“Manners makyth man” is not the quaint slogan of a historic dinner-dance club. It is the motto of Winchester College, one of the oldest and still one of the very best Church schools in the world. Bishop William of Wykeham (1320-1404), the honored founder of Winchester in 1382, understood that the end or first purpose of education is nothing less and nothing more than the formation of Virtue. He thus prescribed the motto to remind his 70 young scholars that we human beings do what we are and we are what we do. The concept is pure Aristotle. Like his mentor Plato, Aristotle realized that Virtue—again with the capital “V”—cannot be taught directly, as if the acquisition of Virtue is merely a matter of getting some sort of rational knowledge under our belt, for example geometry or geography. But Virtue is by all means real. Those the ancients called the “great souls” possessed it. It may come to some men and women from a mysterious source, but it is and must always be the most coveted target for which we aim.
In dialogues such as the Meno and Protagoras, Plato’s Socrates does not want us to take Virtue to be what the Sophists assume it is—being good at something, hence our word virtuoso—but a great and wonderful gift emanating from the transcendental realm of the good, the true, the beautiful, and the one. If the Sophists taught that Virtue (with the capital “V”) is skill or proficiency in a single art, so that to master math or public oratory makes one a person of “Virtue,” Socrates strongly disagrees and teaches a higher doctrine: that Virtue is skill and proficiency at being human as such.
If Plato’s Socrates and Plato’s Aristotle never let go of the doctrine that Virtue is general human excellence “bestowed” somehow from above and is somewhat rare, they refused to let their pupils become relaxed in the proper quest of life. All must make the practice of the virtues (with a small “v”) their daily objective in the hope that coveted Virtue might come down and habituate with each of them (see that two-volume work of Aristotle known as the Ethics and Politics).
Just as Virtue seems to “hover” mysteriously round the person keen to be just, or to be prudent, or to be temperate, or to be brave; just as one is using the reason against the passions in order to determine the mean between two extremes (e.g., pleasure versus pain), so the best educators have assumed that Virtue is “in the air” of a community sincerely dedicated to seeking it. The faith in these scholastic communities is that Virtue will “rub off” on the members who make Virtue their top priority. If I am in this fellowship encouraged to merely act just or prudent; if I dare to be brave or self-denying, then this willed outward intention might become an inward habit and I will be on the path—the best path—to Virtue. Perhaps the concept is analogous to the idea that the better prepared tend to have more “good luck” than others.
In any case, William of Wykeham was well-taught. We do what we are. We are what we do. Manners makyth man. From this high basecamp we can look upward to the summit: Christ Jesus, Who is our Virtue. And here we can see the radical importance of the school community: It is the “Body scholastic” wherein incorporation into Christ happens each day by God’s grace.
Professor David Hein cares about this subject. A longtime teacher in colleges and schools, Hein employes his considerable learning, scholarship, and wisdom to good effect in the just-published Teaching the Virtues (Mecosta House). Hein has written much about Virtue already, especially as manifest in such diverse figures as Rose Macaulay, C.S. Lewis, Austin Farrer, Simon Weil, Samuel Johnson, George Washington, Evelyn Underhill, Archbishop Geoffrey Fisher, Ford Madox Ford, and Steven Pinker. It seems clear here, though, that his experiences as a college professor and school man of much hands-on experience have born good fruit in this very practical little book.
The book is divided into two parts of four chapters each. The eight chapters together are a kind of discursive handbook for teachers, parents, chaplains, administrators, and trustees, but anyone who reads the book will be grateful for the experience.
In Part II of his book, Hein considers the virtues in more detail: faith, hope, love, prudence, justice, courage, and temperance. Other important virtues such as gratitude, stability, and patience are also discussed. The author gives us “Exemplars” as named above to put meat on the bones. The section on Hannah More (1745-1833) is an original and first-class introduction to a Christian intellectual and literary artist who was monumentally important on both sides of the Atlantic in her time and afterward. Hein bravely mentions John Dewey (1859-1952), whose name is mud in certain quarters (in part because E.D. Hirsch demonized him in the 1980s) but who helped educators understand that the school community is itself educative and that we must see students as active and not passive. “Confront them with a problem,” writes Hein, “and stimulate their interest in the questions involved, and guide them in their reflections” (33).
Toward the end of the book, Hein’s reflections on George C. Marshall (1880-1959) are not only fresh but also serve his purpose in Teaching the Virtues. Many will think of Marshall’s instrumental role in the military victory in Europe and his work as the principal architect of the European Recovery Program, or “Marshall Plan.” In a few short paragraphs, though, Hein demonstrates the rarity of Marshall as a statesman. With a spirituality deeply shaped by the Book of Common Prayer, General Marshall is the perfect exemplar for Hein: piety, which is closely allied with respect and is “reverence toward God, country, and kinsmen,” were Marshall’s best qualities. “His soundly constructed piety ordered his soul, oriented his virtues, and contributed to the common good” (175).
