Chapter 10

The actual available power of a state is in its adult population; but its hope is in the classes of children and youth whose plastic minds yield to good influences, and are moulded to higher forms of beauty than have been conceived by Italian or Grecian art. Excellence is always adorable and to be adored. If it appear in beauty of person, it commands our admiration; and how much more ought wisdom, which is the beauty of the mind and the excellency of the soul, to be cultivated and cherished by every human being! "For what is there, O, ye gods!" says Cicero, "more desirable than wisdom? What more excellent and lovely in itself? What more useful and becoming for a man? Or what more worthy of his reasonable nature?"

But wisdom cannot be acquired in a day, nor without devotion and toil. It is the achievement of a life. It is to be pursued carefully through schools, colleges, and the world,--to be mastered by study, intense thought, rigid mental discipline, and an extensive acquaintance with the best authors of ancient and modern times. It is not the child of ease, indolence, or luxury; and it is well that it is not, The best of human possessions are cheapened their attainment is no longer difficult. The wealth of California and Australia has made silver, as an article of luxury, the rival of gold; and the pearl loses its beauty when the mountain streams are as fertile as the depths of the sea. Wisdom comprehends learning, but learning is often found where wisdom is wanting. Wisdom is not accomplishment in study, or perfection in art, or supremacy in poetry or eloquence. Learning is essential to wisdom, for we cannot imagine a wise man who is not also a learned man; and the extent and soundness of his learning may be a measure of his wisdom. Wisdom must always have a basis of learning, but learning is not always a basis of wisdom. Learning is a knowledge of particulars, of details; wisdom is such a combination of these particulars as enables us to harmonize our lives with the laws of nature and of God.

Learning is manifested in what we know; wisdom in what we are, based upon what we know. Philosophy, even, is love for wisdom rather than wisdom itself. The old philosophers defined wisdom to be "the knowledge of things, both divine and human, together with the causes on which they depend;" and in the proverb of Solomon, "The fear of the Lord is the instruction of wisdom." Purity, truth, and justice, are also of its foundation. Wise men of the Jewish and Pagan world built on this foundation, and the Christian can build on none other. Having combined learning with these essential virtues, a liberal, symmetrical, comprehensive character may be built up. In the formation of such a character, industry, powers of observation, strength of will and intellectual humility, are requisite. The virtue and the glory of industry cannot be presented too often to the young. I know of no worldly good or human excellence that can be attained without it; nor is there any inherited possession of name, or wealth, or position, that can be preserved in its extent and quality without active, systematic, judicious labor.

It is not necessary to consider industry as habitual diligence in a pursuit, manual or intellectual; but rather as a judicious arrangement of business and recreation, so as always to have time for the necessary duties of life. Mere diligence is not industry in a good sense; it is labor in a bad sense. Our time should be systematically appropriated to our employments, and each measure of time should be equal to the work or duty appointed for it. Moreover, each work or duty should be accomplished in its appointed time; and this can be secured only by a strong will. The power of will admits of education, culture, improvement, as much as any faculty of the mind or quality of character. A fickle, planless life cannot accomplish much. System in our plans, and firmness of will in their execution, will place us beyond the reach of ordinary disasters; yet how often do young men go through a course of school studies without a plan, even for the moment, and enter upon life the slaves of chance, the victims of what they call fortune, while they might by industry, system and firmness of will, rise superior to circumstances, and extort a measure of success not unworthy of a noble ambition!

Idleness is a wasting disease, a consuming fire, a destroying demon; in youth it is a calamity, in the vigor of manhood it is a disgrace and a sin, and in old age it can be honorably accepted only as the symbol of reflective leisure earned by a life of industry and virtue. Industry is a badge of honor, an introduction everywhere to the true nobility of the world, the security that each may take of the future for his own happiness and prosperity in it.

Cardinal, personal virtues shrink and wither, or are blasted and die, in the company of idleness; and, without firmness of will, the noblest principles and purest sentiments sometimes wear the livery of vice, and often they give encouragement to it. Good principles, good purposes, good ideas, are made fruitful by a strong resolution; while without it they are like bubbles of water, brilliant in the sun-light, but destined to collapse by the changing, silent force of the medium in which they float. And can any life, not positively vicious and criminal, be less desirable than that of the young man who quietly accepts whatever condition circumstances assign to him? I speak now of his moral and intellectual condition rather than of his social position among men. The latter is not in itself important, and only becomes so through the exhibition of high qualities of mind and character. Social and political consideration we cannot demand as a right; but we may acquire knowledge, develop qualities of character, give evidences of wisdom that entitle us to the respect of our fellows.

