to give up the point, and adopt another plan. My pupils would make
resolutions enough; they understood their duty well enough. They were
allowed to leave their seats and whisper to their companions whenever,
_in their honest judgment, it was necessary for the prosecution of their
studies_. I knew that it sometimes would be necessary, and I was
desirous to adopt this plan to save myself the constant interruption of
hearing and replying to requests. But it would not do. Whenever, from
time to time, I called them to account, I found that a large majority,
according to their own confession, were in the habit of holding daily
and deliberate communication with each other on subjects entirely
foreign to the business of the school. A more experienced teacher would
have predicted this result; but I had very high ideas of the power of
cultivated conscience, and, in fact, still have. But then, like most
other persons who become possessed of a good idea, I could not be
satisfied without carrying it to an extreme.

Still it is necessary, in ordinary schools, to give pupils sometimes
the opportunity to whisper and leave seats.[1] Cases occur where this is
unavoidable. It can not, therefore, be forbidden altogether. How, then,
you will ask, can the teacher regulate this practice, so as to prevent
the evils which will otherwise flow from it, without being continually
interrupted by the request for permission?

[Footnote 1: There are some large and peculiarly-organized schools in
cities and large towns to which this remark may perhaps not apply.]

By a very simple method. _Appropriate particular times at which all this
business is to be done_, and _forbid it altogether_ at every other time.
It is well, on other accounts, to give the pupils of a school a little
respite, at least every hour; and if this is done, an intermission of