them should do them this Harm to make them think there is any difference between being in the dark and winking you must get it out of their Minds as soon as you can and let them know That God who made all Things good for them made the Night that they might sleep the better and the quieter and that they being under his Protection there is nothing in the dark to hurt them What is to be known more of God and Good Spirits is to be deferr'd till the time we shall hereafter mention and of Evil Spirits 't will be well if you can keep him from wrong Francies about them till he is ripe for that sort of Knowledge § 123. Having laid the Foundations of Vertue in a true Notion of a God such as the Creed wisely teaches as far as his Age is capable and by accustoming him to pray to him The next thing to be taken Care of is to keep him exactly to speaking of Truth and by all the ways imaginable inclining him to be good natur'd Let him know that Twenty Paulâ—s are sooner to be forgiven than the straining of Truth to cover any one by an Excuse And to teach him betimes to love and be good natur'd to others is to lay early the true Foundation of an honest Man All Injustice generally springing from too great Love of our selves and too little of others This is all I shall say of this Matter in general and is enough for laying the first Foundations of Vertue in a Child As he grows up the Tendency of his natural Inclination must be observed which as it inclines him more than is convenient on one or t'other side from the right Path of Vertue ought to have proper Remedies applied For few of Adam's Children are so happy as not to be born with some Byass in their natural Temper which it is the Business of Education either to take off or counter-balance but to enter into the Particulars of this would be beyond the Design of this short Treatise of Education I intend not a Discourse of all the Vertues and Vices and how each Vertue is to be attained and every particular vice by its peculiar Remedies cured Though I have mentioned some of the most ordinary Faults and the ways to be used in correcting them § 133. Wisdom I take in the popular acceptation for a Man's managing his Business ablely and with fore-sight in this World This is the product of a good natural Temper application of Mind and Experience together and not to be taught Children The greatest Thing that in them can be done towards it is to hinder them as much as may be from being Cunning which being the ape of Wisdom is the most distant from it that can be and as an Ape for the likeness it has to a Man wanting what really should make him so is by so much the uglier Cunning is only the want of Understanding which because it cannot compass its ends by direct ways would do it by a Trick and Circumvention and the Mischief of it is a cunning Trick helps but once but hinders ever after No cover was ever made either so big or so fine as to hide its self No Body was ever so cunning as to conceal their being so and when they are once discovered every body is shie every Body distrustful of crafty Men and all the World forwardly joyn to oppose and defeat them Whilst the open fair wise Man has every Body to make way for him and goes directly to his business To accustom a Child to have true Notions of things and not to be satisfied till he has them To raise his Mind to great and worthy Thoughts and to keep him at a distance from falshood and Cunning which has always a broad mixture of Falshood in it is the fittest preparation of a Child for Wisdom which being to be learn'd from Time Experience and Observation and an Acquaintance with Men their Tempers and designs are not to be expected in the ignorance and inadvertency of Childhood or the inconsiderate heats and unwariness of Youth All that can be done towards it during this unripe Age is as I have said to accufrom them to Truth and submission to Reason and as much as may be to reflection on their own Actions § 134. The next good Quality belonging to a Gentleman is good Breeding There are Two Sorts of ill Breeding The one a sheepish Bashfulness and the other a mis-becoming Negligence and Disrespect in our Carriage both which are avoided by duly observing this one Rule Not to think meanly of our selves and not to think meanly of others § 135. The first Part of this Rule must not be understood in opposition to Humility but to assurance We ought not to think so well of our selves as to stand upon our own Value or assume a Preference to others because of any Advantage we may imagine we have over them but Modestly to take what is offered when it is our due But yet we ought to think so well of our selves as to perform those Actions which are incumbent on and expected of us without discomposure or disorder in whose presence soever we are keeping that respect and distance which is due to every one's Rank and Quality There is often in People especially Children a clownish shamefac'dness before Strangers or those above them They are confounded in their Thoughts Words and Looks and so lose themselves in that confusion as not to be able to do any thing or at least not to do it with that freedom and gracefulness which pleases and makes them acceptable The only cure for this as for any