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collected in one form ; that they contain a rich store of examples for imitation , of precepts for practice , and of Amusement for the social or the solitary hour ; and exhibit , moreover , an extensive reading and industrious research steadily directed to the highest object—that of promoting the moral , intellectual and religious improvement of the rising generation .
Of the high tone of moral and religious Sentiment uniformly inculcated in what Mr . Butler prepared for young persons , an idea may be formed from the following sentence , which is taken from an admirably written preface to one of the works just mentioned : " In the mean time , without undertaking a formal
defence of every question in this collection , " ( his Arithmetical Questions , ) " I am encouraged to hope that the candid and serious part of the public will approve of a design ( how imperfectly soever it may have been executed ) which has for its object to facilitate the path of science ; to allure the learner to mental exertion :
to impress an early veneration and love for civil and religious liberty ; to exhibit the beauty of virtue and the fatal consequences of vice and profligacy ; to hold up to the admiration of the rising age characters eminent for patriotism , benevolence and general philanthropy ; and to their detestation and abhorrence those of
despots , tyrants and persecutors ; to inculcate rational and manly ideas of Government ; and to enforce just notions concerning the inferior orders of society . " These noble ideas were always kept in view by Mr . Butler . His works are
indeed elementary , but they are avenues that conduct to knowledge , and by the aid of which individuals , remembering that in their useful studies " such things were , and were most precious to them , " may be tempted to explore its inward
recesses . As a practical teacher , Mr . Butler had few superiors . It was his favourite opinion , that splendid talents are neither necessary nor even desirable in an instructor . The faculty of calling forth , and afterwards condensing , the learner ' s
attention ; of raising a confidence in the master ' s qualifications—vigilance , method aud regularity ; and an intimate acquaintance with the wants of children ; were , in his estimation , the leading requisites of a good teacher . In all these he was admirably qualified . With what energy he endeavoured to communicate his own
zeal to the learner ; to fix the wandering thought , and prevent knowledge * from being " poured into the heedless ^ ar ;" to animate the slothful , and give' new vigour to the active ; will be long remembered by those who received or witnessed
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his instructions . He was " all eye , all efari' nor will they forget the many incidental remarks , not only intellectual , but moral , which were made by him during the hours of tuition , and which , by connecting present experience with past
years , may have become the inspiring rule of after life . A lesson given by the revered subject of this memoir , was a lesson both of wisdom and of virtue . Among the benefits resulting from Mr . Butler's plan of ingrafting so much general knowledge on his particular line of instruction , was that of its enabling him
to avail himself of those ^ reat political events and discoveries in science which have for the last thirty years riveted public attention . They were rendered subservient to geographical acquisitions : he was accustomed to say , that great generals , such as Buonaparte then was in the height of his military glory , were
among the best practical teachers of geography ; for by their locomotive powers , and their rapid and extensive projects , they compelled the public to trace places , rivers and districts , which , but for the light thrown on them by their progress , would perhaps have remained in obscurity . On all the passing events of the day , by which the interests of mankind
were in a greater or less degree affected , Mr . Butler kept a vigilant eye , for the purpose Of impressing them into his service as a teacher . If a battle was fought , and a hero died while sustaining the glories of his country ; if a planet Was discovered by a philosopher at Palermo or Bremen ;—the pupil was immediately directed to search in an Atlas for the
place thus rendered memorable * Such an opportunity of increasing to day ' s stock of knowledge was hot deferred until to-morrow—a morrow which , like that designed by Lady Macbeth for Duncan , might " never be ' It may , perhaps , be thought that too
high an importance has been assigned to Mr . Butler ' s labours . Let * however , the multiplicity of his engagements , and the lengthened * period to which they were protracted , be considered ; let it be remembered , likewise , that his efforts were directed to thi * t £ ex upon whose conduct much of the character and welfare of
society at large depend—that the early germ of existence is intrusted to the mother ' s care , and that it- is ' skill and diligence , or ignorance and neglect , which determine whether it shall wither or
produce fruit ;—and the ? true * Value of the useful and honourable exertions now commemorated will be duly acknowledged . " A race of virtuous and moral mothers , " says a learned prelate , " wiH produce a race of virtuous and moral
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572 Obituary . —Mr . William Butler .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1822, page 572, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2516/page/52/
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