standards; but no less is this a work of moralization. The two
accordingly go on together. Whether we call the chaotic conditions of
nature in which we begin life ignorance or deficient morality, it is
equally the work of education to abolish them. Both education and
morality set themselves to rationalize the moody, lawless, transient,
isolated, self-assertive, and impatient aspects of things, introducing
the wondering scholar to the inherent necessities which surround him.
"Schoolmasters," says George Herbert, "deliver us to laws." And probably
most of us make our earliest acquaintance with these impalpable and
controlling entities when we take our places in the school. There our
primary lesson is submission. We are bidden to put away personal likings
and see how in themselves things really are. Eight times nine does not
permit itself to be seventy-three or sixty-four, but exactly and forever
seventy-two. Cincinnati lies obstinately on the Ohio, not on the
Mississippi, and it is nonsense to speak of Daniel Webster as a
President of the United States. The agreement of verbs and nouns, the
reactions of chemical elements were, it seems, settled some time before
we appeared. They pay little attention to our humors. We must accept an
already constituted world and adjust our little self to its august
realities. Of course the process is not completed at school. Begun
there, it continues throughout life; its extent, tenacity, and
instantaneous application marking the degree which we reach in
scientific and moral culture. Let a teacher attempt to lighten the task
of himself or his pupil by accepting an inexact observation, a slipshod
remembrance, a careless statement, or a distorted truth, and he will
corrupt the child's character no less than his intelligence. He confirms
the child's habit of intruding himself into reality and of remaining
listless when ordained facts are calling. Education may well be defined
as the banishment of moods at the bidding of the permanently real.
But to acquire such obedient alertness persistence is necessary, and in
gaining it a child wins a second victory over disorderly nature. By this
he becomes acquainted not merely with an outer world, but with a still
stranger object, himself. I have spoken already of the eagerness of
young desires. They are blind and disruptive things. One of them pays
small heed to another, but each blocks the other's way, preventing
anything like a coherent and united life. A child is notoriously a
creature of the moment, looking little before and after. He must be
taught to do so before he can know anything or be anybody. A school
matures him by connecting his doings of to-day with those of to-morrow.
Here he begins to estimate the worth of the present by noticing what it
contributes to an organic plan. Each hour of study brings precious
discipline in preferring what is distantly important to what is
momentarily agreeable. A personal being, in some degree emancipated from
time, consequently emerges, and a selfhood appears, built up through
enduring interests. The whole process is in the teacher's charge. It is
his to enforce diligence and so to assist the vague little life to knit
itself solidly together.
Nor should it be forgotten that to become each day the possessor of
increasing stores of novel and interesting truths normally brings
dignity and pleasure. This honorable delight reacts, too, on the process
of learning, quickening its pace, sharpening its observation, and
confirming its persistence. It is of no less importance for the
character, to which it imparts ease, courage, beauty, and
resourcefulness. But on the teacher it will depend whether such pleasure
is found. A teacher who has entered deeply into his subject, and is not
afraid of allowing enthusiasm to appear, will make the densest subject
and the densest pupil glow; while a dull teacher can in a few minutes
strip the most engrossing subject of interest and make the diligence
exacted in its pursuit deadening. It is dangerous to dissociate toil and
delight. The school is the place to initiate their genial union. Whoever
learns there to love knowledge, will be pretty secure of becoming an
educated and useful man and of finding satisfaction in whatever
employment may afterwards be his.
One more contribution to character which comes from the school as a
place of learning I will mention: it should create a sense of freedom.
Without this both learning and the learner are distorted. It is not
enough that the child become submissive to an already constituted world,
obedient to its authoritative organization; not enough that he find
pleasure in it, or even discover himself emerging, as one day's
diligence is bound up with that of another. All these influences may
easily make him think of himself as a passive creature, and consequently
leave him half formed. There is something more. Rightly does the
Psalmist call the fear of the Lord the beginning of wisdom rather than
its end; for that education is defective which fashions a docile and
slavish learner. As the child introduces order into his previously
capricious acts, thoughts, and feelings, he should feel in himself a
power of control unknown before, and be encouraged to find an honorable
use for his very peculiarities. He should be brought to see that the
world is unfinished and needs his joyful cooperation, that it has room
for individual activity and admits rationally constructed purposes. From
his earliest years a child should be encouraged to criticise, to have
preferences, and to busy himself with imaginative constructions; for all
this development of orderly freedom and of rejoicing in its exercise is
building up at once both knowledge and character.
