as a solid and whole
some education. Hence he has made ample provisions
for thorough instruction in the Ancient Classics, knowing
that, as a means of mental culture, they hold a high
position, and one which no other branches of study can
completely fill. At this day, no young lady can lay claim
to a finished, and hardly even to a fashionable, education,
who has not some knowledge, at least, of the Latin lan
guage and literature. In the classical course, earnest
effort will be made to ascertain and follow the best
method of instruction ; and to win pupils, if possible, to
an appreciative and loving study of those rich treasures
of thought, which, as they glow in their original casket of
burnished words, are like “apples of gold in pictures
of silver.” Mr. Carleton, who will direct this depart
ment, was for several years instructor of Latin and
Greek in Phillips Academy, Andover, Mass.
—0—
^lenfsl snb floral ^Ijilosoplrg.
Shakespeare, next to the Bible, is our best model of
idiomatic English, and staunchest bulwark of the grand
old Saxon. It furnishes the amplest and most varied
means for elocutionary culture, containing, as it does, the
highest incentives to natural and forcible expression. It
induces habits of critical analysis, a terse, graceful style,
a keen discrimination, separating the dross of strained
fancies, pragmatic conceits, and tinselled word-painting,
from the gold of a sterling literature. Though the diffi-
�FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
15
cullies of the study often tax to the uttermost the powers
of the pupil, yet such is the interest excited, that each
knotty point proves a magnet to draw out her best think
ing, and a premium to pay her for it. In a word,
believing Shakespeare without a peer, not only as a poet,
but as a thinker, a philosopher, a logician, though untram
melled by the mechanism of logic, and as the most
acute and profound mental analyst that has ever threaded
the mazes of human nature, we regard the critical study
and analysis of his works as indispensable to the com
pleteness of a liberal culture. We prize it not mainly
as a discipline to unfold the sesthetic elements alone, but
as a quickener of the whole mind; a general educational
force; a normal stimulant to all the faculties ; rousing
the inert, developing the latent, and giving symmetry and
equipoise to the whole. Theodore D. Weld, for many
years principal of the Eagleswood School in New Jersey,
will have charge of this department, and will also give
instruction in mental and moral science.
—♦—
fjhiarg.
This branch of study will be under the care of Miss
Elizabeth P. Peabody, a lady well known throughout
our country as an authoress and teacher.
The pupils of this school will enjoy rare facilities for
acquiring a practical and critical knowledge of the
French language. Prof. Talbot is a native of France,
and is the author'of several French instruction books.
�16 * FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
For this important department, it has been our aim to
secure the very best instructors in Boston ; and we
are happy to announce that our corps of music teachers
will include Prof. B. J. Lang, and E. Zerdahelyi.
Prof. Zerdahelyi, a Hungarian by birth, is one of
the most brilliant pianists in our country. He is a
friend and pupil of Liszt, and to him this great mastei’
has dedicated one of his celebrated compositions. We
feel confident that our School offers unsurpassed advan- •«
tages for the study of music to pupils of every degree
of advancement.
—♦—
Miss Virginia F. Townsend, editress of “Arthur’s
Magazine,” will give instruction in Rhetoric and BellesLettres.
—♦—
io parents.
Dress. — Neatness, good taste, and simplicity — the
natural expression of good sense, modesty, and refine
ment — eminently befit school days ; while ambition of
fashionable display, — the paroxysms of a mind weak,
ill-balanced, and essentially vulgar, — disturbs all educa
tional processes, and represses the higher aspirations.
Pocket-money. — Significant words ! rife with temp
tations to omniverous repletion between meals, and
painfully suggestive of its inevitable effects, — acidity,
sallowness, pimples, disturbed sleep, and bad breath.
Pandora’s box ! full of headaches and other aches,
�FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
17
nauseas and vertigoes; necessitating the excuse, “not
well,” when called for the-»morning walk; rife with
artificial wants, unscholarly ways, late rising, tardiness,
absence, discreditable recitations, and imperilled char
acter. Few attain honorable distinction at school who
have not been withheld by thoughtful parents from the
manifold temptations of much pocket-money.
Visiting. — Visits to friends, during term-time, unsettle
the mind, break in upon habits of study, the regularity of
lessons, and general school order ; multiply the burdens
of teachers ; excite the discontent of classes, whose
members are absent ; lower their tone, and impede their
progress. They generally disqualify for earnest study,
and often necessitate imperfect lessons for days after
resuming the school routine. For these reasons, leave of
absence should never be asked except in emergencies that
cannot be provided against ; and then not through the
pupils, but directly of the Principal. A little forecast
during vacation will obviate the necessity of calling pupils
away from school to replenish their wardrobes, or to visit
the family dentist.
Finally, we earnestly invoke the co-operation of
parents and guardians, both in these special regards, and
in our daily and earnest effort to do worthily the teacher’s
work.
3
�18
FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
I
OUR FIRST YEAR.
After many years’ anxious thought and preparation,
this School was opened on the first of October, 1864.
As an important innovation was to be made, it was
thought best to limit the number of pupils. Thirty was
announced as the maximum number. The School was
full. The young ladies ranged, from twelve to twentythree years of age. The average was seventeen. The
families represented in the School are among the most
intelligent in New England. Intellectually and morally,
our pupils were all we could ask; physically, they were
much below the average.
Accustomed to teach gymanstics among those who,
living at home, indulged the fashionable errors of dress,
diet, sleep, bathing, &c., Dr. Lewis had never compre
hended the possibilities in physical culture. Retiring at
an early hour ; sleeping in large, well-ventilated rooms ;
visiting a plain, nutritious table at proper intervals ; bath
ing frequently under the guidance of intelligent assistants;
wearing a physiological dress ; and spending several hours
a day in the open air, — these concomitants added far
more than had been anticipated to the results of the gym
nastic training. The general development may be infer
red, when it is stated, that, about the upper part of the
chest, the average enlargement was two and three-quarter
�FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
19
inches. In the physical training of this school, lean girls
increased in flesh, while the fleshy ones became thinner
and more active.
We are well satisfied that the common opinion con
cerning excessive brain-work in our schools is an error;
but that our girls, even, may double their intellectual
acquisitions, provided their exercise, bathing, diet, sleep,
and other*physiological conditions, be rightly managed.
�20
FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
NOTICES OF THE P11ESS.
From, the, “ Zion's Herald."
A New School. — Dr. Did Lewis, long identified with the
cause of physical education, and whose system of light gymnastics
has been adopted in nearly all the schools, seminaries, and colleges
of the United States, and to some extent in Great Britain, has
established a Seminary for young ladies at Lexington, Mass.
This School was opened last October, after many years of
careful preparation. The buildings purchased for this purpose are
truly admirable. They are very large, sunny, airy, and happily
arranged. The halls for gymnastic exercises, social gatherings,
and other purposes, are large. Lexington is more than two
hundred feet above the sea, free from fogs, and famous for its
healthfulness.
The first School year has just closed with a two days’ examina
tion, which was attended by many well known friends of education.
The gymnastic exercises were something wonderful. Many of the
young ladies came as invalids, but closed the year with a remark
able development of muscular activity and endurance. Some who
began as invalids, ended the year by frequently walking ten or
twelve miles. The muscular roundness, grace of movement, and
queenly bearing that pervaded the whole School excited general
attention.
The results of this training, as reflected in the intellectual
accomplishments, elicited the warmest praise from gentlemen who
attended the examination to determine, in the interests of educa
tion, the influence of thorough physical training upon intellectual
progress. A well known gentleman, a graduate of Harvard, de
clared that he had never heard such fine recitations in Latin, not
even in Harvard College. Another eminent teacher warmly
declared that he had never heard the intellectual exercises of this
school excelled. Indeed, the theory entertained by all thinkers in
regard to the intimate relation between a sound, vigorous body,
and a vigorous, healthy mind, has received, in the results of the
first year’s training of this School, a striking illustration.
�FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
21
We learn that not less than twenty-one teachers have been
engaged for next year; and we confidently believe that the School
will rise into a grand success, and contribute not a little to inaugu
rate a new era in female education.
--- ♦—
Hon. J. M. Usher, in the "Nation."
An Interesting Occasion. — It was our pleasure to attend
the first anniversary of Dr. Dio Lewis’s School for Young Ladies,
on the 30th and 31st ult. This School is situated in the pleasant
and quiet village of Lexington, one of the healthiest locations in
New England. The mathematical and classical departments were
conducted by I. N. Carleton, A.M. The young ladies exhibited
great thoroughness in the principles involved, almost unequalled
at any similar examination that it has been our privilege to attend
in public or private schools. After being questioned by tlieir’
teacher, until it would seem they had fully explained all the funda
mental truths, they were interrogated by several gentlemen of
high scholarly attainments. They answered in a prompt and
happy manner, which was pleasing to witness, giving great satis
faction to the individuals who questioned, and reflecting great
credit upon their estimable teacher.
The classes in Mental Philosophy and Shakespeare were di
rected by Theodore D. Weld. The recitation in Mental Philoso
phy was exceedingly interesting; they had evidently cultivated
habits of thought, and power to discriminate upon the philosophy
of mind as distinguished from that of matter. Mr. Weld’s intelli
gent manner of teaching Shakespeare, which originated with him
self, rendered it peculiarly attractive. The young ladies evidently
appreciated their teacher’s refined, critical taste, his perfect com
mand of language, and fine conversational powers.
If departed beings are permitted to revisit earth, may we not
hope that Horace Mann, and a host of other bright spirits, pioneers
in the cause of intellectual progress, were present, rejoicing with
us, that at last one has been raised up who has founded and per
fected that system of Physical Education which they deemed of
such vital .importance, but which has remained for Dr. Lewis to
accomplish, thus completing and rounding that idea of true educa
tion which combines both Mental and Physical Culture.
�22
FAMILY SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
From, the, “ Massachusetts Teacher."
We had the pleasure of being present at a portion of the ex
ercises of the first commencement of Dr. Dio Lewis’s School at
Lexington. We found there some thirty or more energetic young
ladies, gathered from some of the most intelligent families of New
England, becomingly attired in a style which admitted of freedom
in the use of their limbs, and all showing such physical activity
and power of endurance as we had never before witnessed in a
young ladies’ school.
The gymnastic exercises were admirable.
The examinations of the classes in various departments of study
were full and fair. A large part of the questions were put by
gentlemen who happened to be present. The classes sustained
themselves well, some of them with rare ability. The examina
tions in Shakespeare, Intellectual Philosophy, and Latin, would
have done credit to any high school in the Commonwealth.
. We are glad to see that there is at least one ladies’ school in
this region, which really combines thorough physical, with thor
ough intellectual training.
Notices from the English Papers of M. Zerdahelyi, one of our
music teachers.
As M. Zerdahelyi is mostly unknown to the American people,
it is thought best to print some brief notices of his performances in
England. The “ Musical World,” London, says of his performan
ces at a concert in that city : —
“ The strength and firmness of his hand enabled him to produce
a great body of tone, full and mellow without harshness ; his finger
is uncommonly rapid; in the most florid passages and brilliant
flights, his articulation is always clear and distinct; and (what is a
great beauty in piano-forte playing) his unerring certainty gives an
air of facility even to the greatest difficulties of execution.”
The “ Staffordshire Sentinel ” says : —
“ The combined softness, and yet amazing power of tone, the
sweet melody alike of his louder and of his gentler notes, the
feather finish displayed in all, and the extraordinary and unerring
rapidity with which he ran his fingers over the keys of his instru-
�FA MTT.Y SCHOOL FOR YOUNG LADIES.
23
ment, were heard with wonder and delight; and showed that in Mr.
Zerdahelyi we have a gentleman amongst us who is second to
none as a pianist.”
The “Leicester Journal ” says of Zerdahelyi’s performances:
“And then there was the absolutely wonderful playing of M.
Zerdahelyi on the piano-forte; playing which converted an old
instrument into an absolutely vocal being, whose marvellous
execution made the listener forget that its best days had long
passed away, and long for another opportunity of hearing the
performer under more favorable circumstances.”
��
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Catalogue and circular of Dr. Dio Lewis's Family School for Young Ladies, Lexington, Mass.
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Place of publication: Boston, USA
Collation: 23 p. ; 20 cm.
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Press of John Wilson and Son
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1865
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G5680
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Women
Education
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Conway Tracts
Education of Girls
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Text
F
THE
Quarterly
Journal
OF
_________ E D U C A T I O N.
No. i.
'Vol. i.
MAY, 1867.
A WORD TO OUR READERS.
there room and need at the present time for a new educational
HI iournal? We think there is. Within the last quarter of a
Blsl century especially, education has made rapid strides through•
.
out the land. Not only have schools greatly multiplied, but
the improvement in the quality of their teaching is even more marked
than the increase in their number. Results, and not attendance of
scholars merely, is now expected and required from them. Grants for
education—which have increased from year to year; Schools of Design,
Mechanics Institutions, and Working Men’s Colleges ; the movement in
our great universities; the local examinations of Oxford and Cambridge
of the Society of Arts, and of the College of Preceptors; the discussions
m Parliament and the press, in social congresses and public meetings__all
evidence that the public mind is at length, and rapidly, becoming fully
alive to the importance of education, and attaining to a better under
standing of its requirements. It will be our ambition to render what aid
we can m furtherance of this great work. Education is a vast continent
even yet but partially explored and imperfectly cultivated. There is
much to be done, and we hope to secure the co-operation of many who
are engaged m the work of tuition, and of earnest, able, and tried friends
01 education 111 carrying out our enterprise.
It will be the especial aim of the Quarterly Journal of Education, by
promoting intercommunication among teachers and others interested in
education to bring about a closer sympathy between them, and a better
understanding of all matters connected with their common work.
m
wit11 PartP or sect’ the Quarterly Journal of Education
will afford facilities to the advocates of different systems and methods of
teaching to make known their respective views, so that all may benefit
by their mutual comparison. We shall discuss the books and appliances
most useful for teaching, and endeavour to place our readers as far as
possible au courant with whatever is most interesting in regard to educa
tion and its progress in all. parts of the kingdom. Essays, and occasion
ally examination-papers, will also appear in our columns. Such will be
the freight of the little bark we this day launch on its first voyage.
X’
I
�2
OUR EARLY ENGLISH SCIENTIFIC WRITERS.
BY THE EDITOR.
—---- LONG and barren period intervenes between the scientific
activity of ancient Greece and that of modern Europe.
During the middle ages philosophy was mystical and dog
matic father than experimental and inductive. Men did not
matic, rather
trust to Nature and experiment, but leaned upon the staff of authority,
and looked for guidance to the wisdom of the ancients, There was a
disposition “to study the opinions of others, as the only mode of form
ing their own; to read Nature through books; to attend terwhat had
been already thought and said, rather than to what really is and happens.
Euclid was mathematics, Aristotle natural history. To question what
Aristotle had said was almost as great an heresy as to question tne
dogmas and authority of the Church.
Philosophy thus came to be little else than an exposition of. the
thoughts of other men; and in place of independent investigation into
the phenomena of Nature, were compilations and epitomes.
Experi
menters were replaced by commentators; criticism took the place of
induction : and instead of great discoverers we had learned men; and
as a consequence (as Lord Bacon, in describing the character and state
of knowledge at this period, remarks), philosophy was 1 barren m effects,
fruitful in questions, slow and languid in its improvement. The following
sentences, which form the conclusion of a lecture—one upon a course .of
Euclid, delivered at Oxford—illustrate better, perhaps, than any descrip
tion, this temper of mind :—“ Gentlemen hearers, I. have performed
mv promise, I have redeemed my pledge, I have explained according tomy ability the definitions, postulates, axioms, and first eight propositions,
of the 1 Elements of Euclid.’ Here, sinking under the weight oi years,
I lay down my art and instruments.”
.
.
But though the great strides made by modern science date back
no farther than from the beginning of the seventeenth century, yet
earlier beams of light during that drear interval penetrated the thick
darkness around : a few bold spirits, from time to time, rose sypenor
to the mental indolence and superstition and scholastic pedantry that
prevailed, and, despite opprobrium and persecution, had the courage
to interrogate nature for themselves. Their “.ineffectual fires may
have “paled” in presence of the greater luminaries that have since
risen above the horizon; but they were the heralds, of the dawn, the
precursors of that brighter and better day in which it is. our happiness
to live
They faithfully handed down the torch of science, and did
somewhat also to increase its light. As there were reformers before
Martin Luther, so in modern Europe there were philosophers who to
some extent applied the inductive method in their researches before
Francis Bacon. They were the avant couriers of that great power which
has revolutionized the thought and changed the face of modern society,
and their names therefore deserve a place among, those which the world
will not willingly let die. Holding this conviction, I propose \ery
B
�Our Early English Scientific Writers,
,
3
briefly, to recall the names of some of those old English worthies who
in their day rendered such service as they pould in promoting a spirit
of inquiry into
“Nature’s infinite book of secrecy,”
(
•
j
’ ■
and in advancing our knowledge of, and control over, the phenomena
and forces of Nature.
The earliest English writer on science whose works have come down
to us was Adelard, a monk of Bath, who lived in the mid Hie of the
twelfth century. He is said to have been learned in all the science of
his time. In pursuit of knowledge he travelled through France, Ger
many, Italy, and Spain; and also visited Arabia, then the great seat of
learning. The. “Elements of Euclid” was translated by him out of
Arabic into Latin; a copy of which, beautifully written on parchment,
with illuminated capitals, may be seen among the Arundel Manuscripts
in the library of the British Museum. Beside this, and the translation
of a work on the “ Seven Planets,” he wrote several treatises on Physics,
and on Medicine, and one on the Seven Liberal Arts. A treatise by
him. on the Astrolabe is also preserved among the manuscripts in the
British Museum; its chief, if not its only, value now is as a curious spe
cimen of our early scientific literature.
Another scientific author, of some note in his time, was Daniel of
Merley, or, as he is sometimes called, Daniel Morley, who, if not a
contemporary of Adelard, flourished in the same century with him; and
like him travelled into Spain and Arabia to increase his learning.’ He
wrote a work on the “ Principles of Mathematics,” but of which no copy
is known to be extant. Another work by him, entitled “ De Inferior!
et Superior! Parte Mundi,” has been more fortunate in escaping the
ravages of time; a copy of it is preserved in the British Museum, bound
up with Adelard’s treatise on the Astrolabe. It is based on the Alma
gest of Ptolemy, and is dedicated to John, Bishop of Norwich. •
But, next to Roger Bacon, perhaps the most celebrated of our early
scientific authors was Robert Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln, who was
born in 1175, and died in 1253. If we are to credit his biographer, he
must have been a living encyclopaedia, having been not only profoundly
versed in Scripture (a rare attainment in those days, even in a bishop),
in theology, and. in ecclesiastical law, but also excelling in music, logic,’
metaphysical philosophy, mathematics, astronomy, and other branches
of natural philosophy. Besides being active in his episcopal duties, he
was a voluminous author. The catalogue of his works appended to’ his
biography shews that in addition to many theological and miscellaneous
treatises, he wrote on the “ Heat of the Sun,” on “ Motion,” on the
“ Quadrature of the Circle,” on the “ Air,” on the 11 Rainbow,” and on
the “Utility of the Sciences.” A selection of his scientific works was
published at Venice in 1514. From writing on astronomy he was called
an astrologer, and is so designated by the poet Gower; and like all who
at that time distinguished themselves by superior knowledge, he enjoyed
—or we should rather say suffered—the reputation of being a magician.
Stories were widely circulated and believed of his having invented a
speaking head made of brass, and of an infernal horse which he had
1— 2
�4
History- Teaching.
erected by his magic art, and on which he was said to have ridden
through the air to Rome. Whether these stories point to some mecha
nical inventions, which popular ignorance would be sure to attribute to
sorcery and connect with supernatural legend, cannot now be ascer
tained ; but we know that any extraordinary invention or discovery, as
the printing press, or gunpowder, would indubitably, in that age, be
fathered on the Evil One, as the illustrious friend of Grosseteste, Roger
Bacon, found to his cost.
But I must defer to another paper the sketch I propose to give of
this the most distinguished Englishman in our scientific annals prior to
the advent of his still greater namesake, the author of the “ Novum
Organon.”
HISTORY-TEACHING.
BY WILLIAM ROSSITER, F.R.G.S.
TTEMPTING to “get blood from a stone” has generally been
considered work in vain, and “ skinning flints ” is sometimes
described as unprofitable labour. The same truth is put
classically as “ ex nihilo, nihil fit" and also colloquially as
“ out of nothing, nothing comes.” I suppose most of us have felt the
truth of this, probably in more ways than one; but I think also that we
teachers, especially teachers of English, suffer frequently from this law,
without even realizing, fully, the cause of the failure of our work.
In teaching Latin or Greek, we never expect a pujpil to use a word
or a construction that has not been explained to him; nor do we look,
in teaching physical science or mathematics, for our pupils to know what
we have not taught them: yet, how frequently do we wish, rather than
hope, for our school-boys to write good English, and to compose narra
tives and essays, without first supplying them with the means of acquiring
the requisite knowledge or ability !
No subject is more frequently chosen for “composition” than
history; and what materials do we give the minds of the “ composers ?”
Generally, compilations of historical facts—frequently admirable as con
taining in a few hundred pages a resume of the facts of history, but
generally dry and barren for the purpose of instruction, giving school
boys nothing but a stereotyped list of names and-dates, summing up a
reign in a chapter, a campaign in half a page, a character in three lines,
and this generally in language the most general and comprehensive pos
sible, and therefore the most difficult for a boy to comprehend.
As a step towards remedying this evil—and a very great step it is—
we have school-books which are not compilations, but extracts from good
authors. These are exceedingly useful, so far as they can be useful, but
they do not satisfy the want I am endeavouring to describe, the want on
the part of school-boys of a sufficient familiarity with facts to know what
to say, and with good English to be able to say it.
�History- Teaching.
5
The very excellence of the extracts is one great cause of this. An
extract from Hallam or Macaulay is nourishment to a mind familiar with
the names and things spoken of; but to one who knows but little of the
facts, and comprehends, and that but imperfectly, but few of the allusions,
an extract from a philosophical author is but a delusion and a mockery,
except for the purpose of accustoming the mind, to expressions which it
may one day understand and know how to value.
There may be much difference of opinion as to the extent of this
“want” on the part of our scholars, there will probably be even more as
to the best means of supplying it, if admitted to be existing. The means
I have adopted is to use, as reading-books, historical novels and plays.
For example, in the study of the Plantagenet period, we have read
“Ivanhoe,” “King John,” and “Richard II.” I don’t mean -selec
tions, but the whole book in each case, taking care to remember that
we were reading “fiction” and not “fact,” but on the whole en
joying the graphic descriptions of the novelist or poet somewhat
more than we should the correct statement of carefully compiled facts,
and, it is to be hoped, educating our hearts as well as our minds, by
learning that “history” does not mean a list of battles, treaties, and
persecutions, but a record of the lives of men and women by whose
struggles, successes, and failures, we may learn to guide ourselves.
Probably our plan may call forth objections on many different
grounds. If so, I will try to be guided by them, and if I can to meet
them. Practically, at examinations, instead of some boys sitting chew
ing their pens, wondering what they shall say, I find every one complain
that the time was not half long enough.
Industrial and Reformatory Schools for the County of
Kent.—The Justices of Kent have resolved to avail themselves of the
provisions of the Industrial Schools Act and the Reformatory Schools
Act passed last session. At a meeting of magistrates held in January,
a committee was appointed to consider the expediency of the court
taking action under these Acts, and their report was presented- at a
court of general session, held on Thursday, 19th March. The com
mittee were of opinion that it was desirable that the system of indus
trial schools should be put into operation in the county. They recom
mended that, in the first instance, suitable buildings, with land attached,
should, if practicable, be hired for this purpose; but that, failing this,
the court should erect one house for boys and another for girls, each
house to be capable of accommodating about 50 children. With refer
ence to the’reformatory schools, the committee recommended that the
court adopt the provision of the 27th section of the Act 29th and 30th
Viet. cap. 117, by making contracts with the managers of the Reforma
tory School at Redhill, or any similar institution for the reception of
boys and girls respectively. The court unanimously adopted the above
recommendations, and notice was ordered to be given that at a subse
quent session the justices would proceed to make a contribution out of
the county rate for such purposes.
�6
ON THE CULTIVATION OF THE MEMORY.
"
BY S. E. EENGOUGH.
AN possesses three primary intellectual faculties, imagination,
memory, and reason. Reason is the monarch, which every
other portion of his nature was created to obey: but the
character and extent of the sway exercised by this kingly attri
bute over the realm of mind depends upon the harmonious action of its
two subordinates, the imagination and the memory. If imagination does
not impart creative life to every province of science in which reason
claims to exercise a judicial function, if memory does not retain its stores
of knowledge in readiness for service at a moment’s notice, reason
expends its energies in vain, and, exhausted by fruitless efforts, too
often becomes the deluded and willing slave of sense and appetite. In
plain terms, the prerogatives of reason can only be maintained by the
judicious culture of the other faculties. Yet any systematic discipline of
the imagination has hitherto had little place in schemes of education,
while it has been the custom to tax unduly the powers of memory with
out the slightest regard to the laws which regulate its action. The time,
we trust, is not far distant when education will be based on rational
principles; when the nature of the human mind, and the processes by
which alone it can be normally developed, will be studied with no less
care than that at present bestowed by the agriculturist on the com
position of soils and the chemical elements of the crops which they are
required to bear.
Youth is the seed-time of our life, and the mind cannot be expected
to produce a harvest useful and rich in quality, and beautiful in form,
unless the germs of future intelligence be early implanted within the
memory. It is a manifest duty, therefore, of all engaged in education to
analyze carefully the constitution of this faculty, and to become ac
quainted with any methods by which the treasures committed to it may
be preserved from perishing. Every individual possesses two almost
distinct kinds of memory, one of which is for the most part under the
control of the will, and is more properly termed recollection; the other
is the passive recipient of impressions conveyed to it through the medium
of the senses. The efficiency of this latter faculty depends mainly on the
possessor’s physical constitution, bent of character, and habits of life, and
is only susceptible of a limited measure of improvement. It is far ptherwise with the recollection, which is subject to volition, and the capabili
ties of which may be increased to an indefinite extent. With this
portion of memory the educator is of course chiefly concerned, and the
failure of attempts to impart information to the young generally arises
from inattention to the laws on which the power of recollection depends.
These are referable to the two heads of association and attention.
The principle of association of ideas may be described as the ten
dency of two or more facts or conceptions, which have been con
templated together or in immediate succession, to become so connected
that one of them at a future time recalls the other, or introduces a train
of thoughts which follow each other in the order in which they were
�Ou the Cultivation of the Memory.
7
originally associated. The causes or conditions of this association of
■ideas are threefold—resemblance or contrast, contiguity in time or place,
■cause and effect. On these principles, then, one thought may suggest
or recall another, which has some relation to it in either of these respects.
The success of the teacher or student in educating and strengthening
the powers of recollection is mainly dependent on the judgment with
which he seizes upon the associations best adapted to insure a lasting
connection between some new fact, which it is desired to imprint upon
the memory, and some other idea, which already exists within the mind.
Now, whether the associations in any particular case should be strictly
logical, local, or merely accidental and arbitrary, must be decided, not only
by the subject matter to be remembered, but also by the mind and
circumstances of -the pupil. Associations, for example, of the strongest
and most serviceable kind for one who had always lived in a city would
be weak and almost unintelligible to a person brought up in the country,
and w? versa. As a general rule, an association should be natural and
rational, should be calculated to quicken the attention by exciting interest,
and should be of intrinsic value, and add to the stock of information at
the same time that it furnishes assistance to the memory.
li Every fresh fact or idea,” it has been truly said, “ should be put by
in its proper place in the mind—that is to say, the new fact or idea
■should be associated with its proper class of facts or ideas already
existing in the mind. A general principle gives the key to the remem
brance of a whole series of facts or events. Physical facts are best
remembered through a knowledge of their general law, effects through a
knowledge of their cause, and results through a knowledge of the general
principles upon which they depend.”
The unwillingness which every intelligent teacher must feel to en
courage his pupils to form frivolous and unnatural, and therefore neces
sarily transient associations, will always prevent artificial aids to memory
from occupying any but a very subordinate place in education. But a
good mnemonical system has its use, and, if properly applied, would save
a vast amount of time and labour. There are many things which it is
necessary to remember, and which are incapable of rational association,
.such as statistics of every sort, unconnected events and lists of names.
How much of the mental energy of children is wasted in the vain attempt
to engrave upon the memory by wearisome repetition such items of
information, which might be mastered more effectually in one tenth of
the time by the aid of mnemonical association !
A striking instance of what may be done in this way is afforded by
Mr. Stokes’s ingenious method of teaching the multiplication table, by
means of which—incredible as the statement may appear—a child of
ordinary capacity may be made perfectly familiar with that formidable
task in a single hour. This great boon to infancy has now been intro
duced into the chief national schools of Glasgow, the masters of which,
fifteen in number, have signed a testimonial to its efficiency. Mr. Stokes
is certainly at the head of all mnemonical professors. Having spent
much time over different systems of artificial memory, we feel able to
-assert with confidence, that the mnemonical key which he places in the
�8
On the Cultivation of the Memory.
hands of his pupils combines in itself the advantages shared among all
other systems, and we strongly recommend it to any one preparing for a
competitive examination.
We have next to consider the surest method of quickening the
attention, the importance of which arises from memory being often the
result of the complex action of several senses. There is, so to speak, a
muscular memory, or involuntary movement, the result of habit and
suggestion—and a memory of the tongue, the eye, and ear, as well • as
reason. If each of these memories can be brought to bear simul
taneously on the same object, an indelible impression is commonly pro
duced. And this is not so difficult as might be supposed. We are
acquainted with an accomplished German linguist who has availed him
self of this principle in teaching language with astonishing success.
Appealing to the eye by written words, to the ear by clear and forcible
enunciation, and quickening the attention by always obliging his pupils
“ to suit the action to the word, and the word to the action,” he under
takes to impart a conversational facility in French or German within a
few weeks. To the simultaneous appeal made to eye, ear, and reason,
we must attribute the success of the Pestalozzian system of instruction,
which is especially adapted to infancy, when the activity of the powers
of observation, as contrasted with those of reflection, clearly indicates
that the senses are the chief channels by which knowledge should reach
the mind. To us it seems scarcely credible, that fifty years ago geo
graphy was commonly taught without an atlas. Fifty years hence, it
may seem equally astounding, that the minds of children of seven years
old and upwards should be nourished, or rather starved, as they generally
are at present, on a diet of grammatical abstractions never fully under
stood until the reason is matured.
Lastly, it is obvious that nothing quickens the attention so much aspleasurable interest. That which is learned unwillingly never sinks deep
in the memory ; and school tasks are too often rendered unnecessarily
irksome and distasteful. We believe there are very few children who, if
taught judiciously, would not take delight in their school books, instead
of listlessly dogearing their leaves, or moistening them with their tears..
It is needless to add, that when a lesson is learned con amorext is learned
in half the time, and the mind receives on a sensitive surface a perma
nent impression.
The Number of Candidates for Examination at the Train
Colleges.—By a return just issued, it appears that the number of
candidates who presented themselves for examination at the training
colleges at Christmas, 1866, was 1614, against 1555 at the previous
Christmas, of whom 1207 passed their examination, against 1306 at the
previous Christmas. The number of those who entered the training
colleges in January, 1867, was 1121, against 1215 in January, 1866, and
the number of pupil teachers apprenticed in 1866 was 3070, against
2631 in the previous year.
ing
�9
THE USE OF CYCLOPAEDIAS
*
BY VERNON LUSHINGTON, ESQ., B.C.L.
HE English Cyclopaedia consists of eleven great volumes, twodevoted to geography, three to biography, two to natural
history, and four to arts and sciences. No critic can pretend
to have read it, but only to have read in it; all, however.,
speak highly, most highly, in its praise. Its peculiar merits seem to
consist in its convenient divisions, and a large degree of completeness,
combined with a very moderate price. I have hardly done more than
look into the Biography and Geography, but with very great satisfaction;
reading descriptions of strange places I have visited, and life-stories of
memorable men now passed away or still living.
Perhaps the first sensation of the reader on opening these massive
volumes will be one of bewilderment, and unwillingness to traverse any
such vast mountain of knowledge. But on better consideration he will
feel two things; first, that kind of reverence which the spectacle of any
great human labour cannot but call forth; and secondly, that this (or
indeed any) Cyclopaedia is a witness to the inexhaustible interest of
reality and simple truth. He will see that it is in fact a record of a
thousand thousand conquests over thick night, won in many generations
by a far-reaching industry, and patient intelligence, in many cases even
—say the discovery of America—by downright unmistakable valour:
and so gazing on these columns, there may come flashing through his
mind something of the exultation with which a people greets a victorious
army returning homeward. At least he cannot but observe how the
age in which we live is assiduously minding and doing her business;
everywhere extending and consolidating positive knowledge; with honest
sober eyes scrutinizing the past of human history, studying the starry
heavens, the solid earth, and all living things, tracking everywhere the
dominion of steadfast laws, then recording what is found, for ourselves
and for those who come after. A Cyclopaedia witnesses that all these
things are being done.
But let not the reader stop here ! Admiration is good, but not
barren admiration. Let the book be really used. A great dictionary
of this. kind, if -within easy reach, should be constantly appealed to.
There is no study, no reading, which does not involve local conditions,
the. history of particular men, the growth of successive efforts, and a
variety of other matters which it is well to know, sometimes even indis
pensable to know, if we would rightly understand the subject in hand.
It is here that a Cyclopaedia, the design of which we owe mainly to the
great Frenchmen of the last century, may be of real service to the indi
vidual student. It is “ a teaching all round,” a catalogued summary of
all knowledge. Under the names of particular men and places, it posts
up such information as ordinary inquirers seek for concerning them;
* “The English Cyclopaedia,” conducted by Charles Knight.
Evans.
London: Bradburv and'
�IO
S
The Use of Cyclopaedias.
under the titles of subjects or things, it gives short popular treatises,
popular in the right sense, which relate the history, and describe the
scope of the special matter, whatever it may be: the essence of a good
Cyclopaedia being, as already suggested, that the information shall be
easily found, and when found, shall be accurate, clear, and, so far as it
goes, sufficient. Thus a Cyclopaedia is a condensed library; which omits,
of course, a whole world of truth and beauty that lies in the works of
original authors, yet guides us to them, in some measure gives us their
results, or at least announces them: it contains also much that is not to
be found elsewhere. There might be worse desultory reading than in
this big book; but its true use is to promptly supplement or animate
our study of this or that subject, which we are otherwise steadily pur
suing ; to make our knowledge sure, precise; a thing of great importance.
Therefore, when in doubt, look !
To take the biographical volumes, for instance. What interest to
those who are studying mathematics or drawing, to look up the biography
•of Euclid or Titian ; to our students of Latin, to find a life of Ctesar or
Horace or Cicero ready at hand, with some reasonable criticism of their
work as a whole; to our lovers of music, to read what follows under the
names of Beethoven, Mozart, Rossini! Again, students of the physical
sciences will often here find a helper at hand to solve some pressing
doubt: often, also, they are discouraged from attacking scientific books
{even if accessible) by their bulk and complexity; in this Cyclopaedia
they will find numerous articles contributed by distinguished professors,
short and readable, yet thoroughly trustworthy, which may send them
instructed and refreshed on their way. Again, to every thoughtful man
the history of his own occupation and its processes presents peculiar
interest: a banker’s clerk may rightly wish to learn something of the
history of banking; a wool-spinner to learn where the wool comes from,
and how his beautiful machinery has been produced; an engineer to
read of the labours of Watt and Stephenson, and so on. .All such
matters are very conveniently studied in a Cyclopaedia. Again, for we
must not pass over the two noble geographical volumes; our home, the
city or town in which we live, the country round about, the places we
visit in our holidays—these we cannot know too much of, and here
again the Cyclopaedia will be our friend.
These slender indications must suffice. It will be observed that a
Cyclopaedia does not dispense with ordinary text-books, and ordinary
steady work, still less with poetry and art, and all that supreme class of
human utterances which speak directly to the heart of man; but it has
a use of its own for every class of students. As such it well deserves a
place in every student’s library.
This notice should not pass without a grateful tribute to Mr. Charles
Knight himself. He is not the publisher, but the “ conductor ” of this
Cyclopaedia, the publishing part being undertaken by the firm of Brad
bury and Evans : they also deserve our thanks, for they take upon them
selves a heavy money-risk which can only be rewarded in many years.
Mr. Knight’s publishing days seem now over. He began his career at
.a time when books were printed for the rich few: he was the first of
�The Use of Cyclopcedias.
II
British publishers who dedicated themselves to the people. He has
since been followed by many: new readers have produced new pub
lishers, and these again new readers; and so the good work goes on.
But Mr. Knight has the credit of leading the way; he was the first man;
he threw his bread upon the waters. The object of his life has been to
bring to the numerous humbler classes sterling English literature and
solid information on national and every-day subjects. We cannot
remember the first appearance of the “ Penny Magazine,” but it still
.gives pleasure in many a cottage, and in its day it wrought great things.
Since then, Mr. Knight (whose own name is modestly omitted from the
biographies) has brought out good volume upon volume, good series upon
series; himself an author of considerable note, the writer of a history of
England and many other books; and what is an especial claim of
honour, he has done more, as editor and publisher, than any other
Englishman for the name and fame and large use of Shakspere.
One day his own name will appear in this book, and all his labours
be duly chronicled; and he will then show well worthy of comparison
with the illustrious family of the Etiennes, more commonly known by
the Latin name of Stephens, the celebrated printers of the sixteenth
century, whose lives I have been reading (for the first time) among the
biographies. They dwelt in Paris and Geneva, patronized, in the
ancient worthy sense, by princes and wealthy merchants, by Francis I.
and Henry III. of France, by the State Council of Geneva, by the
munificent Fuggers of Augsburg; and, on the other hand, persecuted
and hindered (not very seriously, however) by Catholic prelates. There
they produced grand “ Dictionariums ” of Greek and Latin, editions of
Greek and Latin authors, editions of the Bible, and theological works;
writing and printing for the scholars of Europe. What could be done
for letters in those days they did, and excellently well. The same noble
enterprise and unwearied industry has marked the career of our English
printer in the nineteenth century, in his labours to give to the people of
England English secular literature. And here Mr. Knight stands as the
representative of the latest—may we also say, in promise the highest ?—
effort of the English printing-press. What a contrast, what a progress
between the sacred missal, written by one hand, and tenderly illuminated
for the delight of a few high-born eyes, and these stout volumes of secular
lore, printed and stereotyped for the service of the million ! Something
may be lost, but how great the gain ! Worthy of a “ Hymn of Praise,”
such as Mendelssohn actually wrote in honour of Gutemberg, the first
printer’s anniversary day.
At the same time, this is true and most true—that life is a thousand
fold more than books; and especially that no man can live upon a
Cyclopaedia. And the service which positive knowledge has to render
is but begun. It has yet to make itself felt as a disciplined orderly whole;
to deal with far higher subjects (a real political economy, for instance);
and to do what no Cyclopaedia can do—fashion a methodic education,
and reach, in a living form, the great multitude of men. What is espe
cially needed, is that the modern mind should be able to unite itself
wholly with the past; should be able to rise above details—in history
�I
12
The Use of Cyclopaedias.
above chronicles, in science above specialities, in life above professional
subtleties; not despising or neglecting these, but subordinating them;
should comprehend the relations of the great provinces of knowledge to
each other, their office to the individual mind and the social life of men.
This seems a gigantic task, almost an impossible one, and, indeed, to
the first undertaker it is a work of the first order of magnitude; but the
thing once done or truly conceived, practical success is ultimately cer
tain, and every step gained will wonderfully simplify and illuminate all
our conceptions. A right education will, then, aim at communicating
this ascertained order as the basis of all knowledge. But for.this pur
pose a Cyclopsedia is not the instrument. To the philosopher it is but a
quarry of materials, to us it is and must remain only a discoursing dic
tionary. Such thoughts are naturally suggested by the spectacle of this
vast accumulation of knowledge ; and the question which will be asked,
Whither is it all tending? And if, with such great issues before us,
involving inevitable large changes of opinion and practice, we cannot
but look with anxiety to the future, sincerity tells us we must on, and is
full of noble hope withal. In the early times of maritime discovery,
there was an African cape, called Bojador, or the “ Outstretcher,”
which the navigator dared not pass; and rumour said that those who
went beyond would become black men. The cape was passed, and the
outward figure of the world made known; but the bold Portuguese did
not become black !
To go back to Francis I. and the Stephens. Francis, whose face you
may read in Holbein’s portrait of him in Hampton Court, had faults
enough, and an intriguing, warring life with the Emperor Charles V. and
even our Henry VIII.; but he had a genuine love of having gifted men
of peace working about him. Thus Andrea del Sarto, “ the faultless
painter ” (of Browning’s admirable poem), the knave also for once, who
ran away to Florence with the King’s money, describes his former joy
“In that humane great monarch’s golden look,—
One finger in his beard or twisted curl
Over his mouth’s good mark that made the smile,
One arm about my shoulder, round my neck,
The jingle of his gold chain in my ear,
I painting proudly with his breath on me.’
And so it is told how Francis would often visit Robert Stephens in his
printing-house, and might be seen silently watching him finish his proof
before he started upon familiar talk. The English people cannot so
visit Mr. Knight; they are not kings at all; they can but buy Mr.
Knight’s books or read them, which is what Mr. Knight desires. But
many and many a man unknown to him bears him silent gratitude, and,
hereafter, a poor English student asking, “ How came these good books
to me ?” may have for answer, “ By the faithful work of many men;
among the foremost, the worthy English printer, publisher, editor, and
author, Charles Knight.” And so we heartily congratulate him on this
his great work.
�i3
ON TEACHING CHEMISTRY IN SCHOOLS.
BY W. H. WALENN, F.C.S.,
Compiler of Abridgments of Specifications relating to “Electricity and Magnetism,
their generation and applications,” “Photography,’ “Plating or coating metals with
metals,” etc., for the Commissioners of Patents.
HE reasons why chemical science has received so little atten
tion in schools maybe shortly stated under two heads
ist.
The belief that no practical good could be effected, in the
pupil’s mind, by adding to a curriculum already full to re
pletion, a science difficult in itself and only useful to those who intend
to make it the study and profession of their lives. 2nd. The very
general, but erroneous idea, that chemical science is difficult to teach,
more difficult to illustrate, and nearly impossible of experimental de
monstration by the pupils themselves.
In respect to the first point, Dr. W. A. Miller, F.R.S., Professor of
Chemistry in King’s College, London, at the meeting of the British
Association at Birmingham, in 1865, as President of the Chemical
Section, gave it as his deliberate opinion, that the methods of investi
gation employed in Chemistry entitle it to be regarded as an “ instru
ment in training the mind, and shaping the intellectual development of
the future.” After setting forth the difficulty which those whose edu
cation is based upon the linguistic system have to realize the magnitude
and true bearing of the power of the science, “and its educational
value,” he goes on to say that, “ Science is not merely to supply her
facts : she is to be employed to develop the powers of the mind, and
to discipline them for action. Hence it is of far more importance
to instil principles, and to cultivate precision in observation, in thought,
and in description, than it is to load the memory with mere facts, how
ever valuable. In short, the system of cramming is to be eschewed,
while the formation of habits of comparing, reasoning, and judging is
to be encouraged in every way.”
In respect to the second point, in answer to questions put by the
Select Committee of the House of Lords on the Public Schools Bill, in
1865, Dr. Sharpey, L.L.D., F.R.S., observes, that the elements of inor
ganic chemistry are well adapted to render instruction in physical
science exact and solid, “provided that instruction be carried on mainly
by practical lessons at which the pupils take part themselves in the ex
periments, and are permitted to handle and work with apparatus.” .
Apart from the weight which necessarily attaches itself to the opinions
of these celebrated men, we have no doubt that any well-informed
person who looks into the subject for himself will come to the same
conclusion, and that the introduction of Chemistry into schools is but a
question of time.
It is now acknowledged, on all sides, that when learning is imposed
as a duty only—as a task—that the progress of pupils therein is slow
compared with that which is made when their interest is excited. Of
�14
On Teaching Chemistry in Schools.
all sciences, Chemistry is the one most capable of exciting interest in
boys. . In order to do so, however, striking results must be presented
to their view, and, when they have sufficient facts in their minds, those
facts may be applied to analyzing the results and deducing further facts
from them; thus the development of the perceptive and of the rational
faculties goes hand in hand, and one faculty is made to assist the other
by action and re-action.
The labour of teaching is reduced, and the ability of the pupils is
further stimulated, if they are allowed to make such experiments them
selves as their progress in the subject warrants.
The method of teaching Chemistry may be by class books, followed
up by lectures, oral and written examinations, and by certain experi
ments made by the pupils themselves.
Class books’6 are very serviceable in the intervals between lectures;
their principal uses seem to be, laying the foundation of the mnemonics
of the subject, elucidating, by precept and example, the mathematical
principles of the science, and explaining, in proper sequence, the vari
ous processes that are necessary to the attainment of a given result.
They may either be employed to prepare the student for what will come
in the next experimental lecture, or to explain more fully the results
shown at the previous lecture, or (which is the most complete plan) to
clear up the points of the last, and to lay a foundation of theory for
the next lecture. In cases where only a small time can be allotted to
the subject, the class book may be made the text book of the lecture,
both in respect to the arrangement of the experiments and as to the
matter to be placed before the pupils.
Lectures afford the means of laying before the pupils, in a connected
view, the principles and practice of the subject, and many important
details of manipulation may be successfully explained, which would be
dry and trivial if written. Verifications of grand truths and the beauty
of certain results may be made manifest, also deductions may be drawn
from them which would scarcely appear warranted if merely read in a
book. Where experiments are not admissible, as in illustrating the
manufacture of iron, well marked and coloured diagrams of the furnacesand apparatus used are very suitable. Every boy should have a note
book (of ordinary copy-book size) so as to take notes of the points of each
lecture and sketches of the principal experiments and diagrams. At
the end of each lecture, it is a very salutary practice to give out certain
questions bearing upon the subject, to be answered in writing at the
next lecture, also to examine the boys orally upon the principles that
have been inculcated. A weekly examination or “ recapitulation” may
also take place with advantage.
The extent to which the pupils may be permitted to work out their
own experiments must depend very much upon the class of school and
upon the appliances at hand. That this can be done much more easily
than is generally thought possible, the author has endeavoured to de* One of the newest and best class books is ‘ ‘ Lessons in Elementary Chemistry : inor
ganic and organic,” by Henry E. Roscoe, B.A., F.R.S., Professor of Chemistry in Owen’s
College, Manchester. London : Macmillan and Co. 1867. Price 4s. 6d.
�On Teaching Chemistry in Schools.
15;
*
monstrate, but, in establishments that have a laboratory attached, the
pupils may readily work out most of the leading experiments to the
verge of organic chemistry.
In imparting instruction in Chemistry, as in any other subject, the
most important thing is to lay a good foundation. The great principlesof the science should be deeply impressed, both on the memory and on
the reason, at the beginning of the course, by repeated experiments, and
by constant reference to examples in common life so as to connect the
knowledge which is being imparted to that which already exists in the
pupil’s mind.
In the mnemonical part, every student should write out fairly in his.
note book and commit to memory good definitions of what the science
treats of, and of the terms used; the principal elements should also be
learnt by heart, together with their symbols and atomic weights. As the
chief laws of the subject are elucidated (by experiment or otherwise),
they should be placed in the said note book in a tabular form. By this
means, at the end of the course, each student has a complete annota
tion and memoria technicci written by himself, which he can therefore
more easily refer to than any other book.
In the rational part, the notes on the lectures themselves will furnish
abundant instances of the steps by which the discoveries of the science
were made, and of the rationale of well established processes and de
finite changes. All calculations of atomic weights, density of gases, &c.,
as well as the laws and systems of crystallography, and of nomenclature
and notation, come under this head, and afford good practice.
In the experimental part, it is also essential that lucid notes be taken,
and it will be found most successful in the end if the demonstrator or
teacher requires each boy to read over his notes to him before the
students are dismissed; this is important, because it will be found
that the experimental division of the subject clears up all points that
were previously obscure, and there often remains some debris that
require removal; also in interpreting the bearings and results of experi
ments, students necessarily require much guidance. All experiments
should form a connected series, and should elucidate brilliantly and.
pointedly some great truth, the only exception to the latter rule being
the exhibition of useful details of manipulation. Mere “ cookery book”
experiments (as the author has heard them called) such as “ How to
make green fire,” “ How to make mimic lightning,” &c., and all that
are isolated or have no immediate relation to the matter in hand, should,
generally speaking, be avoided.
The highest authorities upon the Science of Chemistry have given
their decided opinion that it should be taught according to the latest
theoretical views, and with as little as possible reference to theories that
rather form a matter of history than of present interest. For this reason
the. new nomenclature and notation should be adhered to throughout, in
their pure and simple form; the notation fully deserves this straight
forward treatment and this universal adoption, for it at once connects
* See ‘‘Little Experiments for Little Chemists,” by W. H. Walenn, F.C.S.
T. J. Allman, 463, Oxford Street. Price is.
London;
�■I 6
On Teaching Chemistry in Schools.
atomic weights with volumes and with specific heats; further assistance
to the unity of the science, as well as to its grasp of facts under a
minimum of general laws, is afforded by the adoption of the theory of
types in inorganic as well as in organic Chemistry, and the doctrines of
atomicity and saturation of combining power remove many difficulties
that have always been felt in the subject. The molecular and substitu
tion formulae that have lately come into general use, appear, in conjunc
tion with the above theoretical principles, to have brought the science
into a sufficiently stable condition to warrant the teaching of the latest
theories in a connected form/''
In conclusion, it appears scarcely possible that the conscientious and
enlightened preceptors of England will deny the entrance, into their
scholastic system, of a science which draws out so many of the latent,
but easily excited, faculties of the mind, and of outward application, as
Chemistry. Chemistry is the rallying point of other exact and experi
mental sciences, and its branches are many, reaching even to the
-celestial bodies.
LATIN FOR LADIES.
is only the other day that we were informed that the young
ladies who were examined by the roving Cambridge authorities
acquitted themselves eminently to the satisfaction of their
questioners. And now we learn that the preparations for the
•similar annual proceedings on the part of the University of Oxford are
completed, and that girls and boys alike, though not, we presume, in
company, are to be put through the examination process with due
severity and rigour. On the whole, it strikes us that this is about the
most astonishing of all the astonishing things which indicate the reality
of that social revolution which English society has for some time been
undergoing. That the old universities should send delegates all over the
country to examine the sons of the smaller gentry and the men of busi
ness was a sufficiently startling novelty. But that “the cloister” should
actually dispatch its missionaries to report upon the acquirements of the
sisters of these long-neglected boys is a proof that our fundamental ideas
as to what constitutes the perfection of the female character are radically
changed. Of course it is not to be doubted for a moment that no sen
timental gallantry has warped the judgment of the presiding examiners.
We cannot suppose that a Latin translation, or the solution of a quad
ratic equation, presented by blushing sixteen, would not be as accurately
estimated at its real value as the same performance sent up by an
ungainly boy. We accept, therefore, the figures by which the examiners
represent the amount of success attained by their fair students, and con* To preceptors the following work is a great boon, and is thoroughly exhaustive of the
subject:—“Elements of Chemistry, theoretical and practical,” by William Allen Miller,
M.D., L.L.D., &c., Professor of Chemistry in King’s College, London. Longman & Co.
3 vols. 3rd Ed. Price £2 17s.
�Latin for Ladies.
17
gratulate them on the delicacy and good sense which have led them to
abstain from publishing the individual names of the interesting postulants
for academic honours. We are quite satisfied with their report, and
it only remains for us to speculate, with no little curiosity, as to the prac
tical results which may be expected to follow from the success of this
wonderful scheme.
That the general character of women would be materially altered, and
altered for the better, by an improved education can hardly be doubted.
Setting aside the popular nonsense about the absolute identity of men’s
and women’s natural powers, it is certain that most of the defects which
men so often cast in the teeth of women are mainly due to the wretched
imitation of education which is all that is in the reach of the immense
majority of Englishwomen. If then they can be made to learn any
thing, or rather to study anything thoroughly, and to carry on their
studies beyond the period of mere girlhood, they must certainly acquire
in some considerable measure that accuracy of thought, that dislike for
rhetorical platitudes, that solidity and fairness of judgment, and that
soundness of critical taste, for which, as things now are, the gentler sex
is not, as a rule, highly distinguished. But it is the incidental conse
quences of the creation of a love for serious study among English girls
of the middle and upper classes which present the most curious subjects
for speculation. What will be its effect upon the “ matrimonial
market,” and upon the education of men? We do not ask whether it
will frighten away our ingenuous youth from offering their hands to
young ladies of whose acquirements they stand in awe and dread.
Possibly here and there some foolish man might abstain from making
pretensions to the companionship of a pretty girl, through dread of being
despised for his inability to extract the cube root and to discuss the
doctrine of the Greek subjunctive mood. But as it is, cases of clever
women marrying stupid husbands are quite numerous enough to reassure
us on this head. The question is not as to the marrying prospects of
stupid men, but as to the marrying inclinations of well-educated women
in general. And here there does seem a probability of a change. At
present, as we take it, it is the want of a definite interest in some work
or occupation of real moment which sets girls speculating about mar
riage at so early a period. It is not because she has a dread of being
an old maid, or is longing to be “ settled in life,” or is discontented
with her home, that the thoughts of a girl of eighteen or nineteen are
so often turned to matrimonial contingencies. It is rather because she
has no present object on which to expend her energies, and nothing to
work upon with a view to any permanent benefit. With boys and
young men it is the reverse. Life with them is very soon a reality,
without any necessity for an early marriage. Men, as a rule, do not
look forward to marrying until they are eight or ten years older than
girls are when they seriously contemplate it. Their business or their
profession, that profession being more or less the continuation of the
work of education itself, furnishes them with an object fortheir thoughts
and for the employment of their energies. But when the average girl
has gone through the wretched “ course of studies” prescribed by the
VOL. I.
2
�18
Latin for Ladies.
schoolmistress or the governess, all comes to an end, and the next'
thing is to be married, or, at any rate, to be engaged. Her education has
totally failed to awaken her interest in the subjects of men’s studies, and
to cultivate her natural faculties to such an extent as to make their
further cultivation and the acquisition of more knowledge a delight and
a necessity. If, then, this new movement succeeds in converting the
■education of girls from a sham into a reality, it -will follow that by hun
dreds and thousands they will be far less impatient for a “ settlement,”
-and will by common consent postpone by three or four years the re
cognised age at which girls may be expect to be mistresses of a home of
their own. Some people may regret the change, but others will wel
come the advent of the theory that a young woman of three-and-twenty
is more likely to be wise in her arrangements for her future life than a
.girl of eighteen or nineteen.
Then, as to the education of the brothers and expectant husbands of
these highly cultured girls. If we have to abandon the idea that the
life of a woman is to be inspired by feeling and the life of a man by
thought and knowledge, a man’s standard as to what is expected of him
self must be raised. Boys who habitually look down upon their sisters’
learning and capacities are pampered in their own idleness, and never
made, as they ought to be, to feel ashamed. At this time, with all our
-advances, the average amount of the real education of the faculties of
English boys, with occasional exceptions, is simply disgraceful, from the
Boys of Eton down to the boys of the humblest grammar-school. And
while Oxford and Cambridge examiners are scouring the country and
’decorating the young provincial prodigies with the title of A.A., the
university system itself is so bad that of those who take an ordinary
bachelor’s degree a very large number are allowed to spend two-thirds
of their time of residence in all but utter idleness, supplemented by six
months’ cram at the end, while the annual six months’ vacation time is
passed in pure, unmitigated amusement. But when the new order of
things reigns in all good households, new ideas will take possession of
the lads who now disport themselves so royally in their ignorance and
self-satisfaction. Shame will do what self-respect and a sense of duty
have failed to accomplish. And while the Oxford and Cambridge
examiners are indoctrinating their charming candidates for distinction in
the country, they will be preparing' for themselves a condemnation as
men incapable of controlling and teaching their own undergraduates.—
Pall Mau Gazette.
Cambridge Local Examinations.—The greatest number of suc
cessful candidates from any one school, at the late Cambridge Local
Examinations, was thirty-six from the Devon County School, West
Buckland, which for three years in succession has passed a greater num
ber than any other school. Thirteen of these were in honours, and five
were distinguished in particular subjects, among them being the first and
second in order of merit in the Senior English Section.
�19
A PLEA FOR THE ART OF READING ALOUD, AS A
BRANCH OF REGULAR SCHOOL EDUCATION.
BY CHARLES JOHN PLUMPTRE,
Lecturer on Public. Reading, King’s College, Evening Class Department. .
HERE is no complaint more general than the rarity of good
readers in all classes of society. About five or six years ago,
in consequence of a notification on the part of the late Bishop
of Rochester, that a certificate of competence as a reader would
be required in the case of candidates for ordination in his lordship’s
diocese, a general awakening to the importance of the subject seemed to
take place among clergy and laity, and for several weeks one could
hardly take up a newspaper, from “ The Times ” to the humblest pro
vincial journal, without seeing leading articles and letters on “ Clerical
Elocution.”
But no adequate practical result of any substantial and permanent
nature followed from all these discussions. It was an illustration of the
old proverb, “ Great cry but little wool.” Complaints teemed on all
sides, but there was little done to remedy the complaint. Several of
the ¿¿shops have, I. know, from that time advised young curates and
candidates for orders to take a regular course of instruction in the art of
public reading, from those whom they thought were competent, from
natural qualifications, education, position, and experience, to teach that
art. But beyond this nothing has been done, and the evil is nearly, if
not quite, as prominent and widely spread as ever.
What a very able writer says, under the signature of 11 Rhetor,” in a
letter to the editor of 11 The English Churchman,” dated October 3,
1861, may be reproduced now with as much truth as then. The laity
(he says towards the close of his letter!) complain, and most justly, of the
bad reading inflicted on them Sunday after Sunday. But how can it be
otherwise while the present system lasts ? Candidates for the ministry
have no proper instruction, either in the public schools or universities.
They enter on their professional duties with provincialisms and cockneyisms uncorrected, and read positively worse than many of their con
gregation. The varieties of professional incapacity are endless—the
mutterer, who swallows all his final syllables—the drawlev. who wearies
with his tediousness—the gabbler, who rushes through the service at
express speed—the preacher, who mistakes prayers for sermons—the
spouter, who mouths the prayers with the most painful affectation. All
these evils are the necessary consequences of the inadequate estimate of
the end in view, and the means to be employed for its attainment.
Some take half a dozen lessons, perhaps, from a strolling player, or trust
to one lecture on church reading, given by the examining chaplain at the
close of the examination for orders ! The only true mode is a regular
course of instruction under a judicious teacher, carried on during the
year which ought to be devoted to theological training, after taking the
ordinary degree. It rests with the bishops to secure this by insisting
on a certificate of attendance on such a course, and I hope the time is
2—2
�20
A Plea for the Art of Reading Aloud.
not far distant when a reform so urgently required will be effected by
the rulers of the Church.
A recent offer has been made by an anonymous benefactor, to found
an annual prize of /40, at the universities of Oxford and Cambridge,
for the encouragement of proficiency in the art of good reading, but, I
regret to say, has been declined by both universities, on the ground, I
believe, of the difficulty of carrying out the wishes of the donor by
adequate and systematic instruction at the universities, as well as by the
alleged difficulty of deciding who are, or are not, the best readers in
the competition for the prize. The rejection, and the ground of the
rejection, of this liberal offer, have excited much dissatisfaction in the
public mind, and the leading journals have expressed their opinions on
the subject in no very measured language, which I have no desire to
reproduce; but I cannot help thinking that what has been found to
work so well, and to be so easily carried out in London, may also be
introduced and flourish at Oxford and Cambridge.
At King’s College, London, there has existed for nearly twenty
years, a Lectureship of Public Reading and Speaking, most ably filled
now by my friend and colleague, the Rev. Alex. J. D. D’Orsey. On the
establishment of the Evening Class Department of King’s College, a
similar Lectureship was made part of its instruction, to which I had the
honour of being appointed last summer j and though my experience
does not date so far back as Mr. D’Orsey’s, I am enabled to confirm all
that he has said on the subject of public reading and speaking, in his
lecture at the Royal Institution and other places, and can bear witness
to the need for instruction in the art, as well as to the excellent results
that ‘in most cases quickly follow from a regular course of practical
training. Prizes and certificates of merit are given for excellence in
public reading and sp&aking in both the Day and Evening Departments
of King’s College; and my colleague and I have hitherto found no very
great difficulty in deciding to whom such prizes and certificates should
be awarded. Surely, then, what has so long been found practicable
here will be found practicable elsewhere.
The prevalence of bad reading, in one or other of its almost count
less forms, is too generally admitted to need any formal quotation from
writers or other authorities in support of such an assertion. Whence
does this fault proceed ? I believe, in general, from inattention in child
hood, and the almost total absence of any system of teaching in a scien
tific yet natural manner in our public and private schools. I should
prefer on this point taking the evidence of a most competent -witness in
regard to all that relates to educational matters—the Rev. Francis
Trench—rather than offer any remarks of my own. Mr. Trench, in a
lecture delivered at St. Martin’s Hall in 1854, and subsequently pub
lished, says:—
“I must confess I can recall nothing worse than ordinary school
reading and recitation (mark, I say ordinary, because I am well aware
there are some exceptions), whether in the institutions for the rich or for
the poor in our land. Many amongst us can remember very well the
method in which we ourselves said our scholastic lessons in our former
�A Plea for the Art of Reading Alorid.
21
days. Whether any improvement in this matter has of late taken place,
I am unable to say. I trust that it may be so; but at the public school
■where I myself was, and one, too, not inferior in repute to any in the land
—I mean Harrow—the utmost attainable speed in repetition was allowed,
a false key and monotonous delivery of the worst kind was never
corrected or rebuked, no attempt whatever was made to render, or to
keep, the utterance in harmony with the sense; and bad habits of
delivery were formed and allowed, in a manner almost too strange for
belief, and on which I can only now look back with exceeding surprise.
Nor do I conceive that the system was in the least better at other schools.
I cannot let them escape. For should the Etonian, or the Winchester,
Rugby, or Westminster man, or the representative of any other public
school, ask me what grounds I have for such a statement, my answer to
the challenge would be, that at college I had full means and opportunity
to judge from the reading of the students there. They were gathered
from all schools of distinction; and to any one hearing them it was
evident enough that the general delivery at other schools was by no
means superior to that which was allowed, and which prevailed at my
■own. A system this not only most objectionable, and most injurious at
the time even to a just impression of the sense of the passage read, but
also so lasting in its evil consequences, that many never are emancipated
■or escape from them. I say this advisedly; and even those who do
•escape often only escape after many years, and with no little difficulty.
Hence, I believe, originates much of the bad reading which we hear in
public worship. Hence, I believe, originates that monotonous cadence
and drawl, which is so adverse to the due expression by the reader, and
to the due comprehension by the hearer, of any passage read. The ear
may be lulled, but the mind is not reached ; at least, if reached, it is
-reached in spite of the readers’ bad tone and enunciation. And here I
quote the words of one who felt this evil very deeply, and laboured very
constantly for its removal, or, at least, its mitigation—the Rev. C.
