Popular Education Part 6

It is the withdrawal of the stimulus necessary to the healthy exercise of the brain, and the consequent weakening and depressing effect produced upon this organ, that renders solitary confinement so severe a punishment even to the most daring minds. It is a lower degree of the same cause that renders continuous seclusion from society so injurious to both mental and physical health. This explains why persons who are cut off from social converse by some bodily infirmity so frequently become discontented and morose, in spite of every resolution to the contrary. The feelings and faculties of the mind, which had formerly full play in their intercourse with their fellow-creatures, have no longer scope for sufficient exercise, and the almost inevitable result is irritability and weakness in the corresponding parts of the brain.

This fact is strikingly ill.u.s.trated by reference to the deaf and blind, who, by the loss of one or more of the senses, are precluded from a full partic.i.p.ation in all the varied sources of interest which their more favored brethren enjoy without abatement, and in whom irritability, weakness of mind, and idiocy are known to be much more prevalent than among other cla.s.ses of people. "The deaf and dumb," says Andral, "presents, in intelligence, character, and the development of his pa.s.sions, certain modifications, which depend on his state of isolation in the midst of society. He remains habitually in a state of half childishness, is very credulous, but, like the savage, remains free from many of the prejudices acquired in society. In him the tender feelings are not deep; he appears susceptible neither of strong attachment nor of lively grat.i.tude; pity moves him feebly; he has little emulation, few enjoyments, and few desires. This is what is commonly observed in the deaf and dumb; but the picture is far from being of universal application; some, more happily endowed, are remarkable for the great development of their intellectual and moral nature; but others, on the contrary, remain immersed in complete idiocy."

Andral adds, that we must not infer from this that the deaf and dumb are therefore const.i.tutionally inferior in mind to other men. "_Their powers are not developed, because they live isolated from society. Place them, by some means or other, in relation with their fellow-men, and they will become their equals._" This is the cause of the rapid brightening up of both mind and features, which is so often observed in blind or deaf children when transferred from home to public inst.i.tutions, and there taught the means of converse with their fellows.

I have myself witnessed several striking ill.u.s.trations of the benefits resulting from mental culture in persons who have lost one or more of their senses. Among these I would especially instance the American Asylum at Hartford for the education and instruction of the deaf and dumb, and the Perkins Inst.i.tution and Ma.s.sachusetts Asylum for the Blind, located at South Boston, to the accomplished princ.i.p.als and teachers of both of which inst.i.tutions I would acknowledge my indebtedness for valuable reports and the information of various kinds which they obligingly communicated to me at the time of my visits during the past summer.

Dr. Howe, the accomplished director of the Asylum for the Blind, after many years of experience and careful observation in this country and in Europe, expresses the conviction that _the blind, as a cla.s.s, are inferior to other persons in mental power and ability_. The opinions put forth in almost every report of the inst.i.tutions for the blind in this country, in almost all books on the subject, and even the doctor's earlier writings, may be brought to disprove this statement. He is now, nevertheless, fully convinced that it will be found true. This erroneous conviction, every where so prevalent, may be accounted for from the fact that none but intelligent parents of blind children could at first comprehend the possibility of their being educated, and even _they_ would not think of trying the experiment except upon a child of more than ordinary ability. As soon, however, as the experiment proved successful, and inst.i.tutions for the blind became generally known, the blind, without distinction--the bright and the backward, the bold and the timid--resorted to them, which gave an opportunity of judging of the _whole cla.s.s_. The result is, that now, while the schools for the blind present a certain number of children who make more rapid progress in _intellectual studies_ than the average of seeing children, they also present a much larger number who are decidedly inferior to them in both physical and mental vigor.

The loss of one sense makes us exercise the others so constantly and so effectually as to acquire a power quite unknown to common persons. This goes far to compensate the blind man who is in the pursuit of knowledge, and enables him to learn vastly more of _some_ subjects than other men; but there are capacities of his nature which can never be developed.

Perfect harmony in the exercise and development of his mental faculties he can never possess, any more than he can exhibit perfect physical beauty and proportion.

