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We usually endeavour to turn it to account by giving it a profitable direction, instead of letting it run to waste or something worse. It expends itself in a longer or a shorter time, but, while any portion of it remains, exertion is not burdensome.

Although the spontaneous flow of activity is best displayed and is most intelligible in the department of muscular exercise, it applies also to the senses and the nerves, and comprises mental action as well as bodily. The intellectual strain of attention, of volition, of memory, and of thought, proceeds to a certain length by mere fulness of power, after rest and renovation; and may be counted on to this extent as involving nothing essentially toilsome. Here, too, a good direction is all that is wanted to make a profitable result.

The activity thus assumed as independent of feeling is nevertheless accompanied with feeling, and that feeling is essentially pleasurable: the pleasure being greatest at first. The presence of pleasure is the standing motive to action; and all the natural activity of the system whether muscular or nervous brings an effluence of pleasure, until a certain point of depletion is arrived at.

If, further, our activity is employed productively, or in yielding any gratification beyond the mere exercise, this is so much added to the pleasures of action. When, besides the delight of intellectual exercise, we obtain for ourselves the gratification of fresh knowledge, we seem to attain the full pleasure due to the employment of the intellect.

Much more, however, is meant by the gratification of the self-activity of the learner. That expression

points to the acquiring of knowledge, as little as possible by direct communication, and as much as possible by the mind's own exertion in working it out from the raw materials. We are to place the pupil as nearly as may be in the track of the first discoverer, and thus impart the stimulus of invention, with the accompanying outburst of self-gratulation and triumph. This bold fiction is sometimes put forward as one of the regular arts of the teacher; but I should prefer to consider it as an extraordinary device, admissible only on special

occasions.

It is an obvious defect in teaching to keep continually lecturing pupils, without asking them in turn to reproduce and apply what is said. This is no doubt a sin against the pupil's self-activity, but rather in the manner than in the fact. Listening and imbibing constitute a mode of activity; only it may be overdone in being out of proportion to the other exercises requisite for fixing our knowledge. When these other activities are fairly plied, the pupil may have a certain complacent satisfaction in his or her own efficiency as a learner, and this is a fair and legitimate reward to an apt pupil. It does not assume any independent self-sufficiency; it merely supposes an adequate comprehension and a faithful reproduction of the knowledge communicated. The praise or approbation of the master, and of others interested, is a superadded reward.

Notwithstanding, there still remains, if we could command it, a tenfold power in the feeling of origination, invention, or creation; but as this can hardly ever be actual, the suggestion is to give it in fiction or imagination. Now, it is one of the delicate arts of an accom

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plished instructor, to lay before the pupils a set of facts pointing to a conclusion, and to leave them to draw the conclusion for themselves. Exactly to hit the mean between a leap too small to have any merit, and one too wide for the ordinary pupil, is a fine adjustment and a great success. All this, however, belongs to the occasional luxuries, the bon-bons of teaching, and cannot be included under the daily routine.

It is to be borne in mind that although the pride of origination is a motive of extraordinary power, and in some minds surpasses every other motive, and has a great charm even in a fictitious example, yet it is not in all minds the only extraneous motive that may aid the teacher. There is a counter motive of sympathy, affection, and admiration for superior wisdom, which operates in the other direction; giving a zest in receiving and imbibing to the letter what is imparted, and jealously restraining any independent exercise of judgment such as would share the credit with the instructor. This tendency is no doubt liable to run into slavishness and to favour the perpetuation of error and the stagnation of the human mind; but a certain measure of it is only becoming the attitude of a learner. It accompanies a proper sense of what is the fact, namely, that the learner is a learner and not a teacher or a discoverer, and has to receive a great deal with mere passive acquiescence, before venturing to suggest any improvements. Unreasoning blind faith is indispensable in beginning any art or science; the pupil has to lay up a stock of notions before having any materials for discovery or origination. There is a right moment for relaxing this attitude, and for assuming the exercise of

independence; but it has scarcely arrived while the schoolmaster is still at work. Even in the higher walks of university teaching, independence is premature, unless in some exceptional minds, and the attempt of masters to proceed upon it, and to invite the free criticism of pupils, does not appear ever to have been very fruitful.1

The Emotions of Fine Art.

This is necessarily a wide subject, but for our purpose a few select points will be enough. The proper and principal end of Art is enjoyment. Now, whatever is able to contribute on the great scale to our enjoyment, is a power over all that we do. The bearings of this on

education are to be seen.

The Art Emotions are seldom looked upon as a mere source of enjoyment. They are apt to be regarded in preference as a moral power, and an aid to education at every point. Nevertheless, we should commence with

It would lead us too far, although it might not be uninstructive, to reflect upon the evil side of this fondness for giving a new and self-suggested cast to all received knowledge. It introduces change for the mere sake of change and never lets well alone. It multiplies variations of form and phraseology for expressing the same facts, and so renders all subjects more perplexed than they need be; not to speak of controverting what is established, because it is established, and allowing nothing ever to settle. Owing to a dread of the feverish love of change, certain works that have accidentally received an ascendancy, such as the Elements of Euclid, are retained notwithstanding their imperfections. The acquiescent multitude of minds regard this as a less evil than letting loose the men of action and revolution to vie with each other in distracting alterations, while there is no judicial power to hold the balance. It is a received maxim in the tactics of

legislation that no scheme, however well matured, can pass a popular body without amendment; it is not in collective human nature to accept anything simpliciter, without having a finger in the pie.

recognizing in them a means of pleasure as such, a pure hedonic factor; in which capacity they are a final end. Their function in intellectual education is the function of all pleasure when not too great, namely, to cheer, refresh, and encourage us in our work.

There are certain general effects of Art that come in well at the very beginning. Such are symmetry, order, rhythm, and simple design and proportion; which are the adjuncts of the school, just as they should be the adjuncts of home life. Proportion, simple design, a certain amount of colour, are the suitable elements of the school interior; to which are added tidiness, neatness, and arrangement, among the pupils themselves; only this must not be worrying and oppressive.

In the exercises suited to infants, Time and Rhythm are largely employed.

Of all the fine arts, the most available, universal and influential is Music. This is perhaps the most unexceptionable, as well as the cheapest, of human pleasures. It has been seized upon with avidity by the human race in all times; so much so, that we wonder how life could ever have been passed without it. In the earlier stages, it was united with Poetry, and the poetical element was of equal, if not of greater, power than the musical accompaniment. As the ethical instructors of mankind have always disavowed the pursuit of pleasure as such, and allowed it only as subsidiary to morality and social duty, the question with legislators has been what form of music is best calculated to educe the moral virtues and the nobler characteristics of the mind. It was this view that entered into the speculative social constructions of Plato and of Aristotle. Now, undoubtedly the various