Simeon. ‘ How often,’ said he, ‘ are the prayers of the Church spoiled,
and good sermons rendered uninteresting, by bad delivery on the part
of ministers.’ ”
Mr. Trench then proceeds to show in detail how the same lamen
table neglect of the art of reading aloud prevails equally in private
schools, from the highest to the lowest class, and calls attention to the
fact, that even at the time when he was speaking, so glaring was the evil
in our national schools that a circular letter had been sent from Her
Majesty’s Board of the Privy Council to the various inspectors of schools,
stating that “ complaints have been made to their lordships concerning
the very small degree of attention which reading (as part of elocution)
receives in elementary schools, and making it imperative to include an
exercise on the art of reading in the oral part of the next Christmas
examination at the training schools.”
I trust I have said enough to prove how general is the neglect of the
art of reading aloud in our public and private schools. The neglect is,
however, I am strongly disposed to believe, far greater in schools for
boys than“ in schools for girls. As far as my own experience goes, I
�22
A Plea for the Art of Reading Aloud.
know that in London and the suburbs, out of a hundred schools where
elocution is taught, at least three-fourths are ladies’ schools. Hence,
probably, may be found one reason why, as a rule, women read aloud
better than men.
But what is the cause of this admitted neglect of the art of reading
in so many schools and families ? Why is it that elocution has been of
late years so much disregarded as a part of education, and yet music,
singing, drawing, and other accomplishments, have all received their due
share of attention? One reason is, I believe, to be found in the fact that
this very word, elocution, has been made a bugbear of, and has frightened
away many from its study, through a completely erroneous interpretation
of its meaning and character. Do not many persons imagine that the
study of elocution must lead to a pompous, bombastic, stilted, or pedantic
style—a style in which the artificial reigns predominant over everything
that is simple and natural ? I can only say, if elocution meant anything
of the kind I should be the last man to advocate its adoption in schools
or anywhere else. If I am asked to define what I then mean by elocu
tion, I think I should answer—“ That which is the most effective
pronunciation that can be given to words when they are arranged into
sentences and form discourse.” In this, of course, I include the appro
priate inflections and modulations of the voice, the purity of its intona
tion, the clearness of articulation, and, when suitable to the occasion, the
accompaniments of expression of countenance and action. This art of
elocution, then, I may further define as that system of instruction which
enables us to pronounce written or extemporaneous composition with
proper energy, correctness, variety, and personal ease; or, in other
words, it is that style of delivery which not only expresses fully the sense
and the words so as to be thoroughly understood by the hearer, but at
the same time gives the sentence all the power, grace, melody, and
beauty of which it is susceptible.
Is it not strange, let me ask, when we reflect on the marvellous power
which spoken language has to excite the deepest feelings of our common
nature, that the cultivation of the art of speaking which onceTeceived
so much attention, should afterwards and for so long a time have been
almost completely neglected. We know what importance the ancient
orators of Greece and Rome attached to the study of rhetoric. The
prince of them all, Demosthenes, asserted that “Delivery” (under which
term is included everything that relates to the effective management of
voice, look, and gesture) is the first, the second, and the last element of
success in a speaker; and the great Roman orator (Cic. de Orat. lib. i.)
most truly remarks that “ address in speaking is highly ornamental and
useful in private as well as in public life.” And surely this is as true in
our own day as it was in his. For even, assuming that a youth has no
apparent prospect of debating in Parliament, of addressing judges or
juries at the Bar, or appealing on the most solemn and important topics
of all from the pulpit, does it therefore follow that he need bestow no
trouble in learning to speak his native language elegantly and effec
tively ? Will he never have occasion to read aloud in his family circle,
or to a company of friends, some leader from “ The Times ” or other
�A Plea for the Art of Reading Aloud.
newspaper, some chapter from a book, or some verses from a poem ?
And what a difference will there be in the effect produced upon thereader and upon his audience accordingly as this is done well or ill ?•
We are most of us in the present day accustomed to have our sons and
daughters taught dancing, drilling, or calisthenic exercises, that give
strength, flexibility, and elegance to the limbs—and very excellent areall such accomplishments in their way. But after all, the limbs are por
tions of our frames far less noble than the tongue; and yet, while no
gentleman who can afford it hesitates about expending time and money
in sending his son to the fencing, drilling, or dancing master, how few,
comparatively, send as systematically their children to the elocution
master, to be taught the full development of that which is the crowning
glory of man—the divine gift of speech.
I believe firmly that consumption, and many other diseases of the
respiratory organs, which carry off so many thousands amongst us, while
they are in the very spring-time of life, would be greatly lessened in
number, and prevented in development, if the art of reading aloud were
more generally and properly taught and practised. This is not mere
vague assertion. Let me call in support of my statement a high medical
authority, Sir Henry Holland. In Sir Henry Holland’s “Medical
Notes,” at p. 42.2, I read as follows
“ Might not more be done in practice towards the prevention of pul
monary disease, as well as for the general improvement of health by
expressly exercising the organs of respiration—that is by practising accord
ing to method those actions of the body through which the chest is in
part filled or emptied of air ? Though suggestions to this effect occur
in some of our best works on consumption, as well as in the writings of
certain continental physicians, they have hitherto had less than their due
influence, and the principle as such is comparatively little recognised,
or brought into general application. In truth, common usage takes for
the most part a directly opposite course; and under the notion or pre
text of quiet, seeks to repress all direct exercise of this important function
in those who are presumed to have any tendency to pulmonary dis
orders. ... As regards the modes of exercising the function of respi
ration, they should be various, to suit the varying powers and exigencies
of the patient. Reading aloud (clara lectio) is one of very ancient recom
mendation, the good effects of which are not limited to this object alone.
It might indeed be well were the practice of distinct recitation, such as.
implies a certain effort of the organs beyond that of mere ordinary speech,
■more generally used in early life, and continued as a habit, or regular
exercise, but especially by those whose chests are weak, and who cannot
sustain stronger exertions. Even singing may for the same reasons, beallowed in many of such cases, but within much narrower limits, and
under much more cautious notice of the effects than would be requisite
in reading. If such caution be duly used as to posture, articulation, and
the avoidance of all excess, these regular exercises of the voice may be ren
dered as salutary to the organs of respiration as they are agreeable in their
influence on the ordinary voice. The common course of education is much
at fault in this respect. If some small part of the time given to crowd
�24
A Pica for the Art of Reading Aloud.
ing facts on the mind not yet prepared to receive or retain them, were
employed in fashioning and improving the organs of speech under good
tuition, and with suitable subjects for recitation, both mind and body
would often gain materially by the substitution.”
I might quote opinions to precisely the same effect from the works
on consumption and other diseases of the respiratory organs, of Dr.
James Bright, Dr. Godwin Timms, Combe, Mayo, and other eminent
physicians and physiologists, but there is no need to multiply quotations;
suffice it to say that all these high medical authorities concur in the same
opinion, viz., that “reading aloud” is, when conducted on sound
principles, an exercise for the delicate and for the robust, as healthy
and strengthening to the body as it is pleasant and profitable to the
mind.
I am not without strong hope that the whole subject will, in course
of time, meet with the attention it so well deserves. It is now nearly
eight years ago since, with the sanction of the Vice-Chancellor, and the
approval of the Bishop of the diocese, I began my work as a lecturer and
teacher of elocution, in reference to professional and public life, at the
University of Oxford on the same day that my colleague, Mr. D’Orsey,
entered on a similar course at the university of Cambridge; and now we
are associated in the same work, though in different departments, at King’s
College. Our pupils have steadily increased, our services have been
called into requisition at many large schools in the provinces, as well as
in London,°jand I have every reason to believe that a growing interest
in the art of public reading and speaking has been manifested. I only
trust that this interest may extend to all classes—high and low, rich and
poor—and bear substantial and enduring fruit, in the shape of men and
women with sound and healthy lungs, pleasant and agreeably modulated
voices, and clear and effective enunciation.
! The Education Grant.—In the year ending March 31, 1866,
¿£622,730 was expended from the Parliamentary grant in aid of Edu
cation in Great Britain. The amount was thus distributed : In annual
grants to elementary schools in England and Wales, ¿£378,003 for day
scholars, and ¿£10,003 for evening scholars ; ¿£68,034 in annual grants
in Scotland ; ¿£21,040 in building grants ; ¿£69,935 in grants to train
ing colleges; ¿£685 in unexpired pensions ; ¿£75,03° in administration
and inspection. Classified according to the denominations of the re
cipients, the expenditure was as follows :—On schools connected with
the church of England, .£351,498; on schools connected with the
British and Foreign School Society, ¿£58,623 ; Wesleyan Schools,
¿£28,592 ; Roman Catholic Schools in England, ¿£26,084 ; parochial
union schools, ¿£120; schools in Scotland connected with the Es
tablished Church, ¿£46,465 ; the Free Church, ¿£29,297 ; the Episcopal
Church, ¿£4,019; Roman Catholic schools in Scotland, ¿£3,002. *
�25
JOHN STUART MILL ON THE VALUE OF THE ANCIENT
CLASSICAL LANGUAGES AND LITERATURE IN
EDUCATION.
From the Inaugural Address delivered to the University of St. Andrew’s, Feb. ist. 1867. >
NIVERSITIES do enough to facilitate the study of modern
languages, if they give a mastery over that ancient language
which is the foundation of most of them, and the possession
of which makes it easier to learn four or five of the conti
nental languages than it is to learn one of them without it. . . . .
The only languages, then, and the only literature, to which I would
allow a place in the ordinary curriculum, are those of the Greeks and
Romans ; and to these I would preserve the position in it which they
at present occupy. That position is justified, by the great value, in
education, of knowing well some other cultivated language and litera
ture than one’s own, and by the peculiar value of those particular lan
guages and literatures.
There is one purely intellectual benefit from a knowledge of lan
guages, which I am specially desirous to dwell on. Those who have
seriously reflected on the causes of human error, have been deeply im
pressed with the tendency of mankind to mistake words for things.
Without entering into the metaphysics of the subject, we know how
common it is to use words glibly and with apparent propriety, and to
accept them confidently when used by others, without ever having had
any distinct conception of the things denoted by them. To quote again
from Archbishop Whately, it is the habit of mankind to mistake fami
liarity for accurate knowledge. As we seldom think of asking the
meaning of what we see every day, so when our ears are used to the
sound of a word or a phrase, we do not suspect that it conveys no clear
idea to our minds, and that we should have the utmost difficulty in de
fining it, or expressing, in any other words, what we think we understand
by it. Now it is obvious in what manner this bad habit tends to be
corrected by the practice of translating with accuracy from one language
to another, and hunting out the meanings expressed in a vocabulary
with which we have not grown familiar by early and constant use. I
hardly know any greater proof of the extraordinary genius of the
Greeks, than that they were able to make such brilliant achievements in
abstract thought, knowing, as they generally did, no language but their
own. But the Greeks did not escape the effects of this deficiency.
Their greatest intellects, those who laid the foundation of philosophy
and of all our intellectual culture, Plato and Aristotle, are continually
led away by words ; mistaking the accidents of language for real rela
tions in nature, and supposing that things which have the same name in
the Greek tongue must be the same in their own essence. There is a
well-known saying of Hobbes, the far-reaching significance of which you
will more and more appreciate in proportion to the growth of your
own intellect: “ Words are the counters of wise men, but the money of
fools.” With the wise man a word stands for the fact which it repre-
�26
On the Value of the Ancient Classical Languages
sents; to the fool it is itself the fact. To carry on Hobbes’ metaphor,
the counter is far more likely to be taken for merely what it is, by those
who are in the habit of using many different kinds of counters. But
besides the advantage of possessing another cultivated language, there
is a further consideration equally important. Without knowing the lan
guage of a people, we never really know their thoughts, their feelings,
and their type of character: and unless we do possess this knowledge,
of some other people than ourselves, we remain, to the hour of our
death, with our intellects only half expanded. Look at a youth who has
never been out of his family circle: he never dreams of any other
opinions or ways of thinking than those he has been bred up in; or, if
he has heard of any such, attributes them to some moral defect, or in
feriority of nature or education. If his family are Tory, he cannot con
ceive the possibility of being a Liberal; if Liberal, of being a Tory.
What the notions and habits of a single family are to a boy who has had
no intercourse beyond it, the notions and habits of his own country are
to him who is ignorant of every other. Those notions and habits are to
him human nature itself; whatever varies from them is an unaccountable
aberration which he cannot mentally realize: the idea that any other
ways can be right, or as near an approach to right as some of his own,
is inconceivable to him. This does not merely close his eyes to the
many things which every country still has to learn from others : it hin
ders every country from reaching the improvement which it could other
wise attain by itself. We are not likely to correct any of our opinions
or mend any of our ways, unless we begin by conceiving that they are
capable of amendment: but merely to know that foreigners think differ
ently from ourselves, without understanding why they do so, or what
they really do think, does but confirm us in our self-conceit, and connect
our national vanity with the preservation of our own peculiarities. Im
provement consists in bringing our opinions into nearer agreement with
facts; and we shall not be likely to do this while we look at facts only
through glasses coloured by those very opinions. But since we cannot
divest ourselves of preconceived notions, there is no known means of
eliminating their influence but by frequently using the differently coloured
glasses of other people : and those of other nations, as the most different,
are the best.
But if it is so useful, on this account, to know the language and lite
rature Of any other cultivated and civilized people, the most valuable of
all to us in this respect are the languages and literature of the ancients.
No nations of modern and civilized Europe are so unlike one another,
as the Greeks and Romans are unlike all of us; yet without being, as
some remote Orientals are, so totally dissimilar, that the labour of a life
is required to enable us to understand them. Were this the only gain
to be derived from a knowledge of the ancients, it would already place
the study of them in a high rank among enlightening and liberalizing
pursuits. It is of no use saying that we may know them through mo
dern writing. We may know something of them in that way; which is
much better than knowing nothing. But modern books do notteach us
ancient thought; they teach us some modern writer’s notion of ancient
�and Literature in Education.
27
thought. Modern books do not show us the Greeks and Romans ; they
tell us some modern writer’s opinions about the Greeks and Romans.
Translations aré scarcely better. When we want really to know what a
person thinks or says, we seek it at first hand from himself. We do not
trust to another person’s impression of his meaning, given in another
person’s words; we refer to his own. Much more is it necessary to do
so when his words are in one language, and those of his reporter in
another. Modern phraseology never conveys the exact meaning of a
Greek writer; it cannot do so, except by a diffuse explanatory circum
locution which no translator dares use. We must be able, in a certain
degree, to think in Greek, if we would represent to ourselves how a
Greek thought: and this not only in the abstruse region of metaphysics,
but about the political, religious, and even domestic concerns of life. I
will mention a further aspect of this question, which, though I have not
the merit of originating it, I do not remember to have seen noticed in
any book. There is no part of our knowledge which it is more useful to
obtain at first hand—-to go to the fountain head for—than our knowledge
of history. Yet this, in most cases, we hardly ever do. Our concep
tion of the past is not drawn from its own records, but from books
written about it, containing not the facts, but a view of the facts which
has shaped itself in the mind of somebody of our own or a very recent
time. Such books are very instructive and valuable; they help us to
understand history, to interpret history, to draw just conclusions from
it; at the worst, they set us the example of trying to do all this ; but
they are not themselves history. The knowledge they give is upon
trust, and even when they have done their best, it is not only incom
plete, but partial, because confined to what a few modern writers have
seen in the materials, and have thought worth picking out from among
them. How little we learn of our own ancestors from Hume, or Hallam,
or Macaulay, compared with what we know if we add to what these tell
us, even a little reading of cotemporary authors and documents 1 The
most recent historians are so well aware of this, that they fill their pages
with extracts from the original materials, feeling that these extracts are
the real history, and their comments and thread of narrative are only
helps towards understanding it. Now it is part of the great worth to us
of our Greek and Latin studies, that in them we do read history in the
original sources. We are in actual contact with cotemporary minds; we
are not dependent on hearsay; we have something by which we can test
and check the representations and theories of modern historians. It
may be asked, why then not study the original materials of modem his
tory ? I answer, it is highly desirable to do so : and let me remark by
the way, that even this requires a dead language j nearly all the docu
ments prior to the Reformation, and many subsequent to it, being written
in Latin. But the exploration of these documents, though a most use
ful pursuit, cannot be a branch of education. Not to speak of their
vast.extent, and the fragmentary nature of each, the strongest reason is,
that in learning the spirit of our own past ages, until a comparatively
recent period, from cotemporary writers, we learn hardly anything else.
Those.authors, with a few exceptions, are little worth” reading on their
�28
On the Vctlne of the Ancient Classical Languages
own account. . While, in studying the great writers of antiquity, we are
not only learning to understand the ancient mind, but laying in a stock
of wise thought and observation, still valuable to ourselves; and at the
same time making ourselves familiar with a number of the most perfect
and finished literary compositions which the human mind has produced
—compositions which, from the altered conditions of human life, are
likely to be seldom paralleled, in their sustained excellence, by the times
to come.
Even as mere languages, no modern European language is so valuable
a discipline to the intellect as those of Greece and Rome, on account
of their regular and complicated structure. Consider, for a moment,
what grammar is. It is the most elementary part of logic. It is the
beginning of the analysis of the thinking process. The principles and
rules of grammar are the means by which the forms of language are
made to correspond with the universal forms of thought. The distinc
tions between the various parts of speech, between the cases of nouns,
the moods and tenses of verbs, the functions of particles, are distinc
tions in thought, not merely in words. Single nouns and verbs express
objects and events, many of which can be cognized by the senses : but
the modes of putting nouns and verbs together, express the relations of
objects and events, which can be cognized only by the intellect; and
each different mode corresponds to a different relation. The structure
of every sentence is a lesson in logic. The various rules of syntax
oblige us to distinguish between the subject and predicate of a propo
sition, between the agent, the action, and the thing acted upon; to mark
when an idea is intended to modify or qualify, or merely to unite with,
some other idea; what assertions are categorical, what only conditional;
whether the intention is to express similarity or contrast, to make a plu
rality of assertions conjunctively or disjunctively; what portions of a
sentence, though grammatically complete within themselves, are mere
members or subordinate parts of the assertion made by the entire sen
tence. Such things form the subject-matter of universal grammar; and
the languages which teach it best are those which have the most definite
rules, and which provide distinct forms for the greatest number of dis
tinctions in thought, so that if we fail to attend precisely and accurately
to any of these, we cannot avoid committing a solecism in language.
In these qualities the classical languages have an incomparable supe
riority over every modern language, and over all languages, dead or
living, which have a literature worth being generally studied.
But the superiority of the literature itself, for purposes of education,
is still more marked and decisive. Even in the substantial value of the
matter of which it is the vehicle, it is very far from having been super
seded. The discoveries of the ancients in science have been greatly
surpassed, and as much of them as is still valuable loses nothing by
being incorporated in modern treatises : but what does not so well admit
of being transferred bodily, and has been very imperfectly carried off
even piecemeal, is the treasure which they accumulated of what may be
called the wisdom of life: the rich store of experience of human nature
and conduct, which the acute and observing minds of those ages, aided
�and Literature in Education.
29
in their observations by the greater simplicity of manners and life, con
signed to their writings, and most of which retains all its value. The
speeches in Thucydides; the Rhetoric, Ethics, and Politics of Aristotle ;
the Dialogues of Plato; the Orations of Demosthenes; the Satires, and
especially the Epistles of Horace; all the writings of Tacitus; the great
work of Quintilian, a repertory of the best thoughts of the ancient world
on all subjects connected with education ; and, in a less formal manner,
all that is left to us of the ancient historians, orators, philosophers, and
even dramatists, are replete with remarks and maxims of singular good
sense and penetration, applicable both to political and to private life :
and the actual truths we find in them are even surpassed in value by the
encouragement and help they give us in the pursuit of truth. Human
invention has never produced anything so valuable in the way both of
Stimulation and of discipline to the inquiring intellect, as the dialectics
of the ancients, of which many of the works of Aristotle illustrate the
theory, and those of Plato exhibit the practice. No modern writings
come near to these, in teaching, both by precept and example, the way
to investigate truth, on those subjects, so vastly important to us, which
remain matters of controversy from the difficulty or impossibility of
bringing them to a direct experimental test. To question all things;
never to turn away from any difficulty: to accept no doctrine either from
ourselves or from other people without a rigid scrutiny by negative, criti
cism, letting no fallacy, or incoherence, or confusion of thought, slip by
unperceived; above all, to insist upon having the meaning of a word
clearly understood before using it, and the meaning of a proposition.be
fore assenting to it; these are the lessons we learn from the ancient
dialecticians. With all this vigorous management of the negative . ele
ment, they inspire no scepticism about the reality of truth, or indiffer
ence to its pursuit. The noblest enthusiasm, both for the search after
truth and for applying it to its highest uses, pervades these writers, Aris
totle no less than Plato, though Plato has incomparably the greater
power of imparting those feelings to others. In cultivating, therefore,
the ancient languages as our best literary education, we are all the while
laying an admirable foundation for ethical and philosophical culture. In
purely literary excellence—in perfection of form—the pre-eminence of
the ancients is not disputed. In every department which they at
tempted, and they attempted almost all, their composition, like their
sculpture, has been to the greatest modern artists an example to be
' looked up to with hopeless admiration, but of inappreciable value as a
light on high, guiding their own endeavours. In prose and in poetry,
in epic, lyric, or dramatic, as in historical, philosophical, and oratorical
art, the pinnacle on which they, stand is equally eminent. I am now
speaking of the form, the artistic perfection of treatment: for, as regards
substance, I consider modem poetry to be superior to ancient, in the
same manner, though in a less degree, as modern science : it enters
deeper into nature. The feelings of the modern mind are more various,
more complex and manifold, than those of the ancients ever were. The
modem mind is, what the ancient mind was not, brooding and self-con
scious ; and its meditative self-consciousness has discovered depths in
�30
Ou the Value of the Ancient Classical Languages
the human soul which the Greeks and Romans did not dream of, and
would not have understood. But what they had got to express’ they
expressed in a manner which few even of the greatest moderns’ have
seriously attempted to rival. It must be remembered that they had more
time, and that they wrote chiefly for a select class, possessed of leisure.
To us who write in a hurry for people who read in a hurry, the attempt
to give an equal degree of finish would be loss of time. But to be
familiar with perfect models is not the less important to us because the
element in which we work precludes even the effort to equal them.
They shew us at least what excellence is, and make us desire it, and
strive to get as near to it as is within our reach. And this is the value
to us of the ancient writers, all the more emphatically, because their
excellence does not admit of being copied, or directly imitated. It does
not consist in a trick which can be learnt, but in the perfect adaptation
of means to ends. The secret of the style of the great Greek and
Roman authors, is that it is the perfection of good sense. In the first
place, they never use a word -without a meaning, or a. word which adds
nothing to the meaning. They always (to begin with) had a meaning;
they knew what they wanted to say; and their whole purpose was to say
it with the highest degree of exactness and completeness, and bring it
home to the mind with the greatest possible clearness and vividness. It
never entered into their thoughts to conceive of a piece of writing as
beautiful in itself, abstractedly from what it had to express ; its beauty
must all be subservient to the most perfect expression of the sense. The
curiosa felicitas which their critics ascribed in a pre-eminent degree to
Horace, expresses the standard at which they all aimed. Their style is
exactly described by Swift’s definition, li the right words in the right
places.” Look at an oration of Demosthenes; there is nothing in it
which calls attention to itself as style at all: it is only after a close exa
mination we perceive that every word is what it should be, and where it
should be, to lead the hearer smoothly and imperceptibly into the state
of mind which the orator wishes to produce. The perfection of the
workmanship is only visible in the total absence of any blemish or fault,
and of anything which checks the flow of thought and feeling, anything
which even momentarily distracts the mind from the main purpose.
But then (as has been well said) it was not the object of Demosthenes
to make the Athenians cry out “ What a splendid speaker !” but to make
them say “ Let us march against Philip !” It was only in the decline of
ancient literature that ornament began to be cultivated merely as orna
ment. In the time of its maturity, not the merest epithet was put in
because it was thought beautiful in itself; not even for a merely descrip
tive purpose, for epithets purely descriptive were one of the corruptions
of style which abound in Lucan, for example : the word had no busi
ness there unless it brought out some feature which was wanted, and
helped to place the object in the light which the purpose of the com
position required. These conditions being complied with, then indeed
the intrinsic beauty of the means used was a source of additional effect,
of which it behoved them to avail themselves, like rhythm and melody
of versification. But these great writers knew that ornament for the
�and Literature in Education,
i
3*
sake, of ornament, ornament which attracts attention to itself, and shines
by its own beauties, only does so by calling off the mind from the main,
object, and thus not only interferes with the higher purpose of human
discourse, which ought, and generally professes, to have some matter to
communicate, apart from the mere excitement of the moment, but also
spoils the perfection of the composition as a piece of fine art, by de
stroying the unity of effect. This, then, is the first great lesson in com
position to be learnt from the classical authors. The second is., not to
be prolix. In a single paragraph, Thucydides can give a clear and vivid
representation of a battle, such as a reader who has once taken it into
his mind can seldom forget. The most powerful and affecting piece of
narrative, perhaps, in all historical literature, is the account of the
Sicilian catastrophe in his seventh book, yet how few pages does it fill 1
The ancients were concise, because of the extreme pains they took with
their compositions ; almost all modems are prolix, because they do not.
The great ancients could express a thought so perfectly in a few words
or sentences, that they did not need to add any more : the moderns, be
cause they cannot bring it out clearly and completely at once, return
again and again, heaping sentence upon sentence, each adding a little
more elucidation, in hopes that though no single sentence expresses the
full meaning, the whole together may give a sufficient notion of it. In
this respect, I am afraid we are growing worse instead of better, for want
of time and patience, and from the necessity we are in of addressing
almost all writings to a busy and imperfectly prepared public. The de
mands of modern life are such—the work to be done, the mass to be
worked upon, are so vast, that those who have anything particular to say
—who have, as the phrase goes, any message to deliver—cannot afford
to devote their time to the production of masterpieces. But they would
do far worse than they do, if there had never been masterpieces, or if
they had never known them. Early familiarity with the perfect makes
our most imperfect production far less bad than it otherwise would
be. To have a high standard of excellence often makes the whole
difference of rendering our work good when it would otherwise be
mediocre.
For all these reasons, I think it important to retain these two. lan
guages and literatures in the place they occupy, as a part of liberal edu
cation, that is, of the education of all who are not obliged by their
circumstances to discontinue their scholastic studies at a very early age.
But the same reasons which vindicate the place or classical studies in
general education, shew also the proper limitation, of them. They
should be carried as far as is sufficient to enable the pupil, in after life,
to read the great works of ancient literature with ease. Those who have,
leisure and inclination to make scholarship, or ancient history, or gene
ral philology, their pursuit, of course require much more; but there is
no room for more in general education. The laborious idleness in which
the school-time is wasted away in the English classical schools deserves
the severest reprehension. To what purpose should the most precious
years of early life be irreparably squandered in learning to write bad
Latin and Greek verses ? I do not see that we are much the better even
�32
Value of the Ancient Classical Langrtages and Literature.
for those who end by writing good ones. I am often tempted to ask the
favourites of nature and fortune, whether all the serious and important
work of the world is done, that their time and energy can be spared for
these nugce difficiles 1 I am not blind to the utility of composing in a
language, as a means of learning it accurately. I hardly know any
other means equally effectual. But why should not prose composition
suffice? What need is there of original composition at all? if that can
be called original which unfortunate schoolboys, without any thoughts to
express, hammer out on compulsion from mere memory, acquiring the
pernicious habit which a teacher should consider it one of his first duties
to repress, that of merely stringing together borrowed phrases ? The
exercise in composition, most suitable to the requirements of learners, is
that most valuable one, of retranslating from translated passages of a
good author: and to this might be. added, what still exists in many Con
tinental places of education, occasional practice in talking Latin. There
would be something to be said for the time spent in the manufacture of
verses, if such practice were necessary for the enjoyment of ancient
poetry; though it would be better to lose that enjoyment than to pur
chase it at so extravagant a price. But the beauties of a great poet
would be a far poorer thing than they are, if they only impressed us
through a knowledge of the technicalities of his art. The poet needed
those technicalities : they are not necessary to us. They are essential
for criticising a poem, but not for enjoying it. All that is wanted is suf
ficient familiarity with the language, for its meaning to reach us without
any sense of effort, and clothed with the associations on which the poet
counted for producing his effect. Whoever has this familiarity, and a
practised ear, can have as keen a relish of the music of Virgil and
Horace, as of Gray or Bums, or Shelley, though he know not the me
trical rules of a common Sapphic or Alcaic. I do not say that these
rules ought not to be taught, but I would have a class apart for them,
and would make the appropriate exercises an optional, not a compulsory
part of the school teaching.
Science and Art Department,—Nero Minute. — My Lords have
promulgated a new Minute to the effect, that every student in the future
who obtains a first or second class position in the May examination, in
any science subject, may teach, and earn the payments or results, a pri
vilege hitherto confined to certificated teachers. The teachers’ exami
nations for certificates in November are to be abolished. This action
of the Committee of Council assimilates, in this particular, the relation
of science teachers with the lately modified relation of the art teachers
to the Department
"
�33
THE SUPPLEMENTARY MINUTE OF THE REVISED CODE.
BY J. STUART LAURIE, FORMERLY H. M. INSPECTOR OF SCHOOLS.
HE reception accorded to the Revised Code four years ago is
still fresh in the memory of every one interested in the ques
tion of popular education. Educational bodies viewed, with
an alarm that amounted almost to a panic, the threatened
demolition of what they had been accustomed for a quarter of a century
to regard as the bulwarks of the system. But all protest was in vain;
and the representatives of the people sanctioned and ratified the official
proposals. Indiscriminate building grants to Primary,’and various grants
to Training, schools were cancelled; pupil-teachers could no longer
claim the enviable title of “pampered recipients of State bounty;”
teachers were constrained to relinquish, suddenly and unexpectedly,
their “ vested interests,” in the shape of the money-value which thencertificates variously represented; and annual grants henceforth took
the simple form of 4s. per head on the average attendance, and 2s. 8d.
per pass in the three fundamental branches of knowledge, Reading,
Writing, wiA Arithmetic. This was aptly termed, “payment for results”
and the practical ring of the phrase doubtless contributed largely to the
success of the measure. The gross result shows an annual “ saving ”
of no less than ^400,000, together with, in Mr. Lowe’s opinion, “in
creased efficiency,” into the bargain 1
But the permanency of that orator’s notable triumph was ever liable
to be endangered by a grave omission in his subversive system of tactics.
He omitted to include Her Majesty’s Inspectors in his taboo. He had at
hand a sufficiently feasible and ready-made plea for their abolition, too ;
seeing that the occupation of those gentlemen was, in a dignified pro
fessional -sense, clearly gone ; while the proposal would have been ably
■seconded by personal predilections, if one may draw an inference
from various acts of scant courtesy, and a uniformly supercilious bearing.
From whatever cause, H. M. Inspectors remained in the field, empowered
to report progress to two successive chiefs, neither of whom was above
lending an ear to deliberate representations, based on the results of
arduous experience acquired at the Queen’s expense.
Excellent a beginning to a scheme of national education as the
Revised Code would unquestionably have been, and admirably fitted as
it even, still is, as a groundwork for a noble superstructure, it has been
ascertained that, as a practical measure, it is capable of improvement:
that, for example (r), small schools—generally the most needy section—
derive but a meagre proportion of pecuniary benefit from the new form
of |rant; that (2), the rate at which pupil teachers are everywhere
diminishing forbodes the steady decay of that key-stone of the system ;
and that (3),the higher, non-paying subjects, such as Geography, Grammar,
and History, are vanishing, or have already vanished, from the common
routine of instruction. With a praiseworthy unanimity, the late VicePresident of the present, and the previous Vice-President of the late,
Government have combined their efforts to supply, at the trifling cost
vol. 1.
3
�34
The Supplementary Minute of the Revised Code.
of
ooo, remedies for the defects alluded to; and, what may be
styled, their joint plan has taken the form of a Supplementary Minute.
*
The title of the new Minute, and Mr. Corry’s early assurance that it
“ did not cancel a single article of the Revised Code]' ought, in all
reason, to have satisfied Mr. Lowe that the latter measure was not
about to be “tinkered” and “tampered with;” and it is therefore
hoped that his menace of “ a speedy and well-merited extinction of the
whole system,” will graciously be allowed to remain in abeyance, until
the country is ripe for a comprehensive, and emphatically national
scheme.
The heads of the Supplementary Minute are briefly as follow:—
I. The payment per pass in reading, writing and arithmetic, respec
tively, is raised from 2s. 8d. to 4s.—up to the maximum of 120 passes;
all in excess of that number being rated as formerly, at 2s. 8d.
The conditions annexed to this additional grant of
are («), that for
all scholars above 25 there be an apprentice for every 40, or an assistant
for every 80 in average attendance; (¿), that the number of passes exceed
200 per cent, of the annual average over six years of age, and, further,
that one fifth part of the whole number of passes fall under Standardsiv. to vi.; and (c), that at least one-fifth of the average over six years of
age pass a satisfactory examination in any specific subject or subjects;
scholars who have already passed in Standard vi. being, on the same
condition, entitled to claim a repetition of the grant.
II. In reference to condition («), the new Minute offers a distinct
aid towards its fulfilment, by means of a prospective bonus to schools of
¿10 and fs respectively, for every male apprentice admitted into a
training school in the first and second class; and the same schools are
further entitled to participate in the success of their former apprentices,
at the rate of
and ¿5 respectively, according to their rank in the
annual students’ examinations.
While no doubt can be entertained of the practical judiciousness of
these provisions, and of their fitness to dovetail into the structure of the
Revised Code, it remains to be seen whether much material advantage will
accrue to the smaller schools, shackled as they are by a too heavy
expenditure, and deplorable irregularity in the attendance ; and whether
the indirect inducements held out to apprentice-recruits will prove equal
to an emergency which want of confidence in the bona fides of the
Government and the large demands of rival labour markets have created.
This at least is certain—that the stimulus now given to the conservation
or restoration of the old scale of indispensable branches—Geography,
Grammar and History (which may be taught singly, or all three succes
sively adjusted to the progress of the several standards), will impart fresh
heart to the teacher; and that the moral intention of the measure will
be accepted by educationalists at large as an earnest that the legislature
did not mean, after all, to throw them eventually on their own, often
sorely overstrained, resources
*
In regard to the historical phases of the question, we seize this op
portunity to disabuse the public mind of the various illusory fictions with
�The Supplementary Minute of the Revised Code.
35
which the results of the “ Government ” scheme anterior to the present
one have been wantonly beset:—
1. “That system, where adequately developed, was not a failure, but
a triumphant success. The teaching was thoroughly good, not superfi
cial and ambitious, but sound and practical.” — (Mr. Fraser, Times,
April 18, and Commissioners’ Report, 1. 308—313.)
2. Where the efficiency was at fault, “ the great source lay in the
want of adequate funds preventing the employment of competent
teachers.”—(Com. Rep. n. 115.)
3. It was, therefore, a physical impossibility for teachers to pay the
requisite attention to the lower classes, especially in cases where pupil
teachers or stipendiary monitors were not procurable. And on the other
hand.
4. The unwise extension of the old capitation grant (for attendance
alone) to towns above 5000 inhabitants, in addition to the somewhat
lavish expenditure on building Primary, and subsidizing Training,
Schools, incited warrantable apprehensions as to the pitch which the
Parliamentary vote would ultimately be required to reach.
5. The unsatisfactory condition of the lower sections, which, how
ever, was greatly exaggerated, and so amplified in argument as to be
made to apply to schools as a -whole, combined with the desirability of
retrenchment to pave the way for a change.
6. Accordingly, when Mr. Lowe propounded the plan of the Revised
Code, professedly based on the conclusions of the Commissioners, and
guaranteed for the measure efficiency coupled with economy, the assent of
the House to the measure was readily given.
7. The new code substituted a simple and palpable, for a cumbrous
and indefinite, machinery, and it therefore displayed, among other
virtues, a captivating fitness for administrative purposes.
8. But, although many educationalists are prepared to acknowledge
its expediency as a basis for a national scheme, those immediately
acquainted with its mode of working, or practically engaged in working
it, object not so much to the limitation of the scale of subjects, as to the
virtual exclusion of education, in the true sense of the term, in connexion
with the instruction. The form of the teaching is now purely mechani
cal ; the memory and manual dexterity are exercised—the understanding
and imagination, not at all. Hence the grave complaint that the
“ tone ” of schools is lowered, a result which could not well be antici
pated by Mr. Lowe, seeing that “tone” is neither a quantititive
element; nor, as he confessed, cognizable by his intelligence. Obviously
it is only by increasing the teaching-power that larger and higher results,
can be secured, and we therefore hail the supplementary Minute as a.
step in the right direction.
3—2
�36
NEW EDUCATIONAL MINUTE.
The following minute by the Lords of the Committee of Council for
Education was adopted on the 20th of February last:—
Their lordships, having considered—1. The present ratio of teachers
to scholars in the elementary day schools under inspection, and the state
of instruction in such schools, as shown by the result of the examinations
under article 48 of the code, and by the reports of Her Majesty s in
spectors ; also, 2. The present supply of candidates qualified for ad
mission into the normal schools for training masters Resolved :
1. To provide in the estimate for public education in England and
Wales, during the financial year 31st March, 1867-8, for an additional
grant of is. 4d. per pass in reading, writing, or arithmetic, up to a sum
not exceeding ^8 for any one school (department), upon the following
conditions beyond those now specified in the articles 38'63
the code,
viz.:—
(«) The number of teachers must have allowed, throughout the
past year (article 17), at least one certificated or one assistant
teacher, fulfilling respectively the condition of articles 67 and
91-3, for every 80 scholars, or one pupil teacher fulfilling the
conditions of articles 81-9 for every 40 scholars after the first
25 of the average number of scholars in attendance.
(3) The number of passes in reading, writing, and arithmetic must 1.
exceed 200 per cent, of the annual average number of scholars
in attendance who are over six years of age. In schools where
the calculation of average attendance is made indiscriminately
upon scholars above and scholars under six years of age, the
school registers of age are to determine in what ratio the aveiage number in attendance is to be divided. 2. Fall under
Standards IV.—VI. to the extent of at least one-fifth part of
the whole number of passes.
(A The time tables of the school, in use throughout the past yeai
(article 17) must have provided for one or more specific sub
jects of secular instruction beyond article 48- The- inspector
must name the specific subject or subjects in his report, and
must state that at least one-fifth part of the average number of
scholars over six years of age have passed a satisfactory exami
nation therein.
.
.
2. To exempt for one year, from the operation of article 46, chil
dren who have already passed in Standard VI., provided they pass a
satisfactory examination in the subjects professed in their school beyon
articles 48 conformably to section (<?) in paragraph. 1 of this minute.
3. To provide in the same estimate for certain new grants to ele
mentary schools wherein it should appear from the inspector s ast
report that the number of teachers throughout the year (article 17) ia
been sufficient to satisfy section (zz) in paragraph 1 of this minute , sue
grants to be at the rate of ^10 for every male pupil teacher admitted
(articles 105-110) from the said elementary schools into any norma
school under inspection from candidates placed by examination m ie
�New Educational Minute.
yj
first class, and ^5 for every male pupil teacher so admitted from candi
dates in the second class.
3. To offer certain further new grants to the same elementary
schools for every male pupil teacher who having been admitted from
them into a normal school under inspection at the examination (articles
103) held in December, 1867, or at any later examination, should at
the end of his first year’s residence, be placed in the first or second
division (articles 119, 121, 1^2); such grants to be at the rate of ^8
for every student placed in the first division, and ^5 for every student
placed in the second division. No grants of this kind can become pay
able before December, 1868, and, therefore, although offered now, they
have no place in the estimate for the financial year March 1867-8.
5. To pay, in the financial year 31st March 1867-8, only so many
twelfth parts of the additional grants offered by this minute as, in the
case of grants under paragraph 1, equal the number of months from
1st April to the end of the school year (article 17), and, in the case of
grants under paragraph 3, equal the number (nine) of months from 1st
April to 31st December (article 81, f. 2.)
THE NEW EDUCATIONAL MINUTE IN THE HOUSE OF
COMMONS.
In the House of Commons on Friday, April 5th, Mr. Lowe, on the
motion for going into Committee of Supply, moved “ That this House
dissents from so much of the minute of the Committee of Council on
Education as provides for an increase of the grants now made to pri
mary schools.” He entered into an elaborate argument to show that in
most cases the money granted under this minute would be wasted, and
that it would do mischief instead of good. He stated that the minute
involved an increased expenditure of ^70,000 a year, and he contended
that this was not justified, considering the steady and satisfactory pro
gress which had been made under the system introduced in 1862.
There had already been an increase in the number of pupils amounting
to
10,000, and a saving of ^400,000, as compared with the expen
diture under the old system.
Mr. Corry defended the minute, and explained that its object was to
give assistance to small schools. He had felt from the representation
made to him that these schools were entitled to aid, and it was upon his
recommendation that the minute had been issued.
After some observations from Mr. P. F. Powell,
Mr. H. A. Bruce said the result of the new system introduced in
1862 was that the schools were receiving two-fifths less than they re
ceived formerly, the sum paid being ^620,000 instead of a million.
As to the minute, his only objection to it was that it was too econo
mical.
Mr. Henley and Mr. Pugh supported the minute.
i Mr. Hadfield denounced all State education whatever.
i. Upon a division Mr. Lowe’s motion was rejected by 203 to 40.
�38
; FORTHCOMING UNIVERSITY EXAMINATIONSOXFORD.
Three scholarships of ^70 a year each for three years, having been
founded in Balliol College by Miss Hannah Brackenbury “ for the
encouragement of the study of law and history, and of the study of
natural science, or one of the aforesaid studies, in order to qualify
students for the professions of law and medicine respectively;” there
will be an examination for one Scholarship, in the subject of natural
science, in November next; the precise time and further particulars to
be announced hereafter. Candidates must not have exceeded eight
terms from their matriculation. Papers will be set in the following sub
jects:—1, Mechanical Philosophy and Physics; 2, Chymistry,; 3, Phy
siology; but candidates will not be expected to offer themselves for
examination in one or more of the above subjects, if the Examiners
should consider it expedient.
_
On Saturday, May 4, there will be held an election at Merton College
to—1, One Classical Postmastership, value ^jioo per annum, tenable
for five years; 2, one Mathematical Postmastership, value ^j8o per
annum, tenable for five years; 3, one Classical Postmastership, value
¿£80 per annum, tenable for five years; 4, one National Science Scholar
ship, value £6q per annum, tenable for five years. Candidates for the
above must be under twenty years of age. Also, 5, one Classical Post
mastership, value ^j8o per annum, for five years, open to candidates of
any age; 6, one Exhibition, value ^25, for three years, also with no
limit of age. Candidates for the Natural Science Scholarship will be
examined in the ordinary classical matriculation subjects; viz., a portion
of a Greek and Latin author, Latin writing, grammar, arithmetic, and
algebra; and to those who pass this examination, papers will be offered
in physics, chymistry, and physiology. The examination begun April 30th.
A Fellowship will be filled up at Lincoln College on Tuesday, July
2. Candidates must call on the Rector some time before the 25th of
June. The examination will begin on Tuesday, the 25th of June, at
10 a.m. The Fellowship is open to all members of the University who
have passed all the examinations required for the degree of B.A. The
Fellow elected will be required to reside, and, except under certain con
tingencies, to take Holy Orders, within ten years.
There will be an election at Brasenose College on Friday, May 10, to
(at least) four open Scholarships—viz., three of the value of ¿£80 a
year during residence, and one of the value of ^73 during residence.
One of the former will be awarded for proficiency in mathematics, sub
ject to a pass examination in classics. Candidates, who must produce
evidence of being under 20 years of age, and must bring testimonials of
good conduct from their college or school, are required to present them
selves to the Principal between 8 and 9 p.m. on Monday, May 6, or
between 9 and 10 a.m. on Tuesday, May 7. The examination will
begin at the last-named hour.
_ _
There will be an election to an Open Scholarship in Pembroke Col
lege on Friday, May 17. The Scholarship is worth £72, and is tenable
for five years. An Exhibition, worth ^50, may be filled up at the same
�Forthcoming University Examinations.
39
time. In awarding this, the pecuniary circumstances of candidates will
be taken into account. The examination will commence on Tuesday,
the 14th, at 10 a.m., and candidates must be under 20 years of age.
CAMBRIDGE.
There will be an examination for two Exhibitions at King’s College on
the 12th, 13th, and 14th of June. The Exhibitions will be of the value
of ¿50 per annum, and will be tenable for three years, or until such
time as the student shall succeed in obtaining one of the Open Scholar
ships hereafter to be offered by the College. Candidates must be under
20 years of age, and have not previously entered any other College in
the University. Further information may be obtained from the Rev.
W. R. Chur ton, Tutor of the College..
There will be two minor Scholarships at Clare College open for com
petition to those intending to commence residence in October, of ^60
each, tenable for two and a half years, or till exchanged for a Founda
tion Scholarship. The examination will commence on Wednesday,
June 5, at 9 a.m. These Scholarships will be awarded to deserving
•candidates only. Preference will be given to those who show special
proficiency in either classics or mathematics. Candidates to send in
their names, with testimonials as to character, to the Rev. W. Raynes,
tutor. Subjects for examination:—Latin and Greek translation and
composition; Euclid, plane trigonometry, arithmetic, algebra, geome
trical and analytical conic sections.
An examination for four Minor Scholarships will be held in-Downing
College on Wednesday, the 5 th of June next, and the two following
days, and will begin at 9 a.m. on Wednesday. The examination will be
in Classics and Elementary Mathematics, but some weight will be given
to proficiency in French and German. Two additional papers of an
elementary character will be set, one on Moral Philosophy, .in connexion
with the principles of Jurisprudence, and on International Law; the
other on the Natural Sciences in connexion with Medicine—namely,
Chymistry, including Analysis, Mineralogy, Botany, Comparative
Anatomy, and Physiology: and in awarding two of these Scholarships
•considerable importance will be attached to any special proficiency in
the legal or in the medical subject. Persons who have not been entered
at any College in the University, or who have not resided one entire
term in any such College, are eligible to these Minor Scholarships,
which will be of the value of ^40 per annum, and tenable for two years,
or until their holders are elected to Foundation Scholarships. No one
elected Minor Scholar will receive any emoluments until he has com
menced residence as a student of the College.
The syndicate for conducting the non-gremial examinations at Cam
bridge have just presented a report as to the girls’ examination, which
was originally put forward merely as a' three years’ experiment. They
-state that the scheme has been a complete success, and recommend
that the examination be made a permanency. No lists are to be pub
lished, but each girl who passes is to receive a certificate, and those who
have passed with credit, certificates of honour. The examinations are
�40
Forthcoming University Examinations.
to be at the same times and in the same subjects as those of the boys.
For the junior examination the girls are not to be more than sixteen
years of age, and for the senior examination not more than eighteen
years; all,, except in cases where the parents disapprove, are to be
examined in religious knowledge.
.The Oxford Local Examinations.—The Oxford Local Exami
nations will be held this year at Oxford, London, Bath, Birmingham,
righton, Exeter, Faversham, Finchley, Gloucester, Leeds, Lincoln,
Liverpool, Manchester, Northampton, Nottingham, Southampton,
launton, Truro, West Buckland, Windermere. The examination will
commence in each place on Tuesday, the nth of June, at 9 o’clock, a.m.
The Master and Fellows of Balliol College, Oxford, anxious to encouiage middle-class education, have offered five exhibitions to be com
peted, foi at the Oxford Local Examinations in the present year. These
exhibitions will be of the annual value of ^52 i°s., and will betenable
during residence for four years. They will be offered to those among
the senior candidates who shall obtain the highest places in the first
division of the. general list. The Exhibitioners will be expected to pro
duce testimonials of good conduct, and to commence residence in
January, 1868 ; and will be required to pass the first of their University
Examinations (Responsions) within six months. The Exhibitioners will
have to pay to the University an admission fee of ^2 10s. and an
annual fee of ^1. They will also have to pay to Balliol College the
annual sums of ^22 8s. for tuition, and of ¿"io for furnished lodgings ;
but they will not be subject to any other College charges, and they will
be able to regulate the expense of their own living.
Middle Class Education in the Metropolis. — The second
annual meeting of the Governors of the Corporation lately established
by Charter for the promotion of Middle Class Education in the Metro
polis, was held on Monday, March 18th, in the Mansion House, the
Lord Mayor in the chair. The school in Bath Street, City Road, was
opened at Michaelmas, and the Council congratulated the Governors on
the success which had attended it. During the first quarter there were
518 scholars, there are now 650, with upwards of 200 applicants for
admission, for whom the Council cannot find accommodation in the
present building. They hoped to be able to obtain from the Ecclesias
tical Commissioners, with whom they were in treaty on the subject,
upwards of an acre of freehold ground of the Finsbury estate, on which
a school capable of accommodating 1000 scholars could be built. The
erection of a similar school would shortly be commenced in Southwark.
There was a sum of ^48,412 in hand. The report and statement of
accounts were adopted. Sir John Lubbock, Mr. Aiderman J. Lawrence,
Mr. J. P. Gassiot, Mr. Samuel Morley, Mr. Sheriff Waterlow, and
others, addressed the meeting. Letters were read from Mr. Goschen
and other members of Parliament, regretting their inability to attend.
After the transaction of some formal business, a vote of thanks to the
Lord Mayor closed the proceedings.
�4i
'KING EDWARD’S SCHOOLS, WITLEY, GODALMING.
HE pleasant and healthy neighbourhood of Witley, a village
and railway station on the line from London to Portsmouth,
a few miles beyond Godaiming, has been chosen as the new
site of the above schools, consisting of an Industrial School
for Boys, and a Girl’s School. The schools were formally opened out
Friday, April the 5th.
It is worth while to glance at the history of this foundation. In the
year 1552 the citizens of London presented a supplication to King
Edward VI., “in the name of the poor, and for Jesus Christ’s sake,”
that his Majesty would be pleased to grant them one of his houses,
called the Palace of Bridewell (situated between St. Bride’s Church and
the Fleet, which is now New Bridge Street), for the harbour and lodging,
of the said poor. This request was granted; and while stringent lawswere enacted to put down the social evils of beggary, misery and thievery,
which were then rife in the city of London, it was provided that the
poor-house at Bridewell should be a workhouse, where those who needed
relief at the public cost should be compelled to earn' it by their labour.
But the legislators and social reformers of that day, being wiser, ap-#
parently, than we are now, did not think it was doing enough to deal
with the case of adult pauperism. They sought also to prevent its
growth, by teaching the young to work for an honest living. “And first,”
say.the citizens of London, in their supplication to the King, “we
thought to begin -with the poor child; that he should be harboured, fed
and clothed, and virtuously trained up;” whereupon they proceed to
state their plans for the establishment of the Industrial Schools, or
“ House of Sundry Occupations,” in which a variety of useful trades may
be taught to the boys and girls who would else be running wild and
wicked in the streets. So truly did the benevolence or prudence of the
Londoners, three hundred years ago, anticipate the efforts of the foundersof our modem “Homes” and “Refuges,” which are “supported by
voluntary contributions,” and are confessedly unequal to the wants of
the present time. Bridewell Hospital was intrusted, in 1557, to the
management of the governors of the House of Bethlem, which was then
situated on the north side of the City walls, outside Bishopsgate, and
was afterwards erected in Moorfields. It very naturally came to pass
that, in connection with the relief of the destitute, and with the educa
tion of children at Bridewell, there were cells or prisons for the punish
ment of beggars, prostitutes, and other disorderly persons, as well as of
idle or disobedient apprentices, such as we see in some of Hogarth’s
pictures; this part of the establishment, with the whipping-post and
stocks, being under the magisterial jurisdiction of the Aldermen of the
city of London. In 1831 the Schools and House of Occupations be
longing to Bridewell were removed from New Bridge Street to a site
adjoining the premises now occupied by Bethlem.
The prison and the workhouse have been superseded by the modem
establishment of Houses of Correction in the one case, and by the
�42
King Edward's Schools, Witley, Godalming.
operation of the New Poor Law in the other; but King Edward’s
Schools have continued their useful work. This institution was, for
many years, .to all intents and purposes, a reformatory school for juvenile
criminals; in fact, it might claim the honour of having set the first
example of that great movement which has latterly been carried on by
the reformatory schools established in London and in other parts of the
kingdom. We find it stated in a report by the chaplain, the Rev. E.
Rudge, that, so lately as 1856, nearly one fourth of the inmates of King
Edward’s Schools were convicted criminals, and some of the boys had
been several times in prison. The institution is now placed on quite a
different footing. It has been converted into a school rather for desti
tute than for criminal children. By the existing rules, criminal children
are not to be received, except in special cases, and the proportion of
them is limited to one sixth part of the whole number of inmates; but,
practically, even this proportion has never been reached since the new
scheme came into operation, and there are now only two or three of the
boys who have been convicted of crime. A few destitute cases are
admitted from the city of London on the recommendation of the Aider
men. The number of boys at the end of last year in the schools was
74, and of girls 100; the total number of both sexes from 1830 to 1866
e inclusive having been 3653. Their average age on admission is twelve
or thirteen. Some of the boys are instructed by “ arts-masters ” in such
trades as tailoring and shoemaking, to which gardening will now perhaps
be added; the girls learn needlework, and that of the kitchen and
laundry; the school teaching consists of reading, writing, arithmetic,
English history, geography, singing, and the Church Catechism. Of
those who left the school during the last year, twenty boys entered the
royal navy, eleven entered the army, and others were apprenticed to
trades, or sent home to their friends; the girls were placed in domestic
service. By a wholesome and praiseworthy regulation, 178 boys’and 42
girls, former inmates of the schools, attended before the committee of
governors with certificates of good conduct from their employers, and
received the customary reward of ^1 each, some for the first time,
others for the second or third time; as the governors keep an eye upon
them during three years from their leaving the schools.
University Education-.—The Bill brought in by Mr. Ewart, Mr. Neate, and Mr.
Pollard-Urquhart to extend the benefits of Education in the Universities of Oxford
and Cambridge to students not belonging to any college or hall, provides that, not
withstanding anything contained in any Act of Parliament now in force relating to
either of the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, or in statutes, charters, deeds of
composition, or other instruments of foundation, of either of the said Universities,
or of any college or hall within the same, any person may be matriculated without
being entered as a member of any college or hall, and may, if he shall think fit. join
himself to any college or hall, with the consent of the head thereof, but without being
obliged to reside within the same ; and every person so matriculated shall in all re
spects and for all intents or purposes be and be considered as a member of the Uni
versity, and upon joining any college or hall shall in all respects and for all intents or
purposes be and be considered as a member thereof. For the purposes of this Act
the cathedral or house of Christ Church, in Oxford, shall be considered to be to all
intents and purposes a college of the University of Oxford.
�43
’ Mr. Gladstone on Compulsory Education.—Mr. Gladstone has
addressed the following letter to the Rev. J. Oakley .
« ii, Carlton House Terrace, S.W. Feb. 20.
“Rev. and dear Sir—I have read the report of the subcommittee
of the London Diocesan Board of Education with much interest, and it
is from no feeling of indifference or aversion if I decline to take part in
its proceedings on the subject. It is because I make it a rule on all
questions of a nature to come before Parliament for its decision, to
avoid, if possible, taking any part beyond its walls, 111 order that I may
be at liberty to act freely for the best at the proper time.
“ As regards opinion, however, I may say that while I well understand,
or at least appreciate, the grounds of the present movement, and.a“very glad that the clergy, under the bishop, have entered actively into
the matter, I yet see much difficulty in the way of direct compulsory
measures. I have always leaned very much to a scheme, the mam point
of which was, that it should be made penal to employ for wages persons
below a certain age not furnished with certain certificates of education
and attainment.
,
, , • „
“ A plan of this kind was prematurely proposed some years back in a
bill by Mr. Adderley, and was rejected on account of the immature
state of circumstances, which, however, must probably ripen from year
to year. A measure of that nature might be brought into action gra
dually, like the new law of 1834.
.
“ I remain, dear Sir, your very faithful servant,
“Rev. J. Oakley.”
“w- K Gladstone.
NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS.
Calisthenics; or the Elements of Bodily Culture-—On Pestalozzian Prin
ciples, designed for Practical Education in Schools, Colleges, Families,
&c. By Henry de Laspee, 2nd Ed. Griffin & Co.
This work is well known to teachers of Calisthenics, and has been so
often favourably noticed, that we need here merely record the appearance
of a second edition of it. In the preface the author makes the following
TCixi^^ks * —-
,
“In reply to the chief objections raised against my system: First, 'That
it is too scientific and laborious for general use,’ . I can only say, that
having myself been from early youth regularly trained, and being per
fectly well acquainted with all which passed for, and was admitted into
schools as, Physical Education ; it was the inadequacy and inefficiency
as branches of Education, which caused me to deviate from, and re
linquish them, and led me to this system, as more simple and compre
hensive than the others; and which will be found to be so, after a little
study, when it will enable any judicious teacher, governess or mother,
to teach and apply it with good effect. Secondly: 'that I had copied my
work from another abroad,’ is easily answered, when I state, that, even to
�44
Notices of New Books.
this day, there exists not another book on the subject of Physical Edu
cation, like mine: methodically treated as to tendency, from elements
to object. When I resolved and proceeded to commit my system to
writing, it had no precedents, nor were there authorities, which I could
ave consulted, except Pestalozzi’s method, for the treatment of the
subject of Bodily Culture/: Pursuing the same, the course lay already
before me; I was no more my own master, so as to write down, or leave
out,.what I wished; and even what remained of my own prejudices had
to give way, to what method dictated.”
An Elementary Physical Atlas, intended chiefly for Map drawing. By the
Rev. J. P. Faunthorpe, B.A., F.R.G.S., Vice-Principal and Geogra
phical Lecturer of Battersea Training-College.
Map drawing though comparatively a new branch of instruction is
m Middle-Class, as well as Primary Schools, steadily attaining the
prominence it deserves as a mechanical aid towards, and confirmatory
test of, Geographical knowledge. The work before us is the latest, and
one of the most meritorious efforts in this direction; and, as the Batter
sea students have always stood in the first rank in this subject, in con
nexion with the Certificate examinations, the authorship is a satisfactory
guarantee of the practical ability displayed in this compilation. The
maps are severally executed in Mr. Stanford’s well known style ; and the
whole is preceded by concise instructions in letter-press, first, in regard
to the general difficulties, and, secondly, in the form of specific directions
for each map
Questions and Answers on Geography, the Globes and Astronomy with a
short Account of the Winds, Tides, Air, &c. By J. J. Hooke. London :
T. J. Allman.
This new Historical Geography of Mr. J. J. Hooke, supplies a desi
deratum long felt in schools; seeing it contains a large amount of in
formation, interestingly put together, and which is found in no other
book of the same kind. The answers to the questions are not verbose,
nor is there one word de trop; and, therefore, the pupil is not neces
sitated to cull his information from matter which is often made obscure
by a too profuse use of words.
We do not say that Mr. Hooke’s book is superior to other geographies
or even that it is equal to some; but we consider it is free from the
fault which many of them have, viz., of saying too much, and thus
yearying the pupil; or of others, which are too meagre. The subjects
introduced are,. of necessity, numerous, so that the amount of instruc
tion contained in so small a compass is somewhat surprising. A brief
discourse on Astronomy is added ; but no more is said about it than the
youthful mind can readily comprehend. There are also short chapters'
on the Winds, Tides, Air, Eclipses, the Thermometer, and various other
subjects, all explained in as concise a form as possible, and in a manner
capable of being easily understood by the learner.
�45
WORDS.
^Passages from various Writers in illustration of certain words.
words arranged alphabetically.
Abrade (to wear away). “For fifteen
years the treaty of Vienna was observed as
sacredly as if it had been written on the
skies ; and it has taken nearly fifty years
altogether to abrade this mighty land
mark down to the level of history.”
Times.
Absinthe (a narcotic). “The American
Tax Bill adopts all these in an exaggerated
form, and swallows them as a whet, just
as an epicure swallows a taste of absinthe
or an anchovy, or half-a-dozen oysters, to
prepare the appetite.”—Times.
Abstention (?vs/?'«iU). “The dignity
Of France will end by being compromised
and abstention will become a duty.”—
Times.
■ Ab sums (to destroy gradually'). . “ Since
we last mentioned the Pontiff, his patri
mony had absumed away from him like
grease before the fire.”—Temple Bar.
Acclaim (shout ofpraise). ‘“The Liberty
of the Press ; it is the air we breathe, if
we have it not we die
And then what
Stentorian cheering till the walls of the old
Crown and Anchor shook again ; and the
crowds in the Strand took up the acclaim
■—and even sleepy Temple Bar seemed in
clined to make an effort towards an echo.”
—Times.
Acclimatized (inured to a climate).
“ The general good health of sailors in the
Arctic regions proves nothing against the
depressing influence of cold, for these
sailors are picked men, and in the prime
of life. Under such circumstances it may,
perhaps, be possible to become ‘ acclima
tized,’ and to feel the cold less the longer
the exposure to it.”—Times.
Acolyte (boys attendant upon the priest
hood. “ Then comes the bishop in his
mitre, his yellow stole upheld by two prin
cipal priests (the curate and sub-curate),
and to him his acolytes waft incense, as
well as to the huge figure of the Madonna
Which follows.”—Roba de Roma, by W.
Story.
Acumen (quickness of intellect). “In
the north of America the people are all
protectionists, in the south they are all
free-traders,notbecausethe south possesses
any greater amount of logical ACUMEN
The
than the north, but because each acts only
for its own interests.”—Times.
Adhibit (to apply). “ In May, 1830,
George IV. became so greatly debilitated
that it was found inconvenient and painful
for him to sign with his own hand public
documents; a bill was, therefore, passed
allowing the sign manual to be adhibited
by a stamp in his Majesty’s presence.”—
Dr. Farr.
JEgis (a shield).
“But as General
Hunter has friends in the cabinet, and is
supposed to be sheltered under the broad
jEG-is of Mr. Secretary Stanton, to whom
the president defers in military matters, it
is possible that he will be allowed to re
tain his post.”—-Times.
“ Providence has covered you with its
2EGIS, and the country with its acclama
tions.”—Address oe the Legislative
Body to the Emperor Napoleon,
March, 1861.
^Esthetic (the science of our feelings and
emotions.) “ No rich drawing-room could
show more taste in its arrangements, or
have a more soothing effect on a mind to
which the sense of ¿esthetic fitness is its
native element.”—Miss Mulock.
“ A purely painful domestic tragedy in
deed, or a subject calculated merely to
harrow up the feelings of the spectator, or
to excite feelings of horror and disgust
like many of the Spanish pictures of mar
tyrdom, should, in our judgment, be pro
scribed as violating ¿ESTHETIC propriety.”
—Times.
Affluent (flowing). “There is another
word which I have just employed.—
affluent—in the sense of a stream which
does not flow into the sea, but joins a
larger stream; as, for instance—the Isis
is an affluent of the Thames, the Moselle
of the Rhine.”—Dr. Trench.
Agglomerate (to gather up as a ball).
