instance, that the ditties of Mother Goose, meaningless jingles as they are, are educating his sense of rhythm; he does not understand that his imaginative powers are being nourished by the fairytale, the normal mental food for a certain stage of the development of the individual as it is the natural and inevitable product of a corresponding stage in the development of the race. So long as a child has genuine interest in a poem or a tale he is getting something from it, but he does not concern himself to consider anything beyond present enjoyment. In the earlier stages at least, and for that matter at any stage, the thing to be secured is interest; and instruction in the lower school grades should be confined to what is actually needed to make children enjoy a given piece. Anything beyond this may wisely be deferred. In many of the lower grades it is now the fashion to have children act out poems. The method is spoken of with satisfaction by teachers who have tried it. I know nothing of it by experience, but should suppose it might be good if not carried too far. Children are naturally histrionic, and advantage may be taken of this fact to stimulate their imagination and to quicken their responsiveness to literature, if seriousness and sincerity are not forgotten. In this early work it does not seem to me that much can wisely be done in the study of metrical effects. Indeed, I have serious doubts whether much in the way of the examination of the technique of poetry properly has place anywhere in } preparatory schools. The child, however, should be trained gradually to notice metrical effects, by having attention called to passages which are especially musical or impressive. By beginning with ringing and strongly marked verse and leading on to effects more delicate the teacher may do much in this line. I have called this early work "inspirational" because it should be directed to making literature a pleasure and an inspiration. The word, clumsy as it may seem, does express the real function of . art, and the only function which may with any profit be considered in the earlier stages of the "study" of literature. The object is to make the children care for good books; to show them that poetry has a meaning for them; and to awaken in them—although they will be far from understand ing the facta sensitiveness to ideals. The child will not be aware that he is being given higher views of life, that he is being trained to some perception of nobler aims and possibilities greater than are presented by common experiences; but this is what is really being accomplished. Any training which opens the eyes to the finer side of life is in the best and truest sense inspiration; and it should be the distinct aim of the teacher to see to it that whatever else may happen, in the lower grades or in the higher, this chief function of the teaching of literature shall not be lost sight of or neglected. VIII AN ILLUSTRATION To attempt to give a concrete illustration of the method in which any teaching is to be carried on is in a way to try for the impossible. Every class and every pupil must be treated according to the especial nature of the case and the personal equation of the teacher. I perhaps expose myself to the danger of seeming egotistic if I insert here an experience of my own, and, what is of more consequence, I may possibly obscure the very points I am endeavoring to make clear. As well as I can, however, I shall set down an actual talk, in the hope that it may afford some hint of the way in which even difficult pieces of literature may be made to appeal to a child. Of course this is not in the least meant as a model, but solely and simply as an illustration. I once asked a fine little fellow of eight what he was doing at school. He answered-because this happened to be the task which at the moment was most pressing that he was committing to memory William Blake's "Tiger." "Do you like it?" I asked. "Oh, we don't have to like it," he responded with careless frankness, "we just have to learn it." The form of his reply appealed to one's sense of humor, and I wondered how many of my own students in literature might have given answers not dissimilar in spirit, had they not outgrown the delicious candor which belongs to the first decade of a lad's life. The afternoon chanced to be rainy and at my disposal. I was curious to see what I could do with this combination of Blake and small boy, and I made the experiment. I should not have chosen the poem for one so young; but it is real, compact of noble imagination, the boy was evidently genuine, and a real poem must have something for any sincere reader even if he be a child. The following report of our talk was not written down at the time, and makes no pretense of being literal. It does represent, so far as I can judge, with substantial accuracy what passed between the straightforward lad and myself. Too deliberate and too diffuse to have taken place in a schoolroom, it yet gives, on an extended scale, what I believe is the true method of "teaching literature" in all the secondary-school work. I do not claim to have originated or to have discovered the method ; but I hope that I may be able to make clearer to some teachers how children may be helped to do their own thinking and thus brought to a vital and delighted enjoyment of the masterpieces they study. I began to repeat aloud the opening lines of the poem. 66 Why," said the boy, "do you know that? Did you have to learn it at school when you were little like me?" "I'm not sure when I did learn it," I answered; "I've known it for a good while; but I did n't just learn it. I like it." I repeated the whole poem, purposely refraining from giving it very great force, even in the supreme symphonic outburst of the magnificent fifth stanza: Tiger, tiger, burning bright In the forests of the night, Could frame thy fearful symmetry? In what distant deeps or skies On what wings dare he aspire? What the hand dare seize the fire? And what shoulder and what art Could twist the sinews of thy heart? And, when thy heart began to beat, What dread hand formed thy dread feet? What the hammer? what the chain? When the stars threw down their spears, Did he smile His work to see? Did he who made the lamb make thee? "It sounds rather pretty," I commented, as carelessly as possible. |