There is between the teacher and other operatives one obvious
difference, arising from the difference in the materials upon which
their labor is bestowed. That class of laborers whose toil and skill are
exerted in modifying the forms of matter, succeed generally in
proportion to the narrowness of the range to which each individual's
attention is confined. It is possible (the writer has known it to be a
fact) for the same person to sow the flax, to pull and rot it, to break
it, hatchel it, spin it, warp it, weave it, dye or bleach it, and
finally make it into clothes. I say this is _possible_, for I have seen
it done, and I dare say many of my readers have seen the same. But how
coarse and expensive is such a product, compared with that in which
every step in the progress of production is made the subject of one
individual's entire and undivided attention.
If we were to go into the factories of Lowell, or into any of the
thousand workshops which are converting Philadelphia into a great
manufacturing centre, we would find the manufacture of an article
approaching perfection just in proportion to the _im_perfection (in one
sense) of the individual workmen employed in its production. The man
who can make a pin-head better and cheaper than any one else, must give
his attention to making pin-heads only. He need not know how to point a
pin, or polish it, or cut the wire. On the contrary his skill in that
one operation increases ordinarily in proportion to his want of skill in
others. His perfection as a workman is in the direct ratio to his
imperfection as a man. He operates upon matter, and the more nearly he
can bring his muscles and his volitions to the uniformity and the
precision of a mere machine--the more confined, monotonous, and
undeviating are his operations--the higher is the price set upon his
work, the better is he fitted for his task.
Not so the instructor of youth. The material operated on here is of a
nature too subtle to be shaped and fashioned by the undeviating routine
of any such mechanical operations. The process necessary to sharpen one
intellect may terrify and confound another. The means which in one
instance serve to convince, serve in other cases to confuse. The
illustration which to one is a ray of light, is to another only
"darkness visible." Mind is not, like matter, fixed and uniform in its
operations. The workman who is to operate upon a substance so subtle and
so varying must not be a man of _one idea_--who knows one thing, and
nothing more. It is not true in mind, as in matter, that perfection in
the knowledge of one particular point is gained by withdrawing the
attention from every other point. All truth and all knowledge are
affiliated. The knowledge of arithmetic is increased by that of algebra,
the knowledge of geography by that of astronomy, the knowledge of one
language by knowing another. As no one thing in nature exists
unconnected with other things, so no one item in the vast sum of human
knowledge is isolated, and no person is likely to be perfectly
acquainted with any one subject who confines his attention with
microscopic minuteness to that subject. To understand thoroughly one
subject, you must study it not only in itself, but in its relations. To
know one thing well you must know very many other things.
Let us return then to the point from which we set out, namely: that one
important difference between the teacher and other operatives arises
from the difference in the objects on which they operate. The one
operates upon matter, the other upon mind. The one attains perfection in
his art by a process which in the other would produce an ignoramus, a
bungler, a narrow-minded, conceited charlatan. Hence the necessity on
the part of those who would excel in the profession of teachers, of
endeavoring continually to enlarge the bounds of their knowledge. Hence
the error of those who think that to teach anything well it is necessary
to know only that one thing. That young woman who undertakes to teach a
primary school, or even an infant class, has mistaken her calling if she
supposes that because she has to teach only the alphabet or the "table
card," she has therefore no need to know many other things. There are
some things which every teacher needs. Every teacher needs a cultivated
taste, a disciplined intellect, and that enlargement of views which
results only from enlarged knowledge.
We all know how much we are ourselves benefited by associating
habitually with persons of superior abilities. So it is in a still
higher degree with children. There is something contagious in the fire
of intellect. The human mind, as well as the human heart, has a
wonderful power of assimilation. Every judicious parent will say: Let
not my child be consigned to the care of an ill-informed, dull,
spiritless teacher. Let it be his happy lot, if possible, to be under
one who has some higher ambition than merely to go through a certain
prescribed routine of duties and lessons; one whose face beams with
intelligence and whose lips drop knowledge; one who can cultivate in him
the disposition to inquire, by his own readiness and ability to answer
childish inquiries; who can lead the inquiries of a child into proper
channels, and train him to a correct mode of thinking by being himself
familiar with the true logical process, by having himself a cultivated
understanding. Such a teacher finds a pleasure in his task. He finds
that he is not only teaching his pupils to read and to spell, to write
and to cipher, but he is acquiring an ascendancy over them. He is
exerting upon them a moral and intellectual power. He is leaving, upon a
material far more precious than any coined in the Mint, the deep and
inerasible impress of his own character.
Let me repeat then, at the risk of becoming tiresome, what I hold to be
an important and elementary truth, that the teacher should know very
many things besides what he is required to teach. A good knowledge of
history will enable him to invest the study of geography with new
interest. Acquaintance with algebra will give a clearness to his
perceptions, and consequently to his mode of inculcating the principles,
of arithmetic. The ability to delineate off-hand with chalk or pencil
the forms of objects, gives him an unlimited power of illustrating every
subject, and of clothing even the dullest with interest. Familiarity
with the principles of rhetoric and with the rules of criticism, gives
at once elegance and ease to his language, and the means of more clearly
detecting what is faulty in the language of others. A knowledge of Latin
or of French, or of any language besides his own, throws upon his own
language a light of which he before had no conception. It produces in
his ideas of grammar and of language generally, a change somewhat like
that which the anatomist experiences from the study of comparative
anatomy. The student of the human frame finds many things that he cannot
comprehend until he extends his inquiries to other tribes of animals; to
the monkey, the ox, the reptile, the fish, and even to the insect world.
So it is with language. We return from the study of a foreign language
invariably with an increased knowledge of our own. We have made one step
at least from the technicalities of particular rules towards the
principles and truths of general grammar.
But it is not necessary to multiply illustrations. I have already said
enough to explain my meaning. Let me say, then, to every teacher, as you
desire to rise in your profession, as you wish to make your task
agreeable to yourself or profitable to your pupils, do not cease your
studies as soon as you gain your election, but continue to be a learner
as long as you continue to be a teacher, and especially strive by all
proper means, and at all times, to enlarge the bounds of your
knowledge.