The success of this method depended upon several factors not present in old-fashioned schools. There was first the elimination of those whose bad conduct was due to some medical defect. Then there was tact and skill in applying the method. But the really vital point was the good conduct of the majority of the class: the child felt itself opposed to the public opinion which it naturally respected. This is, of course, an entirely different situation from that of the schoolmaster who has a class bent on “ragging”. I do not propose to discuss the methods which he should employ, because they would never be needed if education were properly conducted from the start. Children like to learn things, provided they are the right things properly taught. The same mistake is made in imparting knowledge as is made, at an earlier stage, in regard to food and sleep: something which is really an advantage to the child is made to appear like a favour to the adult. Infants easily come to think that the only reason for eating and sleeping is that grown-ups desire it; this turns them into dyspeptic sufferers from insomnia.[15] Unless a child is ill, let it leave its food and go hungry. My boy had been coaxed into eating by his nurse, and had grown more and more _difficile_. One day when we had him for his mid-day meal, he refused to eat his pudding, so we sent it out. After a while, he demanded it back, but it turned out that the cook had eaten it. He was flabbergasted, and never made such pretences with us again. Exactly the same method should apply to instruction. Those who do not want it should be allowed to go without, though I should see to it that they were bored if they were absent during lesson-time. If they see others learning, they will presently clamour to be taught: the teacher can then appear as conferring a benefit, which is the truth of the situation. I should have in every school a large bare room to which pupils could go if they did not want to learn, but if they went there, I should not allow them to come back to lessons that day. And they should be sent there as a punishment if they behaved badly in lesson-time. It seems a simple principle that a punishment should be something you wish the culprit to dislike, not something you wish him to like. Yet “lines” are a common punishment where the professed aim is to produce a love of classical literature.