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with a quiet conscience. On the other hand, how miserable must any boy
feel, if he has any nobleness of mind whatever, to go away from school
to-day thinking that he has not been honest; that he has been trying to
conceal his faults, and thus to obtain a credit which he did not justly
deserve. Always be honest, let the consequence be what it may."

The reader will understand that the object of such measures is simply
_to secure as large a majority as possible_ to make _voluntary_ efforts
to observe the rule. I do not expect that by such measures _universal_
obedience can be exacted. The teacher must follow up the plan after a
few days by other measures for those pupils who will not yield to such
inducements as these. Upon this subject, however, I shall speak more
particularly at a future time.

In my own school it required two or three weeks to exclude whispering
and communication by signs. The period necessary to effect the
revolution will be longer or shorter, according to the circumstances of
the school and the dexterity of the teacher; and, after all, the teacher
must not hope _entirely_ to exclude it. Approximation to excellence is
all that we can expect; for unprincipled and deceiving characters will
perhaps always be found, and no system whatever can prevent their
existence. Proper treatment may indeed be the means of their
reformation, but before this process has arrived at a successful result,


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