time let particular care be taken to improve them in orthography.
Perhaps the latter is best done by pairing the scholars; two of those
nearest equal in their spelling to be put together. Let these strive
for victory; each propounding ten words every day to the other to be
spelled. He that spells truly most of the other's words is victor for
that day; he that is victor most days in a month, to obtain a prize,
a pretty neat book of some kind, useful in their future studies. This
method fixes the attention of children extremely to the orthography
of words, and makes them good spellers very early. It is a shame for
a man to be so ignorant of this little art, in his own language,
as to be perpetually confounding words of like sound and different
significations; the consciousness of which defect makes some men,
otherwise of good learning and understanding, averse to writing even
a common letter.
Let the pieces read by the scholars in this class be short; such as
Croxal's fables, and little stories. In giving the lesson, let it
be read to them; let the meaning of the difficult words in it be
explained to them; and let them con over by themselves before they
are called to read to the master or usher, who is to take particular
care, that they do not read too fast, and that they duly observe the
stops and pauses. A vocabulary of the most usual difficult words
might be formed for their use, with explanations; and they might
daily get a few of those words and explanations by heart, which would
a little exercise their memories; or at least they might write a
number of them in a small book for the purpose, which would help to
fix the meaning of those words in their minds, and at the same time
furnish every one with a little dictionary for his future use.
_The Second Class_
To be taught, reading with attention, and with proper modulations of
the voice, according to the sentiment and the subject.
Some short pieces, not exceeding the length of a Spectator, to be
given this class for lessons (and some of the easier Spectators would
be very suitable for the purpose). These lessons might be given every
night as tasks; the scholars to study them against the morning. Let
it then be required of them to give an account, first of the parts of
speech, and construction of one or two sentences. This will oblige
them to recur frequently to their grammar, and fix its principal
rules in their memory. Next, of the intention of the writer, or
the scope of the piece, the meaning of each sentence, and of every
uncommon word. This would early acquaint them with the meaning and
force of words, and give them that most necessary habit, of reading
with attention.
The master then to read the piece with the proper modulations of
voice, due emphasis, and suitable action, where action is required;
and put the youth on imitating his manner.
Where the author has used an expression not the best, let it be
pointed out; and let his beauties be particularly remarked to the
youth.
Let the lessons for reading be varied, that the youth may be made
acquainted with good styles of all kinds, in prose and verse, and
the proper manner of reading each kind--sometimes a well-told story,
a piece of a sermon, a general's speech to his soldiers, a speech
in a tragedy, some part of a comedy, an ode, a satire, a letter,
blank verse, Hudibrastic, heroic, &c. But let such lessons be
chosen for reading, as contain some useful instruction, whereby the
understanding or morals of the youth may at the same time be improved.
It is required that they should first study and understand the
lessons, before they are put upon reading them properly; to which
end each boy should have an English dictionary, to help him over
difficulties. When our boys read English to us, we are apt to
imagine they understand what they read, because we do, and because
it is their mother tongue. But they often read, as parrots speak,
knowing little or nothing of the meaning. And it is impossible a
reader should give the due modulation to his voice, and pronounce
properly, unless his understanding goes before his tongue, and makes
him master of the sentiment. Accustoming boys to read aloud what
they do not first understand, is the cause of those even set tones,
so common among readers, which, when they have once got a habit of
using, they find so difficult to correct; by which means, among fifty
readers we scarcely find a good one. For want of good reading, pieces
published with a view to influence the minds of men, for their own or
the public benefit, lose half their force. Were there but one good
reader in a neighbourhood, a public orator might be heard throughout
a nation with the same advantages, and have the same effect upon his
audience, as if they stood within the reach of his voice.
_The Third Class_
To be taught speaking properly and gracefully; which is near a-kin
to good reading, and naturally follows it in the studies of youth.
