LB 775 due- Southern Branch of the University of California Los Angeles Form L 1 775 P54e This book is DUE on the last date stamped below QrT 9 i 192TT 1 ,029 OCT 1 AUG 9 1929 » 4 APR ? 1939 NOV 4 194' H**t ma yUL 5 1950 * UG 4 1955 t AUG 3 1956 APR 1 1961 Form L-9-15w-8,'24 O S v EDUCATIONAL AIMS AND METHODS h5^^°- •Tl * 3 -*"** o EDUCATIONAL AIMS AND METHODS LECTURES AND ADDRESSES ST,- OL LOS . iA BY SIR JOSHUA FITCH, M.A., LL.D. LATE HER MAJESTY'S INSPECTOR OF TRAINING COLLEGES AUTHOR OF " LECTURES ON TEACHING," " NOTES ON AMERICAN SCHOOLS AND TRAINING COLLEGES " S0&8 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., Ltd. I9OO All rights reserved Copyright, 1900, Bv THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. Nortoooti 53rc33 J. S. Cushing & Co. - Berwick & Smith Norwood Mass. U.S.A. n ' PREFACE The lectures and addresses collected in this volume have been given at various times within the last few years before different academic audiences in England or America, including the University of Cambridge, the Col- \ lege Association of Pennsylvania, the American Institute of Instruction, the Oxford Conference on University Ex- tension, the College of Preceptors, the Teachers' Guild, and other bodies interested in educational questions. In my former volume, ' Lectures on Teaching,' an attempt was made to discuss in succession the principles which should be borne in mind in connexion with each of the subjects of ordinary school instruction, and with the methods of teaching and discipline generally. The present volume is more miscellaneous and less systematic in its character. But it deals with some aspects of edu- cational work to which my own attention, during a long official life, has been specially directed, and which, though not usually dealt with in formal treatises on pedagogy, deserve and often demand the consideration of those who as teachers, school trustees, or legislators possess influence in determining the goal to be attained in public education, and the processes by which that goal can best be reached. In forming our ideal of the function of a school, we cannot afford to overlook the border-land which separates its corporate life from the larger life of the family and the vi Preface community, nor the light which is shed on educational problems by history, by social and industrial necessities, by religious controversies, and by political events. It has become more and more evident of late that the true science of education of the future must include within its scope the history of former speculations, ideas, and experiments, and the reasons why some of them have succeeded and others failed. I have therefore thought it right to include in this volume two or three monographs on the life and work of prominent teachers. These studies may serve to show how varied are the instruments, and how widely dif- ferent the motive forces which have in successive periods of our history contributed to the establishment of insti- tutions and to the formation of opinion on educational subjects. They will, I hope, leave on the reader's mind a conviction of the great debt we owe to those who, under divers conditions, with more or less imperfect vision of the future, but with an honest desire to meet the intellectual needs of their own times, brought their best powers and resources to bear on the elucidation of the principles, and the improvement of the practice of public instruction. And if this retrospect also leaves on the mind of the reader a strong sense, not only of the value, but of the inadequacy, of what has hitherto been done, and also serves to show how boundless and full of promise is the field which yet lies open to the future worker and explorer, my purpose in consenting to the collective publication of these occasional lectures will have been amply fulfilled. Easter, 1900. CONTENTS LECTURE I METHODS OF INSTRUCTION AS ILLUSTRATED IN THE BIBLE The Bible a teaching book. Teaching by Symbol. Limitations to the value . of symbolic acts, in ethical training. Direct injunction. Peremptoriness. The Law repeated with new sanctions and personal appeals. The Sermon on the Mount. Rewards. The true ambition of life. Poetry as a factor in education. Matthew Arnold's use of the Book of Isaiah. What poetry is suited for children. Characteristics of Hebrew poetry. Reduplication of thought. Stereotyped formularies and creeds. Proverbs better suited to older than to younger learners. Biography. National portraits. Ex- amples of greatness. Narrative power. Parables. Illustrations from Nature. False and strained moralizing from Nature. Co-operation of teacher and taught in the solution of problems. Vision and medita- tion. Dreamy and imaginative scholars not to be discouraged. Con- clusions ..........'.. 1-45 LECTURE II SOCRATES AND HIS METHODS OF TEACHING State of Athens in the time of Socrates. The intellectual discipline of the Athenians. The art of Oratory. Socrates and his conversations. His disciples and reporters. A Socratic dialogue. Negative results not nec- essarily fruitless. Investigation of words and their meanings. Some methods more fitting for adults than for young learners. Ambiguity and verbal confusion. Gorgias. Relation of virtue to knowledge. The dai/xuv of Socrates. Oracles. Conversation an educational instrument. Need for occasional colloquies with elder scholars. Subjects suited for such colloquies. Handicraft. Physical Science. The doctrine of remi- niscence. Pre-natal existence. Socrates a preacher of righteousness. The accusation against him. His death ..... 