The Educational Writings of Richard Mulcaster — John Shaqi
The Educational Writings of Richard MulcasterMulcaster, Richard
History
The Educational Writings of Richard Mulcaster
Mulcaster, Richard
Education -- History
has a special eye (though it does not despise the other), so that
the young fry may be brought up to prove good in the end, and serve
their country well in whatever position they may be placed. For
the performance of this end I take it that this elementary course
is most sufficient, being the best means of perfecting all those
powers with which nature endows our race, by using those studies
which art and reflection appoint, and those methods which nature
herself suggests. For the end of education and training is to help
nature to her perfection in the complete development of all the
various powers.
This is what I mean by following nature, not counterfeiting her
in her own proper work by foolish imitation, or perverse attempt
to produce her effects, like an Apelles in portraiture or an
Archimedes in the laws of motion, but after considering and
marking with good judgment what are the natural tendencies and
inclinations, to frame a scheme of education in consonance with
these, and bring to perfection by art all those powers which
nature bestows in frank abundance.
For the physical life of man, in order to maintain and develop both
the individual and the species, nature has provided organs that
receive, prepare and distribute nourishment for the body, and has,
besides, given us for self-preservation the power of perceiving all
sensible things by means of feeling, hearing, seeing, smelling, and
tasting. These qualities of the outward world, being apprehended
by the understanding and examined by the judgment, are handed
over to the memory, and afterwards prove our chief--nay, our
only--means of obtaining further knowledge. Moreover, we have also
a power of movement, either under the influence of emotion or by
the enticement of desire, either for the direct purposes of life,
as in the action of the pulse and in breathing, or for outward
action, such as walking, running, or leaping. To serve the end
both of sense-perception and of motion, nature has planted in the
body a brain, the prince of all our organs, which by spreading its
channels through every part of our frame produces all the effects
through which sense passes into motion.
Further, our soul has in it a desire to obtain what it holds to
be good, and to avoid what it thinks evil. This desire is stirred
either by quiet allurement or by violent incitement, and when once
it is inflamed it strives to compass its end. To satisfy this
desire nature has given us a heart to kindle heat, and as the sense
is moved by the qualities of the object, and motion is effected by
means of sinews, so appetite, being stirred by the object of desire
or repulsion, is supplied with the means of satisfying itself.
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