II. Yet a school becomes an ethical instrument not merely through being
a place of learning but because it is also a social unit. It is a
cooperative group, or company of persons pledged every instant to
consider one another, their common purpose being jarred by the obtrusion
of any one's dissenting will. Accordingly much that is proper elsewhere
becomes improper here. As soon as a child enters a schoolroom he is
impressed by the unaccustomed silence. A happy idea springs in his mind
and clamors for the same outgo it would have at home, but it is
restrained in deference to the assembled company. In crossing the room
he is taught to tread lightly, though for himself a joyous dash might be
agreeable; but might it not distract the attention of those who are
studying? The school begins at nine o'clock and each recitation at its
fixed hour, these times being no better than others except as
facilitating common corporate action. To this each one's private ways
become adjusted. The subordination of each to all is written large on
every arrangement of school life; and it needs must be so if there is to
be moral advance. For morality itself is nothing but the acceptance of
such habits as express the helpful relations of society and the
individual. Punctuality, order, quiet, are signs that the child's life
is beginning to be socialized. A teacher who fails to impress their
elementary righteousness on his pupils brutalizes every child in his
charge.
Such relations between the social whole and the part assume a variety of
forms, and the school is the best place for introducing a child to their
niceties. Those other persons whom a schoolboy is called on continually
to regard may be either his superiors, equals, or inferiors. To each we
have specific duties, expressed in an appropriate type of manners. Our
teachers are above us,--above us in age, experience, wisdom, and
authority. To treat them as comrades is unseemly. Confession of their
superiority colors all our approaches. They are to be listened to as
others are not. Their will has the right of way. Our bearing toward
them, however trustful or even affectionate, shows a respectfulness
somewhat removed from familiarity. On the other hand schoolmates are
comrades, at least those of the same sex, class, strength, and
intelligence. Among them we assert ourselves freely, yet with constant
care to secure no less freedom for them, and we guard them against any
damage or annoyance which our hasty assertiveness might cause. In case
of clash between their interest and our own, ours is withdrawn. And then
toward those who are below us, either in rank or powers, helpfulness
springs forth. We are eager to bridge over the separating chasm and by
our will to abolish hindering defects. These three types of personal
adjustment--respect, courtesy, and helpfulness, with their wide variety
of combination--form the groundwork of all good manners. In their
beginnings they need prompting and oversight from some one who is
already mature. A school which neglects to cultivate them works almost
irreparable injury to its pupils. For if these possibilities of refined
human intercourse are not opened in the school years, it is with great
difficulty they are arrived at afterwards.
The spiritualizing influence of the school as a social unit is, however,
not confined to the classroom. It is quite as active on the playground.
There a boy learns to play fair, accustoms himself to that greatest of
social ties, _l'esprit du corps_. Throughout life a man needs
continually to merge his own interests in those of a group. He must act
as the father of a family, an operative in a factory, a voter of
Boston, an American citizen, a member of an engine company, union,
church, or business firm. His own small concerns are taken up into these
larger ones, and devotion to them is not felt as self-sacrifice. A
preparation for such moral ennoblement is laid in the sports of
childhood. What does a member of the football team care for battered
shins or earth-scraped hands? His side has won, and his own gains and
losses are forgotten. Soon his team goes forth against an outside team,
and now the honor of the whole school is in his keeping. What pride is
his! As he puts on his uniform, he strips off his isolated personality
and stands forth as the trusted champion of an institution. Nor does
this august supersession of the private consciousness by the public
arise in connection with sports alone. As a member of the school, a boy
acts differently from what he otherwise would. There is a standard of
conduct recognized as suitable for a Washington School boy, and from it
his own does not widely depart. For good or for ill each school has its
ideals of "good form" which are compulsive over its members and are
handed on from class to class. To assist in moulding, refining, and
maintaining these is the weightiest work of a schoolmaster. For these
ideals have about them the sacredness of what is traditional,
institutional, and are of an unseen, august, and penetrative power,
comparable to nothing else in character-formation. To modify them ever
so slightly a teacher should be content to work for years.
III. A third aspect of the school I have called its character as a
Dependent Fellowship, and I have said that this is merely incidental. A
highly important incident it is, however, and one that never fails to
recur. What I would indicate by the dark phrase is this: in every school
an imperfect life is associated with one similar but more advanced, one
from which it perpetually receives influences that are not official nor
measurable in money payment. A teacher is hired primarily to teach, and
with a view also to his ability to keep order throughout his little
society and to make his authority respected there. But side by side with
these public duties runs the expression of his personality. This is his
own, something which he hides or discloses at his pleasure. To his
pupils, however, he must always appear in the threefold character of
teacher, master, and developed human being; while they correspondingly
present themselves to him as pupils, members of the school, and
elementary human beings. Of these pairs of relationships two are
contrasted and supplemental,--teacher and pupil, master and scholar,
having nothing in common, each being precisely what the other is not. As
human beings, however, pupil and teacher are akin and removed from one
another merely by the degree of progress made by the elder along a
common path. Here then the relation is one of fellowship, but a
fellowship where the younger is largely dependent on the older for an
understanding of what he should be. By example, friendship, and personal
influence a teacher is certain to affect for good or ill every member of
his school. In any account of the school as an ethical instrument this
subtlest of its moral agencies deserves careful analysis.