46-80 vii viii Contents LECTURE III THE EVOLUTION OF CHARACTER Charles Darwin. The main doctrines of Evolution. Their application to social life. Limits to the use of analogy. Character a growth, not a manufacture. Intellectual food and digestion. Punishments. Moral precepts. When general rules are operative. Didactic teaching. Expe- riences of childhood. The law of environment. The conditions of our life as determinants of character How far these conditions are alterable at will. The moral atmosphere of a school. Influence of the teacher's personal character. Natural selection. (^Conscious selection of the fittest conditions. Degeneration. Unused facultiEsT— Progression or retrogres- sion. The law of divergence in plants and animals, in social institutions, and in intellectual character. Special aptitudes and tastes. How far they should be encouraged. Eccentricity. Evolution a hopeful creed. The promise of the future ........ 81-113 LECTURE IV THE TRAINING OF THE REASON The art of thinking. Reason v. understanding. Two processes of arriving at truth. The deductive process, e.g. in geometry, and in arithmetic. An arithmetical example. Measures and multiples. The number nine. Oral demonstration of arithmetical principles. Inductive reasoning. Practical work essential in the study of the physical sciences. Two neglected branches of physical enquiry. Natural History. Astronomy. Meteor- ology. Object lessons. Inductive exercises in language. Examples of verbal analysis. Apposition. Induction the test of the value of edu- cational methods. Child study. The three stages of progress in inductive science. The Kindergarten. Religious teaching to be largely judged by its results on character. The School a laboratory. Results . 1 14-144 LECTURE V HAND WORK AND HEAD WORK Manual and technical instruction. Why it is advocated. Apprenticeship. Acoles d'Apprendssage. Technological Institutes. The Yorkshire College of Science. French technical schools, (1) for girls, (2) for artizans. The Frobelian discipline. Sweden and sloyd work. The Ecole Modele at Brussels. Drawing and design. Educational influence of manual train- Contents ix ing. The psychological basis for it. Variety of aptitude. The dignity of labour. Limitations to the claims of manual training. Needlework. General conclusions 145-176 LECTURE VI ENDOWMENTS AND THEIR INFLUENCE ON EDUCATION Turgot and the Encyclopedie. Charitable foundations in France. Avoidable and unavoidable evils. Almshouses. Religious charities : Tests and dis- qualifications. Colston's Charity in Bristol. The Girard College in Phila- delphia. Charities with restricted objects. Doles. Illegal bequests and useless charities. Educational charities. The early Grammar Schools. Charity Schools.j Contrast between the educational endowments of the sixteenth and those of the eighteenth century^ Causes of decadence. Influence on the teachers. The Endowed Schools Act of 1869. Origin of charitable endowments. The equitable rights of founders. The State interested in maintaining these rights. Endowments may encourage variety and new experiments : but sometimes prevent improvement. Con- ditions of vitality in endowed institutions: — That the object should be a worthy one : that the mode of attaining it should not be too rigidly prescribed. The Johns Hopkins University. Sir Josiah Mason's foun- dations. Supervision and needful amendment the duty of the State. Constitution of governing bodies. Publicity. Summary of practical con- clusions. England and America ...... 177-214 LECTURE VII ASCHAM AND THE SCHOOLS OF THE RENAISSANCE The Modern English school the product of growth, not of legislation. The influence of religion. Greek served to shape the Creeds and theology. But Latin more studied and valued by the Church. The revival of Greek learning not due to the Church. Pre-Reformation Grammar Schools. Roger Ascham. The Scholemaster. Aschani's royal pupils. His experi- ence in Italy. St. Paul's School. Examples of Sixteenth century Statutes. Chester, Manchester, Louth. Choice of masters. The scheme of study. Details of the Grammar School curriculum. Disputations. Hours of Study and of Teaching. Vacations. Punishments. Payment of fees. No provision for Girls' education. The Grammar School theory. How should it be modified by later experience? How much of it should survive? 215-248 x Contents LECTURE VIII TEACHERS' INSTITUTES AND CONVENTIONS IN AMERICA Conditions of education in the United States. Teachers trained and un- trained. Institutes. Henry Barnard. Scope and aim of the Institutes. Voluntary associations of teachers. Co-operation of the clergy and public men. Summary of general purpose of Conventions. Newport, Rhode Island. The College Association of Philadelphia. St. John, New Brunswick. Chautauqua. Reading Circles. Absence of educational politics. The corporate spirit among teachers. The Teachers' Guild and its future 249-271 LECTURE IX EDWARD THRING The biographical method of studying educational history. Arnold and Thring. Outlines of Thring's life. His biographers. Fellowships at King's Col- lege, Cambridge. Early practice in a National School. True principles of teaching applicable to schools of all grades. Uppingham. Boarding- houses. The School largely the product of private adventure. The Royal Commissioners. The Hegira. Uppingham by the sea. The teaching of English. Every boy good for something. Variety of employment and of games. Encouragement of music and the fine arts. The decoration of the school-room. Honour to lessons. Thring's books. His fancies. Characteristic extracts. Diaries. The Head-Masters' Conference. Head- Mistresses. Women as teachers. Settlement at North Woolwich. The Uppingham School Society. The prize system .... 