mber, end in mortification and failure.

Were I to give a few concise and summary directions in regard to this
subject to a young teacher, they would be the following:

1. Examine thoroughly the system of public and private schools as now
constituted in most of the states of this Union, until you fully
understand it and appreciate its excellences and its completeness; see
how fully it provides for the wants of the various classes of our
population.

By this I mean to refer only to the completeness of the _system_ as a
system of organization. I do not refer at all to the internal management
of these institutions; this last is, of course, a field for immediate
and universal effort at progress and improvement.

2. If, after fully understanding this system as it now exists, you are
of opinion that something more is necessary; if you think some classes
of the community are not fully provided for, or that some of our
institutions may be advantageously exchanged for others, the plan of
which you have in mind, consider whether your age, and experience, and
standing as an instructor are such as to enable you to place confidence
in your opinion.

I do not mean by this that a young man may not make a useful discovery,
but only that he may be led away by the ardor of early life to fancy
that essential and important which is really not so. It is important
that each one should determine whether this is not the case with
himself, if his mind is revolving some new plan.

3. Perhaps you are contemplating only a single new institution, which is
to depend for its success on yourself and some coadjutors whom you have
in mind and whom you well know. If this is the case, consider whether
the establishment you are contemplating can be carried on, after you
shall have left it, by such men as can ordinarily be obtained. If the
plan is founded on some peculiar notions of your own, which would enable
you to succeed in it when others, who might also be interested in such a
scheme, would probably fail, consider whether there may not be danger
that your plan may be imitated by others who can not carry it into
successful operation, so that it may be the indirect means of doing
injury. A man is, in some degree, responsible for his example and for
the consequences which may indirectly flow from his course, as well as
for the immediate results which he produces. The Fellenberg school at
Hofwyl was perhaps, by its direct results, as successful for