I had seen enough of the world and of him to have observed
this, but it was impossible, or I thought it had been impossible,
for me to have helped him.
Whether I ought to have tried to help him or not I do not know,
but I am sure that the young of all animals often do want help upon
matters about which anyone would say a priori that there should be
no difficulty. One would think that a young seal would want no
teaching how to swim, nor yet a bird to fly, but in practice a young
seal drowns if put out of its depth before its parents have taught
it to swim; and so again, even the young hawk must be taught to fly
before it can do so.
I grant that the tendency of the times is to exaggerate the good
which teaching can do, but in trying to teach too much, in most
matters, we have neglected others in respect of which a little
sensible teaching would do no harm.
I know it is the fashion to say that young people must find out
things for themselves, and so they probably would if they had fair
play to the extent of not having obstacles put in their way. But
they seldom have fair play; as a general rule they meet with foul
play, and foul play from those who live by selling them stones made
into a great variety of shapes and sizes so as to form a tolerable
imitation of bread.
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