272-309 LECTURE X THE UNIVERSITY EXTENSION MOVEMENT, AND ITS RELATION \ TO SCHOOLS The University Extension Scheme. Its missionary character. Its possible influence on Schools, and on Training Colleges. Elementary teachers. Some special disadvantages in their life. Their extra-professional inter- ests. Certificate hunting. The study of history. English literature. Eco- nomic science. The study of nature and art. Teachers' societies. 310-325 Contents xi LECTURE XI JOSEPH LANCASTER Public education in England at the end of the eighteenth century. Philan- thropic work. Private adventure schools for the poor. Crabbe's Borough. Day schools. Joseph Lancaster. His early life. His first educational experiment. Interview with the King. Successes. Dr. Andrew Bell. His work at Madras. The National Society. The monitorial system. Lancaster's plans of discipline. Their defects. His methods of instruc- tion. The schools of the National Society. Training of teachers. The National and Lancasterian systems compared. The treatment of the religious question. Lancaster's disappointments. Efforts of his friends to help" him. His removal to America. Characters of Bell and Lancaster compared. Their work estimated ...... 326-357 LECTURE XII PESTALOZZI The anniversary. Characteristics of Pestalozzi's teaching. Sense training. How he differed from Rousseau. His religious purpose. His rebellion against verbalism. No finality in his system .... 358-364 LECTURE XIII THE SUNDAY SCHOOL OF THE FUTURE Philanthropic efforts in England. Robert Raikes. The changed position of the Sunday Schools. The problem of the future. The Lord's Day and its purpose. The working man's Sunday. Home influence more potent than that of any school. Sunday in the home. The teacher. Conversation. Reading aloud. The School Library. Religious instruc- tion. A teacher's equipment. Need of preparation. Questioning. Verbal memory. Formularies. Catechising in church. Work for the educated laity. Children's services. Formation of a habit of attending public worship. General conclusions. The Sunday School not only a place for religious instruction, but a centre of civilization and social improvement .......... 3°5 _ 393 xii Contents LECTURE XIV WOMEN AND UNIVERSITIES A notable feature in the reign of Queen Victoria. Opening of professions to women. Public employments. Higher education. Women's education not provided by ancient endowments. Defoe's protest. Recent reforms. Why so slowly effected. The Schools' Inquiry Commission. Ancient endowments made available to girls. The Universities' Local Examina- tions. Girls' Public Day Schools. Social effects of this movement. The University of London. Provincial Colleges of University rank. The older Universities. Girton and Newnham. Health of students. A Woman's University. The true intellectual requirements of women. The unused resources of life .......... 394-420 LECTURE XV THE FRENCH LEAVING CERTIFICATE Certificat d Etudes Primaires The French law authorizing the award of leaving certificates. Its influence on the attendance of scholars. Constitution of the local Commission. The standard of examination. Les Ecoles primaires superieures. The examinations not competitive. Statistics. Practical results. The English problem. The "standards." Individual examination. Its uses and de- fects. Certificates for special subjects. Labour certificates. The Scotch certificate of merit. The ideal primary school course. Optional subjects. Oral examination. The relation between school and home . 421-444 Index 445-448 EDUCATIONAL AIMS AND METHODS LECTURE I eoss METHODS OF INSTRUCTION AS ILLUS- TRATED IN THE BIBLE 1 The Bible a teaching book. Teaching by Symbol. Limitations to the value of symbolic acts, in ethical training. Direct injunc- tion. Peremptoriness. The Law repeated with new sanctions and personal appeals. The Sermon on the Mount. Rewards. The true ambition of life. Poetry as a factor in education. Mr Arnold's use of the Book of Isaiah. What poetry is suited for children. Characteristics of Hebrew poetry. Reduplica- V§ tion of thought. Stereotyped formularies and creeds. Proverbs N better suited to older than to younger learners. Biography. National portraits. Examples of greatness. Narrative power. . Parables. Illustrations from Nature. False and strained mor- t) alizing from Nature. Co-operation of teacher and taught in the solution of problems. Vision and meditation. Dreamy and imaginative scholars not to be discouraged. Conclusions. It has seemed to me that in inviting you to enter The Bible upon some further considerations on the principles of a , te ^ chln i teaching and on the application of those principles to the practice of your profession, it might not be unfitting to devote one of our meetings to an enquiry into the ways in which the problem has been dealt with in the old- est educational book in the world. The Bible has many claims upon our attention — claims which are universally recognized in all Christian nations at least. There is 1 Delivered in the University of Cambridge, Lent Term, 1898. B T 2 Methods of Instruction as illustrated in the Bible in it history, poetry, philosophy, theology. Critical dis- cussion on these aspects of the Scriptures would be out of place here. Yet