PREFACE. In the following pages I have endeavoured to give an outline of what I consider most essential in the character, studies, habits, and duties of a teacher, and to present some of the most important methods and rules of teaching and governing. In doing this, I have made free use of what I found written upon the subject, my object being not so much to write an original treatise, as to collect what would be most valuable to the teacher of a common school. The writers to whom I am most indebted are J. Abbott, T. H. Palmer, and S. R. Hall, from "The Teacher," and "The Teacher's Manual," of the two former of whom I have, with their consent, made large quotations, and should have made still larger if I had not known that these works were in the hands of many persons interested in education, as they ought to be in all. Important suggestions have also been received from Lalor, Colburn, and others. The great number of subjects of which it was necessary to treat, in a limited space, has prevented my going fully into any of them. This is particularly the case with the chapter on the Cultivation of the Faculties, which is little more than an indication of what should be done. General principles only are commonly given; and if repetition be sometimes observed, let it be understood that certain points |