and games which were intended to be exhibited in it? And to the exhibitors themselves, would he not be ready to apply sir Francis Bacon's observation on the Olympian victors, that they were so excellent in these unnecessary things, that their perfection must needs have been acquired by the neg. lect of whatever was necessary?

ed; till a false and excessive display of feeling became so predominant, as to bring in question the actual existence of that true tenderness, without which, though a woman may be worthy, she can never be amiable. Fashion then, by one of her sudden and rapid turns, instantaneously struck out both real sensibility and the affectation of it from the standing list of female perfections; and, What would the polished Addison, who by a quick touch of her magic wand, shifted thought that one great end of a lady's learnthe scene, and at once produced the bold and ing to dance was, that she might know how independant beauty, the intrepid female, the to sit still gracefully; what would even the hoyden, the huntress, and the archer; the pagan historian of the great Roman conswinging arms, the confident address, the spirator, who could commemorate it among regimental, and the four-in-hand Such self- the defects of his hero's accomplished miscomplacent heroines made us ready to regret tress, that she was too good a singer and their softer predecessors, who had aimed on- dancer for a virtuous woman;'-what would ly at pleasing the other sex, while these aspi- these refined critics have said, had they liv ring fair ones struggled for the bolder renowned as we have done, to see the art of dancing of rivalling them: the project failed; for, whereas the former had sued for admiration, the latter challenged, seized, compelled it; but the men, as was natural, continued to prefer the more modest claimant to the sturdy competitor.

lifted into such importance, that it cannot with any degree of safety be confided to one instructor; but a whole train of successive masters are considered as absolutely essential to its perfection? What would these accurate judges of female manners have It would be well if we, who have the said, to see a modest young lady first delivervantage of contemplating the errors of the ed into the hands of a military sergeant to two extremes, were to look for truth where instruct her in the feminine art of marching? she is commonly to be found, in the plain and and when this delicate acquisition is attainobvious middle path, equally remote from ed, to see her transferred to a professor, who each excess; and, while we bear in mind is to teach her the Scotch steps: which prothat helplessness is not delicacy, let us also fessor, having communicated his indispensa remember that masculine manners do not ble portion of this indispensable art, makes necessarily include strength of character nor way for the professor of French dances: and vigour of intellect. Should we not reflect al- all perhaps, in their turn, either yield to, or so, that we are neither to train up Amazons have the honour to co-operate with, a finishnor Circassians, but that it is our business to ing master; each probably receiving a stìform Christians? that we have to educate not pend which would make the pious curate or only rational, but accountable beings? and, the learned chaplain rich and happy? remembering this, should we not be solicit- The science of music, which used to be ous to let our daughters learn of the well-communicated in so competent a degree to a taught, and associate with the well-bred? In training them, should we not carefully cultivate intellect, implant religion, and cherish modesty? Then, whatever is engaging in manners would be the natural result of whatever is just in sentiment, and correct in principle; softness would grow out of humility, and external delicacy would spring from purity of heart. Then the decorums, the proprieties, the elegancies, and even the graces, as far as they are simple, pure, and honest would follow as an almost inevitable consequence; for to follow in the train of the christian virtues, and not to take the lead of them, is the proper place which religion assigns to the graces.

Whether we have made the best use of the errors of our predecessors, and of our own numberless advantages, and whether the prevailing system be really consistent with sound policy, true taste, or Christian principle, it may be worth our while to inquire.

Would not a stranger be led to imagine by a view of the reigning mode of female education, that human life consisted of one universal holiday, and that the grand contest between the several competitors was, who should be most eminently qualified to excel, and carry off the prize, in the various shows

young lady by one able instructor, is now distributed among a whole band. She now requires, not a master, but an orchestra. And my country readers would accuse me of exaggeration, were I to hazard enumerating the variety of musical teachers who attend at the same time in the same family; the daughters of which are summoned, by at least as many instruments as the subjects of Nebuchadnezzar, to worship the idol which fashion has set up. They would be incredulous were I to produce real instances, in which the delighted mother has been heard to declare, that the visits of masters of every art, and the different masters for various gradations of the same art, followed each other in such close and rapid succession during the whole London residence, that her girls had not a moment's interval to look into a book; nor could she contrive any method to introduce one, till she happily devised the scheme of reading to them herself for half an hour while they were drawing, by which means no time was lost.†

* Sallust.

