efrauders in this matter the modern educational art of _Cram_. It is
to education what adulteration is to commerce. It is far worse, for
here it is not money that is stolen, it is a parent's best and highest
hopes; it is a boy's whole future life and its success. For the system
rests upon a fallacy, namely, that it is possible for boys of twenty
to know everything, from the multiplication-table to metaphysics, from
Greek plays to theological dogmas.

To the average boy such intellectual feats are simply impossible; but
he is plucky and fertile in expedients; he is neither disposed to be
beaten nor able really to overtake his task, so he uses his brains
carefully, and makes the greatest possible show on the greatest
possible number of subjects.

Perhaps nothing in our present system of education is so demoralizing
and unjust as the custom of public examinations. In them interest and
vanity play into each other's hands; genuine acquirement and principle
"go to the wall." The teachers and the boys alike know that they are
never true criterions of progress, that they are seldom even fair
representations of the actual course of study. Weeks, months are spent
in preparations for the deceitful display; even then true merit, which
is generally modest by nature, does itself injustice, and vain
self-assurance comes off with flying colors.

The Cram teacher scatters seed over a large amount of mental surface,
instead of thoroughly cultivating the most promising portions; and he
brings before the parents and the public the few ears gleaned on all
the acres as samples of crops which he knows never will be gathered.
Yet to his own pedantic vanity, or his self-interest, he sacrifices
the prime of many a fine boy's life. Therefore we are disposed to
believe that if parents would inexorably refuse to sanction these
pretentious public displays, there would be probably a much less
accumulation of bare facts, but a far greater cultivation of natural
abilities, and a far more thorough development of decided aptitudes.

Mechanical drudgery, instead of intelligent labor, is the inevitable
method where cramming a boy, instead of educating him, is the favorite
system. No mental faculties, except the memory, receive any
discipline, and the knowledge disappears as fast as it was gained. All
taste for laborious habits of thought are lost, and if a boy
originally possessed a love for learning he is soon disgusted at what
his simple nature tells