UPTON,
June 18, 1904.
DEAR HERBERT,--I am sick at heart. I received one of those letters this
morning which are the despair of most schoolmasters. I have in my house
a boy aged seventeen, who is absolutely alone in the world. He has
neither father or mother, brother or sister. He spends his holidays
with an aunt, a clever and charming person, but a sad invalid (by the
way, in passing, what a wretched thing in English it is that there is
no female of the word "man"; "woman" means something quite different,
and always sounds slightly disrespectful; "lady" is impossible, except
in certain antique phrases). The boy is frail, intellectual, ungenial.
He is quite incapable of playing games decently, having neither
strength or aptitude; he finds it hard to make friends, and the
consequence is that, like all clever people who don't meet with any
success, he takes refuge in a kind of contemptuous cynicism. His aunt
is devoted to him and to his best interests, but she is too much of an
invalid to be able to look after him; the result is that he is allowed
practically to do exactly as he likes in the holidays; he hates school
cordially, and I don't wonder. He fortunately has one taste, and that
is for science, and it is more than a taste, it is a real passion. He
does not merely dabble about with chemicals, or play tricks with
electricity; but he reads dry, hard, abstruse science, and writes
elaborate monographs, which I read with more admiration than
comprehension. This is almost his only hold on ordinary life, and I
encourage it with all my might; I ask about his work, make such
suggestions as I can, and praise his successful experiments and his
treatises, so far as I can understand them, loudly and liberally.
This morning one of his guardians writes to me about him. He is a
country gentleman, with a large estate, who married a cousin of my
pupil. He is a big, pompous, bumble-bee kind of man, who prides himself
on speaking his mind, and is quite unaware that it is only his position
that saves him from the plainest retorts. He writes to say that he is
much exercised about his ward's progress. The boy, he says, is fanciful
and delicate, and has much too good an opinion of himself. That is
true; and he goes on to lay down the law as to what he "needs." He must
be thrown into the society of active and vigorous boys; he must play
games; he must go to the gymnasium. And then he must learn
self-reliance; he must not be waited upon; he must be taught that it is
his business to be considerate of others; he must learn to be obliging,
and to look after other people. He goes on to say that all he wants is
the influence of a strong and sensible man (that is a cut at me), and
he will be obliged if I will kindly attend to the matter.
Well, what does he want me to do? Does he expect me to run races with
the boy? To introduce him to the captain of the eleven? To have him
thrust into teams of cricket and football from which his incapacity for
all games naturally excludes him? When our bumble-bee friend was at
school himself--and a horrid boy he must have been--what would he have
said if a master had told him to put a big, clumsy, and incapable boy
into a house cricket eleven in order to bring him out?
Then as to teaching him to be considerate, the mischief is all done in
the holidays; the boy is not waited on here, and he has plenty of
vigorous discipline in the kind of barrack life the boys lead. Does he
expect me to march into the boy's home, and request that the boy may
black his own boots and carry up the coals!
The truth is that the man has no real policy; he sees the boy's
deficiencies, and liberates his mind by requesting me, as if I were a
kind of tradesman, to see that they are corrected.
Of course the temptation is to write the man an acrimonious letter, and
to point out the idiotic character of his suggestions. But that is
worse than useless.
What I have done is to write and say that I have received his kind and
sensible letter, that he has laid his finger on the exact difficulties,
and that naturally I am anxious to put them straight. I then added that
his own recollection of his school-days will show that one cannot help
a boy in athletic or social matters beyond a certain point, that one
can only see that a boy has a fair chance, and is not overlooked, but
that other boys would not tolerate (and I know that he does not mean to
suggest this) that a boy should be included in a team for which he is
unfit, simply in order that his social life should be encouraged. I
then point out that as to discipline there is no lack of it here; and
that it is only at home that he is spoilt; and that I hope he will use
his influence, in a region where I cannot do more than make
suggestions, to minimise the evil.
The man will approve of the letter; he will think me sensible and
himself extraordinarily wise.
Does that seem to you to be cynical? I don't think it is. The man is
sincerely anxious for the boy's welfare, just as I am, and we had
better agree than disagree. The fault of his letter is that it is
stupid, and that it is offensive. The former quality I can forgive, and
the latter is only stupidity in another form. He thinks in his own mind
that if I am paid to educate the boy I ought to be glad of advice, that
I ought to be grateful to have things that I am not likely to detect
for myself pointed out by an enlightened and benevolent man.
Meanwhile I shall proceed to treat the boy on my own theory. I don't
expect him to play games; I don't think that it is, humanly speaking,
possible to expect a sensitive, frail boy to continue to play a game in
which he only makes himself ridiculous and contemptible from first to
last. Of course if a boy who is incapable of success in athletics does
go on playing games perseveringly and good-humouredly, he gets a
splendid training, and, as a rule, conciliates respect. But this boy
could not do that.
Then I shall try to encourage the boy in any taste he may exhibit, and
try to build up a real structure on these slender lines. The great
point is that he shall have SOME absorbing and wholesome instinct. He
will be wealthy, and in a position to gratify any whim. He is not in
the least likely to do anything foolish or vicious--he has not got the
animal spirits for that. I shall encourage him to take up politics; and
I shall try to put into his head a desire to do something for his
fellow-creatures, and not to live an entirely lonely and self-absorbed
life.
I have a theory that in education it is better to encourage aptitudes
than to try merely to correct deficiencies. One can't possibly
extirpate weaknesses by trying to crush them. One must build up
vitality and interest and capacity. It is like the parable of the evil
spirits. It is of no use simply to cast them out and leave the soul
empty and swept; one must encourage some strong, good spirit to take
possession; one must build on the foundations that are there.
The boy is delicate-minded, able and intelligent; he is an interesting
companion, when he is once at his ease. If only this busy, fussy,
hearty old bore would leave him alone! What I am afraid of his doing is
of his getting the boy to stay with him, making him go out hunting, and
laughing mercilessly at his tumbles. The misery that a stupid, genial
man can inflict upon a sensitive boy like this is dreadful to
contemplate.
At the end of the half I shall write a letter about the boy's work, and
delicately hint that, if he is encouraged in his subject, he may attain
high distinction and eventually rise to political or scientific
eminence. The old bawler will take the fly with a swirl--see if he does
not! And, if I can secure an interview with him, I will wager that my
triumph will be complete.
Does this all seem very dingy to you, my dear Herbert? You have never
had to deal with tiresome, stupid people in a professional capacity,
you see. There is a distinct pleasure in getting one's own way, in
triumphing over an awkward situation, in leading an old buffer by the
nose to do the thing which you think right, and to make him believe
that you are all the time following his advice and treasuring up his
precepts. But I can honestly say that my chief desire is not to amuse
myself with this kind of diplomacy, but the real welfare of the child.
I know you will believe that.--Ever yours,