+ Since the first edition of this work appeared, the author has received from a person of great em inence the following statement, ascertaining the time employed in the acquisition of music in one instance. As a general calculation, it will perhaps

Π

our own country and our own circumstan- tinize and discriminate. External acquireces, to both of which they seem peculiarly ments too recommend themselves the more applicable, the spirit of that beautiful apos- because they are more rapidly, as well as trophe of the most polished poet of antiquity more visibly progressive; while the mind is to the most victorious nation? "Let us led on to improvement by slow motions and leave to the inhabitants of conquered coun- imperceptible degrees; while the heart must tries the praise of carrying to the very high- now be admonished by reproof, and now alest degree of perfection, sculpture and the sister arts; but let this country direct her own exertions to the art of governing mankind in equity and peace, of showing mercy to the submissive, and of abasing the proud among surrounding nations.'*

CHAP. III.

lured by kindness; its liveliest advances being suddenly impeded by obstinacy, and its brightest prospects often obscured by passion; it is slow in its acquisitions of virtue. and reluctant in its approaches to piety; and its progress, when any progress is made, does not obtrude itself to vulgar observation.— The unruly and turbulent propensities of the mind are not so obedient to the forming hand as defects of manner or awkwardness of

External improvement. Children's balls.-gait. Often when we fancy that a trouble

French governesses.

some passion is completely crushed, we have LET me not however be misunderstood.- the mortification to find that we have The customs which fashion has established, scotch'd the snake, not kill'd it.' One evil when they are not in opposition to what is temper starts up before another is conquerright, when they are not hostile to virtue, ed. The subduing hand cannot cut off the should unquestionably be pursued in the ed-ever-sprouting heads so fast as the prolific ucation of ladies. Piety maintains no nat- hydra can reproduce them, nor fell the stubural war with elegance, and Christianity born Antæus so often as he can recruit his would be no gainer by making her disciples strength, and rise in vigorous and repeated unamiable. Religion does not forbid that the opposition.

exterior be made to a certain degree the ob- Hired teachers are also under a disadvanject of attention. But the admiration be- tage resembling tenants at rack-rent; it is stowed, the sums expended, and the time their interest to bring in an immediate revelavished on arts, which add little to the in-nue of praise and profit; and, for the sake trinsic value of life, should have limitations. of a present rich crop, those who are not While these arts should be admired, let them strictly conscientious, do not care how much not be admired above their just value: while the ground is impoverished for future prothey are practised, let it not be to the exclusion of higher employments: while they are cultivated, let it be to amuse leisure, not to engross life.

duce. But parents, who are the lords of the soil, must look to permanent value, and to continued fruitfulness. The best effects of a careful education are often very remote; But it happens unfortunately, that to ordi- they are to be discovered in future scenes, nary observers, the girl who is really receiv- and exhibited in as yet untried connexions. ing the worst instruction often makes the Every event of life will be putting the heart best figure; while in the more correct but into fresh situations, and making new deless ostensible education, the deep and sure mands on its prudence, its firmness, its infoundations to which the edifice will owe its tegrity, or its forbearance. Those whose strength and stability lie out of sight. The business it is to form and model it, cannot outward accomplishments have the danger- foresee those contingent situations specificalous advantage of addressing themselves more immediately to the senses, and of course meet every where with those who can in some measure appreciate as well as admire them; for all can see and hear, but all cannot scru

* Let me not be suspected of bringing into any sort of comparison the gentleness of British government with the rapacity of Roman conquests, or the tyrannical principles of Roman dominion. To spoil, to butcher, and to commit every kind of violence, they call, says one of the ablest of their historians, by the lying name of government, and when they have spread a general desolation, they call it peace. (1)

ly and distinctly: yet, as far as human wisdom will allow, they must enable it to prepare for them all by general principles, correct habits, and an unremitted sense of dependence on the Great Disposer of events. As the soldier must learn and practise all his evolutions, though he do not know on what service his leader may command him, by what particular foe he shall be most assailed, nor what mode of attack the enemy may employ; so must the young Christian mili tant be prepared by previous discipline for actual duty.

But the contrary of all this is the case With such dictatorial, or as we might now read, with external acquisitions. The master, it directorial inquisitors, we can have no point of con- is his interest, will industriously instruct his tact; and if I have applied the servile flattery of a young pupil to set all her improvements in delightful poet to the purpose of English happi- the most immediate and conspicuous point of ness, it was only to show wherein true national view. To attract admiration is the great grandeur consists, and that every country pays too dear a price for those arts and embellishments of principle sedulously inculcated into her society which endanger the loss of its morals and young heart; and is considered as the fundamental maxim: and, perhaps, if we were required to condense the reigning system of the brilliant education of a lady into an

manners.

