ge, and now he is forty. Between
the years of fifteen and twenty he made a vigorous effort to acquire
such an education as would fit him for these duties. He succeeded, and
by these efforts he raised himself from being a mere laborer, receiving
for his daily toil a mere daily subsistence, to the respectability and
the comforts of an intellectual pursuit. But this change once produced,
he stops short in his progress. Once seated in his desk, he is
satisfied, and for twenty years he has been going through the same
routine, without any effort to advance or to improve. He does not
reflect that the same efforts, which so essentially altered his
condition and prospects at twenty, would have carried him forward to
higher and higher sources of influence and enjoyment, as long as he
should continue them. His efforts ceased when he obtained a situation as
teacher, at forty dollars a month, and though twenty years have glided
away, he is now exactly what he was then.

There is probably no employment whatever which affords so favorable an
opportunity for personal improvement,--for steady intellectual and moral
progress, as that of teaching. There are two reasons for this.

First, there is time for it. With an ordinary degree of health and
strength, the mind can be vigorously employed at least ten hours a day.
As much as this, is required of students, in many literary institutions.
In fact ten hours to study, seven to sleep, and seven to food, exercise,
and recreation, is perhaps as good an arrangement as can be made; at any
rate, very few persons will suppose that such a plan allows too little
under the latter head. Now six hours is as much as is expected of
teachers under ordinary circumstances, and it is as much as ought ever
to be bestowed. For though he may labor four hours out of school, in
some new field, his health and spirits will soon sink under the burden,
if after his weary labors during the day in school, he gives up his
evenings to the same perplexities and cares. And it is not necessary. No
one who knows any thing of the nature of the human mind, and who will
reflect a moment on the subject, can doubt that a man can make a better
school, by expending six hours labor upon it, which he can go through
with, with some alacrity and ardor, than he can by driving himself on to
ten. Every teacher therefore, who is commencing his work, should begin
with the firm determination of devoting only six hours daily to the
pursuit. M