The proposition that the blind, _as a cla.s.s_, are inferior in mental power and ability to ordinary persons, has been established beyond a doubt. Take an equal number of blind and seeing persons, of as nearly the same age and situation in life as may be, and it has been established by well authenticated data, that when all the blind have died, there will still be about half of the seeing ones alive. In other words, the chance of life among the blind is only about half what it is among the seeing. The standard of bodily health and vigor, then, being so much lower among the blind, the inevitable inference is that mental power and ability will be proportionably less also; for such is the dependence of the mind upon the body, that there can be no continuance of mental health and vigor without bodily health and vigor.

It is also true that _the deaf and dumb, as a cla.s.s, are inferior to other persons in mental power and ability_. The general reasons for this are the same as those already given in the case of blind persons, and need not hence be repeated. The truth of this proposition is established beyond a doubt by the concurrent testimony of those who have had the greatest experience with this unfortunate cla.s.s of persons both in this country and in Europe. The report of the directors of the American Asylum for the year 1845 shows that two pupils had died during the year.

One of these had an affection of the lungs which terminated in consumption, and the disease of the other was dropsy on the brain. In a third, hereditary consumption was rapidly developing itself. Others, still, had been subject to more or less of bodily indisposition.

After speaking of the case of a young man in whom _hereditary consumption_ had been rapidly developed, the following statement is introduced: "This great destroyer of our race is found extensively in Europe, as well as in our own country, to be a _common disease among the deaf and dumb_. It is brought on by scrofula, by fevers, by violent colds, and by various other causes; and there is often, no doubt, _a hereditary tendency to it in families connected by blood_". If this is the effect of the loss of one of the senses upon the _bodily health_, keeping in view the principle already stated, we shall naturally enough be led to inquire what the influence is upon the _health of the mind_. A careful examination of the educational statistics of several states has convinced me that an unusually large proportion of the deaf and dumb--and perhaps an equally large proportion of the blind, and especially those who have remained uneducated and unenlightened--have been visited with mental derangement, and have _lived and died insane_.

This is easily accounted for. Uneducated persons, who are deprived of one or more of the senses, are isolated from the world in which they live. The book of nature is open before them, but they are unable to peruse it. The simplest operations constantly going on around them are locked in mystery. They are an enigma to themselves. Even those who are endowed with inquisitive minds are perplexed with the existing state of things. They know nothing of the physical organization of the planet we inhabit, of its political and civil divisions, and of the whole machinery of human society, and are profoundly ignorant of the past history and future destiny of the race to which they belong. It is not remarkable that mind so unnaturally and peculiarly circ.u.mstanced--with its usual inlets of knowledge so obstructed, and deprived of external objects to act upon--should prey upon itself, and thus superinduce insanity in its usual forms, and more especially when unaided and undirected by education.

Keeping the same principle in view, we shall not be surprised to find that _want of exercise_ of the brain and nervous system, or, in other words, that inactivity of intellect and feeling, is a very frequent predisposing cause of every form of nervous disease, even with those who have not been deprived of any of their senses. For demonstrative evidence of this position, we have only to look at the numerous victims to be found among females of the middle and higher ranks, who have no call to exertion in gaining the means of subsistence, and no objects of interest on which to exercise their mental faculties, and who consequently sink into a state of mental sloth and nervous weakness, which not only deprives them of much enjoyment, but subjects them to suffering, both of body and mind, from the slightest causes.

In looking abroad upon society, we find innumerable examples of mental and nervous debility from this cause. When a person of some mental capacity is confined for a long time to an unvarying round of employment, which affords neither scope nor stimulus for one half of his faculties, and, from want of education or society, has no external resources, his mental powers, for want of exercise to keep up due vitality in their cerebral organs, become blunted, and his perceptions slow and dull. Unusual subjects of thought become to him disagreeable and painful. The intellect and feelings not being provided with interests external to themselves, must either become inactive and weak, or work upon themselves and become diseased.

But let the situation of such persons be changed; bring them, for instance, from the listlessness of retirement to the business and bustle of a city; give them a variety of imperative employments, and place them in society so as to supply to their cerebral organs that extent of exercise which gives health and vivacity of action, and in a few months the change produced will be surprising. Health, animation, and acuteness will take the place of former insipidity and dullness. In such instances, it would be absurd to suppose that it is the _mind itself_ which becomes heavy and feeble, and again revives into energy by these changes in external circ.u.mstances. The effects arise entirely from changes in the state of the _brain_, and the mental manifestations and the bodily health have been improved solely by the improvement of its condition.

