An Inquiry into the Permanent Causes of the Decline and Fall of Powerful and Wealthy Nations Part 35

The natural tendency in a nation, while growing richer, to alter its character, owing to the different manner in which the children are educated and brought up, applies particularly to England, and to every nation getting rich by trade or manufactures. In another part, it has been observed, that where the wealth of a country circulates amongst the labouring cla.s.ses first, it alters the manner of living more than when it originates with the higher; it produces, also, a greater change on the education of children.

No part of the general inquiry is so particularly applicable to England, in an excessive degree, as that relative to education. In proportion as ignorant people arrive at that sort of affluence, which manufactures and trade produce, in that same proportion do they ruin their children.

The manners, the nature of the government, and the way of thinking of the people, all lead to this in England; and so far as it is possible to observe the effect, it may be said to appear as if it operated with rapidity at the present period.

Many volumes have been written on education, by the ablest men; but it has already been observed, that they have all treated the subject in a manner much too intricate and complex. Fully aware of the importance, they seem to have thought that it could not be treated too much at length, or investigated too minutely; and, by this means, what they have said is little applicable to general purposes; for, if to educate a man for common life were a difficult complicated operation, it would very seldom be performed. [end of page #216]

{Here appears at page 216 the fourth and final chart, ent.i.tled "Chart Representing the Increase of the Annual Revenues -of- ENGLAND AND FRANCE, from the beginning of the 17th Century to the present time"}

The word education itself appears to be misapplied or misunderstood, owing, probably, to its original construction and use, and no other word having been subst.i.tuted in its place.

By education was meant, in former times, the teaching to read and write; and these accomplishments, which, at that time, distinguished a gentleman from the lower cla.s.ses, and, by that means, education is still considered as only applying to the learning of what is taught at schools or universities. It is princ.i.p.ally in this light that those who have written on it have viewed it, though in fact _well brought up (bien eleve)_ comes nearer to the meaning than being _well learnt_, which is equivalent to well educated.

In this, as in every other thing, the end in view should never be forgotten; but, as it happens with respect to the middling and lower orders, it is forgotten so soon as affluence has made a little progress in a country.

The education of the higher cla.s.ses is generally pretty well conducted; and, indeed, human beings, when beyond the reach of want, who do not inherit the necessity derived from Adam, of gaining their bread by the sweat of their brows, require much more teaching than others, whose conduct is regulated by necessity, and who have not the means of giving way to the pa.s.sions that beset human nature.

With respect, however, to the higher cla.s.ses, it is scarcely possible for a government to interfere to much purpose. Those who are possessed of fortune will act according to inclination; and, in respect to this cla.s.s of society, in England, it is already in less need of reform or interference than any others, while the lower and middling cla.s.ses require it more.

There is no possibility for an ignorant man to become of any importance in this country, even with the aid of wealth and fortune.

An immoral character, or a mean selfish one, has not a much better chance, while, by talents and good conduct, every thing desirable may be obtained: perhaps, nothing further can be done to excite men of rank and fortune to emulation and virtue.

With respect to the learned professions, the modes by which students are brought up to them are by no means unexceptionable; but that is not a point of very great national importance; at any rate, [end of page #217] it is not the part in which England stands the most in need of attention {174} and interference from the government of the country.

The two cla.s.ses to whom bringing up, as it is generally understood, would apply better than the word education, are the middle rank of society, and the lower order of people in trade.

The middle rank of society is, in all countries, the most important in point of principles and manners. To keep it pure is always of the highest importance, and it is the most difficult, for there a baneful change is the most apt to take place.

Gentlemen of rank, in all countries, resemble each other very nearly; not, perhaps, in exterior, because that depends on fas.h.i.+on, which is arbitrary, but in mind and manners there is less difference than between men in a second rank of society.

The lower orders, so far as they are forced, by necessity, to labour, resemble each other also; they are pressed by necessities and pa.s.sions on one side, and the desire of rest on the other; and a fair allowance being made for variety of climate, of circ.u.mstances, and of natural dispositions, there is nothing very different amongst them. {175}

What applies with respect to the higher and lower orders does not

{174} Our lawyers (barristers) are probably superior to those of any other nation, and the clergy are, at least, equal. This is not, indeed, saying a great deal; but it is so difficult, in matters of religion, to temper zeal, and draw a line between emulation and fanaticism, that, perhaps, it is better that they should be a little remiss than righteous overmuch. It is not in the education of churchmen, but in the manner of paying and providing for them, that the error lies; and that subject is treated elsewhere.

