every object of which they are likely to read.' 'It is,' as he says,
'impossible to calculate the injury which the minds of children suffer
from the habit of receiving imperfect ideas:' and it is discreditable
in the highest degree to the majority of good classical scholars that
they have no accurate knowledge of the Roman calendar, and no
knowledge at all of the classical coinage, &c.: not one out of every
twenty scholars can state the relation of the _sestertius_ to the
_denarius_, of the Roman _denarius_ to the Attic _drachma_, or express
any of them in English money. All such defects are weighty: but they
are not adequate illustrations of the injury which arises from
inaccurate ideas in its most important shape. It is a subject however
which we have here no room to enlarge upon.
[Footnote 40: Indeed an Etonian must in consistency condemn either the
Latin or the Greek grammar of Eton. For, where is the Greek '_Propria
quæ maribus_'--'_Quæ genus_'--and '_As in præsenti_'? Either the Greek
grammar is defective, or the Latin redundant. We are surprised that it
has never struck the patrons of these three beautiful Idylls, that all
the anomalies of the Greek language are left to be collected from
practice.]
REWARDS AND PUNISHMENTS.--It has already been mentioned that corporal
punishments are entirely abolished;[41] and upon the same principle
all such disgrace as 'would destroy self-respect.' 'Expulsion even has
been resorted to, rather than a boy should be submitted to treatment
which might lead himself and his school-fellows to forget that he was
a gentleman.' In this we think the Experimentalist very wise: and
precisely upon this ground it was that Mr. Coleridge in his lectures
at the Royal Institution attacked Mr. Lancaster's system, which
deviated from the Madras system chiefly in the complexity of the
details, and by pressing so cruelly in its punishments upon the
principle of shame. 'Public disgrace' (as the Experimentalist alleges,
p. 83) 'is painful exactly in proportion to the good feeling of the
offender:' and thus the good are more heavily punished than the bad.
Confinement, and certain disabilities, are the severest punishments:
but the former is 'as rare as possible; both because it is attended
with unavoidable disgrace' (but what punishment is wholly free from
this objection?) 'and because, unlike labour, it is pain without any
utility' (p. 183). The ordinary punishments therefore consist in the
forfeiture of rewards, which are certain counters obtained by various
kinds of merit. These are of two classes, _penal_ (so called from
being received as forfeits) and premial, which are obtained by a
higher degree of merit, and have higher powers attached to them.
Premial counters will purchase _holidays_, and will also purchase
_rank_ (which on this system is of great importance). A conflict is
thus created between pleasure and ambition, which generally terminates
in favour of the latter: 'a boy of fourteen, although constantly in
the possession of marks sufficient to obtain a holiday per week, has
bought but three-quarters of a day's relaxation during the whole of
the last year. The same boy purchased his place on the list by a
sacrifice of marks sufficient to have obtained for him twenty-six
half-holidays.' The purchase of rank, the reader must remember, is no
way objectionable--considering the means by which the purchase-money
is obtained. One chief means is by study during the hours of
leisure--_i. e._ by _voluntary labour_: this is treated of (rather out
of its place) in Chap. VII., which ought to be considered as belonging
to the first part of the work, viz. to the exposition of the system.
Voluntary labour took its rise from the necessity of furnishing those
boys, who had no chance of obtaining rank through their talents, with
some other means of distinguishing themselves: this is accomplished in
two modes: first, by giving rewards for industry exerted out of school
hours, and receiving these rewards as the price of rank; making no
other stipulation than one, in addition to its being 'tolerably well
executed'--viz. that it shall be in a state of completion. The
Experimentalist comments justly at p. 187, on 'the mental dissipation
in which persons of talent often indulge' as being 'destructive beyond
what can readily be imagined' and as leading to 'a life of shreds and
patches.' 'We take care' (says he) 'to reward no boy for fragments,
whatever may be their excellence. We know nothing of his exertions
until they come before us in a state of completion.' Hence, besides
gaining the 'habit of finishing' in early youth, the boy has an
interest also in gaining the habit of measuring his own powers: for he
knows 'that he can receive neither fame nor profit by instalments;'
and therefore 'undertakes nothing which he has not a rational hope of
accomplishing.'[42] A second mode of preventing rank from being
monopolised by talents is by flinging the school into various
arrangements, one of which is founded on 'propriety of manners and
general good conduct.'
[Footnote 41: On this point there is however an exception made, which
amuses us not a little. 'In a few instances,' says the Experimentalist,
'it has been found or supposed necessary to resent insolence by a blow:
but this may be rather called an assertion of private right, than an
official punishment. In these cases a single blow has _almost_ always
been found sufficient, even the rarity of the infliction rendering
severity unnecessary.' He insists therefore that this punishment (which,
we cannot but think, might have been commuted for a long imprisonment)
shall not be called a punishment, nor entered on the public records as
such: in which case however it becomes a private 'turn-up,' as the
boxers call it, between the boy and his tutor.]