“ The rest of the place and of the inhabi
tants, as I saw it, and them, might be con
sidered as an agglomerate of three or
four sheds, a few long huts, a saw mill,
and some twenty negroes sitting on a log
looking at the trains.”—Times Corre
spondent (Mr. Russell).
Agnatic (a descentfrom the samefather).
�46
Words.
“ The Duchies can, therefore, in no way
pretend that violence has been done to
their rights. Their agnatic succession
has been completely respected, and is now
the law of the whole monarchy. The only
question then, regards the Augustenburg
family.”—Times.
Alembic (a vessel used in distilling).
“ The moment a doctrine is propounded,
hundreds of busy brains are at work to
look at it, from every possible point of
view, to ventilate, to sift, to examine, and
regard it under every conceivable light or
shade. In this fiery alembic truth is
effectually separated from falsehood, and
things are brought down from vague ge
neralities [to practical principles.” —
Times.
“ Cobden’s ideal of universal peace was
not perchance the highest ; but every
thing that was good and noble in his idea
remains with us, and is still a part of our
vital force. Purged of its crudities, in
the sacred alembic of death, it is now of
tenfold worth and purity.” — Tele
graph.
Ambidexter (« double dealer). “ In
comparably more brilliant, more splendid,
eloquent, accomplished, than his rival, the
great St. John could be as selfish as Ox
ford was, and could act the double art as
skilfully as ambidextrous Churchill
(Marlboro).’ ’—Thackeray.
Amenities {agreeableness of situation).
“ I see nothing in the acquirement of a
livelihood by manual labour that degrades
a man of good character. I want to know
why it j is that these amenities of life
should be confined to one class—that the
man that gets his livelihood by mere ma
nual labour should not be as refined as the
greatest man in the land.”—Mr. Roebuck.
Amplify (to enlarge). “ I cannot, how
ever, go along with the honourable mem
ber in thinking that the mere abolition of
passports is a great security for peace be
tween two nations, and I think that in
making such an assertion, the hon. mem
ber rather amplifies a small matter.”—
Lord Palmerston.
Amplitude (largeness, abundance). “Had
Mr. Page only put the public to great in
convenience by pulling down the old
Westminster Bridge, and stopping the
traffic till the new one was thrown open in
all its amplitude of way, what a jubilee
there would have been at its opening.”—
Times.
Anachronism (an error in computing
time). “ And now that Italy has organ
ized herself, and the period of revolution
has passed into that of regular and estab
lished government, the intervention of
France is an anachronism which she her
self ought to be the first to recognize.”—
Times.
“For the ancient history of Egypt, four
authorities; are relied upon; they differ
one from another by hundreds, indeed by
thousands of years. To make Napoleon
the Great the immediate successor of
Charlemagne would not be a greater ana
chronism than is to be found in com
paring the assertions of the four authori
ties in question.”—Examiner.
Ancillary (subservient). “ The mover
and supporters of this bill very fairly avow
that it is the first step towards proposing
the ballot for parliamentary elections.
One honourable member has told us that
it is ancillary and supplementary to a
proposal of vote by ballot.”—Lord Pal
merston.
Angularities (angles or corners). “We
have debated upon public affairs till we
have hardly left to ourselves a substantial
difference of opinion to debate about.-—
We have rounded the corners, and planed
off the angularities, till there is hardly
anything left to lay hold of.”—Times.
Anneal (to temper). “In that case war
would gratify the warlike passions of the
American people, both north and south,
and would tend in popular opinion to
strengthen and anneal the broken links
of their ancient partnership.”—Times. .!
Anomalies (irregularities). “ It is in
evitable that the question should arise—
shall these anomalies be meddled with ?
shall it be attempted to remove them, and
bring writing and speech into harmony
and consent.”—Dr. Trench.
“ The new anomalies which it intro
duces, and the old anomalies which it
spares and re-enacts, are equally mischiev
ous and unmeaning.”—Times.
Anomaly (a deviation). “The Horse
Guards receive three-pence a day—or
twenty-five per cent, more pay than the
Blues. This has gone on for many years
—at last the anomaly struck some medi
tative individual, and he devoted his lei
sure to an. historical inquiry into the
matter.’ ’—Times.
Anonyme (feigned name). “Historicus
in his reply to me yesterday, does himself
great credit as an adroit special pleader,
whatever judgment must be passed upon
that candour which his chosen ANONYME
seems to claim.”—G. N. SAUNDERS.
�THE
AGENCY
DEPARTMENT
In connection with the “ Quarterly Journal" is conducted by Mr. F. S. de
Carteret-Bisson, at 70, Berners Street, Oxford Street, W., to whom all
Communications relating to this Department should be made.
Ko in SCHOOLS FOR SALE.
No. in
Register.
suburb. Held on lease, 14 years unex
281. LONDON.—Superior School for La- pired, at a very low rental. The rent of
dies. Established. 25 years, and situate
the mansion is only £150 (worth £250).
in a favourite suburb of London. Aver
Price for this valuable lease, £550 ; fix
age attendance 30 Boarders : terms 50
tures and fittings at valuation. Full
guineas each, besides extras (day pupils
particulars, with view of house, on ap
easily obtained if desired). A splendid
plication at 70, Berners Street.
detached Mansion, standing in its own 299. MIDDLESEX.—A high class School
grounds, with lawns, croquet ground,
for Gentlemen’s sons ; numbering 75
conservatory, and every convenience.
Boarders. The premises are delightfully
Bent £130. Gross receipts past year
situate not far from Town, and are his
£2,007 7s. Goodwill £650. School
own freehold property, comprising a com
fixtures and furniture at valuation. The
modious house, with dormitories, school
average gross receipts for past 3 years
rooms, out-houses, master’s residence,
are £1.990 6s. 4d. The house and
covered play-ground, fives-court, a
grounds are in every way suited for a
cricket-field of 5 acres, gardens, &c. The
high class school. A bath room and hot
terms for pupils were originally from 60
and cold water for the upper rooms, also
to 80 guineas,but they have been raised
gas has been introduced at the vendor’s
to 80 and 100 guineas. Rent only £200
expense. Books and accounts (clearly
per annum, goodwill £3,000 to be spread
kept) may be seen at Mr. Bisson’s Office,
over a number of years. Furniture at
extending over a period of 10 years.
valuation.
229a. MIDDLESEX.—A Boarding and
Day School for Gentlemen’s sons, situ SCHOOLS AND PARTNERSHIPS
ate in a healthy locality in the N.W.
WANTED.
district of London. A capital house, 3fr. Bisson calls the attention of intending pur
well adapted for school purposes, large chasers to his Bi-monthly List No. 4, issued gratis,
on the 2nd inst. The successful result of a large
playground and garden adjoining, all number of negotiations (see page 8) has reduced the
held upon lease (9 years unexpired) at school properties at present in the market to a very
the low rental of £60. There are 25 small number.
Boarders, averaging from 25 to 40 271. A B.A. of Dublin seeks a partner
ship, £1000 at command.
guineas each, 3 day boarders, and 3 day
pupils, paying good terms. The gross 274. A B.A. of Dublin wants a school
income for past year was £800. Terms
near Town.
for goodwill £200; household furniture 275. A B.A. of Cambridge wishes to join
or part can be taken, if desired, at a
as partner, £500 to invest.
276. An M.A. of Cambridge desires a
valuation.
.
*
295 STAFFORDSHIRE.—ABoarding
partnership.
and Day School for Boys, established 10 281. A B.A. of Cambridge in orders will
years. There are at present 20 board
buy a good-school.
ers. Terms 28 to 30 guineas, with ex 283. A B.A. of Oxford, £300 to invest.
tras, and 50 day pupils, paying £5 and 284. An M.A. of Cambridge (in orders),
£6 a year, besides extras. There is a
£1000 at command.
good play-ground with outbuildings. 285. A Wrangler. Experienced. £300
Rent £60, taxes about £10. The gross
to invest.
receipts the past year were £900. 286. A B.A. of Oxford. £500 to invest.
Terms of sale, goodwill £300, (a year’s 272. A Middle class Boarding and Day
purchase). School and household fur
School wanted.
niture at a valuation.
273. An experienced Tutor (age 24) de
240. MIDDLESEX.—The nucleus of an
sires a partnership.
old established School, with a splendid 276. A B.A. of Oxford wishes to purchase
and commodious Mansion, in thorough
a School. £1000 to invest.
repair, to be obtained on most advanta 277. A Clergyman wishes to purchase a
geous terms. The house is an elegant
good School near London.
building, and can accommodate 50 to 278. A Clergyman (in high honours)
60 Boarders ; it is situate in a favourite
wants a first class School.
Register.
,
�The Agency Department.
Schools, &c., Wanted—continued.
No. in
*
'¡Register
289. An experienced teacher seeks a good
Partnership. Capital to invest, £700.
282. A Clergyman wishes to purchase a
^School in Hants, Bucks, or London.
2/9. An M.A. of Cambridge seeks a good
, opening, Partnership or otherwise.
The following are a few Lady Clients, who
wish to purchase Schools.
-300. A Lady wants a small school, near
London. Capital £150.
No. in
Register.
301. A small preparatory School for Boys.
£250 to invest.
302. A boarding School for Girls. £300
to invest.
303. A School for Ladies, near’ Town.
£500 at command.
300. A boarding and day School. £800
at command.
305. Asmall School. Capital£300 to invest.
306. A good School, near Town. Capital
I to invest, £700.
TUTORS SEEKING APPOINTMENTS AT THE MIDSUMMER
QUARTER, 1867.
arista.
Graduates.
5361. B.A. Oxford, (2nd class Classical
4667. B.A. Oxford (in orders). Classics,
honours). Classics, mathematics, and
mathematics junior, chemistry, French,
English subjects. Age 27, salary £150.
German and English subjects. Age
English Masters.
27, experience 6 years, salary £120.
4738. B.A. Cambridge. Classics, mathe 4710. Classics, moderate mathematics to
quadratics, French gram. English sub
matics, French and English subjects.
jects. Age 22, salary £25.
Age 24, salary £100.
4771. M.A. and B.A. Cambridge. Clas 4883. Classics, mathematics, French and
English subjects. Age 28, salary £60.
sics, mathematics, French, German and
English subjects. Age 30, (in orders), 4897. Drawing, all styles, and English
subjects. _ Age 24, salary £60.
Salary £180.
4778. B.A. Cambridge, (Senior Optime) 4912. Classics, mathematics, drawing
music, and English subjects. Age 21,
Classics, mathematics, French, German,
salary £30.
Drawing and English subjects. Age
5041. Classics, mathematics, French,
24, salary £100.
Drawing and English subjects. Am
■4887. M.A. Dublin. Classics, mathema
36, salary £50.
°
tics, music, organ singing and English
5056. Classics, mathematics, and English
subjects. Age 30, salary, £120.
subjects. Age 21, salary £30.
.5015. B.A. Cambridge (19 Wrangler).
Classics, mathematics, English. A<m 5107. Classics and mathematics, high,
French, German, and English subjects.
22. Salary £150.
°
5059. B.A. Durham (in honours). Clas- ; Age 30, salary £60.
sics, mathematics junior, English sub- I 5114. Classics and mathematics, high, and
jects. Age 25, salary £100.
; English subjects. Age 24, salary £45.
5063. B.A. of Cambridge (Wrangler and 5173. Mathematics, English subjects,
piano, organ, &c. Age 21, salary'£30.
2nd Class Classical Tripos). Age 27,
5309. Classics, mathematics, French,
salary £200.
piano, and English subjects. Age 20,
5074. B.A. Oxford. Classics, mathema
salary £30.
tics, and English. Age 27, salary £120.
5086. B.A. Cambridge (Wrangler). Clas
Foreign Masters.
sics, mathematics, and English sub
136. French and drawing in all styles.
jects. Salary, £150.
Age 30, salary £50.
5135. B.A. Oxford (in orders). Classics,
Mathematics, German and English 315. French, German, drawing. Age 27,
salary £50.
subjects. Age 28, salary £120.
5156. B.A. Cambridge (15 Wrangler). 277. French, German, classics, piano,
organ. Age 29, salary £50.
Classics, mathematics, French and
404. French, German, mathematics,
English. Age 24, salary £150.
drawing. Age 24, salary £40.
5334. M.A. Cambridge. High Second
Classical Tripos. Classics, French, En 416. French, German, drawing, music.
Age 24, salary £50.
glish. Age 27, salary £150.
5316. B.A. Oxford. Classics, mathema 418. French, classics, mathematics, music,
piano, drawing. Salary £60.
tics, French and English. Age 22,
salary £100.
150 numbers omitted for want of space.
�
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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The quarterly journal of education, Vol.1 No.1, May 1867
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Women
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Conway Tracts
Education of women
Education-Great Britain
Teaching
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JEWISH LITERATURE
AND
MODERN EDUCATION:
OR,
THE USE AND MISUSE OF THE BIBLE IN
THE SCHOOLROOM.
BEING TWO LECTURES DELIVERED BEFORE THE SUNDAY LECTURE
SOCIETY, MARCH 26th AND APRIL 2d 1871.
PUBLISHED FOR THE AUTHOR,
BT
THOMAS SCOTT, RAMSGATE.
Price One Shilling and Sixpence, stitched.
On better paper and bound in cloth, Two Shillings and Sixpence.
�“ These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that
they
.
.
.
searched the Scriptures daily, whether those
things were so.”—Acts xvii. 11.
�PREFACE.
Whether or not the Solution, given in these Lectures,
of the “Religious Difficulty” in our National Education,
be acceptable for practical application, is a question other
than that of the intrinsic soundness of that Solution.
It is to this only that my responsibility extends. The
responsibility of declining to accept a proffered remedy
must rest with those to whom the offer is made.
I had intended to keep these Lectures in manuscript,
and repeat them wherever an audience might be found
desirous of hearing facts stated without respect to aught
but the facts. It is in compliance with very many
and pressing solicitations that I have, by printing them,
withdrawn them from further delivery as Public Lectures.
My hope now is that the readers will not be less nume
rous than the hearers would have been, had I adhered
to my original intention.
The Lectures are printed with the changes made on
their second delivery, in Edinburgh.
I cannot let them
�iv
Preface.
go from me without acknowledging my obligations to
the series of small publications issued periodically by
Mr Thomas Scott of Ramsgate, to whose indefatigable
self-devotion to the cause of “ Free Inquiry and Free
Expression,” the present rapid spread of information,
and consequent movement of thought on religious
matters, especially among the clergy of the Establish
ment,—(a movement far greater than the public is aware
of)—is in no small degree attributable. The tracts
entitled, The Defective Morality of the New Testament, by
Professor F. W. Newman; The Gospel of the Kingdom,
and The Influence of Sacred History on the Intellect and
Conscience,—especially deserve mention for the use I
have made of them.
A few brief passages given as
quotations, but without reference, are for the most part
taken, with more or less exactness, from The Pilgrim and
the Shrine.
E. M.
London, September 1871.
�SYNOPSIS.
LECTURE THE FIRST.
KOri 3TIOS
.11.
J2.
.83.
i4.i 5.
’ .‘< 6.
7.
- , J 8..
: .(9.
INTRODUCTION,
.....
DEFINITION AND FUNCTION OF EDUCATION,
THE SCHOOL BOARDS AND THE “RELIGIOUS DIFFICULTY,”
THE GENESIS AND HABITAT OF THE “DIFFICULTY,”
THE BIBLE AS A MORAL TEACHER,
THE BIBLE AS AN INTELLECTUAL TEACHER,
THE BIBLE “WITHOUT NOTE OR COMMENT,”
THE GOSPELS AND THE CHARACTER OF JESUS,
.
THE “KINGDOM OF HEAVEN,”
1
3
6
11
12
24
27
35
37
LECTURE THE SECOND.
.0110.
ill.
THE NEW TESTAMENT AS A RULE OF LIFE AND FAITH,
.
41
THE “CONTINUITY OF SCRIPTURE,” DOCTRINAL AND
OTHER,
.
.
.
.
.
.48
12. WHY THE BIBLE SHOULD BE TAUGHT IN OUR SCHOOLS, .
57
13. HOW IT SHOULD BE DEALT WITH,
.
.
.65
;14. “notes and comments;” the principle of thf.tr
CONSTRUCTION,
.....
69
115. BIBLICAL INFALLIBILITY,
.
.
.
.74
16. BIBLICAL INSPIRATION,
.
.
.
.78
17. THE BIBLE AND MODERN COMMENTATORS,
.
.
86
>18. THE BIBLE AND MODERN PRACTICE,
.
.
.88
19. THE SCHOOL AND TEACHER OF THE FUTURE, .
.
94
��LECTURE THE FIRST.
------- o-------
I.
Why is it with, us in England, that with all our achieve
ments in Science, Literature, and Art; in Government,
Industry, and Warfare; in Honour, Religion, and Virtue;
with conquests ranging over the whole threefold domain
of Humanity, the Physical, the Intellectual, and the
Moral,—why is it that the moment we attempt to ex
tend the manifold blessings of our civilisation to the
entire mass of our countrymen, we find ourselves at fault
and utterly baffled 1
Long has the condition of myriads among us been
known to be terrible in its degradation. Long have we
acknowledged an earnest desire to raise them out of that
condition. Measure after measure have we devised and
enacted; but none of them, not even the vast Church
establishment of the realm, has proved in any degree
commensurate with the evil. At length our efforts have
culminated in the elaboration and enactment of one
comprehensive scheme; and we have proceeded so far as
to have elected as our representatives to carry it into
effect, those of us whom, for superior intelligence and
energy, we deem best qualified for the task.
Shortlived, however, do our exultant hopes promise to
�2
'Jewish Literature
be. The very agents of our beneficent intentions, the
Schoolboards, in whose hands are borne the germs of our
redemption and future civilisation, are altogether at such
odds within themselves upon some of the leading and
most essential principles, that the scheme threatens
wholly to collapse in disheartening failure, or to become
a perennial source of bitterness and dissension.
Is it not passing strange ? Based though our culture
has for centuries been, upon one and the self-same book,
so far from our having attained any degree of unity
thereby, we are divided and rent into sects and factions
innumerable and irreconcilable, until it would appear as
if the very spirit of that proverbially perverse and stiff
necked people whose sacred literature we have adopted
as the rule of our faith and practice, had passed into
ourselves and become a constituent part of our very
nature.
The greatness of the emergency,—for it is the redemp
tion of our masses from pauperism, ignorance, and bar
barism that is at stake,—not justifies merely, but impe
ratively demands the strenuous collaboration of all who,
having the good of their kind at heart, have made this
question one of special investigation. It is in no spirit
of hasty presumption,—scarcely is it with much hope of
wide acceptance,—at least in the present,—that I have
responded to the invitation to recite here to-day the con
clusions to which my study of the points at issue has
brought me. Rather is it that it will be a relief to my
self to have thrown off the reflections and results which,
in a somewhat varied experience at home and abroad,
have accumulated upon me, and to feel that I have done
this at the time when there is most chance of their being
useful. It is thus that I have prepared my contribution
�and Modern Education.
3
towards the solution of “ the Religious Difficulty ” which
lies “ a lion in the path ” of our National Education and
all our national improvement, showing as- yet not the
smallest symptom of discomposure through any “ Reso
lution ” of Metropolitan or other School-board.
II.
In all emergencies, whether of conduct or of opinion,
where there is doubt and space for deliberation, it is
best to go back to the very beginning of the matter, and
there, in its initial principles, seek the clue which is to
conduct us safely out of our dilemma. It is wonderful
sometimes how readily a skein is disentangled when
once the right end of the thread has been found. Our
friends across the Atlantic, the Americans, were for a long
time disastrously hampered in their attempts at legisla
tion. It is not surprising that it should have been so,
when we consider that the principal object of legislation
is Man, and that the two great sections of the American
community differed altogether in their definition of Man;
the one holding that persons who had dark complexions
and a peculiar kind of rough curly hair, several millions
of whom lived in the country, were not men L and the
other holding that they were just as much entitled to be
treated as human beings as people with light complexions
and smooth hair. At length, after many years of bitter
quarrelling, ending with one of the most fearful inter
necine conflicts ever known, it was agreed to regard all
people as human, and to legislate alike for them with per
fect equality; whereupon the difficulty entirely vanished,
and the course of the nation became smooth and easy.
In like manner our difficulties, in regard to popular
�4
Jewish Literature
instruction, have all arisen through our neglect of a de
finition. We have not defined to ourselves the precise
object of the system of National Education, which, after
generations of anxious endeavour, we have at length
succeeded in obtaining, and which we are now seeking
to bring into operation throughout the length and
breadth of the land.
The first step towards obtaining what we want, ever
is to know what we want; and since in this case we
cannot purchase the article ready-made, but have to
fabricate it for ourselves, it is not sufficient to have a
bare name for it, or a vague apprehension about it, but
we must be conversant with its nature, characteristics,
and uses.
Let us further simplify and enlarge the scope of the
question, and ask what is the object of all the education,
public or private, which we give, or seek to give, to our
children ? What, in short, is the purpose of education 1
Using the term education in its broad sense, and
without reference to technical instruction in special
subjects, we can only answer, that its purpose is to
make children into good and capable men and women by
cultivating their intelligence and their moral sense, or
conscience.
It follows, if we agree to this definition, that we are
bound to reject as worse than useless, any instruction
which is calculated to repress or pervert either of those
faculties from their proper healthy development.
Those who at first hesitate to acquiesce in this defini
tion, in the belief that education should have a more
special object, such as to make good Christians, good
Catholics, good Protestants, good Churchmen, or good
Nonconformists, must on a little reflection perceive that
�and Modern Education.
5
they cannot really mean to rank the intelligence and
moral sense as secondary and subordinate to such ends,
but that they only desire people to be good Christians,
good Churchmen, and so on, because the fact of being so
would, in their view, involve the best culture of the
faculties in question. So that if they believed it did not
involve this end, they would abandon their preference
for such denominations. That is, they would rather
have people to be good men and bad (say) Noncon
formists, than good Nonconformists and bad men.
Agreeing, then, that the object of education is the
development of the intellect and moral sense, we shall,
no doubt, further agree that the best chance of success
fully cultivating those desirable qualities which we
designate virtues, lies in impressing the mind while
young with the most elevated and winning examples of
them, and guarding it from any familiarity with their
opposites ; and that it is because we deem such qualities
to be best, that we regard the Deity as possessing them
in the Infinite, and hold up as a pattern of life the most
perfect example of them in the finite.
Yet, though agreeing both in the object and method
of education when thus plainly put before us, so ingeni
ously perverse and inconsistent are we that we first
refuse to agree upon any common system of instruction
whatever, and then we insist upon neutralising or
vitiating such instruction as we do agree upon, by
mingling it with teaching which is at once repressive of
the Intellect, and injurious to the Moral Sense.
The sole impediment to the success of our efforts, the
rock upon which all our hopes of rescuing the mass of our
countrymen from ignorance and barbarism are in danger
of being dashed, consists in the unreasoning and indis
�6
'Jewish Literature
criminate veneration in which the Bible is popularlyheld among us. Impelled by that veneration, we hesi
tate not to degrade our children’s view of Deity by
familiarising them with a literature in which He is
represented as feeble, treacherous, implacable, and
unjust; and confound at once their Intelligence and
Moral Sense, by compelling them to regard that litera
ture as altogether divine and infallible.
Strange infatuation and inconsistency, if, after toiling
for years to obtain an effective system of national edu
cation, we either abandon the task as hopeless, or insist
upon accompanying it by teaching which involves a fatal
outrage upon the very intellect and conscience which it
is the express purpose of that education to foster and
develop!
III.
Before' considering the action of the School-boards, I
must advert for a moment to the principle of their constitution.
There is this difference between Government by Re
presentation and Government by Delegation. It is the
‘ duty of the mere delegate to vote on any given question
precisely as a majority of his constituents may instruct
him. The deliberative function rests with them. He is
their faithful, but unintelligent instrument. The repre
sentative, on the contrary, is selected on account of his
superior faculties or attainments, to go on behalf of his
constituents to the headquarters of information, and
there, in conference with other selected intellects, form
the best judgment in his power; his constituents deter
mining only the general principles and direction of his
policy.
�and Modern Education.
7
The School-boards which are charged with the deter
mination of our new educational system, having been
selected on this principle of representation, we are
entitled to look to their superior intelligence to sup
plement popular deficiencies ; to be superior to popular
prejudices; to be teachers, and, if need be, rebukers,
rather than followers and flatterers of the less instructed
masses : and it is due to such bodies that we carefully
examine the methods by which they propose to deal with
existing difficulties.
Those difficulties turning exclusively upon Religion,
one great step towards their solution has been gained by
the agreement to exclude from the common schools such
minor subjects of difference as the creeds and catechisms
of particular denominations. The Bible remains, the sole
stumbling-block and rock of offence.
The London Board may be taken as representative
not only of the largest and most intelligent. body of
constituents, but also of all the other School-boards. I
propose, therefore, to deal with the propositions by
which the members of that Board have sought to meet
the “religious difficulty.” They are six in number :
1. That the Bible be excluded altogether, on the
ground that its admission is inconsistent with religious
equality.
2. That the Bible be admitted and read,, but without
note or comment.
3. That the Bible be read for the purpose of religious
culture, at the discretion of the teacher.
4. That the teacher’s discretion in the use of the Bible
be so restricted as to exclude the distinctive doctrines of
any sect.
5. That no principle respecting the use of the Bible
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be laid down, but that each separate school be dealt with
by itself.
6. That the Bible be read with such explanations in
matters of language, history, customs, &c., as may be
needed to make its meaning plain; and that there be
given such instruction in its teaching, on the first prin
ciples of morality and religion, as is suitable to the
capacities of children; always excluding denominational
teaching.
The Fifth Resolution, “ that no principle be laid down,”
aptly describes the condition of the question up to that
point. In the absence of a definition of its object, it
was impossible for the Board to lay down any principle
for its guidance. In the absence of any controlling
definition, it could only look back to its constituents to
see what they would bear from it. And looking to the
confused mass of public opinion and prejudice in the
absence of any light of one’s own, is like shutting one’s
eyes to avoid seeing the dark.
Travelling one day by a railway on which there are
several tunnels, I observed that whenever the train
entered a tunnel, a little boy who sat next to me, im
mediately pressed his hands over his eyes, and buried his
face in the cushions. To my inquiry why he did this,
he answered that it was because he was afraid of the
dark. I asked him whether it was not just as dark to
him when his face was buried in the cushions. He said
yes; but he had not thought of that, and he would not
know now what to do. I could not bear to deprive him
of his faith, however unenlightened, without giving him
another. A lamp was burning in the roof of the car
riage, too dim in the broad daylight to have attracted
his attention, yet bright enough to dispel the gloom of
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the tunnel. I suggested that, instead of covering his
face, he would do better to keep his eyes fixed on the
lamp. The little fellow brightened with joy at the
thought; and during the rest of the journey, the in
stant we entered a tunnel, there he was, no longer fear
ful and burying himself in deeper darkness, but steadfastly
looking to the light that shone above him.
“ Look to the light 1 ” is no bad maxim even for those
who have to determine grave questions for the benefit
of others. We have but to “look to the light” of the
definition we have already agreed upon, and difficulties
fly like darkness before the approaching dawn. Even
the difficulties themselves, like Daphne before the Sun
god, are apt to turn into flowers for our delectation. .
The Sixth Resolution, that proposed by Dr Angus, and
supported by Professor Huxley, is the first that shows
any consciousness that there is a light to which we may
look for encouragement and guidance. “ That instruc
tion should be given in the Bible on the first principles of
morality and religion” According to our definition, Edu
cation consists in the cultivation of the Intelligence and
the Moral Sense. This is the light on which the gaze
must be so steadily fixed, that no conflicting influences
shall be capable of diverting our attention. Interpreted
by it, the Bible itself bears witness to the way in which
it should be used. Here, in full accordance with it, is
one of its utterances, “ God is no respecter of persons;
but in every nation, he that feareth Him and worketh
righteousness, is accepted with Him.” (Acts x. 34-5.)
Acting in this spirit, our School-boards will be no re
specters of authors or books, but in every writing that,
and that only, “ which feareth God and worketh righte
ousness,” shall be accepted by them. Here is another,
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also on the positive side: “ Whatsoever things are true,
whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just,
whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely,
whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any
virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.”
(Phil. iv. 8.) And another seems to define that Scrip
ture or writing, as alone given by a holy inspiration,
which “ is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for cor
rection, for instruction in righteousness.” (2 Tim. iii. 16.)
And on the negative side we have “ Refuse profane and
old wives’ fables;” (1 Tim. iv. 7.) “not giving heed to
Jewish fables.” (Titus i. 14.) “But all uncleanness let
it not be once named among you ;” “ for it is a shame
even to speak of those things which are done of them in
secret.” (Eph. v. 3, 12.) And one more on the posi
tive side. “ Whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of
God.” (1 Cor. x. 31.)
Yet with these plain rules for our guidance, not one
of the resolutions proposes to place any restriction upon
the use of the Bible by the children. One, indeed, pro
poses to exclude it bodily from the schools, the good and
the evil together, but upon grounds in no way connected
with its fitness for the perusal of youth. And even the
resolution finally accepted by the Board, while ambigu
ously proposing “ to give from the Bible such instruction
in the principles of religion and morality as is suitable
to the capacities of children,” ventures on no protest
against the Bible as it now stands being put into the
hands of children at all.
The fact is, that the members have allowed themselves
to be so exclusively guided by the “ winds” of popular
“ doctrine,” that they “ have omitted the weightier mat
ters of the law” of morality, and “ passed over judgment
and the love of God.”
�b
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IV.
The reason is not far to seek. A representative body
would not be representative were any wide interval to
intervene between its own intelligence and attainments
and those of its constituents. The latter can be guided
in their selection only by the light they possess j not by
that which they do not possess. Wherefore, for the
School-board to have passed any more radical Resolution
than that which it did pass, would have been for it to
have made itself, not the representative, but the inde
pendent superior of the body which elected it. The
primary defect, therefore, lies with the people at large.
It is the vast amount of bigoted ignorance and supersti
tion still remaining among us that constitutes the real
obstacle to any sound system of national education. It
is the elders who require to be instructed, before we can
begin to teach the children. It is true that a transition
has begun. But every step of the progress from the old
to the new, from darkness to light, is so vehemently
opposed by the vested interests of the dead past, that
the patience of those who believe in the possibility of
progress may well be exhausted, and their faith quenched
in despair.
To be effectual, therefore, remonstrance must be ad
dressed to the people at large, rather than to their
representatives on the School-boards. The transition of
which I spoke as having already begun, is the transition
from a morality affecting to be based upon theology, to
a religion really based upon morality, and, consequently,
to a sound system of morality. This transition must
attain a far more advanced stage in its progress before
the School-board can even begin to carry out the Re-
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solution it has passed. It is absolutely impossible to
“ give from the Bible, instruction in the principles of
morality and religion suitable to children,” until the
popular theory respecting the Bible, and the theology
based upon it, is so vastly modified as to amount to
an almost total renunciation of that theory. The ab
solute and irreconcilable antagonism between what is
called Biblical Theology and the modern principles of
“ Religion and Morality,” cannot be too distinctly
asserted or loudly proclaimed, if we sincerely desire
our children to have an education really consisting in
the development of their intelligence and moral sense.
Valuing the Bible highly as I do, for very much
that is very valuable in it, it is no grateful task to have
to search out and expose the characteristics which
render it an unsuitable basis for the instruction of
children, whether in morality or in religion. Such ex
posure, however, being indispensable to the solution of
the problem of our national education; to shrink from
it would be to abandon that problem as insoluble, that
education as impossible.
V.
Bearing always in mind our definition of the purpose
and method of education, namely the development of
the intelligence and moral sense by the inculcation of
“ the true, the pure, and the honest,”—bearing in mind
also the fundamental fact in human nature, that man’s
view of Deity inevitably reacts upon himself, tending
to form him in the image of his own ideal,—it is selfevident that to familiarise children with the imperfect
morality, the coarse manners and expressions, the rude
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fables, and the degrading ideas of Deity, appertaining to
a people low in culture—such as were the Israelites—
and to confound their minds and consciences at the most
impressible period of life by telling them that such
narratives and representations are all divinely inspired
and infallibly true,—is to utterly stultify ourselves and
the whole of the principles by which we profess to be
actuated in giving them an education at all. Did we
find any others than ourselves, say South Sea savages,
putting into the hands of their children, books containing
coarse and impure stories, detailing the morbid anatomy
of the most execrable vices, extollipg deeds prompted by
a spirit of the lowest selfishness, exulting in fraud,
rapine, and murder, and justifying whatever is most
disgraceful to humanity by representing it as prompted
or approved by their Deity, and so making Him alto
gether such an one as themselves,—surely we should say
that they must indeed be savages of the lowest and most
degraded type, and sad proofs of the utter depravity of
human nature.
In investigating from our present point of view the
contents of this most read, yet most misread, of books,
we must dismiss from our minds any idea that its most
objectionable features are amenable to revision or re
translation. The faults thus removable are but as
freckles upon the skin compared with a constitutional
taint. For it is the spirit as well as the letter of a large
portion of it, that whether “ for reproof, for correction,
or for instruction in righteousness,” is hopelessly in
fault: and the spirit of a book is of infinitely greater
importance than its superficial details.
Palpable to the eyes of all are the hideous tales of Lot
and his daughters; (Gen. xix.) Judah and Tamar;
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(xxxvii.) the massacre of the Shechemites; (xxxiv.)
the Levite of Ephraim; (Jud. xix.) David and Bathsheba;
(2 Sam. ix.) Amnon and his sister ; (xiii.) and whole
chapters in Leviticus and the Prophets. That such
things should be in a book given freely to children to
read, and that they should be expected notwithstanding
to grow up pure and uncontaminated in mind and habit,
is one of those anomalies in the British character which
makes it a hopeless puzzle to the world. Who can say
that much of the viciousness at present prevalent among
us, is not attributable to early curiosity being aroused
and stimulated by the obscenities of the Old Testament ?
To put the Bible as it is into the hands of our children,
is not only totally to bewilder their sense of right and
wrong,—it is to invite familiarity with the idea of the
worst Oriental vices.
Even in the case of those vices being mentioned only
to be denounced, the suggestion is apt to remain, and
the denunciation to be disregarded. It notoriously is
injudicious to put into the minds of children faults of
which they might never have thought themselves, for
the sake of admonishing them against them. It is
related somewhere that a catalogue of offences punish
able by law was once posted in the Roman forum as a
warning to the citizens; but that this was followed by
such a vast increase in the number and variety of the
crimes committed, that it was found advisable to remove
it. I myself know an instance of a pious mother sending
her daughter to a boarding-school, having first written
in her Bible a list of the chapters and passages which she
was not to read. It is remarkable how popular in the
school that particular Bible became. The other girls
were always borrowing it. There is no reason to suppose
that boys would have acted differently.
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It is true that the particular instances I have adduced
may not he immoral as they stand in the Bible, but they
are assuredly provocative of immorality in children who
read them. A far more serious indictment against the
Bible as a handbook of moral instruction must be founded
on its habit of representing the Deity as a consenting
party to some of the worst actions of its characters :
nay, so unreliable is it as a basis of anything what
ever, that after thus characterising the Deity, it deals in
strong denunciations against those “ who not only com
mit such things themselves, but have pleasure in them
that do them
(Rom. i. 32.) thus, by direct implication
condemning the Deity Himself. If it be desirable to
impress upon children the belief that only those “ who
fear God and work righteousness are acceptable to him,”
it is to stultify the whole principle of their education to
represent Him to them as an eastern monarch, selecting
his favourites by caprice, and independently of any merit
or demerit on their part. Yet the entire Bible rests
upon the idea that so far from being an equal Father of
all, “ whose tender mercies are over all His works,”
(Ps. cxlv. 9.) the Almighty selected out of all mankind
one race to be “ His own peculiar people,” (Deut. xiv. 9.)
and out of that race certain individuals to be His own
peculiar favourites, and this in spite of the most glaring
defects in their characters and conduct; and sustained
those whom He had thus chosen through the whole
course of their misdeeds.
Thus, Abraham is said to have had “ faith,” and this
faith is said to have been “ imputed to him for righteous
ness (Rom. iv. 22.) but how far was his actual conduct
righteous, and how much faith did it imply 1 Assured
by repeated promises of the divine favour and protection,
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as well as of a great posterity through his then childless
wife Sarai, he twice voluntarily prostituted her to Pagan
chieftains, pretending that she was only his sister. And
we read that “the Lord plagued,”—not the liar and
poltroon who thus degraded his wife, and entrapped the
kings, whose hospitality he was enjoying;—not the wife
so extraordinarily ready to “ obey her husband in all
things(it appears that her age was about sixty-five on
one occasion, and ninety on the other);—but “ the Lord
plagued Pharaoh and Abimelech with great plagues be
cause of Sarai, Abraham’s wife,” and in the case of the
latter, would only grant forgiveness upon the intercession
of Abraham, saying, “ for he is a prophet.” (Gen. xii. 20.)
Isaac, we read, copied the twice committed fault of his
father, in passing off his wife Rebekah as his sister upon
another king, and was divinely blessed notwithstanding.
In short, in all three transactions, out of the whole of the
parties to them, Abraham, Isaac, Sarai, Rebekah, .the
three kings, and the Deity, those only who indicate the
possession of any moral sense whatever are the Pagan
kings, who show it in no small degree, and these alone
are punished; while Abraham and Isaac retain the divine
favour throughout, the former being honoured by the
distinctive title of “ Friend of God.” (James ii. 23.)
The selfishness and cowardice of Abraham are still
farther illustrated by his treatment of Hagar and Ish
mael. There is no reason to doubt the perfect truthful
ness of the Bible narrative in respect to him. But when
it goes on to represent the Deity as encouraging him in
his cruel and unfatherly conduct to his son, and bid
ding him follow the lead of a frivolous and heartless
wife;—“ In all that Sarai hath said unto thee, hearken
unto her voice(Gen. xxi. 12.) then our m'oral sense is
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offended, and we refuse to identify the God of Abraham
with the God of our own clearer perceptions.
The utter indifference of “ the God of Abraham, Isaac,
and Jacob” to any moral law whatever, reaches its climax
in the history of Jacob. A liar and a trickster from
early youth, yet constantly enjoying the presence and
approbation of God, who finds no word or sign of re
proach wherewith to touch his conscience or arouse his
fears,—such is the patriarch whom the Bible sets forth
as one of God’s especial favourites, because, forsooth, he
had “ faith.” In presence of this mystic quality, right
and wrong sink into absolute nothingness; and that
most fatal of all impieties, a total divorce between the
.will of God and the moral law, finds its plea and justi
fication. It is little that I would give for the moral
sensibility of the child who could read without a pang of
indignation and a tear of pity the tale of this ingrained
blackleg’s atrocities ; his taking advantage of his rough,
honest-hearted brother’s extremity of exhaustion through
hunger to extort from him his birthright; (Gen.
xxv.) his heartless deception of his poor, blind old
father; (xxvii.) his repeated cheats, thefts, and false
hoods against his father-in-law; (xxx., &c.) and the
divine confirmation to him of the blessings thus fraudu
lently acquired ; “ yea, and he shall be blessed,” and con
stant assurance of the divine presence and approbation.
It is without a word of repudiation that the Bible ac
quiesces in Jacob’s degradation of the Deity to a huck
stering or bargaining God; a God, too, who can be got
the better of in a business transaction. For, “Jacob
vowed a vow, saying, If God will be with me in this
way that I go, and will give me bread to eat and raiment
to put on, so that I come again to my father’s house in
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peace; then shall the Lord be my God; and this stone
which I have set for a pillar shall be God’s house; and
of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth
unto thee.” (xxviii. 20, &c.)
When the Israelites reach the Promised Land, their
“ sacred history” consists of little beside perpetual but
cheries. The more directly they are represented as being
under divine guidance, the more sanguinary is their
career. Slaughter of men, women, children, infants at
the breast. None spared, none, except, sometimes—
and mark the exception made by the followers, not of
Mahomet, but of Jehovah—the unmarried girls. Every
sentiment of humanity and mercy is accounted an un
pardonable weakness. Jehovah appears as a savage
patriot-God, approving impurity, treachery, murder, and
whatever else was perpetrated on the side of his “ chosen
people.” A Bushman of South Africa being once asked
to define the difference between good and evil, replied,
“ It is good when I steal another man’s wives; evil when
another man steals mine.” Such is precisely the standard
of right and wrong laid down by the Bible in respect to
the Israelites and their neighbours. Can we wonder that
recent moralists have written to vindicate the Almighty
from the aspersions cast upon his character in the Bible.*
In all the events of the late dreadful war upon the
Continent, probably no single incident caused such a
thrill of horror as that of the wounded German soldier
who staggered from the field of battle into a peasant’s
cottage, and fell fainting upon the bed, and only lived
long enough to tell his comrades how that the woman of
the cottage had taken advantage of his helpless condition
to pick out his eyes with a fork. Possibly the French
* E.g. Theodore Parker in America, and Dr Perfitt in England.
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woman had heard of the blessing pronounced upon Jael
for a similar act. Possibly she had learned from “ Sacred
History” that the most revolting perfidy and cruelty be
come heroic virtues when exercised upon one’s own side.
And were not we Europeans of to-day, with all our faults,
infinitely in advance of those bad times, we too might
find a patriot-poet rivalling the utterances of the
“divinely-inspired” Deborah, to laud the French tigress
as the Jewish one was lauded, detail with rapturous
glee every particular of the fiendish deed, and mock the
wretched victim’s mother watching and longing in vain
for her murdered son’s return.
Nay, the conduct of her whom the Bible pronounces
as “ blessed above women,” was even more flagrant in
its utter heinousness than that of the French woman.
For the husband of Jael had severed himself from the
hostile peoples; “there was peace between Jabin, the
King of Hazor, and the house of Heber, the Keliite
and he dwelt, a friendly neutral, in a region apart. The
general Sisera, moreover, utterly beaten and discomfited,
had fled expressly to Jael’s tent for safety, knowing the
family to be friendly, and she had invited him in with
assurances of protection. “ Turn in, my lord, fear not.”
(Jud. iv.)
While Abraham is described as “ the friend of God,”
to David is awarded the honour of being styled “ a man
after God’s own heart; ” (1 Sam. xiii. 14; Acts xiii. 22.)
“who turned not away from anything that he com
manded him all the days of his life, save only ” in one
particular instance. (1 Kings xv. 5.) In order to see how
little the Bible is fitted for the instruction of children in
respect of a moral sense, let us brush aside for a moment
the halo with which the name of David is surrounded,
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and read his history for ourselves. It is through want
of doing this, that a popular writer has recently described
his life as uniformly “bright and beautiful up to the
time of his one great sin.”* Yet, his career, soon after
the intrepid act which first brought him into notice, was
one of rebellion and brigandage. Collecting all that were
in debt, distress, and discontent, (1 Sam. xxii. 2.) he or
ganised them into bands of freebooters to levy blackmail
upon the farmers. One of these, named Nabal, when
applied to on account of David, boldly and naturally
answered, “ Who is David ? and who is this son of Jesse?
there be many servants now-a-days that break away
every man from his master. Shall I then take my
bread, and my water, and my flesh that I have killed
for my shearers, and give it unto men whom I know not
whence they be ?”
However, Abigail, the wife of Nabal, touched by her
servant’s account of the gallantry of the band, took of
her husband’s stores and gave liberally to them. Upon
this David assured her that, but for her conduct, he
would not have left even a dog of Nahal’s household
alive by next morning. A few days afterwards Nabal
died; the Bible, as if to remove any suspicion of foul
play, stating that “ the Lord smote him;” when David im
mediately took Abigail to be his own wife. (1 Sam. xxv.)
When the great contest took place between the Philis
tines and the Israelites, in which the latter were utterly
routed, and Saul and Jonathan, David’s bosom friend,
were slain, David with his forces stood aloof, unheeding
the peril of his countrymen. (1 Sam. xxx.) The crown
thus devolved upon Ishbosheth the son of Saul, who was
supported by eleven out of the twelve tribes. David,
* Miss Yonge, in “ Musings on the Christian Year.”
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however, would not accept their choice, even though the
whole strength of Israel was needed at that critical mo
ment to withstand the Philistines. (2 Sam. ii.) Exciting
a civil war, he got himself acknowledged as king by the
dissentient tribe of Judah. Treachery and murder came
freely to his aid, and he at length found the crown of
Israel in his hands. But he felt his tenure of it insecure
so long as any descendant of Saul remained to dispute it
with him. He therefore concerted with the priests, who,
since Saul had slighted their authority, had sided with
David, a plot to get rid of the seven sons and grandsons
of Saul. The country having been for three years dis
tressed by famine, David consulted the Oracles. In
Bible phraseology, he “ inquired of the Lord.” Of what
kind of a Lord he inquired, may be judged by the re
sponse. “ It is for Saul and his bloody house, because
he slew the Gibeonites ” many years before. Upon this
the Gibeonites, duly instructed, besought of David that,
as an “ atonement,” seven males of Saul’s family should
be 11 hanged up unto the Lord.” And David took the
seven and delivered them into the hands of the Gibe
onites, five of them being sons of his own former wife
Michal, “ and they hanged them in the hill before the
Lord. . . . And after that, God was intreated for the
land.” (2 Sam. xxi. 1-14.) Revolt, treason, murder,
human sacrifices, all in the name of “ the Lord ” !
On one occasion, after defeating the Moabites, David,
we read, assembled all the people of that nation on a
plain, made them lie down, and divided them into three
groups with a line. Two of these groups he put to death,
and the other he reduced to slavery. (2 Sam. viii. 2.) The
conquered Ammonites he treated with even greater fero
city, tearing and hewing some of them in pieces with
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harrows, axes, and saws, and roasting others in brick
kilns. (xii. 31.) His luxury and voluptuousness equalled
his cruelty. Having had seven wives while he ruled
over Judah alone, he added to the number all those who
had belonged to Saul, (8.) and took yet more wives and
concubines after he had come from Hebron, (v. 13.) But
these, and his vast pomp, were insufficient to satiate him.
Having caught sight of Bathsheba, the wife of one of his
captains named Uriah, he took her to himself, and sent
Uriah to join the army in the field, giving express orders
to his commanding officer to place him in the fore front
of the fight to insure his being killed.
It appears that there was then in Israel an honest pro
phet named Nathan, who had the courage to remonstrate
with the king, and who did so with such effect, that
David was made, for once, to see the enormity of his
conduct. We read, however, that the Lord put away
David’s sin, so that he did not die. But his child did.
And no sooner was the innocent thus punished for the
guilty, than “ David comforted Bathsheba his wife, and
she bare a son, and he called his name Solomon; and
the Lord loved him. And he sent by the hand of
Nathan the prophet,” now subsided into the obsequious
court chaplain, “and he called his name Jedidiah,” or
“ Beloved of the Lord.” (2 Sam. xii.)
Old age and infirmity wrought no amendment in the
truculent spirit of David ; a spirit so truculent as to make
it morally impossible that he could really have been the
author of any of those psalms which in after ages it
pleased his countrymen to ascribe to him; excepting
only, perhaps, the more ferocious of them. He has been
called, “ the Byron of the Bible,” which, after what has
just been stated, seems exceedingly unfair to Byron.
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Early in David’s career of blood, one Shimei had, in
generous indignation, cursed him for his murder of the
sons of Saul. (2 Sam. xvi.) He had afterwards begged
forgiveness and received it. (xix. 16-23.) Yet David’s
last instructions to Solomon were in this wise—“ Behold
thou hast with thee Shimei the son of Gera, which cursed
me with a grievous curse in the day when I came to
Mahanaim: but he came down to meet me at Jordan,
and I sware to him by the Lord, saying, I will not put
thee to death with the sword. Now, therefore, hold
him not guiltless . . . but his hoar head bring thou
down to the grave with blood. So David slept with his
fathers.” (1 Kings ii. 8-10, &c.) And Solomon “com
manded Benaiah, the son of Jehoiada, which went out and
fell upon Shimei, that he died.” (46.) “ And Solomon
loved the Lord, walking in the statutes of David, his
father.” And “ the Lord appeared to Solomon in a
dream by night; and God said, ask what I shall give
thee. And Solomon said, Thou hast shown unto thy
servant David, my father, great mercy, according as he
walked before thee in truth, and in righteousness, and in
uprightness of heart with thee : and thou hast kept for
him this great kindness, that thou hast given him a son
to sit on his throne. . . . And God said unto him . . .
if thou wilt walk in my ways, to keep my statutes and
my commandments, as thy father David did walk, then
will I lengthen thy days.” (1 Kings iii.)
The mystery of these astounding utterances is not far
to seek. History in those days was the work of the
sacerdotal class. To support and subserve that class was
then, as it has been, for the most part, ever since, to be
pronounced, “ beloved of the Lord,” no matter how evil
the individual really was, or how derogatory to the di
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vine honour it might be to have such a preference ascribed
to it. To have “ faith ” in the priests counterbalanced
and condoned any quantity of wicked “ works.” Their
standard of right and wrong, good and evil, was that of
the Bushman. Whatever was for them was good ; what
ever was against them was evil. It is, then, for us seri
ously to ask ourselves whether, when we set before our
children as a fit object of worship such a being as the
Bible represents the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,
of Samuel, David, and Solomon, to have been, we are
ministering towards the end we have in view in giving
to them an education; or whether, in place of raising
them in the scale of being, we are not rather ministering
to the total degradation in them of the human soul.
VI.
1 .
These are but a few of the instances in which the
Bible is antagonistic to one of the main objects of educa
tion, the development of the moral sense. We will now
examine how far its teaching is adapted to promote the
cultivation of the intellect, still confining ourselves to
the Old Testament.
What are the “ glorious gains ” of the modern mind,
of which we are justly proud, and what are the ideas re
specting the constitution of the universe, the recognition
of which we regard as necessary to entitle any one to
the appellation of an intelligent and educated person 1
Surely they are that the order of nature is invariable,
the whole universe being governed by laws so perfectly
appointed as to need no rectification, and fixed so inher
ently in it as to constitute its nature. That, though in
capable of interference from without, inasmuch as there
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can be no without, all things proceeding from within
from its divine immanent character,—its parts are en
dowed with a capacity of advancing by a process of con
tinual evolution to a degree ever higher of complexity
and organisation, as within the physical structure rises
the mental, with all its capabilities of moral, intellectual,
and spiritual, in grandeur surpassing the majesty of the
whole external Cosmos. That it is a low and degrading
superstition to regard deity as other than One, ever liv
ing and operating equally and impartially throughout the
whole domain of existence; or as dwelling apart from
the world, and only occasionally giving proof of his being
by disturbance of the general order. And that,—while it
is impossible truly to ascribe to him aught of feeling cor
responding to the love, hate, fear, passion, caprice, appe
tite, or other affection of men,—when for purposes of
instruction or devotion we seek to utilise the anthropo
morphic tendency of our nature, He is to be represented
as the absolute impersonation of all that we recognise as
best in Humanity.
To what depths do we fall when, abandoning these
hard-won gains of the Intellect’s long warfare against
ignorance, barbarism, and superstition, instead of placing
our children upon the vantage ground we have acquired,
and handing to them our lights at the point which we
ourselves have attained, that they may carry them on
yet further, we abuse their understandings at the most
impressible age, by compelling them to regard the
Almighty as no equal God and Father of the whole
human race, but the exclusive patron of a small Semitic
tribe dwelling in Palestine, whom he supported by
prodigies and miracles in their aggressions upon their
neighbours, revealing to them alone the light of his
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word, and condemning all others to enforced darkness.
By teaching them to believe in magic and witchcraft,
in talismans, charms, and vows; in beasts speaking
with human voices and sentiments; (Gen. iii. 1-4;
Num. xxii. 28-30.) in a deity writing with a finger; (Ex.
xxxi. 18.) speaking with a voice; (xix. 19.) enjoying
the smell of roast meat; (Gen. viii. 21.) standing face to
face ; (xxxii. 30.) walking in a garden ; (iii. 8.) revealing
his hinder parts; (Ex. xxxiii. 23.) coming down to obtain
information as to what men were doing, and to devise
measures in accordance therewith; (Gen. xi. 5-7 ; xviii.
20, 21.) impressing men, not through their consciences,
but by signs and wonders, miracles and dreams; recog
nising and confirming advantages gained by fraud, to the
irreparable disadvantage of their rightful owner; (Gen.
xxvii. 33-37.) in the case of one deliverer of his chosen
people, making his strength depend upon the length of
his hair; (Jud. xvi. 17.) allowing another, in virtue of
a hasty vow, to offer up his daughter in human sacrifice
as a burnt-offering; (xi. 30-39 ; Num. xxx.) and, lastly,
teaching them to believe in man created perfect, and
yet unable to resist the first and smallest temptation;
and, for such a peccadillo as the eating of the fruit of a
magical tree, being with his whole unborn progeny so
ferociously damned as to be redeemable only by another
human sacrifice, even the stupendous sacrifice of God’s
only Son.
How utterly bewildering to the expanding intelligence
of youth to be told that the God whom they are to
worship is revealed in the Bible, and to find him such a
being as this ! Terrible indeed is their responsibility
who proclaim as divinely infallible every absurd or
monstrous narrative to be found in the fragmentary
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legends of a barbarous and imaginative people. When
we consider how great is the difficulty of detaching the
mind from pernicious ideas when imprinted on it in
childhood, and fitting it to receive the later revelations
of reason and morality, we can but shudder at the sum
of misery undergone in the conflict between the Intellect
and the Conscience, through the former having com
menced its onward march, while the latter still continues
bound to the beliefs of childhood. A very Nessus-shirt
of burning poison and agony to all generations of
Christendom, has been the garb of ancient faith which we
have adopted and worn, in spite of its being totally
unfitted to us.
VII.
It is a practice with many savage tribes to invest some
object with certain magical properties, altogether inde
pendent of its real qualities, and to worship this with a
blind adoration, the whole process being known by the
name of Fetich-worship.
Now what else than precisely such Fetich-worship is
theirs who would put up a book to be venerated, but
refuse to allow it to be made comprehensible by any
kind of interpretation ? Yet, of all the Resolutions
considered by the School-board, that for which the
country at largS manifested the strongest preference at
the elections was the proposition “that the Bible be
read in the schools, but without note or comment.”
It can only be the absence of any precise notion as to
what education consists in that has prompted a sugges
tion so utterly opposed to any sort of wholesome de
velopment. To suggest difficulties—such difficulties—
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and forbid their explanation ! Better far that the
children read the Bible in the original tongues at once,
than in the “ authorised version.” They might not get
much good from the process, but they would assuredly
get less harm.
But we will test the working of this suggestion by a
few out of the numerous instances of apparent contra
diction which, “ without note or comment,” cannot fail
to plunge youthful readers in hopeless perplexity.
And first, concerning the Deity, we read that “ God
saw everything that he had made, and behold it was
very good.” (Gen. i. 31.) This was said after the
creation of man, when the character and liabilities of
that creation must have been fully known to God.
Yet we are told soon after that “ it repented the Lord
that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him
at his heart; (iv. 6.) implying that he was surprised and
disappointed at the way man had turned out, having
expected better things of him : implying, too, that the
divine prescience was at fault, the divine work a failure.
And in many other passages we read of the Deity as
repenting and changing his mind; being weary and
resting. Yet elsewhere in the same book it is declared
that “ God is not a man that he should repent;” (Num.
xxxiii. 19.) being one “with whom is no variable
ness, neither shadow of turning;” (Jam. i. 17.) “who
fainteth not, neither is weary.” (Is. xl. 28 ; also 1 Sam.
xv, 35 ; Jonah iii. 10 ; Ex. xxxiii. 1 ; &c.)
Even the all-important questions of God’s justice and
power remain in suspense with such passages as these
unreconciled : “ A God of truth and without iniquity,
just and right is he.” (Deut. xxxii. 4.) “ Hear now, 0
house of Israel; are not my ways equal ? are not your
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ways unequal ? Therefore I will judge you.............
every one according to his ways, saith the Lord God.”
“ The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father.”
(Ez. xviii. 20, 25-30.) And, “ I . . . . am a jealous
God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the
children.” (Ex. xx. 5.) Also, “For the children being
not yet bom, neither having done any good or evil, that
the purpose of God according to election might stand,
not of works, but of him that calleth, it was said unto
her (by God), the elder shall serve the younger. As it
is written, Jacob have I loved (Jacob !) but Esau have I
hated.” (Eom. ix. 11-13 ; Gen. ix. 25 ; Matt. xiii. 11-17.)
How, moreover, are children to reconcile this with the
declaration that “God is no respecter of persons?”
And while, notwithstanding that “ with God all things
are possible,” (Matt. xix. 25.) we are told that “ the
Lord was with Judah, and he drave out the inhabitants
of the mountain; but could not drive out the inhabi
tants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron.”
(Jud. i. 19 ; Josh. xvii. 18.) Also that the inhabitants
of Meroz were bitterly cursed “because they came not
to the help of the Lord against the mighty.” (Jud. v. 23.)
Notwithstanding that we read in several places that
God was seen face to face, and his voice heard, (Gen. iii.
9, 10 ; xxxii. 30; Ex. xxiv. 9-11; xxxiii. 11 ; Is. vi. 1.)
we are yet assured that “ no man hath seen God at any
time; ” (John i. 18.) hath “ neither heard his voice at any
time, nor seen his face.” (v. 37.) And God himself said
unto Moses, “ Thou canst not see my face; for there shall
no man see me and live.” (Ex. xxiii. 20.) And Paul
speaks of him as one “ whom no man hath seen, nor can
see.” (1 Tim. vi. 16.)
It is little that children will learn from the Bible con
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cerning the origin of evil, when, against “ I make peace
and create evil. I the Lord do all these things;” (Is.
xiv. 7.) “ out of the mouth of the Most High proceedeth not evil and good ?” (Lam. iii. 38.)—they set, “ with
out note or comment,” “ God is not the author of con
fusion;” (1 Cor. xiv. 33.) “a God of truth, and without
iniquity, just and right is he.” (Deut. xxxii. 4.) “God
cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any
man.” (Jas. i. 13.)
Concerning the divine dwelling-place, we read that
“ the Lord appeared to Solomon, and said ... I have
chosen and sanctified this house . . . and mine eyes and
heart shall be there perpetually.” (2 Chron. vii. 12-16.)
Yet we also read, “ Howbeit the Most High dwelleth not
in temples made with hands.” (Acts vii. 48.) In one
place he is described as “ dwelling in light which no man
can approach;” (1 Tim. iv. 16.) and in another it is
said, “ clouds and darkness are round about him.” (Ps.
xcvii. 2.)
Similarly contrast these also: “ The Lord is a man of
war(Ex. xv. 3.) “ The Lord mighty in battle(Ps.
xxiv. 8.) “ The Lord of hosts is his name.” (Is. li. 15.)
And, “God is not the author of confusion, but of peace.” (1
Cor. xiv. 33.) “ Bloody men shall not live out half their
days.” (Ps. lv. 23.) “ The God of peace be with you all.”
(Rom. xv. 33.)
In reference to the making and worshipping of images,
we have the positive command, “ Thou shalt not make
unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything
that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath. Thou
shalt not bow down to them, nor serve (or worship)
them,” (Ex. xxii. 4.) and many repeated denunciations
of idolatry. Yet Moses was commanded to “ make two
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cherubim of gold.” (xxv. 18.) Also, “ the Lord said
unto Moses, make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a
pole, and it shall come to pass that every one that is
bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live.” (Num. xxi. 8.)
A direct act of idolatry commanded by God himself!
The books of Exodus and Leviticus abound in direc
tions instituting and regulating sacrifice, in terms such
as “ Thou shalt offer every day a bullock for a sin-offering
for atonement;” (Ex. xxix. 36; also xviii.; Lev. i. 9;
xxiii. 27, &c.) and the most complex and gorgeous
system of ceremonial worship was based upon it, ex
pressly by divine command. Yet in the Psalms we find
the Almighty exclaiming, “ Will I eat the flesh of bulls,
or drink the blood of goats? Offer unto God thanks
giving, and pay thy vows unto the Most High.” (Ps. 1.
13, 14.) And in Isaiah, “To what purpose is the mul
titude of your sacrifices unto me ? saith the Lord . . .
I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of
he-goats . . . When ye come to appear before me, who
hath required this at your hand ? Bring no more vain
oblations; incense is an abomination unto me; the new
moons and Sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot
away with; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting.”
(Is. i. 11-13.) And Jeremiah represents the Almighty
as positively repudiating any connection with the Levitical code. “ I spake not unto your fathers, nor com
manded them in the day that I brought them out of the
land of Egypt, concerning burnt-offerings or sacrifices.”
(Gen. vii. 22.)
“ Without note or comment,” children would assuredly
fail to comprehend the significance of the antagonism
necessarily existing between the whole sacerdotal
class, with its “ trivial round” of ritual and observance,
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and immoral doctrine of compensation for moral de
ficiencies by material payments, and the honest, out
spoken prophet or teacher of practical religion. And to
fail to comprehend this, is to fail to learn one of the
most valuable lessons to be derived from the Bible.
Even the horrible practice of human sacrifice finds
justification with the sacerdotal followers of the Jewish
divinity. We have already seen how, backed by the
priests, David delivered up the seven sons and grandsons
of Saul, “ and they hanged them in the hill before the
Lord . . . and after that God was entreated for the
land.” (2 Sam. xxi.) Moreover, “God said unto Abra
ham, take now thy son, thine only son Isaac . . . and
offer him fora burnt-offering.” (Gen. xxii. 2.) Jephthah,
too, “ vowed a vow unto the Lord” that he would “ offer
up for a burnt-offering” whatever he met first on his re
turn home, provided the Lord would give him a victory.
The victory was given, and the bargain was kept; “ the
Lord,” of course, being in his omniprescience, well aware
what it involved; and, to judge by his antecedent and
subsequent conduct, by no means incapable of being in
duced thereto by the magnitude of the bribe. Jephthah’s
own daughter was the first to come to congratulate her
father j “ and he did with her according to his vow.”
(Jud. xi.) The sacerdotal law gave him no choice, for it
positively enacted that vows, however iniquitous, were
not to be broken, except when taken under certain cir
cumstances by a maid, a wife, or a widow. (Num. xxx.)
The liberality and mercifulness of God find expression
in many touching declarations in the Scriptures. We
read that “ every one that asketh, receiveth, and he that
seeketh, findeth.” (Matt. vii. 8.) “ Those that seek me
early shall find me.” (Prov. viii. 17.) Yet on the other
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side we have, “ Then shall they call upon me, but I will
not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not
find me.” (i. 28.) And notwithstanding such assertions
as: “The Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy.” (James
v. 11.) “He doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve the
children of men.” (Lam. iii. 33.) “ The Lord is good to
all, and his tender mercies are over all his works.” (Ps.
cxlv. 9.) “I have no pleasure in the death of him that
dieth, saith the Lord God.” (Ezek. xviii. 32.) “ God is
love;” (1 John iv. 16.) “Who will have all men to be
saved;” (1 Tim. ii. 4.) “For his mercy endureth for
ever;” (1 Chron. xvi. 34, &c.)—we find also the following
ferocious utterances : “ The Lord thy God is a consuming
fire.” (Deut. iv. 34.) “ I will dash them one against
another, even the fathers and the sons together, saith the
the Lord. I will not pity, nor spare, nor have mercy,
but destroy them.” (Jer. xiii. 14.) “And thou shalt
consume all the people which the Lord thy God shall
deliver thee: thine eye shall have no pity upon them.”