It may be agreeable, but it is not absolutely essential, for us to enjoy the public confidence, or even the public consideration; though we can be happy ourselves only when we are conscious of not being totally unworthy. But no social or political concession or consideration is acceptable to a noble mind, that is grudgingly yielded or doubtingly bestowed; and the lustre of great intellects is dimmed when they become subservient to claims that they despise.

But can we acquire a knowledge of things, either divine or human, unless we cultivate our powers of observation? Partial or inaccurate observation, especially of natural things, is a great defect of character; and in New England, where the aim of educators and of the public in matters of education is elevated, a remedy for this defect ought at once to be sought and applied. Our ideas are vague concerning many subjects of common sight and common observation. Is adult life, even among the educated classes, equal to a description of the common animals, trees, fruits and flowers? Who will paint with words the elm or the oak so that its species will be known while the name is withheld? The introduction of drawing into the schools will improve the power of observation among the people, especially if the pupils are required to make nature their model. And this should always be done. O, how is education belittled and the mind dwarfed by those teachers who keep their pupils' thoughts upon signs and definitions, when they ought to deal continually with the facts, things and life of the world! It is no fable that a student of the higher mathematics, when his master, a practical engineer upon the Boston water-works, required his services, exclaimed, "I had no idea that you had sines and tangents out of doors." With such,

"Nothing goes for sense or light That will not with old rules jump right; As if rules were not in the schools Derived from truth, but truth from rules."

And Butler, in his satirical description of Sir Hudibras, ascribes to his hero more practical philosophy than he appears to have intended, and more, certainly, than is found in some modern systems of education:

"In mathematics he was greater Than Tycho Brahe or Erra Pater; For he, by geometric scale, Could take the size of pots of ale; Resolve by sines and tangents straight, If bread or butter wanted weight; And wisely tell what hour o' th' day The clock does strike, by algebra."

Another prerequisite of wisdom is intellectual humility, Solomon, says, "Before honor is humility;" and humility is before wisdom, and even before learning. We ought not to be ashamed of involuntary ignorance. Franklin, when asked how he came to know so much, replied, "By never being ashamed to ask a question."

It is idle for any one to imagine that there is nothing more for him to learn. Indeed, such a theory is good evidence of defective education and limited attainments, if not of a defective mental and moral structure.

Naturalists delight and instruct their pupils and auditors with the wonderful truths folded in the flower, garnered in the plant, or imprisoned in the rock. Yet how much more there must be of God's wisdom in the humblest of the beings created in his image! There are distinctions among men; and out of these distinctions come the truth and the necessity that each may be both a teacher and a pupil of every other. No man, however learned he may be, does know or can know all that is known by his neighbor, though that neighbor be the humblest of shepherds or of fishermen. We are not independent of each other in anything. The earnest and faithful disciple of wisdom goes through life everywhere diffusing knowledge, and everywhere gathering it up. Over the great gateway of life is the inscription, "None but learners enter here;" and along its paths and in its groves are tablets, on which is written, "None but learners sojourn here." He is a poor teacher who is not a learner, and he is but little of a learner who is not something of a teacher also. The best teachers are they who are pupils, and the best pupils are already teachers. Such was the real and avowed character of the great teachers of antiquity; such is the best practice of modern continental Europe, and such is the requirement of nature in all ages. He who does not learn cannot teach. Socrates professed to know only this, that he knew nothing. Plato was a disciple of Socrates and Euclid; a pupil in the school of Pythagoras; and, as a traveller, under the disguise of a merchant and a seller of oil, he visited Egypt, and thus gained a knowledge of astronomy, and added something to his learning in other departments. He numbered among his pupils Isocrates, Lycurgus, Aristotle, and Demosthenes; and for eight years Alexander the Great was the pupil of Aristotle, while Demosthenes

"Wielded at will that fierce Democratie, Shook the arsenal, and fulmined over Greece To Macedon, and Artaxerxes' throne."

Thus we trace Demosthenes and Alexander, the master spirits in the struggle of Grecian independence against Macedonian supremacy, through teachers and culture up to Socrates, the wanderer in the streets, and the disturber of the peace of Athens.