it is a collection of books which has had a large share in the education of the world ; and while we may properly leave to the antiquarian, to the scholarly critic and to the theologian the duty of com- menting on the substance of Bible teaching, we who are in quest of the best methods of communicating truth and of influencing character may well fasten our attention upon the forms into which the sacred writers have cast their lessons, upon the processes by which they have imparted truth, and upon the light shed in those writings on some problems, still, though under altered conditions, constantly presented to those who are concerned with the instruction and moral discipline of the young. Teaching Now some of the earliest lessons employed in the by Symbol, education of our race took the form — not of direct moral teaching, but of injunctions relating to specific acts. The patriarchs were instructed to perform sacrifices or to set up a stone or a monument. Abraham, when he needed a lesson on the necessity of obedience and self-surrender, was not lectured on the importance of those virtues, but was bidden to go up to a mountain, and to perform an act of sacrifice. The institution of the Passover and of other Jewish festivals represents to us a form of teaching rather by symbolical acts than by direct explanation or counsel. The Jews were intended to keep in memory their great deliverance, their years of discipline, their dependence on a Divine and governing providence, but long before we hear of any definite exhortation on these points we find a number of ceremonial observances which put all such exhortations in a concrete form. The unleavened bread, the Paschal lamb, the feast of tabernacles carry in them- selves their own memories, and their own ethical teaching. Teaching by Symbol To this hour they serve as the chief bonds of the whole Jewish community, and the main safeguards for the preservation of the historical Hebrew faith. They may remind us that the chosen nation in its childhood was largely taught by means of picturesque and representative acts, and that these acts were to be performed before their full significance was understood, and before the conscience or the power of reflection had been awakened into life by persuasion or argument. What is true in the infancy of society and of nations is true also of the childhood of every human being. It is at first easier to enforce the observance of particular acts than to make their meaning intelligible. This may be observed in secular life, in domestic life, and in religious life alike. In America there are the Fourth of July and Washington's birthday ; in a home the birthday of its members, the little acts of deference to the heads of the household, the simple ritual of family prayer ; in the Church the observance of the first day of the week and the outward acts of religious worship. W T e let our children share in these observances ; we do not try to explain all the reasons for them, but we know that latent in them there is teaching which will become intelligible hereafter, and which meanwhile must remain undisclosed. Thus we value Sunday, not only because it is an oppor- tunity for religious instruction and worship, but because by its comparative hush and calm, and by all the social arrangements which separate it from other days, it stands out to the child's mind as a permanent symbol of the claims of the higher life. It is a visible representation and a continual memento of the truths that ' man does not live by bread alone,' that our days must not all be spent in work or in enjoyment, but that thought, rest, and spiritual culture are among the necessaries of life. So all 4 Methods of Instruction as illustrated in the Bible the outward symbolical acts which imply reverence for sacred things, respect and courtesy to elders have their value. " Manners makyth man " because they beget habits, and habits in their turn form character. Such acts as imply and also encourage self-respect yet self-abnegation and deference to the wishes and feelings of others, when habitually practised in the school or in the home, tend to keep alive in the young scholar a sense of duty, long before any rational principles of conduct, such as he can understand, can be enforced upon him in an explicit form. Limits- We may not forget, however, that there is a deep and tiom to the ve ,.y rea j danger j n the multiplication of ceremonial acts, symbolic and that life may be rendered complicated and artificial acts in by tne use f them. They come in time to be regarded ethical ,-,,,, i training. as ends in themselves rather than as means to the higher end of true ethical discipline. It is observable how, both in regard to belief and practice, there is a tendency in human nature to be satisfied with the mate- rial symbols of faith and duty, and with the 'outward and visible sign ' rather than with the ' inward and spiritual grace.' Forms of superstition have flourished and will continue to flourish in all ages, in just the pro- portion in which men shrink from the task of exercising their best faculties on great subjects, and take refuge in the performance of a ceremony, the oral recitation of a formula, or the observance of a day. It is always much easier to do any one of these mechanical acts than to think about its meaning, or to appropriate the truth which it embodies. And we shall do well in our intercourse with children to keep in mind the essentially provisional and incomplete nature of all symbolical