knight, but a sinewy, hardy, and vigorous young man. I have ever, from a child to the age I now am, been of this opinion, and am still constant to it.'

From this sketch of Montaigne's opinions, it will be easily seen how he found a follower in Locke, and how his lessons passed from Locke into our English schools. But we must remember that he naturally emphasises the side of education which in his own day was much neglected. If he wishes his pupil not to grow up a pedant, he does not wish him to grow up an ignoramus. He commends the care taken by his father with his own education, and laments the time he wasted at the college of Guienne. In our own day it will do little harm to obey his precepts of practical education, if we also take care to grasp his conception of the intellectual furniture with which a statesman should be equipped.

CHAPTER VI.

ENGLISH HUMANISTS AND REALISTS.-ROGER ASCHAM AND JOHN MILTON.

IN the three preceding chapters we have given an account of the three principal schools of educationists, which continue to divide us by their controversies even at the present day the Humanists, the Realists, and the Naturalists. But the examples chosen to illustrate them have been drawn entirely from foreign countries. The first two schools have been represented by Germans, the last by Frenchmen. In this chapter and the following one we propose to give an account of the English representatives of those different schools of thought, Ascham, Milton, and Locke. The importance of the first has probably been overrated, the opinions of the second are imperfectly known, while the third has given a powerful bias to naturalistic education, both in England and on the Continent for the last two hundred years.

Roger Ascham was born in 1516. He entered St. John's College, Cambridge, in the year 1530, a wellgrounded boy of fourteen. Stimulated by the seven years' activity of Erasmus, Cambridge was then in a very flourishing condition, and was regarded as the principal place of study for the classical languages. Ascham threw himself vigorously into the study of Greek. He lectured publicly on this language, and succeeded Sir John Cheke as public orator. His "Toxophilus, or Praise

of Archery,' written at the age of thirty, is one of the first works composed in pure English. This work attracted the notice of the Court, and from the time of its publication till his death in 1568, Ascham was, with few intermissions, employed, either about the Court or on foreign missions. He was Greek tutor to Queen Elizabeth. He had taught her Latin when princess, and was her constant and favoured companion. His views on education are contained in a book called the 'Scholemaster.' 1

His account of the occasion of its composition is very interesting. He says that when the Great Plague was at London in the year 1563, the Court lay at Windsor, and it happened on December 10 that Ascham and others of the household were dining together in Sir William Cecil's chamber. 'Not long after our sitting down, "I have strange news brought me," saith Mr. Secretary, "this morning, that divers scholars of Eton ran away from the school for fear of a beating." Whereupon Mr. Secretary took occasion to wish that some discretion were in many schoolmasters in using correction than commonly there is, who many times punish rather the weakness of nature than the fault of the scholar, whereby many scholars, that might else prove well, be driven to hate learning before they know what learning meaneth; and so are made willing to forsake their book, and to be willing to be put to any other kind of living.' On this a discussion arose. Mr. Peter, as one somewhat severe of nature, said plainly that the rod only was the sword that must keep the school in obedience, and the scholars in good order. Mr. Wotton (not to be confounded with the famous Provost of Eton), "a man mild of nature, with soft voice

The best edition of the 'Scholemaster' is that by Professor Mayor of Cambridge. Milton's tractate should be reprinted in a separate form.

Conversation at Windsor Castle.

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and few words," inclined to Mr. Secretary's judgment, and said, "In mine opinion, the school-house should be indeed, as it is called in name, the house of play and pleasure and not of fear and bondage, and therefore if a rod carry the fear of a sword, it is not marvel if those that be fearful of nature choose rather to forsake the play than to stand always within the fear of a sword in a fond man's handling." Mr. Mason, after his manner, was very merry with both parties, pleasantly playing, both with the shrewd touches of many curst boys, and with the small discretion of many lewd schoolmasters. Mr. Hadden was fully of Mr. Peter's opinion, and said that the best schoolmaster of our time was the greatest beater, and named the person (Nicholas Udal, Head-master of Eton). "Though," quoth I, "it was his good fortune to send from his school to the University one of the best scholars, indeed, of all our time, yet wise men do think that came to pass rather by the great towardness of the scholar, than by the great beating of the master, and whether this be true or no, you yourself are best witness." In this conversation Sir Richard Sackville said nothing at all.' But after dinner Ascham went up to read with the Queen's Majesty. 'We read then together, in the Greek tongue, as I well remember, that noble oration of Demosthenes against Æschines for his false dealing in his embassage to King Philip of Macedonie. Sir Richard Sackville came up soon after, and finding me in Her Majesty's privy chamber, he took me by the hand, and, carrying me to a window, said that he would not for a good deal of money have been this day absent from dinner, that he lamented his own beating in his youth, and determined to adopt a different method with his grandson.' As Ascham had a son much of his grandson's age, he asked him to choose a schoolmaster who should educate the two boys together, and that he would pay

for both. They then conversed on the general subject of education for some time, and Sackville asked Ascham to put down his views in a book. Ascham was suddenly called to the Queen. The night following he slept but little, and he determined to write a little treatise for the new year, but the work rose daily higher and wider than he expected. The book was not finished for some little time afterwards.

The first part of the work is entitled 'the bringing up of youth,' and the main lesson in it is that gentleness is to be used in education in preference to severity. In the second book, entitled 'the ready way to the Latin tongue,' Ascham explains his method at length. First the simple rules of accidence are to be learned in the grammar. Then Sturm's Epistles of Cicero is to be taken as a textbook. The master is to follow in some respects the method of Ratich. He is to explain the meaning of each epistle, to construe it to the child in English, to parse it over perfectly. This done, the child is to construe and parse it over again until he knows it. Then he is to take a paper book and write out by himself the translation of the lesson in English; then, when this has been corrected by the master, he is after the interval of an hour to translate the English into Latin back again. The translation is to be compared by the master with Cicero's original. He is not to chide, but to say 'Tully would have used such a word, not this; Tully would have placed this word here, not there; would have used this case, this number, this person, this degree, this gender; he would have used this word, this mood, this tense, this simple rather than this compound; this adverb here, not there; he would have ended the sentence with this verb, not with that noun or participle.' In this way the scholar is to go through the first book of Sturm's selected Epistles, and a good piece of a