we can not
gainsay it. These stalwart apostles of educational hardship and
difficulty are in constant fear lest we shall make studies interesting
and attractive and thus undermine the energy of the will. But the
question at once arises: Does not the will always act from _motives_ of
some sort? And is there any motive or incentive so stimulating to the
will as a steady and constantly increasing _interest_ in studies? It
is able to surmount great difficulties.

We wish to assure our stalwart friends that we still adhere to the good
old doctrine that "there is no royal road to learning." There is no
way of putting aside the real difficulties that are found in every
study, no way of grading up the valleys and tunneling through the hills
so as to get the even monotony of a railroad track through the rough or
mountainous part of education. Every child must meet and master the
difficulties of learning for himself. There are no palace cars with
reclining chairs to carry him to the summit of real difficulties. The
_character-developing power_ that lies in the mastery of hard tasks
constitutes one of their chief merits. Accepting this as a fundamental
truth in education, the problem for our solution is, how to stimulate
children to encounter difficulties. Many children have little
inclination to sacrifice their ease to the cause of learning, and our
dull methods of teaching confirm them in their indifference to
educational incentives. Any child, who, like Hugh Miller or Abraham
Lincoln, already possesses an insatiable thirst for knowledge, will
allow no difficulties or hardships to stand in the way of progress.
This original appetite and thirst for knowledge which the select few
have often manifested in childhood is more valuable than anything the
schools can give. With the majority of children we can certainly do
nothing better than to nurture such a taste for knowledge into vigorous
life. It will not do to assume that the average of children have any
such original energy or momentum to lead them to scale the heights of
even ordinary knowledge. Nor will it do to rely too much upon a
_forcing process_, that is, by means of threats, severity, and
discipline, to carry children against their will toward the educational
goal.

"Be not like dumb driven cattle,
Be a hero in the strife"

is sound educational doctrine.

The thing for teachers to do is to cultivate in children all healthy
appetites for knowledge,