eminent victorians-第45章
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would leave Rugby without having had any personal communication
with him at all。
Yet the effect which he produced upon the great mass of his
pupils was remarkable。 The prestige of his presence and the
elevation of his sentiments were things which it was impossible
to forget。 In class; every line of his countenance; every shade
of his manner imprinted themselves indelibly on the minds of the
boys who sat under him。 One of these; writing long afterwards;
has described; in phrases still impregnated with awestruck
reverence; the familiar details of the scene: 'the glance with
which he looked round in the few moments of silence before the
lesson began; and which seemed to speak his sense of his own
position''the attitude in which he stood; turning over the
pages of Facciolati's Lexicon; or Pole's synopsis; with his eye
fixed upon the boy who was pausing to give an answer''the
pleased look and the cheerful 〃thank you〃; which followed upon a
successful translation''the fall of his countenance with its
deepening severity; the stern elevation of the eyebrows; the
sudden 〃sit down〃 which followed upon the reverse'and 'the
startling earnestness with which he would cheek in a moment the
slightest approach to levity'。
To be rebuked; however mildly; by Dr。 Arnold was a Potable
experience。 One boy could never forget how he drew a distinction
between 'mere amusement' and 'such as encroached on the next
day's duties'; nor the tone of voice with which the Doctor added
'and then it immediately becomes what St。 Paul calls REVELLING'。
Another remembered to his dying day his reproof of some boys who
had behaved badly during prayers。 'Nowhere;' said Dr。 Arnold;
'nowhere is Satan's work more evidently manifest than in turning
holy things to ridicule。' On such occasions; as another of his
pupils described it; it was impossible to avoid 'a consciousness
almost amounting to solemnity' that; 'when his eye was upon you;
he looked into your inmost heart'。
With the boys in the Sixth Form; and with them alone; the severe
formality of his demeanour was to some degree relaxed。 It was his
wish; in his relations with the Praepostors; to allow the Master
to be occasionally merged in the Friend。 From time to time; he
chatted with them in a familiar manner; once a term he asked them
to dinner; and during the summer holidays he invited them; in
rotation; to stay with him in Westmorland。
It was obvious that the primitive methods of discipline which had
reached their apogee under the dominion of Keate were altogether
incompatible with Dr。 Arnold's view of the functions of a
headmaster and the proper governance of a public school。 Clearly;
it was not for such as he to demean himself by bellowing and
cuffing; by losing his temper once an hour; and by wreaking his
vengeance with indiscriminate flagellations。 Order must be kept
in other ways。 The worst boys were publicly expelled; many were
silently removed; and; when Dr。 Arnold considered that a flogging
was necessary; he administered it with gravity。 For he had no
theoretical objection to corporal punishment。 On the contrary; he
supported it; as was his wont; by an appeal to general
principles。 'There is;' he said; 'an essential inferiority in a
boy as compared with a man'; and hence 'where there is no
equality the exercise of superiority implied in personal
chastisement' inevitably followed。
He was particularly disgusted by the view that 'personal
correction';as he phrased it; was an insult or a degradation to
the boy upon whom it was inflicted; and to accustom young boys to
think so appeared to him to be 'positively mischievous'。 'At an
age;' he wrote; 'when it is almost impossible to find a true;
manly sense of the degradation of guilt or faults; where is the
wisdom of encouraging a fantastic sense of the degradation of
personal correction? What can be more false; or more adverse to
the simplicity; sobriety; and humbleness of mind which are the
best ornaments of youth; and offer the best promise of a noble
manhood?' One had not to look far; he added; for 'the fruits of
such a system'。 In Paris; during the Revolution of 1830; an
officer observed a boy of twelve insulting the soldiers; and
'though the action was then raging; merely struck him with the
flat part of his sword; as the fit chastisement for boyish
impertinence。 But the boy had been taught to consider his person
sacred; and that a blow was a deadly insult; he therefore
followed the officer; and having watched his opportunity; took
deliberate aim at him with a pistol and murdered him。' Such were
the alarming results of insufficient whipping。
Dr。 Arnold did not apply this doctrine to the Praepostors; but
the boys in the lower parts of the school felt its benefits; with
a double force。 The Sixth Form was not only excused from
chastisement; it was given the right to chastise。 The younger
children; scourged both by Dr Arnold and by the elder children;
were given every opportunity of acquiring the simplicity;
sobriety; and humbleness of mind; which are the best ornaments of
youth。
In the actual sphere of teaching; Dr。 Arnold's reforms were
tentative and few。 He introduced modern history; modern
languages; and mathematics into the school curriculum; but the
results were not encouraging。 He devoted to the teaching of
history one hour a week; yet; though he took care to inculcate in
these lessons a wholesome hatred of moral evil; and to point out
from time to time the indications of the providential government
of the world; his pupils never seemed to make much progress in
the subject。 Could it have been that the time allotted to it was
insufficient? Dr。 Arnold had some suspicions that this might be
the case。 With modern languages there was the same difficulty。
Here his hopes were certainly not excessive。 'I assume it;' he
wrote; 'as the foundation of all my view of the case; that boys
at a public school never will learn to speak or pronounce French
well; under any circumstances。' It would be enough if they could
'learn it grammatically as a dead language。 But even this they
very seldom managed to do。 I know too well;' he was obliged to
confess; 'that most of the boys would pass a very poor
examination even in French grammar。 But so it is with their
mathematics; and so it will be with any branch of knowledge that
is taught but seldom; and is felt to be quite subordinate to the
boys' main study'。
The boys' main study remained the dead languages of Greece and
Rome。 That the classics should form the basis of all teaching was
an axiom with Dr。 Arnold。 'The study of language;' he said;
'seems to me as if it was given for the very purpose of forming
the human mind in youth; and the Greek and Latin languages seem
the very instruments by which this is to be effected。' Certainly;
there was something providential about it from the point of
view of the teacher as well as of the taught。 If Greek and Latin
had not been 'given' in that convenient manner; Dr。 Arnold; who
had spent his life in acquiring those languages; might have
discovered that he had acquired them in vain。 As it was; he could
set the noses of his pupils to the grindstone of syntax and
prosody with a clear conscience。 Latin verses and Greek
prepositions divided between them the labours of the week。
As time went on he became; he declared; 'increasingly convinced
that it is not knowledge; but the means of gaining knowledge
which I have to teach'。 The reading of the school was devoted
almost entirely to selected passages from the prose writers of
antiquity。 'Boys;' he remarked; 'do not like poetry。' Perhaps his
own poetical taste was a little dubious; at any rate; it is
certain that he considered the Greek Tragedians greatly
overrated; and that he ranked Propertius as 'an indifferent
poet'。 As for Aristophanes; owing to his strong moral
disapprobation; he could not bring himself to read him until he
was f