The evils arising from excessive or ill-timed exercise of the brain, or any of its parts, are numerous, and equally in accordance with the ordinary laws of physiology. When we use the eye too long or in too bright a light, it becomes bloodshot, and the increased action of its vessels and nerves gives rise to a sensation of fatigue and pain requiring us to desist. If we turn away and relieve the eye, the irritation gradually subsides, and the healthy state returns; but if we continue to look intently, or resume our employment before the eye has regained its natural state by repose, the irritation at last becomes permanent, and disease, followed by weakness of sight, or even blindness, may ensue, as often happens to gla.s.s-blowers, smiths, and others who are obliged to work in an intense light.

Precisely a.n.a.logous phenomena occur when, from intense mental excitement, the brain is kept long in a state of excessive activity. The only difference is, that we can always see what happens in the eye, but rarely what takes place in the brain. Occasionally, however, cases of fracture of the skull occur, in which, part of the bone being removed, we _can see_ the quickened circulation in the vessels of the brain as easily as in those of the eye. Sir Astley Cooper had a young gentleman brought to him who had lost a portion of his skull just above the eyebrow. "On examining the head," says Sir Astley, "I distinctly saw that the pulsation of the brain was regular and slow; but at this time he was agitated by some opposition to his wishes, and directly the blood was sent with increased force to the brain, and the pulsation became frequent and violent." Sir Astley hence concludes that, in the treatment of injuries of the brain, if you omit to keep the mind free from agitation, your other means will be unavailing.

A still more remarkable case is said to have occurred in the hospital of Montpellier in 1821. The subject of it was a female who had lost a large portion of her scalp, skull-bone, and dura mater. A corresponding portion of her brain was consequently bare, and subject to inspection.

When she was in a dreamless sleep, her brain was motionless, and lay within the cranium; but when her sleep was imperfect, and she was agitated by dreams, her brain moved and protruded without the cranium.

In vivid dreams the protrusion was considerable; and when she was awake and engaged in active thought or sprightly conversation, it was still greater.

In alluding to this subject, Dr. Caldwell remarks, that if it were possible, without doing an injury to other parts, to augment the constant afflux of healthy arterial blood to the brain, the mental operations would be invigorated by it. This position is ill.u.s.trated by reference to the fact that when a public speaker is flushed and heated in debate, his mind works more freely and powerfully than at any other time. And why? Because his brain is in better tune. What has thus suddenly improved its condition? An increased current of blood into it, produced by the excitement of its own increased action. That the blood does, on such occasions, flow more copiously into the brain, no one can doubt who is at all acquainted with the cerebral sensations which the orator himself experiences at the time, or who witnesses the unusual fullness and flush of his countenance, and the dewiness, flas.h.i.+ng, and protrusion of his eye.

Indeed, in many instances, the increased circulation in the brain attendant on high mental excitement reveals itself by its effects when least expected, and leaves traces after death which are but too legible.

Many are the instances in which public men have been suddenly arrested in their career by the inordinate action of the brain induced by incessant toil, and more numerous still are those whose mental power has been forever impaired by similar excess.

It is generally known that the eye, when tasked beyond its strength, becomes insensible to light, and ceases to convey impressions to the mind. The brain, in like manner, when much exhausted, becomes incapable of thought, and consciousness is well-nigh lost in a feeling of utter confusion. At any time in life, excessive and continued mental exertion is hurtful; but in infancy and early youth, when the structure of the brain is still immature and delicate, permanent injury is more easily produced by injudicious treatment than at any subsequent period. In this respect, the a.n.a.logy is complete between the brain and the other parts of the body, as we have already seen exemplified in the injurious effects of premature exercise of the bones and muscles. Scrofulous and rickety children are the most usual sufferers in this way. They are generally remarkable for large heads, great precocity of understanding, and small, delicate bodies. But in such instances, the great size of the brain, and the acuteness of the mind, are the results of morbid growth, and even with the best management, the child pa.s.ses the first years of its life constantly on the brink of active disease. Instead, however, of trying to repress its mental activity, as they should, the fond parents, misled by the promise of genius, too often excite it still further by unceasing cultivation and the never-failing stimulus of praise; and finding its progress, for a time, equal to their warmest wishes, they look forward with ecstasy to the day when its talents will break forth and shed a l.u.s.ter on their name. But in exact proportion as the picture becomes brighter to their fancy, the probability of its becoming realized becomes less; for the brain, worn out by premature exertion, either becomes diseased or loses its tone, leaving the mental powers feeble and depressed for the remainder of life. The expected prodigy is thus, in the end, easily outstripped in the social race by many whose dull outset promised him an easy victory.

