G. A. Johnston

“ The aim of the school is to develop the natural insight of the child, to enable him to make the best use of the capacities with which he has been endowed, to train him in habits of observation and reflection, and to encourage him to think and reason for himself. In so far as the school is successful in this, it is helping to educate the child in virtue, for it is making it easier for him to acquire the habit of what Arnold of Rugby termed "moral thoughtfulness." And a sane moral thoughtfulness, free from cant and priggishness, is the foundation of all virtue. ”

“ Hence the task of moral education is to train character as a whole, rather than to attempt to impose peculiar virtues on it from the outside. The education of character is on precisely the same footing as the education of the mind. It has long been recognised that education does not aim at filling the mind from the outside with knowledge, whether "useful" or "useless." Education insists that its task is to train the mind to develop its own powers by attending to and observing the world, and by assimilating what enters into its experience. ”

“ An external authority which is not inwardly acknowledged by the child is worse than useless, because, as soon as the child secures his freedom from what he conceives to be the bonds of such an authority, reaction is apt to set in, and he will glory in showing that he can now "do as he likes." Such "doing as he likes" is simply intemperance. Discipline will fail of its lessons, unless its principles are so appreciated by the child that he will come to apply them himself in the control of his own life. ”

“ The virtues, as we have seen, are simply different aspects of goodness of character, and goodness of character is acquired by training. A man's character becomes virtuous only by the habitual doing of virtuous actions. He acquires the virtue of temperance only by constantly practising self-control; and he becomes courageous by habitually acting bravely in the difficulties and dangers of life. The possibility of sound moral education depends on the fact that goodness of character is a unity ”

“ In the view of the child, it is wrong to carry tales, because it is "not fair"; it is wrong for a big boy to bully a small one, because it is "not fair"; it is wrong to cheat, because it is "not fair." In the child's work, as in his games, a practice is immediately and universally condemned if it is seen to be "not fair." The school offers an admirable training-ground for the child to cultivate the virtue of fairness and justice.
Little need be said of the place of wisdom in the school. The school primarily exists to teach wisdom in the best sense. ”

“ It requires a constant struggle: "it is hard to be good." Perfect goodness never is completely attained. But the good man is always in process of attaining. His life is a struggle in which he is gradually realising his ideals. It is impossible for a man to stand still morally. If he is not improving, or at least trying to improve, he is deteriorating. The moment he says to himself, "I have attained," he begins to fall.
Much of our moral life has, indeed, been given over to habit, and in accordance with habit we do what is right or wrong almost mechanically. ”

“ On the other hand, justice is essentially a social virtue. It arises in the relation of individual to individual in a society. The just man observes the principles of social harmony and equity, and practises fairness and honesty in his dealings with all men. And justice is manifested by the state which has so organised its social life that all its citizens live in harmony.
Two aspects of justice were distinguished by Aristotle—justice as distributive and justice as corrective. Distributive justice in the state demands that all men should be, treated equitably in accordance with their merits. ”

“ The two aspects of wisdom of greatest importance in connection with virtue are insight and reflection. The wise man is the man of insight. In treating of duty, we pointed out that the value of moral rules is very limited: they must be applied by the man of insight who has a conscientious attitude to life. Moral insight is one of the most distinctive marks of the good man. ”

“ Temperance is inconsistent with the waste of human powers and the dissipation of human energy. It strives to reform the ugly disproportion of unregulated conduct. The temperate man governs and regulates his life in accordance with his own self-imposed end. Temperance is thus a very comprehensive virtue, which is fully exhibited only by the character whose every activity is rationally controlled, harmonised, and concentrated.
The word temperance has come to be used almost solely in connection with the control of the passion for strong drink. ”

“ Now the child's courage will not be developed any the better, if he knows what specialised courage these vocations require. The child's concern is primarily with such courage as he needs and is called upon to display as a child. If he learns to bear himself with courage as a child, he will not be found wanting when he is called upon to display the particular variety of that virtue which is required by the vocation which he follows. Some schemes of moral education certainly leave upon the child the impression that the virtues are needed only in after-life. ”

“ The virtues, then, are aspects of goodness. Perfect goodness is compact of all the virtues, and the perfectly good character would be perfectly virtuous. Goodness may appear in an infinite variety of aspects: the man of good character will express his goodness in actions of the most diverse kinds, and his conduct will vary in accordance with changing circumstances. The virtues are infinite in number. But most moralists have found it convenient to classify them under four heads, viz. Courage, Temperance, Justice, and Wisdom. ”

“ A virtue is always an activity of character, an activity exercised in some department of the struggle of the moral life. Courage could not exist, were it not for the difficult and dangerous situations which call for its expression. Temperance or self-control would be meaningless if man had no unruly desires and inclinations to restrain. ”

“ Courage is probably the first virtue to appear in the childhood of the individual and the race. The first definite quality which character develops is courage. The child and the savage learn to be brave, to bear pain and discomfort, while as yet the other virtues have not emerged. Courage may be said to be the virtue from which all the others are developed. It is significant that the word virtue is derived from the Latin virtus, which originally meant manliness or courage. The special virtue of man was considered to be courage, and from it all the others were supposed to have grown. ”