(1) Tacitus' Life of Agricola, speech of Galgaous to his soldiers.

aphorism, it might be comprised in this short hood are cheap and natural: for every obsentence, To allure and to shine. This sys-ject teems with delight to eyes and hearts tem however is the fruitful germ, from which new to the enjoyment of life; nay, the hearts a thousand yet unborn vanities, with all of healthy children abound with a general their multiplied ramifications, will spring disposition to mirth and joyfulness, even A tender mother cannot but feel an honest without a specific object to excite it: like triumph in contemplating those talents in our first parent, in the world's first spring, her daughter, which will necessarily excite when all was new and fresh, and gay about admiration; but she will also shudder at the him, vanity that admiration may excite, and at they live and move, the new ideas it will awaken: and, startling And feel that they are happier than they know. as it may sound, the labours of a wise moth- Only furnish them with a few simple and er, anxious for her daughter's best interests, harmless materials, and a little, but not too will seem to be at variance with those of all much, leisure, and they will manufacture her teachers She will indeed rejoice at her their own pleasures with more skill and sucprogress, but she will rejoice with trembling; cess, and satisfaction, than they will receive for she is fully aware that if all possible ac- from all that your money can purchase. complishments could be bought at the price Their bodily recreations should be such as of a single virtue, of a single principle, the will promote their health, quicken their acpurchase would be infinitely dear, and she tivity, enliven their spirits, whet their ingewould reject the dazzling but destructive ac- nuity, and qualify them for their mental quisition. She knows that the superstruc- work. But, if you begin thus early to creture of the accomplishments can be alone ate wants, to invent gratifications, to multisafely erected on the broad and solid ba- ply desires, to waken dormant sensibilities, to sis of Christian humility: nay more, that stir up hidden fires, you are studiously laying as the materials of which that superstructure up for your children a store of premature is to be composed, are in themselves of so caprice and irritability, of impatience and unstable and tottering a nature, the founda- discontent. tion must be deepened and enlarged with more abundant care, otherwise the fabric will be overloaded with its own ornaments, and what was intended only to embellish the building, will prove the occasion of its fall. To every thing there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven,' said the wise man; but he said it before the invention of BABY-BALLS; an invention which has formed a kind of æra, and a most inauspicious one, in the annals of polished education. This modern device is a sort of triple conspiracy against the innocence, the health, and the happiness of children. Thus by factitious amusements, to rob them of a relish for the simple joys, the unbought delights, which naturally belong to their blooming season, is like blotting out spring from the year. To sacrifice the true and proper en- When we see the growing zeal to crowd joyments of sprightly and happy children, is the midnight ball with these pretty fairies, to make them pay a dear and disproportion- we should be almost tempted to fancy it was ate price for their artificial pleasures. They a kind of pious emulation among the mothers step at once from the nursery to the ball- to cure their infants of a fondness for vain room; and, by a change of habits as new as and foolish pleasures, by tiring them out by it is preposterous, are thinking of dressing this premature familiarity with them. And themselves, at an age when they used to be we should be so desirous to invent an excuse dressing their dolls. Instead of bounding for a practice so inexcusable, that we should with the unrestrained freedom of little wood-be ready to hope that they were actuated by nymphs over hill and dale, their cheeks flush- something of the same principle which led ed with health, and their hearts overflowing the Spartans to introduce their sons to scenes with happiness, these gay little creatures are of riot, that they might conceive an early shut up all the morning, demurely practi- disgust at vice! or possibly, that they imitasing the pas grave, and transacting the seri-ted those Scythian mothers who used to ous business of acquiring a new step for the evening, with more cost of time and pains than it would have taken them to acquire twenty new ideas.

While childhood preserves its native simplicity, every little change is interesting, every gratification is a luxury. A ride or a walk, a garland of flowers of her own forming, a plant of her own cultivating, will be a delightful amusement to a child in her natural state; but these harmless and interesting recreations will be dull and tasteless to a sophisticated little creature, nursed in such forced, and costly, and vapid pleasures. Alas! that we should throw away this first grand opportunity of working into a practical habit the moral of this important truth, that the chief source of human discontent is to be looked for, not in our real, but in our factitious wants; not in the demands of nature, but in the insatiable cravings of artificial desire!

plunge their new-born infants into the flood, thinking none to be worth saving who could not stand this early struggle for their lives: the greater part, indeed, as it might have been expected, perished; but the parents took comfort, that if they were lost, the few who escaped would be the stronger for having been thus exposed!