To him who takes for his guide the necessities of the const.i.tution, it will be obvious that the modes of treatment commonly resorted to should in such cases be reversed; and that, instead of straining to the utmost the already irritable powers of the precocious child, leaving his dull compet.i.tors to ripen at leisure, a systematic attempt ought to be made, from early infancy, to rouse to action the languid faculties of the latter, while no pains should be spared to moderate and give tone to the activity of the former. But instead of this, the prematurely intelligent child is generally sent to school, and tasked with lessons at an unusually early age, while the healthy but more backward boy, who requires to be stimulated, is kept at home in idleness merely on account of his backwardness. A double error is here committed, and the consequences to the active-minded boy are not unfrequently the permanent loss both of health and of his envied superiority of intellect.

In speaking of children of this description, Dr. Brigham, in an excellent little work on the influence of mental excitement on health, remarks as follows: "Dangerous forms of scrofulous disease among children have repeatedly fallen under my observation, for which I could not account in any other way than by supposing that the brain had been excited at the expense of the other parts of the system, and at a time in life when nature is endeavoring to perfect all the organs of the body; and after the disease commenced, I have seen, with grief, the influence of the same cause in r.e.t.a.r.ding or preventing recovery. I have seen several affecting and melancholy instances of children, five or six years of age, lingering a while with diseases from which those less gifted readily recover, and at last dying, notwithstanding the utmost efforts to restore them. During their sickness they constantly manifested a pa.s.sion for books and mental excitement, and were admired for the maturity of their minds. The chance for the recovery of such precocious children is, in my opinion, small when attacked by disease; and several medical men have informed me that their own observations had led them to form the same opinion, and have remarked that, in two cases of sickness, if one of the patients was a child of superior and highly-cultivated mental powers, and the other one equally sick, but whose mind had not been excited by study, they should feel less confident of the recovery of the former than of the latter. This mental precocity results from an unnatural development of one organ of the body at the expense of the const.i.tution."

There can be little doubt but that ignorance on the part of parents and teachers is the princ.i.p.al cause that leads to the too early and excessive cultivation of the minds of children, and especially of such as are precocious and delicate. Hence the necessity of imparting instruction on this subject to both parents and teachers, and to all persons who are in any way charged with the care and education of the young. This necessity becomes the more imperative from the fact that the cupidity of authors and publishers has led to the preparation of "children's books," many of which are announced as purposely prepared "for children from _two_ to _three_ years old!" I might instance advertis.e.m.e.nts of "Infant Manuals" of Botany, Geometry, and Astronomy!

In not a few isolated families, but in many neighborhoods, villages, and cities, in various parts of the country, children _under three years of age_ are not only required to commit to memory many verses, texts of Scripture, and stories, but are frequently sent to school for six hours a day. Few children are kept back later than the age of _four_, unless they reside a great distance from school, and some not even then. At home, too, they are induced by all sorts of excitement to learn additional tasks, or peruse juvenile books and magazines, till the nervous system becomes enfeebled and the health broken. "I have myself,"

says Dr. Brigham, "seen many children who are supposed to possess almost miraculous mental powers, experiencing these effects and sinking under them. Some of them died early, when but six or eight years of age, but manifested to the last a maturity of understanding, which only increased the agony of separation. Their minds, like some of the fairest flowers, were 'no sooner blown than blasted;' others have grown up to manhood, but with feeble bodies and disordered nervous system, which subjected them to hypochondriasis, dyspepsy, and all the Protean forms of nervous disease; others of the cla.s.s of early prodigies exhibit in manhood but small mental powers, and are the mere pa.s.sive instruments of those who in early life were accounted far their inferiors."