“ Courage in the form of attention and concentration is needed to overcome the initial difficulties of lessons; and as perseverance the same virtue of courage is constantly being tested throughout the whole of school life, whether in work or at games. Courage is needed, also, to enable the child to make a stand against the force of its fellows' opinion, in schools where the tone is bad. And, of course, the child's courage may be tested also by the traditional bully, whether he be boy or teacher.
Temperance also finds a field for its exercise in the school. ”

“ Temptations as real if not as violent as those of later life beset him—temptations to cheat, to tell lies, to use bad language—and in presence of such temptations he must learn to control and govern himself.
Justice is a virtue to which most children are exceedingly sensitive. The child is alert to notice any suspicion of favouritism on the part of the teacher. If the teacher pays special attention to any one pupil, the rest are apt to think that this one is a "pet," and that the teacher's attitude is "not fair." Partiality is quickly seen by the children to be inconsistent with justice. ”

“ By temperance we mean the virtue of orderliness and moderation in conduct. A character is temperate if it arranges and orders all its conduct in accordance with its dominant purposes. Temperance has both negative and positive aspects. On the one hand, it involves self-control and self-possession. The virtue of temperance is displayed by the man who disciplines his impulses and desires, and organises his emotions and sentiments in a stable character. But temperance does not mean the total annihilation of desires and emotions. ”

“ It is now universally recognised in theory, however imperfectly that theory may be carried out in practice, that education which merely supplies the child with pre-digested knowledge of facts succeeds only in producing obtuseness and stupidity in the child. ”

“ In the formation of habits, as we have seen, the struggle is often fierce; and if it be true that much or most of our moral conduct is habitual, that only means that we are now reaping reward or punishment for victories or defeats in former moral struggles. But however much of our moral life has been taken over by the automatism of habit, scarcely a day or even an hour passes without the emergence of a situation which involves moral struggle. ”

“ Every age must construct its virtues for itself. In every age character must react in new ways to the difficulties of the situations which face it. The moral life is not stationary. It is a constant progress, and the virtues in which it is expressed necessarily alter from time to time. The virtues required in one age are not those whose activity is most valuable in another. ”

“ In a primitive community courage meant simply physical bravery in face of danger, but as opportunities decreased for displaying such bravery in conflicts with wild beasts and the forces of nature, and in fighting against enemies, the meaning of the virtue was gradually extended. It was recognised that mere physical boldness is not the only kind of courage, and that other callings besides warfare call for the virtue. Courage thus becomes immeasurably more comprehensive. Under the general name courage are grouped the specialised aspects in which it is manifested in various vocations. ”

“ Justice is not inconsistent with sympathy. Justice must, indeed, be impartial, and if a man allows sympathy to get the better of his judgment, he is not really just; but an impartial sympathy is possible, and seems indeed to be of the essence of social justice.
§6. Wisdom. The virtue of wisdom should perhaps be regarded as the foundation of all the virtues rather than as a virtue in itself. There would seem to be no virtue without some wisdom or knowledge. ”

“ Though the manifestations of courage vary, it is fundamentally the same virtue in whatever calling it is displayed. In every case, a difficult situation is faced unflinchingly, risks are run with boldness, and obstacles are overcome with fortitude and perseverance. Courage involves firmness in facing moral duties, and efficiency in performing them. ”

“ Every day brings with it new situations and new circumstances, and however habitual our way of life may have become, we are forced to adapt it to the new conditions. Unruly desires solicit satisfaction, flitting ideas distract our attention, capricious emotions affect our equanimity. In some cases the struggle between the self and the distraction may be so slight that we are hardly aware of it at all, in others the victory may be won in a moment, for we put the intruding thought or desire from us without hesitation. ”

“ Corrective justice becomes necessary when distributive justice has failed or has been overridden. If one citizen has obtained more than his due proportion of goods, either by such obviously unlawful means as theft or by subtler illegality or unfairness, it becomes the duty of the state to correct the disproportion. Thus justice in the strict legal sense is almost wholly corrective justice. ”

“ Courage is needed by the child at the beginning of its school life, courage to leave its home, whether for a few hours or for a whole term, courage to associate with strangers, courage to face ridicule and practical joke. ”

“ The other ethically valuable aspect of wisdom is reflection. Virtuous action is not simply a matter of insight. Morality, as we have seen, involves reflection. All good moral actions are voluntary, either in the sense that they are definitely willed, or that they are performed in accordance with habits which have been formed by the repetition of willed actions. ”

“ All men are not equal in capacity, and all men do not deserve equally well of the community, so distributive justice does not claim an equal distribution of goods to every man; but it does try to secure that all men shall be treated equitably and fairly. ”

“ All or none of these aspects of goodness may be exhibited by an action. The same act may be at once courageous, temperate, wise, and just. In such a case all the chief aspects of goodness are possessed by it. On the other hand, a courageous act may be unwise and intemperate and unjust, and a wise action may be neither courageous nor just. It is difficult sometimes to decide whether a man's character or conduct is good, precisely because it may exhibit one or more aspects of goodness without the others. ”

“ The obstacles to be faced and overcome vary in different callings, and the precise kind of courage required to meet them differs accordingly. The sailor, the soldier, the business-man, the doctor, and the minister have to face very different forms of danger and difficulty. We claim that they should show the kind of courage appropriate to their occupation, and if they fail in this, we account it a much more serious delinquency than, if they are found wanting in a kind of courage that is not needed by their calling. ”