Practical Education, Volume II

by Maria Edgeworth; Richard Lovell Edgeworth

S——'s father asked him why he liked these lines, and whether they put him in mind of any thing that he had heard before. S—— said, "It puts me in mind of Hamilcar's making his son Hannibal swear to hate the Romans, and love his countrymen eternally. But I like this much better. I think it was exceedingly foolish and wrong of Hamilcar to make his son swear always to hate the Romans."

Latin lessons are usually so very disagreeable to boys, that they seldom are pleased with any allusions to them; but by a good management in a tutor, even these lessons may be associated with agreeable ideas. Boys should be encouraged to talk and think about what they learn in Latin, as well as what they read in English; they should be allowed to judge of the characters described in ancient authors, to compare them with our present ideas of excellence, and thus to make some use of their learning. It will then be not merely engraved upon their memory in the form of lessons, it will be mingled with their notions of life and manners; it will occur to them when they converse, and when they act; they will possess the admired talent for classical allusion, as well as all the solid advantages of an unprejudiced judgment. It is not enough that gentlemen should be masters of the learned languages, they must know how to produce their knowledge without pedantry or affectation. The memory may in vain be stored with classical precedents, unless these can be brought into use in speaking or writing without the parade of dull citation, or formal introduction. "Sir," said Dr. Johnson, to some prosing tormentor, "I would rather a man would knock me down, than to begin to talk to me of the Punic wars." A public speaker, who rises in the House of Commons, with pedantry prepense to quote Latin or Greek, is coughed or laughed down; but the beautiful unpremeditated classical allusions of Burke or Sheridan, sometimes conveyed in a single word, seize the imagination irresistibly.

Since we perceive, that memory is chiefly useful as it furnishes materials for invention, and that invention can greatly abridge the mere labour of accumulation, we must examine how the inventive faculty can be properly exercised. The vague precept of, cultivate the memory and invention of young people at the same time, will not inform parents how this is to be accomplished; we trust, therefore, that we may be permitted, contrary to the custom of didactic writers, to illustrate a general precept by a few examples; and we take these examples from real life, because we apprehend, that fictions, however ingenious, will never advance the science of education so much as simple experiments.

No elaborate theory of invention shall here alarm parents. It is a mistake, to suppose that the inventive faculty can be employed only on important subjects; it can be exercised in the most trifling circumstances of domestic life. Scarcely any family can be so unfortunately situated, that they may not employ the ingenuity of their children without violent exertion, or any grand apparatus. Let us only make use of the circumstances which happen every hour. Children are interested in every thing that is going forward. Building, or planting, or conversation, or reading; they attend to every thing, and from every thing might they with a little assistance obtain instruction. Let their useful curiosity be encouraged; let them make a part of the general society of the family, instead of being treated as if they had neither senses nor understanding. When any thing is to be done, let them be asked to invent the best way of doing it. When they see that their invention becomes immediately useful, they will take pleasure in exerting themselves.

June 4th, 1796. A lady, who had been ruling pencil lines for a considerable time, complained of its being a tiresome operation; and she wished that a quick and easy way of doing it could be invented. Somebody present said they had seen pens for ruling music books, which ruled four lines at a time; and it was asked, whether a leaden rake could not be made to rule a sheet of paper at once.

Mr. —— said, that he thought such a pencil would not rule well; and he called to S——, (the same boy we mentioned before) and asked him if he could invent any method of doing the business better. S—— took about a quarter of an hour to consider; and he then described a little machine for ruling a sheet of paper at a single stroke, which his father had executed for him. It succeeded well, and this success was the best reward he could have.

Another day Mr. —— observed, that the maid, whose business it was to empty a bucket of ashes into an ash-hole, never could be persuaded to do it, because the ashes were blown against her face by the wind; and he determined to invent a method which should make it convenient to her to do as she was desired. The maid usually threw the ashes into a heap on the sheltered side of a wall; the thing to be done was, to make her put the bucket through a hole in this wall, and empty the ashes on the other side. This problem was given to all the children and grown up persons in the family. One of the children invented the shelf, which, they said, should be like part of the vane of a winnowing machine which they had lately seen; the manner of placing this vane, another of the children suggested: both these ideas joined together, produced the contrivance which was wanted.

A little model was made in wood of this bucket, which was a pretty toy. The thing itself was executed, and was found useful.

June 8th, 1796. Mr. —— was balancing a pair of scales very exactly, in which he was going to weigh some opium; this led to a conversation upon scales and weighing. Some one said that the dealers in diamonds must have very exact scales, as the difference of a grain makes such a great difference in their value. S—— was very attentive to this conversation. M——told him, that jewellers always, if they can, buy diamonds when the air is light, and sell them when it is heavy. S—— did not understand the reason of this, till his father explained to him the general principles of hydrostatics, and showed him a few experiments with bodies of different specific gravity: these experiments were distinctly understood by every body present. The boy then observed, that it was not fair of the jewellers to buy and sell in this manner; they should not, said he, use these weights. Diamonds should be the weights. Diamonds should be weighed against diamonds.