Though justice be thy plea, consider this
That in the course of justice, none of us
Should see salvation! we do pray for mercy;

And that same prayer doth teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy."

Good-natured children are always cheerful and happy; and they become a source of happiness to all their companions; but ill-natured spiteful children become the plague-spots of a school,-they make everybody about them miserable. A happy, cheerful disposition, is not only salutary as regards its moral influence, but it is also one of the most indispensable conditions of intellectual progress.

IV. The benevolent affections, as well as all the other moral faculties, should be cultivated so as to become habits of action.

We have already explained the importance of establishing right habits of thought as well as virtuous habits of action; we have here only further to reiterate that, in order to establish habits of virtue and religion, the teacher should constantly enforce the performance of all important duties at their proper time and in their fitting place; for it should always be borne in mind, that the neglecting to perform any duty, at the time assigned for it, tends to weaken the habit which we wish to establish.

V. The teacher must educate the moral faculties of his pupils by his example as well as by his precepts.

Example bears the same relation to moral science, that experiment does to physical science: you cannot thoroughly teach abstract principles without giving them a tangible form," a local habitation and a name." A teacher's life and conversation should, in all respects, become the living form and embodiment of his precepts. But the discrepancy between our precepts and practice as assumed the form of a common adage,."Do as I say, nd not as I do." The teacher, of all men in society, hould be the most watchful. He necessarily impresses

the leading features of his own moral character upon his pupils. What an awful responsibility this involves ! What a moral power he wields for good or for evil! Each grain of truth or falsehood which he sows in the field of his labour, will multiply itself indefinitely throughout eternity.

No motion or dynamical action can be lost in the physical world; so in like manner, in moral dynamics, the results of our actions will flow on through indefinite ages: what finite mind can investigate that moral formula which shall express the remote bearings of a single example of vicious conduct! Every moral precept given by a teacher to his class, and every act performed by him before his class, will live long after he is dead, and will perpetuate itself a thousand-fold in distant ages.

How awful is the responsibility of the teacher! every wrong word uttered by him, and every improper act done by him, will, as regards its remote consequences, be recorded, again and again, in the doom-book of God, there to stand as damning blots against him till the great day of reckoning!

The thistledown from a single thistle, if left unchecked, will soon spread the weed over a whole district. A single plague-spot is sufficient to give rise to the contagion which may depopulate a city.. In like manner, one symptom of moral corruption, in the personal character of a teacher, may be the cause of a moral contagion, which may spread far and wide, and influence the destinies of future ages.

The teacher should beware of acquiring any habits calculated to provoke censorious remarks. Children are keenly alive to any defects or imperfections in their teacher. It is almost impossible for any teacher to appear what he really is not, before his pupils; his weaknesses are sure to become a matter of ridicule, and his faults a subject of censure; and it would be well if the evil stopped here; but it does not, for children insensibly, and even in spite of their better feelings, imitate the manners and conduct of their superiors in knowledge and station: to laugh at folly does not shield us from its

attack, and to animadvert upon what is vicious, is no guarantee that we are raised above its contamination. We have sometimes heard conversations like the following going on amongst school-boys:—

"I say, Tom, what a fine white choker teacher has got."

"Do you think that he washed his face this morning?" "To be sure he did, but he has stuffed his nose into his snuff-box."

"Don't you think, Jim, that you could give the lesson as well as master, if you had that book of his ?" "How slow master speaks."

"Hold your tongue man; don't you see that he is thinking what he'll say next?"

"I do believe that master was a drinking last night, for he's half asleep while he's a talking." "How very polite! Why don't you return the nod of the gentleman?

"Do you think he could do that sum without the key, which he always peeps into, when he is puzzled ?

"Don't you think that master would give a better lesson without that bit of paper, which he's always a looking at?"

"I wonder where he copied his notes from." "Do you see that there little book that is lying on his desk? well, he took them from that, for I saw him while we were saying our tables."

"I don't care about being late for school;· teacher is often late himself."

