tes_ over the _bottle_, or over _cheese_ and
_oranges_ and _raisins_ and _biscuits_, _after_ he has _dined_; how many
he lounges away, either at the coffee-house or at home, over the
_useless_ part of newspapers; how many he spends in waiting for the
coming and the managing of the tea-table; how many he passes by
candle-light, _wearied of his existence_, when he might be in bed; how
many he passes in the morning in bed, while the sun and dew shine and
sparkle for him in vain: if he were to put all these together, and were
to add those which he passes in the _reading of books_ for his mere
personal _amusement_, and without the smallest chance of acquiring from
them any _useful_ practical knowledge: if he were to sum up the whole of
these, and add to them the time worse than wasted in the contemptible
work of dressing off _his person_, he would be frightened at the result;
would send for his boys from school; and if greater book-learning than
he possessed were necessary, he would choose for the purpose some man of
ability, and see the teaching carried on under his own roof, with safety
as to morals, and with the best chance as to health.

308. If after all, however, a school must be resorted to, let it, if in
your power, be as little populous as possible. As 'evil communications
corrupt good manners,' so the more numerous the assemblage, and the more
extensive the communication, the greater the chance of corruption.
_Jails, barracks, factories_, do not corrupt by their _walls_, but by
their condensed numbers. Populous cities corrupt from the same cause;
and it is, because _it must be_, the same with regard to schools, out of
which children come not what they were when they went in. The master is,
in some sort, their enemy; he is their overlooker; he is a spy upon
them; his authority is maintained by his absolute power of punishment;
_the parent commits them to that power_; to be taught is to be held in
restraint; and, as the sparks fly upwards, the teaching and the
restraint will not be divided in the estimation of the boy. Besides all
this, there is the great disadvantage of _tardiness_ in arriving at
years of discretion. If boys live only with boys, their ideas will
continue to be boyish; if they see and hear and converse with nobody but
boys, how are they to have the thoughts and the character of men? It is,
_at last_, only by hearing _men_ talk and seeing men act, that they
learn to talk and act like men; and, therefor