other Miscarriage is by use to introduce the contrary Habit. But since we cannot accustom our selves to converse with Strangers and Persons of Quality without being in their company nothing can cure this part of Ill-breeding but change and variety of Company and that of Persons above us § 136. As the before-mentioned consists in too great a concern how to behave our selves towards others so the other part of Ill-breeding lies in the appearance of too little care of pleasing or shewing respect to those we have to do with To avoid these two things are requisite First a disposition of the Mind not to offend others and secondly the most acceptable and agreeable way of expressing that Disposition From the one Men are called Civil from the other Well fashion'd The latter of these is that decency and gracefullness of Looks Voice Words Motions Gestures and of all the whole outward Demeanour which pleases in Company and makes those easie and delighted whom we Converse with This is as it were the Language whereby that internal Civility of the Mind is expressed and being very much governed by the Fashion and Custom of every Country as other Languages are must in the Rules and Practice of it be learn'd chiefly from observation and the Carriage of those who are allow'd to be exactly well-bred The other
them to be impatient and troublesome by rewarding them for it when they are so § 39. Those therefore that intend ever to govern their Children should begin it whilst they are very little and look that they perfectly comply with the will of their Parents Would you have your Son obedient to you when past a Child Be sure then to establish the Authority of a Father as soon as he is capable of Submission and can understand in whose Power he is If you would have him stand in awe of you imprint it in his Infancy and as he approaches more to a Man admit him nearer to your Familiarity so shall you have him your obedient Subject as is fit whilst he is a Child and your affectionate Friend when he is a Man For methinks they mightily misplace the Treatment due to their Children who are indulgent and familiar when they are little but severe to them and keep them at a distance when they are grown up For Liberty and Indulgence can do no good to Children their Want of Judgment makes them stand in need of Restraint and Discipline And on the contrary Imperiousness and Severity is but an ill Way of Treating Men who have Reason of their own to guide them unless you have a Mind to make your Children when grown up weary of you and secretly to say within themselves When will you die Father § 40. I imagine every one will judge it reasonable that their Children when little should look upon their Parents as their Lords their Absolute Governors and as such stand in awe of them And that when they come to riper Years they should look on them as their best as their only sure Friends and as such love and reverence them The Way I have mentioned if I mistake not is the only one to obtain this We must look upon our Children when grown up to be like our selves with the same Passions the same Desires We would be thought Rational Creatures and have our Freedom we love not to be uneasie under constant Rebukes and Brow-beatings nor can we bear severe Humours and great Distance in those we converse with Whoever has such Treatment when he is a Man will look out other Company other Friends other Conversation with whom he can be at Ease If therefore a strict Hand be kept over Children from the Beginning they will in that Age be tractable and quietly submit to it as never having known any other And if as they grow up to the Use of Reason the Rigour of Government be as they deserve it gently relaxed the Father's Brow be more smooth to them and the Distance by Degrees abated his former Restraints will increase their Love when they find it was only a Kindness to them and a Care to make them capable to deserve the Pavour of their Parents and the Esteem of every Body else § 41. Thus much for the Setling your Authority over your Children in general Fear and Awe ought to give you the first Power over their Minds and Love and Friendship in riper Years to hold it For the Time must come when they will be past the Rod and Correction and then if the Love of you make them not obedient and dutifull if the Love of Vertue and Reputation keep them not in Laudable Courses I ask What Hold will you have then upon them to turn them to it Indeed Fear of having a scanty Portion if they displease you may make them Slaves to your Estate but they will be never the less ill and wicked in private and that Restraint will not last always Every Man must some Time or other be trusted to himself and his own Conduct and he that is a good a vertuous and able Man must be made so within and therefore what he is to receive from Education what is to sway and influence his Life must be something put into him betimes Habits woven into the very Principles of his Nature and not a counterfeit Carriage and dissembled Out-side put on by Fear only to avoid the present Anger of a Father who perhaps may dis-inherit him § 42. This being laid down in general as the Course ought to be taken 't is fit we now come to consider the Parts of the Discipline to