teaching. It is valuable only in the proportion in which it leads the learner to something better than itself and to a recogni- Direct and positive injunction 5 tion of its underlying moral or spiritual significance. When it is a substitute for reflection, instead of an aid to reflection, it becomes a fetish. We must deal with it, as Hezekiah found it necessary to do when he brake in pieces the brazen serpent which Moses had made, and which had once been a legitimate object of veneration, " because in those days the children of Israel did burn incense to it," and he called it Nehushtan, ' a mere piece of brass.' J But let us once be sure that the duty or the truth symbolized by some outward form or usage is one in which we entirely believe, and which we wish the young scholar hereafter to make his own, and we need not fear, for a time at least, to adopt the method by which belief was strengthened and conduct shaped in the primitive stage of the world's history. It is observable that Moses in all his injunctions about the Passover ordained that the ritual in all its details should be observed during the wandering in Egypt. " And it shall come to pass that when you be come to the land which the Lord will give you, and when your children say unto you, What mean you by this service? that ye shall say, It is the sacrifice of the Lord's Passover, who passed over the houses of the children of Israel when He smote the Egyptians, and delivered our houses." That therefore is one of the pro- cesses of the Divine education. Practise for the present the representative acts which recall great events, or symbolize great truths and duties, and some day their full meaning shall be revealed to you. Later on we find the great lawgiver employing an- Direct in- other method — that of direct and positive injunction. ■ ,H " i The commandments of the two tables possess two prominent characteristics : (i) they are mainly negative ; they denounce certain special forms of wrong-doing, and 1 2 Kings xviii. 4. 6 MetJiods of Instruction as illustrated in the Bible they say definitely respecting each of them, 'This must not be done.' But (2) with only two or three exceptions no reason is assigned for the prohibition : the sanction on which the Law rests is not discussed. The tables of the Law forbid wrong acts, but they do not enjoin any form of virtue. They tell what a good man should abstain from and not what he should do. And it is remarkable that in the case of the two or three com- mandments for which Moses furnishes any ethical basis or explanation, the reason given happens to be one which is local, tribal, or temporary, and not one which is of universal application. In the Second Commandment, for example, the prohibition is not directed against idolatry generally, but against the making of images, or the imitation in any form, of natural objects. To Moses, who knew the people well, and who had much experience of their constant relapses into the grosser forms of fetish worship then prevalent among the neighbouring nations, there seemed to be an awful and very real danger in the mere making of a picture or a graven image, whatever might be the use intended to be made of it. To us, all of whose temptations to idolatry lie in other directions, the argument that God is a jealous God, who will not tolerate as a rival a sculptured or a molten image, is scarcely relevant. The warning against idolatry is, in- deed, eternally necessary, but it is not in our day the love of the fine arts which is likely to seduce us from our allegiance to the King of kings. The Christian Church has never in any age attempted a literal obedience to the injunctions of the Second Commandment. To do so would betoken on her part a total incapacity for dis- tinguishing between the letter and the spirit, between the temporary and the permanent elements in the Mosaic law. So also the obligation to keep one day in seven Peremptoriness of tlic Commandments 7 free from work is based by Moses not on general expediency, nor on any considerations respecting the religious value of a weekly respite from ordinary pursuits, but on the statement that " in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and rested on the seventh day" — an argument which, however weighty to those to whom it was first addressed, has been deprived of much of its significance by all subsequent additions to our knowledge of cosmogony. Again, the Fifth Commandment enjoins a duty which is of perennial obligation, but the particular motive appealed to, " that thy days may be long in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee," had clearly a special application to a nomadic people on their way to a home in which they hoped to abide. At best, the motive suggested for honouring and obeying parents was founded on considerations of self-interest and not on any one of those higher sanctions which the enlightened conscience in all ages of the world would be most ready to recognize. We may conclude therefore that the force of the Ten Perevip- Commandments, and their claim to be still embodied in toriness - the service of the modern Church, does not lie in the kind of justification which the lawgiver has in one or two instances attached to them, but in their directness and peremptoriness. There was a stage, a very early stage, in the history of the chosen people, wherein what they needed most was positive injunction respecting absti- nence from certain faults, to which, owing to the special circumstances of their lives, they