[Footnote 42: The details of the system in regard to the penal and
premial counters may be found from pp. 23 to 29. We have no room to
extract them: one remark only we must make--that we do not see how it
is possible to ascribe any peculiar and incommunicable privileges to
the premial as opposed to the penal counters, when it appears that
they may be exchanged for each other 'at an established rate.']
* * * * *
We have thus gone through a pretty full analysis, and a very accurate
one, of the new system as contained in the three first chapters. Of
the five miscellaneous chapters, the seventh or last but one (on
_voluntary labour_), has been interwoven with our analysis; and the
eighth, which contains a comparison of public and private education,
we do not purpose to notice; the question is very sensibly discussed;
but it is useless to discuss any question like this, which is a
difficult problem only because it is an unlimited problem. Let the
parent satisfy himself about the object he has in view for his child,
and let him consider the particular means which he has at his disposal
for securing a good private education, and he may then determine it
for himself. As far as the attainment of knowledge is concerned,--it
is always possible to secure a good public education, and not always
possible to secure a good private one. Where either is possible
indifferently, the comparison will proceed upon more equal grounds:
and inquiry may then be made about the child's destination in future
life: for many destinations a public education being much more
eligible than for others. Under a perfect indetermination of
everything relating to the child--the question is as indeterminable
as--whether it is better to go to the Bank through Holborn or through
the Strand: the particular case being given, it may then be possible
to answer the question; previously it is impossible.----Three chapters
therefore remain, viz.--Chap. IV. on Languages; Chap. V. on Elocution;
and Chap. VI. on Penmanship.
_Chap. IV. On the best method of acquiring Languages._--The
Experimentalist had occasion to observe 'that, in the Welsh towns
which are frequented by the English, even the children speak both
languages with fluency:' this fact, contrasted with the labour and
pain entailed upon the boy who is learning Latin (to say nothing of
the eventual disgust to literature which is too often the remote
consequence), and the drudgery entailed upon the master who teaches
Latin,--and fortified by the consideration, that in the former
instance the child learns to speak a new language, but in the latter
only to read it,--first drew his attention to the _natural_ mode of
learning languages, _i. e._ learning them from daily use. This mode
never fails with living languages: but how is it to be applied to dead
languages? The Experimentalist retorts by asking what is essential to
this mode? Partly the necessity which the pupil is laid under of using
the language daily for the common intercourse of life, and partly his
hearing it spoken by those who thoroughly understand it. 'Stimulus to
exertion then, and good models, are the great advantages of this mode
of instruction:' and these, he thinks, are secured even for a dead
language by his system: the first by the motives to exertion which
have already been unfolded; and the second by the acting of Latin
dramas (which had been previously noticed in his Exposition of the
system). But a third imitation of the _natural_ method he places in
the use of translations, 'which present the student with a dictionary
both of words and phrases arranged in the order in which he wants
them,' and in an abstinence from all use of the grammar, until the
learner himself shall come to feel the want of it; _i. e._ using it
with reference to an experience already accumulated, and not as an
anticipation of an experience yet to come. The ordinary objection to
the use of translations--that they produce indolent habits, he answers
thus: 'We teach by the process of _construing_; and therefore, even
with the translation before him, the scholar will have a task to
perform in matching the English, word by word, with the language which
he is learning.' For this _natural_ method of learning languages he
alleges the authority of Locke, of Ascham, and of Pestalozzi. The best
method, with those who have advanced to some degree of proficiency, he
considers that of double translations--_i. e._ a translation first of
all into the mother tongue of the learner, and a re-translation of
this translation back into the language of the original. These, with
the help of extemporaneous construing, _i. e._ construing any passage
at random with the assistance of a master who supplies the meaning of
the unknown words as they arise (a method practised, it seems, by Le
Febvre the father of Madame Dacier, by others before his time, and by
Condillac since)--compose the chief machinery which he employs for the
communication of dead languages.
_Chap. V. On Elocution._--In this chapter there is not much which is
very important. To read well, the Experimentalist alleges, presupposes
so much various knowledge, especially of that kind which is best
acquired by private reading, and therefore most spares the labour of
the tutor, that it ought reasonably to bestow high rank in the school.