There are different sorts of example. I may observe how the shopman does
up a package, and do one so myself the next morning. A companion may
have a special inflection of voice, which I may catch. I may be drawn to
industry by seeing how steadily my classmate studies. I may adopt a
phrase, a smile, or a polite gesture, which was originally my teacher's.
All these are cases of direct imitation. Some one possesses a trait or
an act which is passed over entire to another person, by whom it is
substituted for one of his own. Though the adoption of such alien ways
is dangerous, society could hardly go on without it. It is its mode of
transmitting what is supposed to be already tested and of lodging it in
the lives of persons of less experience, with the least cost to the
receivers. Most teachers will have habits which their pupils may
advantageously copy. Yet supposing the imitated ways altogether good,
which they seldom are, direct imitation is questionable as disregarding
the particular character of him in whom the ways are found and in
assuming that they will be equally appropriate if engrafted on anybody.
But this is far from true, and consequently he who imitates much is, or
soon will be, a weakling. On the whole, a teacher needs to guard his
pupils against his imitable peculiarities. If sensible, he will snub
whoever is disposed to repeat them.
Still, there is a noble sort of imitation, and that school is a poor
place where it does not go on. Certain persons have a strange power of
invigorating us by their presence. When with them, we can do what seems
impossible alone. They are our examples rather as wholes, and in their
strength and spirit, than in their single traits or acts; and so
whatever is most distinctive of ourselves becomes renewed through
contact with them. It was said of the late Dr. Jowett that he sent out
more pupils who were widely unlike himself than any Oxford teacher of
his time. That is enviable praise; for the wholesomeness of example is
tested by inquiring whether it develops differences or has only the
power of duplicating the original. Every teacher knows how easy it is to
send out cheap editions of himself, and in his weaker moments he
inclines to issue them. But it is ignoble business. Our manners and
tones and phrases and the ways we have of doing this and that are after
all valuable only as expressions of ourselves. For anybody else they
are rubbish. What we should like to impart is that earnestness,
accuracy, unselfishness, candor, reverence for God's laws, and
sturdiness through hardship, toward which we aspire--matters in reality
only half ours and which spring up with fresh and original beauty in
every soul where they once take root. The Dependent Fellowship of a
school makes these larger, enkindling, and diversifying influences
peculiarly possible. It should be a teacher's highest ambition to
exercise them. And though we might naturally expect that such inspiring
teachers would be rare, I seldom enter a school without finding
indications of the presence of at least one of them.
But for those who would acquire this larger influence a strange caution
is necessary: Examples do not work that are not real. We sometimes try
to "set an example," that is, to put on a type of character for the
benefit of a beholder; and are usually disappointed. Personal influence
is not an affair of acting, but of being. Those about us are strangely
affected by what we veritably are, only slightly by what we would have
them see. If we are indisposed to study, yet, knowing that industry is
good for our scholars, assume a bustling diligence, they are more likely
to feel the real portion of the affair, our laziness, than the activity
which was designed for their copying. Astonishingly shrewd are the young
at scenting humbug and being unaffected by its pretensions. There is
consequently no method to be learned for gaining personal influence.
Almost everything else requires plan and effort. This precious power
needs little attention. It will not come in one way better than another.
A fair measure of sympathetic tact is useful for starting it; but in the
long run persons rude and suave, talkative and silent, handsome and
ugly, stalwart and slight, possess it in about equal degree, the very
characteristics which we should be disposed to count disadvantageous
often seeming to confirm its hold. Since it generally comes about that
our individual interests become in some measure those of our pupils too,
the only safe rule for personal influence is to go heartily about our
own affairs, with a friendly spirit, and let our usual nature have
whatever effect it may.
Still, there is one important mode of preparation: seeing that personal
influence springs from what we are, we can really be a good deal. In a
former paper, on The Ideal Teacher, I pointed this out and insisted that
to be of any use in the classroom we teachers must bring there an
already accumulated wealth. I will not repeat what I have said already,
for a little reflection will convince any one that when he lacks
personal influence he lacks much besides. A great example comes from a
great nature, and we who live in fellowship with dependent and
imitative youth should acquire natures large enough to serve both their
needs and our own. Let teachers be big, bounteous, and unconventional,
and they will have few backward pupils.
