am recommending a difficult art to you, young teacher,--the art of
governing without rules, and of doing everything by doing nothing at
all. I grant, that at your age, this art is not to be expected of you.
It will not enable you, at the outset, to exhibit your shining talents,
or to make yourself prized by parents; but it is the only one that will
succeed. To be a sensible man, your pupil must first have been a
little scapegrace. The Spartans were educated in this way; not tied
down to books, but obliged to steal their dinners;[17] and did this
produce men inferior in understanding? Who does not remember their
forcible, pithy sayings? Trained to conquer, they worsted their
enemies in every kind of encounter; and the babbling Athenians dreaded
their sharp speeches quite as much as their valor.

In stricter systems of education, the teacher commands and thinks he is
governing the child, who is, after all, the real master. What you
exact from him he employs as means to get from you what he wants. By
one hour of diligence he can buy a week's indulgence. At every moment
you have to make terms with him. These bargains, which you propose in
your way, and which he fulfils in his own way, always turn out to the
advantage of his whims, especially when you are so careless as to make
stipulations which will be to his advantage whether he carries out his
share of the bargain or not. Usually, the child reads the teacher's
mind better than the teacher reads his. This is natural; for all the
sagacity the child at liberty would use in self-preservation he now
uses to protect himself from a tyrant's chains; while the latter,
having no immediate interest in knowing the child's mind, follows his
own advantage by leaving vanity and indolence unrestrained.

Do otherwise with your pupil. Let him always suppose himself master,
while you really are master. No subjection is so perfect as that which
retains the appearance of liberty; for thus the will itself is made
captive. Is not the helpless, unknowing child at your mercy? Do you
not, so far as he is concerned, control everything around him? Have
you not power to influence him as you please? Are not his work, his
play, his pleasure, his pain, in your hands, whether he knows it or not?

Doubtless he ought to do only what he pleases; but your choice ought to
control his wishes. He ought to take no step that you have not
directed; he ought not to open his lips without your kno