This hot-bed system of education is not confined to the United States, but is practiced less or more in all civilized countries. Dr. Combe, of Scotland, gives an account of one of these early prodigies whose fate he witnessed. The circ.u.mstances were exactly such as those above described.

The prematurely developed intellect was admired, and constantly stimulated by injudicious praise, and by daily exhibition to every visitor who chanced to call. Entertaining books were thrown in its way, reading by the fireside encouraged, play and exercise neglected, the diet allowed to be full and heating, and the appet.i.te pampered by every delicacy. The results were the speedy deterioration of a weak const.i.tution, a high degree of nervous sensibility, deranged digestion, disordered bowels, defective nutrition, and, lastly, _death_, at the very time when the interest excited by the mental precocity was at its height.

Such, however, is the ignorance of the majority of parents and teachers on all physiological subjects, that when one of these infant prodigies dies from erroneous treatment, it is not unusual to publish a memoir of his life, that other parents and teachers may see by what means such transcendent qualities were called forth. Dr. Brigham refers to a memoir of this kind, in which the history of a child, aged four years and eleven months, is narrated as approved by "several judicious persons, ministers and others, all of whom united in the request that it might be published, and all agreed in the opinion that a knowledge of the manner in which the child was treated, together with the results, would be profitable to both parents and children, and a benefit to the cause of education." This infant philosopher was "taught hymns before he could speak plainly;" "reasoned with" and constantly instructed until his last illness, which, "_without any a.s.signable cause_," put on a violent and unexpected form, and carried him off!

As a _warning to others_ not to force education too soon or too fast, this case may be truly profitable to both parents and children, and a benefit to the cause of education; but _as an example to be followed_, it a.s.suredly can not be too strongly or too loudly condemned. While I speak thus strongly, I am ready to admit that infant schools in which physical health and moral training are duly attended to are excellent inst.i.tutions, and are particularly advantageous where parents, from want of leisure or from other causes, are unable to bestow upon their children that attention which their tender years require.

In youth, too, much mischief is done by the long daily periods of attendance at school, and the continued application of mind which the ordinary system of education requires. The law of exercise already more than once repeated, that _long-sustained action exhausts the vital powers of an organ_, applies as well to the brain as to the muscles.

Hence the necessity of varying the occupations of the young, and allowing frequent intervals of active exercise in the open air, instead of enforcing the continued confinement now so common. This exclusive attention to mental culture fails, as might be expected, even in its essential object; for all experience shows that, with a rational distribution of employment and exercise, a child will make greater progress in a given period than in double the time employed in continuous mental exertion. If the human being were made up of nothing but a brain and nervous system, we might do well to content ourselves with sedentary pursuits, and to confine our attention entirely to the mind. But when we learn from observation that we have numerous other important organs of motion, sanguification, digestion, circulation, and nutrition, all demanding exercise in the open air, as alike essential to their own health and to that of the nervous system, it is worse than folly to shut our eyes to the truth, and to act as if we could, by denying it, alter the const.i.tution of nature, and thereby escape the consequences of our own misconduct.

Reason and experience being thus set at naught by both parents and teachers in the education of their children, young people naturally grow up with the notion that no such influences as the laws of organization exist, and that they may follow any course of life which inclination leads them to prefer without injury to health, provided they avoid what is called dissipation. It is owing to this ignorance that young men of a studious or literary habit enter heedlessly upon an amount of mental exertion, unalleviated by bodily exercise or intervals of repose, which is quite incompatible with the continued enjoyment of a sound mind in a sound body. Such, however, is the effect of the total neglect of all instruction in the laws of the organic frame during early education, that it becomes almost impossible effectually to warn an ardent student against the dangers to which he is constantly exposing himself. Nothing but actual experience will convince him of the truth.

Numerous are the instances in which young men of the first promise have almost totally disqualified themselves for future useful exertion in consequence of long-protracted and severe study, who, under a more rational system of education, might have attained that eminence, the injudicious pursuit of which has defeated their own most cherished hopes, and ruined their general health. Such persons might be saved to themselves and to society by early instruction in the nature and laws of the animal economy. They mean well, but err from ignorance more than from headstrong zeal.

