Ruskin's mother had made up her mind to "devote him to God," or, in other words, to educate him for the ministry, and to that end her discipline was somewhat strict; but, as he says, "entirely right, for a child of my temperament.” He was early taught the inestimable lesson of taking care of himself and of not being troublesome; "and," as he says, "being always summarily whipped if I cried, did not do as I was bid, or tumbled on the stairs, I soon attained serene and secure methods of life and motion."

With a view to the lad's future eminence as a clergyman, he was taken regularly to church, where he tells us, "I found the bottom of the pew so extremely dull a place to keep quiet in (my best story-books being also taken away from me in the morning), that the horror of Sunday used even to cast its prescient gloom as far back in the week as Friday; and all the glory of Monday, with church seven days removed again, was no equivalent for it."

In the course of a few years the dismal house in town was given up, and a cheerful one with a garden taken on Herne Hill, just outside the city's roar and smoke. "The differences of primal importance," says Ruskin, “which I observed between the nature of this garden, and that of Eden, as I had imagined it, were, that, in this one, all the fruit was forbidden; and there were no companionable beasts; in other respects, the little domain answered every purpose of Paradise to me; and the climate, in that cycle of our years, allowed me to pass most of my life in it. My mother never gave me more to learn than she knew I could easily get learnt, if I set myself honestly to work, by twelve o'clock. She never allowed anything to disturb me when my task was set; if it was not said rightly by twelve o'clock, I was kept in till I knew it, and in general, even when Latin

grammar came to supplement the Psalms, I was my own master for at least an hour before half-past one dinner, and for the rest of the afternoon."

Ruskin's father always returned punctually from his business at half-past four and spent the evening reading aloud, the boy sitting in a little recess like an "idol in a niche," and listening if he chose. Speaking of these readings, he says, "The series of the Waverley novels, then drawing towards its close, was still the chief source of delight in all households caring for literature; and I can no more recollect the time when I did not know them than when I did not know the Bible." Later, "I heard all the Shakespeare comedies and historical plays again and again . . . and all Don Quixote." "Such being the salutary pleasures of Herne Hill, I have next with deeper gratitude to chronicle what I owed to my mother for the resolutely consistent lessons which so exercised me in the Scripture as to make every word of them familiar to my ear in habitual music, yet in that familiarity reverenced, as transcending all thought, and ordaining all conduct."

"This she effected, not by her own sayings or personal authority, but simply by compelling me to read the book through for myself. As soon as I was able to read with fluency, she began a course of Bible work with me, which never ceased till I went to Oxford. She read alternate verses with me, watching, at first, every intonation of my voice, and correcting the false ones, till she made me understand the verse, if within my reach, rightly and energetically. It might be beyond me altogether; that she did not care about; but she made sure that as soon as I got hold of it all, I should get hold of it by the right end."

"In this way she began with the first verse of Genesis, and went straight through to the last verse of the Apocalypse1; hard names, numbers, Levitical law, and all; and began again at Genesis the next day. If a name was hard, the better the exercise in pronunciation, —if a chapter was tiresome, the better lesson in patience, if loathsome, the better lesson in faith that there was some use in its being so outspoken." "It is strange that of all the pieces of the Bible which my mother thus taught me, that which cost me most to learn, and that which was to my child's mind chiefly repulsive, - the 119th Psalm,2- has now be come of all the most precious to me, in its overflowing and glorious passion of love for the Law of God, in opposition to the abuse of it by modern preachers of what they imagine to be His gospel."

"And truly, though I have picked up the elements of a little further knowledge, in mathematics, meteorology, and the like, in after life, and owe not a little to the teaching of many people, this maternal installation of my mind in this property of chapters, I count very confidently the most precious, and, on the whole, the one essential part of all my education."

"And for best and truest beginning of all blessings, I had been taught the perfect meaning of Peace, in thought, act, and word."

"I never had heard my father's or mother's voice once raised in any question with each other; nor seen an angry, or even slightly hurt or offended, glance, in the eye of either. I had never heard a servant scolded; nor even

1 Apocalypse: Revelation.

2 Beginning "Blessed are the undefiled in the way, who walk in the law of the Lord."

suddenly, passionately, or in any severe manner blamed. I had never seen a moment's trouble or disorder in any household matter; nor anything whatever either done in a hurry, or undone 1 in due time." "I had never done any wrong that I knew of — beyond occasionally delaying the commitment to heart of some improving sentence, that I might watch a wasp on the window pane, or a bird in the cherry-tree; and I had never seen any grief."

"Next to this quite priceless gift of Peace, I had received the perfect understanding of the nature of Obedience and Faith. I obeyed word, or lifted finger, of father or mother, simply as a ship her helm; not only without idea of resistance, but receiving the direction as a part of my own life and force." "And my practice in Faith was soon complete: nothing was ever promised me that was not given, nothing ever threatened me that was not inflicted, and nothing ever told me that was not true."

"Peace, obedience, faith; these three for chief good; next to these, the habit of fixed attention with both eyes and mind—on which I will not further enlarge at this moment, this being the main practical faculty of my life, causing Mazzini2 to say of me in conversation authentically reported, a year or two before his death, that I had 'the most analytic mind in Europe.' An opinion in which, so far as I am acquainted with Europe, I am myself entirely disposed to concur."

If such a training had great advantages, it also had its under side of detriment. Ruskin speaks frankly of the evil, and says at the close: "My judgment of right and

1 Undone here, in sense of not done.

2 Mazzini (Mat-see' nee): a distinguished Italian patriot and writer; he died in 1872.

wrong, and powers of independent action, were left entirely undeveloped; because the bridle and blinkers were never taken off me. Children should have their times of being off duty, like soldiers." "But the ceaseless authority exercised over my youth left me, when cast out at last into the world, unable for some time to do more than drift with its vortices.1" Meantime, while this home education was going on, Ruskin was getting the ideas which are awakened by travel. Every summer his father took a long vacation, or, more strictly speaking, a tour for orders, through half the English counties, and perhaps a visit to Scotland, the native land of the Ruskin family. This journey, which occupied a couple of months, was made either in a hired post-chaise and pair, or in a comfortable, old-fashioned chariot which Mr. Ruskin borrowed from his business partner.

"This mode of journeying was as fixed as that of our home life. We went from forty to fifty miles a day, starting always early enough in the morning to arrive comfortably to four-o'clock dinner. Generally, therefore, getting off at six o'clock, a stage or two was done before breakfast, with the dew on the grass, and first scent from the hawthorns; if in the course of the midday drive there were any gentleman's house to be seen, or, better still, a lord's or, best of all, a duke's, my father baited the horses, and took my mother and me reverently through the state rooms; always speaking a little under our breath to the housekeeper, major domo,2 or other authority in charge; and gleaning worshipfully what fragmentary illustrations of the history and domestic ways of the family might fall from their lips."

1 Vortices: eddies. 2 Major domo: steward or general manager.