Some educators have feared that in finding our occupations interesting,

we shall lose all power of effort and self-direction; that the will, not
being called sufficiently into requisition, must suffer from non-use;
that we shall come to do the interesting and agreeable things well
enough, but fail before the disagreeable
Some educators have feared that in finding our occupations interesting,
we shall lose all power of effort and self-direction; that the will, not
being called sufficiently into requisition, must suffer from non-use;
that we shall come to do the interesting and agreeable things well
enough, but fail before the disagreeable.

The public school is a little world, and the teacher rules therein

The public school is a little world, and the teacher rules therein. It
contains the rich and the poor, the virtuous and the corrupt, the
studious and the indifferent, the timid and the brave, the fearful and
the hearts elate with hope and courage. Life is there no cheat; it wears
no mask, it assumes no unnatural positions, but presents itself as it
is. Deformed and repulsive in some of its features, yet to him whose eye
is as quick to discover its beauty as its deformity, its harmony as its
discord, there is always a bright spot on which he may gaze, and a fond
hope to which he may cling. Artificial life, whether in the select
school or the select party, tends to weaken our faith in humanity; and a
want of faith in our race is an omen of ill-success in life. Teachers
should have faith in humanity, and should labor constantly to inspire
others with the belief that the true law of our nature is the law of
progress.

IMAGES THE STUFF OF IMAGINATION

IMAGES THE STUFF OF IMAGINATION.--Nothing can enter the imagination the
elements of which have not been in our past experience and then been
conserved in the form of images. The Indians never dreamed of a heaven
whose streets are paved with gold, and in whose center stands a great
white throne. Their experience had given them no knowledge of these
things; and so, perforce, they must build their heaven out of the images
which they had at command, namely, those connected with the chase and
the forest. So their heaven was the 'happy hunting ground,' inhabited by
game and enemies over whom the blessed forever triumphed. Likewise the
valiant soldiers whose deadly arrows and keen-edged swords and
battle-axes won on the bloody field of Hastings, did not picture a
far-off day when the opposing lines should kill each other with mighty
engines hurling death from behind parapets a dozen miles away. Firearms
and the explosive powder were yet unknown, hence there were no images
out of which to build such a picture.