be used a little more particularly I have spoken so much of Carrying a strict Hand over Children that perhaps I shall be suspected of not Considering enough what is due to their tender Ages and Constitutions But that Opinion will vanish when you have heard me a little farther For I am very apt to think that great Severity of Punishment does but very little Good nay great Harm in Education And I believe it will be found that Caeteris paribus those Children who have been most chastised seldom make the best Men. All that I have hitherto contended for is That whatsoever Rigour is necessary it is more to be used the younger Children are and having by a due Application wrought its Effect it is to be relaxed and changed into a milder Sort of Government § 43. A Compliance and Suppleness of their Wills being by a steady Hand introduced by Parents before Children have Memories to retain the Beginnings of it will seem natural to them and work afterwards in them as if it were so preventing all Occasions of Strugling or repining The only Care is That it be begun early and inflexibly kept to till Awe and Respect be grown familiar and there appears not the least Reluctancy in the Submission and ready Obedience of their Minds When this Reverence is once thus established which it must be early or else it will cost pains and Blows to recover it and the more the longer it is deferred 't is by it mixed still with as much Indulgence as they make not an ill Use of and not by Beating Chiding or other Servile Punishments they are for the future to be governed as they grow up to more Understanding § 44. That this is so will be easily allowed when it is but considered what is to be aimed at in an ingenuous Education and upon what it turns 1. He that has not a mastery over his Inclinations he that knows not how to resist the importunity of present Pleasure or Pain for the sake of what Reason tells him is fit to be done wants the true Principle of Vertue and Industry and is in danger never to be good for any thing This Temper therefore so contrary to unguided Nature is to be got betimes and this Habit as the true foundation of future Ability and Happiness is to be wrought into the Mind as early as may be even from the first dawnings of any Knowledge or Apprehension in Children and so to be confirmed in them by all the Care and Ways imaginable by those who have the over-sight of their Education § 45. 2. On the otherside if the Mind be curbed and humbled too much in Children if their Spirits be abased and broken much
Parents and Governors but they should never be offer'd or bestow'd on them as the Rewards of this or that particular Performance that they shew an Aversion to or to which they would not have applied themselves without that Temptation § 53. But if you take away the Rod on one hand and those little Encouragements which they are taken with on the other How then will you say shall Childern be govern'd Remove Hope and Fear and there is an end of all Discipline I grant that Good and Evil Reward and Punishment are the only Motives to a rational Creature these are the Spur and Reins whereby all Mankind are set on work and guided and therefore they are to be made use of to Children too For I advise their Parents and Governors always to carry this in their Minds that they are to be treated as rational Creatures § 54. Rewards I grant and Punishments must be proposed to Children if we intend to work upon them the Mistake I imagine is that those that are generally made use of are ill chosen The Pains and Pleasures of the Body are I think of ill consequence when made the Rewards and Punishments whereby Men would prevail on their Children For they serve but to increase and strengthen those Appetites which 't is our business to subdue and master What principle of Vertue do you lay in a Child if you will redeem his Desires of one Pleasure by the Proposal of another This is but to enlarge his Appetite and instruct it to wander If a Child cries for an unwholsome and dangerous Fruit you purchace his quiet by giving him a less hurtful Sweet-meat this perhaps may preserve his Health but spoils his Mind and sets that farther out of order For here you only change the Object but flatter still his Appetite and allow that must be satisfied Wherein as I have shewed lies the root of the Mischief and till you bring him to be able to bear a denial of that Satisfaction the Child may at present be quiet and orderly but the Disease is not cured By this way of proceeding you foment and cherish in him that which is the Spring from whence all the Evil flows which will be sure on the next occasion to break out again with more violence give him stronger Longings and you more trouble § 55. The Rewards and Punishments then whereby we should keep Children in order are quite of another kind and of that force that when we can get them once to work the business I think is done and the difficulty is over Esteem and Disgrace are of all others the most powerful incentives to the Mind when once it is brought to relish them If you can once get into Children a love of Credit and an apprehension of Shame and Disgrace you have put into them the true Principle which will constantly work and incline them to the