were most prone. There is a similar stage in the lives of the young learners under our charge. The language of the domestic law- giver or of the teacher must sometimes be that of Moses and Aaron : " Do this, abstain from that, because I am in authority and I tell you. We will not discuss the 8 MctJiods of Instruction as illustrated in the Bible grounds of the prohibition. The thing is wrong and must not be done. Some day you will understand why it is wrong. Meanwhile it must suffice for you to know that I forbid it. ' Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness.' That is enough for you.'' The Law But even as Moses when he had once promulgated repeated foe Commandments was not satisfied to leave the people with new . x * sanctions, whom he was called upon to help and guide in a con- and per- Virion of moral serfdom, so the teacher who is rightly sonal ap- . ° J peals. impressed with a sense of the obligations of his own office will not be content when he has merely laid down rules and secured submission to them. Observe how Moses, when he was old, set about the further task of explaining the nature and grounds of his precepts, and claiming the intelligent sympathy of those who were called on to practise them. Deuteronomy — the dupli- cated, re-stated and amplified law — represents a later and most memorable stage in the education of the Jewish people. Throughout the whole of the book bearing that name you will find an effort to vindicate the essential equity of the Divine commands, to abandon the ground of mere authority and to appeal to the conscience, the loyalty, the experience and the good sense of the people themselves. Listen to the voice of Moses, as he enume- rates the blessings those people had enjoyed under the Divine government, and seeks to awaken in them a sense of gratitude and of moral obligation : " For this commandment which 1 command thee this day, it is not hidden from thee, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go up for us to heaven and bring it unto us that we may hear it and do it? Neither is it beyond the sea that thou shouldest say, 'Who shall go over the sea for us, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it and do it? But the word is very nigh thee, in thy mouth and in thine heart, that thou mayest do it. See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and The Law repeated witJi new sanctions 9 evil * * * that thou mayest love the Lord thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him, for he is thy life and the length of thy days, that thou mayest dwell in the land which the Lord sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them." l Here is still, we observe, the motive of self-interest — the offered reward of peace and prosperity in the promised land ; but it is much less prominent than before. This language may serve as a reminder — a very instructive and powerful reminder — to a teacher, of the kind of sanction he should seek for all the orders and rules he gives. His work as a legislator and administrator in the little world in which he reigns supreme is not accomplished until he has done what Moses did with the people of Israel, appealed to their intelligence and sought to awaken in them a sense, not only of the moral claims of the lawgiver, but also of the necessity and the beauty of law. Enforced obedience does not deserve to be called obedience at all — certainly it cannot be regarded as moral discipline. He who obeys a law because he is obliged under penalty to obey it, is but a slave after all. You want to bring up a race of free agents, 2 of children 1 Deuteronomy xxx. 1 1 — 20. 2 Here is your child. Wrong as all children are, just because they are human creatures, how shall you set him right? Is not the whole problem of your education this — to educate the will and not to break it. Perhaps it might be easy, with all the tremendous purchase of your parental power, to break your child's will if you chose. But what have you got then? A poor, spiritless, will- less creature incapable of good as he is incapable of evil, with nothing to contribute to either side of the great battle of humanity which is going on about him. That is not what you want. To keep the will, to fill it with more and more life, but to make it so wise that it shall spend its strength in goodness — that is your true ambition as the trainer of your child. And when some friend disheartened with your slowness comes to you and says, " Why do io MctJwds of Instruction as illustrated in the Bible who as they grow will so incorporate into their own lives the law of duty that they will need no physical or external restraint, but will understand something of that spirit of self-surrender, which finds expression in Words- worth's Ode to Duty : Oft, when in my heart was heard Thy timely mandate, I deferr'd The task imposed from day to clay; But thee I now would serve more strictly, if I may. Through no disturbance of my soul, Or strong compunction in me wrought, I supplicate for thy control; But in the quietness of thought; Me this unchartered freedom tires, I feel the weight of chance-desires, My hopes no more must change their name, I long for a repose that ever is the same. Very nearly akin is this language of a nineteenth century poet to the language of the Hebrew king, " Oh how I love Thy law ! it is my meditation all the day. Thy testimonies are my delight and my counsellors. Thy statutes have been my songs in the house of my pilgrimage. The law of Thy mouth is dearer to