TO ROBERT MOLESWORTH, ESQ.
Here I concluded my defence: when Mr. Locke, perceiving, by the attention we all paid to him, that we were now prepared to receive his answer, raised himself in his chair, and, with a firmer tone and look than I expected, addressed himself to me in the following manner.
MR. LOCKE.
Were the subject before us a matter of indifference or curiosity, such as idle men are used to discourse of, I could allow your lordship to pursue it in this way of Socratic raillery and declamation. But, if ever there was a question, that deserved the examination of a philosopher, properly so called, it is, surely, this of Education; and, among the various parts of it, none is more strictly to be inquired into, as none is, perhaps, so big with important consequences, as that which comes recommended to us under the specious name of Foreign Travel.
I could not, therefore, but wonder to hear your lordship enlarge so much, and so long, on I know not what varnish of manners and good breeding; of the knowledge of men and the world; of arts, languages, and other trappings and shewy appendages of education: just as if an architect should entertain you with a discourse on Festoons and Foliage, or the finishing of his Frize and Capitals, when you expected him to instruct you in what way to erect a solid edifice on firm walls and durable foundations.
What a reasonable man wants to know, is, the proper method of building up men: whereas your lordship seems solicitous for little more than tricking out a set of fine gentlemen. It seemed, indeed, as if your lordship had calculated your defence of travelling for a knot of Virtuosi, or a still more fashionable circle (where, doubtless, it would pass with much ease and without contradiction); and had, somehow, forgotten that your hearers are all plain men; one of them, an old one; and he too, as your Lordship loves to qualify him, a philosopher.
To speak my mind frankly, my Lord, your defence of foreign travel, as lively and plausible as it seemed, has no solid basis to rest upon. You tell us of many defects in the breeding of our English youth, and you would willingly redress them: but in what way this is best done, can never be known from vague and general declamation.
To make this inquiry to purpose, some certain principles must be laid down; some scheme of life and manners must be formed; some idea or model of the character, you would imprint on young minds, must be described; to which we may constantly refer, as we go along; and by which, as a rule, we may estimate the fitness and propriety of that sort of breeding, you would recommend to us.
Since your Lordship then will needs have me dictate to you on the subject of Education, I must have leave to do it in another way, and after a more solemn manner, than you perhaps expect from me in this freedom of conversation.
I begin with this certain principle: That the business of education is to form the Understanding, and regulate the Heart. If man be a compound of Reason and Passion, the only proper discipline of his nature is that which accomplishes these two purposes.