But this is not as it should be.

Such a system is neither likely to produce great nor wise men; and is much better adapted to parrots than children.

Hence, the first thing attempted in an infant school is, to set the children thinking,--to induce them to examine, compare, and judge, in reference to all those matters which their dawning intellects are capable of mastering.

It is of no use to tell a child, in the first place, _what it should think_,--this is at once inducing mental indolence, which is but too generally prevalent among adults; owing to this erroneous method having been adopted by those who had the charge of their early years.

Were a child left to its own resources, to discover and judge of things exclusively by itself, though the opposite evil would be the consequence, namely, a state of comparative ignorance, yet I am doubtful whether it would be greater or more lamentable than that issuing from the injudicious system of giving children dogmas instead of problems, the opinions of others instead of eliciting their own.