LETTER II.-TO A YOUNG TEACHER.

THE PLEASANTNESS OF TEACHING.

"Most persons," says Sir Walter Scott, "must have witnessed with delight, the joyous burst which attends the dismissing of a village school on a fine summer evening. The buoyant spirit of childhood, repressed with so much difficulty during the tedious hours of discipline, may then be seen to explode, as it were, in shout, and song, and frolic, as the little urchins join in groups on the play-ground, and arrange their matches of sport for the evening. But there is one individual who partakes of the relief afforded by the moment of dismission, whose feelings are not so obvious to the eye of the spectator, or so apt to receive his sympathy. I mean the teacher himself, who, stunned with the hum, and suffocated with the closeness of his school-room, has spent the whole day (himself against a host) in controlling petulance, exciting indifference to action, striving to enliven stupidity, and laboring to soften obstinacy; and whose very powers of

intellect have been confounded by hearing the same dull lesson repeated a hundred times by rote, and only varied by the various blunders of the reciters. If to these mental distresses are added a delicate frame of body, and a mind ambitious of some higher distinction than that of being the tyrant of childhood, the reader may have some slight conception of the relief which a solitary walk in the cool of a fine summer evening affords to the head which has ached, and the nerves which have been shattered, for so many hours, in plying the irksome task of public instruction."

What a picture! The "tyrant of childhood," making his escape from the dulness and noise, the heat and suffocation, the tears and punishment of his wretched empire! Who, with such a prospect before him, would be a school-master? If this touching and graphic description, so true to nature, must be realised by the teacher, what strange' mockery to speak of the pleasantness of teaching! Happily for our purpose, however, it need not be realised; the tyranny and tears, the dulness and distraction, may all be dispensed with; and enjoyments of the highest and purest kind, mutually shared by the teacher and the taught, be made to occupy their places. It is thus with some, and therefore it may be thus with you, and with all. The fact is, there are conditions of happiness in a school, as well as in every

other situation in life; and if these conditions be not observed, neither peace nor comfort can be found within its precincts. Permit me to enumerate some of them.

The first is, ABILITY TO GOVERN BY MORAL MEANS. In a school it is of course necessary to resolve to rule; but this is not all that is necessary. Children are, to a much greater extent than is generally supposed, reasonable and intelligent beings; they are just as much influenced by motives as adults: and they must be governed very much in the same way. Now, if a teacher, disregarding this obvious truth, insists upon ruling simply by the exercise of blind and brute force, he must expect to reap the reward of his folly in the uneasiness, vexation, and perplexity, which such a course will inevitably bring upon him. Nor is this all. By so doing, he at once chokes up the spring of some of the highest enjoyments of which the human mind is susceptible. All men love power, especially moral power. The exercise of this kind of power, or what we call influence, is universally grateful; the intensity, the exquisiteness of the enjoyment depending upon the number of minds which can be influenced; the perfection or dominant character of the influence itself; and the difficulties which have been surmounted, the skill that has been exercised,the amount of mind which has been brought to bear, in its attainment.

Now this particular kind of gratification, the able teacher enjoys in the highest perfection. His school is the field of his enterprise: in proportion to his skill and ingenuity in managing human nature, is the extent of his success; and in that success he finds an immediate and rich reward. To lead, simply by the power of his own mind, a hundred other minds in willing captivity; to turn the very waywardness and restlessness of childhood to the accomplishment of his own matured plans and purposes; and to do all this, without crushing the buoyancy of one spirit, or checking the flow of natural gladness in any one heart, is a triumph and a joy abundantly compensating the toil and care by which it has been effected. These few remarks will sufficiently explain what I understand by the ability to govern by moral means. The whole subject of government will come under notice in my next letter.

The second condition of happiness in a school, is BENEVOLENCE. That was a beautiful saying of Dr. Dwight, "He that makes a little child happier for half an hour is a co-worker with God." It precisely expresses the spirit which pervades the bosom of a happy teacher. I have sometimes observed the working of this heavenly principle under circumstances of greatout ward discourageinent. One wonders that a man should remain where there is so little to cheer him. The reason is obvious. He loves his work just because he

delights in the exercise of the benevolent affections. His school-room is a happy place, because it is the theatre of his good-will,-the place where his kindest and best feelings are developed and exercised. He has emotions there into which "a stranger cannot enter." His relationship to it, is distinct from that which belongs to any other locality. It is his own exclusive domain,-the territory within which his influence is paramount. There, every individual is his distinct charge; and as he seeks to stamp upon each the impress of his own mind and character, he finds his reward in that peculiar blessedness which, by the very constitution of human nature, invariably attends the humblest effort to benefit another.

A third condition of happiness, is UNFLINCH

ING FAITH IN THE EFFICACY OF EARLY INSTRUC

TION AS A MEANS OF MORAL REGENERATION. On this point there should be no misgivings. Whatever others may think, the teacher must be satisfied, that any great moral change in the community, will be mainly effected by the instrumentality of schools; that this is God's appointed way of spreading sacred and salutary influences throughout the whole community. I have known some teachers singularly deficient in this essential characteristic of a good instructor. Instead of rejoicing in the hopes and expectations which attach by eminence to their ministry, you see plainly enough they altogether distrust it. The