The art of exercising the faculty of thinking, and reflecting upon every object that is seen, ought to constitute a material branch of a good education . . .
CECILIA: How comes it, Sophia, that I am so often idle, and my thoughts wander from what I am about, when I really intend to be good?
SOPHIA: You are very young, my dear, and mamma says that the habit of attention is difficult to form; but that by steadily endeavoring to fix our thoughts on one object we shall every day find it more easy . . .
– Priscilla Wakefield (1799)