He called his servant and told him to ring the boys into school.  Then, turning to my father he said, “Stand here, sir, by the window; you will see them all come trooping in.  H’m, h’m, I am sorry to see them still come back as soon as they hear the bell.  I suppose I shall ding some recalcitrancy into them some day, but it is uphill work.  Do you see the head-boy—­the third of those that are coming up the path?  I shall have to get rid of him.  Do you see him? he is going back to whip up the laggers—­and now he has boxed a boy’s ears:  that boy is one of the most hopeful under my care.  I feel sure he has been using improper language, and my head-boy has checked him instead of encouraging him.”  And so on till the boys were all in school.

“You see, my dear sir,” he said to my father, “we are in an impossible position.  We have to obey instructions from the Grand Council of Education at Bridgeford, and they have established these institutions in consequence of the Sunchild’s having said that we should aim at promoting the greatest happiness of the greatest number.  This, no doubt, is a sound principle, and the greatest number are by nature somewhat dull, conceited, and unscrupulous.  They do not like those who are quick, unassuming, and sincere; how, then, consistently with the first principles either of morality or political economy as revealed to us by the Sunchild, can we encourage such people if we can bring sincerity and modesty fairly home to them?  We cannot do so.  And we must correct the young as far as possible from forming habits which, unless indulged in with the greatest moderation, are sure to ruin them.

“I cannot pretend to consider myself very successful.  I do my best, but I can only aim at making my school a reflection of the outside world.  In the outside world we have to tolerate much that is prejudicial to the greatest happiness of the greatest number, partly because we cannot always discover in time who may be let alone as being genuinely insincere, and who are in reality masking sincerity under a garb of flippancy, and partly also because we wish to err on the side of letting the guilty escape, rather than of punishing the innocent.  Thus many people who are perfectly well known to belong to the straightforward classes are allowed to remain at large, and may be even seen hobnobbing with the guardians of public immorality.  Indeed it is not in the public interest that straightforwardness should be extirpated root and branch, for the presence of a small modicum of sincerity acts as a wholesome irritant to the academicism of the greatest number, stimulating it to consciousness of its own happy state, and giving it something to look down upon.  Moreover, we hold it useful to have a certain number of melancholy examples, whose notorious failure shall serve as a warning to those who neglect cultivating that power of immoral self-control which shall prevent them from saying, or even thinking, anything that shall not immediately and palpably minister to the happiness, and hence meet the approval, of the greatest number.”