JEAN JACQUES. My poor Robert, you must forgive us. You had given
your labour and your pains to it. I see we were wrong to spoil
your work, but we will send to Malta for some more seed for you,
and we will never dig the ground again without finding out if some
one else has been beforehand with us.
ROBERT. Well, gentlemen, you need not trouble yourselves, for
there is no more waste ground. I dig what my father tilled; every
one does the same, and all the land you see has been occupied time
out of mind.
EMILE. Mr. Robert, do people often lose the seed of Maltese melons?
ROBERT. No indeed, sir; we do not often find such silly little
gentlemen as you. No one meddles with his neighbour's garden; every
one respects other people's work so that his own may be safe.
EMILE. But I have not got a garden.
ROBERT. I don't care; if you spoil mine I won't let you walk in
it, for you see I do not mean to lose my labour.
JEAN JACQUES. Could not we suggest an arrangement with this kind
Robert? Let him give my young friend and myself a corner of his
garden to cultivate, on condition that he has half the crop.
ROBERT. You may have it free. But remember I shall dig up your
beans if you touch my melons.
In this attempt to show how a child may be taught certain primitive
ideas we see how the notion of property goes back naturally to the
right of the first occupier to the results of his work. That is
plain and simple, and quite within the child's grasp. From that
to the rights of property and exchange there is but a step, after
which you must stop short.
You also see that an explanation which I can give in writing in a
couple of pages may take a year in practice, for in the course of
moral ideas we cannot advance too slowly, nor plant each step too
firmly. Young teacher, pray consider this example, and remember
that your lessons should always be in deeds rather than words, for
children soon forget what they say or what is said to them, but
not what they have done nor what has been done to them.
Such teaching should be given, as I have said, sooner or later, as
the scholar's disposition, gentle or turbulent, requires it. The
way of using it is unmistakable; but to omit no matter of importance
in a difficult business let us take another example.