(Deut. vii. 16, and 2.) “ Thus saith the Lord of hosts , . .
slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and
sheep, camel and ass.” (1 Sam. xv. 2, 3.) “ Because they
had looked into the ark of the Lord, even he smote of
the people fifty thousand and threescore and ten men.
And the people lamented because the Lord had smitten
many of the people with great slaughter.” (1 Sam. vi. 19.)
" I also will deal in fury; mine eye shall not spare,
neither will I have pity. And though they cry in mine
ears with a loud voice, yet will I not hear them.” (Ezek.
viii. 18.) “And the Lord said, Go through the city and
smite; let not your eye spare, neither have ye pity: slay
utterly old and young, both maids and little children,
and women. . . . and begin at my sanctuary.” (ix. 4-6.)
c
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It is no less impossible to derive from the Bible alone
any- certainty of God’s unfailing truthfulness than of his
mercy. It is true that we are told, “It is impossible for
God to lie.” (Heb. vi. 18.) “ Lying lips are an abomina
tion to the Lord.” (Prov. xii. 22.) “‘Thou shalt not
bear false witness against thy neighbour.” (Ex. xx. 16.)
“ These things doth the Lord hate ... a lying tongue
. . . a false witness that speaketh lies.” (Prov. iv. 17-19.)
And, “ all liars shall have their part in the lake which
burneth with fire and brimstone.” (Rev. xxi. 8.) Yet,
on the other hand, we find the lies of the Israelitish
women in Egypt, and of Rahab in Jericho, justified;—
“ that admirable falsehood,” as St. Chrysostom called
the latter. (Ex. i. 18-20; Josh. ii. 4-6.) We find the
atrocious deceit of Jael more than justified. (Jud. iv. v.)
And we have also this astounding revelation from behind
the scenes in heaven :—“ And the Lord said, who shall
persuade Ahab 1 . . . And there came forth a spirit and
stood before the Lord, and said, I will persuade him.
And the Lord said, wherewith 1 And he said, I will go
forth and be a lying spirit in the mouth of all these thy
prophets. And he said, thou shalt persuade him, and
prevail also; go forth and do so. Now, therefore, be
hold the Lord hath put a lying spirit in the mouth of all
these thy prophets, and the Lord hath spoken evil con
cerning thee.” (1 Kings xxii. 21-23.) And in confirma
tion of this otherwise incredible narrative, we read later,
“ If the prophet be deceived when he hath spoken a
thing, I the Lord have deceived that prophet, and I will
stretch out mine hand upon him, and will destroy him
from the midst of my people.” (Ezek. xiv. 9.) The New
Testament adopts a similar view of God’s dealings; for,
mingled with its “ glad tidings of salvation,” we read,—
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“ God shall send them strong delusion, that they should
believe a lie, that they all might be damned.” (2 Thess.
ii. 11, 12.)
Once more it must be asked, Can we wonder that
earnest and pious men of our own times have, in their
zeal for the honour of God, endeavoured to rescue his
character from the treatment it receives in the Scriptures ?
VIII.
The character of Jesus is as variously drawn in the
New Testament as that of the Deity in the Old; and
those who desire the children in our schools to recognise
in him the perfect man and infallible Teacher, should, to
be consistent, be the very last to wish them to read the
New Testament “ without note or comment.” Too often
it happens that the explanatory lessons with which the
Scriptures are accompanied, are utterly pernicious, and
even blasphemous. This very year, a youth who has
been for some years a student in one of the wealthiest of
our public foundation-schools, was required to give some
instances of human feeling on the part of Jesus. Of
the value, whether intellectually or religiously, of the
education given at that school, we may judge by
his answer. Of the tender sympathy shown by Jesus
towards all who were suffering : of his unselfish devotion
to the cause of the poor and the depraved; of his noble
indignation against injustice and oppression; of his in
tense sense of a personal Father in God, and instinctive
detestation of all sacerdotal interference;—of all these so
eminently human characteristics, our scholar said nothing.
The result of his compulsory attendance at the school
chapel every morning, and at two full services every
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Sunday, beside much other Scripture instruction, was to
impress upon him the belief that whatever is human is
bad, and whatever is bad is human. He concluded,
therefore, that by human feeling on the part of Jesus,
an instance of something bad was intended. And he
actually sent up for answer, as a solitary instance of
human feeling on the part of Jesus, the story of his losing
his temper, and cursing a fig-tree for being barren when
it was not the season for figs 1 (Mark xi. 13, 14, 21.)
As any explanations which accompany the reading of
the Old Testament should be contrived to disabuse chil
dren of the notion that the Deity could ever have been
such a being as is there described, so in reading of Jesus
in the New Testament they should be told that there are
indications of a better man than the Gospels make him,
peeping out through the corrupted text. “ It is impos
sible that such love and devotion as followed him through
out his life could ever have been won by a hard, unjust,
or intolerant character.” Yet he is represented as more
than once addressing his admirable and devoted mother
in a rough, unfilial tone; (John ii. 4; Luke ii. 4.) and
launching most uncalled for reproaches at a gentleman of
whose hospitality he was partaking, on the occasion of a
woman coming in and washing his feet with her tears,
and wiping them with her hair. (Luke vii. 32-50.)
Nor can there be any doubt as to what must be their
natural judgment of the spirit of one who could describe
his own mission in these terms : “ Whosoever shall con
fess me before men, him will I also confess before my
Father which is in heaven. But whosoever will deny
me before men, him will I also deny before my Father
which is in heaven. Think not that I am come to
send peace on earth: I come not to send peace, but a
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sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against
his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the
daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law, and a man’s
foes shall be they of his own household.” (Matt. x. 32-36.)
Hardly will they reconcile this with the promise of his
birth-song, “On earth peace, good-will toward men;”
(Luke ii. 14.) but will hastily conclude that the angels
were sadly misinformed. And when they read that one
who is elsewhere described as “ going about teaching and
healing” among a people who were “ perishing for lack
of knowledge,” uttered to his disciples such words as
these, “ Unto you it is given to know the mysteries of
the kingdom of God : but unto others in parables ; that
seeing they might not see, and hearing they might not
understand;” (Luke viii. 8.) and read further, “ Therefore
they could not believe, because he hath blinded their eyes
and hardened their heart; that they should not see with
their eyes, nor understand with their heart, and be con
verted, and I should heal them; ” (John xii. 39, 40.)—and
from these fearful utterances, turn to the declaration, that
this same Jesus had received “ all power in heaven and
earth;” (Matt, xxviii. 18.) and that he “ came not to judge
but to save the world;” (John xii. 27.) came especially
“ to seek and to save that which was lost;” (Luke xix. 10.)
it will be no wonder if their souls finally succumb to
despair, and they cry to their teachers, “ Be merciful:
take away from us this book, if you dare not explain to
us its meaning.”
IX.
I shall conclude the present lecture by pointing out
the notable contradiction apparent between the Bible
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and the fact of the world’s present existence. The New
Testament contains scarcely a passage of any length that
does not make some allusion to the near approach of the
end of the world.
We may conceive the perplexity of children when,
after reading in ordinary history the events of the last
eighteen hundred years, with their piteous tale of cruelty
and oppression, disease and death, they open their
Bibles and read that, all those centuries ago, men were
summoned to repent because “ the kingdom of heaven ”
was then “at hand;” (Matt. iv. 17.) and find that by
“ the kingdom of heaven ” was meant, not merely a social
or moral regeneration, though the phrase is sometimes
used in this sense, but the personal second coming of
Christ, and end of all things. That both the Baptist and
Jesus preached thus : that the twelve apostles were sent
forth to preach thus; (x. 7.) that the seventy were
charged with injunctions to announce to the inhabitants
of any city-on their entry, “the kingdom of God is
come nigh unto you (Luke x. 8-11.) that Jesus repre
sented himself as a nobleman who had gone into a far
country to receive for himself a kingdom, and to return;
and instructed his disciples in these terms, “ Occupy till
I come (xix. 13.) that this was the kingdom for which
Joseph of Arimathea “ waited (xxiii. 51.) unto which
Paul prayed that he might be preserved; (2 Tim. iv. 18.)
charging Timothy to “ keep the commandment.............
until the appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Tim.
vi. 14.)
How bewildering to the youthful intelligence, to per
ceive the world still going on much in its old track,
slowly elaborating its own destiny, and to find in the
records of its history no trace of the dread phenomena
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which they read in their Testaments were to portend
and accompany the return of the Son of Man and of God,
—the darkened sun, the falling stars, the bloodshot
moon, the roaring sea, the myriad hosts of heaven, the
voice of the archangel, and the trump of God; the
judgment of the quick and dead, the wailing of the lost,
and the gathering of the elect from the four winds of
heaven, the resurrection of those who slept, the ecstasy
of “we who remain,” as Paul said, (1 Thess. iv. 15-17.)
when “ caught up to meet the Lord in the air,” on his
“ coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great
glory;” (Matt. xxiv. 29-35.) for which all the disciples
were bid to watch ; (Mark xiii. 37.) and which some of
them were still to be alive on earth to see. For Jesus
had said, " Verily I say unto you, that there be some of
them that stand here now which shall not taste of death
till they have seen the kingdom of God come with
power.” (Matt. xvi. 28; Mark xi. 1; Luke xix. 27.)
“ Immediately after the tribulation of those days
and,
“ Verily I say unto you, this generation shall notpassaway,
until all these things shall be fulfilled.” (Matt. xxiv. 29,
35.) Add, too, the assurance of the angels to the disci
ples as they stood watching the Ascension, that he should
return “ in like manner;” (Acts i. 11.) add the declara
tion of Peter that “the end of all things is at hand;”
(1 Pet. iv. 7.) add the admonition of Paul to the
Romans, “ Now it is high time to awake out of sleep,
for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.
The night is far spent, the day is at hand;” (Rom. xiii.
11, 12.) “ these last days;” (Heb. i. 2.) even the days of
us “ upon whom the ends of the world are come ; ” (1 Cor.
x. 11.) add, lastly, the final book of “The Revelation,”
opening with the announcement that these things “ must
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shortly come to pass •” and concluding with the declara
tion, “ Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come,
Lord Jesus,”—a book which, claiming to be the final
utterance of divine truth, is charged with dire curses
against any who should add to it; instead of saying,
rather, “to be continued, so long as God continues to
work in man,”—add, I say, to all that has been set forth,
these and the yet other numerous similar intimations of
the then expected rapidly approaching end ; set children
to read them “ without note or comment,” but with the
belief which they will inevitably acquire, from the fact
of the Bible being put into their hands without informa
tion to the contrary,—the belief that it must therefore
be all infallibly true, that God did speak, the Lord did
say, all the things therein ascribed to him; and then,
if they retain any particle of intelligence whatever, most
surely they will have but a confused idea of God, a con
fused idea of man, and a confused idea of the relations
between them; a confused idea of right and wrong, a
confused idea of faith and fact; or rather, we may con
fidently declare, a false and pernicious idea of all things
whatsoever, in heaven and earth, from beginning to end.
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LECTURE THE SECOKD.
X.
It is not unusual for people, when pressed upon the
subject, to say, “ We do not lay much store by the Old
Testament. We concede much of what you say against
it as a teacher of morality and even of religion. We
value it chiefly as the basis and introduction of the New.
It is upon the New Testament that we take our stand.
The sufficient, and only sufficient, rule of life, its prac
tical religion and morality, are distinct and unimpeach
able.” I propose, therefore, to conclude my examination
of the effects of the popular proposition, “ that the Bible
be read without note or comment,” by showing that in
respect of its teaching, both religious and moral, even
the New Testament requires elucidation and correction
to prevent it from being productive of much that would
be immoral, irreligious, and grossly superstitious.
Passing over the innumerable discrepancies in the
gospel narratives, to reconcile which so many “ Har
monies ” have been constructed in vain, let us compare
first those utterances of the New Testament which have
regard to life—civil, political, and social. Are our chil
dren to learn from its pages to grow up to be intelligent
and independent citizens, respecting the laws, and re
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specting themselves ? It is clear that, “ without note or
comment,” they will hardly escape great perplexity of
conscience when on one side they read, “ Be subject to
principalities and powers, obey magistrates.” (Tit. iii. 1.)
“ Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit
yourselves.” (Heb. xiii. 17.) “The powers that be are
ordained of God. Whoso therefore resisteth the power,
resisteth the ordinance of God:” (Rom. xiii. 1, 2.) and
on the other side, find, that no sooner did a dilemma
arise, than “ Peter and the other apostles answered and
said, We ought to obey God rather than man.” (Acts
v. 29.)
Concerning the institution of Slavery, we find in the
Old Testament the most conflicting utterances, of which
one is, “ Of the children of the strangers that do sojourn
among you, of them shall ye buy . . . and they shall be
your possession. . . . They shall be your bondmen for
ever(Lev. xxv. 45, 46.) and another, “ Thou shalt
neither vex a stranger nor oppress him (Ex. xxxii. 21.)
both of which are in the books ascribed to Moses. While
the New Testament contains no direct reprobation of
Slavery, but rather the reverse. It must be remembered
that, wherever in our translation the word servant occurs,
the original means slave. And while masters are enjoined
to “ give unto their slaves that which is just and equal”
for their labour, and to “ forbear threatening ” them;
(Col. iv. 1; Eph. vi. 9.) it says nothing in repudiation
of the institution itself as being unjust and unequal;
but repeatedly admonishes slaves to be content with
their condition ; to “ count their masters worthy of all
honour (1 Tim. vi. 1.) and be “ obedient to them with
fear and trembling.” (Eph. vi. 5.) We read, moreover,
that Paul himself sent back to his master the slave Onesimus, after converting him to Christianity. (Philemon.)
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There are, indeed, ample grounds for fearing lest all
respect for Rights vanish in the prominence given exclu
sively to Duties. And even in the important matter of
respect and affection for parents and relatives, children
may fail to find a sufficient rule to exclude hesitation.
It is true that they read, “ Honour thy father and
mother,” for the low and unsatisfactory motive, “ that
thy days may be long.” (Ex. xx. 12.) “Husbands love
your wives.” (Eph. v. 25.) And “whoso hateth his
brother is a murderer.” (1 John iii. 15.) But there is to
be set on the other side this of Jesus himself, “ If any
man hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and chil
dren, and brethren, and sisters ... he cannot be my
disciple.” (Luke xiv. 26.)
Great will be their perplexity, too, when, after the
ordinary lessons of the schoolroom, inculcating respect
for property, the duty of industry, forethought, and thrift,
the disgrace of beggary, and evil of pauperism, they read
“ without note or comment,” “ Take therefore no thought
for the morrow“Lay not up for yourselves treasures
upon earth.” (Matt. vi. 34,19.) “ Sell whatsoever thou hast
and give to the poor;” (Mark x. 21.) and see how Jesus
backed up his communistic precepts by his practice, in
instituting the order of Mendicant Friars, by sending
forth the Twelve and the Seventy with injunctions to
“ carry neither purse nor scrip.” (Luke x. 3-7, &c.)
Neither can we consistently endeavour to cherish in
children a love of science, literature, and art, and all the
glorious uses of which man’s high faculties are capable ;
a love, in short, of that mental culture to obtain which
we expressly send them to school; if we ply them with
such contemptuous allusions to it as “ Beware lest any
man spoil you with philosophy and vain deceit; ” (Col.
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ii. 8.) “The Greeks seek after wisdom ;” (1 Cor. i. 22.)
“ Vain babblings and oppositions of science falsely so
called;” (1 Tim. vi. 20.) “Knowledge puffeth up;” (1
Cor. viii. 1.)—without telling them at the same time,
that ignorance ever “ puffeth up ” far more than know
ledge; that “science,” now-a-days stands on a very dif
ferent basis to that on which it stood in those days,
namely, on a basis of positive fact as ascertained by
actual investigation into the phenomena of the universe,
instead of on the imaginations and foregone conclusions
of men who believed in the infallibility of their mental
impressions, and pretended to knowledge independently
of experience; and that it is our highest duty and pri
vilege to cultivate “ every good gift and every perfect
gift,” intellectual and other, “ which cometh down from
the Father of lights.” (Jam. i. 17.)
Even in so simple a matter as the advantage of bear
ing a good character, they will be at a loss to determine
between “a good name is better than precious oint
ment ;” (Eccl. vii. 1.) “ it is rather to be chosen than
great riches;” (Prov. xxii. 1.) and, “Woe unto you
when all men shall speak well of you.” (Luke vi. 25.)
The Bible makes it a reproach to King Asa that “ in
his disease he sought not to the Lord, but to the physi
cians,” and significantly adds, “Asa slept with his
fathers.” (2 Chron. xvi. 12.) Of another patient it is
said that she had “ for twelve years suffered many things
of many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and
was nothing bettered, but rather grew worse,” but straight
way was healed through faith. (Mark v. 25-29.) And
there is this express injunction, “ Is any sick among you?
let him call for the elders of the Church, and let them
pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the
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Lord: and the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the
Lord shall raise him up.” (Jam. v. 14.) “Without note
or comment,” but influenced, unconsciously perhaps,
within school or without it, to regard the plain teaching
of the Bible as intended to be followed unshrinkingly,
the children in our National Schools will be apt to grow
up with the belief that it is unchristian and wicked to
call in a doctor, or to take medicine, when they are ill.
Lawyers are scarcely named but to be censured in
such terms as these: “Woe unto you lawyers ! for ye
lade men with burdens grievous to be borne, and ye your
selves touch not the burdens with one of your fingers.
Woe unto you lawyers I” (Luke xi. 45, 52.) For “with
out note or comment,” the term rendered “ lawyers,” will
inevitably be held to signify, not the expounders of Rab
binical doctrine, but the members of that eminent profes
sion which is so indispensable to the maintenance of our
rights and privileges. While the despised “ publicans ”
of Jewish times, instead of being recognised as mere
collectors of taxes, are sure to be confounded with our
own respectable company of “ licensed victuallers.”
We have seen how summarily two of the learned pro
fessions may be disposed of. Following the Bible with
out guidance by “ note or comment,” the clergy will be
in danger of faring little better than the lawyers or doc
tors. And this brings us to the subject of religious
duties as laid down in the New Testament.
It is, whether rightly or wrongly I do not venture to
decide, a subject of peculiar pride with us, that we are a
prayerful and churchgoing people. But what is really
curious is, that the practice of assembling together for pub
lic worship, we regard as essential to our character as Chris
tians. Now, how can children be expected to understand
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“without note or comment” that it is their duty to
attend “ divine service,” when they find that Jesus, who is
held up to them as the infallible pattern and guide of life,
never joined in public prayer himself, but always when
he wished to pray or meditate went apart, either “ up
into a mountain,” (Matt. xiv. 23.) or some other “ solitary
place,” (Mark i. 35.) or “ withdrew about a stone’s cast
(Luke xxii. 24.) that he only went into the synagogue or
the temple to read or to teach ; (Luke iv. 16: Matt. xxi.
23.) or to indulge in what to children and unexplained
must appear to be riotous conduct in church, namely to
drive out with blows and threats a number of persons
who were exercising a lawful industry in its precincts;
(Matt. xxi. 12.) that the persons he mentioned in one of
his parables as “ going up to the temple to pray,” (Luke
xviii. 10.) belonged to the classes he most persistently de
nounced, being a pharisee and a publican; and even these
he distinctly exonerates from the reproach of having
joined in common prayer ; that moreover, in addition to
his example, he delivered precepts absolutely prohibitory
of all public praying in these emphatic terms: “ When
thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are; for
they love to pray standing in the synagogues, and in the
corners of the streets to be seen of men. Verily, I say
unto you, They have their reward. But thou, when thou
prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut
thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy
Father which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly;”
(Matt. vi. 5, 6.)—a rule which he relaxed only on the
condition that two, or at most three, should agree upon
a subject for petition, in which case they might gather
together in his name. (Matt, xviii. 19, 20.) It is indeed
a painful perplexity in which the minds of the more sen
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sitive children will be plunged when they ask themselves
how, in the face of Christ’s most positive precepts and
example, they can continue to pray in church or chapel,
and at the same time deserve to be called by his name.
The propriety of continuing to observe the Sabbath, if
rested on the Bible alone, will remain, to say the least,
doubtful. The difference in the reasons assigned for its
institution can hardly fail to create wonder as to the
authority upon which the command said to be “ written
with the finger of God” himself, basing the appointment
upon the creation of the universe in six days, (Ex. xxxi.
17, &c.) was changed to one representing it as a memo
rial of the deliverance out of Egypt. (Deut. v. 15.)
While the institution itself is, on account of the abuses
to which it led, referred to variously by the later pro
phets ; and, in the New Testament, seems to have been
repudiated in a great measure, if not altogether, by Jesus
and the apostles; Paul distinctly admonishing the Colossians in these terms : “You hath Christ quickened. . .
blotting out the handwriting of ordinances. . . Let
no man therefore judge you . . in respect of an holi
day, . . or of the Sabbath.” (Col. ii. 13-16.) So that
something at any rate has to be added to the New Tes
tament to justify our present usage in this respect.
In the absence of explanatory comment, the statements
of scripture respecting the resurrection of the body appear
in direct conflict with each other; as also do those re
specting the after-life of the soul. In the Old Testament
we are told, “ He that goeth down £0 the grave shall
come up no more.” (Job vii. 9.) “The dead know not
anything, neither have they any more reward.” (Eccl. ix.
5, 10.) And in the New Testament, “ The trumpet shall
sound, and the dead shall be raised(1 Cor. xv. 52.)
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“Then shall he reward every man according to his
works.” (Matt. xvi. 27.) While the narratives of the
ascent of Enoch and Elijah seem to find a positive con
tradiction in the declaration of Jesus, “No man hath
ascended up to heaven but he that came down from
heaven, even the son of man;” and the narrative makes
him add, “ which is in heaven,” putting what appears to
be an absurd contradiction into the mouth of Jesus.
(John iii. 12.)
And even concerning the status of Jesus himself, expla
nations are needed to reconcile the various contradictory
declarations; “I and my Father are one.” (John x. 30.)
“ He thought it not robbery to be equal with God.”
(Phil. ii. 6.) “ Jesus increased in wisdom and stature,
and in favour with God and man.” (Luke ii. 52.) “ My
Father is greater than I.” (John xiv. 28.) “ Of that day
and that hour knoweth no man. . . Neither the Son,
but the Father.” (Mark xiii. 32.) And his agonised ex
clamation when dying, which we can easily believe to
have been held up by the clergy of those days as uttered
in remorse of soul for a life spent in opposition to the
church orthodoxy of his country,—“ My God, my God,
why hast thou forsaken me ?” (Matt, xxvii. 46.)
XI.
Much stress has been laid by orthodox writers on the
“ Continuity,” or uninterrupted connection, of Scripture.
The inference which they have drawn from the con
sistency existing between its various parts, is that it
must all be alike the result of one divine harmonious
scheme. That such Continuity exists it is impossible to
help seeing, but the extent to which it exists, and its
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significance in relation to what is called doctrinal
religion, are likely, “ without note or comment,” wholly
to escape the observation of youthful scholars.
The whole religious system of the Old Testament rests
upon the theory that the object of Religion is, not the
exaltation of man, but the delectation of the Deity; and
the stimulants offered in it to the practice of religion are
of the most material and seductive kind, wealth, honour,
long life, numerous posterity. In the New Testament
the same idea is continued, with this difference, that
experience having demonstrated the theory to be unsound
as regards this life, inasmuch as prosperity does not by
any means always accompany virtue, nor adversity vice,
rewards and punishments are there reserved for a future
state of existence, in a region inaccessible to verification
by experience.
Two other instances of Continuity between the two
divisions of Scripture may be classed together as being
intimately connected with each other. These are, the
institution of Sacrifice, and the character of the Jewish
Deity. To the instances already given of the amazing
ferocity of this Being, as represented in the Sacred Books
of the Jews, may be added the tremendous threats and
penalties denounced for the smallest transgressions, the
readiness to dart forth from the mountain and deal
destruction upon any who might but touch it; and the
perpetual demand for blood. This propensity for blood
constitutes a notable instance of Continuity in the
character of the God of the Bible. Blood of animals;
blood of peoples hostile to the Israelites; blood of
transgressors among the Israelites; and in numerous
instances, blood of unoffending men, women, and
children, even from among his own chosen people.
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(1 Sam. vi. 19 ; 2 Sam. xxiv. 15 ; Ezek. ix. 6 ; &c.) We
have already dealt with David’s sacrifice of the seven
sons of Saul: “ They hanged them in the hill before
the Lord. .... and after that God was entreated for
the land;” (2 Sam. xxi.) Jephthah’s sacrifice of his
daughter; (Jud. xi.) and Abraham’s attempt to sacri
fice his son. (Gen. xxii.) Of this last I must speak
more fully, because there are, holding high positions
both in the church and in popular estimation, as thinkers
and scholars, men who insist on drawing from it a moral
which they deem favourable to the character of the deity
as represented in the Jewish Scriptures. But at present
they have failed to do more than read back into the
Bible the civilisation of their age and their own personal
amiability. So far from their being justified in regard
ing the arrest of Abraham as a protest on the part of
the Deity against the prevailing custom of human sacri
fices, the narrative distinctly asserts that “ God tempted
Abraham ” to commit the horrid deed: that his consent
to commit it was accepted at the time as an “ act of faith,”
and rewarded by a renewal of the promise of a numerous
posterity; and not only is there in the Scriptures no
expression whatever commending him for refraining
from completing the sacrifice, but the New Testament
treats it approvingly as being as good as completed,
saying in one place, “ By faith Abraham, when he was
tried, offered up Isaac; and he that had received the
promises offered up his only-begotten son;” (Heb. xi. 17.)
and in another place, “Was not Abraham our father
justified by works, when he had offered Isaac his son
upon the altar ? Seest thou how faith wrought with his
works, and by works faith was made perfect ?” (Jam. ii.
21, 22.)
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So far from the principle of human sacrifices, or the
belief in a deity who required to be propitiated by blood,
being repudiated in the New Testament, “the Continuity
of Scripture ” is in these respects plain and indisputable,
and the principle is carried to a height undreamt of in
Old Testament times. The God of the Jewish priests
requires at length the blood of his own “ only-begotten,”
“ beloved ” son ! It is only when this tremendous climax
has been reached that the dread thirst is appeased. This
is the fundamental argument of the eminently sacerdotal
epistle to the Hebrews, (of unknown authorship). In it
we are assured that “ without shedding of blood there is
no remission of sins.” (Heb. ix. 22.) A human parent, not
in this respect “ made in the image of God,” can forgive
a repenting errant child. The divine parent, made by
priests, and at once unhuman and inhuman, must have
his “pound of flesh” from somebody. This epistle tells
us concerning Christ that “ neither by the blood of goats
and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into
the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for
us............... So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of
many;” (ix. 12, 28.) thus adopting and justifying the
view of the high-priest Caiaphas, who, by virtue of his
sacerdotal office, counselled and I prophesied that Jesus
should die for the people;” (John xi. 50, 51.) — a
view shared even by John himself, who in one of his
epistles declares that “ God sent his only begotten Son
to be the propitiation for our sins.” (1 John iv. 9, 10.)
Thus early were the attempts of Jesus to abolish sacer
dotalism, and promulgate purer notions of the Deity,
defeated by his own disciples, or by those who wrote in
their names; and the reformation which constituted the
real Christianity, overlaid and stifled by “ the Church.”
I
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Let the churches called Christian, demonstrate, if they
will, their “ Continuity ” with the most hideous of
Jewish superstitions ; and cherish the recollection of the
worst side of the Jewish Divinity, by perpetual repetitions
of the rite which, while declining to practice it simply
“ in remembrance ” of a loved and lost benefactor, they
yet profanely style “the holy Eucharist.” Say they, it
requires a miracle to keep the church up ? Well, perhaps
it does. But if we who “ have not so learned Christ ”
are to act consistently with our more advanced ideas of
religion and morality, the “notes and comments” by which
the reading of these passages in our schools is accom
panied, must direct attention rather to the higher and
better teaching of prophetical lips ; “ the sacrifices of
God are a contrite heart; ” (Ps. li. 17.) “ he saveth such
as be of a contrite spirit;” (xxxiv. 18.) and “ dwelleth
with him that is of a contrite and humble spirit;” (Is. lvii.
15.) as well as that of Jesus himself, “If a man love
me he will keep my words; and my Father will love
him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with
him.” (John xiv. 23.) There is no savour of blood here.
If an education is.to be imparted that is consistent
with “ the development of the intellect and mor^J sense,”
the doctrine that justice can be satisfied by the substitu
tion of the innocent for the guilty, must be rigidly ex
cluded from our schools. It is true that this doctrine is
not without a certain significance; that there is a way by
which the position of the wicked may be bettered through
the condemnation of the righteous. For the punishment
of the innocent involves the divine law of justice being,
not fulfilled, but so utterly shattered and destroyed, as to
be thenceforth absolutely non-existent. The sinner’s gain,
therefore, would consist in there being no law of justice
by which he could be arraigned.
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But so invincibly implacable is the deity of at least a
great portion of the New Testament, that even such stu
pendous atonement fails to gain him over. Its benefits
are confined to a fortunate few, and his fury towards the
rest is redoubled. As Burns says, he
“ Sends ane to heaven, and ten to hell
A’ for his glory.”
The penalties of evil-doing are infinitely enhanced, and
they are applied to a fresh class of offences. Here, too,
Continuity is combined with progression; but it is,
morally, a progression backwards. The Old Testament
consigns no one to eternal punishment, neither does it
make penal the conclusions of the intellect. The New
Testament abounds in menaces of the most fearful cha
racter, not only against malefactors, but also against un
believers. It represents the Almighty, when punishing
the reprobate, as uninfluenced by anything analogous to
the human motive of promoting the security of society or
the reformation of the criminal, but inflicting torture in
the spirit of a fiend, out of pure malignity, because with
no advantage to any. “ The unbelieving and the abomi
nable” are classed together, and, we read, “shall have their
part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone;”
(Rev. xxi. 8.) “where their worm dieth not, and the
fire is not quenched;” (Mark ix. 44.) “there shall be
weeping and gnashing of teeth.” (Matt. viii. 12.) “Depart
ye cursed,” is the final doom of those who had failed to
recognise Christ on earth, “ depart ye cursed into ever
lasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.” (Matt,
xxv. 41.)
Nay, more than this. The gospels, as we have them,
actually represent Jesus himself as pronouncing sentence
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of damnation upon all who cannot work miracles. His
last words to his disciples are thus reported: “Go ye
into all the world, and preach the gospel to every crea
ture. . . He that helieveth not shall be damned.
And these signs shall follow them that believe: in my
name they shall cast out devils; they shall speak with
new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they
drink any deadly thing it shall not hurt them; they shall
lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.” (Mark
xiv. 16.) Not to work miracles is not to believe, and
not to believe is to be damned. Is it not certain that if
the young are allowed to read the New Testament with
out explanation or correction by “note or comment,”
they will, as have millions of tender souls to their in
expressible terror and anguish, find the gospel of Jesus to
be to them but a gospel of damnation ?
Let us return to this world and the practical concerns
of life. In its manner of dealing with the crucial act of
life, marriage, and its treatment of the relations of the
sexes generally, the New Testament takes, in regard to
the Old, a great step backwards. A demonstration of its
vacillation and utter inadequacy to provide rules for the
conduct of civilised life on this most important of all
points connected with morals, will fitly conclude this
division of the subject. To the commendation of impotency uttered by Jesus, the stress laid by him upon mere
physical fidelity, (Matt. xix. 9, 12.) and his disregard of
all incongruity or incompatibility of character or affec
tion, as a plea for separation, (a peculiarity which we
have in our institutions but too faithfully followed), must
be added these sentences of Paul: “ Art thou bound to a
wife ? Seek not to be loosed. Art thou loosed from a
wife 1 Seek not to be bound. . . It is better to marry
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than to burn,” and, “ good for the present distress.” (1 Cor.
vii. 27, 9, 29.) Hardly from this will our youth learn to
recognise love as capable of being a pure and an elevating
influence, or to give to Christianity the credit, so often
claimed for it, of having raised woman from the depressed
position in which that age found her. It will be in vain
that they read “Marriage is honourable in all,” (Heb.
xiii. 4.) when they find the prevailing spirit of the
gospel to be ascetic, exalting absolute chastity as one of
the loftiest of virtues, and denouncing all natural desire
as sinful in itself. (1 Cor. vii. 1, 38; Rev. xiv. 4.) Will
not the later teaching of Scripture appear to them to
have receded sadly in its fitness for humanity, from the
earlier which commanded men to “ increase and multi
ply;” (Gen. i. 28.) commended a virtuous woman as “a
crown to her husband;” (Prov. xii. 4.) and pronounced a
blessing on “children and the fruit of the womb;” (Ps.
cxxvii. 3, &c.) and, in so far as the relations of the
sexes are concerned, excite in them a preference for the
Jewish regime over the Christian 1
The number is beyond all reckoning, of women, the
best and noblest of their sex, the most fitted to be the
mothers and early trainers of mankind, who through a
superstitious regard to this characteristic of the New
Testament, have renounced their natural “ high calling,”
leaving to inferior types the fulfilment of the functions
upon the right exercise of which the progress, elevation,
and happiness of mankind depend ; who have withdrawn
themselves from the duties of real life into artificial
isolation, through a conscientious but mistaken belief,
that in practising the selfishness of the devotee, they are
seeking a virtue which is possible only through the exer
cise of the affections. It is in vain that Paul in his
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riper experience wrote, “ I will that the younger women
marry, bear children, guide the house,” (1 Tim. v. 14.)
when Churches persist in making so much of his earlier
utterance delivered, as he himself acknowledges, with
hesitation and doubt. “ The unmarried woman careth
for the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both
in body and spirit: but she that is married careth for
the things of the world, how she may please her hus
band,” and . . . “ I think that I have the spirit of God,”
(1 Cor. vii. 34, 40.)—as if the best, the only way of serv
ing God was not by serving man. This is but an
expression and echo of that same Manichaean principle
of Asceticism, which has led alike Pagans and Christians
innumerable to despise the material world. Blasphem
ously divorcing the Creator from his work, it teaches
that nature is so utterly corrupt and wrong, that the
more we go against and mortify it, the more likely we
are to be pure and right.
‘ And so it comes that woman, while promoted theo
logically to be “Queen of Heaven” and “Mother of
God,” ecclesiastically is regarded as a mistake of nature,
a thing to be snubbed and repressed, and condemned to
the living death of an enforced celibacy.’
One whom I dare to call the greatest of our philo
sophers, Herbert Spencer, has epitomised in a single
sentence all that can be said on this subject:—“Morality
is essentially one with physical truth. It is a kind of
transcendental physiology.” (“ Social Statics.”) It is
.through ignorance of this, the real basis and nature of
morality, that myriads of the best women in Christendom
have, in every generation, to the incalculable loss of the
whole species, made the saddest shipwreck both of their
own lives and of the lives which by their sweet and holy
influence they might have rendered supremely blest.
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There is a “ Higher Law” of morality which impels
ns to suppress our own affections and desires, not through
hope of reward here or hereafter; not through deference
to conventional standards, hut solely through an un
selfish regard to the feelings of those to whom it is our
lot to be allied. But that such a law is to be the law of
our lives, and sole standard of virtue, we find no intima
tion in the Testament, Old or New.
XII.
Yet, notwithstanding the failure of the Bible to pro
vide an authoritative or satisfactory rule either of morals
or of religion, I hold that, both for its own intrinsic
merits, and for the place which it occupies in the litera
ture and history of ourselves and of mankind, it ought
not to be excluded from the educational course of our
children.
It was proposed in the London School-board to exclude
it on the ground that its use as a religious text-book
outside the schools, makes its admission into the schools
inconsistent with religious equality. It certainly would
be, as is generally allowed, an act of gross unfairness to
admit partisan theology into a common school. But,
happily, as is also very generally allowed, speculative
dogma and practical religion are very far indeed from
being one and the same thing; and even those who
object most strongly to dogma in itself, desire to see
children brought up religiously, that is with reverential
regard for divine truth and law.
If fairness and impartiality forbid the Bible to be in
troduced and used as the text-book of any party or sect,
they equally forbid it to be excluded for happening to be
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such a text-book. For this would equally constitute
dogmatic teaching, though of a negative kind. Perfect
fairness requires that the question of the introduction
and use of a book within the schools, should not be in
any way dependent upon dogmatic opinions entertained
respecting it by parties outside the schools. Perfect
fairness forbids that anything which is good and instruc
tive in itself, be excluded merely on account of the source
from which it is derived; be it from Turk, Infidel, Heretic,
Pagan, Jew, or Christian. It is here that the limitation
imposed by our definition of education, comes to our aid,
“ The cultivation of the intelligence and moral sense” by
means of “ whatsoever things are true, pure, and honest;”
“ that fear God, and work righteousness;” and are “pro
fitable for doctrine (or teaching), for reproof, for correc
tion, for instruction in righteousness.”
Thus, in the common schools, nothing must be taught
as being the “ Word of God,” or as not being the “ Word
of God either assertion being equally dogmatic. But
everything must be allowed to derive its force from its
own intrinsic character. And. those who hold that the
children ought to be taught to regard the Bible as being,
or containing, exclusively the “ Word of God,” will only
betray their own want of faith if they express misgivings
lest that word fail to assert its own efficacy and speak its
own divine message to the soul, without special enforce
ment as such by the schoolmaster.
Perhaps, too, upon the idea being put before them,
they will even acquiesce in the suggestion, that for any
man, be he schoolmaster or priest, or any body of men,
lay or cleric, ancient or modern, even though dignified
by the title of “ General Council,” to take upon them
selves the responsibility of determining or declaring what
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is, or what is not, “ the Word of God,” is to lay them
selves open to the charge of the most stupendous pre
sumption of which finite being can possibly be guilty:
a presumption which is no other than that of declaring
themselves to be infallible, and entitled to sit in the
temple of God as if they were God. (2 Thess. ii. 4.)
And further, to declare that the Bible is or contains
exclusively “ the Word of God,” is to forbid the souls of
men to find a divine message elsewhere than in the
Bible. It is to dictate to God as well as to man. For
it is to forbid God to make of others “ ministers to do
his will.” (Ps. ciii. 21; Heb. i. 24.) It is to extract all
meaning from the saying of Jesus, “ Lo, I am with you
alway, even unto the end of the world.” (Matt, xxviii. 20.)
It is to reject that “ Spirit of truth” who was promised
to “guide us into all truth.” (John xvi. 13.) It is to
“ quench the Spirit that giveth life,” in “ the letter that
killeth.” (1 Thess. v. 1, 9; 2 Cor. iii. 6.) It is to insist
that the Almighty speak to men, like a clergyman of the
Establishment, only from a text in the Bible. Let us, if
we will, define as “ the Word of God” that which “feareth
him and worketh righteousness;” but let us not dog
matise as to what particular author or composition comes
under that category^ For “ the Word of God” can only
be the word or thought of which God makes use to im
press the heart of any. If we “ search the Scriptures,”
we find that neither by the writers of the Psalms, by the
prophets, nor by Jesus, scarcely, if ever, is the phrase
used to denote that which was already written, but only
the deeper impression then present in the mind of the
speaker or writer. If not used by God to impress the
heart, it is then not “ his word.” The same utterance
may be “ his word” on one occasion, and not on another.
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Varying for each person, it is not always the same for
any person, inasmuch as that which impresses us in
one mood, does not necessarily affect us in another. A
“ word of God” cannot fail, any more than a “ law of
God” can be broken. Any definition of Deity that does
not exclude such a possibility, is an utterly inadequate
definition, and one dishonouring to God.
But in the matter of the education of the young, we
have to use our best judgment in apportioning the means
to the end we have in view. And therefore we must
put into their hands such reading only as is plainly
adapted for their edification, whether we take it from
the Bible or from any other book. It is for children to
to be in statu pupillari to men. It is for men to be in
statu pupillari to God.
I hold, then, that the Bible should be used in our com
mon schools, First, for its intrinsic merits. In its pages
we find the most complete revelation of humanity to be
found in any written book, showing the gradual growth
of the moral and spiritual faculties from the most rudi
mentary ages to the Christiaii era. We find this mainly
in the exhibition of the rise and development, however
irregular, of the idea of God, until, from a Being so
limited in his nature and operations as to be able to
sympathise and side with only a few individuals or a
particular race, partaking all the deficiencies of their own
gross, rude natures, bribed by gifts, appeased by sacri
fices, partial, cruel, jealous, capricious, the patron and in
stigator of blood-thirsty and fraudulent men and actions,
the resort and associate of “ lying spirits,” and sharing
his sovereignty with the devil, — he is at length pre
sented to us as “ the high and holy one that inhabiteth
eternity;” (Is. lviii. 15.) “ the righteous judge;” (Rev.
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xix. 11.) “creator of all things;” (Gen. i. 1, &c.)
“ Saviour of all men;” (1 Tim. iv. 10.) “ whose kingdom
ruleth over all.” (Ps. ciii. 19).
Here we find first recorded the existence of a sense of
responsibility for our actions to a law and a power which
are above us. “ Here human nature is drawn in all its
extent, from its lowest depths to its loftiest reach; for the
Bible is a gallery in which all the paintings are life-like,
but the subjects so varied, that none are too gross for
admission. Being a revelation of God according to the
characters and imaginations of the men in whose con
sciousness his idea was conceived, it is emphatically a
revelation of man, inasmuch as man’s ideal is the index
to his own character and degree of intelligence.
This, however, is no speciality of the Bible. It is the
characteristic of all art and literature which speaks out
the genuine deeper feelings of men’s hearts ; and in this
respect, as containing the truest art, the Bible ranks as
the highest classics.
In selecting from the world’s literature, reading lessons
inculcating “ the true, the* pure, and the lovely,” who
could have the heart to exclude the remarkable hymn of
the creation; the significant allegory of Eden; the charm
ing pastoral of Isaac and Rebekah in their first love; the
touching idyl of Joseph and his brethren and their aged
father; the wondrous romance of the Exodus; the story
of Moses, that king of men; the noble recitations of law
and legend in Deuteronomy; the interesting narratives of
Samson, Samuel, David, and Solomon; the simple tales
of Ruth and of Esther, so illustrative of the manners of
the ancient east; the sublime poetry of Job and the
Psalms; the shrewd wisdom of the Proverbs; the genial
cynicism of Ecclesiastes; the magnificent outpourings of
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Isaiah, denouncing the degradation and despair of his
countrymen, and encouraging them anew to hope and to
restoration through the moral regeneration of their
nature ? (Which of us even now could not point out
some nation that has sore need of an Isaiah ?) Then the
noble lesson of Jonah, wherein children are oftener
taught to see a tale of a cross-grained prophet, a whale,
and a gourd, than to recognise the poet’s protest against
the popular notion, shared by Jonah, that the Lord was
a mere district-god who could be avoided by change of
place, and to see the moral of the fable in the representa
tion of deity as everywhere present alike, even in the
depths of the sea.
And, added to these, the exquisite purity and simpli
city of the gospels, with their central figure of Jesus and
his enthusiastic life-devotion to the cause of man’s re
demption from sin and suffering, and deliverance from
the blighting effects of religious formalism, and the
crushing weight of sacerdotalism; producing from the
harmonious depths of his own great soul a sublime ideal
of God as a Father, and a rule of life for man most noble
in conception even when most impracticable of applica
tion. (Of all the characters of history, I know of none
who would have sympathised more intensely with the
object and the views I am seeking to advance, than the
Christ whom I find in the gospels. Of course to the or
thodox and the vested interests of his day, he was only a
sad blasphemer and dangerous revolutionist.) Then, the
varied and genuine humanity of the Epistles; and, no
tably, the magnificent monologue on charity, (in the thir
teenth chapter of the first epistle to the Corinthians,)
wherein Paul, dropping his too favourite character of
Rabbinical lawyer and quibbling controversialist, soars to
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an altitude whither the churches have never yet been
able to follow him. And, lastly, the lofty rhapsody of
the Apocalypse, wherein fervid imagination, escaping
from the woes beneath which mankind was being crushed
by a Domitian and a Nero, took refuge in an ideal
“ state of God,” where all wrongs should be redressed,
all tears wiped away, the tormentors relegated to ever
lasting punishment, and sorrow and pain be no more for
their victims.
And not for its intrinsic merits only, but for its in
fluence’ on the hearts of mankind, should our children not
be strangers to the volume in which, to borrow words
from one of our most highly inspired writers, “book after
book,Law and truth and example, oracle and lovely hymn,
and choral song of ten thousand thousand, and accepted
prayers of saints and prophets, sent back as it were from
heaven, like doves to be let loose again with a new
freight of spiritual joys and griefs and necessities; where
the hungry have found food, the thirsty a living spring,
the feeble a staff, and the victorious warfarer songs of
welcome and strains of music: which for more than a
thousand years has gone hand in hand with civilisation,
. . often leading the way. . . a book which good
and holy men, thepest and wisest of mankind, the kingly
spirits of historyl enthroned in the hearts of mighty
nations, have borne witness to its influences, and declared
to be beyond compare the most perfect instrument, the
only adequate organ of humanity; the organ and instru
ment of all the gifts, powers, and tendencies, by which
the individual is privileged to rise above himself.”*
To exclude all knowledge of the Bible from our youth,
would be to make a greater gap in the education of a
* S.T. Coleridge’s “Confessions of an Inquiring Spirit.”
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Briton than to omit almost any calculable number of
other books, including the bulk of the world’s history.
Indeed it would be to exclude almost all history what
soever; not ancient history merely, with knowledge of
Egypt, Palestine, Syria, and Rome in its decline and fall;
but the history of all Christendom itself, with that of the
Papacy and the Reformation, and the whole of our own
struggles for and against liberty | (for even we have not
always been consistently on the side of freedom:) almost
all of which struggles have been associated more or less
with the Bible; the rise and origin, too, of the United
States of America. All these in the past, together with
our own condition in the present and hopes in the future,
and the signification of the vast bulk of our literature,
would, without some knowledge of the book that has
filled a leading part in them all, be absolutely dark and
meaningless.
Besides, there is not so much wisdom and beauty in
the world that we can afford to throw any away. If we
exclude the Bible altogether as being a text-book of our
own religious sects, there is no plea upon which we can
admit the admirable teaching that is to be found in the
sacred books of the Hindoos and Chinese, the Mohamme
dans and Buddhists. Nay, to exclude the good parts of
any book merely because it happens to be the text-book
of a sect, is to put it in the power of any small knot of
persons to secure the exclusion of any book whatsoever,
by claiming it as one of their sacred books. Fancy a sect
of Shakespeare worshippers getting by such means all
knowledge of Shakespeare excluded from our educational
course ! Or a new sect of Pythagoreans to revive the
worship of numbers, and, setting up Colenso as their highpriest, forcing us to exclude arithmetic from our schools !
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Indeed, if only because of the very power and popular
ity of the Bible, it should not be left to be dealt with
exclusively by a class of interpreters who acknowledge
other allegiance than to the developed intellect and con
science of men. But, containing as it does, the whole
sacred literature of the most remarkable of all ancient
peoples, the Jews, and that of their most remarkable
sect of religious reformers, the Christians, who, together,
more than any other people, have influenced the develop
ment of the human mind and the course of human his
tory; to exclude all knowledge of it from our youth
would be to keep back from them the master-key to the
heart and facts of humanity.
XIII.
But the fact of the Bible being, not a single book, but
a whole literature ranging over many centuries, greatly
simplifies the question of dealing with it. We rarely use
the whole of any book in the schoolroom; never an entire
literature. Imagine the whole, or samples of the whole, of
our own literature being put at once into the hands of a
child, with its rude early legends and ballads, its laws and
statutes, its medicine and science, its trials and police
reports, and all the revolting details which even the least
respectable of our newspapers suppress as “ unfit for pub
lication !” Yet this is what we have done with the
ancient literature of the Jews. Instead of exercising any
discrimination, we crowd our houses with it, we read it
aloud to our families, we put it entire into the hands of
■our children; and when we find impurity and supersti
tion rife among us, instead of admitting that we have
■done our best to promote them, we postulate the horrible
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doctrines of “ original sin ” and “ total depravity,” and
shift the responsibility from our own shoulders to those
of “the devil!” It was remarked once by a well-known
Frenchman that “the English tolerate no indecencies
except in their Bibles.” Fatal exception, when we print
Bibles in millions, in all the languages of the earth, and
thrust them into the hands of every babe and suckling
and growing youth.
The remedy which I propose is twofold : First, that a
new version, omitting the whole of the parts which are
objectionable on the score of decency, omitting also the
headings by which ecclesiastical editors have sought to
palliate immorality or strain the meaning to the support
of particular doctrines, be made to take the place of the
existing “ authorised versionand that this be done
so completely that the old version be no longer accessible
to the young, but continue to exist only as a curiosity
or book of reference upon the shelves of students.
This change is one which, while it might be'initiated
by the School-boards undertaking to produce such a
version for the use of their schools, would require both
general and individual action on the part of the people
themselves. It will be aided by the wise resolve of the
Bible-revision Committee to omit the headings from their
new and improved version. If the powers of this Com
mittee were extended so as to enable it to make these
changes, a great step towards carrying out this part of
my proposed remedy would be gained. To further it
would be an admirable occupation for a society which
has existed for years among us under the presidency of
Lord Shaftesbury, calling itself “ The Pure Literature
Society.” Strange to say that, with all its zeal for
purity in literature, it has never yet tried its hand on
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the Bible. It will indeed prove itself worthy of its high
title and calling, when it joins in the chase of the
“ authorised version ” from our homes, and the pews of
our churches, so that children shall no longer be tempted
to beguile the tedium of a sermon by feeding their
curiosity on its improprieties.
It is related of Goethe that he was present at a meeting
of the Dutch clergy, when it was proposed to establish
a censorship to enforce the expurgation of any improper
books which might be brought forward for publication!
Goethe at once expressed his admiration of the plan, and
recommended that they commence with the Bible.
Whereupon the king of Holland said to him, “ My dear
Goethe, pray hold your tongue. Of course you are quite
right: but it won’t do to say so.”
This, however, is not enough. There are, as we have
seen, very many portions of the Bible which, while not
totally “ unfit for publication,” are yet shocking, to the
intellect and moral sense if accepted literally as true,
inasmuch as they are libellous to the Deity. I propose,
therefore, Secondly, that teachers be required, alike by
School-boards and by parents, whenever such portions
of Scripture are read,—(and they ought to be read, if
only to show the advance we have made)—to make their
pupils clearly understand that they represent only the
imperfect notions of a barbarous age and people. ' That
just as the Greeks had their supreme ruling divinity in
Zeus, their divinity of song in Apollo, of war in Ares, of
gain in Hermes, of storms in JEolus, of wisdom in Pallas,
and of love in Aphrodite; so the Jews, instead of dis
tributing these functions among a number of distinct
divinities, ascribed them all in turn, no matter how
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incongruously, as occasion required, to their own Jehovah.
By turn he is a “ man of war,” he is “love,” he is “fire,”
he “ rides on the wings of the wind,” and so on.
We cannot even accord to the Jews the credit, often
claimed for them, of being, in a world of polytheists, the
only pure monotheists. It is true that their institutions
forbade the worship of more than one God.; but they
recognised the existence of many gods. They were
monotheists in worship, but not in faith. Their Jehovah
was a far too unsociable, exclusive, “jealous” God, to
share their homage with others. He thus was made
strictly in the image of the Jews themselves, the most
exclusive of human races. That Baal and Chemosh,
Ashtoreth and Molech, were all realities for them, is
shown in frequent utterances ascribed even to Jehovah
himself. And Solomon, though “ the wisest of men,”
established their worship in Jerusalem. The Bible
shows, tod, by numerous instances, that the Jews were
by no means satisfied with their own deity. The minds
of their loftiest poets, indeed, occasionally, in their
loftiest moods, rose to the conception of a deity, one and
universal; but they did this in common only with the
loftiest minds of all peoples, ages, and religions; those
minds whose opinions have ever been regarded by the
conventional and superstitious as atheistic and blasphem
ous, whether it be Socrates, Spinoza, Shelley, or Jesus.
But even if the Jews acknowledged but one God, they
called him by various names ; and it would be an addi
tional safeguard against superstition if, in the new
version, those names were preserved. In translating
the Latin and Greek writers we never think of substitu
ting God for Jupiter or Apollo. There is no valid
reason for dealing differently with Jehovah, Elohim,
Adonai, Shaddai.
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This, then, is the whole conclusion :—
(1.) That the Bible should be admitted into the
schools; but it must be a purified, an expurgated Bible;
and (2.) That its reading must be accompanied by such
“ notes and comments ” as will make it really conducive
to the development of the Intelligence and Moral Sense
of the scholars.
But to minister to these ends, it must be read with no
adventitious solemnity that might specialise it as a
superior authority, and invest it with a preter-educational
character. For this would at once be to remove it from
the category of legitimate educational uses, by exempting
it from the operation of the normal digestive apparatus
of the intellect. In short, to make the Bible useful for
education, it must be taught comparatively. And as this
implies the possession of a certain amount of related
knowledge, it is clear that there is but very little of it
that is suited to the very young or very ignorant.
XIV.
Now for the general principle on which these u notes
and comments ” should be based.
It is universally acknowledged that the human mind
is endowed with a tendency to imagine the Deity as pos
sessed in perfection of all the qualities which are recog
nised by itself as best. The strength of this tendency is
ever in inverse proportion to the degree of the mind’s
development, being greatest in the most rudimentary
stage of intelligence.
Investing the Deity with the attributes of personality,
the finite mind cannot do otherwise than make God in
its own image. The character of that image is the mea
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sure of our own moral and spiritual capacity. For, when
by God we mean the ideal of our own imagination, it
follows that the character of our God indicates the de
gree of our own development. Later on, when the mind
attains a certain advanced stage of intellectual progress,
we find our conception of Deity so transcendently en
larged, that no definition satisfies us, save one which re
cognises Him as the sum of all the forces, physical, moral,
and spiritual, at work in the universe; the divine work,
which we call Nature, being the sum of all phenomena.
God the sum of causes, Nature the sum of effects. This
is no dogma. It is only a definition of what we mean
by God, what by nature.
For the purposes of early education, however, we have
to deal with God in a moral aspect, as the Ideal of
Humanity j the perfection towards which it is our high
est function to strive. Wherefore, nothing can be more
fatal to our moral progress than to have that ideal de
graded to a low type of character. If we are to call him
“ Fool,” who, denying cause and effect, says, “ there is
no God,” (Ps. xiv. 1.) what are we to say of him who
teaches that God is evil ? What, again, are we to call
those who, holding that God is absolutely good, and that
a firm belief in that goodness is requisite to enable man
to be good also, and who, moreover, desire to cultivate
goodness in their children, yet hesitate not to put into
the hands of those children narratives of impurity,
cruelty, and deceit, and tell them that the perpetrators
and their deeds were acceptable to, and indeed prompted
by, the Deity ? If the purpose of right education be to
develop the moral sense, what sort of education is this ?
If another- purpose be to develop the intellect, how is this
end to be served, when the only way of escape that such
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teachers have, on being questioned by their perplexed
pupils, lies in declaring it to be a “ mystery,” and so
closing the doors of their intelligence the moment it
begins to expand ? .
Keeping in mind the remarks I have made respecting
the inevitable anthropomorphism of all imperfectly de
veloped minds, you will perceive that it involves no
reproach to the Jews that, in those early stages of human
progress, they partook of the universal tendency, and
constructed their God in their own image; that they
credited him with the qualities, moral and immoral,
which they found in themselves; and, in their total
ignorance of natural law and phenomena, were more ready
to seek the divine hand in departures from the regular
order of nature, than to recognise it in its establishment
and maintenance. It is thus that all early literatures
necessarily contain prodigies and fables illustrative of the
imperfect notions of their period. And so far from these
things being true because they are in the Bible, or a re
proach to the Jews in being untrue, the miracle really
would have been if there were no miracles, no anthro
pomorphism, in the Scriptures. In this sense, therefore,
it may be said that the truth of the Bible is proved by
the untruths of the Bible.
Even if we give the Jews credit as having done their
best for the honour of their god in thus constructing him
in their own image, we assuredly cannot lay claim to
similar credit for ourselves. For we have fallen infinitely
below our own best, in the character we have assigned
to our God. Think for a moment how marvellous is the
anomaly we present. For six days of the week we avail
ourselves freely of the wondrous results of the most ad
vanced science and culture, philosophy and thought, of
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this nineteenth century after Christ, in which the labours
of all former centuries have culminated, and we do this for
our own advantage and enjoyment; and on the seventh
day, when the honour of our God is concerned, we are con
tent to jump back to the nineteenth century before Christ,
and borrow for him both character and lineaments from
a semi-barbarous Syrian tribe, whose whole literature
proves their absolute incapacity to comprehend the
simplest of his works in nature. And in their image,
fitful and vengeful, we make our God, refusing him the
benefits of the light we have gained. A wondrous feat
of moral and intellectual athletics is this our weekly
jump backward and then-forward again.
The resolution finally passed by the London Board
provides that “ the Bible shall be read, and there shall
be given therefrom such instruction in the principles of
religion and morality, as is suitable to the capacities of
children, no attempt being made to attach the children
to any particular denomination.”
Thus, the Bible is to be read “ with notes and com
ments.” If, however, these notes and comments are not
to be of the kind I have just described, the Resolution
means absolutely nothing. If the teachers are not to
explain that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Samuel, David,
and Solomon, were, in respect of the acts which have been
enumerated, exceedingly bad men, and that the deity
who is said in the Bible to have approved of them, was
but the imaginary local divinity of the Hebrews as re
presented by their priests, the Resolution is nothing but
an illusion and a blind. If the teacher is not to say that
Abraham was wrong to follow his impulse to sacrifice
his son; Jacob wrong to cheat his nearest and dearest
relations ; Samuel wrong to revoke his sovereign’s pledge
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of clemency, and rebelliously to set up a rival to him;
David wrong to sacrifice the sons of Saul, and to order
the execution of the man he had sworn to spare; if
he is not to say that Jesus and the apostles were mis
taken in expecting the early end of the world rand
re-appearance of Christ; that the story of his birth
is a piece of mere paganism, and that many of the
injunctions in the New Testament are not fitting rules
for civilised life—the Resolution is utterly devoid
of meaning. I am not saying that it may not be per
fectly sound theology to praise Abraham and Jacob for
these things, and represent the deity as approving of
them, but only that it is neither good religion nor good
morality; and it is not theology, but religion and mor
ality, which, both by the Education Act and the Resolu
tion, the teacher is bound to inculcate. Even if it be
true that morality is based upon religion, the religion
containing such theology can certainly not claim to be in
any way connected with morality. And to teach it will
be to go directly in the face of the Resolution which
provides “ that instruction be given from the Bible in
the principles,” not of theology, but “of religion and
morality.” Wherefore, when a question arises in the
schools, such as that of the propriety of Abraham’s com
pliance, of Jael’s treachery, or of Caiaphas’s counsel to
offer up Jesus in human sacrifice as an atonement for the
people;—the teacher acting in accordance with our
definition and the Board’s Resolution, will have no
choice but to reply, “ The justification of these actions
belongs to the domain of theology. Morality unequivo
cally condemns them. And my duty here is to teach
you morality.”
And this, I think, settles the question which has been
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raised since the passing of the Resolution, namely, the
question, Who is to give Biblical or religious instruction
in the schools, whether the ordinary teachers who are
responsible to the Board, or the clergy or other persons
specially appointed for that ^purpose by the various reli
gious bodies themselves ? The resolution declares that
the children are to be taught, not theology, but Religion
and Morality. To admit, therefore, independent teachers
of theology, would be, in so far as such theology is in
conflict with religion and morality, to admit teachers of
irreligion and immorality, and would thus neutralise the
Resolution of the Board, and the whole object of educa
tion, which, as cannot be repeated too often at this time,
consists in the development of the intellect and moral
sense.
Probably nothing could be put before the young more
pernicious than the teaching of the official theologian.
It was but the other day that a clergyman of the English
Establishment preached a sermon to the effect that Jacob
was quite right to cheat his father and brother because
he knew that he should make a better use of the property
than they would. No, however sound the theology of such
teaching may be, and this is no rare or extreme instance,
it certainly is not the teaching by which either the
intelligence or the moral sense of children is likely to be
developed.
XV.
So far from the simple and natural explanation which
I have given of the incongruities and contradictions con
tained in the Bible, having been diligently promulgated
by those who have’ undertaken to be its interpreters, our
spiritual teachers have, on the contrary, during some
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three hundred years done their best to erect the Bible
into an jinfallible standard, not merely of theology, but
of religion and morality. Outvying the apostle who, in
the excess of his zeal, cut off one ear, they have done
their best to stop up both ears against the voice of reason
and conscience. They forget that Jesus restored the in
jured organ.
It is true that an excuse for the existence of the popular
theory, and for the tenacity with which it has held its
ground, is not far to seek. It was natural that we should
feel a high degree of gratitude towards the book which
materially aided us in emancipating ourselves from the
yoke of mediaeval Papalism, and asserting our own indi
viduality among the community of the nations. It was
natural that our enthusiasm for the agent of our deliver
ance should lead us to place it high, even too high, in our
regards. And so it came that we replaced an infallible,
but discomfited, Pope by an infallible book; not per
ceiving that, if indeed it was a credit to the Bible to
have made us free, we do the reverse of honour to it by
allowing it to tyrannise over us in turn.
Again, in addition to being a grateful, we are an emi
nently prudent, folk. We prefer to be on with a new *
love before we are quit of the old. Hating anything
like an interregnum, we cry, “ The king is dead. Long
live the king,” without the interval of a moment. And
so we continue to cling to the old accustomed dwelling,
letting it crumble into ruin around us, rather than endure
a brief season of discomfort while waiting for the rear
ing of a new habitation on its site. “ If we give up the
Bible as an infallible guide,” it is asked, “ to what are
we to look in its place 1 ”
Having at present to deal with facts, and not with
fancies, there is no need to enlarge on the popular dogma
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further than to say that, not being contained in the Bible
itself, but being unknown alike to the Fathers of the
primitive Church, to the Reformers of the sixteenth cen
tury, and to the articles and formularies of both the
Romish Church and the English, it must have its basis
in modern innovation rather than in ancient authority.
I ascribe, then, the popular theory respecting the
Bible in some degree to the causes I have named, but
mainly to that instinctive monarchical tendency which
leads the uneducated to distrust their own intelligence
and moral sense, and require some palpable ruler and
guide. “ In their ignorance of the experimental cha
racter of human nature, men will seek infallibility some
where ; in an oracle, a priest, a church, or a book.” This
tendency has been, as a rule, sedulously fostered by
governments and teachers. Once deprived of their
Fetich, and roused from indolent acquiescence in its
supposed commands, they cry out that their gods have
been stolen from them, and fancy that the universe
will collapse, because they are now forced to fulfil their
proper vocation, and use their own faculties.
