Friendly Feelings.

first moments of every morning to devotional exercises, and thus let your pupils see that you and they have one common friend and counsellor in "Our Father who art in heaven."

Discipline is the first item that will claim your attention, and it is an all-important item. It lies at the very foundation of your labors; and unless you have right views and adopt right measures on this point, it will be useless for you to hope for success in teaching, for without good discipline, there can be no truly successful teaching. One may be able to govern a school, and yet not competent to teach the same; but he cannot, in the highest and truest sense, teach a school, unless he can also govern it. True teaching implies correct discipline. But I will proceed to give a few hints, which, I hope, may be of some service to you.

Try to cause your Pupils to feel that you are their Friend. Let all your plans and arrangements be made with reference to their good. As, for the first time, you enter the school-room, do it with a cheerful look, which shall indicate that your heart is in your work. Let your words be but the kindly expression of friendly feelings and good intentions; let no frowns cloud your brow, even though all may not, at the outset, be just as you might wish. Perfect discipline cannot be established in a day; yet you must aim to secure it gradually and surely. But you may ask what I mean by perfect discipline. I say, negatively, that

Order defined.

I do not consider it to consist in rigid and upright positions, in exact and undeviating movements, nor in constrained looks. I say, positively, that I consider that school in a good state of discipline, in which the pupils attend to all their duties, perform all their movements, and regard all the requirements of the school with cheerful alacrity, and with an evident and constant desire to co-operate with the teacher, studiously and pleasantly refraining from every act, which may tend to disturb the teacher or the school. "I consider a school judiciously governed, where order prevails; where the strictest sense of propriety is manifested by the pupils towards the teacher, and towards each other; where they are all busily employed in the appropriate duties of the school-room, and where they seem. to be under the influence of the teacher as a leader, but not as a driver. There is some difference of opinion as to the degree of stillness possible or desirable in a school. We all agree, however, that, for a still school, all unnecessary noise must be excluded." The best governed are they who seem to be ungoverned, save by the inward desire to do right; and the best disciplinarians are they who govern without seeming to govern. If you would succeed, do not attempt to govern too much. Lure your pupils into the right path by kindly words and friendly acts, and thus gain that perfect control over them which you should possess, and at the

* Admiral Stone.

Self-Control.- Anecdote.

same time have their obedience cheerful and prompt. In this way you will govern them, and at the same time they will not feel that they are governed.

Govern Yourself. — Unless you can exercise a good degree of self-government, you can hardly expect to govern others. It will not always be an easy matter for you to exhibit perfect self-control, but you must aim to do so; and if you can succeed in so governing your own feelings as never to appear angry or annoyed, you will find no difficulty in governing your pupils. I do not mean that you should be entirely regardless of the conduct of your pupils, but merely that you should not allow their errors to cause you to lose your patience, by exhibiting some sudden ebullition of passion. You know how ready some people are to take offence and show anger. A faithful servant, who had long borne the abusive words of a petulant master, finally said to him that he could no longer tolerate his captiousness, and that he was determined to leave his service. "But, Peter," said the relenting master,— Peter, you know I mean no harm, and that I am no sooner mad than pleased again.' “Very true, master,” replied Peter; "but I also know that you are no sooner pleased than mad again." So it is with some teachers, they allow feelings and expressions of anger and pleasantness to follow each other in such ludicrously rapid succession, as entirely to impair their influence.

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Let Circumstances modify your Views of Order and your Plans to secure it. Some teachers form a certain view of discipline, and certain undeviating plans for securing it. With them, attending circumstances have no influence. The act is judged in and of itself, entirely independent of the motives which led to it. This, of course, is wrong. If you would govern successfully and justly, study all the particulars bearing upon a transgression. Sometimes an act, in itself wrong, may be divested of all actual wrong when the circumstances are duly considered. In a certain school, for example, a boy of very orderly deportment and studious habits, suddenly whistled, no less to his own astonishment than that of his teacher. He was called out by his teacher and asked if he had whistled, when the frightened lad exclaimed, with all honesty of heart, "No, Sir, I didn't whistle,—it whistled itself!" The little fellow had been so intent on his lessons, and perhaps so delighted at overcoming some difficulty, that, forgetful alike of time, place, or circumstances, he expressed his joy by an unpremeditated whistle. That the school was interrupted was obvious, but no sensible teacher would deal with such a lad as he would with a culprit. Precisely such an interruption would seldom occur; and yet pupils will often be guilty of deviations in act, when the motives are entirely correct. Study, therefore, very carefully to discriminate between a wilful wrong and an unintentional error. Only a bad pupil can

"Hard Days."

be guilty of the former, while a very good one may be of the latter.

Then there are other circumstances which you must always take into consideration. There are certain days in the experience of every teacher which are hard days; there is something in the atmosphere, in the state of the teacher's health, or some incidental circumstances, which have an unfavorable influence upon the state of feeling, and consequently upon the apparent order of the school. You will, undoubtedly, sometimes enter your schoolroom in a depressed state of mind, and everything may seem to you"out of place," nothing meeting your expectations, and yet you may not be able to tell precisely what or where the trouble is. Under such circumstances, do not make a bad matter worse, by manifesting an unduly sensitive spirit. The Rev. Dr. Huntington, of Harvard College, gives the following excellent advice in relation to such days:

"It is in the experience of most teachers, I presume, that on certain days, as if, through some subtle and untraceable malignity in the air, the school-room seems to have fallen under the control of a secret fiend of disorder. There is nothing apparent to account for this epidemic perversity; all the ordinary rules of the place are in full recognition; the exercises tramp on in the accustomed succession; the parties are arranged as usual. There are the pupils coming from their several breakfasts, bringing both their identity and individuality; no