The Lyttelton Times. TUESDAY, AUGUST 18, 1891.

Lyttelton Times, Volume LXXVI, Issue 9495, 18 August 1891, Page 4

The Lyttelton Times. TUESDAY, AUGUST 18, 1891 .

Over the entrance to one of the oldest English grammar schools (Winchester, we think) may he read the inscription, “ Manners maketh the man.” William cf Wykeham, the founder of that school, was not one whose life had been spent in the seclusion of “academic shades,” or the scriptorium, of a monastery. As a man who had earned distinction in architecture, in State-craft, and in the rule of his diocese, he may safely be credited with the possession of no small share of varied knowledge, and a wide experience of men in every rank of life; yet the conclusion drawn by him from that knowledge, and supported by that experience, is crystallised, as it were, in the maxim we have quoted, “ Manners maketh the man.”* Coming to our own time, and reasoning from our own more limited experience, we fully recognise the truth of that maxim which was so deeply impressed upon the mind of William of Wykeham. In every grade of society, in every sphere of human action, the success or failure of the individual depends less upon what be knows than upon what he does, and how he does it. Each calling naturally demands from its followers some needful special knowledge and certain necessary technical skill, but these in themselves do not insure success to their possessors. Eespect for the opinions, and, it may be, the prejudices of others, “reverence, selfknowledge, self-control,” all go far towards smoothing the asperities and removing the obstacles met with both in public and in private life. These thoughts have been suggested by the final paragraph of the last annual report laid before the North Canterbury Education Board by its Inspectors. “In discipline,” say the Inspectors, “ we do not think pur schools are improving. In fact, during the past two years the impression has been deepening on our minds that this all-important' matter has suffered from some weakening influences, chief among which is the growing tendency of parents to resent the exercise of corporal punishment, and a certain amount of apprehension among teachers that frivolous complaints may be seriously entertained by School Committees not fully alive to the necessities of school control.” The bearing, ilia conversation and the habits of a considerable number of the young people who come under notice in our streets and places of public resort go far to sustain the charge laid against our schools by the Board’s Inspectors; but, at the same timo, we are fully convinced that greater and steadily increasing numbers of our New Zealand youth are growing up a credit to themselves, to their schools and to the country. We agree with the Inspectors in their surmise that parents are to blame for much of that laxity, or, rather, that absence of control. There are households which are literally governed by the children; if the bairns find school life, with its duties and necessary restraints, in any degree irksome, there is no difficulty iu obtaining leave of absence for a few days. In many eases it is taken without being obtained or even sought. Some parents ere yet to be found (we truafc their number may rapidly grow less) who look upon the school as an institution only one degree better than a prison, and who consider the teacher not a whit less diabolical than the arch-fiend himself. Many, again, forget that in children imagination is frequently the most active of all the mental faculties, and, consequently, they fail to discount sufficiently those tiles of “ woes unnumbered ” which are laid to the credit of the school and the teacher. We cannot help thinking, moreover, that this aversion to corporal punishment is based upon a somewhat mawkish sentimentalism. A lad may come home from a football match battered and shaken, bruised and bleeding, yet the father and, other admiring relatives will regard him with a certain amount of satisfaction, particularly if be has been on the winning side, and give him to understand (rightly too) that such casualties are all necessary accompaniments of the game, and that the pluck and heroism of British youth are evinced by a Spartan endurance of these hardships. The same youth may distinguish himself at school by bullying, lying, cheating, disobedience and general blackguardism; but, should the teacher leave a mark upon that sacred cuticle, he may, in nine cases out of ten, anticipate an interne?/ with a Bench of Magistrates, or expect to be held up to execration iu the gossip of the district. Should it be his good fortune to serve a Board whose members are ever ready to receive petty complaints, he may find himself either advised to seek employment elsewhere, or debarred from that preferment which ho had fully earned. One fact noticed in the Inspectors’ report goes far to confirm us in the belief that this falling off in discipline may prove merely temporary and accidental. Attendance is stated to bo improving in regularity. This may be taken to indicate the consoling fact that an increasing number of children is being daily brought under wholesome control. A close observer of the working of our schools finds it difficult, however, to understand how it happens that a school may be singled out by an Inspector as deserving, in all respects, unstinted praise, while at the same time its management has not sufficiently gained the confidence of the public to secure a fairly regular attendance without a threat of enforcing the compulsory clauses of the Education Act. ... , • We deem it advisable to-speak

with the utmost candour upon this all-important question of the manners of our Colonial youth; and we speak wit|i the greater freedom because, in our opinion, young New Zealand iu general bids fair to develop one of the best types (we fondly hope the best) of our Anglo-Saxon race. The unruly element hitherto has been in a minority a very unmistakable minority. We cannot help thinking too, that the judicious line of action which magistrates in general have recently adopted in this class of cases, will tend greatly to strengthen the hands of teachers and of Committees who are resolved to discharge their duties without fear or favour. The notably rapid diffusion of democratic ideas and the vigorous growth of democratic power render it essential that our future rulers should not grow up untrained and untaught. Many of our oldest, and perhaps not least intelligent teachers take a deep, although it may be a silent interest in the political and social movements of our time. We know that they are keenly alive to the importance of the work placed in their hands, and we would earnestly urge parents, Committees and Education Boards to see that, so far as in thorn lies, no teacher shall feel himself discouraged, impeded or harassed in the performance of his difficult and important task.