children up to men and women. As regards those whose education is superior and protracted, there is a full opportunity for developing power and self-control. How do we give a young man power to fight his way in the world? We put him into a school which teaches only the brain, and only a corner of that. When he is thirty years old, he will, assuredly, not be groaning that his tutors gave him but too imperfect an acquaintance with the Greek lyrists, or Visigothic numismatology; he will probably be wondering (if he is an active American) whether it pays to know all that; and at forty he will have discovered that the one thing which does pay in this life is life itself; that vital force and endurance and a good digestion are what are needed, as much as anything from books, to insure success in life. The President of Harvard College states this more strongly still.

The element of self-control and guidance, in culture, is quite as much a moral as an intellectual one. The boy is taught how to control his hand in writing or playing, his voice in speaking or singing, his organ of language in writing theses. He is not so taught in regard to the use of his moral faculties, his affections, emotions, and passions; nor is he shown how a want of self-control, whether in the form of caprice, indolence, good-nature, affection, or ambition, or even when veiled under the aspect of duty, may take away the half of the value of his talents

and knowledge. Perhaps these remarks would be more forcible if applied to girls and young women, in whom self-restraint is not commonly thought a necessity, and the feelings naturally take the place of reflection.

All that can be said against over-study must be reversed when we speak of moderate and rational study. Overwork ought not to be allowed, on the one hand; and on the other, indolence must not be permitted. It is little to say that study ought not to be allowed to injure the health. We may say much more: it is capable of improving health; and for many persons it is an indispensable means of health. A child who has been kept at suitable tasks unconsciously misses them when they come to an end. Civilized and reading beings (I assume that a civilized, awakened, informed, and interested mind is a desideratum!) must have something for the mind to work upon, or they fret themselves with ennui. Much study may be a weariness to the flesh; it may give dyspepsia by being allowed to encroach on physical duties; but when a person has learned to hold the proper proportion between these two, there is nothing that he finds more conducive to peace, satisfaction, and comfort. This pleasant result always follows when one has accomplished work which he is fitted for; and to deny an individual his intellectual exercise is as truly a damage to the body as is the deprivation of physical ex

ercise. For want of accustomed mental stimulus and work, many a man (it is an old story) has found that his retirement from active business was his deathwarrant.

School-life, however, seems to have some injurious effects on the health and growth of some children. Very often it is not the school that injures a child, but the fact that the child is living in a city and has no place to run out-of-doors. Very often it is not study at all that hurts, but study in hot or close or badly-lighted rooms; or study may be in excess of the powers of the system. Such points as these will receive our present attention.

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CHAPTER II.

EMOTIONAL AND MENTAL STRAIN.

MOTIONAL STRAIN.-Teachers are fully aware

that this is a fluctuating factor in each child, dependent on the weather, fatigue, excitement, and other circumstances.

Of these circumstances, those which affect the equilibrium of power are among the most important. There is a large class of irregular mental or emotional states which are unfavorable to the complete health and steady activity of the mind. The socalled depressing emotions-timidity, despondency, anxiety, and discontent-often interfere with the mental health, producing actual and very marked lowering of the powers of execution. No scholar ought to be allowed to remain under the influence of them. It is the teacher's place to find out the cause, and remove it if possible. In a certain number of cases, they may be due to unkindness or neglect coming from the teacher or the playmates. A neglect to award merited praise either wounds or hardens the one who feels the injustice. Again, all these de

pressed states may be simply a sign of over-work, want of exercise, bad air, want of sleep or food,

etc.

A child must not be spared all that is irksome. Quite the contrary of this, the performance of irksome duty is one of the best lessons taught in school. But it is undesirable that he should feel the object of his study a worthless one, or should find his best efforts unsuccessful. I venture to suggest that, in these respects, the teacher needs as much of our sympathy as the scholar. Too much drudgery is laid upon her in correcting exercises, looking over examination books and papers, making up averages of marks, weekly and monthly reports, and other "school statistics." It is hard and unsatisfactory to have to give hours of the time needed for mental refreshment to the production of a few numerical results, which are probably destined to lie idle on a shelf.

Mental Strain.-There is a great deal of harm done by excessive urging or over-driving of children in school, as the reader must be aware. Yet, on the other hand, there are many scholars whose natures need this urging, and are not properly developed without it. If a given degree of “ pressure seems to the teacher's judgment moderate, how shall it be decided to be excessive by persons who are not witnesses? Who is a better judge than the teacher of