In order to overcome the resistance which his corrupt heart and perverse will might therefore be expected to offer to the authority and influence of his teachers, a scheme of rewards and punishments has had to be devised for his benefit.

As there is no better nature for the scheme to appeal to, an appeal has had to be made to fears and hopes which are avowedly base.

The refractory child has had to be threatened with corporal punishment in the form of an eternity of torment in Hell.

And he has had to be bribed by the offer of prizes, the chief of which is an eternity of selfish enjoyment in Heaven,--enjoyment so selfish that it will consist with, and even (it is said) be heightened by, the knowledge that in the Final Examination the failures have been many and the prize-winners few.
And as, under this system of education, obedience is the first and last of virtues, so self-will--in the sense of daring to think and act for oneself--is the first and last of offences.

It is for the sin of spiritual initiative--the sin of trying to work out one's own salvation by the exercise of reason, conscience, imagination, aspiration, and other spiritual faculties--that the direst penalties are reserved.