le system of education supposes,
undoubtedly, that the teacher, in those matters which he teaches, should
be an authority to the taught: a learner in any matter must rely on the
books, and on the living instructors, out of which and from whom he is
to learn. There are difficulties, certainly, in all learning; but we do
not commonly see them increased by a disposition on the part of the
learner to question and dispute every thing that is told him. There is a
feeling rather of receiving what he is told implicitly; and, by so
doing, he learns: but does it ever enter into his head that his teacher
is infallible? or does any teacher of sane mind wish him to think so?
And observe, now, what is the actual process: the mind of the learner is
generally docile, trustful, respectful towards his teacher; aware, also,
of his own comparative ignorance. It is certainly most right that it
should be so. But this really teachable and humble learner finds a false
spelling in one of his books; or hears his teacher, from oversight, say
one word in his explanation instead of another: does he cease to be
teachable and humble,--is it really a want of childlike faith, and an
indulgence of the pride of reason, if he decides that the false spelling
was an error of the press; that the word which his teacher used was a
mistake? Yet errors, mistakes, of how trifling a kind soever, are
inconsistent with infallibility; and the perceiving that they are errors
is an exercise of our individual judgment upon our instructors. To hear
some men talk, we should think that no boy could do so without losing
all humility and all teachableness; without forthwith supposing that he
was able to be his own instructor.

I have begun on purpose with an elementary case, in which a very young
boy might perceive an error in his books, or in his instructors,
without, in any degree, forfeiting his true humility. But we will now go
somewhat farther: we will take a more advanced student, such as the
oldest of those among you, who are still learners, and who know that
they have much to learn, but who, having been learners for some time
past, have also acquired some knowledge. In the books which they refer
to, and from which they are constantly deriving assistance, do they
never observe any errors in the printing? do they never find
explanations given, which they perceive to be imperfect, nay, which they
often feel to be actually wrong? And, passing from books to living
instruc