Page:Tom Brown's School Days (6th ed).djvu/53



S that venerable and learned poet (whose voluminous works we all think it the correct thing to admire and talk about, but don't read often) most truly says, "the child is father to the man"; a fortiori, therefore, he must be father to the boy. So, as we are going, at any rate, to see Tom Brown through his boyhood, supposing we never get any further (which, if you show a proper sense of the value of this history, there is no knowing but what we may), let us have a look at the life and