XXVIII.
COUNSELS.
1. To a Young Teacher.
You are about to assume the charge of a class in the school under my care. Allow me, in a spirit of frankness, to make to you a brief statement of some of the aims of the institution, and of the principles by which we are guided in their prosecution.
1. "Unless the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it." I have no professional conviction more fixed and abiding than this, that no persons more need the direct, special, continual guidance of the Holy Spirit than those who undertake to mould and discipline the youthful mind. No preparation for this office is complete which does not include devout prayer for that wisdom which cometh from above. If any one possession, more than another, is the direct gift of the Almighty, it would seem to be that of knowledge. The teacher, therefore, of all men, is called upon to look upwards to a source that is higher than himself. He needs light in his own mind; he should not count it misspent labor to ask for light to be given to the minds of his scholars. There is a Teacher infinitely wiser and more skilful than any human teacher. The instructor must be strangely blind to the resources of his profession, who fails to resort habitually to that great, plenary, unbounded source of light and knowledge. While, therefore, we aim in this school to profit by all subsidiary and subordinate methods and improvements in the art of teaching, we first of all seek the aid of our Heavenly Father; we ask wisdom of Him who "giveth liberally and upbraideth not." This, then, is the first principle that governs us in the work here assigned us. The fear of God is the beginning of knowledge. We who are teachers endeavor to show that we ourselves fear God, and we inculcate the fear of Him as the first and highest duty of our scholars; and in every plan and effort to guide the young minds committed to us, we ourselves look for guidance to the only unerring source of light.
2. In proportion to the implicitness with which we rely upon divine aid, should be the diligence with which we use all the human means within our reach. It should therefore, in the second place, be the aim of the teachers of this school to acquaint themselves diligently with the most approved methods of teaching. No teachers will be retained who do not keep themselves well posted in the literature of their profession, and who are not found continually aiming at self-improvement. In whatever school of whatever country, any branch is taught by better methods than those practised here, it should be the duty of a teacher in this school to search it out, and to profit by the discovery. Improvement comes by comparison. The man, or the institution, that fails to profit by the experience of others, is not wise. I hold it to be the duty of every teacher of this school to be habitually conversant with the educational journals of the day, and with the standard works on the theory of teaching, and to lose no opportunity for personal observation of the methods of others. I have often noticed, with equal pain and commiseration, that young teachers, after having once finished their preliminary studies and obtained a situation, are thereupon apparently quite content, making no further effort at improvement, but settling down for life in an inglorious mediocrity. The best teachers in this school are expected to be better teachers next year than they are now,—with ampler stores of knowledge, and a happier faculty for communicating it. This, then, is our second aim in this school. We aim to have teachers thoroughly posted in regard to the theory and the methods of teaching, prepared to ride upon the advance wave of every real improvement in the art.
3. I should, however, fail entirely to convey my meaning, were I to lead you to suppose that we expect to accomplish our ends mainly by fine-spun theories. I have no faith in any theory of education, which does not include, as one of its leading elements, hard work. The teachers of this school expect to work hard, and we expect the scholars to work hard. We have no royal road to learning. Any knowledge, the acquisition of which costs nothing, is usually worth nothing. The mind, equally with the body, grows by labor. If some stuffing process could be invented, by which knowledge could be forced into a mind perfectly passive, the knowledge so acquired would be worthless to its possessor, and would soon pass away, leaving the mind as blank as it was before. Knowledge, to be of any value, must be assimilated, as bodily food is. Teaching is essentially a co-operative act. The mind of the teacher and the mind of the scholar must both act, and must act together, in intellectual co-operation and sympathy, if there is to be any true mental growth. Teaching is not merely hearing lessons. It is not mere talking. It is something more than mere telling. It is causing a child to know. It is awakening attention, and then satisfying it. It is an out-and-out live process. The moment the mind of the teacher or the mind of the scholar flags, real teaching ceases. This, then, is our third aim. We aim in this school to accomplish results, not by fanciful theories, but by bona fide hard work,—by keeping teachers and scholars, while at their studies, wide awake and full of life; not by exhausting drudgery, nor by fitful, irregular, spasmodic exertions, but by steady, persevering, animated, straight-forward work.
4. A fourth aim which we have steadily before us, is to make thorough work of whatever acquisition we attempt. A little knowledge, well learned and truly digested, and made a part of the pupil's own intellectual stores, is worth more to him than any amount of facts loosely and indiscriminately brought together. In intellectual, as in other tillage, the true secret of thrift is to plough deep, not to skim over a large surface. The prevailing tendency at this time, in systems of education, is unduly to multiply studies. So many new sciences are being brought within the pale of popular knowledge, that it is no longer possible, in a school like this, to embrace within its course of study all the subjects which it is practicable and desirable for people generally to know. Through the whole encyclopædia of arts and sciences, there is hardly one which has not its advocates, and which has not strong claims to recognition. The teacher is simply infatuated who attempts to embrace them all in his curriculum. He thereby puts himself under an absolute necessity of being superficial, and he generates in his scholars pretension and conceit. Old James Ross, the grammarian, famous as a teacher in Philadelphia more than half a century ago, had on his sign simply these words, "Greek and Latin taught here." Assuredly I would not advocate quite so rigid an exclusion as that, nor, if limited to only two studies, would it be those. But I have often thought Mr. Ross's advertisement suggestive. Better even that extreme than the encyclopædic system which figures so largely on some circulars. Mr. Ross indeed taught nothing but Latin and Greek. But he taught these languages better probably than they have ever been taught on this continent; and any two branches thoroughly mastered are of more service to the pupil than twenty branches known imperfectly and superficially. A limited field, then, and thorough work. This is our fourth aim.
5. As a fifth aim, we endeavor, in the selection of subjects of study, not to allow the common English branches, as they are called, to be shoved aside. To read well, to write a good hand, to be expert in arithmetic, to have such a knowledge of geography and history as to read intelligently what is going on and the world, to have such a knowledge of one's own language as to use it correctly and purely in speaking and composition,—these are attainments to be postponed to no others. These are points of primary importance, to be aimed at by every one, whatever else he may omit.