and invention as much as you will. Pursue steadily
the great objects which demand the teacher's attention. They are simple
and few. Never lose sight of them, nor turn to the right or to the left
to follow any ignis fatuus which may arise to allure you away, but
exercise as much ingenuity and enterprise as you please in giving
variety and interest to the modes by which these objects are pursued.

If planning and scheming are confined within these limits, and conducted
on these principles, the teacher will save all the agitating perplexity
and care which will otherwise be his continual portion. He can go
forward peaceably and quietly, and while his own success is greatly
increased, he may be of essential service to the cause in which he is
engaged, by making known his various experiments and plans to others.
For this purpose, it seems to me highly desirable that every teacher
should KEEP A JOURNAL of all his plans. In these should be carefully
entered all his experiments; the new methods he adopts; the course he
takes in regard to difficulties which may arise, and any interesting
incidents which may occur which it would be useful for him to refer to
at some future time. These, or the most interesting of them, should be
made known to other teachers. This may be done in several ways:

(1.) By publishing them in periodicals devoted to education. Such
contributions, furnished by judicious men, would be among the most
valuable articles in such a work. They would be far more valuable than
any general speculations, however well conceived or expressed.

(2.) In newspapers intended for general circulation. There are very few
editors whose papers circulate in families who would not gladly receive
articles of this kind to fill a teacher's department in their columns.
If properly written, they would be read with interest and profit by
multitudes of parents, and would throw much light on family government
and instruction.

(3.) By reading them in teachers' meetings. If half a dozen teachers who
are associated in the same vicinity would meet once a fortnight, simply
to hear each other's journals, they would be amply repaid for their time
and labor. Teachers' meetings will be interesting and useful, when those
who come forward in them will give up the prevailing practice of
delivering orations, and come down at once to the scenes and to the
business of the school-room.

There is one topic connected with the subject of this chapter