FOOTNOTES:
[110] Quite unimportant. It simply complained of the condition of the streets.
[111] Dr. Edward Browne, the son of the author of the "Religio Medici," Sir Thomas Browne. Writing to his father from Rotterdam, in 1668, he says: "The cleanenesse and neatnesse of this towne is so new unto mee, that it affoordeth great satisfaction, most persons going about the streets in white slippers."—"Life and Works of Sir Thomas Browne." Pickering, 1836. Vol. i. p. 154.
[112] Mr. Ruskin was as good as his word, and his sweepers were at work in the following January.
MISCELLANEOUS LETTERS.
IV.
EDUCATION FOR RICH AND POOR.
True Education. 1868.
The Value of Lectures. 1874.
The Cradle of Art! 1876.
St. George's Museum. 1875.
The Morality of Field Sports. 1870.
Drunkenness and Crime. 1871.
Madness and Crime. 1872.
Employment for the Destitute Poor and Criminal Classes. 1868.
Notes on the General Principles of Employment for the Destitute and Criminal Classes (a pamphlet). 1868.
Blindness and Sight. 1879.
The Eagle's Nest. 1879.
Politics in Youth. 1879.
"Act, Act in the Living Present." 1873.
"Laborare est Orare." 1874.
A Pagan Message. 1878.
The Foundations of Chivalry.
(Five letters: February 8, 10, 11, and 12, 1877, and July 3, 1878.)
IV.
EDUCATION FOR RICH AND POOR.
[From "The Pall Mall Gazette," January 31, 1868.]
TRUE EDUCATION.[113]
To the Editor of "The Pall Mall Gazette."
Sir: The letter you published yesterday from a parish schoolboy of "Sixty Years Since" at Weary-faulds (confirmed as it would be doubtless in all practical respects by testimony of English boys educated at Waverley Honour) has my hearty sympathy; but I am wearier than any tenant of Weary-faulds of seeing this subject of education always treated as if "education" only meant teaching children to write or to cipher or to repeat catechism. You know, Sir, as you have shown by your comments on the Bishop of Oxford's last speech on this subject, and you could not at present use your influence more beneficially than by farther showing that the real education-the education which alone should be compulsory—means nothing of the kind. It means teaching children to be clean, active, honest, and useful. All these characters can be taught, and cannot be acquired by sickly and ill-dispositioned children without being taught; but they can be untaught to any extent, by evil habit and example at home. Public schools, in which the aim was to form character faithfully, would return to them in due time to their parents, worth more than their "weight in gold." That is the real answer to the objections founded on economical difficulties. Will you not make some effort, Sir, to get your readers to feel this? I am myself quite sick of saying it over and over again in vain.
I am, Sir, your faithful servant,
J. Ruskin.
Denmark Hill, Jan. 31, 1868.