d, still too
weak and pliable, in the hands of strangers. People of the best
intentions, by pressing too much upon him, run the risk of so crushing
his faculties, that he will never be able to enjoy the free use of them
again. The world is full of men, who remain bondsmen all their lives,
from having borne a heavy load too soon. A too solid and too
precocious education has injured something within them; their
originality, the _genius_ and _ingegno_, which is the prime part of man.

Who respects in these days the original and free ingenuity of
character, that sacred genius which we receive at our birth? This is
almost always the part which offends and gets blamed; it is the reason
why "_this boy is not like everybody else_." Hardly does his young
nature awake, and flourish in its liberty, than they are all
astonished, and all shake their heads: "What is this? we never saw the
like."--Shut him up quickly--stifle this living flower. Here are the
iron cages.--Ah! you were blooming, and displaying your luxuriant
foliage in the sun. Be wise and prudent, O flower! become dry, and
shut up your leaves.

But this poor little flower, against which they are all leagued--what
is it, I pray you, but the individual, special, and original element by
which this being would have distinguished itself from others, and added
a new feature to the great variety of human characters--a genius,
perhaps, to the series of great minds. The sterile spirit is almost
always that plant which, having been tied too fast to the dead wood
which serves to support it, has dried upon it, and gradually become
like it; there it is, very regular, and well fastened up, you may fear
nothing eccentric from it; the tree is, however, _dead_, and will never
bear leaf more.

What do I mean? that the support is useless, and that we must leave the
plant to itself? Nothing is further from my thoughts. I believe in
the necessity of both educations, that of the family and that of the
country. Let us distinguish their influence.

The latter, our public education, which is certainly better in our days
than it ever was--what does it require? What is its end and aim? It
wishes to harmonise the child with his native land, and with that great
country the world. This is what constitutes its legitimacy and
necessity. It purposes especially to give him a fund of ideas common
to all, to make him a reasonable being, and prevent him from being out
of tune with what