It was in virtue of this characteristic that the Swiss
theologians of the seventeenth century maintained the
inspiration • of the comparatively recent vowel-points of
the Hebrew text: that the early Christians ascribed a
supernatural origin to the Septuagint; and the Council of
Trent gave an authority superior to that of the original
texts to the Vulgate, which attained such a height of
superstitious respect that, according to Erasmus, some
monks, on seeing it printed in parallel columns between
the Greek and the Hebrew, likened it to Christ crucified
between the two thieves. (Colloquies.) And it was even
seriously proposed by the theological faculty of Mayence,
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^■r,'‘'7?-,?>,''z
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in the 15th century, to make a total “ revision and cor
rection of the Hebrew Bible, inasmuch as it differed
from the authorised Latin translation ! ”
Perhaps the most singular fact in connection with the
popular doctrine is, that to doubt its accuracy has come
to be treated as a piece of heinous moral depravity, and
this even by some who ought to know better. When
the eminent author of the “Christian Year” was con
sulted respecting a difficulty in the way of receiving it,
felt by Dr Arnold, then a student, Keble’s advice was
“ work it down 1 Throw yourself wholly into your
parish or your school, and work it down! ” * This
simply meant, “ ignore itas if faith consisted in the
suppression of doubt, and conscientious scruples were
demons to be exorcised.
Later in life, when pressed on the same point by Sir
John Coleridge, who urged the subject on him as one
that he was competent to deal with, adding that it pro
mised shortly to become the great religious question of
the time, Mr Keble, after endeavouring to evade an
swering, replied shortly that “most of the men who had
difficulties on this subject were too wicked to be reasoned
with.”t Such was the answer of one of the most vene
rated of modern Sacerdotalists to a near relative. of the
great Coleridge, who (in the book I have already quoted)
had pronounced the popular doctrine to be “ superstitious
and unscriptural.”
“ Ignore a conscientous scruple, or you are too wicked
to be reasoned with I” Respect a dogma because it is a
dogma, no matter how the reason and the conscience, nay,
the Almighty himself, be outraged thereby! Submit
humbly to authority, no matter how immoral its require* Stanley’s Life of Arnold.
f Coleridge’s Memoirs of Keble.
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ments! Ignore your scruples, and instead of manfully
“facing your doubts” and “beating your music out,” let
your doubt remain, an unresolved discord, to jar ever
more within your soul! To such straits are they driven
who remain in bondage to “ the weak and beggarly ele
ments” of the popular orthodoxy. Surely it is time for
us to say positively that we will not commit the minds
and consciences of our children to teachers who will bring
them up to regard sincerity as a vice, and crush at once
both intellect and moral sense by superstition, popular or
ecclesiastical.
XVI.
But though our immediate teachers in nursery, school
and pulpit, have laboured assiduously to inculcate this
dogma, it may safely be affirmed that, in addition to the
vast range of authorities already named who reject it,
there is not at this day a single scholar, (I do not say
“learned divine,” but scholar of acknowledged critical
ability,) lay or cleric, orthodox or heretic, in Christendom,
who holds it for himself. One and all, they recognise the
existence in the Bible of, at the very least, a largely per
vading. element of human imperfection. It is true that
Dr Hook in his “ Church Dictionary” defines “ Inspira
tion” as being “the extraordinary or supernatural in
fluence of the Spirit of God on the human mind, by
which the prophets and sacred writers were qualified to
receive and set forth divine communications without any
mixture of error,” and asserts upon his own sole autho
rity that in this sense the term occurs in the passage,
“ all scripture (is) given by inspiration of God.” (2 Tim.
iii. 16.) It is true that in this he is followed by Dr
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Wordsworth and other prominent churchmen. But no
critical scholar ventures to affirm that “ Inspiration ” is
identical with, or implies, “ Infallibility.” On the con
trary, their profoundest investigations only serve to de
monstrate the truth of the conclusion patent to common
sense, that humanity is so constructed as to be incapable
of infallibility in the absence of means of verification;
and that the being prompted by a “ holy spirit,” or dis
position, by no means guarantees a man against error,
however wide his spiritual range, or deep his spiritual
insight.
But farther, even if the original text could be regarded
as infallible, there is the. fact that we do not possess that
original text, and that the documents which claim to be
derived from it, have passed through the hands of many
copyists, each more or less accurate, more or less honest.
And were the text certainly perfect as it is certainly most
defective, there are still the difficulties of translation, diffi
culties which are, as every scholar knows, often absolutely
insurmountable. For the language of different nations
varies with their ideas, and their ideas vary with their
institutions, associations, and habits; so that different
languages frequently have no terms whatever in which to
express the ideas contained in other languages. Many
tropical tribes, for instance, have no words to express
such things as ice and snow, because those things are alto
gether unknown to them. A translation, therefore, of
the Bible into their language is, so far as ice and snow
are concerned, impossible. “ In the islands of the South
Seas there were no quadrupeds Until the first navigators
took some pigs there, when the name given by the natives
to the pigs, became the generic term for all four-legged
animals. The horse was the big pig that runs over the
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ground. The cow was the great milky pig. The sheep
the curly pig. We may imagine the feelings with which
the pious translators of the Bible for the islanders found
themselves compelled to use a corresponding designation
for the phrase “Lamb of God.” The Zulus of South
Africa had no idea of God or a future state, and prized
above all things flesh in an advanced stage of decomposi
tion. Wherefore the missionaries in translating the Bible
for them, and rendering the supreme good in their lan
guage, were obliged to identify God and heaven with
rotten meat.
The same lack of corresponding terms exists more or
less between all languages, as is shown by the fact that
words and phrases are often transported whole from one
language into another. Moreover, words used to express
actions, principles, or qualities, in one language, often be
come concreted into persons and things by the genius of
another. And in all languages, or nearly all, the same
word frequently has many different significations. (As
in English the words Jac,
&c., have each half-a-dozen
meanings.) It sometimes happens, therefore, that a trans
lator has to be guided by what he is led by the context
or some other criterion to think the passage is likely to
mean.
Thus, in the passage, “ Whosoever will save his life
shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake
shall find it. For what is a man profited if he shall gain
the whole world, and lose his own soul ? or what shall a
man give in exchange for his soul?” (Matt. xvi. 25, 26.)
—the word rendered soul is precisely the same, article
and all, with the word rendered life.
Again, for the word spirit, which is used by us in nearly
a score of different senses, personal and impersonal, the
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Greek equivalent, pneumo,, generally, if not always, signi
fies the air, breath, or life. In the well-known passage
in John, (iii. 8.) “ The wind bloweth where it listeth, and
thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence
it cometh and whither it goeth; so is every one that is
born of the spirit,”—the word rendered wind, and the
word spirit, are identical, article and all, with each other.
Yet the translators have given to the same word, occur
ring in the same sentence, two entirely different mean
ings. And, as if to justify this, the modern printers of
the. Greek text sometimes give a capital initial to the
word which is translated spirit; thus in a measure, alter
ing the text to suit the authorised version.
Such was the imperfection of the ancient Hebrew for
the purposes of expression in writing, that it was not
until long after the Bible had been written that the dis
tinction between the tenses of past and future was pro
perly developed. It was in their confusion between these
tenses that our translators, in the magnificent ode of
Isaiah beginning, “ Comfort ye, comfort ye, my people,”
produced the absurd and impious phrase, “ She hath re
ceived at the Lord’s hand double for all her sins,” in
stead of the joyous assurance, “ She shall receive . . .
double for all her sufferings.” (xl. 2.) It is easy to im
agine the difficulty attending prophetic expression in a
language which had no distinct future tense !
A very little reflection on the modus operandi of what
theologically is called “ Inspiration,” will at once exhibit
to us the fallacy of the popular notion. It can only con
sist of an impulse or impression on the mind, so strong
as to make the individual receiving it, ascribe it to a
preternatural source. But, however irresistible for him,
the authority and character of the impression must still
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be determined, not by its strength in relation to his
mind, but by its own intrinsic nature. A bad impres
sion cannot proceed from a healthy source; neither does
a strong impression imply accuracy of doctrine. It is
under an irresistible impulse that the maniac mother
flings her child down a well. It is under an impression
so strong as to be for him an inspiration or divine reve
lation that the celibate takes his unnatural vow, the
devotee starves himself into bad health, the Russian
fanatic mutilates his body, and the Revivalist goes into
convulsions of madness. Thus, whatever is claimed to
be a divine revelation, must be referred ultimately to the
test of the Intellect and Moral Sense, as the sole canon
of criticism. Even the common notion that infallibility
may be attested by the power to work miracles, must be
disclaimed in presence of the instances ascribed in
Scripture to magical or diabolical agency.
“ Wherefore, although a man may have an overwhelm
ing sense that something claiming to be God has spoken
to him, it is clear, that unless he has a prior, personal and
infallible knowledge of God,—a knowledge prior, that is,
to his ‘ inspiration,’—he knows not but that it may be
a demon assuming the garb of light, perhaps even one of
those ‘ lying spirits’ who are represented in the Bible as
infesting even heaven itself, or a fantastic creation of his
own excited fancy. It behoves him, therefore, still to
judge the communication in his calmer moments by its
own intrinsic character, and to deliberate upon the actions
to which it impels him.” The wider the range we learn
to assign to Nature and the human faculties, the less be
comes our necessity for seeking a preternatural origin for
our ideas and impulses, and the more honour we pay to
the divine worker and his work.
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83
The prevalent readiness to distrust our own ability to
.perceive the higher moral facts of the universe, and our
consequent liability to refer all revelation to the con
sciousness of men who lived ages ago, is, no doubt, attri
butable partly to our possession of so many ancient books
which claim our attention, and draw our minds away
from the contemplation of the direct action of the uni
verse upon our own individual consciousness; and partly
to the repressing influence of those sacerdotal interests
which naturally repose upon traditional authority rather
than upon living insight and reason.
The habit is one to be firmly checked if we would
avoid the practical Atheism of banishing G-od and Truth
from the living present to the dead past. “ The creed or
belief of any age is, at best, but the index to the height
■of the divine presence of Truth in that ago.” To adopt
its limitations as our own, is to turn a deaf ear to the
voice of that “ Spirit of Truth” or Truthfulness, of whom
it was said by one who himself drew all his inspiration from
within, that “ when he is come he will guide you into all
truth.” (John xvi. 13.) It is but a limited sway that this
Spirit of Truthfulness has as yet obtained. Wherefore
the effect of all dogmas,—whether formulated in creeds,
■catechisms, or articles of faith,—and their maintenance by
oaths and emoluments, independently of intrinsic pro
bability or any possibility of verification, is to arrest
the natural development of Humanity and to disturb and
retard the whole process of the evolution of the species,
in regard to its highest functions. It is to give the
world a base money-bribe to retain in its maturity the
form, the garb, the dimensions, the ^maturity of its
childhood. Hear a recent utterance of one who, with
whatever drawbacks, seeks still to combine the prophet
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and the poet, and thus, with “ Songs before Sunrise,’^ •
heralds the dawn of better times:
A creed is a rod,
And weapon of night:
But this thing is God,
To be man with thy might,
To grow straight in the strength of thy spirit,
And live out thy life as the light. *
The very word Inspiration, in its primary meaning,
relates to the atmosphere. It is an ancient supposition
that ideas are inhaled with the breath. A man found
himself possessed of an idea or thought which the
moment before he had not. Whence could it have
come, if not in-breathed, or inspired, with the air 1 It
was Pythagoras who conceived the idea that the vital
process of the world is a process of breathing, the
infinite breath or atmosphere of the Universe being the
source of all life. An imaginative Oriental people
readily, in their expressions, personified such supposed
source of life and thought. We matter-of-fact Westerns
go on to make such personification absolute and dog
matic. Pn&uma, the air, becomes a personal spirit, or
assemblage of spirits, and divinely “ inspires ” us: as in
the old days of philosophy in Persia, under the influence
of which, during, or after the Babylonish captivity,
many of the Jewish sacred books evidently were com
posed,—’the breath, or Div, formed a linguistic basis for
a personal Devil,j
Ideas in the air !
Those who know what it is to
* Swinburne, very slightly altered.
t Cons. Donaldson’s “ Christian OrthodoxyArt. “Interme
diate Intelligences.”
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85
-crouch in the unhealthy confinement of close study, ever,
as the Poet says,
“ With blinded eyesight poring over miserable books,”
till heart and head become heavy and dull; and then to
betake themselves to seaside or mountain, where the
fresh winds of heaven blow freely upon them, inflating
their lungs, aerating their blood, and “sweeping the
cobwebs from their brains,” until the renovated organism
becomes re-charged with creative energy, and ideas
begin anew to spring up in the mind, revealing to it
“ Tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in everything, ”
—such as these can well appreciate the charming old
fancy that peopled the air with ideas, and regarded
every new thought as a separate spirit. It is only under
theologic manipulation that such gentle poetry becomes
steam-hammered into hard dogma, that existence is rob
bed of its charm, and millions of mankind are doomed
to pass through life, and to leave it, without ever having
been allowed to know how good the world really is.
But above and beside the questions of Inspiration, of
Language, of Transcription, and Translation, there is
the question of Interpretation. And, supposing all other
difficulties surmounted, we are here met by an impass
ible barrier. For the proposition is nothing less than
axiomatic, that “ an infallible revelation requires an
infallible interpreter : and that both are useless without
an infallible understanding wherewith to comprehend
the interpretation.”
By such demonstration of the utter impossibility of
infallibility, (in the theologic sense,) the ground is
entirely cut away from beneath, not only all past, but all
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• future superstitions. For, by. annihilating “ authority,
it compels us to refer everything whatsoever to the
criterion of the intellect and moral sense of man. There
is now, therefore, no longer any space for " dogma.”
XVII.
To the list of authorities already given, I propose to
add a few representative names from the various schools
of theologic thought within the Established Church.
The first is that of the Bev. Dr Irons, who, in his
remarkable little volume, “ The Bible and its Inter
preters,” declares that “ any reasonable being who
would accept the Scriptures at all, must take them on
some other ground than that which identifies the written
Word with God’s Eevelation. A more hopeless, carnal,
and, eventually sceptical position, it is impossible to
conceive.” (p. 39.) Dr Irons, in this, follows the learned
Bishop of St David’s, Dr Thirlwall, whose recent noble
protest against the dishonesty of sacerdotal bigotry in
high places, in relation to the work of Biblical revision,
may well raise our respect for him to veneration, as one
who, in spite of his position, has dared practically to
point the distinction between Morality and the prevalent
Theology. In one of his Episcopal charges, Dr Thirlwall
points out the fact that “ Among the numerous passages
of the New Testament in which the phrase The Word
of God,” occurs, there is not one in which it signifies the
Bible, or in which that word could be substituted for it
without manifest absurdity.
It is notorious that the popular imagination is wont
to regard the same phrase, when used in the Psalms, as re
ferring, if not to the whole of the Old and New Testaments,
at least to the books ascribed to Moses and Samuel. .
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87
The late Dean of Canterbury, Dr. Alford, in his
“New Testament for English readers,” (p. 3.) says,
“Each man reported and each man selected according
to his own personal characteristics of thought and
feeling.”
Yet one other name, that of Bishop Colenso, whose
critical analysis of the Hebrew text is allowed by
scholars to constitute one of the most remarkable monu
ments of patient labour and sober judgment to be
found in literature. These scholars, approaching the
subject from opposite directions, agree in their main
conclusions. Their immediate motives, however, differ
considerably. The object of Dr. Irons is to force us
back, in the search for Infallibility, to rely altogether
upon “the Church.” “Hearthe Church,” is his maxim.
(Matt, xviii. 17.) But which Church ? we must ask,
and ask in vain. What saith the Church of England
in her articles? “As the Churches of Jerusalem,
Antioch, and Alexandria, have erred, so also hath the
Church of Rome erred.” (Art. xix.) Moreover, “General
Councils.............sometimes have erred.” (xxi.) (It was
a general Council that determined what books should
form the canon of Scripture, and what should be
rejected.) Can we wonder if the other Churches rejoin,
as at least one of them has done, with anathemas,
“ So also hath the Church of England erred ?”
The object of Dean Alford was to mediate between
the two extremes of popular orthodoxy and the results
of critical knowledge.
That of Bishop Colenso is simply to find out and state
what is the fact, believing that such purpose alone is
consistent with the deference due to the intellect and
moral sense of man, to truth, and to God Himself. In
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one of his “ Natal Sermons,” he sums up the results of
his labours by describing the Bible as containing the
“Early attempts at History,” the writers of which
record, with «the simplicity of childhood, the first ima
ginings of thoughtful men about the Earth’s formation
and history, and mingle with traditionary lore and
actual fact, the legends and mythical stories of a hoar
antiquity, yet tell us how men were “ moved by the
Holy Ghost,” in those days, how they were “feeling
after God,” and finding Him, how the light shone
clearer and clearer upon their minds, as the day-star
of Eternal truth rose higher and higher upon them. . . .
A human book, in short, though a book full of divine
life.............written, as Paul says, for our learning, but
not all infallibly true.” (i. p. 62, &c.) •
But Dr. Irons and Bishop Colenso, while differing
apparently so widely in their motives, yet have in reality .
the same object. The Bishop would force us back
directly upon the Intellect and the Moral Sense. And
Dr Irons would force us back upon them through the
intermedium of “ the Church,” whatever that may be.
For we need not entertain the uncharitable supposition,
that he would have us substitute the authority of the
Church for that of the Mind and the Conscience.
XVIII.
There is yet another authority to which it is necessary
to refer, inasmuch as it is the highest present expression
of the intellect and moral sense of the country applied
to the regulation of human life in its secular relations.
We have seep that, so far as following Christ and his
precepts are concerned, there are many respects in
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89
which both the Church and the world are palpably
anti-Christian. The world rejects communism, celibacy,
and contempt of knowledge; and both Church and
world set at nought the most positive injunctions of
Christ and of the Bible, as in taking medicine and in
praying in Church. The practice of our Courts of
Law is equally in opposition to the. popular doctrine of
an infallible Bible. Yet, with curious confusion, the
popular mind still endeavours to concur with both;
and judges still have the audacity to assert that the law .
of the land is founded on the Bible.
I will give an example or two.
You will remember the passages I quoted (p. 44.) in
reprobation of the medical profession, and of those who,
in illness, “ Seek not to the Lord, but to the physicians.”
Well, we have among us a small sect calling itself after
a Bible-phrase, “ The Peculiar People.” These hold
that prayer is the only allowable resource for Christians
in tijne of sickness. They do not refuse to cure them
selves of hunger by food, of fatigue by rest, or to pick
themselves up when they fall. They have no consistent
theory or uniform practice respecting the relation of
means to ends. But because a verse in one of the
Epistles enjoins the calling in of the elders to pray over
the sick, and declares that “the prayer of faith shall
save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up;” (Jam.
v. 14.) they prefer to die sooner than call in a doctor, or
take any medicine. Had the Apocrypha been thought
fit by our Church to be included in the Canon, this sect
would have had no existence, for the Book of Ecclesiasticus contains several warm commendations of medicine
and medical men : saying, “ Honour the physician. . . .
for the Lord hath created him............... the Lord hath
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created medicines out of the earth; and he that is wise
will not abhor them.” (xxxviii. i. 1-15, &c.)
A short time ago, however, the neighbours of the
people who are so very “ peculiar” as to show their faith
in the New Testament by their works, and to risk their
lives on the strength of a vote in an ecclesiastical council,
(that rejecting the Apocrypha,) were scandalised by
observing that they had allowed a child to die without
taking any human means to save it. An appearance in
the police-court followed, when the leaders of the sect
attempted to justify their conduct by an. appeal to the
Scriptures. But so diametrically opposed is the Spirit of
our Law to that of the Sacred Books upon which our
Law-Established Church is founded, that the magistrate,
though he made allowance for the offenders on the ground
of gross ignorance, flatly refused to receive their plea, and
warned them that on a repetition of the offence, nothing
would save them from being committed for trial on a
charge of manslaughter. And his conduct received the
approbation of a country calling itself Christian!
The other instance is that of the late case of “ Lyon
versus Home.” This was an action for restitution of’
money obtained under false pretences; and of course in
an action of this nature the one thing to be proved is
that the pretences under which the money was obtained,
were false.
The defendant Home is one of a sect of persons who
claim to hold intercourse with the spirits of the dead.
The prosecutor Lyon is, (or was,) a believer in thedoctrines of that sect, and in the defendant Home as one
of its chief apostles. She is, (or was,) also a wealthy
widow; and under the supposed injunctions of her
departed husband, as made known to her through the-
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mediumship of Home, she made over to Home a large
portion of her property, I believe some <£60,000, but
the amount, however material elsewhere, is not material
to our argument.
You will bear in mind that what I am about to relate
occurred in a country whose laws maintain, at an enormous
expense to its people, a Church called Christian, whose
Sacred Books,—which are accepted by the whole nation
officially as divinely inspired, and by the bulk of the
nation individually as infallibly true,—repeatedly and
unmistakeably affirm the leading doctrines of the sect to
which the parties in this case belonged; namely, that
intercourse is possible and frequent between the living
and the spiritual world.
To quote some of the numerous passages involving this
belief, there is the well-known story of the witch of
Endor, in which the spirit of Samuel is represented as
appearing to the witch, and delivering a discourse for the
benefit of king Saul. (1. Sam. xxxvii.) There is the
statement that at the crucifixion of Jesus, many of “ the
Saints which slept arose. . . . and appeared unto many.”
(Matt, xxvii. 52-53.) There is the story of the “Trans
figuration,” in which Moses and Elias, dead for hundreds
of years, appeared to the disciples; (xvii. &c.) the con
version of Paul, in which Jesus himself, sometime dead,
addressed Paul in an audible voice from heaven, (in the
words of a Greek Play ;*) (Acts ix. 4-6.) and the
summoning back of the spirit of Lazarus to his body.
(John xi. 25-43, &c.) There is the parable of the rich
man in torment conversing with the spirit of Abraham
in bliss, begging, with curious confusion between spirit
and matter, that the spirit of Lazarus might be permitted
* The Bacchae of Euripides.
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to “ dip the tip of his finger in water ” and cool the rich
man’s tongue : or, in case the alleviation of suffering
were not among the functions of the blessed, that the
spirit of Lazarus might be sent back to earth to convert
the five living brethren of the rich man; which last
request-was refused, not as the first was on the ground of
its impossibility, but as superfluous and useless. (Luke
xvi. 22, &c.). We read, too, of guardian angels, (Matt,
iv. 4.) and “ministering spirits;" (Heb. i. 14.) and of
a whole apparatus of intermediate intelligences existing
between God and man. In the Acts we find certain
pious Pharisees exclaiming of Paul, “ if an angel or
spirit hath spoken to him, let us not fight against God.” ♦
(xxiii. 9.) John tells us to “ believe not every spirit, but
try the spirits whether they be of God.” (1 John iv. 1.)
Job, in thrilling language, describes a spirit as passing
before his face and pausing to speak to him. (iv. 15, &c.)
The practice of necromancy is forbidden in Deuteronomy,
(xviii. 2.) its reality not being called in question; (though
how the Jews reconciled it with their denial of the after
life, does not appear.) The Gospels repeatedly refer to
cases of possession by spirits, without specifying their
nature or origin; and in Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible,
the fact of apparitions of the dead is regarded as being,
for the Bible, past a doubt.
S.uch, on this point, are the tenets of the book which
it is an article of faith with the very people whose law
was invoked in the case of “Lyon versus Home,” im
plicitly to believe. And yet, so far from any proof
being required of the falsity of the defendant’s pretences,
they were at once assumed to be an utter and monstrous
imposition; and the defence was laughed out of court,
in face of the contents of the very book upon which the
�and Modern Education.
93
witnesses in it had been sworn : the book upon which
our Religion is “ by law established
and for the sake
of inculcating which as infallible, we insist upon vitiating
or crippling our whole system of National Education !
To these illustrations of the growing divorce between
ancient credulity and modem Belief must be added that
of Witchcraft; concerning the belief in which John
Wesley said that “The Bible and Witchcraft must stand
or fall together.” While the anger excited among us by
the devout utterances of the Prussian king over his late
successes, may be ascribed in some degree to the fact
that we are learning to repudiate the old notions which,
recognising success as the test of merit, make Divine
Providence the arbiter in human quarrels ; and in some
degree to the consciousness of having ourselves been
such eminent practisers in the same pietistic line as to
make king William’s conduct look very much as if meant
for a caricature of our own.
Having paid some attention to the recent sittings of
the Church Assemblies in Edinburgh, I have been pleased
to observe symptoms of a growing respect for the authority
of the Intellect and the Conscience in regard to matters of
Eaith, north of the Tweed. I have read that one clergy
man declared his belief that the sacrifice of Christ was
an atonement of sufficient value to counterbalance the
misdeeds of Satan himself, and justify the Almighty in
pardoning the Arch-fiend; and that another “ elder ”
valued the character of the Deity so highly “that his hair
stood on end at the notion that God could ever be re
conciled to the devil.” I take it as a hopeful sign that
these two theologians should thus renounce all claim to
judge such questions by the old dogmatic standards, and
appeal instead to their own moral sense. They have only
�94
'Jewish Literature
to carry the process somewhat further to perceive that the
God who could create such a being as the devil at dll, or
who could require to be propitiated towards his own off
spring by such a sacrifice as that of Christ at dll, is no
God worthy of being acknowledged or revered by any
being possessed of a spark of intelligence or independence
of spirit.
Lord Chesterfield once wrote to a friend, “Both
Shaftesbury and I have been- dead for several years; but
we don’t wish the fact to be generally known.” In the
same way very much of the Bible has been dead for
some time. It still exists, but is outliving its influence
for evil; and there are many who fancy themselves in
terested in keeping the fact from being generally known.
Yet that it is no chimera which I am encountering,
has just been powerfully illustrated by a discussion in
the House of Lords * in relation to University Tests;
wherein it was declared, both by Lord Houghton and by
the Marquis of Salisbury, that “ the immense majority
of the people of this country adhere to the authority and
teaching of the Bible; their reverence for it being so
absolute that any person who avows hostility to its
doctrines is disabled, not only from holding any office
connected with moral and religious teaching, but almost
from any political office. And that no one can appear at
the hustings with any chance of success, and announce
that he does not accept the Bible.”
XIX.
Sir John Coleridge was right when he said that this
Bible question promised shortly to become the great
* (Debate of May 11th 1871.)
�and Modern Education.
95
religious question of the time. It is so; not for the
reason he then anticipated, hut because the Bible, or
rather the popular theory about the Bible, stops the way
to our advance in all that favours the redemption, or
constitutes the highest good, of a people.
By reason of this one impediment our whole system
of national education “ hangs fire; ” while our systems
of private education are neutralised or vitiated. It is
therefore for those who are under no obligation to refrain
from using their reasoning faculties; those who decline
allegiance to any dispensation which imposes a penalty
for putting forth a hand to .sustain and forward that
which they regard as the Ark of their country’s redemp
tion ; (1 Chron. xiii. 9, &c.) those who believe that it is
only through man working together freely and intelli
gently with man towards the highest moral ends, that
real good is to be done;—it is for these, I say, to grapple
with the difficulty, and if need be, to take the place of
those who have hitherto been our teachers. If we are
no longer to regard the Bible as a Fetich, to be adored,
but not comprehended; if wfe are not to adopt as an
article of Faith the suggestion of the flippant Frenchman,
that the God of the Jewish Scriptures and of our own
advanced intelligence and moral sense, is in reality one
and the self-same Being ;■—that he was once as bad as
the Jews made him out to be, but has improved with
age and experience, (a suggestion I have lately heard
seriously propounded by a clergyman in despair at the diffi
culties he found in the Bible)—then the solution which
has now been proposed must be accepted by us: other
wise the intellect and the conscience must be rejected
altogether as illusory and inventions of the devil; and
some other criterion, and one which discards both
�96
yewish Literature
intellect and conscience, must be sought for to regulate
our judgment.
For my part, I think better of my countrymen than
to believe that when once the truth is put plainly before
them, they will long halt between the two opinions. I
believe that when once the alternative is shown to them
to lie between gross superstition and a rational religious
ness,—they will no longer endure that their faith be only
definable as believing what they know to be untrue; but will
insist on their children being trained to subject all
things to the test of a cultivated intelligence and moral
sense. Thus trained, they will peruse the Bible, no
longer as slaves, but in a spirit of intelligent appreciation,
sifting out the germs of truth for themselves, and not
scoffing at or rejecting the whole on account of the husks.
From henceforth the teacher in the schools of the
nation must never forget that it is the purpose of his
schoolroom to be the training-ground, not of any party or
sect, but whereon to develop the faculties which later in
life are to determine the nature of individual belief. To
impart a bias, or to anticipate or prevent the formation
of genuine, honest opinion, by the early instilment of
dogma, is at once to stultify every principle of sound
education, inasmuch as it is to repress the intellect and
contravene the moral sense. Whatever the views which
may be adopted in mature age by those who have been
educated under the system I am advocating, there will
be no cause to fear that they will be the' worse for being'
founded in an intelligence and moral sense which have
been thus rigidly trained in youth.
Shall it be said of our solution as was said by one
upon first beholding the sea, “ Is this the mighty ocean, •
�and Modern Education.
97
is this all ? ”
“ Yes,” we may confidently reply, in
respect to our reliance upon the intellect and the con
science developed by rational education, “ these are all.”
At first, indeed, you see from the margin but a small part
of them. But only trust yourself to them: launch boldly
out upon them: sail where you will with them, and they
will bear you safely through the whole universe of
being.”
At present, for us in England, the issue lies with our
School-boards. If their members are themselves ignorant
of the simple law of human development in religious
ideas, or are unworthily complacent to the ignorance and
superstition of their constituents, generations may pass
before the standard of education and religion is brought
up to the standard of modern thought and knowledge.
Generations may pass and the Bible will still be found
the subject of hopeless contention, and source of fatal
disunion and weakness. And generations long here
after will find the country sunk deeper and deeper in
ignorance and barbarism; while the nations which have
sprung from our race, and speak our language, will have
passed so far ahead of us that they can only look back
upon “ poor England” with pity and contempt as an effete
and imbecile land, “ whose prophets prophesied falsely,
whose priests bore rule by their means, and whose people
loved to have it so.”
TURNBULL AND SPEARS, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH.
�
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Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Jewish literature and modern education, or: the use and misuse of the Bible in the schoolroom, being two lectures delivered before the Sunday Lecture Society, March 26th and April 2d 1871
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: Ramsgate
Collation: 97, [1, 3] p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Publisher's list on unnumbered pages at the end.
Publisher
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Thomas Scott
Date
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1871
Identifier
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G3435
Creator
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[Unknown]
Subject
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Education
Judaism
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Jewish literature and modern education, or: the use and misuse of the Bible in the schoolroom, being two lectures delivered before the Sunday Lecture Society, March 26th and April 2d 1871), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
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Text
Language
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English
Bible
Judaism
Religious Education
-
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4ce1534d4af2d690b3b4c5d885ed9b86
PDF Text
Text
RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION
IN
SECONDARY FOUNDATION
SCHOOLS.
HOW TO DEAL WITH IT.
HE writer of the following brief remarks has been
impelled to commit them to print by the reflection
that whilst the propriety of allowing the Masters of
Primary Schools to give instruction in religion has for
the last two years formed a prominent subject of
national discussion, the objections which lie against
allowing or requiring the Head Masters of Secondary
Endowed Schools “to make provision, in conjunction
with the Governing Body,” for similar instruction, have
not, as far as he is aware, received adequate attention.
Under the system which at present obtains in the
Secondary Endowed Schools of England, a Head Master
of honesty and intelligence is evidently liable to find
himself in a dilemma of the following kind; either he
must teach the scholars (and whether he does so by
explicit inculcation or by the implication of reticence,
makes but little difference to the resiflt), at a peculiarly
impassionable age, that every detail of the Biblical nar
rative is truth unquestioned and unquestionable on pain
of offending God, and. the maxims of conduct therein
commended, of perfect morality; or he must acquaint
them with some at least of the conclusions to the con
trary established or advanced by modern criticism.
The first alternative, it will be admitted, is not only
very unfavourable to the teacher’s growth in accuracy
of thought on religious topics, and sensitiveness to the
responsibilities of his position, but involves the risk of
drawing the children of parents of broad and en
lightened religious opinions back into the terrifying
misapprehensions, to use no stronger word, which it cost
themselves possibly years of mental agony and painful
study to outgrow. The second alternative would most
assuredly involve him in contentions with the Governors
of the School and with parents of a narrow, unculti
vated, and, by consequence, intolerant type of ortho
doxy, whereby would be caused very probably the im
mediate decadence of the School, and, finally, the ruin
of the Head Master by dismissal where possible.
T
�2
Two courses are open by which the evils indicated
may be avoided. Either the curriculum of instruction
in these schools may be restricted to secular knowledge,
as is the case in the nascent Public Schools and Col
leges in New Zealand, among our colonies ; or the treat
ment of the text of the Bible may be conformed in
practice to that of the histories of Livy and Herodotus,
and the ethical treatises of Plato, Aristotle, and Cicero,
the established conclusions and critical methods of
modern science and historical proof being no more
ignored, discredited, or suppressed in the case of the
one department of study than in that of the other.
It is to be feared that some time must yet elapse
before either of these two courses is introduced by legis
lative enactment into Secondary Endowed Schools. He
desires, therefore, to advocate the immediate establish
ment of a College of Secondary Education, on the Pro
prietary system, after the model of Cheltenham College,
in which the second of the courses defined above, which
is also the one which appears to him abstractedly the
best, may form the distinguishing feature.
He entertains the conviction that the number of
persons has enormously increased of late years, and is
daily increasing still more rapidly, who, so far from
desiring to see promoted in their children, by the in
struction given them in school, a retrogression in reli
gious conceptions from the standard of enlightenment
they have themselves attained, desire to see them aided
and encouraged in achieving and maintaining a like
moral enfranchisement. He is also of opinion that in
the foundation of a school of this kind is to be found
the remedy for the fact that whereas many of the most
able and the most ardent friends of religious enlighten
ment only achieve late in life the mental development
necessary to qualify them for a position in the ranks of
its adherents (perhaps but a few years before they are
removed from active service by death or the infirmities
of advancing years), the champions of obscurantism,
obstruction, and intolerance are recruited, owing to the
present system of Public School education, by the enlist
ment of each successive generation in its childhood.
PRINTED BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLE PULTENEY STREET, HAYMARKET.
�
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Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Religious instruction in secondary foundation schools: how to deal with it
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: [London?]
Collation: 2 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Printed by C.W. Reynell, Little Pulteney Street, London.
Publisher
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[Thomas Scott?]
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
[187-?]
Identifier
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G5536
Subject
The topic of the resource
Education
Religion
Creator
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[Unknown]
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Religious instruction in secondary foundation schools: how to deal with it), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Conway Tracts
Education
Religious Education
-
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bbde8cb69c4a92f4056d2a675eb1a350
PDF Text
Text
��ALPHABET OF THE DEAF AND DUMB.
a
b
c
d
e
��THE
FIFTY.SECOND ANNUAL EEPORT
OF THE
Directors and Officers
OF THE
AMERICAN ASYLUM
AT HARTFORD,
FOR THE
EDUCATION AND INSTRUCTION
OF THE
DEAF AND DUMB.
PRESENTED TO THE ASYLUM, MAY 16,' 1868.
HARTFORD, CONN.:
WILEY, WATERMAN & EATON, STEAM BOOK AND JOB PRINTERS,
1868.
��PBESIDE1TT.
Hon. CALVIN DAY.
VICE-PRESIDE JSTT^.
JAMES B. HOSMER,
HENRY A. PERKINS,
BARZILLAI HUDSON,
SAMUEL S. WARD,
CHARLES GOODWIN,
ROLAND MATHER,
JOHN BEACH,
NATHANIEL SHIPMAN.
DIRECTORS.
(By Election.)
LEONARD CHURCH,
ERASTUS COLLINS,
LUCIUS BARBOUR,
JONATHAN B. BUNCE,
GEO. M. BARTHOLOMEW,
OLCOTT ALLEN,
JOHN C. PARSONS,
ROWLAND SWIFT,
PINCKNEY W. ELLSWORTH,
FRANCIS B. COOLEY.
EX-OFFICIO.
His Excellency, JOSHUA L. CHAMBERLAIN, Governor of Maine.
Hon. F. M. DREW, Secretaiy of State.
His Excellency, WALTER HARRIMAN, Governor of New Hampshire.
Hon. JOHN D. LYMAN, Secretary of State.
His Excellency, JOHN B. PAGE, Governor of Vermont.
Hon. GEORGE NICHOLS, Secretary of State.
His Excellency, ALEXANDER H. BULLOCK, Governor of Massachusetts.
Hon. OLIVER WARNER, Secretary of State.
His Excellency, AMBROSE E. BURNSIDE, Governor of Rhode Island.
Hon. JOHN R. BARTLETT, Secretary of State.
His Excellency, JAMES E, ENGLISH, Governor of Connecticut.
Hon. LEVERETT E. PEASE, Secretary of State.
SECRETARY.
JOHN C. PARSONS.
TREASURER.
ROLAND MATHER.
��©Sow an4 Teaslws
PRINCIPAL.
Rev. COLLINS STONE, M. A.
INSTRUCTOR OF THE GALLAUDET SCIENTIFIC SCHOOL.
JOHN C. BULL, M. A.
INSTRUCTORS.
DAVID E. BARTLETT, M. A.
JOHN R. KEEP, M. A.
RICHARD S. STORRS, M.. A.
EDWARD C. STONE, M. A.
JOB WILLIAMS, M. A.
ABEL S. CLARK, B. A.
WILSON WELTON.
WILLIAM H. WEEKS.
MARY A. MANN.
SARAH W. STORRS.
CATHARINE BLAUVELT.
TEACHER OF DRAWING.
Miss LOUISE STONE.
ATTENDING PHYSICIAN.
E. K. HUNT, M. D.
STEWARD.
HENRY KENNEDY.
ASSISTANT STEWARD.
SALMON CROSSETT.
MATRON.
Mrs. PHEBE C. WHITE.
ASSISTANT MATRONS.
Mrs. REBECCA A. CADY.
Miss NANCY DILLINGHAM.
RUEUS LEWIS, Master
of the
Cabinet Shop.
WILLIAM B. FLAGG, Master of
the
Shoe Shop.
Miss MARGARET GREENLAW, Mistress
of the
Tailors’ Shop.
��REPORT OF THE DIRECTORS.
To the Patrons and Friends of the American Asylum.
Since the Asylum has entered on the second half century of
its existence, we have been frequently called to deplore the death
of some of its earliest friends. But seldom has any loss been
so marked and irreparable as that which we have suffered by
the death of our late President, Hon. William W. Ellsworth,
in January, 1868. His election to the office was not a tribute
simply to his abilities, his honored name, his political and judi
cial positions, his ripe age or his moral worth, though all these
claims he had to our reverence and esteem.
But he had been, from its inception, a warm and devoted
friend of the Asylum. He was its first Secretary. He was
then a Director. Retiring from the Board under the pressure of
professional and political life, he was again brought into official
relations with the Institution, while for four years Governor of
this State., When in 1862, the office of President was vacated
by the death of Judge Williams, it seemed naturally and fitly to
devolve upon Judge Ellsworth. His associates in this body will
not soon forget with what dignity, conscientiousness, and earn
estness, he discharged his duties as President. A copy of the
resolutions on the occasion of Judge Ellsworth’s death, passed
at an informal meeting of the Directors, is appended to this
Report
At the annual meeting of this Corporation in 1867, its by
laws were so amended as to constitute the Governors and Secre
taries of all the New England States ex-officio members of the
2
�10
Board of Directors. The doubt then expressed, whether non
resident Directors would find it practicable to attend our meet
ings, has been confirmed. But, these gentlemen have generally
manifested by letter, or in personal interviews with the Princi
pal and pupils, or by visits at the Asylum, such a warm inter
est in its welfare, as greatly to gratify and encourage the officers,
instructors and pupils of the institution.
No special or extraordinary action on the part of the Board
has been required since our last Report All the departments
of supervision and instruction have been satisfactorily filled', and
the accompanying Reports show the results of patient labor in a
year of unusual prosperity.
To the Report of the Treasurer, should be added the fact that
the Asylum is still deprived of any income from its Phoenix
Bank stock. We regret that no settlement of the questions in
dispute has yet been reached, but think we may reasonably an
ticipate an adjustment at an early day.
In behalf of the Directors,
JOHN C. PARSONS, Clerk
Hartford, May 9th, 1868.
�RESOLUTIONS.
At an informal meeting of the Directors of the American
Asylum at Hartford, for the Education and Instruction of the
Deaf and Dumb, held at their office on the 18th day of January,
A. D. 1868, James B. Hosmer, Esq., Senior Vice President in
the chair,
THE FOLLOWING RESOLUTIONS WERE ADOPTED.
God in his Providence having removed by death the Hon.
William W. Ellsworth, the President of this Society, and one
of the original corporators, of the Asylum,
Resolved, That as members of this Board, we are called upon
in his decease, to mourn the loss of one of the earliest and most
efficient friends of the important charity committed to our care;
one whose intelligent interest, active labors, .and wise counsels
have contributed largely to the career of usefulness and benefi
cence with which the Institution, during fifty years of its his
tory has been crowned.
Resolved, That we desire to place on record our profound ap
preciation, derived from long and intimate association with the
deceased, of his eminent ability, his spotless integrity, his sound
judgment, his warm sympathies, his genial Christian courtesy,
and of the rare purity, simplicity and nobleness which adorned
his character, and shone forth in all the relations of his useful
life; and while we feel his removal as a deep personal bereave
ment and a great public loss, we yet recognize the fact, that, as
ripened grain, he has been gathered, full of years and honors, to
his rest and reward.
Resolved, That in testimony of our respect for his memory,
we will attend his funeral in a body; that the clerk be directed
to enter these resolutions upon the records of the Board, and to
transmit a copy of the same to the family of the deceased, and
to furnish a copy to the newspapers of the city for publication.
J. C. PARSONS, Clerk.
��REPORT OF THE PRINCIPAL.
To The Board of Directors:
Gentlemen:—The number of pupils in attendance at the
date of my last Report, was two hundred and twenty-four.
Forty-one new pupils have been admitted during the year, and
one former pupil, making the whole number under instruction
two hundred and sixty-six. Forty-one have left the school, and
the number now present is two hundred and twenty-five. These
are arranged in thirteen classes, under eight hearing, and five
deaf-mute teachers, giving each class an average of seventeen
pupils.
While the general health of the family has been excellent, we
have to record the death of two interesting pupils, Myron W.
Day, of South Royalston, Mass., and Alvah-H. Harris, of Ne
ponset, in the same State. The former died on the 13th of May,
1867, from congestion of the lungs, following an attack of mea
sles, and the latter on Feb. 18th, 1868, from erysipelas. Both
were bright, promising boys—successful in their studies, and
loved by their teachers and companions. In the bloom of youth
they were suddenly called away; yet we indulge the hope that
the instruction they were permitted here to receive served to
prepare them for that unknown future they have so unexpected
ly entered. Mr. Arthur H. Whitmore, who had been a member
of our corps of instructors somewhat less than a yean, died from
quick consumption on the 26th of August last. Mr. Whitmore,
after teaching for a year in the Pennsylvania Institution, entered
upon his duties here with characteristic ardor, and proved him
self a skillful and faithful instructor. He was a young man of
pure and lovely character, and of great promise, and his early
death is a serious loss to the profession.
>
�14.
The position thus rendered vacant was filled by the engage
*
ment of Mr. Abel S. Clark, a graduate of Yale, of the class of
1867, who, by the successful experiment of several months, has
already shown a gratifying and satisfactory degree of aptness for
his new work.
The arrangements for securing the health, comfort and educa
tion of so large a family as ours, necessarily involve the most
careful attention. There are so many families personally inter
ested in these arrangements, that a detailed narration of the dai
ly routine of our household may not be unacceptable. The pu
pils, called by one of their number, rise at 5 o’clock in summer,
and at 6 o’clock in winter. Breakfast is served at half-past six,
the time before breakfast in summer being devoted to amuse
ment. At seven the boys repair to the shops (of which we have
three, a tailor’s, cabinet and shoe-shop,) where they are occupied
till a quarter before nine. The larger girls, divided into four sec
tions, engage in domestic duties. One class clear the tables, wash
the dishes in the dining hall, and make the beds; one sweep the
school rooms and halls; a third go to the laundry, while a fourth
engage in plain sewing, and mending their own garments. These
divisions alternate in their several duties once a month. The
pupils under twelve are excused from these arrangements, and
after committing a short lesson spend the time in amusement
At a quarter before nine the boys leave the shops and prepare
themselves for school. At five minutes before nine the pupils,
under the charge of a monitor, quietly, and in perfect order, pro
ceed to the chapel. The service is conducted by the principal,
or one of the instructors, and occupies about fifteen minutes. A
text of scripture is written in large characters upon a slate, so as
to be visible from all parts of the room. This is explained and
commented upon in a simple and practical manner, and a brief
prayer is offered. The entire exercise is in pantomime, or the
natural sign language of the deaf-mute, is intelligible to nearly
all in the room, scarcely excepting the youngest, and brief, sim
ple and practical, is one of great interest and profit to the pupils.
The profound stillness of the company, the fixed attention, and
the intelligent appreciation of the course of remark, as indicated
by the frequent response of the eye and head, are very impres
sive to those who witness the exercise for the first time.
�15
Making careful note of the chapter and verse of the text ex
plained, the pupils repair, in order, to the school rooms for the
instructions of the morning. These are interrupted at half-past
ten by a recess of fifteen minutes, and at 12 o’clock they go to
the dining room. The meal is eminently a social one, the diet
is abundant, varied and acceptable. After dinner comes amuse
ment, always in the open air, when the weather will allow. At
two o’clock school reassembles, and continues till four, when the
pupils go again to the chapel, in the same order as in the morn
ing. Meantime the text explained has been committed to mem
ory, and is spelled on the fingers by one of the boys, and also
by one of the girls, prayer following, and the exercise occupying
about ten minutes. The pupils are then dismissed, and the boys
go again to the shops, where they remain till a quarter before
six. All the girls engage for the same time in plain sewing,
dress-making, knitting, etc. Tea comes at six, and from tea till
study-hours—seven in winter, and till time to light the gas in
summer, is spent in playing, walking or conversation. The
younger pupils go to bed at seven, and the older pupils spend
an hour in study under the care of an instructor. At half-past
nine all retire. On Saturday we have no school, but the boys
work in the shops till eleven o’clock and the girls are busied in
sewing. Then follows the bathing, every pupil having a thor
ough warm bath at least once a week. The afternoon of Satur
day is spent in visiting objects of interest in the city, excursions
to the woods, or games upon the grounds of the Institution.
The boys are supplied with balls and quoits, and with skates and
sleds in their season, and often become quite expert in chess and
checkers. The girls have jumping-ropes, swings, sea-saws,
hoops, croquet, with sleds and skates. The little boys, when out
of school, are under the constant supervision of the AssistantSteward, who sees to their daily ablutions, mingles in their sports,
and devotes himself to their comfort and happiness. The Ma
tron and one of the Assistant-Matrons have special charge of
the girls when out of school, with the care of their clothing,
while the other Assistant superintends the kitchen department,
and house arrangements. The girls cut and make their own
dresses and under.-garments, do their own mending, make all the
�16
sheets, tablecloths, towels and napkins, and boys’ shirts, and
knit all the socks that are furnished the pupils. In the tailor’s
shop the little boys become expert in the use of the needle, and
make jackets and pants. The boys in the cabinet shop not only
learn the use of tools, but make tables, bureaus and desks of ex
cellent workmanship. Those in the shoe-shop acquire a good
knowledge of the trade, and become able to earn good wages.
Order is indispensable in such a community as ours. This is
secured almost entirely by moral means. The pupils, while out
of school are under the care of monitors, who note irregularities
of conduct, rudeness, quarrelling or graver offences. These are
entered upon a book provided for the purpose, and are reviewed
every month by the principal in the chapel. A pupil who has
received no mark of discredit for a month, thus showing entire
correctness of conduct, has his or her name entered upon the
Boll of Honor, where it will remain among the permanent re
cords of the Institution. In addition to this the pupil receives
a badge to be worn upon the person, indicating good behavior.
By this and other methods a strong influence is brought to bear
in the direction of quietness, order and correct deportment, and
the results are in the highest degree gratifying. Among one
hundred and thirty-five boys, many of whom have grown up
without the least restraint or control, ninety-three during one of
the winter months, received this honor, while the offences of the
others were mostly of a trifling character; and of the ninetythree girls eighty-five received a similar commendation. It is
believed that few schools of hearing children, of the same size,
would endure such a test with higher credit.
We have been honored during the year by visits from Gov.
Chamberlain, accompanied by his Council, from Maine, from
Gov. Harriman, of New Hampshire, from the Hon. Secretary and
members of the Board of Education, from Massachusetts, and
from the Hon. John B. Bartlett, Secretary of State, and Com
missioner for Deaf Mutes of Bhode Island. I have also had
the pleasure during the year, as Principal of the Institution, of
visiting the Legislative Bodies of all the States, of New Eng
land, accompanied by pupils in different stages of their course,
showing the proficiency they attain in the various branches of
�17
education and explaining our methods of instruction. The
Delegation was everywhere kindly received, and our rela
tions with these Bodies are of the most friendly character.
In the recent discussions respecting the best methods of edu• eating deaf mutes, we hear much of the French and of the
German schools. As these schools were the pioneers, and for
many years, the only workers in this department of education,
and as they differed materially in their fundamental principles,
as well as in their practical methods, there was an eminent pro
priety in the rival systems receiving their designation from the
countries where they originated. The work of deaf-mute edu
cation, however, has now been prosecuted in this country with
enthusiasm and with the highest success, for more than fifty
years. In no country in Christendom, are there more able and
devoted men engaged in this benevolent work, in none is it
more distinctly recognized as the unquestioned duty of the
State, no where are the pecuniary means and appliances more
liberally and cheerfully provided, and we are free to say, in no
country has the education of the deaf mute been carried to a
higher point, reached a larger class, or been prosecuted on a
broader or more practical basis than in our own. It is quite
time, therefore, and for similar reasons, that as we are beginning
to'have an American Literature, and the phases of a distinct
American nationality, we should speak of an American sys
tem of deaf-mute education. Though our methods do not dif
fer widely from some followed in other countries, they yet have
their peculiar features.
Our system is eminently eclectic.
Selecting the improvements and best features of other systems,
we weave them into one consistent whole, of the highest practi
cal utility. We challenge our brethren engaged in this profes
sion in other countries, to the noble emulation of bringing deaf
mutes to a higher plain of culture, of imparting to them a more
perfect use of the language of their country, of preparing them
more fully for the duties of intelligent citizenship, in fine, of
relieving them more completely from the pressure of their mis
fortune, than is effected in American Institutions, as the result
of the American system of instruction.
3
�18
The Report of the special Joint Committee of the Massachu
setts Legislature, (session of 1867) to whom the subject of deafmute education was referred, and before whom the rival systems
were so fully discussed, came to hand so late, that it could be
noticed only in the briefest manner in the last Report presented to
your Board. The conclusions reached by this able Committee,
after listening to a thorough discussion of the subject, were, for
the most part, those which were then advocated, and have ever
been maintained by this Institution.
Among the “ conclusions ” to which they arrive, are the follow
ing:
“ The sign language and manual alphabet can be taught to all
classes of deaf persons and deaf mutes, and are the most effect
ual means of communicating information to a large majority of
such persons.
“ Your Committee believe that to the majority of those con
genitally deaf, or who lost their hearing in infancy, it (articula
tion) cannot be successfully taught; but that it can to the major
ity of semi-mutes and semi-deaf persons.” p. 16.
The Committee place a higher value on lip-reading, and upon
the ease with which it may be acquired, than our experience will
allow us to do. Alluding, however, to the difficulties attending
it, they make the following quotation from a letter from a cler
gyman, who is himself afflicted with deafness.
“ In order to read on the lips of an individual, it is necessary
that he should speak plainly, deliberately, distinctly, and show
an expressive face. Those who wear a full beard, raise their
voices to a loud tone, speak with great rapidity, so as to run
their words together, are very verbose with long sentences, show
little or no movement of their lips, or keep the teeth closed
together, are seldom or never understood at all.”
They go on to remark:
“ That a small number only can be taught lip-reading by one
teacher, and that when learned, it can be made available only in
a favorable light, and at short distances. Your Committee
felt that at the several hearings, the deaf mutes present, if they
had been taught lip-reading only, could not have obtained any
clear idea of the proceedings, which they were enabled to do by
�■
the manual signs of Prof Bartlett, who acted as interpreter.”—
p. 17.
“
The Committee sensibly remark, with regard to the best
method of instructing deaf mutes, that “ it is a question of pro
portions.” All practical teachers allow,that while all deaf mutes
can be taught thoroughly and well, through the medium of signs, a
portion can be benefitted by instruction in articulation, and can
acquire a certain amount of intelligible speech. The vital point
upon which this controversy turns, is, What is this proportion ?
It is very clear that the line dividing those who can profitably
be taught to speak, from those who cannot, does not run
between children born deaf, and those who lost their hearing even
as late as three or four years of age. The ability to acquire
speech, is affected by other important considerations, such as
acuteness of mental perception, quickness of observation, flexi
bility of the vocal organs, and a retentive memory, any of
which may be wanting in children who have lost their hearing
at a comparatively late period. It not unfrequently happens
that when none of these disabilities exist, and the child can dis
tinguish and imitate the position of the vocal organs, the pitch
of the voice is so disagreeable as to render the speech acquired
intolerable. We are sometimes greatly annoyed by the harsh
tones of adult persons, who from a partial loss of hearing, are
unable to modulate their voices. When the loss of hearing is
total, the attempt at speech is often so discordant that it is seldom
made. We hold in the highest esteem the tones of the human
voice in all their wonderful and varied play and scope, if they
are modulated by a sensitive, delicate ear. But there are few
sounds in nature so intolerable, so grating upon every sensibility
and nerve, as those of the human voice not thus controlled.
There are some sounds in nature that we expect to be harsh and
discordant, and therefore, if unavoidable, we can endure them
with some degree of patience. But rough screeching tones of
the voice are not among these, certainly if there is a more excel
lent way of communication. When to this unpleasantness, is
added an unintelligible utterance which demands frequent repe
tition, taking into the account also, that to acquire this amount
of speech, involves a large expenditure of labor, which brings
�20
no other return, it is hardly a question whether the labor of
acquisition, is compensated by the benefit received. We hold
distinctly, that the natural signs of the deaf mute, for communi
cation on common matters, are not only more agreeable, but more
intelligible than a great mass of this imperfect speech, and where
persons can resort to writing, such speech, if acquired, should
be, in fact actually is set aside. The practical question, there
fore, and the one which in spite of all theories, will decide the
matter among sensible persons, is not what proportion of deaf
mutes can be made, by great labor, to articulate words, which
may to a certain degree be understood, but how many have
voices that will allow them to use their power of speech obtained
at such an expense. Taking into consideration the acknowl
edged loss of mental development involved in all cases in which
articulation is taught, the imperfection of the speech acquired in
many cases, and the chance that the tones may be annoying
and disagreeable, our experience has led us to the conclusion that
very few pupils, except those who are semi-mutes and semi-deaf,
can profitably spend much time in this labor. At the same time,
we fully concede that there are cases of congenital deafness,
where there is on the part of the child, a peculiar flexibility of
the vocal organs, and a bright mind, and on the part of the
friends, intelligence and abundant leisure, in which instruction
in articulation may be properly and successfully given. Even
in these cases, it is too tedious and uncertain to be made the
medium of instruction. It should be given as a means of
communication, and rather as an accomplishment, than as a par
ticularly valuable part of education.
The proposition we are considering, will be materially affected
by the language which it is proposed to communicate orally to
the deaf mute. German, Italian, or French teachers, may suc
ceed in a much larger number of cases, and to a higher degree,than
those who seek to impart the English language. If half the
number of deaf mutes can be taught to speak intelligibly in
these languages, and there is no reliable evidence that nearly
this proportion can be so instructed, it by no means follows that
a like proportion can acquire the same facility in the English
language. Our language confessedly presents peculiar difficul
�21
ties to the deaf mute; difficulties so formidable that those -who
have tried it, with scarcely an exception, agree with the views
already stated as to the number who can be successfully taught.
Mr. E. M. Gallaudet, President of the National Deaf-Mute
College at Washington, and son of the distinguished Founder of
this Institution, has recently visited the prominent schools for
deaf mutes in Europe, to notelaarefully their methods, and par
ticularly their success in teaching articulation. It has been
vauntingly asserted, and no little pains taken to spread the in
pression, that in consequence of this examination, Mr. Gallau
det has reached conclusions differing widely from those adopted
by his venerated father, and his successors in this school, that
he has returned to this country an advocate for material changes
■in the methods followed here, and finally, that his Report proves
that statements we have made respecting methods pursued in
other countries, are at variance with facts. To show how ground
less are such representations, we have only to allow the able
Report of Mr. Gallaudet to speak for itself.
We have maintained that articulation, as a medium of instruc
tion, has, with but one notable exception, been rejected by Brit
ish instructors and Institutions. What says Mr. G.’s Report on
this point?—The following is the testimony of Mr. Charles Ba
ker, the distinguished Principal of the Doncaster Institution:
“ The success hitherto attendant on the. efforts to teach articulation to
the totally deaf, is by no means flattering, and I do not believe there is one
Institution in our country which can produce a dozen pupils whose articu
lation could be understood by indifferent auditors ... I must therefore
decide against giving up the time now bestowed on the acquisition of lan
guage, and useful knowledge, by my pupils, to devote it to the specious
acquirement of articulation.” pp. 12. 13.
After remarking that at the Institution at Edinburgh, under
Mr. Kinniburgh, articulation was the original basis, Mr Baker
says:
“ To my certain knowledge, it early gave way to means more universally
applicable. Of the older Institutions of these Isles, about twenty, not one
has adopted articulation, except in the cases of those pupils who could
hear a little, or who had become deaf after they had acquired speech.” p. 50.
Mr. Hooper, of the Birmingham Institution, one of the oldest
in Great Britain,
�u Is inclined to coincide with Prof. Baker’s view, that the results of the
labor of teaching the great body of deaf mutes artificial speech, and read1ng on the lips, are not of sufficient practical benefit to compensate for the
necessary outlay of time and labor... in the case of the semi-mute and se
mi-deaf, it is the duty of instructors to see that all possible means are taken
to retain and improve what speech is possessed by the pupil. This is done
in the Birmingham school, but no more, in the direction of articula
tion.” p. 13.
Mr. Patterson, of the Manchester Institution,
“ Coincides entirely with Prof. Baker and Mr. Hopper. Although he has
in several cases taught it successfully to congenital mutes, he thinks it im
practicable for any large proportion of the deaf and dumb.” p. 121.
Mr. Buxton, of the Liverpool school, who has had several years
actual experience in this branch of instruction in the London
Institution, says:
“ Articulation was formerly taught in the Liverpool school to a greater
extent than at present. Now, only the semi-mute and semi-deaf are instruc
ted in artificial speech and bp-reading.”
Mr. Buxton mentioned that “many cases in his experience had
arisen, where parents of his pupils particularly requested that
their children should not be taught articulation. The reason for
this, is found in the fact that the artificially acquired utterances
of the deaf, are generally monotonous, and oftentimes disagreea
ble : so unpleasant evidently, in certain cases, as to lead the pa
rents of uneducated mutes to express the desire above referred
to.” p. 16.
The venerable Duncan Anderson, of the Glascow Institution,
who in former years had given much attention to this subject,
and had prepared a valuable manual for use in this branch of
deaf-mute instruction, says:
“ The experience of nearly half a century of personal deaf-mute instruc
tion had led him to abandon all efforts at articulation, save with the semi
deaf and semi-mute.” p. 16.
Again he says:
“ On looking back upon an experience of forty-one years as a teacher of
the deaf and dumb, I am free to confess that the few successful instances
of articulation by deaf mutes which I have witnessed in this and other
countries, were very inadequate to the time and pains bestowed upon
them.” ibid.
�23
The Rev. John Kinghan, of the Institution- of Belfast, Ire.
land,
“ Is as decided in his testimony against articulation as any instructor in
the United Kingdom. He deems it, to use his own words, ‘ worse than use
less in a vast majority of cases;’ including the semi-deaf and semi
mute.” p. 17.
The views of the Principals of the other schools in the British
Isles visited by Mr. Gallaudet, agree entirely with those above
presented, and similar opinions are entertained by the Masters of
several schools on the continent. The gentlemen whose testi
mony is here quoted, are among the oldest and ablest teachers of
deaf mutes in the world. Their lives have been devoted to this
work, and their writings and their labors have placed them in the
highest rank among the benefactors of this class of persons.
Mr. Gallaudet sensibly remarks:
“ The testimony of such experienced instructors as those now conducting
the eight schools declaring against articulation, coupled with the consid
eration that in the majority of them, it has been successfully taught, is en
titled to great weight, while the fact that it is where the English language
is spoken that such strong ground is taken, should not be lost sight of by
Americans.”
It will be noticed that views of British teachers as above ex
pressed, correspond with our own, that few, except the semi-mute
and semi-deaf, can profitably be taught to speak.
Although German teachers make this proportion larger than
this, it does not, in their view, embrace the whole number, or a
majority. Canon de Haerne, of the Institution of Brussels, Bel
gium, while believing “ that a decided majority of so-called deafmutes are unable to acquire any valuable facility in artificial
speech, holds that in addition to the semi-deaf and semi-mute,
about ten per-cent, of congenital mutes, may acquire fluency in
this method of communication.
Signor Tarra, of the Milan Institution, estimates the number
of deaf mutes who may succeed in articulation, at thirty per-cent.,
including the semi-mutes and semi-deaf, and also many who
could not talk readily with strangers.
Mr. Hill, of Weissenfels, who stands at the head of deaf-mute
instruction in Germany, says that out of one hundred, eleven can
converse readily with strangers on ordinary topics. Prof. Vaisse
�24
of the Paris Institution, gives the same proportion. “Out of
ten, the number who can converse with strangers on all subjects,
and with ease, will not extend to more than two, and often to no
more than one.” Of the more than one hundred teachers con
sulted by Mr. Gallaudet, only one claimed that success in arti
culation was the rule among deaf mutes.
These, it will be noticed, are the opinions of gentlemen who
are advocates of the articulating system. The usual average is
thirty per-cent., one placing it at fifty per-cent, and only one
placing it higher than this. Is it not highly probable, without
casting the least reflection on these worthy and able gentlemen,
that the unbiassed judgment of a candid and competent observer,
would make the proportion of clearly successful cases consid
erably smaller than this ?
Mr. Grallaudet states it as his own judgment, that from ten to
twenty per-cent, of the deaf and dumb can profitably be taught
articulation. As the semi-mute and semi-deaf constitute about
half this number, he would thus judge that ten per-cent, of con
genital mutes are worthy of such instruction. This we believe
to be a larger number than any experiment yet made in the En
glish language will warrant, nor do we think it desirable for the
sake of a possible benefit conferred upon this proportion, to sub
ject thd whole number to the tedious and exhausting processes
of artificial speech, during the first year of their instruction. Mr.
G. gives his final conclusions on this point, in the following de
cided language:
“ It is plainly evident from what is seen in the articulating schools of Eu’rope, and from the candid opinions of the best instructors, that oral lan
guage, cannot in the fullest sense of the term, be mastered by a majority of
deaf mutes. ... It should be regarded as an accomplishment attain
able by a minority only. . . . The numbei’ of those born deaf who
can acquire oral language is small, and their success may justly be attribu
ted to the possession of peculiar talents or gifts, involving almost preternat
ural quickness of the eye in detecting the slight variations in positions of
the vocal organs in action, and a most unusual control over the muscles of
the mouth and throat.” p. 53.
