His father's house was his home, and was ever after fondly remembered;
nay, I appeal to many superiour men, who were educated in this manner,
whether the recollection of some shady lane where they conned their
lesson; or, of some stile, where they sat making a kite, or mending
a bat, has not endeared their country to them?
But, what boy ever recollected with pleasure the years he spent in
close confinement, at an academy near London? unless, indeed, he
should, by chance, remember the poor scare-crow of an usher, whom he
tormented; or, the tartman, from whom he caught a cake, to devour it
with a cattish appetite of selfishness. At boarding-schools of every
description, the relaxation of the junior boys is mischief; and of the
senior, vice. Besides, in great schools, what can be more
prejudicial to the moral character than the system of tyranny and
abject slavery which is established amongst the boys, to say nothing
of the slavery to forms, which makes religion worse than a farce?
For what good can be expected from the youth who receives the
sacrament of the Lord's supper, to avoid forfeiting half a guinea,
which he probably afterwards spends in some sensual manner? Half the
employment of the youths is to elude the necessity of attending public
worship; and well they may, for such a constant repetition of the same
thing must be a very irksome restraint on their natural vivacity. As
these ceremonies have the most fatal effect on their morals, and as
a ritual performed by the lips, when the heart and mind are far
away, is not now stored up by our church as a bank to draw on for
the fees of the poor souls in purgatory, why should they not be
abolished?
But the fear of innovation, in this country, extends to every
thing.
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