SECTION I.-Requisites in the Teacher for Government 148 THEORY AND PRACTICE OF TEACHING. CHAPTER I. SPIRIT OF THE TEACHER. PERHAPS the very first question that the honest individual will ask himself, as he proposes to assume the teacher's office, or to enter upon a preparation for it, will be—“ What manner of spirit am I of?" No question can be more important. I would by no means under value that degree of natural talent-of mental power, which all justly consider so desirable in the candidate. for the teacher's office. But the true spirit of the teacher, a spirit that seeks not alone pecuniary emolument, but desires to be in the highest degree useful to those who are to be taught; a spirit that elevates above every thing else the nature and capabilities of the human soul, and that trembles under the responsibility of attempting to be its educator; a spirit that looks upon gold as the contemptible dross of earth, when compared with that imperishable gem which is to be polished and brought out into heaven's light to shine forever; a spirit that scorns all the rewards of True spirit.-Motives often wrong. earth, and seeks that highest of all rewards, an ap proving conscience and an approving God; a spirit that earnestly inquires what is right, and that dreads to do what is wrong; a spirit that can recognise and reverence the handiwork of God in every child, and that burns with the desire to be instrumental in train ing it to the highest attainment of which it is capable, -such a spirit is the first thing to be sought by the teacher, and without it the highest talent cannot make him truly excellent in his profession. The candidate for the office of the teacher should look well to his motives. It is easy to enter upon the duties of the teacher without preparation; it is easy to do it without that lofty purpose which an enlightened conscience would ever demand; but it is not so easy to undo the mischief which a single mistake may produce in the mind of the child, at that tender period when mistakes are most likely to be made. Too many teachers are found in our schools without the spirit for their work which is here insisted on. They not only have not given attention to any preparation for their work, but resort to it from motives of personal convenience, and in many instances from a consciousness of being unfit for every thing else! In other professions this is not so. The lawyer is not admitted to the bar till he has pursued a course of thorough preparation, and even then but warily employed. The physician goes through his course of reading and his course of lecture, and often almost through a course of starvation in the country village where he first puts |