Let the scholars of this class begin with learning the elements of
rhetoric from some short system, so as to be able to give an account
of the most useful tropes and figures. Let all their bad habits of
speaking, all offences against good grammar, all corrupt or foreign
accents, and all improper phrases, be pointed out to them. Short
speeches from the Romans, or other history, or from the parliamentary
debates, might be got by heart, and delivered with the proper action,
&c. Speeches and scenes in our best tragedies and comedies (avoiding
every thing, that could injure the morals of youth) might likewise
be got by rote, and the boys exercised in delivering or acting them:
great care being taken to form their manner after the truest models.
For their farther improvement, and a little to vary their studies,
let them now begin to read history, after having got by heart a short
table of the principal epochs in chronology. They may begin with
Rollin's ancient and Roman histories, and proceed at proper hours, as
they go through the subsequent classes, with the best histories of
our own nation and colonies. Let emulation be excited among the boys,
by giving, weekly, little prizes, or other small encouragements to
those, who are able to give the best account of what they have read,
as to time, places, names of persons, &c. This will make them read
with attention, and imprint the history well in their memories. In
remarking on the history, the master will have fine opportunities of
instilling instruction of various kinds, and improving the morals, as
well as the understandings, of youth.
The natural and mechanic history, contained in the Spectacle de la
Nature, might also be begun in this class, and continued through the
subsequent classes, by other books of the same kind; for, next to
the knowledge of duty, this kind of knowledge is certainly the most
useful, as well as the most entertaining. The merchant may thereby
be enabled better to understand many commodities in trade; the
handicraftsman, to improve his business by new instruments, mixtures
and materials; and frequently hints are given for new manufactures,
or new methods of improving land, that may be set on foot greatly to
the advantage of a country.
_The Fourth Class_
To be taught composition. Writing one's own language well, is
the next necessary accomplishment after good speaking. It is the
writing-master's business, to take care that the boys make fair
characters, and place them straight and even in the lines: but to
form their style, and even to take care that the stops and capitals
are properly disposed, is the part of the English master. The
boys should be put on writing letters to each other on any common
occurrences, and on various subjects, imaginary business, &c.
containing little stories, accounts of their late reading, what
parts of authors please them, and why; letters of congratulation, of
compliment, of request, of thanks, of recommendation, of admonition,
of consolation, of expostulation, excuse, &c. In these, they should
be taught to express themselves clearly, concisely, and naturally,
without affected words or high-flown phrases. All their letters to
pass through the master's hand, who is to point out the faults,
advise the corrections, and commend what he finds right. Some of the
best letters published in our own language, as sir William Temple's,
those of Pope and his friends, and some others, might be set before
the youth as models, their beauties pointed out and explained by the
master, the letters themselves transcribed by the scholar.
Dr. Johnson's Ethices Elementa, or First Principles of Morality,
may now be read by the scholars, and explained by the master, to
lay a solid foundation of virtue and piety in their minds. And as
this class continues the reading of history, let them now, at proper
hours, receive some farther instruction in chronology, and in that
part of geography (from the mathematical master) which is necessary
to understand the maps and globes. They should also be acquainted
with the modern names of the places they find mentioned in ancient
writers. The exercises of good reading, and proper speaking, still
continued at suitable times.
_Fifth Class_
To improve the youth in composition, they may now, besides continuing
to write letters, begin to write little essays in prose, and
sometimes in verse; not to make them poets, but for this reason,
that nothing acquaints a lad so speedily with variety of expression,
as the necessity of finding such words and phrases as will suit the
measure, sound and rhyme of verse, and at the same time well express
the sentiment. These essays should all pass under the master's eye,
who will point out their faults, and put the writer on correcting
them. Where the judgment is not ripe enough for forming new essays,
let the sentiments of a Spectator be given, and required to be
clothed in the scholar's own words; or the circumstances of some good
story, the scholar to find expression. Let them be put sometimes on
abridging a paragraph of a diffuse author: sometimes on dilating or
amplifying what is wrote more closely. And now let Dr. Johnson's
Noetica, or First Principles of Human Knowledge, containing a logic,
or art of reasoning, &c. be read by the youth, and the difficulties,
that may occur to them, be explained by the master. The reading of
history, and the exercises of good reading and just speaking still
continued.
