A visitor to a pottery establishment was puzzled by an operation that seemed aimless. In one room there was a mass of clay beside a workman. Every now and then he took up a mallet and struck several smart blows on the surface of the lump. Curiosity led to the question, “Why do you do that?” “Wait a bit, sir, and watch it,” was the answer. The stranger obeyed, and soon the top of the mass began to heave and swell. Bubbles formed upon its face. “Now, sir, you see,” said the modeler, “I could never shape the clay into a vase if these air-bubbles were in it, therefore I gradually beat them out.”
Is not the discipline of life just a beating out of the bubbles of pride and self-will, so that God may form a vessel of earth to hold heavenly treasures? (Text.)
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See [Success in Failure].
DISCIPLINE AMONG CHILDREN
It required just one minute and fifteen seconds for three thousand pupils and teachers of Public School 22, at Sheriff and Stanton Streets (New York), to file into the streets after the “four taps signal,” indicating that the building must be vacated with haste, a few minutes after a fire had been discovered. One incident indicated particularly the degree of discipline instilled into the children.
Harry Kagel, one of the smallest boys in the primary department, asked permission to go down-stairs just after the pupils had assembled for the afternoon session. As the boy was passing a room near the vestibule on the ground floor, he scented smoke. Opening the door, he found a fire blazing in waste paper and baskets. He did not cry out or run with fear from the building, but, remembering what his teachers had told him again and again, he ran quietly up-stairs to his class-room and whispered about the fire in the ear of the teacher, Miss Dixey.
She called an older boy and sent him to investigate. In a minute he was back with a verification. Then Miss Dixey hurried to Miss C. Knowl, principal of the primary department, and to John P. Townley, principal of the school, and the signal was sounded.
At once every child in the school went to his or her station, and all were in line or at the post assigned in a few seconds. Altho the thin smoke in the hallways, creeping into the sixty-six classrooms of the four-story building, indicated to pupils and teachers that this was not one of the regular drills, there was no confusion, and with the exception of the faces of pupils and teachers, which were a trifle more serious than at daily drill, the program was carried out perfectly.
One of the teachers, assigned to the piano, began the march, and the pupils began to file out of the rooms after the last bell. Monitors took their places on the stone steps to guard against confusion near the exits. Every door in the building was thrown open by those assigned to that duty.