I shall conclude this chapter with a few rules relating to mental exercise, and the development and culture of the mind and brain. It is a law of the animal economy that two cla.s.ses of functions can not be called into vigorous action at the same time without one or the other, or both, sooner or later sustaining injury. Hence the important rule never to enter upon continued mental exertion or to rouse deep feeling immediately after a full meal, otherwise the activity of the brain is sure to interfere with that of the stomach, and disorder its functions.

Even in a perfectly healthy person, unwelcome news, sudden anxiety, or mental excitement, occurring after eating, will put an entire stop to digestion, and cause the stomach to loathe the sight of food. In accordance with this rule, we learn by experience that the very worst forms of indigestion and nervous depression are those which arise from excessive mental application, or turmoil of feeling and distraction of mind, conjoined with unrestrained indulgence in the pleasures of the table. In such circ.u.mstances, the stomach and brain react upon and disturb each other, till all the horrors of nervous disease make their unwelcome appearance, and render life miserable. The tendency to inactivity and sleep, which besets most animals after a full meal, shows repose to be, in such circ.u.mstances, the evident intention of Nature.

The bad effects of violating this rule, although not in all cases immediately apparent, will most a.s.suredly be manifest at a period less or more remote.

Dr. Caldwell, who has devoted much time and talent to the diffusion of sound physiological information and the general improvement of the race, and whose opportunities of observation have been very extensive, expressly states, that dyspepsy and madness prevail more extensively in the United States than among the people of any other nation. Of the amount of our dyspeptics, he says, no estimate can be formed; but it is immense. Whether we inquire in cities, towns, villages, or country places; among the rich, the poor, or those in moderate circ.u.mstances, we find dyspepsy more or less prevalent throughout the land.

The early part of the day is the best time for severe mental exertion.

Nature has allotted the darkness of night for repose, and for the restoration by sleep of the exhausted energies of both body and mind. If study or composition be ardently engaged in toward the close of the day, and especially at a late hour of the evening, sound and invigorating sleep may not be expected until the night is far spent, for the increased action of the brain which always accompanies activity of mind requires a long time to subside. Persons who practice night study, if they be at all of an irritable habit of body, will be sleepless for hours after going to bed, and be tormented perhaps by unpleasant dreams, which will render their sleep unrefres.h.i.+ng. If this practice be long continued, the want of refres.h.i.+ng repose will ultimately induce a state of morbid irritability of the nervous system bordering on insanity. It is therefore of great advantage to engage in severer studies early in the day, and to devote the after part of the day and the evening to less intense application. It will be well to devote a portion of the evening, and especially the latter part of it, to light reading, music, or cheerful and amusing conversation. The excitement induced in the brain by previous study will be soothed by these influences, and will more readily subside, and sound and refres.h.i.+ng sleep will be much more likely to follow. This rule is of the utmost importance to those who are obliged to perform a great amount of mental labor. It is only by conforming to it, and devoting their mornings to study and their evenings to relaxation, that many of our most prolific writers have been enabled to preserve their health. By neglecting this rule, others of the fairest promise have been cut down in the midst of their usefulness.

Regularity is of great importance in the development and culture of the moral and intellectual powers, the tendency to resume the same mode of action at stated times being peculiarly the characteristic of the nervous system. It is this principle of our nature which promotes the formation of what are called habits. By repeating any kind of mental effort every day at the same hour, we at length find ourselves entering upon it, without premeditation, when the time approaches. In like manner, by arranging our studies in accordance with this law, and taking up each regularly in the same order, a natural apt.i.tude is soon produced, which renders application more easy than it would be were we to take up the subjects as accident might dictate. The tendency to periodical and a.s.sociated activity sometimes becomes so strong, that the faculties seem to go through their operations almost without conscious effort, while their facility of action becomes so much increased as ultimately to give unerring certainty where at first great difficulty was experienced. It is not so much the soul or abstract principle of mind which is thus changed, as the organic medium through which mind is destined to act in the present mode of being.