_Sixth Class_
In this class, besides continuing the studies of the preceding in
history, rhetoric, logic, moral and natural philosophy, the best
English authors may be read and explained; as Tillotson, Milton,
Locke, Addison, Pope, Swift, the higher papers in the Spectator and
Guardian, the best translations of Homer, Virgil and Horace, of
Telemachus, travels of Cyrus, &c.
Once a year, let there be public exercises in the hall; the trustees
and citizens present. Then let fine gilt books be given as prizes
to such boys, as distinguish themselves, and excel the others in
any branch of learning, making three degrees of comparison: giving
the best prize to him, that performs best; a less valuable one to
him, that comes up next to the best, and another to the third.
Commendations, encouragement, and advice to the rest; keeping up
their hopes, that, by industry, they may excel another time. The
names of those, that obtain the prize, to be yearly printed in a list.
The hours of each day are to be divided and disposed in such a
manner, as that some classes may be with the writing-master,
improving their hands; others with the mathematical master, learning
arithmetic, accounts, geography, use of the globes, drawing,
mechanics, &c. while the rest are in the English school, under the
English master's care.
Thus instructed, youth will come out of this school fitted for
learning any business, calling, or profession, except such wherein
languages are required: and, though unacquainted with any ancient or
foreign tongue, they will be masters of their own, which is of more
immediate and general use, and withal will have attained many other
valuable accomplishments: the time usually spent in acquiring those
languages, often without success, being here employed in laying such
a foundation of knowledge and ability, as, properly improved, may
qualify them to pass through and execute the several offices of civil
life, with advantage and reputation to themselves and country.
FOOTNOTE:
[75] This piece, which we believe to be an early production of our
author, is taken from the American Museum, Vol. V. p. 473. _Editor._
TO MISS S----N[76], AT WANSTEAD.
_Advice to Youth in Reading._
_Craven-street, May 17, 1760._
I send my good girl the books I mentioned to her last night. I beg
her to accept of them as a small mark of my esteem and friendship.
They are written in the familiar easy manner for which the French are
so remarkable, and afford a good deal of philosophic and practical
knowledge, unembarrassed with the dry mathematics, used by more
exact reasoners, but which is apt to discourage young beginners. I
would advise you to read with a pen in your hand, and enter in a
little book short hints of what you find, that is curious, or that
may be useful; for this will be the best method of imprinting such
particulars in your memory, where they will be ready, either for
practice on some future occasion, if they are matters of utility,
or at least to adorn and improve your conversation, if they are
rather points of curiosity. And as many of the terms of science are
such, as you cannot have met with in your common reading, and may
therefore be unacquainted with, I think it would be well for you to
have a good dictionary at hand, to consult immediately when you meet
with a word you do not comprehend the precise meaning of. This may
at first seem troublesome and interrupting; but it is a trouble that
will daily diminish, as you will daily find less and less occasion
for your dictionary as you become more acquainted with the terms; and
in the mean time you will read with more satisfaction, because with
more understanding. When any point occurs, in which you would be glad
to have farther information than your book affords you, I beg you
would not in the least apprehend, that I should think it a trouble
to receive and answer your questions. It will be a pleasure, and no
trouble. For though I may not be able, out of my own little stock of
knowledge, to afford you what you require, I can easily direct you to
the books, where it may most readily be found. Adieu, and believe me
ever, my dear friend,
Yours affectionately,
B. FRANKLIN.
FOOTNOTE:
[76] Stevenson. _Editor._
PAPERS
ON
_SUBJECTS OF GENERAL POLITICS_.