It is stated that a distinguished modern philosopher often says, "I don't know," when the curiosity or science of his pupils suggests questions that he has not considered. If we respect and admire the wisdom of the wise, how ought we to be humbled, intellectually, by the reflection that the unknown far exceeds the known, and that all become as little children when they enter the temple of the sages! The ancients prized schools, teachers, and learning, because they were essential to wisdom; and wisdom enabled them to live temperately, justly, and happily, in the present world; while we prize schools, teachers, and learning, because they contribute to what we call success in life. The population of New England, is composed of skilful artisans, intelligent merchants, shrewd or eloquent lawyers, industrious and intelligent farmers; and to these results our system of education is too exclusively subservient. These results are not to be condemned, nor are the processes by which they are secured to be neglected. But our schools ought to do something always and for every one, for the full development of a character that is essential to artisans, merchants, lawyers, or farmers. Learning should not be prized merely as an aid to the daily work of life,--though this it properly is and ever ought to be,--but for its expansive power in the mind and soul, by which we attain to a more perfect knowledge of things human and divine. There are many persons who accomplish satisfactorily the tasks assigned them, but who do not always comprehend the processes of life, in its political, social, literary, scientific and industrial relations, by which the affairs of the world are guided.

Something of this is due, speaking of America, and especially of New England, to the universal desire to be engaged in active business. Young men destined for the farm or the shop, the counting-house or the store, leave home and school so early that their apprenticeship is ended long before their majority commences; and they are thus prepared to enter early and vigorously upon the business of life. This course has its advantages, and it is also attended by many evils. Our youth have but little opportunity for observation, and a great deal of time for experience. They fall into mistakes that should have been observed, and consequently shunned. Moreover, this custom tends to make business men too exclusively and rigidly technical and professional; that is, in plain language, speaking relatively, they know too much of their own vocation, and too little of everything else. Business life follows so closely upon home life and school life, that the lessons of the latter fail to exert an immediate and controlling influence, and it is often only in maturer years that the fruits of early training are seen. The connection is such that the boy or youth becomes a devotee of business before he is developed into complete manhood. This is movement, but not true progress; activity, but not culture; appropriation and accumulation, but not natural development. This peculiarity is less prominent in England, and it is hardly known in the central states of Europe. It is to some extent a national, and especially is it a New England characteristic. It is a manifestation of the forward moving spirit of our people, and it is also at once a promise and the security for the ultimate supremacy of the American race and nation in the affairs of the world. In Athens young men attained their majority when they were sixteen; but they usually prosecuted their studies afterwards, and Aristotle thought them unfit for marriage until they were thirty-seven years of age. This rule was observed by Aristotle in his own case; but we are unable to say whether the rule was made before or after his marriage, which is a fact of much importance when we consider the wisdom of the precept, and the real principles and philosophy of its famous author. Moreover, regardless of one-half of creation, he has neither stated the age at which females are marriageable, nor given us that of his own wife. This neglect justly detracts from his authority; and it will not be strange if young men and women view with distrust an opinion that is so manifestly partial and one-sided. If schools make merely learned people, in a narrow and technical sense, they are not doing their whole work. Such learning makes an efficient population, which is certainly desirable; but it ought also to be a well-educated population in a broad, comprehensive, philosophic sense. By the force of nature and the developing influences of society, including the church, the school, and the home, we ought first to be educated men and women, and then apply that education to the particular work we have in hand. By learning, in this connection, I do not mean the learning of Agassiz as a naturalist, the learning of Choate as a lawyer, or the learning of Everett as an orator; but a more general and less minute culture, by which men are prepared to form an accurate judgment upon subjects that usually attract public attention.

In the gardens of the wealthy, we often see peach-trees and pear-trees trained against brick or stone walls, to which they are attached by substantial thongs. These trees are carefully and systematically trained, and they are trained so as to accomplish certain results. They present a large surface, in proportion to the whole, to the sun and air; in addition to the direct rays of the sun, they receive the reflected and accumulated heat of the walls to which they are fastened; and they furnish ripe fruit much in advance of trees in the gardens and fields of the common farmers. Here art and nature, in brick walls, manure, the germinating power of the peach or pear, and rigid training and pruning, have produced very good machines for the manufacture of fruit; but for the full-grown, symmetrically developed tree, or even for the choicest fruit in its season, we must look elsewhere. And who does not perceive, if all the trees of the gardens, fields, and forests, were treated in the same way, that the world would be deprived of a part of its beauty and glory, and that many species of trees would soon become extinct? Who would not give back the luscious pear and peach to their native acritude, rather than subject the highest forms of vegetable life to such irreverence? And, upon reflection, we shall say that such cruelty to inanimate life can be justified only as we justify the naturalist who dexterously and suddenly extracts a vital organ from a reptile, that he may observe the effect upon that form of animal existence.

