accent is a stress of voice laid on some syllable or letter of a word.
But this definition had not been illustrated by an example, and the
classification of words by their accent, in the spelling-book, he had
never understood. The definition had been to him an unmeaning
collection of words. He now discovered what it meant. This was in
itself a trifling event, but it led to the further discovery that
other things, which he had been accustomed, parrot-like, to repeat
_memoriter_, had a meaning; that the meaning of things was that which
the student should be set to learn, and that his own education had, in
this view, been greatly neglected. He says that a new world seemed to
be opened to his view; that nothing now appeared so important as an
opportunity to reflect on what he had learned, and that he was greatly
displeased with the instructors by whom he had been so badly cheated.
He resolved that, if ever he should be a teacher, he would propose it
to himself, as his leading object, to make his pupils understand
whatever they should study. This resolution he afterward had the
opportunity of carrying into effect in five or six winter schools; and
his attempt was attended with gratifying success.

"It was the opinion of Dr. Shurtleff, grounded on his own experience
as learner and teacher, that too much importance is attached to the
books used in schools; that the end to be reached is too generally
regarded as the learning of the book rather than the mastery of the
subject, and that books are too often prepared mainly with a view to
abridge the labor of the teacher. He believed that, while the pupil
might, through the text-book, possess himself of the knowledge of
others, he was in danger of acquiring little which could be called his
own.

"In consequence of using his eyes too soon, after his recovery from
the measles, when he was about seventeen years old, Shurtleff was
almost wholly cut off from the reading of books for two years, and he
never afterward perfectly recovered from the injury resulting from
this imprudence. He made some proficiency, however, by listening to
the reading of others. About two years after this affliction he
entered the academy at Chesterfield, N. H., whither his father's
family had removed a few years before. He attended first to English
studies. The weakness of his eyes continued, and he was considerably
embarrassed for a time from the necessity of using the eyes of his
friends. At length he com