Private reading is most favourable to the rapid collection of an
author's meaning: but for reading well--this is not sufficient: two
great constituents of that art remain to be acquired--Enunciation and
Inflection. These are best learned by Recitation. Thus far there is no
great novelty: the most interesting part of the chapter is what
relates to Stammering. This defect is held by the Experimentalist to
result from inattention to rhythmus: so much he thinks has been proved
by Mr. Thelwall. Whatsoever therefore compels the pupil to an
efficient perception of time and measure, as for example, marching
and music (p. 32), he resorts to for its correction. Stammerers, he
observes, can all sing: let them be taught to sing therefore, if not
otherwise corrigible: and from this let them descend to _recitative_:
then to the recitation of verses distinguished by the simplicity of
their rhythmus, marching at the same time and marking the accented
syllables by the tread of the foot; from this to the recitation of
more difficult verses; from that to measured prose; thence to ordinary
prose; and lastly to narrative and dialogue.
_Chap. VI. Of Penmanship._--This is a subject on which we profess no
experience which could warrant us in contradicting a writer who should
rest his innovations solely upon that ground: but the writer before us
does not rely on the practical issue of his own experiment (he does
not even tell us what that issue was), but on certain _à priori_
arguments, which we conceive to be ill-reasoned. The amount of the
chapter is this--that to write a good running hand is the main object
to be aimed at in the art of caligraphy: we will go farther, and
concede that it is the sole object, unless where the pupil is educated
for a writing-master. Thus far we are agreed; and the question is--as
to the best means of attaining this object. On which question the plan
here proposed differs from those in use by the very natural
error--that what is admitted to be the ultimate object, this plan
would make the immediate object. The author starts from a false theory
of the practice amongst writing-masters: in order that their pupils
may write small and running hands well, writing-masters (as is
well-known) begin by exacting from them a long praxis in large hands.
But the rationale of this praxis escapes the Experimentalist: the
large hand and the small hand stand related to each other, in the
estimate of the masters, as a means to an end; whereas the
Experimentalist supposes them to be viewed in the relation simply of
two co-ordinate or collateral ends: on which false presumption he
grounds what would on his own view be a very sound advice; for justly
conceiving that the small hand is of incomparably more use in life, he
argues in effect thus: let us communicate the main object, and then
(if he has leisure and taste for it) let the pupil direct his
attention to the lower object: 'when the running hand is
accomplished,' says he, 'the pupil may (if it be thought necessary)
learn to write the larger hands according to the received models.'
_When_ it is acquired! 'Aye, but in order that it _may_ be
acquired,'--the writing-master will reply, 'I must first teach the
larger hands.' As well might the professor of dancing hold out as a
tempting innovation to the public--I teach the actual dances, the true
practical synthesis of the steps and movements, as it is in fact
demanded by the usage of the ball-room: let others teach the analytic
elements of the art--the mere useless steps--to those who have time to
waste on superfluities. In either art (as in many others) that, which
is first (or rather sole) in order of importance, is last in the order
of attainment: as an object _per se_, the larger hand is not wanted at
all, either before or after the running hand: if it does really
contribute nothing to the more accurate formation of the letters, by
compelling the pupil to exhibit his aberrations from the _ideal_
letter more clearly because on a scale of greater magnitude (which
yet in the second sentence of this chapter our Experimentalist himself
admits), then let it be abandoned at once: for not doing this service,
it does nothing at all. On the other hand, if this be its specific
service, then it is clear that, being no object _per se_, but simply a
means to an object, it must have precedency in the order of
communication. And the innovation of our Experimentalist is so far (in
the literal sense of that word) a _preposterous_ inversion of the old
usage: and this being the chief principle of his 'plan' we desire to
know no more of it; and were not sorry that (p. 178) we found him
declining 'to enter into a detail of it.'--The business of the chapter
being finished however, there yet remains some little matter of
curiosity. 1. The Experimentalist affirms that 'Langford's
copper-plate copies, or indeed any other which he has seen, fail' if
tried by a certain test: what test? Why this: that 'the large hand
seen through a diminishing glass, ought to be reduced into the current
hand; and the current hand, magnified, ought to swell into a large
hand.' Whereas, on the contrary, 'the large hands reduced appear very
stiff and cramped; and the magnified running hand'--'appears little
better than a scrawl.' Now to us the result appears in a different
light. It is true that the large hands reduced do not appear good
running hands according to the standard derived from the actual
practice of the world: but why? Simply because they are too good: _i. e._
they are _ideals_ and in fact are meant to be so; and have nothing
characteristic: they are purely _generic_ hands, and therefore want
_individualisation_: they are abstractions; but to affect us
pleasurably, they should be concrete expressions of some human
qualities, moral or intellectual. Perfect features in a human face
arranged with perfect symmetry, affect us not at all, as is well
known, where there is nothing characteristic; the latency of the
individual in the generic, and of the generic in the individual, is
that which gives to each its power over our human sensibilities. And
this holds of caligraphy no less than other arts. And _that_ is the
