The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1866-09-06
From the Richmond Wing.
Schools, Schoolmasters and
Scholars.

SC0O3aTS.
The newspapers of the South are full
of school advertisements. 1t would seem
that teaching has become the most popu-
lar of pro fessions. The fact is, that hum
dreds of educated people-who, before the
war, had ample-means and lived in luxury
are now driven by necessity to labor,
and they have chosen to make their scho-
lastic acauirements available. If we may
Judge by the number of teachers who OF
fer their services to the public, we are
justified in believing that the youth OF this
generation will not lack educational ad-
.yantages. 1t becomes important to in
ouire into the question as to what is the
true school discipline-that vigorous but
time-honored discipline in which the birch
played SO conspicuous part, and under
which our fathers, many indeed OF our
selves, were reared, or that Democratic,
we may say Radical system, which pro-
ceeds upon the assumption that human
rights are encroached upon, and that
needless degradation is inflicted when an
offending urchin is subjected to corporeal
punishment. To reject the rod, under an
,o7erstrained humanitarianism or false
pride, is, to reject the teachings of the
past and the lessons of the Scriptures {:
tsWhoso spareth the rod spoieth the
child" This doubtless applies to all who
have the training of children-to the
teacher as we'll as the parent-to females
as well as males We deem it proper,
however, to say that in the remarks we
are about to make we refer exclusively
to male schools, leaving the discipline of
what a quaint old English writer Thomas
Fuller) calls 'sshe schools" to bo consid-
cred by others protesting. though, against
the definition which Writer Of the thir-
teenth century gives of the proper educa-
ton of woman, to wit: "Knowlng now
to pray to God, to love man, and to knit
and sew"
NOVEL; constituted person would choose
to have the i'll will of children, and we
would not run the risk of incurring it, or
the displeasure of doting parents, by com
enending the virtues of the rod, if we did
not, entertain grave doubts of the judi
ciousness of raising and educating chill
dren without its application. Besides the
sScriptural authority already cited, there
is the authority of the most ancient and
enlightened nations for it. In the me-
diaval ages, also, the rod played a promi-
nent part in schools. We read that the
festival of the rod was holiday, and that
the boys and girls went together to the
nearest forest for bundle Of birchen
twigs, and returned singing a chant re-
serring to the use the master would make
of them. The severity of schoolmasters
(such they were called even in our day
now they are called teachers) was con-
sidered one of their merits. In the good
old times, scholarship and severity went
hand in hand. The older of our Virginia
gentry will remember the stern school
masters to whom and whose rigorous
discipline they are indebted for much that
they otherwise would never have acquir-
ed. They were not cruel, but were dis
ciplinarians, and used the rod. In read
ing of the most famous English masters,
under whose tuition the greatest men Of
. England were reared, we always find the
rod leading agency. We have-befor
us now an interesting sketch of Westmln-
-ster school, in which famous schoolmas-
ter, by name Richard Busby, figured. He
held the head mastership of Westminster
for ffty-seven years, resigning it only
with his life, when nearly ninety years
old, and even at that great age, vigor-
ous and able master. His name has pass
ed into proverb Of severity. His rod,
he used, to say, was the sieve with which
he sifted the wheat from the chaff of
scholarship. His scholars both feared and
respected him-morc than that-loved
KIM Jt,is said that sat one time be could
boast that sixteen of the bishops then on
the bench had been taught by him"
Those honest and simple days have
passed. New theories have sprung up.
The rule then in the education of children
was restrained; the rule now is license.
The schoolmaster was then an autocrat; /;
he is now something of o slave to the
whims of his pupils and their parents
The same master to whom we have re-
ferred, Richard Busby, while escorting
his royal master, Charles the second,
through his school, kept on his hat, and
apologized for wearing it in the royal
presence by saying that "it would never
do to let the boys believe there was
greater man in the world than himself"
There were scholars in those days, and
respect for authority also. No doubt
there was much of tyranny, and too much
parsimony in the boarding department OF
the schools. But it was one OF the pre-
yailing notions of those times that feeding
and learning did not 60 together. The
opinion was that full stomach made
heavy brain.
The thorough training and rigid disci-
pline to which boys werc subjected de-
yeloped all the powers of their minds
e TheY were drilled to the severest analy-
sis. and were forced to think. They
learned thoroughly, and never forgot