What, then, is there to do? The parents who are unwilling to permit their children to undergo a course of training under strict discipline, are the ones who deserve the reproof. In the first place, everything they possess, including the children, is devoted to ambition. Then, that their wishes may the more quickly be realized, they drive these unripe scholars into the forum, and the profession of eloquence, than which none is considered nobler, devolves upon boys who are still in the act of being born! If, however, they would permit a graded course of study to be prescribed, in order that studious boys might ripen their minds by diligent reading; balance their judgment by precepts of wisdom, correct their compositions with an unsparing pen, hear at length what they ought to imitate, and be convinced that nothing can be sublime when it is designed to catch the fancy of boys, then the grand style of oratory would immediately recover the weight and splendor of its majesty. Now the boys play in the schools, the young men are laughed at in the forum, and, a worse symptom than either, no one, in his old age, will confess the errors he was taught in his school days. But that you may not imagine that I disapprove of a jingle in the Lucilian manner, I will deliver my opinions in verse,-- CHAPTER THE FIFTH. “The man who emerges with fame, from the school of stern art, Whose mind gropes for lofty ideals, to bring them to light, Must first, under rigid frugality, study his part; Nor yearn for the courts of proud princes who frown in their might: Nor scheme with the riff-raf, a client in order to dine, Nor can he with evil companions his wit drown in wine Nor sit, as a hireling, applauding an actor’s grimace. But, whether the fortress of arms-bearing Tritonis smile Upon him, or land which the Spartan colonials grace, Or home of the sirens, with poetry let him beguile The years of young manhood, and at the Maeonian spring His fortunate soul drink its fill: Then, when later, the lore Of Socrates’ school he has mastered, the reins let him fling, And brandish the weapons that mighty Demosthenes bore. Then, steeped in the culture and music of Greece, let his taste Be ripened and mellowed by all the great writers of Rome. At first, let him haunt not the courts; let his pages be graced By ringing and rhythmic effusions composed in his home Next, banquets and wars be his theme, sung in soul-stirring chant, In eloquent words such as undaunted Cicero chose. Come! Gird up thy soul! Inspiration will then force a vent And rush in a flood from a heart that is loved by the muse!” CHAPTER THE SIXTH.