In
large towns and cities there is no excuse for the existence of private
schools to do the work now done in such schools as those of Newburyport
and other places where equal educational privileges exist.
The chief objection brought against the public school, touching its
morality, is derived from the fact that children who are subject to
proper moral influences at home are brought in contact with others who
are already practised in juvenile vices, if they have not been guilty of
petty crimes. I am happy to believe that this statement is not true of
many New England communities. The objection was considered in the last
Annual Report,--it has been often considered elsewhere; and I do not
propose to repeat at length the views which are entertained by the
friends of public education.
I have, however, to suggest that while this objection applies with some
force to the public school, it applies also to every other school, and
that the evil is the least dangerous when the pupil is intrusted to the
care of a qualified teacher, who is personally responsible to the public
for his conduct, and when the child is also subject to the restraints,
and influenced by the daily example and teachings, of the parents.
Moreover, it is to be remembered that the great value of education, in a
moral aspect, is the development of the power to resist temptation. This
power is not the growth of seclusion; and while neither the teacher nor
the parent ought wantonly to expose the child to vicious influences, the
school may be even a better preparation for the world from the fact that
temptation has there been met, resisted, and overcome.
Pages:
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65