It is indeed evident from Mr. Gallaudet’s observations, that if
there has been any change in the views of teachers on the Con
tinent within the last ten years, it has been quite as distinctly a
�26
Movement towards the use of signs as towards articulation.
While in some schools in which the latter method was formerlydisused, a portion of the pupils are now taught to speak, in
others in which articulation was the sole method, signs are freely
used and highly valued. In place of the theory once quite
general among the disciples of Heinicke, that all deaf mutes of
sound mental development could be taught to speak, and that
inability to acquire speech, indicated a want of ordinary capacity,
it is now generally admitted, on the one hand, that a large class can
only be successfully instructed by signs, and on the other, that
they are an important adjunct in teaching articulating pupils.
With regard to the value of signs in the instruction of all
classes of deaf mutes, the opinion of prominent German teach
ers is emphatic and decided. Mr. Hill states his views in the
strongest terms. Speaking of proscribing every species of pan
tomimic language, he says:
“ This pretence is contrary to nature, and repugnant to the rules of sound
educational science. If this system were put into execution, the moral
life, the intellectual development of the deaf and dumb, would be inhu
manly hampered. It would be acting contrary to nature to forbid the deaf
mute a means of expression employed even by hearing and speaking per
sons. ... To banish the language of natural signs from the school
room and limit ourselves to articulation, is like employing a golden key
which does not fit the lock of the door we would open, and refusing to use
the iron one made for it. . -. . Where is the teacher, who can consci
entiously declare that he has discharged his duty, in prosponing moral and
religious education until he can impart it by means of articulation ? ”—
p. 29.
Mr. Hill acknowledges in the language of natural signs, among
a number of other particulars which he mentions, the following
excellencies:
—“ One of the two universally intelligible innate forms of expression
granted by God to mankind—a form which is in reality more or less em
ployed by every human being.
—The element in which the mental life of the deaf mute begins to germi
nate and grow; the only means whereby he, on his admission to the school,
may express his thoughts, feelings and wishes.
—An instrument of mental development and substantial instruction, made
use of in the intercourse of the pupils with each other; for example, the
well known beneficial influences which result from the association of the
new pupils with the more advanced.
I
�26
—A most efficacious means of assisting even pupils in the higher degrees
of school training, giving light, warmth, animation to spoken language,
which for sometime after its introduction, continues dull and insipid.”—
p. 30.
Of its aid in religious instruction Mr. Hill remarks:
“ It is particularly in the teaching of religion, that the language of pan
tomime plays an important part, especially when it is not only necessary to.
instruct, but to operate on sentiment and will; either because here this lan
guage is indispensable to express the moral state of man, his thoughts and
his actions, or that the word alone
too little impression on the eye of
the mute to produce without the aid of pantomime, the desired effect in a
manner sure and sufficient.” p. 30, 31.
We have no where met with a more appreciative exposition
of the real significance and value of natural signs in the educa
tion of the deaf and dumb, than these forcible paragraphs of Mr.
Hill.
We will close our quotations with the decided and emphatic
testimony of Mr. Gfallaudet in favor of the American system of
deaf-mute education.
“ It is hardly needful for me to say, after what has been said in this Re
port, that nothing in my foreign investigations has led me to question the
character of the foundation on which the system of instruction pursued in
our American Institutions is based. The edifice is built on the rock of
sound philosophy; its comer stone is universal applicability; its materials
are cemented by consistency and success, while for its crowning beauty it
has a dome of high educational attainment, loftier and more grand than
can be seen in the nations of the Old World.” p. 53.
We have made these copious extracts from this able and in
teresting Report, partly from the relation of its author to the
founder of our own school, and partly because the Report itself,
has been confidently quoted as a distinct condemnation of the
methods and principles which have been advocated here, from
the beginning to the present time.
We entered into this discussion at the outset, and have con
tinued it, with no partisan spirit, The principles upon which
our Institution was founded, and has since been conducted, were
sharply assailed. Our sole object has been to show that we are
not beating the air, but are working intelligently and success
fully to secure grand and important ends: that the methods we
adopt for this purpose, are sanctioned by sound philosophy, as
�well as by the experience of the most able men who have turned
their attention to this subject. We regard no Institution or school
as in any sense a rival in this good work, but hail with satisfac
tion every honest effort to help on the education, and consequent
elevation of the unfortunate mute. Wedded mechanically to
no system for its own sake, or for any prestige of antiquity or
association, we strive to give our pupils the best education which
science, skill and faithful instruction, under the best methods,
can impart.
The semi-mute and semi-deaf children who are sent to us, have
always received special attention. While by instruction, through
the medium of signs, their minds have been sedulously culti
vated, we have been careful to retain and improve all their pow
er of speech. This has sometimes been done by assigning to
this class a special teacher, and at other times by placing them
under speaking instructors, and holding with them constant oral
communication. We propose still to give these children every
desirable advantage, assigning to them a special instructor, if the
numbers will warrant it; if not, taking care, by other methods,
that the facility of speech which some of them possess, shall not
be lost. We deem this discussion as in all respects fortunate and
timely, as it has served to bring not only the real calamity of the
deaf mute, but also the best means of relieving it, more distinct
ly to public attention. We have no apprehension respecting the
verdict of sensible persons who will review the whole subject.
The newspapers* sent our pupils, for the most part weekly
issues from the vicinity of their own homes, contribute so mani
festly not only to their enjoyment, but also to their intellectual
progress, that they are worthy of distinct mention. Before his
education commences, the deaf mute is shut out to a great degree
from a knowledge of the events occurring in the world around
him. A happy change comes over him when, on entering the In
stitution, he is brought within the electric circle of intelligence,
and becomes informed, even through others, of what is daily
transpiring in the busy world. When his education is so far ad
vanced that he can read for himself from the columns of a pa
per the record of passing events, his interest is unbounded. It
/
* Appendix, No. TV.
�28
is often surprising to notice the extent to which even those
whose ability to use language, from the short time they have
been at school, is quite limited, yet are able to spell out the
meaning of a paragraph containing some item of news from fa
miliar localities, while the large class of more advanced pupils
read the papers with intelligent facility, and with far more enjoy
ment than is usual with hearing persons. The papers are regu
larly distributed, care being taken to supply the children with
issues from their own neighborhood. They are perused with
eagerness, and there are few communities more thoroughly posted
in the current news of the day than our own.
The walls of the Institution have received some graceful and
most acceptable decorations during the year. An excellent set
of the Cartoons of Raphael, presented by the Rev. J. D. Hull,
of New York, have been handsomely framed and placed in the
girls’ sitting room, where they are a constant joy to many observ
ing and admiring eyes. Mr. R. S. DeLamater, and Messrs. Web
ster & Popkins, have each presented us with a highly finished
photograph of the venerable Laurent Clerc, while Messrs. Prescott
& White, have furnished fine copies of the old and well engraved
portraits of those magnates of deaf-mute education, the Abbe
De 1’ Epee, and the Abbe Sicard. These pictures are finished
in the highest style of art, and as long as the Institution shall
stand, they will remain on its walls, speaking representatives of
these benefactors of the Deaf and Dumb, and of the skill of the
generous artists who have so faithfully perpetuated their memoryA citizen of Hartford, who is in the habit of such kind deeds,
but whose modesty prefers that his name shall be withheld, has
gained for himself a warm place in the hearts of our pupils by
the gift of two barrels of luscious oranges, to aid them in cele
brating the holidays.—Our acknowledgements are due to Messrs.
J. Gr. Batterson and J. W. Stancliff for the high gratification en
joyed by our pupils of repeatedly visiting the collection of beau
tiful paintings on exhibition at the Wadsworth Atheneum during
the month of March.—Miss Dix, whose generous sympathy for
the suffering and unfortunate, has gained for her so noble a rep
utation, has sent our pupils ten dollars, as an indication of her
interest in their welfare, desiring the sum to be spent in some
�29
way which shall contribute to their gratification.—Mr. J. R.
Burnet, of Newark, N. J., has sent us some carefully drawn
views of places in the Holy Land.—We are indebted to the
American Tract Society, of Boston, for the acceptable grant of
one hundred and fifty copies of the “ Child’sPaper,” and for
twenty-five copies of the “ Christian Banner.”—Hon. A. D. Ha
ger, of Proctorsville, Vt., has presented to the Library of the In
stitution two valuable volumes on the geology of Vermont.—We
are also indebted to the Hon. L. S. Foster for valuable Public
Documents.
With devout gratitude to God for His watchful care over eve
ry department of the Institution during the year that is past, we
invoke upon its future course His continued guidance and bles
sing.
COLLINS STONE,
Principal.
American Asylum, )
May 16,1868.
f
��REPORT OF THE PHYSICIAN.
The year just closed, adds another to the catalogue of those
during which the general health of this large household has
been usually very good.
•
There have been but two periods, and these of brief duration,
during which the pupils have suffered from diseases of conse
quence, or which affected any considerable number. One of
these occurred soon after my last Report was presented to your
Board, when measles made its appearance, and included in the
course of the outbreak about eighty cases. Several of them
were quite severe, and one died of congestive pneumonia, which
suddenly supervened upon the ordinary pulmonary symptoms.
The duration of this malady did not much, if at all, exceed
three weeks, ceasing, doubtless, for want of subjects.
Soon after the commencement of the fall term, an affection of
the eyes appeared in the form of acute ophthalmia, varying in
severity, but generally easily controlled, and soon terminating
favorably in most cases. It was confined principally to the
boys, very few girls comparatively, suffering from it.
The cause, though probably local, eluded the most careful
search, and still occasionally manifests its presence in a sporadic
case.
A case of malignant pustule occurred in February last, in the
person of one of the larger boys, terminating fatally in about
thirty-six hours from the time it was first seen professionally.
A single case of fracture of the fore-arm, occurring in a little
boy, concludes, it may be said with almost exact truth, the list
of ailments which have come under my observation during the
year, the usual acute pulmonary and other diseases so com
mon during Spring and Autumn, not having appeared, being
planted perhaps, by those before named.
�The Hygiene of the Institution, to which the utmost import
ance is justly attached, continues to be strictly observed in each
and all of those particulars to which reference has been had in
my former Reports, and which are so intimately connected both
with the health and the effective working capacity of the pupils.
E. K. HUNT, M. D.
Hartford, May 6th, 1868.
��,
.
“
“
“
T
T
•
•
I n s u r a n c e , .................................
a lbrf ry,
-
,
-
363.00
100.00
1,189.37
53,000.00
678.00
1.
“
“
“
“
“
1867.
April 1. By
1868.
“
P u p ils ,
—
---- 7
’
’
1
’
$104,566.86
_
Treasurer.
'
’
Ci
balance on hand,
sgp 27
Income from the fund the year past, 17 74217
Rent of Dwellings,
.
’
47500
Paying
.............................................
3 236.84
Receipts from the six N. E. States for support of Beneficiaries,
. V .
36 187 50
Receipts from Fund Account,
46 500 00
Advanced to A. Blodget Estate, repaid,
345 08
— ---- __ ------- ------------------------------------------------------$104,566.86_______________
Examined and found correct. We have also this day examined the vouch~
~
ers for the securities owned by the American Asylum, as per Inventory of
t iz x t *
-mr .
the Treasurer, and find them to agree with the same.
ROLAND MATHER,
ERASTUS COLLINS, ) A ...
T
T
JONA. B. BUNCE,
Auditors.
Hartford, May 16, 1868.
Hartford, April 1, 1868.
Sundry Expenses,
“ Reinvestments, “ Fund Account,”
“ Balance to Cr. of New Account, -
‘
u
..
‘
“
.
Paid Orders of Directing Committee, in favor
of Henry Kennedy, Steward, the
o , year past,
$28,500.00 April
“
for S a la r ie s , ....................................
20,036.42
((
Annuity to Laurent Clerc, - 700.00
.
A m e r ic a n . A s y lu m in a c c o u n t w ith . R o la n d . M a th e r , T r e a s u r e r .
u
((
1868.
April 1. To Cash
A BSTRA CT OF T H E T R E A SU R ER S ACCOUNT.
A F F E N B IX .
I.
�II. STATEMENT
OF THE FUND OF AMERICAN ASYLUM.
Invested in Bank Stocks in Connecticut,
“
on Bond and Mortgage of Beal Estate,
“
in Railroad Bonds,
“
in United States Bonds, Real Estate in Hartford,
Furniture in the Institution,
Cash on hand,
...
.
-
$94,100.00
88,500.00
23,900.00
7,000.00
, 82,522.88
5,390.00
■
678.07
$302,090.95
Hartford, May 16, 1868.
�36
III.
Dr.
ABSTRACT OF
American Asylum in account with Henry
To Flour,
“ Meal,
“ Cakes and Crackers, . “ Rice and Corn Starch,
“ Yeast, “ Hay and Straw,
“ Provender and Oats,
“ Live Stock,
“ Tools, Blacksmithing, &c.,
“ Butter,
££ Charcoal,
“ Hard Coal, “ Wood, “ Furniture, “ Groceries,
- •
“ Light and Gas Bills,
“ Meat, Fish and Fowl, ££ Medicine,
“ Miscellaneous, “ Pupils,
££ Repairs and Improvements,
£; Schools and Postage,
“ Cabinet Shop, “ Shoe
££
“ Tailor ££
“ Vegetables and Fruits,
“ Wages,
- ,
££ Washing and Soap,
££ Water Works, -
Balance to new account,
-
1 , -
$3,724.70
9.00
39.41
81.11
119.00
265.51
620.14
455.00
466.76
3.125.33
445.65
2.354.78
38.25
1,113.84
2,265.32
802.10
4,169.48
267.92
548.98
1,011.54
1.862.34
476.23
1.497.78
2,045.83
549.80
859.44
3,086.26
649.98
128.40
$33,079.88
187.83
$33,267.71
�37
CURRENT EXPENSES.
Kennedy, Steward, for the year ending April 1, 1868.
By Cash from Treasurer,
“ State of Massachusetts,
"
"
"
"
Rhode Island,
"
"
"
"
Vermont,
"
"
"
"
Connecticut,
"
"
"
"
Maine,
"
"
"
"
New Jersey,
"
"
"
"
Pupils,
"
"
"
"
Individuals,
"
"
"
"
Cabinet Shop,
"
"
"
"
Shoe
“
"
"
"
"
Tailor
“ "
"
"
"
Miscellaneous,
“ Balance from old account,
-
-
-
-
- '
-
American Asylum, Hartford, April 1st, 1868.
Cr.
$28,500.00
768.75
34.17
107.78
162.73
487.50
37.52
1,158.23
1,521.60
67.30
210.89
35.81
8.84
176.59
$33,267.71
�38
IV.
PAPERS, PERIODICALS, &o.
THE FOLLOWING PAPERS HAVE BEEN SENT TO THE PUPILS GRATUITOUSLY DURING THE
PAST YEAR.
Name.
ASgis and Gazette,
Weekly,
American Traveler,
Anamosa Eureka,
Argus and Patriot,
Boston Advertiser,
Daily,
Boston Courier,
Weekly,
Boston Journal,
Boston Transcript,
Burlington Free Press,
Burlington Times,
Christian Mirror,
Christian Secretary,
Churchman,
Columbian Register,
Congregationalist,
Connecticut Courant,
Connecticut Herald and Journal,
Deaf Mute Casket,
Monthly,
Eastern Argus,
,
Weekly,
Fitchburg Sentinel,
Hartford Courant,
Daily,
Hartford Post,
Hartford Times,
Independent Democrat,
Weekly,
Kenebec Journal,
Maine Farmer,
Maine State Press,
44
Massachusetts Spy,
44
Mirror and Farmer,
44
Natick Times,
New Hampshire Patriot and Gazette
“
“
Statesman,
“
“
Telegraph,
“ London Democrat,
‘ ‘ York Evangelist,
“
“ Spectator,
“
“ State Radii,
Northampton Free Press,
!Semi-Weekly,
Norwich Courier,
Weekly,
Portland Advertiser,
Portland Transcript,
44
Providence Journal,
41
Religious Herald,
Republican Standard,
Rhode Island Free Press,
Rutland Herald,44
Union Democrat,
Vermont Christian Messenger,
Vermont Watchman and State Journal,
Vineyard Gazette,
14
Waterbury American,
44
Willimantic Journal,
44
Worcester Palladium,
44
Zion’s Herald,
Editors and Publishers.
Where Published.
S. B. Bartholomew & Co., Worcester, Mass.
Worthington, Flanders & Co., Boston,
“
Edmund Booth & Son,
Anamosa, Iowa.
Hiram Atkins,
Montpelier, Vt.
Dunbar, Waters & Co.,
Boston, Mass.
George Lunt & Co.,
44
44
Charles O. Rodgers,
44
44
Henry W. Dutton & Son,
G. G. & B. L. Benedict,
Burlington, Vt.
George H. Bigelow,
Charles A. Lord,
Portland, Me.
E. Cushman,
Hartford, Conn.
Osborn & Baldwin,
New Haven, “
W. L. Greene & Co.,
Boston, Mass.
Hawley, Goodrich & Co.,
_______ Conn.
Hartford,______
Carrington, Hotchkiss & Co., New Haven, Ct.
W. J. Palmer,
"
Raleigh, N. C.
John M. Adams & Co.,
Portland, Me.
Garfield & Stratton,
Fitchburgh. Mass.
Hawley^Goodrich & Co..
Hartford, Conn.
Sperry, Hall & Co.,
Burr Brothers,
Independent Press Association, Concord, N.H.
------ “ Sayward,
Augusta, Me.
Stevens & "
True & Boardman,
N. A. Foster & Co.,
Portland, “
J. D. Baldwin & Co.,
Worcester, Mass.
John B. Clarke,
Manchester, N. H.
Washington Clapp,
Natick, Mass.
William Butterfield,
Concord, N. H.
McFarland & Jencks,
Dearborn & Berry,
Nashua, N. H.
D. S. Ruddock,
New London, Conn.
Field & Craighead,
New York City.
Levi S. Backus,
Canajoharie, N. Y.
Albert R. Parsons,
Northampton, Mass.
Norwich, Conn.
Bulletin Association,
Smith & Wiltham,
Portland, Me.
Elwelf, Pickard & Co.,
Knowles, Anthony & Danielson, Prov., R. I.
’ ’ i,
Hartford, Conn.
D. B. Mosely,
John D. Candee,
Bridgeport, Conn.
Providence, R. I.
Providence Press Co.,
Rutland, Vt.
Manchester, N. H.
Campbell & Hanscom,
Montpelier, Vt.
C. W. Willard,
E. P. Walton,
Edgartown, Mass.
Charles M. Vincent,
Waterbury, Conn.
E. B. Cook & Co.,
Curtis & Jackson,
Willimantic, Conn.
J. S. C. Knowlton,
Worcester, Mass.
Boston, Mass.
Haven & Rand,
�The Presidents and Superintendents of the following Railroads will
please accept our thanks for special favors shown to the pupils of the
Institution during the year.
Boston & Albany.
Boston & Maine.
Boston & Providence.
Concord, Manchester & Lawrence.
Connecticut & Passumpsic.
Connecticut River.
Hartford, New Haven & Springfield.
Hartford, Providence & Fishkill.
Portland & Kennebec.
Rutland & Burlington.
Vermont Central.
Worcester & Nashua.
COLLINS STONE, Principal.
Hartford, May 16, 1868.
�I
I
I
�V.
LIST OF PUPILS,
IN THE SCHOOL WITHIN THE YEAR ENDING ON THE 16TH OF MAY, 1868.
MALES.
Residence.
Name.
Abbott, W. John.........
Abbott, William W...
Acheson, Charles.........
Acheson, George W..
Aldrich, Erwin E.........
Anderson, Wallace E.
Bailey, Arthur E.........
Baker, Jesse H...........
Baldwin, Charles F....
Barrett, William S....
Bastinella, Oliver.........
Blodget, Frank P.........
Bond, Thomas S...........
Bowler, Albert 0 ....
Boyington, George W.
Branch, Degrand, D. L
Brown, Alpheus E....
Butler, John.................
Cain, Cornelius............ .
Campbell, John,...........
Carter, William T....
Cary, Daniel W...........
Chapman, Albert W...
Clark, Frank H.............
Clark, John ...................
Conley, James..............
Conners, John J............
Cook, Thomas.........
Coughlin, William........
Crandall, William F...
Crane, John E...............
Cronan, Stephen..........
6
Admission.
.. Sidney, Me., ......................... Sept., 1865
..Northumberland, N. H., ..Sept., 1861
..West Randolph, Mass.,....... Sept., 1864
.. West Randolph, Mass.,... .Sept., 1864
. .Smithfield, R. I.,..........
.Sept., 1864
..South Framingham, Mass.,.Sept., 1867
.Poland, Me., ......................... Sept., 1866
.Manchester, N. H., ........... Sept., 1867
.Litchfield, Conn., ................ Sept., 1864
..Plymouth, Mass., ................ Sept., 1865
. .Pittsfield, Mass., .................. Sept., 1865
.Nashua, N. H., ............ ..Sept., 1867
..Hartford, Conn., ............ .Sept., 1860
.Rockland, Me.,..................... Sept., 1867
..Prentiss, Me.,........................ Nov., 1860
.Hartford, Conn.,.................. Sept., 1866
..North Dunbarton, N. H., ..Sept., 1867
. .East Boston, Mass., ............. Sept., 1863
.Lewiston, Me.,..................... Sept.,. 1867
.Danbury, Conn., ______
Nov., 1867
.Boston, Mass.,.......................Oct., 1866
Gardiner, Me., ................... Sept., 1860
.Cambridgeport, Mass.,........... Sept., 1865
..East Hampton, Mass.,__ .Sept., 1867
.Monson, Mass.,.....................Sept., 1865
.Newport. R. I., .................... Oct., 1861
.Mansfield, Mass., ................. Sept., 1865
.Portland, Me., .....................Sept., 1865
Fitchburgh, Mass., ............. Sept., 1862
Newport, R. I.,..................... Sept., 1860
. Whiting, Me., .......................Feb., 1868
Fitchburgh, Mass.,.............. Sept., 1862
�42
Name.
Cross, Samuel S....
Culver, Samuel L...
Cummings, Daniel...
Cutter, George F...
Damon, Frank C...
Daniels, Orson.........
Davis, Edwin A....
Day, Myron W....
Derby, Ira H...........
Dougherty, Charles
Drew, Frank H....
Drown, Carlos.........
Duran, Edward.....
Duran, Thomas........
Ellis, Manford...........
Erbe, Hermann....
Evans, Oscar H....
Fahy, Thomas.........
Ferris, John.............
Fifield, Oscar W...
Fish, Charles...........
Fitch, Henry H....
Freallick, James F..
Frisbee, Edward W
Frost, Edwin F....
Gale, Arthur F....
Gambol, John..........
Gardner, William M.
Graham, Samuel....
Halsey, Waldron H.
Hargrave, Albert C.
Harris, Alvah H....
Hawley, Levi R....
Hawley, Lewis N..
Hayden, Othello D..
Helfpenny, Martin..
Hill, Willie L.........
Jellison, Simon.........
Residence.
Admission.
Beverly, Mass.,................... Sept., 1864
.Waterville, Conn.,.............. Sept., 1866
Greeneville, Conn................ Sept., 1864
.Irasburgh, Vt.,.................. Sept., 1865
.Amherst, N. H.................... Sept., 1861
.North Adams, Mass., ....Sept., 1867
..Auburn, Me.,..................... Sept., 1867
.South Royalston, Mass., ..Sept., 1864
.South Weymouth, Mass., .Sept., 1861
.Hartford, Conn., ................. Sept., 1863
, .Boston, Mass.,.................... Sept., 1865
.Browningtori, Vt.,............ Sept., 1861
..South Boston, Mass.,........ Sept., 1865
..South Boston, Mass., ....Sept., 1865
.Belgrade, Me.,.................... Sept., 1864
. Southington, Conn.,........... Sept., 1865
.South Royalston, Mass., . ..Sept., 1861
.Pittsfield, Mass., ................ Sept., 1862
. Waitsfield, Vt.,.................... Dec., 1862
.Deer Isle, Me.,.................... Nov., 1862
.Danby, Vt.,.........................Sept., 1865
.Preston, Conn.,.................. Sept., 1860
..Provincetown, Mass., ....Sept., 1865
.Charlestown, Mass., ......... Sept., 1866
.Boston, Mass.,.................... Sept., 1861
. Charlton, Mass.,................. Sept., 1863
. South Boston, Mass.,.......... Oct., 1864
.Hardwick, Mass.,................Sept., 1864
.Newark, N. J.,................. zSept., 1866
.Newark, N. J.,
..........Nov., 1863
.East Boston, Mass.,............ Sept., 1867
.Neponset, Mass.,................ Oct., 1863
.North Amherst, Mass., .. ..Sept., 1865
.North Amherst, Mass., .. ..Sept., 1865
.Stoughton, Mass.,............... Sept., 1863
• Waterbury, Conn.,............. Sept., 1864
.Athol Depot, Mass.,........... Sept., 1864
.Monroe, Me.,.......................Sept., 1865
�43
Name.
Residence.
Admission.
Johnson, George D............ Erving, Mass.,...................... .... Sept.,
Josselyn, Andrew P......... East Foxboro, Mass.,.......... .... Sept.,
Kendall, Phillip................. Whitefield, Me.,................ .........Sept.,
King, James H................. Middletown Point, N. J., . .... Sept.,
Ladd, Amos A.................. East Haddam, Conn.,.......... .... Sept.,
Ladue, Edward................. St. Albans, Vt.,................ ... .... Sept.,
Lally, John......................... South Boston, Mass.,.......... .... Sept.,
Laplant, Peter................... West Milton, Vt.,.............. ... .Nov.,
Leary, Matthew................. Boston, Mass.,...................... .... Sept.,
Lewis, Willie H................. Providence, R. I.,.............. ......... Sept.,
Mackintosh, George........... Canton, Mass.,.................... .... Sept.,
Marr, IraR......................... North Washington, Me., ... .... Sept.,
Marston, Westley N......... Greenland, N. H.,.............. .... .Sept.,
Martin, Charles H............. Salem, Mass.,...................... ......... Sept.,
Mayhew, Jared................. Chilmark, Mass., ................ . -... Sept.,
Mayo, Hawes...................... Monroe, Me.,....................... ......... Sept.,
McCarty, John................... Andover, Mass.,.................. .... Sept.,
McDonnell, John............... West Stockbridge, Mass., . .... Sept.,
McGirr, Francis................. East Cambridge,Mass., .. ......... Sept.,
McKinney, Wm. J.............Alleghany City, Penn., ... .... Sept.,
McMaster, Hugh H. B... .Pittsburgh, Penn.,............. .... Sept.,
McMechen, James H.........Wheeling, West Virginia, .........Aug.,
Meagher, Michael............... Waterbury, Conn.,.............. .... Sept.,
Miller, George................... Providence, R. I.,.............. .... Sept.,
Mitchell, Isaac................... Brookville, Vt., .................. .... Sept.,
Morrell, Leland................. Cornish, Me.,...................... .... Sept.,
Moseley, Joseph A........... Pomfret, Conn.,.................. .... Sept.,
Moulton, Thomas... A... Buxton Centre, Me.,......... ......... Sept.,
Muth, John.......................... Hartford, Conn., ........ .... Sept.,
Negus, Edward R............ Salisbury, Conn.,................ .... Sept.,
Nelson, James. ................. Tewksbury, Mass.,.............. .... Sept.,
*
O’Harra, John................... Milford, Mass.,..................... .... Sept.,
O’Neil, John......................Thorndike, Mass.,.............. ......... Sept.,
O’Neil, Michael................. Charlestown, Mass.,............ .... Sept.,
Ould, Edward C................. Derby, Conn.,..................... ......... Sept.,
Page, Roscoe G............. .. . Augusta, Me.,.................... .........Sept.,
Pattee, Wilbur D............... Alexandria, N. H., .......... .... Sept.,
Patterson, Charles.............. Saco, Me., . ......................... ......... Sept.,
Paul, John E..................... Cambridgeport, Mass., .... .... Sept.,
1862
1868
1865
1865
1866
1864
1866
1866
1863
1867
1864
1867
1864
1863
1864
1865
1865
1865
1863
1865
1864
1865
1865
1861
1867
1865
1862
1864
1865
1866
1864
1860
1867
1866
1861
1860
1867
1864
1867
�44
Name.
Residence.
Peterson, Willie S. H......... South Plymouth, Mass., .
Philbrook, Henry 0......... Charlestown, Mass., .........
Pick, William C................. Providence, R. I.,............
Pond, Nathan L................. Milford, Mass., ..................
Porter, Wendell P............. Somerville, Mass.,............
Powers, James.................... Boston, Mass., ..................
Powers, James A........... ,. Salem, Mass.,.....................
Pratt, John W....................Middletown, Conn.,..........
Quincy, Josiah....................Munson, Mass.,...................
Richmond, Ephraim H... .Voluntown, Conn., .........
Rideout, Charles H........... Houlton, Maine,................
Roberts, Frank B............... Boston, Mass., ..................
Rudolph, William............. Boston, Mass.,..................
Ryan, John.......................... Rutland, Vt.,....................
Sachse, Charles F............... Waterbury, Conn., ..........
Sackett, Charles E..............South Glastenbury, Conn.,
Saul, Willie H ..................Salem, Mass.,......................
Scoles, William M........... Augusta, Me.,.....................
Seamen, Mortimer W.... Rockville, Conn.,.............
Sharts, Herman H........... Hudson, N. Y.,...................
Skelly, Edwin J............... Rochester, N. H.,...............
Slattery. Patrick............... Boston, Mass.,................... .
Small, Albert A................. Auburn, Me.,......................
Small, George B............... Hartland, Vt.,.....................
Small, Walter R........ Hartland, Vt.,.................
Smith, Freeman N............. Chilmark, Mass.,.................
Smith, George................. Springfield, Mass.,.............
Smith, Orlando A............. Roxbury, Mass.,.................
Soper Isaac N................... Lowell, Mass.,....................
Sparrow, Wilber N........... Eastham, Mass.,.................
Stevens, William.............. Stonington, Conn.,...............
Sullivan, Patrick J........ Boston, Mass.,...........
Tufts, Samuel A................. Malden, Mass.,...................
Walker, Freddie............... Norwich, Conn.,.................
Wardman, Samuel ........... Ballardvale, Mass.,.............
Waters, Warren L......... .. Hartford, Conn.,........
Watts, Francis A........... Rockville, Conn,,...............
Weaver, Jonathan........... South Woodstock, Conn.,.
Webb, Clarence A............. Canterbury, Conn.,............ ,
Admission.
. Sept., 1862
. Sept., 1864
. April, 1863
. Sept., 1862
.Nov., 1858
. Sept., 1865
. Mar., 1862
. Sept., 1861
. Sept., 1865
. Sept., 1865
. Sept., 1863
. Sept., 1866
.Sept., 1866
. Sept., 1865
. Sept., 1861
. Sept., 1865
. Sept., 1866
. Sept., 1863
. Sept., 1866
. Sept., 1865
. Sept., 1867
. Sept., 1862
. Sept., 1863
. Sept,, 1865
.. Oct., 1862
. Sept., 1861
. Sept., 1864
. Sept., 1863
. Sept., 1861
. Sept., 1864
. Sept., 1867
, Sept., 1860
. Sept., 1865
. Sept., 1864
Sept., 1866
, Sept., 1865
Sept., 1860
Sept., 1866
Sept., 1864
�45
Name.
Residence.
Admission.
Wellington, Elbridge A .. Wayland, Mass.,........................ Sept.,
Wentworth, Sylvester W. Ipswich, Mass.,............................ Sept.,
Wheeler Staunton F..... Plymouth, Vt.,............................ Sept.,
White, Henry,................... Roxbury, Mass., .......................... Sept.,
Wilkinson, John................. West Lubec, Me., .. ..................... Sept.,
Winslow, John N............. Putnam, Conn.,............................. Sept.,
Wood, Eugene W........... Webster, Mass.,................. .......... Sept.,
1863
1864
1863
1866
1861
1867
1861
FEMALES.
Adams, Alda M.......... ... Charlestown, Mass.,............. .. .Sept., 1866
Annan, Josephine A...... Manchester, N. H.,.............. .. .Sept., 1864
Atkins, Sylvia B.......... ... Chatham, Mass.,................... ...Sept., 1862
Axt, Matilda................ . ... New Haven, Conn.,............. ... Sept., 1866
Ayshers, Mary........... . ... Hartford, Conn.,................... ....Feb., 1867
Barnard, Ada J........... ... Lowell, Mass.,....................... .. .Sept., 1865
Barry, Anna B........... . ... Baltimore, Md.,.................... .. .Sept., 1867
Bishop, Stella M.......... ... East Avon, Conn.,............... . . .Sept., 1866
Bond, Juba P................ ,.. Hartford, Conn.,.................... .. .June, 1865
Brown, Emily C.......... ... North Stonington, Conn.,... .. .Sent., 1864
Brown, Susan F...........,.. North Dunbarton, N. H., .. .. .Nov., 1865
Carey, Mary................... ,.. Boston, Mass.,...................... .. .Sept., 1863
Carroll, Mary E.......,.. South Boston, Mass.,............ ...Sept,, 1867
Case, Lillie A............... ... East Avon, Conn.,............... ... .Oct., 1867
Chaffin, Abbie L........... ... Worcester, Mass.,................ ...Sept., 1865
Champion, Ellen J .... .. Westmore, Vt.,.................... ...Sept., 1863
Clapp, Elmina D.............. Newburgh, N. Y.,............... . ..Sept., 1860
Clark, Millie H............. .. Biddeford, Me.,........ . .......... ... Sept., 1867
Cole, Lizzie M............... .. Concord, N. H.,................... ...Sept., 1867
Colley, Mary E............. .. Falmouth, Me.,..................... .. ..Oct., 1862
Corcoran, Ellen............. .. East Boston, Mass.,............. .. .Nov., 1865
Daley, Nancy J............. .. Chester, Conn.,.................... .. .Sept., 1865
Darghan, Joanna........... .. New Haven, Conn.,............. ...Sept., 1867
Dewsnap, Clara............. .. Lakeville, Conn.,.................... .. .Jan., 1863
Driscoll, Julia A........... .. East Boston, Mass.,............... . ..Nov., 1865
�46
Name.
Residence.
Dube, Adeline ....
Orono, Me.,...............
Duffy, Ellen.............
Boston, Mass.,...........
Dummer, Caroline L
Weld, Me.,.................
Dunnell, Manila ...
Buxton Center, Me.,.
Durbrow, Carrie B..
New York City,....,
Eaton, Mary E........
East Salisbury, Mass.,
Emerson, Gertrude A.... Danby, Vt.,......................
Fahy, Bridget..................... Pittsfield, Mass., ..............
Flagg, Clarinda J............. Natick, Mass., ................ .
Foley, Bridget................... Bristol, Conn., ................
Foley, Mary A...........
Bristol, Conn.,.................
Frost, Harriet E................. Bucksport, Me.,................. ,
Gardner, Rosa.................... Greeneville, Conn., ...........
Gray, Leonora C............... New Haven, Conn., ....
Hall, Elizabeth................. Portland, Me., ..................
Harper, Sarah L................. New London, Conn.,....
Hartshorn, Anna S......... .'. Boston, Mass., ..;............
Hichens, Mary W............. "Wellfleet, Mass., ..............
Howe, Eldora M............... Marlboro, Mass.,..............
Hull, Ida A........................ Plainville, Conn.,..............
Hull, Josephine D............. Farmington, Conn.,..........
Knapp, Sophia A............... Winchester, N. H.,..........
Lee, Mary J...................... East Longmeadow, Mass.,
Linnehan, Mary A........... Boston, Mass., ..................
Lovejoy, Lydia A............. Augusta, Me., ..................
Lummis, Delia A............... Pomfret, Conn., ................
Lyons, Ellen....................... Ludlow, Mass., ................
Marks, Sarah C.................Providence, R. I.,.............
Marr, Anna M....................North Washington, Me., .
Martes, Elizabeth.............. Charlestown, Mass.,..........
Mason, Flora S................. Bangor, Me.,......................
Mattson, Elizabeth............ New York City,................
McDonald, Catharine........ Boston, Mass., ..................
McDonough, Elizabeth A.Russell, Mass.,.................
McKay, Mary A............... River Point, R. I., .........
Meacham, Mary O............. Westfield, Mass., ............
Meacham, Morcellia A.. ..Westfield, Mass.,.............
Merrill, Frances J.............. Skowhegan, Me., ..............
Milan, Catharine............... Milford, Mass.,..................
Admission.
.... Sept., 1866
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1866
........ Sept., 1866
........ Oct., 1863
.. ..Sept., 1863
.........May, 1864
.... Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1862
.... Sept.-, 1863
........Sept., 1863
... .Sept., 1865
.... Sept., 1859
........ Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1863
... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1865
.... Sept., 1861
—. Sept., 1861
.... Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1861
.... Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1866
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1866
.... Sept., 1864
... .Nov., 1863
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1867
... .Sept., 1865
........ Oct., 1865
.... Sept., 1866
......... Oct., 1864
....Feb., 1862
.... Sept., 1866
.... Sept., 1866
.... Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1865
�47
Name.
Residence;
Miller, Catharine W......... Thompsonville, Conn., ...
Monahan, Anna................. Lowell, Mass., ................ .
Moore, Eliza A............... .Derby, Conn., ..................
Moulton, Florette........... Biddeford, Me., ... ...............
Mulcahy, Mary E.............. Salem, Mass.,....................
Munroe, Betsey A............. Rehoboth, Mass.,.............
Murphy, Mary E............... Boston, Mass.,...................
Nichols, Marietta C........... Roxbury, Mass.,............. .
O’Brien, Mary................... East Cambridge, Mass., ..
O’Donnell, Catharine.........Stonington, Conn.,.......... .
O’Hearn, Eliza.................. Tewksbury, Mass., ..........
Peltier, Ella M............... * Cambridge, Mass.,............
.
Prince, Mary E............... Camden, Me.,....................
Perron, Clara.................... Yantic, Conn., ..................
Platt, Sarah E.................... Hinsdale, Mass., ................
Proctor, Emma J............... West Gloucester, Me., ...
Putnam, Almedia M......... Oxford, Me., .....................
Quin, Mary A................... Hartford, Conn.,...............
Richardson, Amelia A.... Mansfield, Mass.,.............
Richardson, Lauretta J... Mansfield, Mass.,..............
Robinson, Hattie J............. Freedom, Me., ..................
Rounds, Sylvia D............... Greene, R. I.,..................
Sanborn, Hester E............. East Wilton, M^e.,.......
Sargent, Lizzie M.............. Concord, N. H.,................
Scoles, Rachel A............... Augusta, Me.,....................
Smith, Mary J................... East Hartford, Conn., ...
Soper, Ella J..................... Lowell, Mass.,...................
Spillane, Mary................... East Boston, Mass.,..........
Stevens, Mary A............... Gloucester, Mass.,............
Stone, Sally E.................. Natick, Mass.,.....................
Stuart, Harriet N............... Wells, Me., .......................
Swett, Persis H................. Henniker, N. JI., ............
Taft, Marion L................... Worcester, Mass.,..............
Talcott, Lillia M................. Bolton, Conn., ................ ..
Teele, Sarah F................... Somerville, Mass.,............ .
Tilton, Ellen L....................Cheshire, Mass.,................
Turner, Lucy M................ South Coventry, Conn., ..
Tisdale, Jennie M............... North Bridgewater, Mass.,
Vincent, Emma A............. South Adams, Mass., ....
Admission.
.... Sept., 1862
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1863
.... Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1865
.... Sept., 1862
.... Sept., 1862
.... Sept., 1865
.... Sept., 1865
.... Sept., 1860
.... Sept., 1864
.... Sept., 1863
.... Sept., 1860
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1865
.... Sept., 1866
....May, 1862
.... Sept., 1861
.... Oct., 1866
.... Sept., 1862
.... Sept., 1853
.... Sept., 1862
.... Sept., 1867
.... Sept., 1867
... Sept., 1864
... Sept., 1865
... Sept., 1866
.. .Nov., 1865
... Sept., 1867
.. .Sept., 1865
.... Oct., 1867
.... Oct., 1863
... Sept., 1864
.... Oct., 1866
... .Sept., 1862
... Sept., 1864
,... Dec., 1864
... Sept., 1866
... Sept., 1863
�48
Name.
Residence.
Admission.
Walsh, Margaret........... .. .Norwich, Conn., ......... .............. Sept.,
Wentworth, Ella J... . ... Ipswich, «Mass.,............. ............... Sept.,
West, Anna J.............. ... Coventry, R. I.,........... .............. Sept.,
Westgate, Abby.......... ... Warren, R. I.,............. .............. Sept.,
Whitney, Hattie M... ... Gray, Me.,...................... ,............. Sept.,
Willey, Florence H... ... Lockport, N. Y., ......... .............. Sept.,
Wing, Nancy A........... ., .Wayne, Me.,................. ...............Sept.,
York, Mellissa J.......... ... Gilmanton, N. H., .... .............. Sept.,
1866
1866
1857
1864
1867
1866
1867
1864
SUMMARY.
Males.
10
22
8
11
67
- 6
28
3
—
155
Whole number in attendance within the year, Greatest number at any one time,
Average attendance during the year,
-
Females.
Total.
11
21
6
2
45
4
22
0
—
Ill
■
21
43
14
13
112
10
50
3
-
-
-
Supported by Friends, u
Maine,
a
New Hampshire,
u
V ermont,
u
Massachusetts,
a
Rhode Island,
u
Connecticut,
u
New Jersey,
—
-
266
266
229
226
�VI.
COMPOSITIONS.
It is a rule of the school that specimens of composition published in our annual Reports, and
also the letters sent at stated times to the friends of our pupils, shall receive no correction,
except such as their respective authors can make on a careful review when the errors they
contain are pointed out by a teacher.
STORIES.
A lady goes into a store. She buys a pretty box. She carries the box
to her home. She gives the box to her little girl. The girl opens the box.
She finds a doll in it. She is very happy.
Two boys take a large bag. They go to the woods. They see some nuts
on a tree. They throw stones at the nuts. The nuts fall. The boys put
the nuts into the bag. They leave the woods. A dog chases them. They
run. They lose all the nuts.
A girl takes a basket. She puts the basket on her arm. She goes to an
apple tree. She finds some red apples under the tree. She puts the apples
into her basket. She carries the basket into the house. She gives the
apples to her mother. Her mother makes some pies.
Harteord, May 5th, 1868.
My Dear Father and Mother:—I am very well. I am happy. The
Asylum is large. Many boys and girls are here. The boys play ball, the
girls jump rope. I like bread and butter. I like sugar and milk and cof
fee. I write in the school. Mr. S. rides on a white horse. Mr. Clark car
ries Master Clark on his shoulder. I see a lady riding on a white horse.
I am eight years old. Mrs. White gives some stockings out of a drawer to
Master Clark. Mr. Kennedy chases Master Clark. I hide behind a door.
7
�50
I see three little pigs in a barrel. I love my father and my mother. They
are very kind. I hope my father and my mother are well.
I am your affectonate son,
F. H. C.
Lost hearing at two years. In school eight months.
Hartford, May 8th, 1868.
My Dear Father and Mother :—I live in the Asylum. There are some
trees near the Asylum. It is pleasant now. The grass is green. The flow
ers are growing. I like flowers. They are very pretty. In school we write
slates. In the morning I wash my face and comb my hair. I Work in the
shop. I sew shoes. A deaf and dumb girl finds a little pigeon. She car
ries the pigeon into the Asylum. Mrs. White gives some bread to the
pigeon. Mr. Kennedy sees a rat. He calls his dog. The dog chases the
rat and kills it. Mr. S. rides on a white horse. I love my father and my
mother. I send my love to all.
I am your affectionate son,
F. P. B.
Lost hearing at three. In school eight months.
A hunter.
A few years ago a wise man went to the city. He went into a store. He
bought a gun and some powder and shot. He put the powder and shot
into his pocket. He took his gun and put the gun on his shoulder. He
went to a depot. He went into the cars. He went to A. in a steamboat.
He went to a forest. He walked through the woods. He saw a bear on a
large tree. He put the powder and shot into the gun. He loaded the gun
with a ramrod. He shot the bear. The bear fell to the ground. He was
very glad that the bear fell to the ground. He went to the bear. He car
ried the bear to a river and threw it into the river. He went to the woods.
He saw a deer sleeping. He put the powder and shot into the gun. He
loaded the gun with the ramrod. He shot the deer. He went to the deer.
He carried it to the steamboat. He put it on the steamboat. He went
into the steamboat. He went to Boston in the steamboat. He took the
deer out of the steamboat. He put the deer on a wagon. He rode in the
wagon home. He took the deer out of the wagon. He carried it into a
house. He showed the deer to my mother and brother and sister and
father. My brother and sister and mother and father were very glad that
the deer was dead. His wife cooked some venison. My brother and sister
and father and mother liked to eat some venison. He gave the deer to my
father.. My father thanked the wise man. He was very glad that the wise
man gave the deer to my father.
‘yy. p
Lost hearing at 2 years. In school 16 mos.
�51
Stories ok monkeys.
Several years ago a man lived in South America. He made some baskets.
One day he picked them and tied them together. He carried them to the
city and sold them. He got money. He went into another store. He
bought some hats and caps. He started for home. He walked through
the woods. After walking one or two hours, he was very tired. He put
the hats and caps on the ground under a cocoa-nut tree. He lay on the
ground and fell asleep. While he was sleeping some monkeys saw the man
sleeping. The monkeys climbed down the tree and went to him. The
monkeys stole them and took them. The monkeys put them on and
climbed up. When he awoke he looked for his hats and caps. Soon he
saw the monkeys put them on. He was provoked. He shook his fist at
the monkeys. The monkeys shook their fists at the man. He threw some
stones to the monkeys and the monkeys threw cocoa-nuts to the man. He
threw his hat. The monkeys threw the hats and caps on the ground. He
picked them and tied them together. He carried them home and was very
glad to get them.
Many years ago a clergyman lived in England. He had a monkey. One
day he wrote a sermon to prepare for the next day. The monkey came to
him. He told the monkey that it should not go to church. The monkey
told him that it should go to church. The next day he put clean clothes
on and his wife also put clean clothes on. He offered his arm to his wife
and went to church. He told his wife to sit down. He went into the pul
pit. By and by he was warm and rested for a few minutes. He prayed to
God. Many people sang. He preached the sermon. The monkey came
up and sat on the sounding-board over the pulpit. It heard him preaching
the sermon. It saw him making his gestures. It imitated his gestures.
The people saw the monkey on the sounding-board and laughed at it. He
saw the people laughing and asked them why they laughed at him. One
of the people told him that it preached like him. He told his servant to
go up and catch it. So he went up and caught it and carried it home. At
noon the people went away.
M. J. S.
Congenital. In school three years.
A GENEROUS MAN.
Many years ago, there were two students in a College in Athens. One ,
student was named Septimius and he was a native of Rome. The other
student was named Alcander and he was a native of Athens. Alcander
was the most eloquent speaker. Septimius’ was a strong reasoner. Al
cander saw a beautiful lady. Her name was Hypatia. He wished to marry
her. He admired her. He wished to introduce Septimius to Hypatia.
«
�52
*
They visited Septimius and came into the house. The next day Septimius
was very sick with a fever and laid on a bed. Alcander and Hypatia
wished to visit Septimius. But the doctors told them that they should not
go to see Septimius. Alcander understood that Septimius was jealous of
Hypatia. Alcander gave Hypatia to Septimius to marry her. He was
very glad to marry her and the fever left him. He was very well and mar
ried her. They went to Rome. Hypatia’s friends were very angry with
Alcander. They seized him, robbed him of his property. He became a
slave. His master was very cruel to him. Alcander determined to run
away. He ran away and went into caves and slept all day. At last he
came to Rome. Septimius sat in a chair at court. Alcander walked
among many people. Septimius did not know Alcander. In the night
he took anum and went into the cave. He fell into a sound sleep.
Two robbers came near Alcander and quarrelled about some plunder.
One robber killed the other. He lay bleeding on the ground. The other
robber ran away. Many people saw the dead man near Alcander. They
seized Alcander and brought him into the court. They showed him to
Septimius. He found that Alcander was guilty. Septimius was going to
sentence him, when Septimius knew Alcander and kissed him. Many
people were surprised to see him. He went home with Alcander. The
other robber was found and sentenced.
R. A. S.
Lost hearing at two. In school four years.
AUTOBIOGRAPHY.
My name is Gertie Robin. Early this spring I built a new nest in the
branches of a tall ever-green tree, and I began to live in it, in the state of
Vermont. I am very glad to live in my new nest in safety. I always make
a nest in the country every spring, because it is pleasanter in the country
than in the city. I would be afraid of many bad boys in the city. I am
sorry that I begin to be old, and am tired of flying around the trees all
day. I often fly to my nest and sit in it and rest and sing sweetly. I am
proud that I sing sweetly. When I am hungry, I fly and get some worms
and eat them and then I sit in my nest again. Last summer I had four
little eggs in my nest and I sat on them a long time. In a few weeks they
hatched and I had four little birds. Then I flew away to get some worms
for them, and I fed them to my young ones. In the evening I put my
young ones in my nest and they slept under my wings and they were warm
enough because I have many feathers on my body. In a few weeks I
taught them how to fly and then they flew away, and I missed them very
much. How foolish I was to teach them to fly. But I lived with them
again in South Carolina, which is a warm country. We all went there last
Fall. They do not live near me now. I told them that I must make a
new nest here this spring. Perhaps I shall have four more eggs by and by.
�53
I shall be glad to have some new young ones. But I almost died yester
day. I happened to sit on the fence in the garden. How careless I was I
A wild grey cat came near me and caught me, but I pecked his head with
my sharp bill and he was afraid and I flew away. By and by I shall fly
away to South Carolina again and I shall see my friends. They will be
very glad to see me. I shall ask them “ Do you wish me to tell you about
the North?” They will say “Yes.” Then I shall tell them about the
grey cat. I shall be very happy to see them again. I am very proud be
cause I have two black and beautiful eyes. I am proud because you ad
mire me. Will you please to give me some crumbs of bread, and I will
sing to you.
G. A. E.
Congenital. In school three years.
DREAMS.
Our dreams are not sure and they do not tell us truly—But they are
sometimes funny. Our Heavenly Father, who is very wise and good,
makes us dream. It is very wonderful. I suppose our souls go out of our
bodies and work and travel, as we do, while we are lying on our beds at
night. We do not know what our dreams will be, and we cannot stop the
dreams because God makes us dream steadily. Our dreams tell us many
lies and many funny stories in the night. I will tell you some of my
dreams. About a month ago I dreamed that it snowed very much, so that
it was very deep, and I took my books in a little leather bag, and put on a
pair of my Father’s boots and bade my family good-bye and said to them
that I was going to school on the top of the snow. While I was walking,
I saw a large bear following me. I tried to walk very fast, but I fell many
times for I dreamed that the road was perpendicular, so that the bear
caught me and bit my body. I screamed very loudly, and my Father
heard me and shot the bear. By and by I awaked and my dream was aw
ful. I would like to dream my own dreams.
About a year ago I dreamed that many letters were in my bureau, and I
was very glad to get them but I awaked and found that my handkerchief
was in my hand, it seemed to be a letter. I was disappointed. Last
night I dreamed that I was walking along the bridge near my home and
met my friends. They were all surprised for I told them that Mr. S. had
expelled me, but I awaked and I was here in my bed. I was very glad. If
x Mr. S. should expel me truly, I should be very much ashamed.
MY WISH.
If I could have my wish, I would be a book. I would be a very large
book:—larger than these books. I would not be printed, but I would be
created, and would put language on it myself. I would never be worn out.
�54
If any person did hot take care of me, and keep me clean, I would not al
low him to read me. I would run to the good people and let them read
me always. I would be one of the wise books, and would cause the people
to admire me for my language which would be very simple and good. I
would be very useful, and would not want to have any person dislike to
read me. I would walk to people and speak my language, so that they
could hear me. I would shut myself when they had done reading me. I
would have one trillion of pages so that the people would never finish
reading me. I would not want to be on a shelf, but I would be on a table.
If any person forgot me, I would follow him, and walk with him, for I
would not want to be put in a trunk. I would never want to eat nor
drinkK but I would breathe and walk with people. I would want to have
people believe me, that I always tell them truly about everything which
happens in ancient or modern times. I would wish to live one thousand
years. I would want to go to heaven. I would not want to have any fable
books go to heaven. I would let the Bible go to heaven, because it always
tells the people truly about important things. Before I died, I would go
up and down, and would tell every person that this was the last time to
read me. I would let good persons go with me to heaven and read me in
heaven.
P. S.
Congenital. In School five years.
A WEDDING.
One day a bird whose name was Jenny Wren, stood on a tree. A bird
whose name was Cock Robin, came to her. He said to her “ Please may I
marry you ? ” She said “Yes.” Robin flew away and bought a yellow
dress for Wren. He came to Wren’s house and knocked at the door. She
went to the door and opened it. She led him to the parlor and he sat by
the window and told her that he had brought a yellow dress to her. She
blushed behind her fan. He went away and met Lark and Sparrow and
said to them “please come to see me this afternoon for I shall be married.”
They told many birds. Rook, who was a preacher walked with Jenny
Wren. Many birds came to their wedding party. Rook said to Robin
“Will you marry Wren?” Jenny Wren sung very sweetly. Robin mar
ried her and they were happy. They went to their house. Some birds
were on the tree and sung to honor Robin and Wren. Robin and Wren
ate cherry pies which were very sweet. After supper, they walked in the
woods. Sparrow was jealous of them. He had his arrows and bows and
shot Robin so that he died. Jenny Wren wept for him. She pulled the
arrow from his heart. When the birds heard that Robin was dead, they
mourned. They carried him to his house and put him in a beautiful coflin
and had a funeral. Then they caught Sparrow and hanged him. Poor
Widow Jenny Wren.
E. H.
Lost hearing at two and a half years. In school five years.
�55
MY WISH.
If I could have my wish, I would be a noble oak tree. Yes ! Such as
shelters the weary traveller from the mid-day sun. Such as the weary cat
tle find rest under, and such a tree as is honored above all trees. I would,
on first coming into the world, be a small shoot, not one-third as thick as
my little finger, then I would grow on year by year until I became in gen
eral sense a tree, but only a quarter the size I intended to be. I should not
be much thought of until I had lived about one generation, then I should
begin to be honored. The oldest inhabitants, would tell their children and
grand-children of my life, of my nobleness, and how often they had
played under me in their youth, and fastened their swings to my thick
branches. Now they being too old to enjoy such things, should still love
to sit under me, and watch the young children play. Yes ! I should often
bring tears to their eyes, when I reminded them of their happy youth. I
would in summer clothe my branches with the thickest and greenest of fol
iage, and in winter give my greatest strength to my limbs, to help them
bear the stormy winds and heavy snow and ice. I should learn to bear the
cold winds and storms which would beat against me. I would learn to
bear them all as a young man his temptations, a Christian his difficulties.
I would show myself so proud and noble that every one would say “ Noble
oak! honored above all.”—Yes ! I would do all this and more; I would
show still greater ambition. I would spread forth my branches to the
North, to the South, to the East and to the West. I would outgrow all
the other trees in height, thickness and strength. I would grow on until
no body knew how old I was. I would be the grand old oak which could
bear a hurricane. I would be so great and fine that all who knew my age
and nobleness would say—“ woodman! spare that tree.” I would be the
noble oak under which many had told their tales of love, and confessed
their broken vows. Under which merry children had played and the aged
had rested their limbs weary with cares. The tree which birds could build
their nests in with out fear. The largest birds should rest upon me and build
their nests in my branches. I would spread my root out in the earth a great
distance. I would tell all the other trees, who had not lived half my age
of the past generations, of their frivolous fashions, their modes of living and
of their goodness and wickedness. I would teach them all to be good and
noble, and to shun all evil. None should want for shelter from the raging
blast or the scorching heat while I lived. I would do wonders if I was an
oak tree—such wonders as an oak has never been known to do before and
never will do hereafter.
C. D.
ASTRONOMY.
t
No one can look at the heavenly bodies through a powerful telescope,
without experiencing feelings of mingled wonder and awe. To the naked
�56
eye, the stars appear to be but mere specks dotted here and there in the
blue canopy far above us. Considering the immense distance of the stars
from the earth, it seems almost incredible that they can shine with such
brilliancy. But the stars are not in reality the insignificant objects that
they appear to be. When viewed through telescopes they are seen to be
very large bodies.
The planet Jupiter is said to be a thousand times larger than the earth,
and consequently is of great size. The earth itself is but a mere atom in
comparison with the enormous size of the sun. It has been proved to be a
million times smaller. A pinhead placed by the side of a large ball, would
be a good illustration of the different sizes of the sun and earth.
With the aid of large refracting telescopes and other powerful instru
ments the stars and heavenly bodies have been examined and studied. The
results of these observations arb truly wonderful, instead of the few thou
sand stars visible to the naked eye many millions can be discerned. The
faint misty specks resembling fog seen among the constellations are discov
ered to be composed of innumerable stars, very small in appeararance and
close together. The numerous stars called “ Double Stars” which are so
near to each other that to the naked eye they seem as one star are seen by
the telescope to be separated by immense distances.
By close inspection spots have been discovered on the surface of the sun
much larger than the earth. The light and heat which appear to us to
come directly from the sun do in fact proceed from self-luminous clouds
far above its body. These clouds bestow upon the earth more heat in sum
mer than in winter. This arises from the fact that the North pole of the
earth is turned towards the sun in the summer months and is turned away
from it in winter. Consequently this not only allows us longer days but
gives us more heat in summer than in winter. The sun which is really a
star, appears to move in a vast circle around the earth. But the earth in
reality turns about on an axis and completes a rotation in a day and night.
The sun is attended on its course by a system of planets. The planets are
movable stars which revolve around the sun, but the fixed stars are sup
posed to be suns which bestow upon other planetary systems the genial in
fluences of their light and heat.
Some of the planets shine with great splendor and brilliancy. There are
eight planets of which Venus and Jupiter are the brightest and most beau
tiful. These two planets are the most conspicuous of the whole planetary
system. The planet Saturn shines with a dull pale light, and-is of a dull
red color. Around Saturn and wholly detached from the body of the
planet, is a vast luminous ring, many thousands of miles in diameter.
When we consider the enormous size of Jupiter we are filled with great
wonder. It is difficult and perhaps absolutely impossible to realize the
fact of one of the stars being larger or even as large as the earth. Venus
which is the most beautiful planet in the whole heavens, is a little smaller
than the earth and can easily be discerned with the naked eye.
�57
Upon the surface of the planet Mars, large bodies of water and continents
have been discovered. The bright beautiful moon, by whose generous
light we are enabled to distinguish objects by night, though appealing no
larger than a ball, is of great size and has been discovered to contain
numerous mountains, by which its surface is much diversified.
The light and heat which the sun and other heavenly bodies bestow upon
the earth, furnishes a striking illustration of the goodness and benevolence
of our blessed Creator.
W. L. H.
IS IT RIGHT TO MARRY FOR MONEY ?
\Scene I.—A young lady's boudoir in a handsome mansion.—Afternoon.—
Lily seated in a deep bay window, embroidering.—Enters her intimatefriend
Mabel, in a high state of excitement.']
Mabel. Oh Lily! I have the greatest little piece of news to tell you.
The beautiful Miss M. is going to be married to that horrid Mr. T. and
nearly all the fashionable world is at the height of excitement, and only
think, there is a whisper that it is all for money!
Lily. Mabel! for money ! did you say it is all for money ? Well, it is
very foolish to marry for money. Isn’t it so, ma chere ?
M. Ah ! my dear, I am sorry to say I must differ with you in this. I
am in favor of marrying for money, provided the man is old and of a weak
constitution, and not likely to survive long !
L. Why, Mabel, for shame! How heartless you have grown—you who
used to have such romantic notions when at school. What has caused such
a change in you, darling ?
M. My dear girl, I have learned that such a thing as love, is well enough
for a brief time, but when you come to real life, you will find that it is a
different thing. How absurd it is to think of such a thing as love in a cot
tage, without the means to procure the common conveniences of life. Such
billing and cooing will do well enough for the sentimental,
“ But give me a sly flirtation,
By the light of a chandelier,
With music to play in the pauses,
And nobody very near.”
L. Indeed you are greatly mistaken about love. You talk as if you
never felt the pangs of true love. But if you knew what love was, you
could not help echoing my words: “ How sweet it is to love and to be
loved.”
\Enter a servant bea/ring a silver tra/y with a perfumed note for Lily.]
M. (Eagerly) is it from Miss M. ?
L. (Reading.) Oui, ma aime.
M. What does she say ?
L. She asks the favor of my company at her wedding.
8
�58
Jf. Shall you not go, my darling ?
L. No, dear, I must decline it, as I do not want to see her take upon
herself the burden of future misery, as I know this marriage will produce.
Jf. Well, then, my dear, I must go without you. You have such queer
ideas about marriage. Good evening.
[Exit Mabel.]
Scene II.—same room—five months after the wedding.
L. Now, Ma chere, hear what I am going to say. Well, I heard a rumor
that Mrs. T. is very unhappy and miserable because of her husband, who is
getting cross and unlovable as he is getting older every day, though he will
probably live many years, for he has such a strong constitution. What is
your opinion of marrying for money now ? [with a sneer.]
I am really sorry if it is true, but notwithstanding it has not yet
weakened my faith in money. Mrs. T. who was present at the late grand
ball at Music Hall, looked as happy as any one in the room ! besides she was
covered with jewels the gifts of her devoted lord. I am sure I did not see
the least traces of grief or misery upon her face. I think the rumor must
have been false.
L. But if you could see behind the curtain, you would think differently.
I suppose “ to keep up appearances” is her motto. I do really pity her, but
she knew better when $he sold herself for money.
Scene III.—five months later—Mabel and Lily driving down Fifth ave
nue.
L. Now, Mabel, did you see Mrs T. just now, in her splendid mansion,
flattening her nose against the window of the drawing room, with such a
despairing look—such a wild longing in her eye, that I know she has not
lived a happy life, in spite of wealth which could buy anything she wished.
The riches which she thought would buy happiness, are like the apples of
Sodom. Mabel, what do you think of marrying for money ?
M. hlLy dearest girl, I must confess that I have made a fatal mistake in
thinking that money without love can give happiness. According to Mrs.
T.’s confession which she made to me a few days ago, she says money, with
out love, is the source of the greatest unhappiness. She says that she would
rather be the wife of a poor man whom she loved, than the rich man’s dar
ling whom she hates. Therefore I hope we shall never be so foolish as to
marry for money.
Lily, E. D. C.
Mabel, M. A. McK.
�TERMS OF ADMISSION.
I. The Asylum will provide for each pupil, board, lodging and washing,
the continual superintendence of health, conduct, manners and morals, fuel,
lights, stationery and other incidental expenses of the school-room; for
which, including tuition, there will be an annual charge of one hundred
;and seventy-five dollars.
II. In case of sickness, the necessary extra charges will be made.
III. No deduction from the above charge will be made on account of
vacation or absence, except in case 01 sickness.
