Section 4
How One Ought To Bring Up And Instruct Youth In Good Manners And Christian Discipline; A Few Short Precepts, By Ulrich Zwingli
Grace And Peace From God And Our Lord Jesus Christ Be Unto The Honorable and Discreet Youth, Gerald Meyer, by Ulrich Zwingli.
As you have just returned from the bath and as everyone else has received you with gladness, some presenting you with one gift and others with another, I thought it would be unkind and even rude on my part, my dear Gerald, were I not also to receive you with a present provided for you. I feel all the more pressed to do this, because it is the general custom among good friends thus to honor those returning from health resorts or even before they return.
I have a twofold reason for counting you among my dear friends. You earnestly devote yourself to art and learning, and I hope not without good results. You also strive diligently after learning in the ranks of the young heroes, in the school of our Glarean, the learned and well-informed instructor and master.
In thinking much, for a long time, about what would be most agreeable to you, I have come to the conclusion that the present, in order to please you, should be of a sacred character or of the character of the liberal arts, or it should partake of the nature of both. As you are inclined to godliness and virtue, you also manifest, at an early age, the agreeable fruits of good citizenship and nobleness of character. Though I diligently sought to give you something pertaining to the arts but failed to succeed, I thought it not without value to you and perhaps I might render you a lasting service, if I were to instruct you in certain things pertaining not only to the health of the body but also to the good of the soul. Remembering that I had planned, some time ago, to write a little book on the manner of instructing and training youth, and that I was prevented from carrying out what I had in mind, by many untoward circumstances, as you can now see, it occurred to me, in thinking about a present for you, that my former intention should now be carried out.
Although I see some who are exceedingly careful to place a perfect work of art into the hands of one really worthy of it, I find myself defeated at this point; for the one to whom I desire to dedicate such a work is already present, and I have not the leisure of an artist, nor the nine years of time afterwards to store up the masterpiece [Horace De Arte Poetica, V., 386 et seq.]. Being now in a dilemma, since, on the one hand, I ought to make you a present, and on the other, I have no time to prepare anything without haste and according to the custom, I have found a way, as I believe, that will satisfy both of us on this occasion. I have robbed my occupation of so much time as to collect hastily, certain instructions; but they will be brief and carefully considered, lest you should become weary of reading to the end. As a rule, when little of a good thing is given, more is wanted.
What I teach you here, I hope you will not judge from its style; but I trust that you will appreciate it, on account of its significance and because it comes from the heart. He who is not godless may promise to [write about] holy things [in so short a time], but the most learned man would be ashamed to promise a finished work.
My subject will be treated under three heads: Part first tells how the delicate mind of youth should be nurtured and instructed in the things pertaining to God; part second instructs the youth in the things pertaining to himself; and part third shows how a youth should act towards other persons.
In this undertaking I do not have in view the instruction of infants, nor the manner in which pupils should be taught, when they begin to go to school; but the instruction and conduct of those who have arrived at an age in which they are clever and intelligent and, as men say, are able to swim without dry bark.
I regard you as now having arrived at this age. It is to be hoped that you will read these thoughts attentively and frequently, and that you will conform your life to them, in order that other youths may learn of you as a living example. May God work out these things in your heart. Amen.
Given at Zurich, on the first day of August, in the year 1523.