With regard to the punishment of flogging, many persons condemn it, as degrading to a boy's character. These same persons would, probably, deem it out of place to raise their hats on entering a man's shop, and perhaps every one would feel it to be so in England; but in other countries, were they not to do so, the shopkeeper, from experience, would merely attribute the omission to what he deems an instance of ill-breeding, habitual to John Bull; or, when he is not aware of this, he will frequently decline to accommodate his customer. I mention this instance to show, that what may meet with disapprobation in one place, will not do so in another; and thus what to us at a distance, and in after years, may appear to be repulsive, may by no means be so considered during boyhood. Again, others will say, that it ought to be felt as a disgrace. To this, I can only answer that it never will be; for where there are so many boys as at Eton, this mode of punishment must frequently be adopted; and as often as it is, so certain, from its repetition, will it cease to be considered in that light--it is altogether a necessary evil, which flesh is heir to. Should the boy have committed anything unbecoming a gentleman, he is invariably and appropriately punished by the manner adopted towards him by his own associates, and the feeling of the school in general. Let flogging, then, still be tolerated as a mere physical and convenient inconvenience--its effect, too, is but ephemeral, and soon becomes lost among the things that were. Not so will be the effects of frequent attendance in church. Concerning these three subjects, perhaps no two persons could be found who might entertain similar opinions; therefore, it behoves one to advance any decision as regards them with caution and diffidence; but if one of them admits of greater certainty of opinion than the others, is it not that relative to the frequent occurrence of the church service? However the other two subjects may be opposed, some advantages may be still held out in extenuation of their practice, but I cannot help feeling that this cloying attendance on chapel must be altogether pernicious. His religion is not to be flogged or forced into a boy, like so much Latin and Greek, or even to be instilled into him by a comparative stranger. Until he comes to be able to inquire or think about it for himself, the duty of instructing him is exclusively incumbent on his parents, or on those who are in more immediate contact with him than the tutors of a college can be. The superior and sufficient influence of the former, in this respect, may be evidenced by the fact of a little Catholic boy whom I knew, duly attending church with the rest of us, and afterwards leaving the school, and remaining to this day as stanch a Papist as ever entered the confessional.