{175} Cervantes, in his admirable romance of Don Quixote, paints the mind of a gentleman, which all countries will acknowledge to be like the truth. The madness apart, the manner of thinking and acting was that of the gentleman of Spain, France, Germany, or England. Neither was he the gentleman of the fifteenth or eighteenth century, but of any other century. His dress was Spanish; his madness and manners belonged to the ages of chivalry and romance, but the mind and principles of the gentleman suited all ages and all countries.

Sancho, again, barring likewise his oddities, is the peasant of all countries; studying to live as well as he can, and labour as little as he may. In short, a mind continually occupied about personal wants, and alive to personal interest. In the middle ranks of society there is no such similarity.

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apply at all to the middling cla.s.ses, nor even to the most wealthy cla.s.s of labourers in a manufacturing country: in those we can find no fixed character; it is as variable as the circ.u.mstances in which the individuals are placed, and it is there that a government should interfere. It should interfere in guiding the richer cla.s.ses of working people, and the middling ranks, in the education of their children, and in a.s.sisting those of the lower orders, who are too much pressed upon by indigence.

The end in view in all education is to make the persons, whether men or women, fill their place well and properly in life; and this is only to be done by setting a good example, instilling good principles, accustoming them, when young, to good habits; and, above all, by teaching them how to gain more than they are habituated to spend.

It follows from this, that industry, and a trade, are the chief parts of education, that reading and writing are not, being but of a very doubtful utility to the labouring cla.s.s of society.

On this subject, it is absolutely necessary to advert to what Dr. Smith says relative to apprentices.h.i.+ps; the opinion of so great a writer is of too much importance not to be examined, and refuted, if found wrong.

Apprentices.h.i.+ps, or teaching a trade, is the basis of the future happiness and prosperity of the individual in the lower and middle cla.s.ses. On this subject, however, Mr. Smith says quite the contrary.

That the idleness of apprentices is well known, that their inducement to industry is small, and that, as to what they have to learn, a few weeks, or sometimes a few days, would, in most cases, be sufficient.

In short, he maintains, that they would learn better, be more industrious and useful, if employed on wages, than if bound for a term of years; and, finally, that there were no apprentices amongst the ancients. As to there being no apprentices in the ancient world, if that was the case, is no argument with respect to the present state of things; for, while most part of working men were slaves, there could not possibly be much occasion for apprentices; but are we quite certain, that the freed men, so often mentioned, were not people who had served apprentices.h.i.+ps? Freed men are so often mentioned, that there must have been probably something else to which they owed their freedom, besides the goodwill or [end of page #219] caprice of their masters, particularly as that goodwill must have been exercised to deserving objects, and consequently the sacrifice made in giving liberty was the greater. {176}

As men cultivated difficult arts; that is, as luxury increased, it must have become difficult to get labour done by slaves, merely by compulsive means; there must have been bargain and mutual interest settled between the master and the slave, so as to accomplish the end intended. {177} Amongst rewards to a slave, liberty, at a certain period, is not only the greatest, but is the only one that effectually serves the slave; for, while he remains the property of a master, his rewards can consist of little else than good treatment, as all property given is liable to be taken back again.

Supposing, however, the point yielded, and that there were no apprentices in the early ages; but that the practice originated in the days of ignorance; in the dark ages, under the feudal system, together with the invention of corporations and privileged bodies, against whose existence the whole set of economists have leagued together, as the Greeks did against Troy; still the obscurity of the origin is no objection. A const.i.tution like that of Britain, for example, is not an invention of antiquity; it took its rise in the dark ages and in times of ignorance, but it is not for that the less an object of admiration. Many other examples may be furnished of the admirable things that took rise in the dark ages; and amongst them, not the least, is the abolition of slavery itself. {178}

Let us, however, examine the effect of apprentices.h.i.+ps in those places where they can be compared with persons brought up entirely free.

{176} We may form some idea of the difficulty of getting work done by people in no way interested in the success, by the workhouses in this country. The smallest quant.i.ty, and of the most simple nature, is all we get done, because the overseers are ignorant, and the nation inattentive, and the labour compulsive.

{177} In Egypt, and most other ancient countries, the son followed, by law, the trade of his father: this was equivalent to an apprentices.h.i.+p.

{178} Whether it arose from the mixture of a northern with the southern people, or from what other cause, it is certain, that, during the ages of ignorance, the foundation was laid for almost all that is great, at the present time.

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If there are trades, where it is true, (as Mr. Smith affirms,) that the art of working may be learnt in a few weeks, what are the consequences?