The necessity of judicious repet.i.tion in mental and moral education is, in fact, too little adverted to, because the principle on which it is effectual has not hitherto been generally understood. Practice is as necessary to induce facility of action in the organs of the mind as in those of motion. The idea or feeling must not only be communicated, but it must be represented and reproduced in different forms till all the faculties concerned in understanding it come to work efficiently together in the conception of it, and until a sufficient impression is made upon the organ of mind to enable the latter to retain it. Servants and others are frequently blamed for not doing a thing at regular intervals when they have been but once told to do so. We learn, however, from the organic laws, that it is presumptuous to expect the formation of a habit from a single act, and that we must reproduce the a.s.sociated activity of the requisite faculties many times before the result will certainly follow, just as we must repeat the movement in dancing or skating many times before we become master of it.

We may understand a new subject by a single perusal, but we can fully master it only by dwelling upon it again and again. In order to make a durable impression on the mind, repet.i.tion is necessary. It follows, hence, that in learning a language or science, six successive months of application will be more effectual in fixing it indelibly in the mind, and making it a part of the mental furniture, than double or even treble the time if the lessons are interrupted by long intervals. The too common practice of beginning a study, and, after pursuing it a little time, leaving it to be completed at a later period, is unphilosophical and very injurious. The fatigue of study is thus doubled, and the success greatly diminished. Studies should not, as a general thing, be entered upon until the mind is sufficiently mature to understand them thoroughly, and, when begun, they should not be discontinued until they are completely mastered. By this means the mind becomes accustomed to sound and healthy action, which alone can qualify the student for eminent usefulness in after life. Much of the want of success in the various departments of industry, and many of the failures that are constantly occurring among business men, are justly attributable to the fits of attention and the irregular modes of study they became habituated to in their school-boy days. Hence the mischief of long vacations, and the evil of beginning studies before the age at which they may be understood. Parents and teachers should hence, at an early period, impress indelibly upon the minds of their children and pupils the ever true and practical sentiment, that _what is worth doing at all is worth doing well_. Although, at first, their progress may _seem_ to be r.e.t.a.r.ded thereby, still, in the end, it will contribute greatly to accelerate their real advancement, and in after life, whether employed in literary or business pursuits, will be a means of augmenting their happiness and increasing their prospect of success in whatever department of labor they may be engaged.

In physical education most persons seem well aware of the advantages of repet.i.tion. They know, for instance, that if practice in dancing, fencing, skating, and riding is persevered in for a sufficient length of time to give the muscles the requisite prompt.i.tude and harmony of action, the power will be ever afterward retained, although rarely called into use. But if we stop short of this point, we may reiterate practice by fits and starts without any proportional advancement. The same principle is equally applicable to the moral and intellectual powers which operate by means of material organs.

The impossibility of successfully playing the hypocrite for any considerable length of time, and the necessity of being in private what we wish to appear in public, spring from the same rule. If we wish to be ourselves polite, just, kind, and sociable, or to induce others to become so, we must act habitually under the influence of the corresponding sentiments, in the domestic circle, in the school-room, and in every-day life, as well as in the company of strangers and on great occasions. It is the private and daily practice of individuals that gives ready activity to the sentiments and marks the real character. If parents or teachers indulge habitually in vulgarities of speech and behavior in the family or in the school, and put on politeness occasionally for the reception and entertainment of strangers, their true character will s.h.i.+ne through the mask which is intended to conceal it. The habitual a.s.sociation to which the organs and faculties have been accustomed can not thus be controlled. Parents hence, in addition to correct personal influence in the family, should provide for their children teachers whose habits and character are in all respects what they are willing their children should form. If they neglect to do this, the utmost they can reasonably expect is that their children will become what the teacher is.

The principle that repet.i.tion is necessary in order to make a durable impression on the organ of the mind, and thus const.i.tute a mental habit, explains how natural endowments are modified by external situation. The extent to which this modification may be carried, and is actually carried in every community, is much greater than most persons are aware of. Take a child, for example, of average propensities, sentiments, and intellect, and place him among a cla.s.s of people in whom the selfish faculties are exclusively exercised--a cla.s.s who regard gain as the end of life, and look upon cunning and cheating as legitimate means, and who never express disapprobation or moral indignation against either crime or selfishness--and his lower faculties, being exclusively exercised, will increase in strength, while the higher ones, remaining unemployed, will become enfeebled. A child thus situated will, consequently, not only act as those around him do, but insensibly grow up resembling them in disposition and character; for, by the law of repet.i.tion, the organs of the selfish qualities will have acquired proportionally greater apt.i.tude and vigor, just as do the muscles of the fencer or dancer. But suppose the same individual placed, _from infancy_, in the society of a superiorly endowed moral and intellectual people, the moral faculties will then be habitually excited, and their organs invigorated by repet.i.tion, till a greater apt.i.tude will be induced in them, or, in other words, till a higher moral character will be formed. The natural endowments of individuals set limits to these modifications of character; but where original dispositions and tendencies are not strongly marked, the range is very wide.

