Iago. Why, but you are now well enough: how came you thus recovered?
Cassio. It has pleased the devil drunkenness, to give place to the devil wrath: one unperfectness shows me another, to make me frankly despise myself.
Iago. Come, you are too severe a moraler. As the time, the place, and the condition of this country stands, I could heartily wish this had not befallen; but, since it is as it is, mend it for your own good.
Cassio. I will ask him for my place again: he shall tell me, I am a drunkard. Had I as many mouths as Hydra, such an answer would stop them all. To be now a sensible man, by-and-by a fool, and presently a beast! O, strange! Every inordinate cup is unblessed, and the ingredient is a devil.—Othello, Act ii., Sc. 3.
In conclusion, begin with simple emotions. Do not ask the younger pupils to represent intense pathos, great solemnity, and the like. Reserve these for the upper grades of the high school. Again, avoid the baser emotions, such as anger, hate, jealousy. Time does not permit us to enlarge on this, but the whole trend of the best psychology is in favor of this admonition. Select extracts in which the characters manifest simple, noble, inspiring, and uplifting feeling. Patriotism, self-sacrifice, love of nature, these are the themes with which the imagination of the pupils should come into contact.
The teacher is heartily advised to gather a dozen or more extracts and speeches (from this book and elsewhere) under three or four significant heads, such as patriotism, love of nature, etc., and to keep the class at each phase until definite results are attained. There is no hesitation in deprecating the method that compels teachers to teach any lesson simply because it follows, numerically, the preceding lesson. The proper method is hinted at elsewhere. A few words are now added to justify that method. In many readers there may be two patriotic selections; one at the beginning, one at the end. Probably a year will intervene between these two. Is it not good pedagogy to take up these lessons in succession? To keep the pupils in a patriotic mood for five consecutive days must be certainly productive of better results than can be obtained by the other method of Lesson I, Lesson II, Lesson III. So also with other emotions. When a certain emotion is present in only one or two paragraphs of a selection, only those paragraphs need, of course, to be prepared.