The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1878-03-13
SCHOOLS OF MIND AND MANNERS.
(CONTINUED.)


As one may say that there is way Of
learning triAes which strengthens mind and
will, ali depending on the learners view Of
life as performance or duty, so there may
be way of acquiring knowledge which yel
makes very little impression on character ano
conduct In this sense cultivated manner
may be as good guarantee OF cultivated
mind as the most well chosen list OF books
plodded through under the stimulus of emu
lation or some imminent examination; o.
even for the love of it, if the social duties
and checks of good breeding are untaught
and disregarded. For, in fact, what grea,
deal of study of motives and character and
of self-study also, what training OF sympa
thies, goes to the formation of a courteous
and engaging manner! Separate learning
from discipline, and We really do net know
where We are, or what benefit we are confer
ring on the pupil To the run of people the
use of learning is, in some sense, remote from
the lessons learnt, and may be resolved into
discipline rather than knowledge. How few
people have to do in after-life with the pre-
else teaching of their childhood and youth
What difference, We might ask, does 1t make
to most women whether the astronomy they
learnt as girls was called The Use OF the
Globes or notY Let us not be understood
as undertaking that inestimable advantage,
exact knowledge; only we believe the com
mon experience will justify our impression
that fructifying knowledge of this high order
is for the few. The majority of people learn
through the reading of others, not through
their own; one part of mankind browses
among books for the intellectual nouishment
of the species. 1t is not what most people
ACQUIRE for themselves at first hand which
places them above their ignorant fore fathers,
but the atmosphere they breathe, the enlight
eminent of the age, through the influence of
its choicer or more labOriouS spirits. What
they read or skim for themSelves-or perhaps
we should say, what they might read, what
they are politely assumed to read-tells lit
tie on them; they cannot assimulate it, their
private stock of learning being mainly of use
in helping to conceal their ignorance; but
they hear others talk, they catch tone, and
thus learn unconsciously and accidentally,
aided no doubt by glimmeriDgs OF once faint
ly apprehended truth.
What, then, becomes of those who have
never been taught that great fundamental in
good manners, the habit and art of listening!
an art which, to judge by the training of
some children, threatens to become obsolete,
an art which no people can learn late in life
Writers on the duties of the religious life
tell us that contemplation is habit of mind
difficult of requirement, and needing much
practice and gelf.cOntrol. Listening is the
same to children, when the talk that passes
is not addressed to them individually, when
their attention is not courted by lowering
the tone to their taste. Yet for certain spaces
of time, to listen both to conversation and
reading as a discipline, we think all who were
ever subjected to it will allow to have been
very strengthening, inVigOrating process
The human voice conveys ideas which, read
in books, would excite no interest, make no
impression; and even dulness, compulsory
quiet, often stimulates thought, by COMPEL
ing the mind to turn to itself, which desul
tory reading, to escape from it, would never
have stirred There is an activity and in
ventiveness of mind especially induced by In
evitable quiet, of which biography furnishes
striking examples, and which we believe
many q private experience can bear witness
to and there is a study of character which
can scarcely take its rise early enough for
the finer perceptions without this condition.
This train of thought has been stimulated,
not so much by the absence of old-fashioned
discipline in manners and the first principles
of good breeding in modern households, as
by the tone now adopted in books for the
young; books written not merely for amuse-
ment, but nstruction-books not addressed
to the parents, but their children ;-ridicul-
ing old restraints; assuming that the race has
been oppressed long enough by absurd re.
strictions that children have come into the
world to make noise; that it is the part Of
good parents to put up with it, and to make
every household arrangement with view to
their sole pleasure and convenience. Hither-
to manners have always been considered one
Of the ends of education but we see tokens
of abatement of that jealous care on the SUBJ
iect which alone can succeed in its object
Neglected manners are rarely good manners.
No doubt in fiction, and in descriptions of
childhood for older readers, certain wildneSs
and defiance of rule is treated as proof of
spirit, and so far of promise but it is CON-
parstively lately that books written for chill
dren with didactic purpose, represent dis
regard of proprieties as the natural indica-
tions of mental and moral superiority. At
the risk of being thought to make bugbesr
of triAes, we will illustrate our argument by
an extract from popular cbild's serial, we
do not doubt in the nursery or school room
of very many of our readers; and bearing on
its title. page the name of clergyman in de
servelly high and general esteem ~
at was one of the great convenienceS of
Redburn vicarage, that you could make your
self heard all over the house without the least
trouble. For example, if there were not
enough bread. and-butter cut for the school
room tea, you had only to shout Bread.and-
butterp at the top of your voice, and Dinah
quickly brought up fresh supply from the
Kitchen; or if Perry was up on the top Of
the house administering worm to partic-
ularly interesting family of starlings in the
chimney. pot, and did not notice the time,
and Eight o'clock struck, Hugh had just to
call out, 'Prayersl at the foot of the stairs,
and down came Perry, leaving worm Wrig
Cling out of wide-Open yellow mouth. DR..
Guest was of opinion that this was owing
much more to the strong lungs and loud