PAPERS
ON
_SUBJECTS OF GENERAL POLITICS_.
_Observations concerning the Increase of Mankind, peopling of
Countries, &c[77]._
Written in Pensylvania, 1751.
1. Tables of the proportion of marriages to births, of deaths to
births, of marriages to the number of inhabitants, &c. formed on
observations made upon the bills of mortality, christenings, &c. of
populous cities, will not suit countries; nor will tables, formed on
observations made on full settled old countries, as Europe, suit new
countries, as America.
2. For people increase in proportion to the number of marriages,
and that is greater, in proportion to the ease and convenience of
supporting a family. When families can be easily supported, more
persons marry, and earlier in life.
3. In cities, where all trades, occupations, and offices are full,
many delay marrying, till they can see how to bear the charges of
a family; which charges are greater in cities, as luxury is more
common; many live single during life, and continue servants to
families, journeymen to trades, &c. Hence cities do not, by natural
generation, supply themselves with inhabitants; the deaths are more
than the births.
4. In countries full settled, the case must be nearly the same, all
lands being occupied and improved to the height; those who cannot
get land, must labour for others, that have it; when labourers are
plenty, their wages will be low; by low wages a family is supported
with difficulty; this difficulty deters many from marriage, who
therefore long continue servants and single. Only, as the cities take
supplies of people from the country, and thereby make a little more
room in the country, marriage is a little more encouraged there, and
the births exceed the deaths.
5. Great part of Europe is fully, settled with husbandmen,
manufacturers, &c. and therefore cannot now much encrease in
people. America is chiefly occupied by Indians, who subsist mostly
by hunting. But as the hunter, of all men, requires the greatest
quantity of land from whence to draw his subsistence, (the husbandman
subsisting on much less, the gardener on still less, and the
manufacturer requiring least of all) the Europeans found America as
fully settled, as it well could be by hunters; yet these, having
large tracts, were easily prevailed on to part with portions of
territory to the new comers, who did not much interfere with the
natives in hunting, and furnished them with many things they wanted.
6. Land being thus plenty in America, and so cheap, as that a
labouring man, that understands husbandry, can, in a short time,
save money enough to purchase a piece of new land, sufficient for
a plantation, whereon he may subsist a family; such are not afraid
to marry; for if they even look far enough forward to consider how
their children, when grown up, are to be provided for, they see,
that more land is to be had at rates equally easy, all circumstances
considered.
7. Hence marriages in America are more general, and more generally
early, than in Europe. And if it is reckoned there, that there is
but one marriage _per annum_ among 100 persons, perhaps we may
here reckon two; and if in Europe, they have but four births to a
marriage, (many of their marriages being late) we may here reckon
eight, of which, if one half grow up, and our marriages are made,
reckoning one with another, at twenty years of age, our people must
at least be doubled every twenty years.
8. But notwithstanding this increase, so vast is the territory of
North America, that it will require many ages to settle it fully,
and till it is fully settled, labour will never be cheap here, where
no man continues long a labourer for others, but gets a plantation
of his own; no man continues long a journeyman to a trade, but goes
among those new settlers, and sets up for himself, &c. Hence labour
is no cheaper now, in Pensylvania, than it was thirty years ago,
though so many thousand labouring people have been imported from
Germany and Ireland.
9. The danger, therefore, of these colonies interfering with their
mother country in trades, that depend on labour, manufactures, &c. is
too remote to require the attention of Great Britain.
10. But, in proportion to the increase of the colonies, a vast demand
is growing for British manufactures; a glorious market, wholly in
the power of Britain, in which foreigners cannot interfere, which
will increase, in a short time, even beyond her power of supplying,
though her whole trade should be to her colonies.
* * * * *
12. It is an ill-grounded opinion, that, by the labour of slaves,
America may possibly vie in cheapness of manufactures with Britain.