"What a raging passion master sometimes puts himself in; I wonder if he would like to be struck with a stick, as he sometimes strikes me."

"How awfully long teacher makes the prayers. Do you think that he could pray without the book?" "I don't understand the prayers; they seem to be written for men and women, and not for little boys like us."

"Teacher never called once upon me, for all the time I was ill."

"Do you know where teacher goes to of a night?

R

He goes to the cricketers' suppers; I saw him once myself coming out of the White Hart' late of a night.”

6

Our moral duties may be classed under three heads, viz: (1) our duty to ourselves, —(2) our duty to our neighbour, and (3) our duty to our God. To treat this subject adequately, or to give all the rules and maxims by which our moral faculties may be cultivated, in relation to these duties, would more properly belong to a treatise on ethics, rather than to a work on school education. There are, however, three cardinal school virtues, which demand the special attention of every schoolmaster: these cardinal school virtues are (1) Truthfulness; (2) Honesty; and (3) Humility.

ON THE CULTIVATION OF TRUTHFULNESS.

Truthfulness is said, by Professor Moseley, to be the great central pillar of the school-room. All cases of falsehood and deceit should be promptly denounced, and even the slightest evidence of prevarication, cunning, or hypocrisy, should be unmasked and exposed to reprobation. The concealment of truth is, in many cases, as great a crime as a direct falsehood. Boys too readily fall into a habit of adhering to the truth, as regards the letter, but violate it, as regards the spirit and intention. In such cases, the teacher should carefully explain to his pupils the true character of a lie; - that they tell a lie, whenever they say anything, or do anything, with the intention of deceiving others. Mr. A. entered his school one day, and found what appeared to him to be a piece of cotton rag pinned to the coat-tail of one of the boys, but which was, in reality, a piece of flannel. "Who pinned that bit of rag to this boy's coat-tail?" said he to his class; but no boy had moral courage enough to answer him. He looked round his class, and observed the evidences of guilt in the countenance of little Tommy Teaser, who was always the ringleader in all sorts of spiteful pranks. "Now, Tommy," said Mr. A., " tell me the truth; did you pin that cotton rag to this boy's coat-tail?"

"Please sir," answered Tommy, "I did not pin any cotton rag to his coat-tail." Mr. A. was not satisfied he felt confident that the boy had told a falsehood; but being always very careful, in making any direct charge of falsehood without a full evidence of the fact, he patiently and cautiously made further inquiries. "Please sir," at length said a little boy, "it is a bit of flannel, not a bit of cotton rag." "Oh, that is it," said Mr. A., “and Tommy Teaser tried to deceive me by apparently adhering to the letter of the fact, while he lied in spirit and intention. Now, my boys, he has not only practised a piece of deception upon me, but he has also lied to himself by attempting to silence his own conscience. Do always remember, my children, that you tell a lie when you say or do anything with the intention to deceive others. I propose, as a punishment for this great crime, that Tommy Teaser shall not be allowed to enter the play-ground for the next two days. Do you not consider that this punishment is only fit and proper?" "Yes, sir," was the response of the class.

We should endeavour to keep, as far as possible, all temptations to lying and deceit out of a child's way. The fear of punishment, the love of gain, and the love of approbation, are the great causes of lying in the schoolroom. Whenever temptations to lying are unavoidably incurred, the teacher should be more than usually careful and watchful. When a boy, for example, is suspected of having committed a fault, it may not be wise to ask him the direct question, "Did you do this?" for in such case a great majority of timid boys would most certainly tell a falsehood in order to shield themselves from punishment: lying is most frequently a cowardly act. Again, in the conducting of school examinations, great care and delicacy should be observed to PREVENT the boys from practising any deceit here the love of approbation is the chief temptation to the practice of falsehood or deceit, as the case may be. The teacher should frequently illustrate the evil consequences of lying, by stories and anecdotes: the fable of the "Shepherd Boy and the Wolf" is an excellent example.