right But it will be asked how shall this be done I confess it does not at first appearance want some difficulty but yet I think it worth our while to seek the ways and practise them when found to attain this which I look on as the great Secret of Education § 56. First Children earlier perhaps than we think are very sensible of Praise and Commendation They find a Pleasure in being esteemed and valued especially by their Parents and those whom they depend on If therefore the Father caress and commend them when they do well shew a cold and neglectful Countenance to them upon doing ill And this accompanied by a like Carriage of the Mother and all others that are about them it will in a little Time make them sensible of the Difference and this if constantly observed I doubt not but will of it self work more than Threats or Blows which lose their Force when once grown common and are of no use when Shame does not attend them and therefore are to be forborn and never to be used but in the Case hereafter mentioned when it is brought to Extremity § 57. But Secondly To make the Sense of Esteem or Disgrace sink the deeper and be of the more weight other agreeable or disagreeable Things should constantly accompany these different States not as particular Rewards and Punishments of this or that particular Action but as necessarily belonging to and constantly attending one who by his Carriage has brought himself into a State of Disgrace or Commendation By which Way of Treating them Children may as much as possible be brought to conceive that those that are commended and in Esteem for doing well will necessarily be beloved and cherished by every Body and have all other good Things as a Consequence of it And on the other Side when any one by Miscarriage falls into Dis-esteem and cares not to preserve his Credit he will unavoidably fall under Neglect and Contempt and in that State the Want of what ever might satisfie or delight him will follow In this way the Objects of their Desires are made assisting to Vertue when a setled Experience from the beginning teaches Children that the Things they delight in belong to and are to be enjoyed by those only who are in a State of Reputation If by these Means you can come once to shame them out of their Faults for besides that I would willingly have no Punishment and make them in love with the Pleasure of being well thought on you may turn them as you please and they will be in love with all the Ways of Vertue § 58. The great Difficulty here is I imagine from the Folly and Perverseness of Servants who are hardly to be hinder'd from crossing herein the Design of the Father and Mother Children discountenanced by their Parents for any Fault find usually a Remedy and Retreat in the Caresses of those foolish Flatterers who thereby undo whatever the Parents endeavour to establish When the Father or Mother looks sowre on the Child every Body else should put on the same Carriage to him and no Body give him Countenance till Forgiveness asked and a contrary Carriage restored him to his Esteem and former Credit again If this were constantly observed I guess there would be little need of Blows or Chiding Their own Ease and Satisfaction would quickly teach Children to court Commendation and avoid doing that which they found every Body condemned and they were sure to suffer for without being chid or beaten This would teach them Modesty and Shame and they would quickly come to have a natural Abhorrence for that which they found made them slighted and neglected by every Body But how this Inconvenience from Servants is to be remedied I can only leave to Parents Care and Consideration only I think it of great Importance and they are very happy who can get discreet People about their Children § 59. Frequent Beating or Chiding is therefore carefully to be avoided because it never produces any Good farther than it serves to raise Shame and Abhorrence of the Miscarriage that brought
for Health but dangerous to the Life The confidence of it being apt to engage in Quarrels those that think they have some Skill and to make them more touchy than needs on Points of Honour and slight Occasions Young Men in their warm Blood are forward to think they have in vain learned to Fence if they never shew their Skill and Courage in a Duel and they seem to have Reason But how many sad Tragedies that Reason has been the Occasion of the Tears of many a Mother can witness A Man that cannot Fence will be the more careful to keep out of Bullies and Gamesters Company and will not be half so apt to stand upon Punctilio's nor to give Affronts or fiercely justifie them when given which is that which usually makes the Quarrel And when a Man is in the Field a moderate Skill in Fencing rather exposes him to the Sword of his Enemy than secures him from it And certainly a Man of Courage who cannot Fence at all and therefore will put all upon one thrust and not stand parrying has the odds against a moderate Fencer especially if he has Skill in Wrestling and therefore if any Provision be to be made against such Accidents and a Man be to prepare his Son for Duels I had much rather mine should be a good Wrestler than an ordinary Fencer which is the most a Gentleman can attain