IV. Payments are always to be made six months in advance, for the
punctual fulfillment of which, a satisfactory bond will be required.
V. Each person applying for admission, must be between the ages of
eight and twenty-five years; must be of a good natural intellect; ca
pable of forming and joining letters with a pen, legibly and correctly; free
from any immoralities of conduct, and from any contagious disease.
Applications for the benefit of the legislative appropriations in the States
of Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts, should be made to the Sec
retaries of those States respectively, stating the name and age of the pro
posed beneficiary, and the circumstances of his parent or guardian. Ap
plications as above should be made in Vermont, Rhode Island and Con
necticut, respectively, to his Excellency, the Governor of the State. In all
cases, a certificate from two or more of the selectmen, magistrates, or other
respectable inhabitants of the township or place to which the applicant
belongs, should accompany the application.
Those applying for the admission of pa/ying pupils, may address their
letters to the Principal of the Asylum; and on all letters from him respect
ing the pupils, postage will be charged.
The time for admitting pupils is the second Wednesday of September, and
at no other time in the year. Punctuality in this respect is very import
ant, as it cannot be expected that the progress of a whole class should be
retarded on account of a pupil who joins it after its formation. Such a
pupil must suffer the inconvenience and the loss.
�60
It is earnestly recommended to the friends of the deaf and dumb, to have
them taught to write a fair and legible hand before they come to the
Asylum. This can be easily done, and it prepares them to make greater
and more rapid improvement.
When a pupil is sent to the Asylum, unless accompanied by a parent or
some friend who can give the necessary information concerning him, he
should bring a written statement embracing specifically the following par
ticulars :
1. The name, in full.
2. Post office address, and correspondent.
3. Day, month and year of birth.
4. Cause of deafness.
5. Names of the parents.
6. Names of the children in the order of their age.
7. Were the parents related before marriage ? If so, how ?
8. Has the pupil deaf-mute relatives ? If so, what ?
The pupil should be well-clothed; that is, he should have both summer
and winter clothing enough to last one year, and be furnished with a list of
the various articles, each of which should be marked. A small sum of
money should also be deposited with the Steward of the Asylum, for the
personal expenses of the pupil not otherwise provided for.
Careful attention to these suggestions is quite important.
There is but one vacation in the year. It begins on the last Wednesday
of June, and closes on the second Wednesday of September. It is expected
that the pupils will spend the vacation at home. This arrangement is as
desirable for the benefit of the pupils, who need the recreation and change
of scene, as for the convenience of the Institution, thus affording opportu
nity for the necessary painting, cleansing, &c. The present facilities for
travel, enable most of the pupils to reach home on the evening of the day
they leave Hartford. Every pupil is expected to return punctually at the
opening of school, on the second Wednesday of September.
On the day of the commencement of the Vacation, an officer of the
Asylum will accompany such pupils as are to travel upon the railroads be
tween Hartford and Boston, taking care of them and their Baggage, on
condition that their friends will make timely provison for their expenses on
the way, and engage to meet and i eceive them immediately on the arrival
of the early train at various points on the route previously agreed on, and
at the station of the Boston and Worcester Railroad, in Boston. A similar
arrangement is made on the Connecticut River Railroads, as far as to
White River Junction. No person will be sent from the Asylum to accom
pany the pupils on their return, but if their fare is paid, and their trunks
checked to Hartford, it will be safe to send them in charge of the Con
ductor.
�
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Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Pamphlet
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Title
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The fifty-second annual report of the directors and officers of the American asylum at Hartford for the education and instruction of the deaf and dumb
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
American Asylum at Hartford for the Deaf and Dumb
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: Hartford, Conn.
Collation: 60 p. : ill ; 23 cm.
Notes: With illustration of the building and the deaf and dumb alphabet. Contains list of pupils. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
Publisher
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Wiley, Waterman & Eaton
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1868
Identifier
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G5186
Subject
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Disability
Education
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The fifty-second annual report of the directors and officers of the American asylum at Hartford for the education and instruction of the deaf and dumb), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Deafness
Education
Muteness
-
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PDF Text
Text
NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY
kJ 05^
THE
JOINT EDUCATION
OF
YOUNG MEN AND WOMEN
IN THE
AMERICAN SCHOOLS AND COLLEGES.
BEING A LECTURE DELIVERED BEFORE THE
SUNDAY LECTURE SOCIETY,
On 27th
of
April, 1873,
BY
MARY E. BEEDY, M.A.,
Graduate of Antioch College, U.S.
LONDON:PUBLISHED
by the
SUNDAY LECTURE SOCIETY.
1873.
Price Threepence.
�SUifoerttsentent.
SUNDAY LECTURE SOCIETY,
To provide for the delivery on Sundays in the Metropolis, and
to encourage the delivery elsewhere, of Lectures on Science,
—physical, intellectual, and moral,—History, Literature,
and Art; especially in their bearing upon the improve
ment and social well-being of mankind.
THE SOCIETY’S LECTURES
ARE DELIVERED AT
ST GEORGE’S HALL, LANGHAM PLACE,
On SUNDAY Afternoons, at FOUR o’clock precisely
(Annually—from November to May).
Twenty-four Lectures (in three series), ending 3rd May,
1874, will be given.
Members’ LI subscription entitles them to an annual ticket
(transferable and admitting to the reserved seats), and to eight
single reserved-seat tickets available for any lecture.
Tickets for each series (one for each lecture), or for any
eight consecutive lectures, as below :
To the Shilling Reserved Seats—5s. 6d.
To the Sixpenny Seats—2s. being at the rate of Three
pence each lecture.
For tickets apply (by letter) to the Hon. Treasurer,
Wm. Henry Domville, Esq., 15 Gloucester Crescent, Hyde
Park, W.
Payment at the door
One Penny
Sixpence ■—and
(Reserved Seats) One Shilling.
�JOINT EDUCATION
OF
YOUNG MEM AND WOMEN.
HE American colonists carried with them their
practical English tendencies.
They were
impressed with a deep sense of the advantages of
education, but it had to be got at the least expense.
In the towns and cities they could have schools
for boys and schools for girls, but in the sparselypopulated rural districts separate schools were
impossible. It was almost more than the farmp.rs
could do to pay the cost of one. All the boys and
girls within a radius of two or three miles met
together in the same school. They were companions
and rivals in their pastimes, and it probably did not
occur to any one to consider whether there could
be any danger in continuing this rivalry in their
lessons. In the rapid growth of the population
some of these rural centres gradually became vil
lages and towns, but the joint education of the
girls and boys went on.
Iwo leading principles in school economy are, to
secure the smallest number of classes, and the
greatest equality of attainment between the pupils
in each class; and these principles favour large
schools rather than numerous schools. Schools
affording a higher grade of instruction, and known
T
�4
"Joint Education of
as academies, sprang up here and there. These
were private enterprises, and the commercial aim
was to furnish the best educational advantages
for the largest number of pupils at the least ex
pense. The teacher wanted to make as much money
as he could, and the parents had in general but little
to spend for the education of their sons and daughters.
The same economical views made these joint schools :
fewer teachers were required. These academies,
with the district schools I have before mentioned,
met almost the entire educational demands of the
rural and village population. A few of the more
ambitious boys went from these academies to the
universities, and a few of the girls went to young
ladies’ boarding-schools; but these were exceptional
cases.
You probably know that we have no men of
wealth and leisure living in the country. The soil
is owned by the men who work it, and the rich
men live in the cities. And I suppose you also know
that in any generation of American men the large
majority of those who lead in commerce, in politics,
and in the professions are the sons of farmers^
who in their boyhood worked on the farms and'
went to these rural schools in the leisure season;
the wives of these men having had for the most
part the same rural training. You can readily
see from this that the peculiarities of our rural
life, the circumstances that gave these men and
women the energy to bring themselves to the front
Tank of society, were likely to mefit with approval.
However, joint education was simply looked upon
as one of the necessities of our youthful life till
about twenty years ago. Men who rose to positions
of wealth and honour upon the basis of the educa
�Young Men and Women.
5
tion received in these schools did not praise joint
education any more than they praised the other
natural and frugal habits that attended their rural
life. No one had philosophised upon this system,
and there was no occasion to think of it. It had
simply been the most natural means of meeting a
great need. In both the district schools and in the
academies the boys and girls did about the same
work. They liked. to keep together. Now and
then a boy went a little farther in mathematics
than the girls did, in the prospect of a business
career and a life in the city; or he learned more Latin
and Greek in preparation for the university. There
was no question about difference of capacity or
difference of tastes between boys and girls; there
was nothing to suggest it. They liked to do the
same things, and the one did as well as the other.
Forty years ago, in one of the academies near Bos
ton, a number of girls went with a set of their school
boy-friends through the entire preparation for Har
vard University. The girls knew mathematics and
Greek as well as the boys did, and formed a plan for
going to the university with them. I cannot say
whether the plan grew out of a keen zest forknow
ledge, or out of an unwillingness to break off the
very pleasant companionship. Probably from both.
The girls did not think there could be much objection
to admitting them at the university. They thought
the reason there were no girls at the universities
was that none had wanted to go, or had been pre
pared to go. They proposed to live at home; so there
would be no difficulty on the score of college resi
dence. However, as their request was new, it
occurred to them that a little diplomacy might be
required in presenting it; so they deputed the most
�6
J
’ oint Education of
prudent of the party to do the talking, and imposed
strict silenee upon the youngest and most impulsive
one, from whom I have the story. The girls called
upon old President Quincy ; they told him what they
had done in their studies,—that they had passed
the examinations with the boys, and wished to be
admitted to the university. He listened'to their
story, and evinced so much admiration for their
work and aims that they at first felt sure of success.
But President Quincy seemed slow in coming to the
point. He talked of the newness and difficulties of
the scheme, and proposed other opportunities of
study for them, till at length this youngest one,
forgetting in her impatience her promise to keep
silent, said, “Well, President Quincy, you feel sure
the trustees will let us come, don’t you ? ”
0, by
no means,” was the reply :“ this is a place only for
men.”' The girl of sixteen burst into tears, and
exclaimed with vehemence, “ I wish I could anni
hilate the women, and let the men have every
thing to themselves! ”
This, so far as I know, was the first effort made
by women to get into an American university, but
the incident was too trifling to make any impression,
and I narrate it only as marking the beginning of
the demand for university advantages for women.
About the same time Oberlin College was founded
in Northern Ohio. It grew out of a great practical
everyday-life demand. There was a wide-spread
desire on the part of well-to-do people for larger
educational advantages than the ordinary rural
schools provided. They could not afford the expense
of the city schools : besides, they wanted their sons
and daughters to go on together in their school work ;
they were unwilling to subject either to the dangers
�Young Men and Women.
7
of boarding-school life without the companionship
and guardianship of the other. Oberlin College was
founded on the strictest principles of economy. It
was located in a rural village in the West, where the
habits were simple and the living inexpensive. In
the third year of its existence it had 500 students,
and since the first ten years it has averaged nearly
1,200, the proportion of young women varying from
one-third to one-half. There was a university
course of study for the young men, and a shorter
ladies’ course for the young women, which omitted
all the Greek, most of the Latin, and the higher
mathematics. It was not anticipated that the
young women would desire the extended university
course, but so far as the two courses accorded the
instruction was given to the young men and the
young women in common. But the young women
were allowed to attend any of the classes they chose,
and at the end of six years a few of them had pre
pared themselves for the B.A. examination, and
were allowed upon passing it to receive the degree.
The college authorities did not seem to consider
that B.A. and M.A. were especially masculine
designations. They regarded them only as marks of
scholastic attainments, which belonged equally to
men and women when they had reached a certain
standard of scholarship. Not many Women could
stay, or cared to stay, long enough to get these
degrees. The “ ladies’ course ” required nearly two
years’ less-time, and contained a larger proportion of
the subjects that women are expected to know. The
number of women who have received the university
degrees from Oberlin is still less than a hundred,
making an average of only two or three for each
year. Oberlin sent out staunch men and women.
�"8
"Joint Education of
Wherever these men and women went it was ob
served that they worked with a will and with effect.
The eminent success of Oberlin led many parents
in different parts of the country to desire its advan
tages for their sons and daughters. But Oberlin was
a long way off from New England and from many
other parts of the country; besides some thought
it an uncomfortably religious place; negroes were
admitted, and it was altogether very democratic,
much more so than many people liked. So parents
began to say, 11 Why can’t we have other colleges
that shall provide all the advantages of Oberlin and
omit the peculiarities we dislike.” Now began the
discussion upon the real merits of this economical
system of joint education. It had sprung up like
an indigenous plant. It had met a necessity remark
ably . well, and it was only when, its advantages
becoming recognised, it began to press itself into
the cities and among people where it was not a ne
cessity, that it evoked any discussion. This was a
little more than twenty years ago. People who had
observed the working of the joint schools were alto
gether in favour of them. The wealthier people in
the towns and cities, who were accustomed to having
boys and girls educated apart, preferred separate
schools, and thought joint education would be a dan
gerous innovation ; that in the institution adopting
it the girls would lose their modesty and refinement,
and the boys would waste their time. Leading edu
cators were divided upon this question: „ those who
were familiar with the joint schools were the most
uncompromising advocates of that system; those
who had known only the schools where girls and
boys were educated apart for the most part preferred
separate education, where it could be afforded. Not
�Young Men and Women.
9
all, however, for many had developed the theory of
joint education out of an opposite experience. In
girls’ schools they had felt the want of adequate
stimulants for thorough work. They had seen the
strong tendency in girls to fit themselves for society
rather than for the severer duties of life ; they be
lieved that if girls were associated with boys and
young men in their studies, they would not only be
better scholars, but that they would remain longer
in school, that they would have less eagerness to
get out of school into society. And many who
were familiar with boys’ schools felt the dangers
attendant upon the absence of domestic influence,
and saw that it might be very largely supplied by
the presence of sisters and schoolfellows’ sisters.
They saw too that the tendencies to a coarse
physical development, which are found in an ex
clusive- society of men, might be counteracted by
the presence of women. In short, all who were
acquainted with joint education gave it their most
unqualified approval; while those who knew only
the system of separate education were for the most
part disposed to favour that, though many of these
saw the need of something in girls’ schools which the
presence of boys would introduce, and something in
boys’ schools which the presence of girls would sup
ply. The advocacy of joint education was valiantly
led by Horace Mann, the greatest American educator,
the man who stands with us where Dr Arnold
stands in the hearts of English people.
About this time Antioch College was founded in
Southern Ohio, and Mr Mann was invited to take
charge of it. Its object was to provide educational
facilities as nearly equal to those found at the best
New England universities as possible, and it
was
�io
Joint Education of
founded avowedly upon the principle that joint
education per se was a good thing; that it was
natural; that it was a great advantage to have
brothers and sisters in the same school; that girls
were both more scholarly and more womanly when
associated with boys, and boys were more gentle
manly and more moral when associated with girls ;
and that both girls and boys come out of joint
schools with juster views of life, and a larger sense
of moral obligation.
Other new colleges followed the example of
Antioch, and some of the old ones began to open their
doors to women. To-day the national free schools
and public schools in most of the cities of the North
educate boys and girls together. In some of the older
cities, particularly Boston, New York, and Phila
delphia, the schools are for the most part conducted
on the original plan of separate schools. The school
buildings are not arranged for the accommodation of
boys and girls together, and there is still a strong
sentiment against the plan, though it is gradually,
and I may say rapidly, giving way. In tire Western
cities, Cincinnati, Chicago, and St Louis, the boys
and girls study together throughout the entire
course, that is, till they are ready to go to the
universities ; though in St Louis, and perhaps in
the other two cities, there are a few of the grammar
schools where they are still apart, the buildings not
being arranged for the accommodation of both.
The system prevails in the rural schools almost
without exception, and almost as generally in the
public schools' of the towns and cities, with the
exceptions that I have mentioned ; there are now
over thirty colleges and universities that offer univer
sity degrees to women on the same conditions as
�Young Men and Women.
11
to men. On the other hand, there is still a large
number of private schools in the towns and cities
which are generally either boys’ schools or girls’
schools. They are for the most part schools esta
blished for teaching the children of some pai-ticular
religious denomination, for fitting boys for a com
mercial career, or for giving especial drill for the
universities; or, in the case of girls’ schools, for
giving especial training for society: but the public
schools are rapidly drawing into them the children
of the best educated families, for the simple reason
that they are the best schools of the country.
The oldest universities and colleges still keep
their doors shut against women. Harvard, within
the last year, has appointed a committee to consider
the demand made by women, but their report was
adverse. The committee recognised the success of
the system elsewhere, but thought it not wise to
attempt the change in Harvard.
Michigan University, a free state university,
which stands second to none in educational advan
tages, except Harvard and Yale, and has double the
number of students of either of these, admitted
women three years ago. And Cornell University,
which has as good prospects as any in the country,
has just received its first class of women.
I heard it announced with great gravity in the
British Association a year-and-a-half ago in Edin
burgh, that girls had no difficulty in learning arith
metic, and no one smiled. So completely is this
question settled with us, that I think such .an
announcement would have been received by a
public assembly in America with a derisive laugh.
Joint schools and colleges have settled the question
whether girls can learn not only arithmetic, but
�12
'Joint Education of
also the higher mathematics, logic, and metaphysics;
and have established beyond a doubt in the minds
of American educators, that in acute perception,
in the ability to grasp abstruse principles, the
feminine mind is in no wise inferior to the mascu
line. But the question is still open, whether
women have the physical strength to endure the
continuous mental work requisite for the greatest
breadth and completeness of comprehension. This
can be determined only by experiments which shall
extend through a longer series of years devoted to
study. The records at Oberlin indicate that the
young women are no more likely to break down in
health than the young men are. The records of
the city schools do not seem to be quite the same
upon this point, but the same difference would
doubtless appear if the girls were not in school; and
this failure in health cannot be attributed to the
school work, but rather to the more indoor life of the
girls. The Oberlin statistics also indicate that the
women who have taken the university degrees have
not diminished their chance of longevity by this
severe work in their youth. Women have less phy
sical strength than men have, but there seems to be
in them a tendency to a more economical expendi
ture of strength. Their energy is less driving, and
there is, in consequence, less waste from friction.
In regard to the social morality at these schools
the results are equally satisfactory. At the rural
schools boys and girls. have almost unrestricted
companionship; they have just the same freedom
in their home intercourse, but improper or even
objectionable conduct is a'thing unknown at the
schools, and almost equally unknown in the associa
tion outside the schools. Brothers and brothers’
�Young Men and Women.
13
friends guard the sister, and sisters and their friends
o-uard the brother. In cases where it is necessary
for the pupils to reside at the school there is more
love-making, but it is mostly repressed by want of
time; besides, there are few occasions for meeting,
except in the presence of the class, and where there
is an acquaintance with so many on about equal
terms an especial regard for one is less likely to be
formed. The admiration of the boys is suie to
centre upon the girls who are nearest the head
of the class; but these girls have not time to return
it and keep their position, and to lose their position
would be to lose the admiration; and the same is
true with the boys.
I am sure it would be surprising to any one who
is not familiar with these schools to observe to what
very practical and common-sense principles all these
otherwise romantic and illusory relations are sub
jected. In this mutual intellectual rivalship the
conjectural differences between the sexes, and the
fancied charms of the one over the other, are sub
mitted to very practical tests. A disagreeable boy
is not likely to be considered a hero in virtue of his
assumed bearing and physical strength; nor is a
silly girl, by* dint of her coquettish airs likely to
be thought a fairy with magical gifts. Girls know
boys as boys know each other; and boys know girls
as girls know each other. Hence the subtle charms
that evade human logic find little opportunity to
blind and mislead in the constant presence of unmistakeable facts.
In all the time I was at Antioch College no word
of disreputable scandal ever came to my ears, and
in recent years I have repeatedly heard from young
men who were there when I was, that in their whole
�14
Joint Education of
five or six years they never heard the faintest shadow
of imputation against any young woman in the
institution. And so stern was the morality, that
smoking, beer-drinking, and card-playing were
all considered crimes,, and banished from the
premises.
You have now heard my statement respecting the
effectiveness of joint education, and, though it is
made from a very extended and thorough acquaint
ance with the system, I shall not ask you to accept
it without the support of other and authoritative
testimony. Abundant confirmation of my state
ment will be found in all Official Reports and in
treatises that review this system, while no testi
mony of a contrary character is anywhere to be
found. I will first quote from the published
. Report of Mr Harris, Superintendent of the Public
Schools in St Louis. He is well known to the
leading students of German philosophy in all the
countries of Europe, and I think I may say in
his own country is recognised as standing in the
front rank of American educators. No other man
has brought so much philosophical insight to the
study of dur public school system. I quote from
Mr Harris’s Report of 1871 a condensed summary
of the results- of this system of joint education as
they have developed themselves under his observa
tion and direction. He says :—
- “ Within the last fifteen years the schools of St Louis have
been remodelled upon the plan of the joint education of the
sexes, and the results have proved so admirable that a few
remarks may be ventured on the experience which they
furnish.
. “ I-—Economy has been secured, for, unless pupils of widely
different attainments are brought together in the same classes,
�Young Men and Women.
15
the separation of the boys and girls requires a great increase
in the number of teachers.
“II.—Discipline has improved continually by the adoption
of joint schools ; our change in St Louis has been so gradual
that we have been able to weigh with great exactness every
point of comparison between the two systems. The joining
of the male and female departments of a school has always
been followed by an improvement in discipline ; not merely
on the part of the boys, but with the girls as well. The rude
ness and abandon which prevails among boys when separate
at once gives place to self-restraint in the presence of girls,
and the sentimentality engendered in girls when educated
apart from boys disappears in these joint schools, and in its
place there comes a dignified self-possession. The few schools
that have given examples of efforts to secure clandestine asso
ciation are those few where there are as yet only girls.
“ HI.—The quality of instruction is improved. Where the
boys and girls are separate, methods of instruction tend to
extremes, that may be called masculine and feminine. Each
needs the other as a counter-check. We find in these joint
schools a prevalent healthy tone which our schools on the
separate system lack—more rapid progress is the conse
quence.
“ IV.—The development of individual character is, as
already indicated, far more sound and healthy. . It has been
found that schools composed exclusively of girls or boys
require a much more strict surveillance on the part of the
teachers. Confined by themselves and shut off from inter
course with society in its normal form, morbid fancies and
interests are developed which this daily association in the
class-room prevents. Here boys and girls test themselves
with each other on an intellectual plane. Each sees the
strength and weakness of the other, and learns to esteem
those qualities that are of true value. Sudden likes, capri
cious fancies, and romantic ideas give way to sober judgments
not easily deceived by mere externals. This is the basis of
the dignified self-possession before alluded to, and it forms a
striking point of contrast between the girls and boys edu
cated in joint schools and those educated in schools exclu
sively for one sex. Our experience in St Louis has been
entirely in favour of the joint education of the sexes, in all
the respects mentioned and in many minor ones.”
�16
Joint Education of
I give Mr Harris’s statement as representative of
the sentiment of those who are engaged in public
school instruction in America. As I said before, in
some of the older cities, where the public schools
were earliest organised, the joint system has been
accepted as yet only partially, and the teachers, who
are only familiar with the separate system, gene
rally prefer it. But a very large proportion of
the public schools of the country are joint schools,
and a still larger proportion of the instructors and
managers of public schools favour the system of
joint education. Mr Harris’s testimony applies to
city schools, when the pupils reside at home.
I now quote to you from another authority, addi
tionally valuable inasmuch as it represents the
results of this system of education upon young men
and women who reside at the school and away from
the guardianship of parents.
In 1868 a meeting was called of all the College
Presidents of the country, to discuss questions
relating to college discipline and instruction. As
Oberlin was the oldest college that had adopted
the system of joint instruction, a strong desire
was felt to secure a critical and comprehensive
statement of the results of the system there. Dr
Fairchild, the present President of Oberlin, was
deputed to make the Report. He had at that
time been connected with Oberlin seven years
as a student and twenty-five years as professor,
and has long had the reputation of being the most
accomplished scholar and acute thinkei' among the
Oberlin professors. His statements may therefore
be accepted as absolute in point of fact, and as
wholly representative of the opinion of those who
have conducted the instruction and discipline at
�Young Men and Women.
!7
Oberlin. But my chief reason for selecting this out
of the accumulated published testimony is that it
.seems to me the best digest of the subject that I
have seen.
Dr Fairchild says :—
“ 1st.—On the point of economy In the higher depart
ments of instruction, where the chief expense is involved,
the. expense is no greater on account of the presence of the
ladies.
“ 2nd.—Convenience to the patrons of the school:—It is a
matter of interest to notice the number of cases where a
brother is followed by a sister, or a sister by a brother. This
is an interesting and prominent feature in our work. Each is
safer in the presence of the other.
“3rd.—The wholesome incitements to study, which the
system affords :—The social influence arising from the consti
tution of our classes operates continuously and upon all.
Each desires for himself the best standing he is capable of,
and there is no lack of motive to exertion. It will be observed,
too, that the stimulus is of the same kind as will operate in
after life. The young man going out into the world does
not leave behind him the forces that have helped him on.
They are the ordinary forces of society.
“ 4th.-—The tendency to good order that we find in the
system :—The ease with which the discipline of so large a
school is conducted has not ceased to be a matter of wonder
to ourselves. More than one thousand students are gathered
from every State in the Union, from every class in society, of
every grade of culture, the great mass of them bent on im
provement, but numbers are sent by anxious friends with the
hope that they may be saved or reclaimed from every evil
tendency. Yet the disorders incident to such gatherings are
essentially unknown among us. Our streets are as quiet
by day and by night as in any other country town. This
result we attribute greatly to the wholesome influence of the
system of joint education. College tricks lose their attrac
tiveness in a community thus constituted. They scarcely
appear among us. We have had no difficulty in reference to
the conduct and manners in the college dining-hall. There is
an entire absence of the irregularities and roughness so often
complained of in the college commons.
“ 5th.—Another manifest advantage is the relation of the
B
�18
Joint Education of
school to the community. A cordial feeling of goodwill and
the absence of that antagonism between town and college
which in general belongs to the history of universities and
colleges. The constitution of the school is so similar to that
of the community that any conflict is unnatural; the usual
provocation seems to be wanting,
“ 6th.—It can hardly be doubted that people educated
under such conditions are kept in harmony with society at
large, and are prepared to appreciate the responsibilities of
life, and to enter upon its work. If we are not utterly de
ceived in our position, our students naturally and readily find
their position in the world, because they have been trained in
sympathy with the world. These are among the advantages
of the system that have forced themselves upon our attention.
The list might be extended and expanded, but you will wish
especially to know whether'we have not encountered disad
vantages and difficulties which more than counterbalance
these advantages.
“ As to the question whether young ladies have the mental
vigour and physical health to maintain a fair standing in a
class with voung men, I must say, where there has been the
same preparatory training, we find no difference in ability to
maintain themselves in the class-room and at the examina
tions. The strong and the weak scholars are equally distri
buted between the sexes.
“ Whether ladies need a course of study especially adapted
to their nature and prospective work ?—The theory of our
school has never been that men and women are alike in
mental constitution, or that they naturally and properly
occupy the same position in their work of life. The educa
tion furnished is general, not professional, designed to fit men
and women for any position or work to which they may pro
perly be called. The womanly nature will appropriate the
material to its own necessities under its own laws.' Young
men and women sit at the same table and parta.ke of the
same food, and we have no apprehension that the vital forces
will fail to elaborate from the common material the osseous,
fibrous, and nervous tissues adapted to each frame and
constitution.
.
<£ Apprehension is felt that character will deteriorate on
the one side or the other,—that young men will become
frivolous or effeminate, and young women coarse and mas
culine.
�Toung Men and Women.
T9
“ That young men should lose their manly attributes and
character from proper association with, cultivated young
women is antecedently improbable and false in fact. It is
the natural atmosphere for the development of the higher
qualities of manhood—magnanimity, generosity, true chivalry,
and earnestness. The animal man is kept subordinate in the
prevalence of these higher qualities.
“We have found it the surest way to make men of boys
and gentlemen of rowdies.
“ On the other hand, will not the young woman, pursuing
her studies with young men, take on their manners, and
aspirations, and aims, and be turned aside from the true ideal
of womanly life and character ? The thing is scarcely con
ceivable. The natural response of woman to the exhibition
of manly traits is in the correlative qualities of gentleness,
delicacy, and grace.
“ It might better be questioned whether, the finer shadings
of woman’s character can be developed without this natural
stimulus ; but it is my duty not to reason, but to speak from
the limited historical view assigned me.
“You wish to know whether the result with us has been a
large accession to the number of coarse, strong-minded women,
in the disagreeable sense of the word; and I say, without
hesitation, that I do not know a single instance of such a
product as the result of our system of education.
“ Is there not danger that young men and young women
thus brought together in the critical period of fife, when the
distinctive social tendencies act with greatest intensity, will
fail of the necessary regulative force, and fall into undesirable
and unprofitable relations ? Will not such association result
in weak and foolish love affairs ? It is not strange that such
apprehension is felt, nor would it be easy to give an a priori
answer to such difficulties ; but if we may judge from our
experience, the difficulties are without foundation. The
danger in this direction results from excited imagination,
from the glowing exaggerations of youthful fancy, and the
best remedy is to displace these fancies by every-day facts
and realities.
“Theyoung man shut out from the society of ladies, with
the help of the high-wrought representations of life which
poets and novelists afford, with only a distant vision of the
reality, is the one who is in danger. The women whom he
sees are glorified by his fancy, and are wrought into his day
�io
Joint Education of
dreams and night dreams as beings of supernatural loveliness.
It would be different if he met them day by day in the class
room, in a common encounter with a mathematical problem,
or at a table sharing in the common want of bread and butter.
There is still room for the fancy to work, but the materials
for the picture are more reliable and enduring. Such associa
tion does not take all the romance out of life, but it gives as
favourable conditions for sensible views and actions upon
these delicate questions as can be afforded to human nature.
“ But is this method adapted to schools in general, or is the
success attained at Oberlin due to peculiar features of the
place, which can rarely be found or reproduced elsewhere,
and can it be introduced into men’s colleges with their tradi
tional customs and habits of action and thought ? Might not
the changes required occasion difficulty at the outset and
peril the experiment ? On this point I have no experience,
but I have such confidence in the inherent vitality and
adaptability of the system that I should be entirely willing to
see it subjected to this test.”
I am sorry not to give you a more lengthened
account of Dr Fairchild’s Report, but the time warns
me to hasten.
Respecting economy, school discipline, social
order, and the improved character of both young
men and young women, and the high scholar
ship attained by young women, you see that Dr
Fairchild’s statement fully corroborates my own
and that of Mr Harris. He agrees with us that
the grade of scholarship of the young men is in no
wise lowered by this joint work, but, on the con
trary, that the average is higher.
To be definite upon this point, my own opinion
is that those marvellous feats of scholarship that
sometimes occur in boys’ schools are not so likely to
occur in a joint school, where a little more of the
domestic and social element is found. On the other
hand, from a long and close observation, I feel fully
justified in saying the average scholarship is higher.
�Young Men and 'Women.
21
There is a more general stimulus for good scholar
ship. The standard of respectability is somewhat
different from what it is in a school exclusively for
boys. A boy may secure the respect of his boy
associates by being an adept on the playground or
generally a good fellow, but as he is known to the
girls only through his class work, he feels more
especially bound to make this creditable.
I should like to accumulate authority upon these
points, but I must ask you to accept my statement
that the opinions I have' given you are those held
by the very large majority of the educators of the
country.
In this system of joint education you see that
the difficulty of getting funds to establish schools
scarcely appears as an obstacle to the higher edu
cation of women. It requires so little more to edu
cate girls along with boys than it does to educate
boys alone, and lack of the masculine incentive to
study is largely supplied to the girls by class
rivalry. The girls like to remain at school, and
they like to do as much work and as good work as
the boys do; and the boys are equally eager to keep
the companionship of the girls, and to keep up the
competition in all the departments of the work.
There is a mutual rivalry which both enjoy, and
the girls work with zest, without thinking whether
there is to be any reward beyond the simple enjoy
ment of their work, without considering whether it
will ever bring them any farther returns.
The work of the girls in the joint schools has
done much to force up the standard in the exclu
sively girls’ schools. These schools could not afford
the disparaging comparison. So the teachers intro
duce the same studies as are found in the joint
�22
Joint Education of
schools, and do the best they can to get as good
work from their girls. But in most of the girls’
schools I have ever visited, the work will not com
pare with the work of girls in the joint schools.
When Dr Fairchild says he does not know a '
single instance in which a coarse, strong-minded
woman, in the disagreeable sense, has been the pro
duct of the Oberlin system of education, it must not
be understood that there have been no women of that
type at Oberlin, for there have been, and Oberlin
lias done much to soften them and refine them,
but it could not wholly change their natures and
previously-acquired habits. Upon this point there
is a pernicious popular delusion, and I am at a loss
to account for its origin. It is not association with
men that developes this type of character. The
reverse of this is the case, as Dr Fairchild has
indicated. It is true that many highly-intellectual
and highly-educated women have been peculiar,
have developed peculiarities or idiosyncrasies of
character or habit which lessened their companion
able and womanly attractiveness, but these women
have generally worked by themselves, away from
society, apart from the companionship of men.
Joint schools are the most complete corrective of
these tendencies. Whatever elevates women in the
eyes of men they are disposed to cultivate in the
presence of men, and whatever elevates men in the
eyes of women they cultivate in the presence of
women. There is little danger of careless toilet
with young women who are constantly meeting
young men; little danger of angular movement, of
unamiable sharpness, of egotism, and pronounced
self-assertion.
The disagreeable women, the women contemp-
�Toung Men and Women.
23
tuously called strong-minded, are women who have
not known a genial social atmosphere. Crotchety
men and crotchety women are the product of isola
tion from society, and formerly women could not
mount the heights of knowledge except in isolation.
The attractive women, the women who seem to have
a genius for womanliness, are the women who have
been much in the society of men,—women at court,
women in political and diplomatic circles, women
who are familiar with the thought and’ experience
of men, women who talk with men and work with
men.
Social intercourse at these joint schools is not of
course left to chance. Girls and boys need and get
as careful attention at school as in their homes.
Usually they enter and leave the school building
by different doors, and indeed meet only when they
are receiving instruction from the teachers, where
they occupy separate forms on different sides of the
room. Among the older pupils, at all times, except
at the lecture hours, the girls usually have their own
rooms and the boys theirs,'and no communication
between them is possible, except as the teachers
choose to grant permission, which is not asked with
out explaining the occasion. The boys do not
appear to care very much to talk to the girls, at
least they would not be willing to have it seen that
they did. At the boarding-schools the young men
and young women usually have their private apart
ments in different buildings, but meet in a common
dining-hall in the building occupied by the young
■ women. Here they arrange themselves as they
like, the size of the company and the presence of
teachers being quite sufficient to exclude objection
able manners. At the times allowed for recreation
�24
.•
Joint Education of
the arrangements are such as to preclude for the
most part opportunities for young men and young
women to meet, though there are very frequent
receptions at .the homes of the professors or at the
general parlours, when they meet as they would at
any ordinary social party. At a few of the smaller
boarding-schools much more freedom, of intercourse
has been allowed, and with very admirable results ;
but this requires great wisdom and care on the part
of the teachers, more than they are generally able
to give in a large school. Where the pupils live at
home no very especial care is required on the part
of the teachers, further than would under any
circumstances be necessary to secure general good
order.
This system of education developes self-reliance
and a sense of responsibility, to such a degree that,
as I quoted from Dr Fairchild, it is a constant sur
prise to see how little direction they need. A good
many times while I was at Antioch College, young
men who had got into disgrace, or had been dis
missed from young men’s colleges, were sent there
to be reclaimed from their bad habits, and it is
surprising what effect this home-like association
had upon them.
I have already mentioned Michigan University
as the best institution that has as yet opened its
doors to women. This was done three years ago.
For ten years the question had been pending before
the trustees. A letter was addressed to Horace
Mann, asking for minute information concerning
the working of Antioch, and seeking counsel in
reference to the advisability of attempting the
tame plan at the Michigan University. Mr Mann
replied, that though he was an ardent advocate
�Toung Men and Women. '
25
of joint education and was satisfied with the
results achieved at Antioch, he should be afraid
to attempt the plan in a large town, where college
residence was not required. This ‘letter settled
the matter for the time. The trustees said:—
“ We cannot, endanger the morality of our students,
and the reputation of our institution, to accommo
date the few women who wish to come. We give
them our sympathy, but can at present do nothing
more.” But every now and then, with the change
of trustees, the question was revived. The men of
this new rich State felt ashamed to do so much less
for their daughters than for their sons, and they
were particularly sensitive to the argument that the
privileges of the institution could be extended to
the young women with almost no increase in the
expenses. Three years ago the opposition found
itself in the minority, and a resolution was passed
admitting women to all the classes of the university.
The dangers Horace Mann feared have not, and
in all probability will not come. Even the young
men, who in anticipation dreaded an invasion of
women into their realm of free-and-easy habits,
now unite in the most cordial approval of the plan.
They find a genial element added to their college
life in place of a chafing restraint.
The first year only one woman came into the
Arts-classes. This bold venturer was the daughter
of a deceased professor, by whom she had been
trained up to a point a good deal in advance of the
requisites for entrance. This enabled her to step at
once into the front rank of the class of two hundred
young men, who had been in the university a year
before her. No sooner was she there than the
dread and anticipated restraint on the part of the
�26
*
'Joint Education of
young men were forgotten, and the most chivalric
feeling sprang up in its place.
For a whole year Miss Stockwell was alone in
the Arts-classes among seven or eight hundred young
men, yet nothing ever occurred to make her feel in
the slightest degree uncomfortable. She took her
B.A. degree last summer as the first Greek scholar
in the university. There are now a hundred young
women or more in the various departments of
the university. The Professor of Civil Engineer
ing has been in the habit of giving to his class
every year a particular mathematical problem,
a sort of pons asinorum, as a test of their
ability. Not once during fifteen years had any
member of the class solved it, though the professor
states that during that time he has propounded it
to fifteen hundred young men. Last year, as usual,
the old problem was again presented to the class.
A Miss White alone, of all the class, brought in the
solution. The best student in the Law school last
year was a woman.
I could tell you many other stories of the suc
cesses of women in these joint schools, but it would
not be safe to conclude from these accounts that the
young women in America are superior to the young
men ; for, as you would naturally suppose, the few
women who at present avail themselves of university
training, in opposition to the popular notion of what
is wise and becoming, are for the most part above
the average of the women of the country. I think
I may say, however, that girls are a little more
likely to lead the classes in the schools than boys
are. They are, perhaps, a little more conscientious
in doing the work assigned them, and have a little
more school ambition.
�Toung Men and Women.
27
I quote the following from the Annual Report of
the Michigan University for the year ending 1872 :—
■ “ In the Medical Department the women receive instruc
tion by themselves. In the other departments all instruction
is given to both sexes in common.
“ It is manifestly not wise to leap to hasty generalisations
from our short experience in furnishing education to both
sexes in our university. But I think all w’ho have been
familiar with the inner life of the university for the past
three years will admit that, thus far, no reason for doubting
the wisdom of the action of the trustees in opening the uni
versity to women has appeared.
“Hardly one of the many embarrassments which some
have feared have confronted us. The young women have
addressed themselves to their work with great zeal, and have
shown themselves quite capable of meeting the demands of
severe studies as successfully as their classmates of the other
sex. Their work, so far, does not evince less variety of apti
tude or less power of grappling even with the higher mathe
matics than we find in the young men. They receive no
favour, and desire none. They are subjected to precisely the
same tests as the men. Nor does their work seem to put a
dangerous strain upon their physical powers. Their absences
by reason of illness do not proportionably exceed those of the
men. Their presence has not called for the enactment of a
single new law, nor for the slightest change in our methods of
government or grade of work.
“If we are asked still to regard the reception of women
into our classes as an experiment, it must certainly be deemed
a most hopeful experiment. The numerous inquiries that
have been sent to us from various parts of this country, and
even from England, concerning the results of their admission
to the university, show that a profound and wide-spread
interest in the subject has been awakened.”
I can say for myself, that I have never known
any one who has spent a few days at one of these
colleges who has not become a convert to the
scheme.
There is in America a strong and constantly
growing conviction, that the best plan for educating
.
�28
"Joint Education of
both boys and girls is for them to reside at home
and attend day schools; that this avoids the defects
attendant upon the system of governesses and
tutors, and also the dangers that are inherent in
the congregated life of boarding-schools; and as
American families seldom leave home for, at most,
more than a few weeks in midsummer, this plan is
easily carried out. In accordance with this con
viction, the citizens of Boston have recently erected
and endowed a large university in the centre of
their city, although the time-honoured Harvard
stands scarcely two miles beyond their precincts.
The Boston University, which starts with larger
available funds than those of Harvard, will be
opened this autumn, and as a second step in the
direction of the popular educational sentiment, the
trustees have decided to offer its advantages and
honours to young women on the same conditions as
to young men.
There is evidently a disposition in America to
open all lines of study to women, and a few women
have entered each of the three learned professions,
but the time is too short and the number too small
for us to be able as yet to generalise upon the fitness
of women for professions, or their inclination to
choose them.
Most of our women—I think I may almost say
all of our women—expect to marry, and most of
them do marry. We have not that redundancy of
women to trouble and puzzle the advocates of
domesticity that you have here; and as fortunes are
more easily made, men are not timid in incurring
domestic responsibilities. As a consequence of this,
the industrial occupations that women seek, other
than domestic, are expected to be only temporary,
�Young Men and Women.
ig
and are such as may be entered upon without
much especial professional training, and may be
given up without involving much sacrifice of pre
vious study or discipline. I think I may say there
is a very general disposition to seek those that will
especially contribute to their fitness for domestic
life.
This brings me to a peculiar feature of American
education—the prevalence of women teachers. In
the public schools of St Louis there are forty men
teachers and over four hundred women teachers;
only about one-twelfth of the whole number are
men, and this I think would be about the general
average for the cities of the north. The primary
schools are taught exclusively by women—most of
the grammar schools have only a man at the head of
them, and in the high schools there is about an
equal number of men and women.
In two of the most successful grammar schools in
St Louis there are only women teachers. Recent
experiments in placing women at the head of several
of the grammar schools in Cleveland, Ohio, give
still stronger confirmation of the marked governing
power of women as contrasted with men.
Women teachers have been employed in the
schools in preference to men as a matter of economy,
but underneath this cloak of economy an unex
pected virtue has been found. It is now pretty
well settled that with equal experience and scholarly
attainments women teach better than men do, and
that they manage the pupils with more tact; that
is, they succeed in getting from the pupils what
they want, with more ease and less disturbance of
temper.
Where women do precisely the, same work as
�jo
Joint Education of
men in teaching, they get less pay. Wages have
followed the law of supply and demand. The guar
dians of the public school treasures have generally
not felt at liberty to offer more than the regular
market prices for work. But I am glad to say the
more enlightened public feeling is beginning to make
a change in this respect. A few women are paid
men’s wages—are paid what they ought to have,
rather than what they could command in an open
market.
Teaching in America, as I have indicated, is for
the most part a temporary occupation ; it is chiefly
done by young people between the ages of eighteen
and thirty who have no intention of making it a
profession. The women marry and the men enter
other occupations. How much the schools lose by
the immaturity and inexperience of the teachers it
is difficult to estimate accurately; but that they
gain much by the freshness and enthusiasm of these
young minds is unquestionable. Young teachers
get into closer sympathy with pupils, and can more
readily understand the movements of their minds
and apprehend their difficulties.
The plan of teaching for a few years is very
popular among young people, from the general
belief that it furnishes the best possible discipline
for a successful life. This experience in teaching is
considered valuable for young men, but still more
valuable for young women, and many young women
who have no need to earn money teach for a few
years .after leaving school, sometimes from their
own choice, but much oftener from the choice of
their parents, who wish to supplement the daughter’s
education with the more varied discipline that
teaching affords.
�Toung Men and Women.
31
Thus the teaching of women is encouraged from
four considerations :—
First. According to the present arrangement of
wages it is economical.
Second. Women seem to have an especial natural
aptitude for the work as compared with men.
Third. The general welfare of society demands
that wage-giving industries shall be provided for
women.
Fourth. Of all the employments offered to women,
teaching seems the best suited to fit them for
domestic life, the life that lies before the most of
them, and so positive are its claims in this direction
that it is being sought as an employment with that
single end in view.
A few years of teaching forms so prominent a
feature in the education of leading American
women, that I could not omit it in any general
consideration of this subject.
Note.—The Times of' January 3rd, 1874, gives the following
extracts from “Circulars of Information,” just published by the
United States Bureau of Education:—The total number of
degrees conferred in 1873 by the Higher Colleges was 4,493, and
376 honorary. One hundred and ninety-one ladies received
degrees. Illinois has thirteen Colleges, in which women have
the same or equal facilities with men ; Wisconsin has four, Iowa
three, Missouri four, Ohio ten, and Indiana nine; New York has
seven, and Pennsylvania, seven.
PRINTED BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLE PULTENEY STREET, HAYMARKET.
��
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Victorian Blogging
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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The joint education of young men and women in the American schools and colleges : being a lecture delivered before the Sunday Lecture Society, on 27th of April, 1873
Creator
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Beedy, Mary E.
Sunday Lecture Society
Description
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 31 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Advertisement for Sunday Lecture Society on p.[2], delivered at St George's Hall, Langham Place. Printed by C.W. Reynell, Haymarket, London. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection.
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Sunday Lecture Society
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1873
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N058
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Education
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Coeducation-United States
Education
NSS
Women
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PDF Text
Text
GRACE.
PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT,
II THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD, UPPER NORWOOD,
LONDON, S.E.
1876.
Price Threepence.
�LONDON
THINTED BY C. TV. REYNELL, LITTLE TULTENET STREET,
HAYMARKET.
�GRACE.
------ *-----VICTIM to the received system of religious
education, I have suffered considerably for socalled conscience’ sake. Finding nay questions as
irritating to my instructors as their answers were
unsatisfactory to me, I early sank down into the
mould prepared for me, and at nine years old was at
the top of the religious class in a school I attended.
An excellent memory, a distinct utterance, and a
sort of knack of finding out texts with great rapidity,
were points in my favour, and as I soon left
off asking what were called impertinent questions,
it was assumed that the process of thinking had,
by the merciful interference of a superintending
Providence, been checked ere it had developed into
an insurmountable hindrance to salvation. At first
I did not think very much, but I thought a little, and
to some purpose. I learnt a hymn which contained
these lines : “ I thank the goodness and the grace
which on my birth have smiled, and made me in
these Christian days a happy English child. I was
not born, as thousands are, where God was never
known,” etc. I did not sufficiently value my privi
lege of sitting in a close room learning abstruse texts,
and when I looked at the pictures of little negroes in
sugar-plantations I did not pity them at all, but
thought that they had the best of it.
A
�6
Grace.
To check the free expression of thought is an
admirable means towards the desired end—the an
nihilation of thought itself—and had not a counter
influence been at work out of school I should, doubt
less, have become a “ chosen vessel.” As it was, I
went about, as numbers do, under false colours, sup
posed to be very pious, because I had a good verbal
memory, a quiet, old-fashioned manner, and great
digital dexterity in finding out passages in the Bible.
I seemed, of course, like a piece of wax, as all good
children should be, ready to receive any religious
impressions stamped upon me by my teachers. I
was being educated in hypocrisy under the name
of religion. The system was calculated to foster
conceit, and, until a few years ago, I thought I under
stood all that is included in the comprehensive word
grace. I was called a child of grace, I coveted grace,
prayed daily for an increase of it, explained its sup
posed effects to others, pleaded with those who seemed
indifferent to it, and mourned over those who had
fallen from it. My teachers used grace as synonymous
with self-denial, self-control, patience, fortitude, re
signation, etc., and I was accustomed to attribute all
that is elevating to its influence, and all that is
degrading to its absence. But? when a mere child, I
had silently observed the supposed effects of grace in
those who never resorted to the “means ” of it, and
before I had attained maturity, I had, when away
from the restraints of school, indulged in many a
flippant remark as to the inefficacy of grace in those
who seemed indefatigable in their strivings after it.
I was puzzled and disappointed, but not until many
years had elapsed did it occur to me that I had been
deceived, deceived by well-meaning individuals who
were themselves deceived, and who, I have every
reason to suspect, preferred to be deceived, and
would have gone on deceiving others, even if
they had permitted themselves to be undeceived.
�Grace*
7
My spiritual masters and mistresses told me that
grace was “ a supernatural gift freely bestowed upon
me for my sanctification and salvation.” I was early
taught to seem grateful that, while thousands of chil
dren were suffered to live and die in heathen lands,
where grace was unknown, I had been elected by
special favour to be “a member of Christ, a child of
God, and an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven.”
I knew that the unbaptized were the devil’s children,
that God hated them, that they could get no grace
because they were not in a “ state of grace,” and that
actions, to all appearance meritorious, were of no avail
at all towards salvation unless they were performed
in “ a state of grace.” I was exhorted to thank God
repeatedly for the grace of baptism and to look upon
the unbaptized with a mixture of pity and horror.
But for “ prevenient grace,” I should, they told me,
yield to the suggestions of my corrupt nature and
tell lies, give blow for blow, steal, cheat, and become
a hardened sinner.
At school I committed to memory a surprising
number of hymns. I knew that grace was “ a charm
ing sound,” that there was “a fountain filled with
blood,’’ and that I deserved “ his holy frown.” But
at an early age grace began to lose ground in my
estimation. At home hymns were not esteemed;
my parents never asked me to repeat them, and
of “ grace ” I never heard, save at school. I
had a playfellow, about my own age, named Bobby.
Bobby’s real father was the devil, but his reputed
father was a respectable and respected Quaker who
lived close to us, a widower, with two attractive
children, whose education was his sole occupation.
Bobby was a gentle, manly, intelligent child, the
peace-maker in all squabbles, and a great favourite
in the play-ground. In the person of this little
Quaker, Satan had succeeded admirably in transform
ing himself into an angel of light, for a superficial
�Grace.
observer might easily have mistaken. Bobby for “ a
member of Christ, a child of God, and an inheritor
of the kingdom of heaven.” I knew better—I knew
that he was a child of wrath—that God’s holy frown
rested upon him, and that unless God in his infinite
mercy should call him to the font, his portion would
be “everlasting pains, where sinners must with
devils dwell, in darkness, fire, and chains.” Bobby
never was taken to a place of worship; he was
taught no prayers, and knew no hymns. He squinted
abominably, and it was in consequence of that sad
blemish that my childish thoughts were drawn to a
common-sense view of grace. He was taken to an
oculist, and returned with a most disfiguring glass
over one eye, in comparison with which the squint
seemed almost an embellishment. Poor Bobby ! we
laughed at him, pointed at him, danced round him,
squinted at him, and called him “ old goggle-eye !” I
had frequently wondered at the engaging manners and
generous conduct of the devil’s little boy, but on this
occasion he surpassed himself. He turned red, his
lips quivered, the well-known “ ball ” rose in his
throat, but with steady voice he said, “ You have
nearly made me cry ; you do not know how painful
my eye is; the doctor said crying would make it
worse; I promised him I would not cry. See, I
have got a shilling, let us go and spend it and play
at something else.” “I’ll tell father, see if I don’t! ”
said Bobby’s brother, with fraternal indignation, “ and
he shall know how that shilling went.” “Ho, you
will not,” said Bobby, laughing, “ for a tell-tale is
even worse than a teaze ! ” Of course we all de
clared we were only in fun, etc., but I felt keenly
that the children of God had not set the devil’s little
boy a very good example, and I valued my religious
privileges less from that hour. I continued commit
ting many hymns and texts to memory, but I suppose
I had already “fallen from grace,” for though I
�Grace.
9
recited them with my usual accuracy, they interested
me less. I left off begging to be allowed to learn
some particular hymns, and many of my former
favourites faded unregretted from my memory. My
schoolmistress was an Evangelical gentlewoman, and
I was one of her most attentive pupils. Hearing me
say that Bobby could be good without grace, she
looked very grave, and, turning to an assistant
teacher, remarked, “ How amazing it is that parents
suffer their children to associate with the uncon
verted ! ” I repeated her words to my father. Un
like most parents, he spoke very openly, and explained
to me in very simple language that he had never
observed any moral superiority in the baptized, and
that in his own circle of acquaintances he had found
more genial characters among the unbaptized. He
drew my attention to a gentleman who was a con
stant visitor at our house, one who was in great
favour with all the children who knew him, in conse
quence of his imperturbable good humour and amiable
devotion to their little interests. “That man,” said
my father, “was brought up among the Quakers, and
though he is not a Quaker now, has never been bap
tized, and I cannot see in what respect he would
be a better member of society if he had.
The
gentleman in question was a great ally of mine, and
his children were my playmates. It would have
been difficult to find better people than were these
who had taken no pains to cleanse themselves from
their inherited filth, and it is not surprising that,
with such amiable associates, a child under twelve
should lose sight of the inestimable privilege of
“ grace ” and cease to attribute virtuous conduct to
its influence. I gave up caring about grace. I let
it go without a regret, little knowing that a few
years later I should give myself wholly to its sup
posed influence, and suffer exceedingly in mind and
body ere I succeeded in wrenching myself from a
�iO
Grace.
grasp which was crushing my individuality out of
me.
Before my childhood was quite over an incident
occurred which I shall relate, for it made an im
pression, and preserved me from rushing in after life
into certain extremes, towards which my devotional
acquaintances tended.
There was a lumber-room in Bobby’s house ; books,
pictures, ornaments and furniture, which had been
undisturbed since his mother’s death, were heaped
together in dusty confusion. The humour seized
Bobby to sort out the objects and put the room to
rights. He asked me to help him and we set to work.
I caught hold of a mutilated copy of a book called
‘ The Soul on Calvary,’ and my eyes fell upon the
following incredible and revolting passage:—
“ We will here relate the example of a most
heroic patience in sickness and of a most perfect love
of God in the heart. Perhaps it may wound the
delicacy of some ; but many others will have sufficient
greatness of soul to be edified and touched by it. A
person had fallen into a malady equally painful and
humiliating : a great sore was formed, which, in the
course of time, had engendered a quantity of worms.
This person was eaten up alive by them, and suffered
excessive pains ; yet her lively love of God surmounted
the violence of her sufferings to such a degree that
if any of her worms happened to fall, she picked them
up and replaced them in the sore, saying that she was
unwilling to lose any part of the merit of her suffer
ings, and that she considered those worms as so
many precious pearls which might one day adorn her
crown.” From the disgust excited in me by this
horrible statement, I never rallied, though I was sub
sequently thrown into daily contact with people whose
religious fervour would have inclined them to go and
do likewise.
‘ The Soul on Calvary ’ is a cheap book widely
�Grace.
ii
circulated among Roman Catholics, many of whom
would not shrink from putting into practice the wild
and filthy experiments suggested by the perusal of
that and similar fanatical works.
At a boarding-school, to which I was sent "for six
months for change of air, considerable attention was
paid to the religious instruction of the children. I was
slowly regaining my strength, after a long illness, and
was probably more susceptible to what are called spiri
tual influences than I should otherwise have been; more
over, I was at the impressionable age of fourteen, and
of a grave turn of mind. I was soon “full of grace;” that
is to say, I thought and heard of little else; answering
Scripture questions occupied a great portion of my
time, for, being very weak, I was not required to study
much, and it cost me but little trouble to get up all
the hymns, catechisms, texts, collects, etc., with which
I had formerly been somewhat overburdened. I was
soon a great favourite with my teacher, and to “ grow
in grace” once more became the great object of
my life. For a few years I had been neglecting
grace, but had not retrograded morally, and was
not a whit more unruly than my more persevering
companions.
Schooled in grace for the second time, and
thoroughly engrossed with self, I should, I ima
gine, have become very much like the ideal my
teacher had in view. . She tried hard to work upon
the feelings of her pupils, and I have seen a child of
seven years leave the class in tears, and retire sobbing,
at the thought of her ingratitude to her Saviour; and
we were taught to admire the “ workings of grace ”
in her heart, and to deplore our own indifference. Of
practical piety I do not remember hearing. Faith, grace,
hymns, Bible questions and the Church prayers seemed
all in all. We were not encouraged to make clothes for
the poor, or to deny ourselves anything for the sake
of others; for the souls of others we were earnestly
�12
Grace.
enjoined to pray, but of their bodily wants I neverheard. Once, in consequence of illness, I and another'
girl of sixteen were the sole occupants of a room.
I remarked with horror that she did not kneel downbefore getting into bed. “ Why, Emily,” said I,
f‘you have forgotten your prayers.” “You meanthat I have forgotten to kneel down. I never say
prayers, but I kneel down in the big room because of
the others; I do not mind you.” “ But do you not
mind God,” asked I, with sincere surprise. “ No,”
said she, “ God minds me ! ” I was too much grieved^
to notice the drollery of the remark. Presently she*
resumed, “ What do you. suppose becomes of the
sponge-cakes ? ” I knew dozens of them were con
veyed to the boarders through one of the ser
vants, and now I was informed that they were always
devoured during the extempore prayer made every
evening by a teacher; it lasted, with other devotions,
twenty minutes, and as the girls turned to the wall
during prayers the opportunity was favourable to the
enjoyment of soft cakes. Emily’s revelations sad
dened me indescribably. Had she been an unprin
cipled, unruly, low-minded girl, I should have been
relieved, but, like the graceless Bobby of my child
hood, Emily was superior to the other girls in moral
worth; she never copied sums, verbs, &c., from her
neighbour’s slate, and had often surprised me by her
readiness to admit ignorance, to offer an apology, and,
in short, to act as if this so-called grace had taken
firm hold of her ; but she did not care about grace,
she even called it “ a hoax,” and said that all the
religious people she knew were very disagreeable.
Her father had yielded to the wishes of his wife in
sending her to this school, and as she was soon about
to leave it, she spoke, as all girls do under such cir
cumstances, with reckless candour.
Hypocrisy must infect those who are taught so
many solemn and startling confessions, creeds, hymns.
�Grace.
and texts long before they can understand them..
Emily had discontinued her prayers because she did
not assent to the assertions in them. lc As God made
me,” said she, “ he must know me far better than I
know myself, and therefore it seems very silly to pre
tend to inform him. I am not going to say ‘ I have
followed too much the devices and desires of my own
heart,’ because it is not true; if I were to follow
those desires I should be off in the morning, in spite
of my influenza.”
All she said made me feel extremely uncomfortable,
—she had given up grace, and yet seemed thoroughly
good. However, my six months of school life were
fortunately over, and I returned to a home where all
that is estimable was inculcated without any allusion
to hymns, grace, or any other supernatural means of
arriving at the ordinary virtues which should dis
tinguish the members of a civilized community. I
do not think my father had a Bible ; I never saw him
use one, save to look out some disputed text.
Having been forced in his boyhood to read the Bible
exclusively, he made up for it in his manhood by
reading any book except the Bible. Away from the
gracious influences which for a brief season had
surrounded me, shaken somewhat by Emily’s ex
perience, and highly dissatisfied with my own
immature conclusions, I soon grew very lukewarm as
to prayer and other religious practices, and was
actually learning “ to be good and to do good ” with
out having recourse to the supernatural. I was,
however, ill at ease within, for I had been so
thoroughly impressed with the necessity of grace,
that I was quite alarmed to find how easily I had let
it go and how very well I could do without it. I was
afraid of myself knowing, or rather having been
taught, that in me “ dwelt no good thing,” and I was
greatly perplexed to find no unholy tendencies arise
now that grace had Jost its hold on me. I should
�>4
Grace.
have been quite delighted to have been able to detect
some moral retrogression, which I should have been
justified in attributing to a withdrawal of grace.
I ardently wished to believe in the efficacy of prayer
and indeed in all the doctrines I had been
taught in my childhood, but I was losing both
faith and confidence. I pretended I had not lost
either.
I was afraid to think anything out.
About that time I was invited to pass a few
weeks with a lady and gentleman at Sydenham.
Owing to curious circumstances the lady, though a
Protestant, had been educated in a convent, and was
quite familiar with all the tenets of the various
religious sects. She talked, and apparently thought
frequently about piety, grace, resignation, etc., and
said she intended to leave a large portion of her
wealth to those who had grounded her in religion.
She was, as far as I could judge, an essentially worldly
woman, and, owing probably to her wretched health,
of a singularly trying disposition. In her husband
all those virtues, specially intended, where Christian
virtues are named, shone conspicuously, and I shall
never forget my amazement when with the utmost
composure he informed me that he was hostile to
every form of religion, and that, though it grieved
him sorely to thwart his wife, he had absolutely for
bidden her to teach his little nephew, who lived with
them, any creed, catechism or hymn; she gained her
point as to the Lord’s prayer, which the boy repeated
every night in the drawing-room, beginning thus,—
“ Our Father charty neaven.”
Full twenty years have passed since the day when
I discovered that the man whose character I so much
admired, whose forbearance so much amazed me, and
whose abstemiousness bordered upon the marvellous,
was what is called an infidel! Would that I could
meet him now! How readily would I confess to
him that ‘'whereas I was blind, now I see,”—see that
�Grace.
J5
I was the real infidel, faithless to my own secret con
victions, and faithless to the tenets I was supposed
to have embraced. Fettered by formulas, vague
fears, and by a feeling of restraint which for years
prevented me from daring to be myself, I was unable
to assimilate the wholesome ingredients in the sensible
conversation of my infidel friend, who sought to wean
me from useless theological speculations, and en
deavoured to direct my attention to things practical.
I was then and for years afterwards in the position
which Fichte has so clearly described : “ Instructions
were bestowed upon me before I sought them; an
swers were given me before I had put questions;
without examination and without interest I had
allowed everything to take place in my mind. How
then could I persuade myself I possessed any real
knowledge in these matters ? I only knew what
others assert they know, and all I was sure of was
that I had heard this or that upon the subject. What
ever truth they possessed could have been obtained
only by their own reflection, and why should not I by
means of the same reflection discover the like truth
for myself, since I too have a being as well as they ?
How much I have hitherto undervalued and slighted
myself ! ”
My infidel friend was aware that I was by no means
blind to his many good qualities, for I was frequently
present, to my great discomfort, when he was severely
tried, and was forced to acknowledge that he behaved
like a saint.
“ Well, little lady,” said he one day when we were
speaking of grace, “ I hate the very word grace, I
don’t fully understand its meaning, and as lean do very
well without it, I should consider it a superfluity;
but tell me to what you attribute all that strikes you
as good in me, for as I am the only graceless dog you
know, myself must be my subject ? ”
I had repeatedly asked myself that question, and
�i6
Grace.
invariably winced at my own answer. According to
my religious notions he ought to have been conspicu
ous for moral depravity, but according to my common
sense it seemed to me that no amount of grace could
make him a more genial specimen of a moral man
than he was. However, I said that as he had been
baptized and had been taught to pray in his childhood,
he must have received many graces, and that his
avoidance of great sins was due to God’s grace, which
had preserved him from great temptations. He smiled
as he replied : “ I am afraid your surmise will fall to
the ground when you hear that I early gave up my
prayers. I had a great misfortune when quite a little
fellow. I smashed a most expensive and much-valued
old china jar to atoms. My thoughts instantly flew
to the omnipotent and benevolent Being whose eyes
were in every place, and I ran upstairs to my little
cot, by the side of which I knelt, and most earnestly
entreated God to mend the jar and replace it upon the
bracket before my father returned. Down I rushed, fully
expecting to find all as I wished, the fragments gone,
and the jar in its place. At the bottom of the stairs
stood my poor nurse, too agitated to scold me, feeling
that she would get most of the blame, and dreading
the return of ‘ Master.’ Ko words can convey my
bitter disappointment at seeing the fragments where I
had left them. I had prayed with faith and hope;
but there was no new jar upon the bracket, and never
again did I turn with confidence to that omnipotent
and benevolent Being who had not helped me out of
my terrible scrape.”