Thus they lose the amusements which properly belong to their smiling period, and unnaturally anticipate those pleasures (such as they are) which would come in, too much of course, on their introduction into fash- To behold Lilliputian coquettes, projectionable life. The true pleasures of child-ing dresses, studying colours, assorting rib

ands, mixing flowers, and choosing feathers; | can help trembling for the event of that edu their little hearts beating with hopes about cation, from which religion, as far as the go. partners and fears about rivals; to see their erness is concerned, is thus formally and sys fresh cheeks pale after the midnight supper, tematically excluded. Surely it would not their aching heads and unbraced nerves, dis- be exacting too much, to suggest at least that qualifying the little languid beings for the an attention no less scrupulous should be exnext day's task; and to hear the grave apol- erted to insure the charactier of our chilogy, 'that it is owing to the wine, the crowd, dren's instuctor, for piety and knowledge, the heated room of the last night's ball;' all than is thought necessary to ascertain that this, I say, would really be as ludicrous, if she has nothing patois in her dialect. the mischief of the thing did not take off from the merriment of it, as any of the ridiculous and preposterous disproportions in the diverting travels of captain Lemuel Gulliver.

'England! with all thy faults, I love thee still.'

I would rate a correct pronunciation and an elegant phraseology at their just price, and I would not rate them low; but I would not offer up piety and principle as victims to Under a just impression of the evils which sounds and accents. And the matter is now we are sustaining from the principles and the made more easy; for whatever disgrace it practices of modern France, we are apt to might once have brought on an English lady lose sight of those deep and lasting mischiefs to have had it suspected from her accent that which so long, so regularly and so system- she had the misfortune not to be born in a atically we have been importing from the neighbouring country; some recent events same country, though in another form and may serve to reconcile her to the suspicion under another government. In one respect, of having been bred in her own. A country, indeed, the first were the more formidable, to which, (with all its sins, which are many!) because we embraced the ruin without sus- the whole world is looking up with envy and pecting it; while we defeat the malignity of admiration, as the seat of true glory and of the latter, by detecting the turpitude, and comparative happiness! A country, in which defending ourselves against its contagion. the exile, driven out by the crimes of his own, This is not the place to descant on that levity finds a home! A country, to obtain the proof manners, that contempt of the sabbath, tection of which it was claim enough to be that fatal familiarity with loose principles, unfortunate; and no impediment to have and those relaxed notions of conjugal fideli- been the subject of her direst foe! a county, which have often been transplanted into try, which, in this respect, humbly imitating this country by women of fashion, as a too the Father of compassion, when it offered common effect of a long residence in a neigh- mercy to a suppliant enemy, never conditionbouring nation; but it is peculiarly suitable ed for merit, nor insisted on the virtues of the to my subject to advert to another domestic miserable as a prelimiuary to its own bounmischief derived from the same foreign ex- ty! traction: 1 mean, the risks that have been run, and the sacrifices which have been made, in order to furnish our young ladies with the means of acquiring the French language in the greatest possible purity. Perfection in this accomplishment has been so long established as the supreme object; so long considered as the predominant excellence to which all other excellencies must bow down, that it would be hopeless to attack a law which fashion has immutably decreed, and which has received the stamp of long prescription. We must, therefore, be contented with expressing a wish, that this indispensable perfection could have been attained at the expense of sacrifices less important. It is with the greater regret I animadvert on this and some other prevailing practices, as they are errors into which the wise and respectable have through want of consideration, or rather through want of firmness to resist the tyranny of fashion, sometimes fallen. It has not been unusual when mothers of rank and reputation have been asked how they ventured to intrust their daughters to foreigners. of whose principles they knew nothing, except that they were Roman Catholics, to answer, That they had taken care to be secure on that subject; for that it had been stipulated that the question of religion should never be agitated between the teacher and the pupil.' This, it must be confessed, is a most desperate remedy; it is like starving to death, to avoid being poisoned. And who

CHAP. IV.

Comparison of the mode of female education

in the last age with the present.

To return, however, to the subject of general education. We admit that a young lady may excel in speaking French and Italian; may repeat a few passages from a volume of extracts; play like a professor, and sing like a syren; have her dressing-room decorated with her own drawings, tables, stands, flower-pots, screens and cabinets; nay, she may dance like Sempronia* herself, and yet we shall insist that she may have been very badly educated. I am far from meaning to set no value whatever on any or all of these qualifications; they are all of them elegant, and many of them properly tend to the perfecting of a polite education. These things in their measure and degree may be done, but there are others which should not be left undone. Many things are becoming, but one thing is needful.' Besides, as the world seems to be fully apprised of the value of whatever tends to embellish life, there is less occasion here to insist on its importance.

But though a well-bred young lady may

* See Cataline's Conspiracy.