to in it unless he will be constantly in the Fencing-School and every Day exercising But since Fencing and Riding the great Horse are so generally looked upon as necessary Qualifications in the breeding of a Gentleman it will be hard wholly to deny any one of that rank these Marks of Distinction I shall leave it therefore to the Father to consider how far the Temper of his Son and the Station he is like to be in will allow or incourage him to comply with Fashions which having very little to do with civil Life were yet formerly unknown to the most Warlike Nations and seem to have added little of Force or Courage to those who have received them unless we will think Martial Skill or Prowess have been improved by Duelling with which Fencing came into and with which I presume it will go out of the World § 188. These are my present Thoughts concerning Learning and Accomplishments The great Business of all is Vertue and Wisdom Nullum numen abest si sit prudentia Teach him to get a Mastery over his Inclinations and submit his Appetite to Reason This being obtained and by constant practice settled into Habit the hardest part of the Task is over To bring a young Man to this I know nothing which so much contributes as the love of Praise and Commendation which should therefore be instilled into him by all Arts imaginable Make his Mind as sensible of Credit and Shame as may be And when you have done that you have put a Principle into him which will influence his Actions when you are not by to which the fear of a little smart of a Rod is not comparable and which will be the proper Stock whereon afterwards to graft the true Principles of Morality and Religion § 189. I have one Thing more to add which as soon as I mention I shall run the danger to be suspected to have forgot what I am about and what I have above written concerning Education which has all tended towards a Gentleman's Calling with which a Trade seems wholly to be inconsistent And yet I cannot forbear to say I would have him learn a Trade a Manual Trade nay two or three but one more particularly § 190. The busy Inclination of Children being always to be directed to some thing that may be useful to them The Advantage may be considered of two Kinds 1. Where the Skill it self that is got by exercise is worth the having Thus Skill not only in Languages and learned Sciences but in Painting Turning Gardening Tempering and Working in Iron and all other useful Arts is worth the having 2. Where the Exercise it self without any other Consideration is necessary or useful for Health Knowledge in some Things is so necessary to be got by Children whilst they are young that some part of their time is to be allotted to their improvement in them though those Imployments contribute nothing at all to their Health Such are Reading and Writing and all other sedentary Studies for the improvement of the Mind and are the unavoidable Business of Gentlemen quite from their Cradles Other Manual Arts which are both got and exercised by Labour do many of them by their Exercise contribute to our Health too especially such as imploy us in the open Air. In these then Health and Improvement may be joyn'd together and of these should some fit ones be chosen to be made the Recreations of one whose chief Business is with Books and Study In this Choice the Age and Inclination of the Person is to be considered and Constraint always to be avoided in bringing him to it For Command and Force may often create but can never cure an Aversion And whatever any one is brought to by compulsion he will leave as soon as he can and be little profited and less recreated by whilst he is at it § 191. That which of all others would please me best would be a Painter were there not an Argument or two against it not easie to be answered First ill Painting is one of the worst things in the World and to attain a tolerable degree of Skill in it requires too much of a Man's Time If he has a natural Inclination to it it will endanger the neglect of all other more useful Studies to give way to that and if he have no inclination to it all the Time Pains and Money shall be employ'd in it will be thrown away to no purpose Another Reason why I am not for Painting in a Gentleman is Because it is a sedentary Recreation which more employs the Mind than the Body A Gentleman 's more serious Employment I look on to be Study and when that demands relaxation and refreshment it should be in some Exercise of the Body which unbends the Thought and confirms the Health and Strength For these two Reasons I am not for Painting § 192. In the next place for a Country-Gentleman I should propose one or rather both these viz. Gardening and working in Wood as a Carpenter Joyner or Turner as being fit and healthy Recreations for a Man of Study or Business For since the Mind endures not to be constantly employ'd in the same Thing or Way and sedentary or studious Men should have some Exercise that at the same time might divert their Minds and employ their Bodies I know none that could do it better for a Country-Gentleman than these two the one of them affording him Exercise when the Weather or Season keeps him from the other Besides that by being skill'd in the one of them he will be