as the soul, and nothing else is such. I remember, continued he, my tutor used to say, “That the great business of education was to teach youth early to distinguish between objects of industry, and objects quite beyond our power, and therefore objects of resignation to the divine will. Till the goddess Minerva, said he, had driven away the mist that overcast the eyes of Diomede,33 and had cleared his sight, his bravery stood him in very little stead, for he could not distinguish between gods and men, but promiscuously attacked whatever opposed him.” We cannot, without long and costly experience, except by the early help of a wise teacher, discern what things are the proper objects of our pursuit, care and industry; and what things nature hath put beyond our power to obtain. Education ought therefore to open the eyes of youth, dispel the mist which hinders us from observing this essential, important difference of things, and thus direct our labour and resolution towards the objects wherein they can have success; and teach and inure us to submit the things above our reach or power to the kind will of heaven, which manages all these to the best end, the greater good of intelligent beings. The former are men’s, i.e. they are human things, things subjected by the laws of our nature to human power and industry: The latter are God’s, i.e. divine things, objects not subjected to our command, but which the divinity hath reserved the disposal of to his own wisdom, that alone can comprehend the universal good the disposition of them is to promote.
STR. The similitude is admirable and full of instruction. For indeed if one does not keep this difference of things in his view, he cannot possibly direct his industry aright; that industry to which, it must be owned, heaven is not niggardly: For, as every thing we do, or can obtain, is done and obtained by it alone, so it hath abundant room to exert itself: It is able to make large conquests, or to acquire a very extensive and glorious dominion, if it be rightly applied and directed.
DAM. You fully comprehend my meaning. And if this be the rule in life, ought it not also to be the rule in education?
STR. It ought, and I can now see, how happy and wise due attendance to it in the instruction and discipline of children would very early make them, with much less trouble to themselves, or their parents and tutors, than the correction of any one passion costs, which, if suffered to prevail, would be of very fatal consequence. I can now see, how the love of liberality, justice, and every virtue, may be early formed in young minds, by practising them in these virtues, and giving them just notions of their beauty and excellence.
DAM. You have yourself laid down the principle that ought always to be kept in view, and by which education should be directed, in your excellent definition of virtue, when you said it consisted in bearing and forbearing as reason dictates. Whence can virtue be in danger but from pleasure or pain? But if that be the case, then to breed virtue in a young mind, can be nothing else but to nurse the habit of hearkening to reason, and of not suffering pain or pleasure to lead us as they will, without controul. Now to do this, it is evident that the mind must be early accustomed to look upon every immoral indulgence as more contrary to nature, and a greater evil than any bodily pain.
STR. Alas! Damocles, how few arrive at this pitch of fortitude!
DAM. And whence is it so rare, but because men are not thus educated, but contrariwise, are taught and inured to prefer bodily pleasure to virtue, and to dread the smallest corporal pain more than the greatest vice? Let us not charge human nature with incapacity of such virtuous strength and resolution, as we have been discoursing of. For upon what pains and dangers do not men rush to gratify avarice, ambition, or revenge? Do not these passions by their strength often get the ascendant of self-love? Or why else do we so often wonder that men should run with their eyes open to their manifest ruin? But if persons can expose themselves to hunger, want of rest, nay, poverty, shame, racking torments, and even to death itself, commonly thought the greatest of evils, in pursuit of some imaginary good, that cannot stand the test of cool examination; how can we pronounce it impossible to beget by proper institution and discipline in young minds, true courage, even that which fears nothing so much as acting contrary to reason and virtue? We know it hath been attained, and that maugre the worst education, the most inveterate evil habits. And we know that falsely directed courage is not uncommon. The human mind must therefore be capable of true fortitude and magnanimity. But, Strephon, you will easily perceive, that in order to form this habit in the mind, children must not on the one hand be taught and inured to look on bodily pain as the greatest evil, or punishment; and therefore they must not be beaten for their faults; nor upon bodily pleasure as the greatest good, as the greatest reward; and therefore bodily gratifications must not be the recompenses of their good behaviour. For such discipline is diametrically opposite to the lesson and habit we have agreed is the main thing.
STR. How then, Damocles, would you have no rewards or punishments used?
DAM. In order to find an answer to this question, you need only ask your own heart, Strephon, what are its motives to good actions? What, for instance, makes you so concerned to do your duty to your son, and to give him a good education; to place more satisfaction in this laborious task, than in the pursuits of pleasure most other fathers indulge themselves in, without any thoughts about, not to say the public, even their own offspring? What motives do you think consistent with virtue?
STR. He alone is truly virtuous, who sincerely abhors moral evil as such, and places his supreme satisfaction in acting conformably to his reason and moral conscience.
DAM. Are there no other motives, which may concur with this principle, that is indeed the genuine spring of truly virtuous deeds?
STR. I know but one, and that is the desire of the esteem and love of wise and good men. This, I think, is very near a-kin to the love of virtue for its own sake, if it be not inseparable from it. It seems to me to grow up and strengthen in the mind, as virtue waxes stronger and more ardent.
DAM. Well then, Strephon, only consider what must be the natural effects of the rewards and punishments we use with children, and you will easily discover what they ought to be. Will not what is used as a reward be esteemed a great good, and what is used as a punishment be esteemed a great evil?
STR. They will, and therefore we ought to employ no rewards which ought not to be considered as goods, and no punishments which ought not to be considered as evils, and be motives.
DAM. What then are we to make use of as motives to excite children to virtue, besides the excellence of virtue and the deformity of vice?
STR. None other but what I have named as the only other motive consistent with virtue, viz. good reputation and disgrace.
DAM. And hath not nature implanted in all young minds a desire of esteem, and a sense of honour and shame, which, if rightly used, are very proper handles for turning children towards the sedulous improvement of their minds in wisdom and virtue?
STR. Of this I am very sensible. But perhaps you may have thought of some other motives besides those named.
DAM. No, Strephon, I know no other but those you have mentioned, duly extended.
STR. What do you mean by the ideas of the excellence of virtue and of good reputation duly extended?
DAM. Extend your thoughts, Strephon, from good men to the Author of all good, the Father and Governor of the universe, and then you will be at no loss to comprehend my meaning. For is not his approbation and love a noble, an invincible incentive34 to steady perseverance in goodness? And if you dwell a little upon this great and comfortable thought, it will quickly lead you to another, which renders the cause of virtue compleatly triumphant, viz. That under his government, virtue must be a perpetual progress from perfection to perfection; and therefore virtue, when arrived by proper culture in this its first state of education and trial, to great maturity, will not be wilfully destroyed, but on the contrary, as it is in its own nature an immortal good, the seed of eternal and never-fading bliss, so it will be taken due care of and properly