There are choice, adage-like sentences throughout Hein’s discussions, such as, “Men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters” (94). Other keepers include: “True learning is not au fond utilitarian. Rather, it begins with an attitude that is more like thankfulness for a gift than a seeking after rewards” (40). “Attempting to see with others’ eyes lies at the heart of the ethical life; it is a work of the moral imagination” (42). “Prudence is assessing, balancing, prioritizing ethical norms in relation to practical considerations in a particular situation” (90). “The path to moral truth most often runs through narrative than through theory” (100). As Hein ponders various themes in the movie Ride the High Country, we can see that “morality has an objective grounding apart from individual preferences” (145). The wise woman or man will know that “faith trusts—and faith doubts” (160). Hein prizes Sir Roger Scruton’s last journal entry before his death to cancer in early 2020. “Coming close to death you begin to know what life means, and what it means is gratitude” (96).
The chapter “Writing as a Moral Act” is a tour de force, one replete with practical wisdom and insight. If the great spiritual guide Evelyn Underhill insisted that “unselfing the self” is crucial to maturity, Hein notes that “attempting [in one’s writing] to perceive with others’ eyes” is utterly necessary if difficult. “Scorning self-discipline leaves a person not freer but weaker” (49). Grade inflation and easygoing grading of students’ writing is bad for them and ruinous to society. “Surely in these cases equity is not justice” (50). Hein sees the sacred importance of good teaching and honest grading of a student’s work. Here is a teacher who recognizes what it takes to help students learn how to think and how to be good.
I found the most engrossing pages of this book in Part II. Here Professor Hein offers us very thoughtful and immediately useful reflections on virtuous individuals such as George Washington, Booker T. Washington, Simone Weil, and others. Hein ably reflects on the characters and themes of very teachable great books such as Robert Penn Warren’s All the King’s Men (1946), classic films such as Ride the High Country (1962), and Arthur Koestler’s novel made into a stage play, Darkness at Noon (1940, 1953). From these exemplary moral tales, Hein deftly gleans lessons in integrity, loyalty, and faith. In his treatment of Koestler’s Darkness, Hein hints at a lesson for our time. He writes that the difference between Soviet totalitarianism and present-day left ideology is one of degree and not so much of kind. In this ideology, ends justify means. Good citizens must put faith in either an unreality called “the future” or the doctrine that, if we just have the will to rearrange everything, including human life, we can have heaven on earth. Tradition, history, the past, old wisdom, are despised. The experts in control manage the definitions of “the future,” “heaven,” and everything else, and mass media is the all too perfect means to this end. The individual person is discarded as a mere bourgeois category. The truth is what the smart set says.
Bishop Joseph Butler (1692-1752), who is known for both his intellectual brilliance and his holiness, insisted that “if no care be taken to habituate children to the religious habit of mind and to moral behavior, they will grow up in a direct contrary behavior and be hardened in direct contrary habits” (Sermon IV, Six Sermons Preached Upon Public Occasions, 1729). We have been watching the negative side of Butler’s prediction for two generations at least. “Liberation” is a good thing until it becomes totally secular. Can “self-fulfillment” be the goal of a Christian? Is “self-realization” the target for which we must aim? At a time when our young are pressured to grow into nothing but consumers and info-sphere automatons, we need to question the ways and means of every institution in the land. Hein provides light on this subject.
Teaching the Virtues is obviously a labor of love, is exceptionally written, and should be read widely. Because of his previous work on these topics, Hein achieves profundity in only 198 pages. A real triumph is the way this practical book presents good theory and best practice interchangeably without overdoing either. How children and adolescents grow up; how they become good and wise and not just learned or skilled; how they acquire the knowledge that makes them good and useful citizens; and how godliness and good learning can actually grow side by side—these subjects are Hein’s passion.
Fortunately, a new generation of parents—millions of them (literally)—want to reestablish the proper purpose of education, which is the acquisition of Virtue in the fullest Christian sense of the word. For American parents and educators who refuse to be secularized and, indeed, will not be tranquilized by the great social, economic, and cultural forces of our time, Professor David Hein offers an economical treatise that is fulsome in its common sense and saturated with moral beauty.
The Rev. W.L. (Chip) Prehn, PhD, is president of The Living Church Foundation and is a principal of Dudley & Prehn Educational Consultants. He was a parish priest for 12 years before turning to school administration and consulting. Prehn writes poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and history.
