Father. Why is it said,
"By vain prosperity receiv'd,
To her they vow their truth, and are again believ'd?"
S——. Because the people, I suppose, when they were in prosperity before, believed them before, but I think that seems confused.
"Oh gently on thy suppliant's head,
Dread goddess, lay thy chastening hand."
S—— did not seem to comprehend the first of these two lines; and upon cross examination, it appeared that he did not know the meaning of the word suppliant; he thought it meant "a person who supplies us."
"Not in thy Gorgon terrors clad,
Nor circled by the vengeful band,
As by the impious thou art seen."
It may appear improbable, that a child who did not know the meaning of the word suppliant, should understand the Gorgon terrors, and the vengeful band, yet it was so: S—— understood these lines distinctly; he said, "Gorgon terrors, yes, like the head of Gorgon." He was at this time translating from Ovid's Metamorphoses; and it happened that his father had explained to him the ideas of the ancients concerning the furies; besides this, several people in the family had been reading Potter's Æschylus, and the furies had been the subject of conversation. From such accidental circumstances as these, children often appear, in the same instant almost, to be extremely quick, and extremely slow of comprehension; a preceptor who is well acquainted with all his pupil's previous knowledge, can rapidly increase his stock of ideas by turning every accidental circumstance to account: but if a tutor persists in forcing a child to a regular course of study, all his ideas must be collected, not as they are wanted in conversation or in real life, but as they are wanted to get through a lesson or a book. It is not surprising, that M. Condillac found such long explanations necessary for his young pupil in reading the tragedies of Racine; he says, that he was frequently obliged to translate the poetry into prose, and frequently the prince could gather only some general idea of the whole drama, without understanding the parts. We cannot help regretting, that the explanations have not been published for the advantage of future preceptors; they must have been almost as difficult as those for the preliminary lessons. As we are convinced that the art of education can be best improved by the registering of early experiments, we are very willing to expose such as have been made, without fear of fastidious criticism or ridicule.
May 1, 1796. A little poem, called "The Tears of Old May-day," published in the second volume of the World, was read to S——. Last May-day the same poem had been read to him; he then liked it much, and his father wished to see what effect it would have upon this second reading. The pleasure of novelty was worn off, but S—— felt new pleasure from his having, during the last year, acquired a great number of new ideas, and especially some knowledge of ancient mythology, which enabled him to understand several allusions in the poem which had before been unintelligible to him. He had become acquainted with the muses, the graces, Cynthia, Philomel, Astrea, who are all mentioned in this poem; he now knew something about the Hesperian fruit, Amalthea's horn, choral dances, Libyan Ammon, &c. which are alluded to in different lines of the poem: he remembered the explanation which his father had given him the preceding year, of a line which alludes to the island of Atalantis:
"Then vanished many a sea-girt isle and grove,
Their forests floating on the wat'ry plain;
Then famed for arts, and laws deriv'd from Jove,
My Atalantis sunk beneath the main."