that have treated of this very particular touching the
Education of Children, as it relates either to Domestick or
Civill government; but we shall take it for granted without
more adoe, supposing none will deny of what effect it is in
all the concernments of mankinde, either in Conversation or
Action.
The necessity of this Point appears from hence, as well as
the Reason: That if care be not taken to temper the young
Frie of a Commonweal with Principles and Humors suitable
to that Form, no sure settlement or Peace can ever bee expected;
for Schools, Academies, with all other Seed plots or
Seminaries of Youth, will otherwise bee but so many Nurseries
of Rebellion, publick Enemies, and unnatural Monsters,
that will tear the Bowels of their Mother Countrey: And
this neglect, if it follow an alteration of Government, after a
Civill War, is so much the more dangerous, because as long as
Youngsters are muzled up in the old wayes and Rudiments,
and by the old ill-affected Pedagogues, there will ever bee a
hankering after the old Government; which must ever be in a,
fair probability of Return, when new Generations shall be
catechized into old Tenets and Affections, contrary to the
present establishment. Therefore the consequence of such a
neglect is clearly this, that the enmity will be immortall, a
settlement impossible; there must be a perpetuall disposition
to Civil war in stead of Civil society.
I remember a discourse of a very subtile Polititian, very
pertinent to our purpose, who shewing of what force education
is in respect of Government, compares such as have
been educated under a Monarchy, to those beasts which have
been caged, or coop't up all their lives in a Den, where they
seem to live in as much pleasure as other beasts that are abroad:
And if they happen to be let loose, yet they will return
in again, because they know not how to use their Liberty:
So strong an impression is made likewise by education
and custome from the Cradle, even upon men that are
indued with reasonable souls, that they chuse to live
in places and forms of Government under which they have