Personal influence is often assumed to be greater the closer the
intimacy. I believe the contrary to be the case. Familiarity, says the
shrewd proverb, breeds contempt. And certainly the young, who are little
trained in estimating values, when brought into close association with
their elders are apt to fix their attention on petty points and so to
miss the larger lines of character. These they see best across an
interval where, though visible only in outline, they are clear,
unconfused with anything else, and so productive of their best effect.
For the immature, distance is a considerable help in inducing
enchantment, and nothing is so destructive of high influence as a
slap-on-the-back acquaintance. One who is to help us much must be above
us. A teacher should carefully respect his own dignity and no less
carefully that of his pupil. In our eagerness to help, we may easily
cheapen a fine nature by intruding too frequently into its reserves; and
on the other hand I have observed that the boy who comes oftenest for
advice is he who profits by it least. It is safest not to meddle much
with the insides of our pupils. An occasional weighty word is more
compulsive than frequent talk.
Within the limits then here marked out we who live in these Dependent
Fellowships must submit to be admired. We must allow our pupils to
idealize us and even offer ourselves for imitation. It is not pleasant.
Usually nobody knows his weaknesses better than the one who is mistaken
for an example. But what a helpful mistake! What ennobling influences
come to schoolboys when once they can think their teacher is the sort of
person they would like to be! Perhaps at the very moment that teacher is
thinking they are the sort of person he would like to be. No matter.
What they admire is worthy, even if not embodied precisely where they
imagine. In humility we accept their admiration, knowing that nothing
else can so enlarge their lives. As I recall my college days, there rise
before me two teachers. As I entered the lecture rooms of those two men,
I said to myself, "Oh, if some day I could be like that!" And always
afterwards as I went to those respective rooms, the impression of
dignity deepened. I have forgotten the lessons I learned from those
instructors. I never can discharge my debt to the instructors
themselves.
Such are the moral resources of our schools. Without turning aside in
the slightest from their proper aim of imparting knowledge, teachers are
able,--almost compelled--to supply their pupils with an intellectual,
social, and personal righteousness. What more is wanted? When such
opportunities for moral instruction are already within their grasp, is
it worth while to incur the grave dangers of ethical instruction too? I
think not, and I even fear that the establishment of courses in moral
theory might weaken the sense of responsibility among the other teachers
and lead them to attach less importance to the moralization of their
pupils by themselves. This is burdensome business, no doubt, but we must
not shift it to a single pair of shoulders. Rather let us insist, when
bad boys and girls continue in a school, that the blame belongs to the
teachers as a whole, and not to some ethical coach. It is from the
management and temper of a school that its formative influence proceeds.
We cannot safely turn over anything so all-pervading to the instructors
of a single department. That school where neatness, courtesy,
simplicity, obtain; where enthusiasm goes with mental exactitude,
thoroughness of work with interest, and absence of artificiality with
refinement; where sneaks, liars, loafers, pretenders, rough persons are
despised, while teachers who refuse to be mechanical hold sway--that
school is engaged in moral training all day long.
Yet while I hold that the systematic study of ethics had on the whole
better be left to the colleges, I confess that the line which I have
attempted to draw between consciousness and unconsciousness, between
the age which is best directed by instinct and the age when the
questioning faculties put forward their inexorable demands, is a
wavering one and cannot be sharply drawn. By one child it is crossed at
one period, by another at another. Seldom is the crossing noticed.
Before we are aware we find ourselves in sorrow on the farther side.
Happy the youth who during the transition time has a wise friend at
hand to answer a question, to speak a steadying word, to open up the
vista which at the moment needs to be cleared. Only one in close
personal touch is serviceable here. But in defect of home guidance,
to us teachers falls much of the charge of developing the youthful
consciousness of moral matters naturally, smoothly, and without jar.
This has always been a part of the teacher's office. So far as I can
ascertain schools of the olden time had in them a large amount of
wholesome ethical training. Schools were unsystematic then; there lay
no examination paper ahead of them; there was time for pause and talk.
If a subject arose which the teacher deemed important for his pupils'
personal lives, he could lead them on to question about it, so far as he
believed discussion useful. This sort of ethical training the hurry of
our time has largely exterminated; and now that wholesome incidental
instruction is gone, we demand in the modern way that a clear-cut
department of ethics be introduced into the curriculum. But such
things do not let themselves be treated in departmental fashion. The
teacher must still work as a friend. He cannot be discharged from
knowing when and how to stimulate a question, from discerning which
boy or girl would be helped by consciousness and which would be
harmed. In these high regions our pupils cannot be approached in
classes. They require individual attention. And not because we are
teachers merely, but because we and they are human beings, we must be
ready with spiritual aid.
IV
SELF-CULTIVATION IN ENGLISH