Now there are a few, who have some dim perceptions of these so obvious features to a disinterested spectator. They see that it is a poor compensation to the wretched misery which holds thousands hopelessly in its grasp, to point out an occasional accident of escape--where some one, more gifted and more fortunate than his fellows, happens to rise into comfort and slight esteem! These noble men, the harbingers of light, who try to see and to act honestly, in spite of early prejudice and habit, perceive that there is no hope for these _serfs_, unless they can be moved with a higher interest. They think they discover a chance to move them by offering them _knowledge_, without, or nearly without, cost. But it is doubtful if they be not too low, too brutal, to care for _knowing_ anything. Then, "they must be forced to send the children, to be taught--_they must be whipped to School_." This is resented as an outrage on the _freedom_ of the serf--as an invasion of his family rights--as a positive, additional, tax and burden. For he gets _something_ from the petty work, or from the begging or thieving of the children, and now the Master takes _that_! Yet, probably, this is one needful thing--to take the children into the hands of the State, in every case where the natural guardian is unfit to properly care for them. But the State cannot _half_ take them. It cannot take anything of the present pittance, and claim to have compensated by giving words instead. It is cruel to say to him who starves in body, "Starve--I feed the mind!" A poor parent cannot receive even knowledge in exchange for bread. And it cannot be asked of him, in his low estate, to exchange the little added support of the child's wage for the, to him, useless words of knowledge. In the face of want one cares only for bread! Therefore, the State which teaches must also feed the poor--or see to it that the honest poor be first fed. If the parent can only feed by the help of the child, the State must not arbitrarily assume to be Master and Judge--saying, "Come to school--and starve, if must be."