rking great harm to the
world in general.

But when we come to consider the amount of evil produced by each of
these factors, it will be seen at once that there is a good deal to
choose between them. The private tutor, under present methods of
teaching, is in a far better position to encourage the individual
development of a child than is the schoolmaster who has the care of a
class. Children can contend, to a certain extent, against the tyranny of
the tutor; they can force their own wishes upon his attention should
they possess the necessary strength of character. But the strongest
must succumb to the school system. Here there is no latitude to
particular pupils, no concession made to idiosyncrasies of mind or
character. The system must not be relaxed, and in consequence everybody
has to be subjected to precisely the same course of study.

Children begin to receive instruction at a very early age. The usual
plan is to take a child the moment it is able to string enough words
together to form ideas, and to subject it to a methodical process of
teaching. The custom of beginning what is called a child's education at
a tender age is verified by the fact that the State now compels, or
rather pretends to compel, parents to send their children to school at
the age of five, whilst large numbers of the children of the poor are
voluntarily sent to school at three years of age, or even younger. It
will be observed, therefore, that the State, as far as the masses of the
people are concerned, takes the child in hand at the most impressionable
period of its existence.

The instruction of infants is not a very difficult task, if all that is
aimed at is to teach them certain elementary subjects. At five years of
age children will generally learn with avidity. Their minds are just
sufficiently formed to be receptive, and as all knowledge is a blank to
them they are ready to learn anything, within the limits of their
comprehension, that the teacher may choose to put before them. This
would place upon the latter a very heavy responsibility if the matter
were left entirely to his discretion. But this is by no means the case;
the course of instruction is fixed beforehand by the school managers.
It may differ slightly in schools of varying types; but in the main it
is identical in all the essentials.

To what extent this variation may occur is, however, entirely beside the
point. What should be noted in this connection is that each scho