What good end Providence had in view by throw
ing me into contact with Bobby, Emily, and this
honourable infidel, pious people have never explained
to me. “ To try your faith,” they told me ; but seemed
at fault when I asked if Providence foresaw that I
should lose my faith.
My visit ended, I returned home ill at ease, honestly
�Grace.
!7
doubting, but dishonestly concealing my doubts for
so-called conscience’ sake. It would, I thought, be
awful to become an infidel, and thus expose myself to
the just indignation of my maker; but it did not occur
to me for some years that my insincerity must long
have rendered me odious in the eyes of the searcher of
hearts, the God of truth, and that I had been in jeo
pardy ever since I had dared to use my own judgment
concerning grace and its effects.
In looking over the past I can say, with the utmost
deliberation, that in my case religion was a hindrance
instead of a help, as it is intended to be. While re
calling my past experience I feel sincerely sorry for
myself and for those who, owing to my devout adhe
rence to sundry New Testament injunctions which I
had “ grace” enough to carry out, suffered acutely.
The certainty that but few have sufficient “grace” to
“ go and do likewise,” is a source of satisfaction to
me. Were I not convinced by hardly-earned experi
ence of the futility of prayer, I would pray with great
fervour that the meaning I discerned in Gospel teach
ing might be for ever hidden from their eyes lest they
should become “ converted” and show forth their
faith as I did. By nature frank and fearless, I early
profited by the lessons taught me by my ghostly coun
sellors, and learnt, like multitudes of other young
people, to conceal what passed within, and to be afraid
of my corrupt nature, and of all that emanated there
from. I was afraid of thinking, of using my own
mind, of following my own impulses, in short, of being
myself.
Conscious of insincerity, alarmed at the probable
consequences of sincerity, siding secretly with what
are called dangerous opinions, frightened at my ten
dencies, confessing with my lips what my understand
ing refused to digest, clinging to planks which I felt
could ill bear my weight, I went on praying that
infidels might be brought to the knowledge of the
�Grace.
truth, but never realising the melancholy fact that
I myself was an arch infidel, for I was a dissembler
before God and man ; reciting incredible creeds in the
house of the former, and carefully concealing my real
sentiments from the latter.
After a while, by dint of pious reading, pious
friends, and lonely visits to sundry churches, I shook
off for a season some of my most disturbing doubts,
and, during four or five years “grace” assuredly
triumphed over nature, and, but for the timely inter
ference of common sense, I too might have been dis
covered magnanimously replacing fallen creepers in
their home on my epidermis !
“ Grace” prompted me to despise “the world,” to
keep aloof from my fellow-creatures, to become
odiously unsociable, and, in adhering to what I con
ceived to be the strict line of duty to God, to disregard,
all the little courtesies and concessions to others as
“ Satanic varnish,” deviations from truth, worldly
wisdom, &c. Reproaches or remonstrances had the
effect of making me persevere still more obstinately
in the course I had chosen. I felt like a martyr
“ persecuted for righteousness ” sake, and was su
premely happy in the conviction that an unusual
amount of grace was bestowed upon me. My spiritual
advisers encouraged me in despising all human con
siderations, and in devoting myself exclusively to my
religious duties, assuring me that the world would
certainly hate me as it had hated Christ, but that I
must “ overcome the world.” In short, I acted upon
the conviction that “ the friendship of the world is
enmity with God,” and that unless I came “ out from
among them ” I was no worthy member of a Head
crowned with thorns. I had the sweet approval of
my own conscience, and felt sure that God was on my
side, so did not fear what man might do unto me.
The requirements of the Gospel seemed to me
peremptory and unmistakable, and as long as I re-
�Grace.
*9
mained under the absorbing influence of what is
called “ grace” I did my best to carry them out; but
a change came over me; old doubts assailed me with
fresh vigour; they took firm hold of me, and I could
not shake them off. During those years of religious
zeal I had been undisturbed by misgivings, and had
acted with sincerity. I look back upon them with
mingled amusement and regret, and rejoicing that I
was at length enabled to be as true to my doubts as
I bad been to my folly and fanaticism. Of course it
will be said by many that I had been guilty of absurd
exaggeration, and that true religion does not demand
that we should fly in the face of the world, that it is
possible to continue in “ grace” without sternly
abjuring “ the world,” &c. ; but such a compromise
seemed to me then impossible, and, to be perfectly
candid, I am still of opinion that to yield to the dic
tates of “ grace ” is to become what I was once, but
with my enlarged experience can never be again.
“ Grace,” as understood by the orthodox, had taken
great effect upon me; it had done its work right well,
and rendered me quite unfit for this world, and, there
fore, as I was persuaded, a worthier candidate for the
other. In my exuberant self-satisfaction, I failed to
see that by steady adherence to my favourite Gospel
texts I was daily sinking deeper into that slough of
selfishness, bigotry, and intolerance, in which the
“Lord’s people” are wont to wallow. I knowmany who
are “ full of grace ;” I avoid them, for a “ burnt child
dreads the fire.” Withdrawn from the pernicious
influence of “ grace,” I can now look dispassionately
on my former God-fearing self, and see myself in the
light in which I must have appeared to those who
deplored my “ supernatural ” tendencies, and des
paired of my return to common sense. Released
from the fetters which so tightly bound me, and
which in my blindness I hugged so fondly, I have
now the “ grace ” to see, and the candour to confess,
�20
Grace.
that I was the victim of a degrading delusion. I have
returned to the miserable “ worldlings,” who are onlydoing their duty, and striving to make the best of the
only world of which we have any knowledge, and in
which I hope I may have “ grace ” to lead a rational
life and set a natural example !
PRINTED BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLE PULTENEY STREET, HAYMARKET.
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
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Pamphlet
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Title
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Grace
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 18 p. ; 19 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Published anonymously. Author believed to be Annie Besant. "A victim to the received system of religious education, I have suffered considerably of so-called conscience' sake". [Opening sentence]. Printed by C.W. Reynell, Little Pulteney Street, London.
Creator
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Besant, Annie Wood
Date
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1876
Publisher
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Thomas Scott
Subject
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Rationalism
Free thought
Education
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<img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /><br />This work (Grace), identified by <span><a href="www.conwayhall.org.uk">Humanist Library and Archives</a></span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.
Identifier
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RA1609
CT183
Format
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Conway Tracts
Free Thought
Religion
Religious Education
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Text
������������������������
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Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
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2018
Publisher
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
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Pamphlet
Dublin Core
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Title
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An address to the people of Cambridge from the School Committee concerning a recent case of corporal punishment in the Allston Grammar School
Creator
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Cambridge (Mass) School Committee
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: Cambridge, Mass.
Collation: 24 p. ; 23 cm.
Notes: Mr Henry W. Muzzey presented the report. Published by order of the Board. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
Publisher
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Press of John Wilson and Son
Date
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1866
Identifier
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G5182
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Education
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (An address to the people of Cambridge from the School Committee concerning a recent case of corporal punishment in the Allston Grammar School), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
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Text
Language
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English
Conway Tracts
Corporal Punishment
Education
School Discipline
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Text
INAUGURAL ADDRESS
AT EDINBURGH, APRIL 2nd, 1866 ;
BY
THOMAS CARLYLE,
ON BEING INSTALLED AS RECTOR OF THE
UNIVERSITY THERE.
[AUTHORIZED REPORT]
EDINBURGH: EDMONSTON AND DOUGLAS.
LONDON : CHAPMAN AND HALL.
.1 8 6 6.
�ADDRESS.
Gentlemen,—I have accepted the office you have elected
me to, and it is now my duty to return thanks for the
great honour done me. Your enthusiasm towards me, I
must admit, is in itself very beautiful, however undeserved
it may be in regard to the object of it. It is a feeling hon
ourable to all men, and one well known to myself when I
was of an age like yours, nor is it yet quite gone. I
can only hope that, with you too, it may endure to the
end,—this noble desire to honour those whom you think
worthy of honour; and that you will come to be more
and more select and discriminate in the choice of the
object of it:—for I can well understand that you will
modify your opinions of me and of many things else,
as you go on. {Laughter and cheers?) It is now fifty-six
years, gone last November, since I first entered your City,
a boy of not quite fourteen; to ‘attend the classes’ here,
and gain knowledge of all kinds, I could little guess
what, my poor mind full of wonder and awe-struck ex
pectation ; and now, after a long course, this is what we
have come to. (Cheers?) There is something touching
�6
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
and tragic, and yet at the same time beautiful, to see, as
it were, the third generation of my dear old native land,
rising up and saying, “ Well, you are not altogether an
unworthy labourer in the vineyard; you have' toiled through
a great variety of fortunes, and have had many judges:
this is our judgment of you I” As the old proverb says,
‘ He that builds by the wayside has many masters.’ We
must expect a variety of judges; but the voice of young
Scotland, through you, is really of some value to me; and
I return you many thanks for it,—though I cannot go
into describing my emotions to you, and perhaps they
will be much more perfectly conceivable if expressed in
silence. (Cheers.)
When this office was first proposed to me, some of you
know I was not very ambitious to accept it, but had my
doubts rather. I was taught to believe that there were
certain more or less important duties which would lie
in my power. This, I confess, was my chief motive in
going into it, and overcoming the objections I felt to
such things: if I could do anything to serve my dear
old Alma Mater and you, why should not I ? (Loud
cheers.) Well, but on practically looking into the matter
when the office actually came into my hands, I find it
grows more and more uncertain and abstruse to me whether
there is much real duty that I can do at all. I live four
hundred miles away from you, in an entirely different
scene of things; and my weak health, with the burden
of the many years now accumulating on me, and my total
unacquaintance with such subjects as concern your affairs
here,—all this fills me with apprehension that there is
�EXTEMPORE.
7
really nothing worth the least consideration that I can do
on that score. You may depend on it, however, that if
any such duty does arise in any form, I will use my most
faithful endeavour to do in it whatever is right and proper,
according to the best of my judgment. (Cheers.)
Meanwhile, the duty I at present have,—which might
be very pleasant, but which is not quite so, for reasons you
may fancy,—is to address some words to you, if possible
not quite useless, nor incongruous to the occasion, and on
subjects more or less cognate to the pursuits you are
engaged in. Accordingly, I mean to offer you some loose
observations, loose in point of order, but the truest I have,
in such form as they may present themselves; certain
of the thoughts that are in me about the business you
are here engaged in, what kind of race it is that you
young gentlemen have started on, and what sort of arena
you are likely to find in this world. I ought, I believe,
according to custom, to have written all that down on
paper, and had it read out. That would have been much
handier for me at the present moment—(A laugh);—
but, on attempting the thing, I found I was not used
to write speeches, and that I didn’t get on very well.
So I flung that aside; and could only resolve to trust, in
all superficial respects, to the suggestion of the moment, as
you now see. You will therefore have to accept what is
readiest; what comes direct from the heart; and you must
just take that in compensation for any good order or
arrangement there might have been in it. I will endea
vour to say nothing that is not true, so far as I can
manage; and that is pretty much all I can engage for.
(A laugh.)
�8
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
Advices, I believe, to young men, as to all men, are
very seldom much valued. There is a great deal of ad
vising, and very little faithful performing ; and talk that
does not end in any kind of action is better suppressed
altogether. I would not, therefore, go much into advising;
but there is one advice I must give you. In fact, it is the
summary of all advices, and doubtless you have heard it a
thousand times; but I must nevertheless let you hear it
the thousand-and-first time, for it is most intensely true,
whether you will believe it at present or not:—namely,
That above all things the interest of your whole life depends
on your being diligent, now while it is called to-day, in this
place where you have come to get education ! Diligent:
that includes in it all virtues that a student can have: I
mean it to include all those qualities of conduct that lead
on to the acquirement of real instruction and improve
ment in such a place. If you will believe me, you who
are young, yours is the golden season of life. As you have
heard it called, so it verily is, the seed-time of life; in
which, if you do not sow, or if you sow tares instead of
wheat, you cannot expect to reap well afterwards, and you
will arrive at little. And in the course of years, when you
come to look back, if you have not done what you have
heard from your advisers,—and among many counsellors
there is wisdom,—you will bitterly repent when it is too
late. The habits of study acquired at Universities are of
the highest importance in after-life. At the season when
you are young in years, the whole mind is, as it were,
fluid, and is capable of forming itself into any shape
that the owner of the mind pleases to allow it, or con
�HONESTY OF MIND.
9
strain it, to form itself into. The mind is then in a
plastic or fluid state ; but it hardens gradually, to the
consistency of rock or of iron, and you cannot alter the
habits of an old man: he, as he has begun, so he will
proceed and go on to the last.
By diligence I mean among other things, and very
chiefly too,—honesty, in all your inquiries, and in all you
are about. Pursue your studies in the way your conscience
can name honest. More and more endeavour to do that.
Keep, I should say for one thing, an accurate separation
between what you have really come to know in your minds
and what is still unknown. Leave all that latter on the
hypothetical side of the barrier, as things afterwards to be
acquired, if acquired at all; and be careful not to admit a
thing as known when you do not yet know it. Count a thing
known only when it is imprinted clearly on your mind, and
has become transparent to you, so that you may survey it
on all sides with intelligence. There is such a thing as a
man endeavouring to persuade himself, and endeavouring
to persuade others, that he knows things, when he does
not know more than the outside skin of them; and yet
he goes flourishing about with’ them. (Hear, hear, and
a laugh?) There is also a process called cramming, in some
Universities (A laugh),—that is, getting up such points of
things as the examiner is likely to put questions about.
Avoid all that, as entirely unworthy of an honourable
mind. Be modest, and humble, and assiduous in your
attention to what your teachers tell you, who are pro
foundly interested in trying to bring you forward in the
right way, so far as they have been able to understand it.
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e
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
Try all things they set before you, in order, if possible, to
understand them, and to follow and adopt them in propor
tion to their fitness for you. Gradually see what kind of
work you individually can do; it is the first of all pro
blems for a man to find out what kind of work he is to
do in this universe. In short, morality as regards study
is, as in all other things, the primary consideration, and
overrules all others. A dishonest man cannot do anything
real; he never will study with real fruit; and perhaps it
would be greatly better if he were tied up from trying
it. He does nothing but darken counsel by the words
he utters. That is a very old doctrine, but a very true
one; and you will find it confirmed by all the thinking
men that have ever lived in this long series of generations
of which we are the latest.
I daresay you know, very many of you, that it is now
some seven hundred years since Universities were first set
up in this world of ours. Abelard and other thinkers had
arisen with doctrines in them which people wished to hear
of, and students flocked towards them from all parts of the
world. There was no getting the thing recorded in books,
as you now may. You had to hear the man speaking to
you vocally, or else you could not learn at all what it
was that he wanted to say. And so they gathered to
gether, these speaking ones,—the various people who had
anything to teach;—and formed themselves gradually,
under the patronage of kings and other potentates who
were anxious about the culture of their populations, and
nobly studious of their best benefit; and became a body
�UNIVERSITIES.
11
corporate, with high privileges, high dignities, and really
high aims, under the title of a University.
Possibly too you may have heard it said that the course
of centuries has changed all this ; and that ‘ the true Uni
versity of our days is a Collection of Books.’ And beyond
doubt, all this is greatly altered by the invention of Print
ing, which took place about midway between us and the
origin of Universities. Men have not now to go in person
to where a Professor is actually speaking; because in
most cases you can* get his doctrine out of him through a
book; and can then read it, and read it again and again,
and study it. That is an immense change, that one fact
of Printed Books. And I am not sure that I know of any
University in which the whole of that fact has yet been
completely taken in, and the studies moulded in complete
conformity with it. Nevertheless, Universities have, and
will continue to have, an indispensable value in society;
—I think, a very high, and it might be, almost the highest
value. They began, as is well known, with their grand
aim directed on Theology,—their eye turned earnestly on
Heaven. And perhaps, in a sense, it may be still said, the
very highest interests of man are virtually intrusted to them.
In regard to theology, as you are aware, it has been, and
especially was then, the study of the deepest heads that
have come into the world,—what is the nature of this stupen
dous universe, and what are our relations to it, and to all
things knowable by man, or known only to the great Author
of man and it. Theology was once the name for all this;
all this is still alive for man, however dead the name
may grow! In fact, the members of the Church keeping
�12
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
theology in a lively condition—(Laughter)—for the benefit
of the whole population, theology was the great object of
the Universities. I consider it is the same intrinsically
now, though very much forgotten, from many causes, and
not so successful—(A laugh)—as might be wished, by any
manner of means I
It remains, however, practically a most important truth,
what I alluded to above, that the main use of Universities
in the present age is that, after you have done with all
your classes, the next thing is a collection of books, a
great i library of good books, which you proceed to study
and to read. What the Universities can mainly do for
you,—what I have found the University did for me, is, That
it taught me to read, in various languages, in various
sciences ; so that I could go into the books which treated of
these things, and gradually penetrate into any department
I wanted to make myself master of, as I found it suit me.
Well, gentlemen, whatever you may think of these
historical points, the clearest and most imperative duty
lies on every one of you to be assiduous in your reading.
Learn to be good readers,—which is, perhaps, a more
difficult thing than you imagine. Learn to be di scrim in ative in your reading; to read faithfully, and with your best
attention, all kinds of things which you have a real in
terest in, a real not an imaginary, and which you find to be
really fit for what you are engaged in. Of course, at the
present time, in a great deal of the reading incumbent on
you, you must be guided by the books recommended
by your Professors for assistance towards the effect of their
�READING.
13
prelections. And then, when you leave the University, and
go into studies of your own, you will find it very important
that you have chosen a field, some province specially suited
to you, in which you can study and work. The most unhappy
of all men is the man who cannot tell what he is going to
do, who has got no work cut out for him in the world,
and does not go into it. For work is the grand cure of
all the maladies and miseries that ever beset mankind,—
honest work, which you intend getting done.
If, in any vacant vague time, you are in a strait as to
choice of reading,-^-a very good indication for you, perhaps
the best you could get, is towards some book you have
a great curiosity about. You are then in the readiest
and best of all possible conditions to improve by that
book. It is analogous to what doctors tell us about the
physical health and appetites of the patient. You must
learn, however, to distinguish between false appetite and
true. There is such a thing as a false appetite, which will
lead a man into vagaries with regard to diet; will tempt
him to eat spicy things, which he should not eat at all,
nor would, but that the things are toothsome, and that
he is under a momentary baseness of mind. A man ought
to examine and find out what he really and truly has an
appetite for, what suits his constitution and condition;
and that, doctors tell him, is in general the very thing he
ought to have. And so with books.
As applicable to all of you, I will say that it is highly
expedient to go into history; to inquire into what has
passed before you on this Earth, and in the Family of Man.
�14
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
The history of the Romans and Greeks will first of all
concern you; and you will find that the classical know
ledge you have got will he extremely applicable to eluci
date that. There you have two of the most remarkable
races of men in the world set before you, calculated to
open innumerable reflections and considerations; a mighty
advantage, if you can achieve it;—to say nothing of what
their two languages will yield you, which your Professors
can better explain; model languages, which are universally
admitted to be the most perfect forms of speech we have
yet found to exist among men. And you will find, if you
read well, a pair of extremely remarkable nations, shining
in the records left by themselves, as a kind of beacon, or
solitary mass of illumination, to light up some noble
forms of human life for us, in the otherwise utter darkness
of the past ages; and it will be well worth your while if
you can get into the understanding of what these people
were, and what they did. You will find a great deal of
hearsay, of empty rumour and tradition, which does not
touch on the matter; but perhaps some of you will get
to see the old Roman and the old Greek face to face; you
will know in some measure how they contrived to exist,
and to perform their feats in the world.
I believe, also, you will find one important thing not
much noted, That there was a very great deal of deep reli
gion in both nations. This is pointed out by the wiser kind
of historians, and particularly by Ferguson, who is particu
larly well worth reading on Roman history,—and who, I
believe, was an alumnus of our own University. His book
is a very creditable work. He points out the profoundly
�ROMANS AND GREEKS.
15
religious nature of the Roman people, notwithstanding their
ruggedly positive, defiant, and fierce ways. They believed
that Jupiter Optimus Maximus was lord of the universe, and
that he had appointed the Romans to become the chief of
nations, provided they followed his commands,—to brave
all danger, all difficulty, and stand up with an invin
cible front, and be ready to do and die; and also to have
the same sacred regard to truth of promise, to thorough
veracity, thorough integrity, and all the virtues that ac
company that noblest quality of man, valour,—to which
latter the Romans gave the name of ‘ virtue’ proper (yirtus,
manhood), as the crown and summary of all that is en
nobling for a man. In the literary ages of Rome, this re
ligious feeling had very much decayed away; but it still
retained its place among the lower classes of the Roman
people. Of the deeply religious nature of the Greeks,
along with their beautiful and sunny effulgences of art,
you have striking proof, if you look for it. In the tragedies
of Sophocles, there is a most deep-toned recognition of
the eternal justice of Heaven, and the unfailing punish
ment of crime against the laws of God. I believe you
will find in all histories of nations, that this has been at
the origin and foundation of them all; and that no nation
which did not contemplate this wonderful universe with
an awestricken and reverential belief that there was a great
unknown, omnipotent, and all-wise and all-just Being,
superintending all men in it, and all interests in it,—no
nation ever came to very much, nor did any man either,
who forgot that. If a man did forget that, he forgot the
most important part of his mission in this world.
�16
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
Our own history of England, which you will naturally
take a great deal of pains to make yourselves acquainted
with, you will find beyond all others worthy of your study.
For indeed I believe that the British nation,—including
in that the Scottish nation,—produced a finer set of men
than any you will find it possible to get anywhere else in
the world. (Applause?) I don’t know, in any history
of Greece or Rome, where you will get so fine a man as
Oliver Cromwell, for example. (Applause?) And we, too,
have had men worthy of memory, in our little corner of
the Island here, as well as others; and our history has had
its heroic features all along; and did become great at last
in being connected with world-history:—for if you examine
well, you will find that John Knox was the author, as it
were, of Oliver Cromwell; that the Puritan revolution
never would have taken place in England at all, had it
not been for that Scotchman. (Applause.) That is an
authentic fact, and is not prompted by national vanity
on my part, but will stand examining. (Laughter and
applause^)
In fact, if you look at the struggle that was then going
on in England, as I have had to do in my time, you will
see that people were overawed by the immense impedi
ments lying in the way. A small minority of God-fearing
men in that country were flying away, with any ship they
could get, to New England, rather than take the lion by
the beard. They durst not confront the powers with their
most just complaints, and demands to be delivered from
idolatry. They wanted to make the nation altogether con
formable to the Hebrew Bible, which they, and all men,
�ENGLISH AND SCOTTISH HISTORY.
17
understood to be the exact transcript of the Will of God ;
—and could there be, for man, a more legitimate aim ?
Nevertheless, it would have been impossible in their
circumstances, and not to be attempted at all, had not
Knox succeeded in it here, some fifty years before, by
the firmness and nobleness of his mind. For he also is of
the select of the earth to me,—John Knox. (Applause?)
What he has suffered from the ungrateful generations that
have followed him should really make us humble ourselves
to the dust, to think that the most excellent man our country
has produced, to whom we owe everything that distin
guishes us among the nations, should have been so sneered
at, misknown, and abused. (Applause?) Knox was heard by
Scotland; the people heard him, believed him to the marrow
of their bones : they took up his doctrine, and they defied
principalities and powers to move them from it. “We
must have it,” they said; “ we will and must!” It was in
this state of things that the Puritan struggle arose in
England; and you know well how the Scottish earls and
nobility, with their tenantry, marched away to Dunse Hill
in 1639, and sat down there: just at the crisis of that
struggle, when it was either to be suppressed or brought
into greater vitality, they encamped on Dunse Hill,—thirty
thousand armed men, drawn out for that occasion, each
regiment round its landlord, its earl, or whatever he might
be called, and zealous all of them ‘ For Christ’s Crown and
Covenant.’ That was the signal for all England’s rising up
into unappeasable determination to have the Gospel there
also ; and you know it went on, and came to be a contest
whether the Parliament or the King should rule; whether it
B
�18
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
should he old formalities and use and wont, or something
that had been of new conceived in the Souls of men, namely,
a divine determination to walk according to the laws of
God here, as the sum of all prosperity; which, of these
should have the mastery: and after a long, long agony of
struggle, it was decided—the way we know.
I should say also of that Protectorate of Oliver Crom
well’s, notwithstanding the censures it has encountered,
and the denial of everybody that it could continue in the
world, and so on, it appears to me to have been, on the
whole, the most salutary thing in the modern history of
England. If Oliver Cromwell had continued it out, I
don’t know what it would have come to. It would have
got corrupted probably in other hands, and could not have
gone on; but it was pure and true, to the last fibre, in
his mind; there was perfect truth in it while he ruled
over it. Machiavelli has remarked, in speaking of the
Romans, that Democracy cannot long exist anywhere in
the world; that as a' mode of government, of national
management or administration, it involves an impossibility,
and after a little while must end in wreck. And he goes
on proving that, in his own way. I do not ask you all to
follow him in that conviction—(hear),—but it is to him
a clear truth; he considers it a solecism and impossibility
that the universal mass of men should ever govern them
selves. He has to admit of the Romans, that they con
tinued a long time; but believes, it was purely in virtue
of this item in their constitution, namely, of their all
having the conviction in their minds that it was solemnly
�THE PROTECTOR.
19
necessary, at times, to appoint a Dictator; a man who had
the power of life and death over everything, who degraded
men out of their places, ordered them to execution, and
did whatever seemed to him good in the name of God above
him. He was commanded to take care that the republic
suffer no detriment. And Machiavelli calculates that this
was the thing which purified the social system, from time
to time, and enabled it to continue as it did. Probable
enough, if you consider it. And an extremely proper
function surely, this of a Dictator, if the republic was
composed of little other than bad and tumultuous men,
triumphing in general over the better, and all going the
bad road, in fact. Well, Oliver Cromwell’s Protectorate,
or Dictatorate if you will let me name it so, lasted for
about ten years, and you will find that nothing which was
contrary to the laws of heaven was allowed to live by
Oliver. (Applaus'e.)
For example, it was found by his Parliament of Notables,
what they call the ‘Barebones Parliament,’—the most
zealous of all Parliaments probably (laughter),—that the
Court of Chancery in England was in a state which was
really capable of no apology; no man could get up and
say that that was a right court. There were, I think,
fifteen thousand, or fifteen hundred (Laughter),—I really
don’t remember which, but we will call it by the last num
ber, to be safe (Renewed laughter);—-there were fifteen
hundred cases lying in it undecided; and one of them,
I remember, for a large amount of money, was eightythree years old, and it was going on still; wigs were
wagging over it, and lawyers were taking their fees, and
�20
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
there was no end of it. Upon view of all which, the
Barebones people, after deliberation about it, thought it
was expedient, and commanded by the Author of Man and
Fountain of Justice, and in the name of what was true and
right, to abolish said court. Really, I don’t know who could
have dissented from that opinion. At the same time, it was
thought by those who were wiser in their generation, and
had more experience of the world, that this was a very dan
gerous thing, and wouldn’t suit at all. The lawyers began to
make an immense noise about it. (Laughter?) All the public,
the great mass of solid and well-disposed people who had got
no deep insight into such matters, were very adverse to it:
and the Speaker of the Parliament, old Sir Francis Rous,—
who translated the Psalms for us, those that we sing here
every Sunday in the Church yet; a very good man, and a
wise and learned, Provost of Eton College afterwards,—
he got a great number of the Parliament to go to Oliver
the Dictator, and lay down their functions altogether, and
declare officially, with their signature, on Monday morning,
that the Parliament was dissolved. The act of abolition
had been passed on Saturday night; and on Monday
morning, Rous came and said, “We cannot carry on the
affair any longer, and we remit it into the hands of your
Highness.” Oliver in that way became Protector a second
time. I give you this as an instance that Oliver was
faithfully doing a Dictator’s function, and of his prudence
in it, as well.
Oliver felt that the Parliament, now
dismissed, had been perfectly right with regard to Chan
cery, and that there was no doubt of the propriety of
abolishing Chancery, or else reforming it in some kind
�sources of history.
21
of way.. He considered the matter, and this is what he
did. He assembled sixty of the wisest lawyers to be found
in England. Happily, there were men great in the law;
men who valued the laws of England as much as anybody
ever did; and who knew withal that there was something
still more sacred than any of these. (A laugh,^ Oliver
said to them, “ Go and examine this thing, and in the name
of God inform me what is necessary to be done with it.
You will see how we may clean out the foul things in that Chancery Court, which render it poison to everybody.”
Well, they sat down accordingly, and in the course of six
weeks,(there was no public speaking then, no reporting
of speeches, and no babble of any kind, there was just
the business in hand,)—they got sixty propositions fixed
in their minds as the summary of the things that re
quired to be done. And upon these sixty propositions,
Chancery was reconstituted and remodelled; and so it got
a new lease of life, and has lasted to our time. It had
become a nuisance, and could not have continued much
longer. That is an instance of the manner of things that
were done when a Dictatorship prevailed in the country,
and that was how the Dictator did them. I reckon, all
England, Parliamentary England, got a new lease of life
from that Dictatorship of Oliver’s; and, on the whole, that
the good fruits of it will never die while England exists as
a nation.
In general, I hardly think that out of common history
books you will ever get into the real history of this
country, or ascertain anything which can specially illu
�■
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
minate it for you, and which it would most of all behove
you to know. You may read very ingenious and very
clever books, by men whom it would be the height of in
solence in me to do other than express my respect for.
But their position is essentially sceptical. God and the
Godlike, as our fathers would have said, has fallen asleep for
them; and plays no part in their histories. A most sad and
fatal condition of matters; who shall say how fatal to us all'
A man unhappily in that condition will make but a tem
porary explanation of anything:—in short, you will not be
able, I believe, by aid of these men, to understand how this
Island came to be what it is. You will not find it re
corded in books. You will find recorded in books a
jumble of tumults, disastrous ineptitudes,, and all that
kind of thing. But to get what you want, you will have
to look into side sources, and inquire in all directions.
I remember getting Collins’s Peerage to read,—a very poor
performance as a work of genius, but an excellent book
for diligence and fidelity. I was writing on Oliver Crom
well at the time. (Applause?) I could get no biographical
dictionary available; and I thought the Peerage Book,
since most of my men were peers or sons of peers, would
help me, at least would tell me whether people were old
or young, where they lived, and the like particulars, better
than absolute nescience and darkness. And accordingly
I found amply all I had expected in poor Collins, and got
a great deal of help out of him. He was a diligent dull
London bookseller, of about a hundred years ago, who
compiled out of all kinds of parchments, charter-chests,
archives, books that were authentic, and gathered far and
�COLLINS’S PEERAGE.
23
wide wherever he could get it the information wanted.
He was a very meritorious man.
I not only found the solution of everything I had ex
pected there, but I began gradually to perceive this im
mense fact, which I really advise every one of you who
read history to look out for, if you have not already found
it. It was that the Kings of England, all the way from
the Norman Conquest down to the times of Charles I.,
had actually, in a good degree, so far as they knew, been
in the habit of appointing as Peers those who deserved
to be appointed. In general, I perceived, those Peers of
theirs were all royal men of a sort, with minds full of justice,
valour, and humanity, and all kinds of qualities that men
ought to have who rule over others. And then their genea
logy, the kind of sons and descendants they had, this also
was remarkable:—for there is a great deal more in genea
logy than is generally believed at present. I never heard
tell of any clever man that came of entirely stupid people.
(Laughter^) If you look around, among the families of your
acquaintance, you will see such cases in all directions;—
I know that my own experience is steadily that way; I
can trace the father, and the son, and the grandson, and
the family stamp is quite distinctly legible upon each of
them. So that it goes for a great deal, the hereditary prin
ciple,—in Government as in other things; and it must be
recognised so soon as there is any fixity in things. You
will remark, too, in your Collins, that, if at any time the
genealogy of a peerage goes awry, if the man that actu
ally holds the peerage is a fool,—in those earnest practical
times, the man soon gets into mischief, gets into treason
�24
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
probably,—soon gets himself and his peerage extinguished
altogether, in short. (Laughter?)
From those old documents of Collins, you learn and
ascertain that a peer conducts himself in a pious, highminded, grave, dignified, and manly kind of way, in his
course through life, and when he takes leave of life:—his
last will is often a remarkable piece, which one lingers
over. And then you perceive that there was kindness in
him as well as rigour, pity for the poor; that he has fine
hospitalities, generosities,—in fine, that he is throughout
much of a noble, good and valiant man. And that in general
the King, with a beautiful approximation to accuracy, had
nominated this kind of man; saying, “ Come you to me,
sir. Come out of the common level of the people, where
you are liable to be trampled upon, jostled about, and can
do in a manner nothing with your fine gift; come here and
take a district of country, and make it into your own image
more or less; be a king under me, and understand that
that is your function.” I say this is the most divine
thing that a human being can do to other human beings,
and no kind of thing whatever has so much of the
character of God Almighty’s Divine Government as that
thing, which, we see, went on all over England for about
six hundred years. That is the grand soul of England’s
history. (Cheers?) It is historically true that, down to
the time of James, or even Charles I., it was not under
stood that any man was made a Peer without having
merit in him to constitute him a proper subject for a
peerage. In Charles i.’s time, it grew to be known or
said that, if a man was born a gentleman, and cared to
�BOOKS.
25
lay out £10,000 judiciously up and down among courtiers,
lie could be made a Peer. Under Charles H. it went on
still faster, and has been going on w7ith ever-increasing
velocity, until we see the perfectly breakneck pace at
which they are going now (A laugh?), so that now a
peerage is a paltry kind of thing to what it was in those
old times. I could go into a great many more details
about things of that sort, but I must turn to another
branch of the subject.
First, however, one remark more about your reading.
I do not know whether it has been sufficiently brought
home to you that there are two kinds of books. When a
man is reading on any kind of subject, in most depart
ments of books,—in all books, if you take it in a wide
sense,—he will find that there is a division into good
books and bad books. Everywhere a good kind of book
and a bad kind of book. I am not to assume that you
are unacquainted, or ill acquainted with this plain fact;
but I may remind you that it is becoming a very im
portant Consideration in our day. And we have to cast
aside altogether the idea people have, that, if they are.
reading any book, that if an ignorant man is reading any
book, he is doing rather better than nothing at all. I must
entirely call that in question; I even venture to deny it.
(Laughter and cheers?) It would be much safer and better
for many a reader, that he had no concern with books at
all. There is a number, a frightfully increasing number,
of books that are decidedly, to the readers of them, not
useful. (?H?ear?) But an ingenuous reader will learn, also,
that a certain number of books were written by a su
�26
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
premely noble kind of people,—not a very great number
of books, but still a number fit to occupy all your reading
industry, do adhere more or less to that side of things.
In short, as I have written it down somewhere else, I
conceive that books are like men’s souls; divided into
sheep and goats. (Laughter and cheers.) Some few are
going up, and carrying us up, heavenward; calculated,
I mean, to be of priceless advantage in teaching,—in
forwarding the teaching of all generations. Others, a
frightful multitude, are going down, down; doing ever
the more and the wider and the wilder mischief. Keep
a strict eye on that latter class of books, my young
friends!—
And for the rest, in regard to all your studies and read
ings here, and to whatever you may learn, you are to
remember that the object is not particular knowledges,—
not that of getting higher and higher in technical perfec
tions, and all that sort of thing. There is a higher aim
lying at the rear of all that, especially among those who
are intended for literary or speaking pursuits, or the sacred
profession. You are ever to bear in mind that there lies
behind that the acquisition of what may be called wisdom;
—namely, sound appreciation and just decision as to all
the objects that come round you, and the habit of behaving
with justice, candour, clear insight, and loyal adherence to
fact. Great is wisdom; infinite is the value of wisdom.
It cannot be exaggerated ; it is the highest achievement
of man: ‘ Blessed is he that getteth understanding.’ And
that, I believe, on occasion, may be missed very easily;
never more easily than now, I sometimes think. If that
�ENDOWMENTS.
27
is a failure, all is failure!—However, I will not touch
further upon that matter.
But I should have said, in regard to hook-reading, if it
he so very important, how very useful would an excellent
library be in every University! I hope, that will not be
neglected by the gentlemen who have charge of you; and,
indeed, I am happy to hea.r that your library is very much
improved since the time I knew it, and I hope it will go
on improving more and more. Nay, I have sometimes
thought, why should not there be a library in every county
town, for benefit of those that could read well, and might
if permitted? True, you require money to accomplish
that;—and withal, what perhaps is still less attainable at
present, you require judgment in the selectors of books;
real insight into what is for the advantage of human souls,
the exclusion of all kinds of clap-trap books which merely
excite the astonishment of foolish people (Laughter), and
the choice of wise books, as much as possible of good books.
Let us hope the future will be kind to us in this respect.
In this University, as I learn from many sides, there
is considerable stir about endowments; an assiduous and
praiseworthy industry for getting new funds collected to
encourage the ingenuous youth of Universities, especially of
this our chief University. (Hear, hear?) Well, I entirely
participate in everybody’s approval of the movement. It
is very desirable. It should be responded to, and one
surely expects it will. At least, if it is not, it will be
shameful to the country of Scotland, which never was so
rich in money as at the present moment, and never stood
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INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
so much iu need of getting noble Universities, and insti
tutions to counteract many influences that are springing
up alongside of money. It should not be slack in coming
forward in the way of endowments (A laugh) ; at any rate,
to the extent of rivalling our rude old barbarous ancestors,
as we have been pleased to call them. Such munificence as
theirs is beyond all praise; and to them, I am sorry to say,
we are not yet by any manner of means equal, or ap
proaching equality. (Laughter?) There is an abundance
and over-abundance of money. Sometimes I cannot help
thinking that probably never has there been, at any other
time, in Scotland, the hundredth part of the money that
now is, or even the thousandth part. For wherever I go
there is that same gold-nuggeting (A laugh?),—-that ‘ unex;
ampled prosperity,’ and men counting their balances by
the million sterling. Money was never so abundant, and
nothing that is good to be done with it. (Hear, hear, and
a laugh?) No man knows,—or very few men know,—what
benefit to get out of his money. In fact, it too often is
secretly a curse to him. Much better for him never to
have had any. But I do not expect that generally to
be believed. (Laughter?) Nevertheless, I should think it
would be a beneficent relief to many a rich man who has an
honest purpose struggling in him, to bequeath some house
of refuge, so to speak, for the gifted poor man who may'
hereafter be born into the world, to enable him to get on
his way a little. To do, in fact, as those old Norman
kings whom I have been describing; to raise some noble
poor man out of the dirt and mud where he is getting
trampled on unworthily, by the unworthy, into some kind
�A DEEPER WANT.
29
of position where he might acquire the power to do a little
good in his generation! I hope that as much as possible
will be achieved in this direction; and that efforts will
not be relaxed till the thing is in a satisfactory state. In
regard to the classical department, above all, it surely is
to be desired by us that it were properly supported,—that
we could allow the fit people to have their scholarships and
subventions, and devote more leisure to the cultivation of
particular departments. We might have more of this from
Scotch Universities than we have; and I hope we shall.
I am bound, however, to say that it does not appear as if,
of late times, endowment were the real soul of the matter.
The English, for example, are the richest people in the
world for endowments in their Universities; and it is
an evident fact that, since the time of Bentley, you
cannot name anybody that has gained a European name
in scholarship, or constituted a point of revolution in the
pursuits of men in that way. The man who does so is
a man worthy of being remembered; and he is poor,
and not an Englishman.
One man that actually did
constitute a revolution was the son of a poor weaver in
Saxony; who edited his Tibullus, in Dresden, in a poor
comrade’s garret, with the floor for his bed, and two folios
for pillow; and who, while editing his Tibullus, had to
gather peasecod shells on the streets and boil them for his
dinner. That was his endowment. (Laughter?) But he
was recognised soon to have done a great thing. His
name was Heyne. (Cheers?) I can remember, it was
quite a revolution in my mind when I got hold of that
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INAUGURAL address.
man’s edition of Virgil. I found that, for the first time,
I understood Virgil; that Heyne had introduced me, for
the first time, into an insight of Roman life and ways of
thought; had pointed out the circumstances in which
these works were written, and given me their interpreta
tion. And the process has gone on in all manner of
developments, and has spread out into other countries.
On the whole, there is one reason why endowments are
not given now as they were in old days, when men founded
abbeys, colleges, and all kinds of things of that description,
with such success as we know. All that has now changed;
a vast decay of zeal in that direction. And truly the reason
may in part be, that people have become doubtful whether
colleges are now the real sources of what I called wisdom;
whether they are anything more, anything much more, than
a cultivating of man in the specific arts. In fact, there has
been in the world a suspicion of that kind for a long time.
(A laugh.') There goes a proverb of old date, ‘ An ounce
of mother-wit is worth a pound of clergy.’ {Laughter^)
There is a suspicion that a man is perhaps not nearly so
wise as he looks, or because he has poured out speech
so copiously. {Laughter.) When ‘the seven free arts ’
which the old Universities were based on, came to be
modified a little, in order to be convenient for the wants of
modern society,—though perhaps some of them are obsolete
enough even yet for some of us,—there arose a feeling that
mere vocality, mere culture of speech, if that is what comes
out of a man, is not the synonym of wisdom by any
means ! That a man may be a ‘ great speaker,’ as eloquent
as you like, and but little real substance in him,—espe
�FINE SPEECH.
31
cially, if that is what was required and aimed at by the
man himself, and by the community that set him upon
becoming a learned man. Maid-servants, I hear people
complaining, are getting instructed in the ‘ologies,’ and
are apparently becoming more and more ignorant of brew
ing, boiling, and baking (Laughter); and above all, are
not taught what is necessary to be known, from the highest
of us to the lowest,—faithful obedience, modesty, humility,
and correct moral conduct.
Oh, it is a dismal chapter all that if one went into it,—
what has been done by rushing after fine speech! I have
written down some very fierce things about that, perhaps
considerably more emphatic than I could now wish them to
be; but they were and are deeply my conviction. (Hear,
hear?) There is very great necessity indeed of getting a
little more silent than we are. It seems to me as if the
finest nations of the world,—the English and the Ameri
can, in chief,—were going all off into wind and tongue.
(Applause and laughter?) But it will appear sufficiently
tragical by-and-by, long after I am away out of it. There
is a time to speak, and a time to be silent. Silence withal
is the eternal duty of a man. He won’t get to any real
understanding of what is complex, and what is more than
aught else pertinent to his interests, without keeping
silence too. ‘Watch the tongue,’ is a very old precept,
and a most true one.
I don’t want to discourage any of you from your
Demosthenes, and your studies of the niceties of language,
and all that. Believe me, I value that as much as any
�32
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
one of you. I consider it a very graceful thing, and a
most proper, for every human creature to know what the
implement which he uses in communicating his thoughts
is, and how to make the very utmost of it. I want you
to study Demosthenes, and to know all his excellences.
At the same time, I must say that speech, in the case
even of Demosthenes, does not seem, on the whole, to
have turned to almost any good account. He advised
next to nothing that proved practicable; much of the re
verse. Why tell me that a man is a fine speaker, if it is
not the truth that he is speaking ? Phocion, who mostly
did not speak at all, was a great deal nearer hitting the
mark than Demosthenes. (Laughter?) He used to tell
the Athenians, “You can’t fight Philip. Better if you
don’t provoke him, as Demosthenes is always urging
to you to do. You have not the slightest chance with
Philip. He is a man who holds his tongue ; he has
great disciplined armies; a full treasury; can bribe any
body you like in your cities here; he is going on steadily
with an unvarying aim towards his object; while you, with
your idle clamourings, with your Cleon the Tanner spout
ing to you what you take for Wisdom— ! Philip will in
fallibly beat any set of men such as you, going on raging
from shore to shore with all that rampant nonsense.”
Demosthenes said to him once, “ Phocion, you will drive
the Athenians mad some day, and they will kill you.”
“ Yes,” Phocion answered, “ me, when they go mad; and
as soon as they get sane again, you I ” (Laughter and
applause?) It is also told of him how he went once to
Messene, on some deputation which the Athenians wanted
�FINE SPEECH.
33
him to head, on some kind of matter of an intricate and
contentious nature: Phocion went accordingly; and had,
as usual, a clear story to have told for himself and his
case. He was a man of few words, but all of them true
and to the point. And so he had gone on telling his
story for a while, wheii there arose some interruption.
One man, interrupting with something, he tried to answer;
then another, the like ; till finally, too many went in, and
all began arguing and bawling in endless debate. Where
upon Phocion struck down his staff; drew back altogether,
and would speak no other word to any man. It appears
to me there is a kind of eloquence in that rap of Phocion’s
staff which is equal to anything Demosthenes ever said:
“ Take your own way, then; I go out of it altogether.”
(Applause?)
Such considerations, and manifold more connected with
them,—innumerable considerations, resulting from obser
vation of the world at this epoch,—have led various
people to doubt of the salutary effect of vocal education
altogether. I do not mean to say it should be entirely
excluded; but I look to something that will take hold of
the matter much more closely, and not allow it to slip out
of our fingers, and remain worse than it was. For, if a
‘good speaker,’ never so eloquent, does not see into the
fact, and is not speaking the truth of that, but the untruth
and the mistake of that,—is there a more horrid kind of
object in creation ? (Loud cheers?) Of such speech I hear
all manner of people say, “ How excellent!” Well, really
it is not the speech, but the thing spoken, that I am
anxious about! I really care very little how the man
I
�34
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
said it, provided I understand him, and it be true. Ex
cellent speaker ? But what if he is telling me things that
are contrary to the fact; what if he has formed a wrong
judgment about the fact,—if he has in his mind (like
Phocion’s friend, Cleon the Tanner) no power to form a
right judgment in regard to the matter? An excellent
speaker of that kind is, as it were, saying, “ Ho, every
one that wants to be persuaded of the thing that is not
true; here is the man for you!” (Great laughter and
applause?) I recommend you to be very chary of that
kind of excellent speech. (?Renewed laughter?)
Well, all that sad stuff being the too well-known product
of our method of vocal education,—the teacher merely
operating on the tongue of the pupil, and teaching him to
wag it in a particular way (Laughter),—it has made various
thinking men entertain a distrust of this not very salu
tary way of procedure; and they have longed for some less
theoretic, and more practical and concrete way of working
out the problem of education;-—in effect, for an educa
tion not vocal at all, but mute except where speaking was
strictly needful. There would be room for a great deal of
description about this, if I went into it; but I must con
tent myself with saying that the most remarkable piece
of writing on it is in a book of Goethe’s,—the whole of
which you may be recommended to take up, and try if you
can study it with understanding. It is one of his last
books; written when he was an old man above seventy
years of age: I think, one of the most beautiful he ever
wrote; full of meek wisdom, of intellect and piety; which
�THE EDUCATION OF THE FUTURE.
35
is found to be strangely illuminative, and very touching,
by those who have eyes to discern and hearts to feel it.
This about education is one of the pieces in Wilhelm,
Meister’s Travels; or rather, in a fitful way, it forms
the whole gist of the book. I first read it many years
agoand, of course, I had to read into the very heart of
it while I was translating it (Applause); and it has ever
since dwelt in my mind as perhaps the most remark
able bit of writing which I have known to be executed in
these late centuries. I have often said that there are some
ten pageS of that, which, if ambition had been my only rule,
I would rather have written, been able to write, than have
written all the books that have appeared since I came into
the world. (Cheers?) Beep, deep is the meaning of what
is said there. Those pages turn on the Christian religion,
and the religious phenomena of the modern and the
ancient world: altogether sketched out in the most aerial,
graceful, delicately wise kind of way, so as to keep him
self out of the common controversies of the street and
of the forum, yet to indicate what was the result of things
he had been long meditating upon.
Among others, he introduces in an airy, sketchy kind
of way, with here and there a touch,—the sum-total of
which grows into a beautiful picture,—a scheme of entirely
mute education, at least with no more speech than is ab
solutely necessary for what the pupils have to do. Three
of the wisest men discoverable in the world have been
got together, to consider, to manage and supervise, the
function which transcends all others in importance; that
of building up the young generation so as to keep it
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INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
free from that perilous stuff that has been weighing
us down, and clogging every step;—which function, in
deed, is the only thing we can hope to go on with, 'c we
would leave the world a little better, and not the worse,
of our having been in it, for those who are to follow.
The Chief, who is the Eldest of the 'three, says to Wil
helm : “ Healthy well-formed children bring into the
world with them many precious gifts; and very frequently
these are best of all developed by Nature herself, with
but slight assistance, where assistance is seen to be wise
and profitable, and with forbearance very often on the
part of the overseer of the process. But there is one
thing which no child brings into the world with him,
and without which all other things are of no use.”
Wilhelm, who is there beside him, asks, “And what is
that?” “All want it,” says the Eldest; “perhaps you
yourself.” Wilhelm says, “Well, but tell me what it is?”
“ It is,” answers the other, “ Reverence (EhrfurcM); Re
verence! Honour done to those who are greater and
better than ourselves; honour distinct from fear. Ehrfurcht; the soul of all religion that has ever been among
men, or ever will be.”
And then he goes into details about the religions of the
modern and the ancient world. He practically distinguishes
the kinds of religion that are, or have been, in the world ;
and says that for men there are three reverences. The
boys are all trained to go through certain gesticulations;
to lay their hands on their breast and look up to heaven,
in sign of the first reverence; other forms for the other
two: so they give their three reverences. The first and
�THE EDUCATION OF THE FUTURE.
37
simplest is that of reverence for what is above us. It is
the soul of all the Pagan religions; there is nothing better
in th# antique man than that. Then there is reverence
for what is around us,—reverence for our equals, to which
he attributes an immense power in the culture of man.
The third is reverence for what is beneath us; to learn to
recognise in pain, in sorrow and contradiction, even in thoee
things, odious to flesh and blood, what divine meanings
are in them; to learn that there lies in these also, and
more than in any of the preceding, a priceless blessing.
And he defines that as being the soul of the Christian
religion,—the highest of all religions; ‘ a height,’ as Goethe
says (and that is very true, even to the letter, as I con
sider), ‘ a height to which mankind was fated and enabled
to attain; and from which, having once attained it, they
can never retrograde.’ Man cannot quite lose that (Goethe
thinks), or permanently descend below it again; but
always, even in the most degraded, sunken, and unbe
lieving times, he calculates there will be found some few
souls who will recognise what this highest of the religions
meant; and that, the world having once received it, there
is no fear of its ever wholly disappearing.
The Eldest then goes on to explain by what methods
they seek to educate and train their boys; in the trades,
in the arts, in the sciences, in whatever pursuit the boy is
found best fitted for. Beyond all, they are anxious to dis
cover the boy’s aptitudes; and they try him and watch him
continually, in many wise ways, till by degrees they can
discover this. Wilhelm had left his own boy there, per
haps expecting they would make him a Master of Arts,
X
�38
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
or something of the kind; and on coming back for him,
he sees a thunder-cloud of dust rushing over the plain,
of which he can make nothing. It turns out to be a
tempest of wild horses, managed by young lads who had
a turn for horsemanship, for hunting, and being grooms.
His own son is among them || and 'he finds that the
breaking of colts has been the thing he was most suited
for. (Laughter?)
The highest outcome, and most precious of all the fruits
that are to spring from this ideal mode of educating, is
what Goethe calls Art:—of which I could at present give
no definition that would make it clear to you, unless it
were clearer already than is likely. (A laugh?) Goethe
calls it music, painting, poetry: but it is in quite a higher
sense than the common one ; and a sense in which, I am
afraid, most of our painters, poets, and music men, would
not pass muster. (A laugh?) He considers this as the
highest pitch to which human culture can go; infinitely
valuable and ennobling; and he watches with great in
dustry how it is to be brought about, in the men who have
a turn for it. Very wise and beautiful his notion of the
matter is. It gives one an idea that something far better
and higher, something as high as ever, and indubitably
true too, is still possible for man in this world.—And that
is all I can say to you of Goethe’s fine theorem of mute
education.
I confess it seems to me there is in it a shadow of what will
one day be; will and must, unless the world is to come to a
conclusion that is altogether frightful: some kind of scheme
of education analogous to that; presided over by the
�THE EDUCATION OF THE FUTURE.
39
wisest and most sacred men that can be got in the world,
and watching from a distance: a training in practicality
at every turn; no speech in it except speech that is to be
followed by action, for that ought to be the rule as nearly
as possible among men. Not very often or much, rarely
rather, should a man speak at all, unless it is for the sake
of something that is to be done; this spoken, let him go
and do his part in it, and say no more about it.
I will only add that it is possible,—all this fine theorem
of Goethe’s, or something similar ! Consider what we have
already ; and what ‘ difficulties ’ we have overcome. I
should say there is nothing in the world you can conceive
so difficult, prima facie, as that of getting a set of men
gathered together as soldiers. Rough, rude, ignorant, dis
obedient people; you gather them together, promise them
a shilling a day; rank them up, give them very severe
and sharp drill; and by bullying and drilling and com
pelling (the word drilling, if you go to the original,
means ‘beating,’ ‘steadily tormenting’ to the due pitch),
they do learn what it is necessary to learn; and there is
your man in red coat, a trained soldier; piece of an ani
mated machine incomparably the most potent in this
world; a wonder of wonders to look qt. He will go
where bidden; obeys one man, will walk into the can
non’s mouth for him; does punctually whatever is com
manded by his general officer. And, I believe, all
manner of things of this kind could be accomplished,
if there were the same attention bestowed. Very many
things could be regimented, organized into this mute
system;—and perhaps in some of the mechanical, com
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INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
mercial, and manufacturing departments, some faint in
cipiences may be attempted before very long. For the
saving of human labour, and the avoidance of human
misery, the effects would be incalculable, were it set about
and begun even in part.
Alas, it is painful to think how very far away it all is,
any real fulfilment of such things! For I need not hide
from you, young gentlemen,—and it is one of the last
things I am going to tell you,—that you have got into a
very troublous epoch of the world; and I don’t think you
will find your path in it to be smoother than ours has been,
though you have many advantages which we had not.
You have careers open to you, by public examinations and
so on, which is a thing much to be approved of, and which
we hope to see perfected more and more. All that was
entirely unknown in my time, and you have many things
to recognise as advantages. But you will find the ways
of the world, I think, more anarchical than ever. Look
where one will, revolution has come upon us. We have
got into the age of revolutions. All kinds of things are
coming to be subjected to fire, as it were: hotter and hotter
blows the element round everything. Curious to see how,
in Oxford and other places that used to seem as lying at
anchor in the stream of time, regardless of all changes,
they are getting into the highest humour of mutation, and
all sorts of new ideas are afloat. It is evident that what
ever is not inconsumable, made of asbestos, will have to
be burnt, in this world. Nothing other will stand the
heat it is getting exposed to.
And in saying that, I am but saying in other words that
�AN AGE OF REVOLUTIONS.
41
we are in an epoch of anarchy. Anarchy plus a constable!
(Laughter?) There is nobody that picks one’s pocket
without some policeman being ready to take him up.
(?Renewed laughter?) But in every other point, man is
becoming more and more the son, not of Cosmos, but
of Chaos. He is a disobedient, discontented, reckless,
and altogether waste kind of object (the commonplace
man is, in these epochs); and the wiser kind of man,
—the select few, of whom I hope you will be part,—has
more and more to see to this, to look vigilantly forward ;
and will require to move with double, wisdom. Will
find, in short, that the crooked things he has got to pull
straight in his own life all round him, wherever he may
go, are manifold, and will task all his strength, however
great it be.
But why should I complain of that either ? For that is
the thing a man is born to, in all epochs. He is born to
expend every particle of strength that God Almighty has
given him, in doing the work he finds he is fit for; to
stand up to it to the last breath of life, and do his best.
We are called upon to do that; and the reward we all get,
—which we are perfectly sure of if we have merited it,—is
that we have got the work done, or at least that we have
tried to do the work. For that is a great blessing in itself;
and I should say, there is not very much more reward than
that going in this world. If the man gets meat and
clothes, what matters it whether he buy those neces
saries with seven thousand a year, or with seven million,
could that be, or with seventy pounds a year? He can
get meat and clothes for that; and he will find intrinsi
�42
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
cally, if he is a wise man, wonderfully little real differ
ence. (Laughter?)
On the whole, avoid what is called ambition; that is
not a fine principle to go upon,—and it has in it all de
grees of vulgarity, if that is a consideration. ‘ Seekest
thou great things, seek them notI warmly second that
advice of the wisest of men. Don’t be ambitious; don’t
too much need success; be loyal and modest. Cut down
the proud towering thoughts that get into you, or see that
they be pure as well as high. There is a nobler ambition
than the gaining of all California would be, or the getting
of all the suffrages that are on the Planet just now. (Loud
and prolonged cheers?)
Finally, gentlemen, I have one advice to give you, which
is practically of very great importance, though a very
humble one. In the midst of your zeal and ardour,—
for such, I foresee, will rise high enough, in spite of all the
counsels to moderate it that I can give you,—remember
the care of health. I have no doubt you have among you
young souls ardently bent to consider life cheap, for the
purpose of getting forward in what they are aiming at of
high; but you are to consider throughout, much more than
is done at present, and what it would have been a very
great thing for me if I had been able to consider, that
health is a thing to be attended to continually; that you
are to regard that as the very highest of all temporal things
for you. (Applause?) There is no kind of achievement you
could make in the world that is equal to perfect health.
What to it are nuggets and millions ? The French financier
�HEALTH.
43
said, “ Why, is there no sleep to be sold !” Sleep was not
in the market at any quotation. {Laughter and applause?)
It is a curious thing, which I remarked long ago, and have
often turned in my head, that the old word for ‘holy’
in the Teutonic languages, heilig, also means ‘healthy.’
Thus Heilbronn means indifferently ‘holy-well,’ or ‘health
well.’ We have, in the Scotch too, ‘ hale,’ and its deriva
tives; and, I suppose, our English word ‘whole’ (with a
‘w’), all of one piece, without any hole in it, is the same
word. I find that you could not get any better defini
tion of what ‘holy’ really is than ‘healthy.’ Completely
healthy; mens sana in corpore sano. {Applause.) A
man all lucid, and in equilibrium. His intellect a clear
mirror geometrically plane, brilliantly sensitive to all
objects and impressions made on it, and imaging all
things in their correct proportions; not twisted up into
convex or concave, and distorting everything, so that he
cannot see the truth of the matter-without endless groping
and manipulation: healthy, clear, and free, and discerning
truly all round him. We never can attain that at all. In
fact, the operations we have got into are destructive of it.
You cannot, if you are going to do any decisive intellectual
operation that will last a long while; if, for instance, you
are going to write a book,—you cannot manage it (at
least, I never could) without getting decidedly made ill
by it: and really one nevertheless must; if it is your
business, you are obliged to follow out what you are at,
and to do it, if even at the expense of health. Only
remember, at all times, to get back as fast as possible out
of it into health; and regard that as the real equilibrium
�44
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
and centre of things. You should always look at the
heilig, which means 1 holy’ as well as ‘healtny.’l I
And that old etymology,—what a lesson it is against
certain gloomy, austere, ascetic people, who have gone
about as if this world were all a dismal prison-house. It
has indeed got all the ugly things in it which I have been
alluding to ; but there is an eternal sky over it; and the
blessed sunshine, the green of prophetic spring, and rich
harvests coming,—all this is in it, too. Piety does not
mean that a man should make a sour face about things,
and refuse to enjoy wisely what his Maker has given.
Neither do you find it to have been so with the best sort,
—with old Knox, in particular. No; if you look into
Knox you will find a beautiful Scotch humour in him, as
well as the grimmest and sternest truth when necessary,
and a great deal of laughter. We find really some of
the sunniest glimpses of things come out of Knox that I
have seen in any man; for instance, in his History of
the Reformation,—which is a book I hope every one of
you will read (Applause), a glorious old book.
On the whole, I would bid you stand up to your work,
whatever it may be, and not be afraid of it; not in sor
rows or contradictions to yield, but to push on towards the
goal. And don’t suppose that people are hostile to you or
have you at ill-will, in the world. In general, you will rarely
find anybody designedly doing you ill. You may feel often
as if the whole world were obstructing you, setting itself
against you: but you will find that to mean only, that
the world is travelling in a different way from you, and,
rushing on in its own path, heedlessly treads on you.
�A LAST WORD.
45
That is mostly all: to you no specific ill-will;—only each
has an extremely good-will to himself, which he has a right
to have, and is rushing on towards his object. Keep out
of literature, I should say also, as a general rule (Laughter),
—though that is by-the-by. If you find many people
who are hard and indifferent to you, in a world which you
consider to be inhospitable and cruel, as often indeed
happens to a tender-hearted, striving young creature, you
will also find there are noble hearts who will look kindly
on you; and their help will be precious to you beyond
price. You will get good and evil as you go on, and
have the success that has been appointed you.
I will wind up with a small bit of verse which is from
Goethe also, and has often gone through my mind. To me,
it has something of a modern psalm in it, in some mea
sure. It is deep as the foundations, deep and high, and it
is true and clear :—no clearer man, or nobler and grander
intellect has lived in the world, I believe, since Shakspeare left it. This is what the poet sings;—a kind of
road-melody or marching-music of mankind :
‘ The Future hides in it
Gladness and sorrow;
We press still thorow,
Nought that abides in it
Daunting us,—onward.
And solemn before us,
Veiled, the dark Portal;
Goal of all mortal:—
Stars silent rest o’er us,
Graves under us silent.
�46
INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
While earnest thou gazest,
Comes boding of terror,
Comes phantasm and error;
Perplexes the bravest
With doubt and misgiving.
But heard are the Voices,
Heard are the Sages,
The Worlds and the Ages
“ Choose well, your choice is
Brief, and yet endless.
Here eyes do regard you,
In Eternity’s stillness;
Here is all fulness,
Ye brave, to reward you ;
Work, and despair not.” ’
Work, and despair not: Wir heissen euch hoffcn, We bid
you be of hope!’—let that be my last word. Gentlemen,
I thank you for your great patience in hearing me ;
and, with many most kind wishes, say Adieu for this
time.
EDINBURGH I THOMAS CONSTABLE,
PRINTER TO THE QUEEN, AND TO THE UNIVERSITY.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
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Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Inaugural address at Edinburgh, April 2nd, 1866; by Thomas Carlyle, at being installed as Rector of the university there
Creator
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Carlyle, Thomas [1795-1881.]
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: Edinburgh; London
Collation: 46 p. ; 20 cm.
Notes: 'Authorised Report' [title page]. Later published under the title 'On the Choice of Books'. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
Publisher
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Edmonston and Douglas; Chapman and Hall
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1866
Identifier
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G5189
Subject
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Education
Rights
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Inaugural address at Edinburgh, April 2nd, 1866; by Thomas Carlyle, at being installed as Rector of the university there), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Addresses
Education
Reading
Speeches
Thomas Carlyle