At the age of sixteen or seventeen, a boy can get as much money as he will be able to earn at any future time in his life; he will be able to get as much as a man, who has a wife and five or six children to maintain.

There will be required a very great share of moderation and wisdom, indeed, under such circ.u.mstances, to prevent such a boy from wasting his money in ways that will incapacitate him from living easy when he shall become a father of a family himself, or from idling away the spare time that his gains afford him. He will, naturally, do part of both: but the way that is generally done is this. Without controul from a master, and totally independent of parents, who are quite left behind in poverty, (not having more to maintain their whole family than the youth himself earns,) he despises them, saves a little money at first, and purchases finery. The novelty of dress soon wears off, and the more immediate pleasures of eating, drinking, and keeping company, as it is termed, take the lead. The consequence of the same is idleness and rags. Ashamed to shew himself amongst persons of better conduct, the youth changes his place of residence and work; habit has got hold of him, and labour becomes hateful; a soldier's life appears the best for a youth of such a description; and, it is an undoubted fact, that, at those places where trades are carried on, that can be learnt in a short time, {179} there are more recruits obtained for the army than in any other districts of equal population. It is also an undoubted fact, that, in these same districts, the most respectable people bind their sons apprentices; and, in doing so, they are guided by experience, and affection for their children, not by interested motives.

{179} This is not the case with many trades, and Mr. Smith is under a mistake as to the fact; but, granting it to be true, the places in question, Birmingham, Sheffield, Manchester, and other towns where the division of labour reduces every operation to great simplicity, are the best for recruiting the army. In those places, all respectable people, who can afford it, bind their sons apprentices, to prevent the danger.

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In the other case, again, where a trade is not easily learnt, how is skill to be obtained but by an apprentices.h.i.+p. The bringing the son up to his father's trade, a practice that prevails in the eastern parts of Asia, is one way; parental authority needs not the aid of a written indenture; but, where this is not the case, who is to teach a youth, if he is not to be bound for a certain number of years, but to go away as soon as he has learnt a trade? The father, in some cases, may be able to pay for his son learning the trade, and this experiment has sometimes been tried, but generally with very imperfect success. The youth, for the most part, in those cases, considers himself as independent of the master, and gives himself very little trouble to learn his business.

Where the reward of the master, or rather the remuneration for his pains and trouble, is to arise from the labour of the boy, the master is interested in his learning; and the other feels an obligation, as well as an interest in learning. Though the apprentice is not absolutely paid for what he does, he finds his ease, his importance, and comfort, all depend on his proficiency; and, with young minds, such motives are much more powerful, and act through a better channel than avarice.

The power that the legislature gives to a master over his apprentice appears not only to be wise but necessary; and, if rewards for earning a trade could be given, in addition to that without infringing on liberty, or burthening the state, it would be a great advantage.

But learning a trade is not the only advantage of an apprentices.h.i.+p; a good moral conduct, fidelity, and attention to his duties, are all acquired at the same time, or ought to be so; whereas, the youth who, at an early age, is left without control, is apt to learn just the contrary.

Where people have fortune, circ.u.mstances give them a control over their children by expectancies; but, where there is no fortune, and children must provide for themselves, an apprentices.h.i.+p is a subst.i.tute for expectancies, which appears highly necessary; and it is wonderful how so discriminating and profound a man as Dr. Smith could overlook so material a circ.u.mstance. It shews how far prejudice, and an [end of page #222] opinion once adopted, will lead men of the first judgement and genius astray; {180} for it is not to be supposed that any person will stand forward of himself to maintain an opinion against which experience speaks so decidedly.

To learn a trade, and be taught a good moral conduct, and attention to one's duty, is certainly the essential part of education, both in the lower and middling cla.s.ses; and that portion of education, which appears to have got an exclusive t.i.tle to the name, reading and writing, are, with the working cla.s.ses, a very inferior object.

One of the duties of government, then, is to watch over the education of the children of the middling and lower orders, which has a tendency to grow worse, as the nation advances in wealth.

In England, the pride of the middling cla.s.ses is to have their children educated at boarding-schools, where the business of eating, sleeping, dressing, and exercise, is pretty well understood; where the branches of education, pretended to be taught, are little attended to, (writing, and some exterior accomplishments, of which the father and mother can judge, excepted,) where moral conduct, the duties in life, and the conduct necessary to be followed, are scarcely once thought of.

It is true, that, till a certain age, it is generally not known for what particular line of life a young man is intended; but, there are certain things necessary to every line of life, and those should never be neglected. The habits contracted at schools are very often of a sort never to be got the better of; and how can good habits be contracted when no attention is bestowed on the subject?