attend in earnest
for a short time, his mind will be less fatigued, and his
understanding more improved, than if he had exerted but half the
energy twice as long: the degree of pain which he may have felt will
be amply and properly compensated by his success; this will not be an
arbitrary, variable reward, but one within his own power, and that can
be ascertained by his own feelings. Here is no deceit practised, no
illusion; the same course of conduct may be regularly pursued through
the whole of his education, and his confidence in his tutor will
progressively increase. On the contrary, if, to entice him to enter
the paths of knowledge, we strew them with flowers, how will he feel
when he must force his way through thorns and briars!

There is a material difference between teaching children in play, and
making learning a task; in the one case we associate factitious
pleasure, in the other factitious pain, with the object: both produce
pernicious effects upon the temper, and retard the natural progress of
the understanding. The advocates in favour of "scholastic badinage"
have urged, that it excites an interest in the minds of children
similar to that which makes them endure a considerable degree of
labour in the pursuit of their amusements. Children, it is said, work
hard at play, therefore we should let them play at work. Would not
this produce effects the very reverse of what we desire? The whole
question must at last depend upon the meaning of the word play: if by
play be meant every thing that is not usually called a task, then
undoubtedly much may be learned at play: if, on the contrary, we mean
by the expression to describe that state of fidgeting idleness, or of
boisterous activity, in which the intellectual powers are torpid, or
stunned with unmeaning noise, the assertion contradicts itself. At
play so defined, children can learn nothing but bodily activity; it is
certainly true, that when children are interested about any thing,
whether it be about what we call a trifle, or a matter of consequence,
they will exert themselves in order to succeed; but from the moment
the attention is fixed, no matter on what, children are no longer at
idle play, they are at active work.

S----, a little boy of nine years old, was standing without any book
in his hand, and seemingly idle; he was amusing himself with looking
at what he called a rainbow upon the floor; he begged his sister
M----to look at it; then he said he wond