The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1847-11-23 00:00:00

SCHOOL PRIZES EMULATION

It will be objected by certain purists in education, that
prizes are injudicious—that they stir up envy, strife, emu-
lation, and discontent—that higher and nobler principles
should be inculcated as motives to exertion—that children
should be taught to learn, because it is their duty and fn-
tare interest to do so, and not at all for the sake of grati-
fying their love of approbation. This has often been said,
and in a country too where the education of the noble and
wealthy is conducted, in a great measure, on this very re-
pudiated principle : where human life is nothing less than
a parpetual struggle for the athla kezineua eu mere—the
prizes so profusely spread before the eyes of the poorest
and the most humble. Such a relegation of the principle
of emulation might be judicious, if it were an object of
public policy to train the people in the apathy of the' an..
cient Peruvians ; but assuredly not so in a country such
as ours. May it not, too, be calculated to cast a shade of
untruthfulness over all our teaching, when a class of mo-
tives are not merely subordinated to others, but wholly
repudiated ; while, at the same time, the characteristic
acuteness of childhood must perceive, that of all around
it, some are entirely, while others are in a great measure,
ruled by these abnegated principles and much-decried
motives. Even were it possible to extinguish the feeling
of emulation, such a course would be objectionable. The
constituent elements of our moral nature were implanted
in us for wise purposes. The perfection of moral action
consists not in their eradication, but in their due subordi-
nation and control. The attempt to eradicate those se-
condary principles, with a view to afford more freedom for
the growth of primary motives, apparently more unexcep-
tionable, is no less unphilosophical than it would be inju-
dicious, if successful : unphilosophical, as subversive of
the due equilibrium of our moral principles, and injudi-
cious, because wherever the attempt has even partially
succeeded, the result has been the excessive predominance
of other secondary principles much more objectionable.
He that would deny the propriety of the influence of such
motives on our actions, should also assert that we ought
not to eat because we are hungry, or drink because we are
thirsty, but on the higher grounds of preserving our
health, and for the sustentation of our bodies. How much
more 'then of true wisdom is there shown in educing she
feelimip. of emulation in childhood ; in training, guiding,
and keeping it within due bounds, than when we endea-
vour to retard its growth by the harsh and nipping frosts
of stern discipline, till at last it shoots forth in all the
rank and late luxuriance of an undisciplined manhood,
unchecked and uncontrolled ; for " life," as it has well
been observed, " is but a competition, or a number of
competitions." Nor is this view less sanctioned by expe-
rience. Are the higher classes, who pass through this or-
deal, more prone to envy, or more jealous of one another
than the poor ? Is it not true that those passions are vi-
rulent in proportion to the lack of education ? It is e,
misapprehension of the truth to infer, that if one class of
motives act upon the mind, even with considerable forcer
all the others become either evanescent or wholly inope-
rative; that if, for example, the love of praise be appealed
to, the principles of duty and obedience can no longer be
heard. This is not so ; for it may be laid down as a me-
taphysically universal proposition, that no one human ac-
tion results from a single motive. Actions are the " mo-
ral resultants," FO to speak, of numerous motives, some
great, others of little force—of some that conspire toge-
ther, of others that are in direct antagonism. It is this
phenomenon which gives to conscience her supremacy ;
for, it every action were the result of a single motive, one
does not well see where would be the opportunity for con-
science to interfere. The very structure of language
proves this ; for what is it to deliberate, but to weigh mo-
tives, to give to each its due moral force. It follows, then,
,that an appeal to one class of motives by no means infers
the suspended action of others. Why, then, may not the
feelings of emulation, of love of praise, be as fairly ap-
pealed to as the more directly selfish feelings of our na-
ture ? Are we at liberty, in our desperate conflict with
ignorance, recklessness, apathy, and vice, to cast from our
hands the ready aid of any instrument not essentially evil
If such views are founded in truth, it will necessarily fol-
low that 'we 'should leave no mode untried to supply in-
centives to exertion. Amongst such, the distribution of
prizes, and other honorary rewards, holds the high dis
tinction which the experience of ages has conferred upon
it, that when judiciously and discreetly managed, it is one
of the most powerful, as well as one of the most exten-
sively useful of those means of inciting to action, which
the nature of man itself has placed in our Pands.—Exa-
, mination the Province of the Stale, by Dr. Jame'
Booth,