The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green | Page 7

were objects of perfect indifference to her.
So, after luncheon, Mr. Green and the rector paced up and down the long-walk, and talked the matter over. The burden of Mr. Green's discourse was this: "You see, sir, I don't intend my boy to go into the Church, like yours; but, when anything happens to me, he'll come into the estate, and have to settle down as the squire of the parish. So I don't exactly see what would be the use of sending him to a university, where, I dare say, he'd spend a good deal of money - not that I should grudge that, though; - and perhaps not be quite such a good lad as he's always been to me, sir. And, by George! (I beg your pardon,) I think his mother would break her heart to lose him; and I don't know what we should do without him, as he's never been away from us a day, and his sisters would miss him. And he's not a lad, like your Charley, that could fight his way in the world, and I don't think he'd be altogether happy. And as he's not got to depend upon his talents for his bread and cheese, the knowledge he's got at home, and from you, sir, seems to me quite enough to carry him through life. So, altogether, I think Verdant will do very well as he is, and perhaps we'd better say no more about the matriculation."
But the rector ~would~ say more; and he expressed his mind thus: "It is not so much from what Verdant would learn in Latin and Greek, and such things as make up a part of the education, that I advise your sending him to a university;
[16 ADVENTURES OF MR. VERDANT GREEN]
but more from what he would gain by mixing with a large body of young men of his own age, who represent the best classes of a mixed society, and who may justly be taken as fair samples of its feelings and talents. It is formation of character that I regard as one of the greatest of the many great ends of a university system; and if for this reason alone, I should advise you to send your future country squire to college. Where else will he be able to meet with so great a number of those of his own class, with whom he will have to mix in the after changes of life, and for whose feelings and tone a college-course will give him the proper key-note? Where else can he learn so quickly in three years - what other men will perhaps be striving for through life, without attaining - that self-reliance which will enable him to mix at ease in any society, and to feel the equal of its members? And, besides all this - and each of these points in the education of a young man is, to my mind, a strong one - where else could he be more completely 'under tutors and governors,' and more thoroughly under ~surveillance~, than in a place where college-laws are no respecters of persons, and seek to keep the wild blood of youth within its due bounds? There is something in the very atmosphere of a university that seems to engender refined thoughts and noble feelings; and lamentable indeed must be the state of any young man who can pass through the three years of his college residence, and bring away no higher aims, no worthier purposes, no better thoughts, from all the holy associations which have been crowded around him. Such advantages as these are not to be regarded with indifference; and though they come in secondary ways, and possess the mind almost imperceptibly, yet they are of primary importance in the formation of character, and may mould it into the more perfect man. And as long as I had the power, I would no more think of depriving a child of mine of such good means towards a good end, than I would of keeping him from any thing else that was likely to improve his mind or affect his heart."
Mr. Larkyns put matters in a new light; and Mr. Green began to think that a university career might be looked at from more than one point of view. But as old prejudices are not so easily overthrown as the lath-and-plaster erection of mere newly-formed opinion, Mr. Green was not yet won over by Mr. Larkyns' arguments. "There was my father," he said, "who was one of the worthiest and kindest men living; and I believe he never went to college, nor did he think it necessary that I should go; and I trust I'm no worse a man than my father."
"Ah! Green," replied the rector; "the old argument! But you