most perfect hand-writing which unites the _minimum_ of deviation from
the ideal standard of beauty (as to the form and nexus of the letters)
with the _maximum_ of characteristic expression. It has long been
practically felt, and even expressly affirmed (in some instances even
expanded into a distinct art and professed as such), that it is
possible to determine the human _intellectual_ character as to some of
its features from the hand-writing. Books even have been written on
this art, as _e. g._ the _Ideographia_, or art of knowing the
characters of men from their hand-writings, by _Aldorisius_: and,
though this in common with all other modes of _physiognomy_, as
craniology, Lavaterianism (usually called physiognomy), &c. &c. has
laboured under the reproach of fancifulness,--yet we ought not to
attribute this wholly to the groundlessness of the art as a possible
art--but to these two causes; partly to the precipitation and
imperfect psychology of the professors; who, like the craniologists,
have been over-ready to determine the _indicantia_ before they had
settled according to any tolerable theory the _indicanda_; _i. e._
have settled what A, what B, what C, shall _indicate_, before they
have inquired what it was presumable upon any systematic development
of human nature would have a right _to be indicated_; and thus have
assigned an external characteristic to a faculty of the third
order--suppose (or perhaps a mere accidental effect of a faculty or a
mere imaginary faculty), whilst a primary faculty went without any
expression at all:--partly, I say, to this cause which is obviously
not merely a subjective but also an accidental cause; and partly also
to the following cause, which is objective (_i. e._ seated in the
inherent imperfections of the art itself, and not removeable therefore
by any future improvements to be anticipated from a more matured
psychology); viz. that the human mind transcends or overflows the
gamut or scale of the art; in other words, that the qualities--intellectual
or moral, which ought to be expressed, are far more in number than the
alphabet of signs or expressions by which they are to be enunciated.
Hence it follows as an inevitable dilemma, that many qualities must go
unrepresented; or else be represented by signs common to them with other
qualities: in the first of which cases we have an art imperfect from
defect, in the other case imperfect from equivocal language. Thus, for
example, determination of character is built in some cases upon mere
energy of the will (a moral cause); and again in other cases upon
capaciousness of judgment and freedom from all logical perplexity (an
intellectual cause). Yet it is possible that either cause will modify
the hand-writing in the same way.
* * * * *
From the long analysis which we have thus given of the book recording
this new system of education, it is sufficiently evident that we think
very highly of it. In the hands of its founder we are convinced that
it is calculated to work wonders; and so strong is the impression
which his book conveys, that he is not only a man of very
extraordinary talents for the improvement of the science of education,
but also a very conscientious man--that, for our own parts, we should
confide a child to his care with that spirit of perfect confidence
which he has himself described at p. 74. There is an air of
gentlemanly feeling spread over the book which tends still further to
recommend the author. Meantime two questions arise on the
system,--first, is it a good system? which we have answered:--secondly,
is it a system adapted for general diffusion? This question we dare not
answer in the affirmative, unless we could ensure the talents and energy
of the original inventor in every other superintendent of this
system.--In this we may be wrong: but at all events, it ought not to be
considered as any deduction from the merits of the author--as a very
original thinker on the science of education, that his system is not
(like the Madras system) independent of the teacher's, ability, and
therefore not unconditionally applicable.--Upon some future occasion we
shall perhaps take an opportunity of stating what is in our opinion the
great desideratum which is still to be supplied in the art of education
considered simply in its _intellectual_ purposes--viz. the communication
of knowledge, and the development of the intellectual faculties:
purposes which have not been as yet treated in sufficient insulation
from the _moral_ purposes. For the present we shall conclude by
recommending to the notice of the Experimentalist the German writers on
education. Basedow, who naturalised Rousseau in Germany, was the first
author who called the attention of the German public to this important
subject. Unfortunately Basedow had a silly ambition of being reputed an
infidel, and thus created a great obstacle to his own success: he was
also in many other respects a sciolist and a trifler: but, since his
time, the subject has been much cultivated in Germany: 'Paedogogic'
journals even, have been published periodically, like literary or
philosophic journals: and, as might be anticipated from that love of
children which so honourably distinguishes the Germans as a people, not
without very considerable success.
* * * * *
CASE OF APPEAL.
Our little Courts of Justice not unfrequently furnish cases of
considerable interest; and we are always willing to make the
resemblance between our microcosm and the world at large as close as
possible, at least in every useful point we are trying to collect a
volume of Reports. As all the boys are expected to be present during a
trial, to give importance to the proceeding, the time of such as are
capable of the task must be profitably employed in taking notes. A
useful effect may also be produced upon the parties; and these records
will be valuable acquisitions for those boys who wish to study the
laws, and enable themselves to conduct the jurisprudence of the
school. We shall detail a case which lately occurred, not because it
is the most interesting which could have been selected, but because
there will be nothing in its publication to hurt the feelings of any
person engaged in the transaction.