But the tree is not to be left in its native state. By culture its growth is so aided, that it is first and always a tree after its own kind, whether it be peach, pear, apple, elm, or oak; at once ornamental and graceful, stately or majestic, according to the germinating principle which diffuses itself through each individual creation. "For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear." So in the human heart, mind, and soul, nature bringeth forth fruit of herself; and it is the work of schools and teachers to aid nature in developing a full and attractive character, that shall yield fruit while all its powers are enlarged and strengthened, as the almond in the peach is not only more luscious in its fruit, but more graceful in its branches. Culture, in a broad sense, is the aid rendered to each individual creation in its work of self-improvement. It is not a noble and generous culture which dwarfs the tree that early ripened or peculiarly flavored fruit may be obtained; and it is not a noble and generous culture of the child which forces into unnatural activity certain faculties or powers that surprise us by their precocity, or excite wonder by the skill exhibited in their use. Rather let the child grow, expand, mature, according to the law of its own being, giving it only encouragement and example, which are the light and air of mental and moral life. I am not conscious that any one has given us a philosophical, logical system of development, that relates to the physical, intellectual, and moral character; and to-day I state the educational want in this particular, but I do not attempt to supply it. Yet in nature such a system there must be, and only powers of observation are needed that we may avail ourselves of it. And in stating this want more particularly, I offer, as my first suggestion, the opinion, common among educators, that, speaking generally and with reference to a system, we have no physical training whatever.

In the days of our ancestors, one hundred or two hundred years ago, this training, as a part of a system of education, was not needed. We had no cities, and but few large towns. Agriculture and the ruder forms of mechanical labor were the chief occupations of the people. Populous cities, narrow streets, dark lanes, cellar habitations, crowded workshops, over-filled and over-heated factories, and the number of sedentary pursuits that tax and wear and destroy the physical powers, and undermine the moral and mental, were unknown. These are the attendants of our civilization, and they have brought a melancholy train of evils with them. In the seventeenth century, men perished from exposure, from ignorance of the laws of health, from the prevalence of malignant diseases that defied the science of the times; and, as a consequence, the average length of human life was not greater than it now is. At present, there is but little exposure that is followed by fatal results; malignant diseases are deprived of many of their terrors; rules of living, founded upon scientific principles, are accessible to all; and yet we daily meet young men and women who are manifestly unequal to the lot that is before them. In some cases, the sin of the parent is visited upon the children, and the measure of life meted out to them is limited and insufficient. In other cases, the individuals, first yielding in their own persons, are the victims of positive vice, or of some of the evils stated. Civilization is not an unmixed good; and we cannot offer to the city or the factory any adequate compensation for the loss of pure water, pure air, and the healthful exercise of body, which may be enjoyed in the country villages and agricultural districts of the state.

Yet even in cities and large towns the culture of home and school should diminish these evils; and it is a pleasure to believe that our system of domestic and public education is doing something at the present moment in behalf of the too much neglected body; but nowhere, either in city or country, do we observe the evidences of juvenile health and strength that a friend of the race would desire to see. And it is, I fear, specially true of schools, and to some extent it is true of teachers, as a class, that too little attention is given to those exercises and habits which secure good health. There are many causes which tend to lower the average health and strength of our people. 1st. The practice of sending children to school at the tender age of five, four, or even three years. Every school necessarily imposes some restraint upon the pupils; and I assume that no child under five years of age should be subject to such restraints. But the education of the child is not, therefore, to be neglected. Parents, brothers and sisters, may all do something for the young inquirer; but he should never have lessons imposed, nor be subject to the rules of a school of any description. The moment of his admission must be determined by circumstances, and the force of the circumstances must be judged of by parents. If a child is blessed with kind, considerate, intelligent parents, the first eight years of his life can be spent nowhere else as profitably as at home. The true mother is the model teacher. No other person can ever acquire the control over her off-spring that is her own rightful possession. When she neglects the trust confided to her, she is guilty of a serious wrong; and when she transfers it to another, she takes upon herself a greater responsibility than she yields up. The instinctive judgment of the world cannot be an erroneous judgment. The mother has always, to a great extent, been made responsible for the child; and the honor of his virtues or the disgrace of his crimes has been traced through him to her.