me than thousands of gold and silver." All through these and the like outpourings you hear little or nothing about the penalties of breaking the law, or about the good land you not settle the whole matter once for all by breaking the child's will to pieces and compelling obedience whether he wants to obey you or not?" you reply, "I cannot do that; obedience won in that way would not be obedience. To prevent badness so, would be to prevent goodness also." What is that conversation but the translation into household language of the old conversation of the farmer and his servants : " Wilt thou that we go and gather up the tares?" "Nay, lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them." — Bishop Phillips Brooks. The Sermon on the Mount 1 1 and the long life of which Moses says so much. The Psalmists had got beyond that stage of educational dis- cipline. Read the hundred and nineteenth Psalm, which is a sustained paean on the majesty and beauty of the Divine law. Consider that the chief literature of the Jewish people — the Talmud and the Targums — consists of comments and amplifications of the statutes and ordinances as given by Moses, and it will be plain that all that is best in Jewish history connects itself with reverence for the Law and with a desire to interpret and to apply it. Grant then that during the period of our pupil's life, before conscience and sympathy can be aroused, many of our commands must necessarily be unexplained ; we may not forget that the training of the responsible human being must ever remain incomplete until he is made to recognize the value of the injunctions he is expected to obey. As occasion offers, and as scholars grow in years and experience, we do well to let them see as far as we can why we impose our own will on theirs. We need not fear that doing this implies any loss of dignity, or of personal authority. It merely implies that you are leading them by degrees to rely on something better than your personal authority, upon the intuitions of conscience and on the law of God. The whole drift and purpose of the Sermon on the The Ser- Mount lie in this direction. It aims throughout at the ™° n on to Mount. substitution of a principle or a general law of action for the authoritative enforcement of specific rules. " Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt not kill, and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judg- ment. But I say unto you, that whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment." In this spirit, each of the specific in- junctions of the old law is considered in turn and shewn 1 2 Methods of Instruction as illustrated in the Bible to be practically absorbed and superseded by the higher law, which concerns itself with the motives of human action. When once this higher law is duly recognized and welcomed all formal rules and ordinances become well-nigh superfluous. And indeed the whole Sermon on the Mount is characterized by the way in which concrete examples are treated in the light of large general principles, although those principles are not themselves enunciated in an abstract form. On this point Professor Seeley appositely remarks : "The style of the Sermon on the Mount is neither purely philo- sophical nor purely practical. It refers throughout to first principles, but it does not state them in an abstract form: on the other han<], it enters into special cases and detail, but never so far as to lose sight of first principles. It is equally unlike the early national codes, which simply formulari/.ed without method existing customs, and the early moral treatises, such as those of Hato and Aristotle, which are purely scientific. Of Jewish writers it resembles most the book of Deuteronomy, in which the Mosaic law was recapitulated in such a manner as to make the principles on which it was founded apparent; of Gentile writings it may be compared with those of Epictetus, Aurelius, and Seneca, in which we see a scientific morality brought to bear upon the struggles and details of actual life. It uses all the philosophical machinery of generalization and distinction, but its object is not philosophical but practical — that is, not truth, but good." 1 The framers of the English Liturgy in one of the collects address Him " Whose service is perfect freedom," and in another, pray that we " may love the thing that thou commandest and desire that which thou dost promise." This certainly was the thought of St Paul when after describing the Law as a schoolmaster he clenched the whole of a memorable argument with the words, " Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the 1 Ecce Homo. Rewards 1 3 yoke of bondage." x If our schemes of moral discipline do not contemplate this result as the ultimate goal to be attained, however halting and imperfect are the steps by which it is approached, those schemes themselves are necessarily faulty. It is good of course that our scholars should shape their conduct according to the rules which we prescribe, but it is still better that they should acquire the power of self-government and become in the highest and best sense a law unto themselves. In considering the methods of moral discipline Rewards. adopted or described in the Bible, it is well to refer for a moment to the light thrown by the sacred writers on the manner in which the rewards of life are distributed. Bacon has said, " Prosperity is the blessing of the Old Testament ; adversity the blessing of the New." He shews that this general statement is subject to some exceptions, for he adds that even " if you listen to David's harp, you shall hear as many hearse-like airs as carols." 