Laudator Temporis Acti

James Hurnard (1808-1881), A Memoir, Chiefly Autobiographical, with Selections from His Poems. Edited by His Widow (London: Samuel Harris & Co., 1883), p. 22:

Contrary to what would be the general opinion of my fellow-men, and what might suit some characters, I esteem it an advantage to me that circumstances prevented me from going again to school. If I had continued there, I should, probably, by tedious industry, have become technically correct in the usual branches of education, and then have been driven forward into the unfathomable bog of Latin and Greek, where my spirit would have been worn out, and where, eventually, I should have foundered. As it was, the world became my school, and in this school I selected my own teachers and my own studies. I might lose in point of rudimental accuracy, but acquired larger views, sounder opinions, and freer processes of thought, and my knowledge was less reflected from books than radiated from actual life.

In his poem The Setting Sun, 3rd ed. (London: Saml. Harris & Co., 1878), pp. 310-311, Hurnard tells how he was brought up reading the works of Quakers such as John Roberts (1623-1684), George Fox (1624-1681), Thomas Elwood (1639–1714), William Penn (1644-1718), Thomas Story (1670–1742), John Woolman (1720-1772), and Job Scott (1751-1793). He continues (p. 311):

What infinitely better pabulum
For youthful minds than heathen Greek and Latin
And knowledge unavailable in life!