“They   are   to   be   gentlemen,   unsullied   by   trade   and   the   menial   labours   of   agriculture   and craftsmanship:    and    they    are    to    follow    the    gentleman's    calling    of    public    service    in    the administration   and   the   army.   Whereas   the   civilian,   with   his   vulgar   interests   in   his   craft,   in money-making   and   in   family-life,   is   a   natural   subject,   the   ruler,   conscious   of   the   the   social responsibility which higher intellectual and moral capacities bring is a natural gentleman.”

 William Penn  1644 – 1718 ‘Some Fruits of Solitude’ - (On Education) 

We   are   in   pain   to   make   them   scholars   but   not   men!   To   talk,   rather   than   know,   which   is   true canting.The   first   thing   obvious   to   children,   is   what   is   sensible;   and   that   we   make   no   part   of their   rudiments.We   press   their   memory   too   soon,   and   puzzle,   strain   and   load   them   with words   and   rules,   to   know   grammar   and   rhetorick,   and   a   strange   toungue   or   two,   that   it   is   ten to   one   may   never   be   useful   to   them,   leaving   their   natural   genius   to   mechanical   and   physical or   natural   knowledge   uncultivated   and   neglected;   which   would   be   of   exceeding   use   and pleasure   to   them   through   the   whole   course   of   their   life.   To   be   sure,   languages   are   not   to   be despised   or   neglected.   But   things   are   still   to   be   preferred.Children   had   rather   be   making   of tools,   and   instruments   of   play,   shaping,   drawing,   framing,   building   etc;   than   getting   some rules   of   propriety   of   speech   by   heart;   and   those   also   would   follow   with   more   judgement,   and less trouble and time.