2 Long life, corn and wine, flocks and herds, honour and wealth are more frequently referred to as the rewards of obedience in the Old than in the New Testament. But here again the generalization must be qualified. There is a remarkable episode in the life of Solomon, which illustrates the inadequacy of merely material prosperity as an object of ambition. The young sovereign is repre- sented as seeing a vision, and hearing a voice, " Ask what I shall give thee," and his answer was, " ' O Lord, my God, I am but a little child * * * Give therefore thy servant a wise and understanding heart, to judge thy people, that I may discern between good and bad ; for who is able to judge this thy so great people?' And this speech pleased the Lord that Solomon had asked this thing. And God said unto him, ' Because thou hast asked this thing, and hast 1 Galations. v. i . 2 Essay on Adversity. 14 Methods of Inst ruction as illustrated in the Bible not asked for thyself long life, neither hast asked riches for thyself, nor hast asked the life of thine enemies, but hast asked for thyself understanding to discern judgment ; behold I have done according to thy words. Lo, I have given thee a wise and understanding heart. * * * And I have also given thee that which thou hast not asked, both riches and honour, so that there shall not be any among the kings like thee all thy days.' And Solomon woke and behold it was a dream." * But it was a dream of profound significance, for it reveals to us the true and enduring connexion between the duties of life and the rewards of life. Success, wealth and prosperity, if sought for their own sakes, may often elude the seeker ; but he who first of all desires the wisdom and the power needed for the right fulfilment of duty is often found to obtain them and also something which he has not asked, both riches and honour. In the New Testament the same great law of the Divine ruler of the world is expressed in the words, " Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things — what ye shall eat and what ye shall drink — shall be added unto you." The true Thg W ords used in the parable of the Talents illus- ambition r . . r , r . . of life. trate a further view of the true nature of rewards and punishments. From the unprofitable servant the talent was taken away that he might no longer misuse or hide it, but the diligent and conscientious servant is told, "Thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things." " Have thou authority over ten cities." Herein lies a key to the Divine economy as regards human service, and to the whole philosophy of human ambition. The faithful servant is not offered rest or luxury, or any immediate visible compensation; but more duty, higher responsibility, the rule over a larger 1 I Kings iii. 5 — 15. The true ambition of life 1 5 province, power to become a still more honoured and useful servant. I think this is a view of the relations between duty and reward which we shall be wise to keep prominently in view of our scholars, who at the threshold of life are looking wistfully forward into the unknown future, and are filled with vague ambitions and with hopes of success. Books such as those of Dr Smiles, with stories of great engineers and of ' men who have risen,' possess a very intelligible fascination for many boys ; but they present, after all, a somewhat ignoble, or at least an incomplete view of life's meaning and purpose. ' Getting on ' should be set before the young and hopeful pupil, not merely as rising to higher social rank or larger fortune, though it may and often does mean this ; but rather getting to that work which we can do best, and which calls into exercise our highest faculties. The true prizes of life are not gifts or large salaries, or material advantages ; but honour, influence, opportunities of use- fulness, power to be of service to others, and especially to add to the happiness of those whom we love. Fortunately these prizes are not competitive ; no one in winning them prevents another from gaining them. They are accessible to every earnest and honest student, whether he gains school distinctions and a prosperous career or not. In organizing a school, and in assigning duties, a teacher has many opportunities of keeping this principle in view. He is subject to special temptation to over-rate talent — the sort of mental endowment which saves himself trouble as a teacher, and brings repute to his school ; but one of his highest duties is to recognize the merit of commonplace abilities, and to furnish full encourage- ment and opportunity for their use. The worship of mere cleverness is often fatal to the growth of what is morally excellent in a place of education. So although a L 1 6 Methods of Instruction as illustrated in the Bible good teacher will not deem it necessary to say much on this subject, he will none the less effectually make his pupils aware that in the microcosm of school there is room for the exercise of varied talents and for generous ambition ; and that possibilities of being useful to others are within reach of all the scholars, whether distinguished or undistinguished. "To one the Master has given five talents, to another two, and another one," but for all alike there is the promise of the crowning recompense, " Well done, good and faithful servant." Poetry as a The reader of the Bible who traces with care the ]