A stranger who knew them by reputation but not by sight would inevitably have mistaken each for the other. Mr. Plummer, tall and thin, with a hooked nose, hollow cheeks, and sallow complexion, looked the embodiment of pessimism; while Mr. Bent, short, stout, with round eyes and a florid face, ought to have been a born optimist. Mr. Rankin used to say that Providence had designed the character of the one for the person of the other, that a malicious fairy had negotiated an exchange, and that they sought each others company because, apart, they were both conscious of being incomplete. But on this occasion, as we have said, Mr. Plummer was inclined to be pessimistic. “I don’t like this idea,” he said, “of calling in an outside opinion. If the parents once get it into their heads that they are able to dictate, there will be an end of systematic teaching.” “My good Plummer,” replied Mr. Bent, “there cannot possibly be an end, because there has never been a beginning. Systematic teaching indeed! Why, a boy told me the other day that he had been doing the same French book ever since he came to the school two years ago; and it is notorious that Cox set one and the same Latin prose every Term to his Form, and never looked it over.” “I was not thinking of organisation,” said Mr. Plummer, “I was speaking of principles; and I repeat, if the parents are allowed to dictate the lines on which education is to proceed, there will be an end of systematic teaching.” “They will not dictate,” said Mr. Bent; “they have no manuscript to dictate from. Their theories on education are purely negative--I say, steady up the hill! The only thing they insist on is that their offspring should not be taught to think or know. Thought and knowledge are dangerous to the existing social order and must be smothered young, like the Princes in the Tower. Provided that they _are_ smothered, the parents don’t care a rap what sort of pillow is used.” “Thought,” said Mr. Plummer, “hardly exists outside the middle classes.” “Knowledge,” retorted Mr. Bent, “only begins where middle-classdom ends. The art of being middle class consists in shutting yourself up in a detached house and only recognising the people who come in at the front door. Knowledge leads to the back door and the streets, and is therefore fatal to the art; and knowledge is the goal of education.” “If parents didn’t believe in education,” said Mr. Plummer, “they wouldn’t send their boys here.” “The English middle classes,” said Mr. Bent, “never have believed in education. The Scotch did once, till they discovered the superior merits of football; but the English never. And they send their sons here to be inoculated against it--I say, _do_ go a bit slower. For choice they put them with Chowdler, who returns them, in a few years, finished specimens of Philistinism, with orthodox views on Bible criticism and the off-theory, and a complete lack of interest in anything that really matters.”