In the cultivation of the brain and mental faculties, each organ should be exercised directly upon its own appropriate objects, and not merely roused or addressed through the medium of another organ. When we wish to teach the graceful and rapid evolutions of fencing, we do not content ourselves with merely giving directions, but our chief attention is employed in making the muscles themselves go through the evolutions, till, by frequent repet.i.tion and correction, they acquire the requisite quickness and precision of action. So, when we wish to teach music, we do not merely address the understanding and explain the qualities of sounds. We train the ear to an attentive discrimination of these sounds, and the hand or the vocal organs, as the case may be, to the reproduction of the motions which call them into existence. We follow this plan, because the laws of organization require the direct practice of the organs concerned, and we feel instinctively that we can succeed only by obeying these laws. The purely mental faculties are connected during life with material organs, and are hence subjected to precisely the same laws. If, therefore, we wish to improve these faculties--the reasoning powers, for example--we must exercise them regularly in tracing the cause and relations of things. In like manner, if our aim is the development of the sentiments of attachment, benevolence, justice, or respect, we must exercise each of them directly and for its own sake, otherwise neither it nor its organ will ever acquire prompt.i.tude or strength.

It is the brain, or organ of the mind, more than the abstract immaterial principle itself, that requires cultivation, or can, indeed, receive it in this life. Education hence operates invariably in subjection to the laws of organization. In improving the _external_ senses, we admit this principle readily enough; but when we come to the _internal_ faculties of thought and feeling, it is either denied or neglected. That the superior quickness of touch, sight, and hearing, consequent upon judicious exercise, is referable to increased facility of action in their appropriate organs, is readily admitted. But when we explain, on the same principle, the superior development of the reasoning powers, or the greater warmth of feeling produced by similar exercise in these and other internal faculties, few are inclined to listen to our proposition, or allow to it half the weight or attention its importance demands, although every fact in philosophy and experience concurs in supporting it. We see the mental powers of feeling and of thought unfolding themselves in infancy and youth in exact accordance with the progress of the organization. We see them perverted or suspended by the sudden inroad of disease. We sometimes observe every previous acquirement obliterated from the adult mind by fever or by accident, leaving education to be commenced anew, as if it had never been; and yet, with all these evidences of the organic influence, the proposition that the established laws of physiology, as applied to the brain, should be considered our best and surest guide in education, seems to many a novelty. Among the numerous treatises on education, there are very few volumes in which it is even hinted that these laws have the slightest influence over either intellectual or moral improvement.

As G.o.d has given us bones and muscles, and blood-vessels and nerves, for the purpose of being used, let us not despise the gift, but consent at once to turn them to account, and to reap health and vigor as the reward which he has a.s.sociated with moderate labor. As he has given us lungs to breathe with and blood to circulate, let us at once and forever abandon the folly of shutting ourselves up with little intermission, whether engaged in study or other sedentary occupations, and consent to inhale, copiously and freely, that wholesome atmosphere which his benevolence has spread around us in such rich profusion. As he has given us appet.i.tes and organs of digestion, let us profit by his bounty, and earn their enjoyment by healthful exercise in some department of productive industry. As he has given us a moral and a social nature, which is invigorated by activity, and impaired by solitude and restraint, let us cultivate good feelings, and act toward each other on principles of kindness, justice, forbearance, and mutual a.s.sistance; and as he has given us intellect, let us exercise it in seeking a knowledge of his works and of his laws, and in tracing out the relation in which we stand toward him, toward our fellow-men, and toward the various objects of the external world. In so doing, we may be well a.s.sured we shall find a reward a thousand times more rich and pure, yea, infinitely more delightful and enduring, than we can hope to experience in following our own blind devices, regardless of his will and benevolent intentions toward us.

CHAPTER VI.

THE EDUCATION OF THE FIVE SENSES.