The labour of slaves can never be so cheap here, as the labour of
working men is in Britain. Any one may compute it. Interest of
money is in the colonies from 6 to 10 per cent. Slaves, one with
another, cost 30_l._ sterling per head. Reckon then the interest of
the first purchase of a slave, the insurance or risque on his life,
his clothing and diet, expences in his sickness, and loss of time,
loss by his neglect of business, (neglect is natural to the man,
who is not to be benefited by his own care or diligence) expence of
a driver to keep him at work, and his pilfering from time to time,
almost every slave being, from the nature of slavery, a thief, and
compare the whole amount with the wages of a manufacturer of iron or
wool in England, you will see, that labour is much cheaper there,
than it ever can be by negroes here. Why then will Americans purchase
slaves? Because slaves may be kept as long as a man pleases, or has
occasion for their labour, while hired men are continually leaving
their master (often in the midst of his business) and setting up for
themselves. §8.
13. As the increase of people depends on the encouragement of
marriages, the following things must diminish a nation, viz. 1. The
being conquered; for the conquerors will engross as many offices, and
exact as much tribute or profit on the labour of the conquered, as
will maintain them in their new establishment; and this diminishing
the subsistence of the natives discourages their marriages, and
so gradually diminishes them, while the foreigners increase. 2.
Loss of territory. Thus the Britons, being driven into Wales, and
crouded together in a barren country, insufficient to support such
great numbers, diminished, till the people bore a proportion to the
produce; while the Saxons increased on then abandoned lands, till
the island became full of English. And, were the English now driven
into Wales by some foreign nation, there would, in a few years, be no
more Englishmen in Britain, than there are now people in Wales. 3.
Loss of trade. Manufactures, exported, draw subsistence from foreign
countries for numbers, who are thereby enabled to marry and raise
families. If the nation be deprived of any branch of trade, and no
new employment is found for the people occupied in that branch, it
will soon be deprived of so many people. 4. Loss of food. Suppose
a nation has a fishery, which not only employs great numbers, but
makes the food and subsistence of the people cheaper: if another
nation becomes master of the seas, and prevents the fishery, the
people will diminish in proportion as the loss of employ and dearness
of provision makes it more difficult to subsist a family. 5. Bad
government and insecure property. People not only leave such a
country, and, settling abroad, incorporate with other nations, lose
their native language, and become foreigners; but the industry of
those that remain being discouraged, the quantity of subsistence
in the country is lessened, and the support of a family becomes
more difficult. So heavy taxes tend to diminish a people. 6. The
introduction of slaves. The negroes, brought into the English sugar
islands, have greatly diminished the whites there; the poor are by
this means deprived of employment, while a few families acquire vast
estates, which they spend on foreign luxuries; and, educating their
children in the habit of those luxuries, the same income is needed
for the support of one, that might have maintained one hundred. The
whites, who have slaves, not labouring; are enfeebled, and therefore
not so generally prolific; the slaves being worked too hard, and
ill fed, their constitutions are broken, and the deaths among them
are more than the births; so that a continual supply is needed from
Africa. The northern colonies, having few slaves, increase in whites.
Slaves also pejorate the families that use them; the white children
become proud, disgusted with labour, and, being educated in idleness,
are rendered unfit to get a living by industry.
14. Hence the prince, that acquires new territory, if he finds it
vacant, or removes the natives to give his own people room;--the
legislator, that makes effectual laws for promoting of trade,
increasing employment, improving land by more or better tillage,
providing more food by fisheries, securing property, &c.--and the man
that invents new trades, arts or manufactures, or new improvements in
husbandry, may be properly called _fathers of their nation_, as they
are the cause of the generation of multitudes, by the encouragement
they afford to marriage.
15. As to privileges granted to the married, (such as the _jus
trium liberorum_ among the Romans) they may hasten the filling of
a country, that has been thinned by war or pestilence, or that has
otherwise vacant territory, but cannot increase a people beyond the
means provided for their subsistence.